living is a risky business

This is going to be really quick, abstract, and vague, but:

I think that a flaw that corrupts some philosophy, whether it be in ethics or metaphysics, is the desire to give a final, perfect answer. In ethics, this would be a way of living that is, once and for all, morally unimpeachable. If we could just get things right, there would be no danger of acting wrongly (acting wrongly even with the best of intentions). I don't think there is any such answer, any such way of living. Life is a risky business. We can't eliminate the possibility of mistakes, of failures, of one sort or another.

One of the ways that philosophy tries to avoid the point that there is no such answer is by divorcing philosophy and its subject matter. There is the good life, and there is philosophizing about the good life. That is, it would be moronic (or exceedingly arrogant) for a philosopher not to acknowledge that their theories are controversial, doubtful, subject to criticism and revision. But by separating the good life from their philosophizing about it, they can separate it (the good life) off from all that controvesry, doubt, criticism, and revision. This is both wrong and bad.