Is philosophical consulting something new?
Almost. It started a mere 2,500 years ago. Aristotle was a consultant to Alexander the Great–who went on to conquer the world. Confucius, whose philosophy is even more influential in Chinese culture than is Aristotle’s in the west, was a free-lance philosophical consultant. Lao Tzu, perhaps the most brilliant Chinese philosopher, was a senior civil servant. Bacon, Hobbes, Hume and Locke all acted as political and/or diplomatic advisors. Queen Catherine of Sweden hired Descartes as her personal philosopher. In every age, philosophers have been available as consultants–though not every age has been wise enough to enage them. If the wisdom of a culture can be gauged by the number and quality of philosophical consultants it employs, then our culture has a chance to become surpassingly wise.
