My question, then, is this: Shouldn't philosophers be able to bring more to an ethical dilemma than a highly intellectualized version of the debate that was already taking place before they intervened? The reason this is important is because philosophers have, from the very beginning of philosophy, been accused of doing nothing more than "navel gazing," of asking and answering questions that are of interest only to other philosophers rather than providing any practical benefit to the world outside of philosophy. Or, as Karl Marx put it, "The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point is to change it."
