Folks,

1) In order to talk about Philosophy, a person needs to be capable of THINKING.

2) Philosophy is the THINKING behind THINKING.  It is the construction of a MODEL behind the THINKING.

3) Philosophy is the SEARCH for the answer of the 3 questions:

       A) Cause -> Past

       B) Existence (Being) -> Present

       C) What it will be -> Future

4) For example, in term of time, Western Philosophy think in term of linear time.  Eastern philosophy think in term of circular time.  The model of thinking behind time is different.

5) As per (4), if you are NOT multi-lingual aka knowing a language beyond English, you CANNOT break the linear time model.  In English, you have to THINK when something happened before you can even say about this.  It is a linear time based language.  Hence, it is VERY DIFFICULT to explain circular time in English.

6) Mandarin / Chinese is a language based on circular time.  There are NO TENSES.

In this case, philosophy is a model on time and how time behave.  Aka, the thinking behind the thinking.  And, this model is used to construct language.

Dreamer