Today anyone can call themselves a philosopher and announce any claim as a philosophical truth, and no one can say that the author is not a philosopher nor the claim is not a philosophical truth; which means philosophy is useless.
Philosophy is useless because it lacks a useful definition, so to make philosophy useful I have advanced the simple definition that philosophy is the study of how understanding creates truth, for understanding is the source of all meaning. And without understanding there is no reality, no truth and no meaning. Thus, to allow philosophy to become a science, I suggest the following self-evident truths be adopted :
Philosophy is the study of how truth is created by an understanding.
Understanding: is the application of beliefs to observations so bestowing form (what it can sense) and meaning, to create new beliefs; all of which exist, as they are expressed, in a language.
Two Kinds Of Beliefs:
CONTROL the Understanding (Religion): those bestowed by nature and modified by infancy in the creation of an understanding so are unchangeable: that is, the instincts and infantile experiences, which
dictate right from wrong so create Meaning, hence Purpose: what the creature should, or should not, do, which is to survive, eat, sleep, multiply, etc. And are the morality of the understanding, which bestows either Sanity, the ability to resist the demands of its feelings, or Insanity, the inability to resist its feelings.
TOOLS of the Understanding (Science): those revealed by the understanding's experience of cause and effect. That is, if you step off a cliff you fall, and these axioms, which are collected and refined throughout the life of the understanding, allow the recognition of true or false and are the knowledge of the understanding.
Truth: is the beliefs of an understanding, which create the reality of the understanding.
Reality: is the remembered forms that its senses detect and the meaning it bestowed on them: its experience. And consists of:
The nature of the understanding: Its senses and Sanity
The position of the understanding: What it can observe
Tradition: is the habits adopted by an understanding to achieve the greatest benefit from its reality.
Knowledge: is the beliefs of a sane understanding, for those of an insane understanding are corrupted by its fears and fancies and are delusions.
Wisdom: is the sane use of knowledge
The adoption of these truths convert Philosophy into a useful tool: a science. This science of philosophy explains not only understanding, language, reality, and truth, but also society: a shared understanding. These explanations allow a better understanding of ourselves by revealing why humanity behaves the way it does in forming a civilisation (a dominant society) and why such a society waxes (refines its understanding) then wanes (loses its understanding).
Although the new science of philosophy significantly improves human understanding it reveals our current society is waning so condemning most citizens as fools, who naturally resent such a judgement. Most contemporary citizens insist upon ignoring the new science, and if they are pressed to recognise it, will persecute its proponents.