What's the first job of someone who wants to study philosophy? Get rid of your arrogance. You can't learn something you think you already know. We all talk randomly about what should and shouldn't be done. We chat about good and bad, beautiful and ugly. We praise and criticize. We accuse and blame. We judge what's honorable and what's not. Then we go to the philosophers. Why do we go to them? Because we want to learn what we don't think we know. And what's that? Their theories. We want to learn what philosophers say because it sounds elegant and clever. Some want to learn so they can profit from it. But here's the ridiculous part: you think you want to learn one thing, but you'll actually learn something else entirely. Even worse — how can you get good at something you're not actually learning?
What is the first business of him who philosophizes? To throw away self-conceit ([Greek: oiaesis]). For it is impossible for a man to begin to learn that which he thinks that he knows. As to things then which ought to be done and ought not to be done, and good and bad, and beautiful and ugly, all of us talking of them at random go to the philosophers; and on these matters we praise, we censure, we accuse, we blame, we judge and determine about principles honorable and dishonorable. But why do we go to the philosophers? Because we wish to learn what we do not think that we know. And what is this? Theorems. For we wish to learn what philosophers say as being something elegant and acute; and some wish to learn that they may get profit from what they learn. It is ridiculous then to think that a person wishes to learn one thing, and will learn another; or further, that a man will make proficiency in that which he does not learn.