In general almost everybody thinks about collectors as being the opposite of philosophers, collectors being petty materialists while philosophers only need the wide blue sky and a wooden cask to live in (the aroma of some noble drink being a fine plus).

In general almost everybody thinks about collectors as being the opposite of philosophers, collectors being petty materialists while philosophers only need the wide blue sky and a wooden cask to live in...

... Now I confess that I was at least a little drunk when I wrote this, but the question remains: can collecting be philosophical somehow?

Would it be somewhere implied that the heterogenous collector is afraid of about Everything, running away from the world, hiding in his little doll-house, while the real problems are tackled by those fearless vampire killers called philosophers ;-) ? Two aphoristic farts here:

-One is either a philosopher or a man trying to understand the world.

-Philosophers fear the obvious. If it's the truth they're out of business.

Confronting your fears by collecting the objects that scare you? May not be applicable to matchbox cars, but the motive for collecting blades may be just good old agression, denying itself as usual. My american neighbour has a huge collection of handguns, he goes to the shooting-range every Saturday, and he teaches his eight year old son how to handle a Mauser (school is for sissies). All this because he fears fire-arms? Don't tell him that if you want to live :-))

And fleeing from the world by hiding between your objects? It may be self-deception, but I think that due to the continuous presence of these objects I know more and I have experienced more than many others. I go on trips to collect fossils, I go to flea markets, to art auctions.. I know what a Cymbiola Imperialis is and I even know how it smells (it does not smell). My objects are Knowledge Incorporated, for me they're just some kind of parallel library. Perhaps some philosophers may exactly know how polished marble feels according to its environment, deducing every property of it from its Pure Idea. But I can touch it every day, and I think that's quite a priviledge (the statue being of course a nude ;-) ).

Now in their search for the improbable philosophers often forget there is a science of about everything, even about the psychology of collecting. There seem to be many motives, some more personal and some more general, some (morally) good and some dubious or bad. Ranging from pure scientific curiosity to trying to impress people, from warm love for the objects to seeing them merely as an investment. And did we say moral? Can objects -sometime bought at high prices- not inspire their owner to care, to caution, to a sense of responsibility? But we were talking philosophy here. These objects are at their best when they bring you to quiet contemplation, when you can taste their significance your whole life long, measuring your evolution with the constancy of their richness. When W.R. Hearst was dying he often called for his Veronese. When I die I'd rather do that between my things, than looking at a bleak hospital wall. But of course nothing beats a living hand...