[173] Now this is the situation, and it cannot be changed. This situation includes that we cannot have a definite concept of philosophy^a which should be accepted by all philosophers and which is a meaningful definition. Instead of that, we can have a kind of pre-philosophical description about which we can agree---and the popular mind can help us here---namely the idea that philosophy has to deal with more universal problems than everything else. Now this is certainly not a definition. This is a very poor superficial, popular description and nothing else. But we cannot do more in the present moment and can find out perhaps whether this will lead us to a little more...[?]. Philosophy is the attempt to answer the general questions about the nature of reality and the nature of human existence. Perhaps this non-definition, but description, is a way out, and we NEED such a way out, otherwise we could not even [have] specialized departments of philosophy. What is that?---a "depart- ment of philosophy". Every university has a "department of philosophy," and if somebody is asked "What do they do in these departments?", no one could answer it [laughter], because if you want to answer it in a clear defintion [sic.] (as in "department of mathematics"), namely exactly KNOW what is done there, then you have to ask each of the philosophers and then you will ask not [for] a depart- mental answer, but the answer of individual philosophers. And RIGHTLY so---it cannot be otherwise. Nevertheless we have "departments of philosophy" and everyone knows what that means, namely it means here some rather general questions are asked, and each of these philosophers answers them