>A field has certain goals, certain questions it tries to answer. In most intellectual fields, newcomers start by learning the best possible answers to those qu

>A field has certain goals, certain questions it tries to answer. In most intellectual fields, newcomers start by learning the best possible answers to those questions found till now Not so in philosophy. If philosophy has the aim (if one's idea is that science has some goal, or a goal outside of being done for the sake of being done) to create new answers to old questions, or create new questions which require new answers, one must know (1) what questions were previously asked, (2) why the questions do (or don't) have answers, or what the problems and advantages of the answers are, (3) what these answers were in their original form, such that we have the best access to the most complete argument. Endless rephrasing of texts didn't get us from Newton to Einstein. Even if one accepts that philosophy makes progress (internally), it doesn't in any way imply that one can get away without reading both old (to see what remains uncovered, and there is plenty to this day) and new.