One answer may be found in a story from Plato. Its depiction of a Thracian servant girl mocking a philosopher gives one possible definition--the philosopher as "a laughing stock, an absent-minded buffoon," as Critchley writes. But then he notices, too, that Plato distinguishes between the philosopher and the lawyer, or "pettifogger." For instance:
The pettifogger, the jury, and by implication the whole society, live with the constant pressure of time. The water of time’s flow is constantly threatening to drown them.
By contrast, we might say, the philosopher is the person who has time or who takes time ... Pushing this a little further, we might say that to philosophize is to take your time, even when you have no time, when time is constantly pressing at your back.
This freedom from time and convention may make philosophers something else, however: enemies of the state. As Critchley reminds readers, Socrates was sentenced to death, suggesting that philosophy should include a health warning like "one finds on packs of European
cigarettes: PHILOSOPHY KILLS."
Critchley leaves off inconclusively, reflecting on these conflicted definitions of philosophers: "Nurtured in freedom and taking
their time, there is something
dreadfully uncanny about the philosopher, something either monstrous or
god-like or indeed both at once."
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Heather Horn
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