“Wittgenstein spoke of ‘an experience that was, for him, a paradigm of the sense of ultimate value: the sense of wonder at the very existence of the world itself.’ Heidegger said that what we call the pre-socratic philosophers were not philosophers, but thinkers (Denker) who had no need of ‘philosophy’, caught up as they were in the radical astonishment of Being. For Plato, ‘the sense of wonder (thaumazein) is the mark of the Philosopher – philosophy indeed has no other origin’; in fact he thought that theios phobos (sacred fear) was so profoundly moving and life-altering that the arts, which could summon it up, ought to be under strict censorship to preserve public order. Aristotle wrote that ‘it is owing to their wonder that men both begin, and at first began, to philosophize.” – Ian McGilchrist, ‘The Master and his Emissary’

“Wittgenstein spoke of ‘an experience that was, for him, a paradigm of the sense of ultimate value: the sense of wonder at the very existence of the world itself.’ Heidegger said that what we call the pre-socratic philosophers were not philosophers, but thinkers (Denker) who had no need of ‘philosophy’, caught up as they were in the radical astonishment of Being. For Plato, ‘the sense of wonder (thaumazein) is the mark of the Philosopher – philosophy indeed has no other origin’; in fact he thought that theios phobos (sacred fear) was so profoundly moving and life-altering that the arts, which could summon it up, ought to be under strict censorship to preserve public order. Aristotle wrote that ‘it is owing to their wonder that men both begin, and at first began, to philosophize.”

– Ian McGilchrist, ‘The Master and his Emissary’