In the book “The Synthesis of Yoga” in Chapter XII titled The Realization of Sachchidananda by Sri Aurobindo it states
“It is at least a fundamental principle principle of the ancient wisdom, the wisdom of the East on which we are founding ourselves, that philosophy ought not to be merely a lofty intellectual pastime or a play of dialectical subtlety or even a pursuit of metaphysical truth for its own sake, but a discovery by all right means of the basic truths of all-existence which ought then to become the guiding principles of our own existence. ”
Philosophy should mean something. It should be for something and it should amount to something. Philosophy in the West has been neutered and any attempt to bring philosophy to earth is derided and is often considered to be subversive. This is why Philosophy is considered in the West to simply be a waste of time. On the rare occasion where philosophy has been substantial as in Sri Aurobindo’s work or the work of Karl Marx the attitude is taken either that with Aurobindo for example that his writings are cultist (and therefore suspect) or in Marx’s case that his writing are subversive and ultimately evil.
Philosophy should mean something and stand for something. It should not be an idle exercise practiced only by those in the “Ivory Towers” like the scholars in Hermann Hesse’s famous work “The Glass Bead Game.”