Turnbull then makes a distinction between everyday questions that emerge from ordinary common life and can usually be answered by relying on common sense, and technical questions that require the acquisition and analysis of information. In the midst of these two sets of questions there are also philosophical questions, a special variety of everyday questions. Being a special variety of everyday questions, philosophical questions, or big questions, can be asked by ordinary people. Everyone, as Gramsci states, can be a philosopher at some point in his or her life. Philistines ask ordinary everyday questions, technocrats ask technical questions, and philosophers ask big questions using a philosophical approach.
Philosophers are the lovers of wisdom, of meaning that sets themselves against opinion-lovers.
They are also those who are engaged in reflective thinking, a speculative type of thinking that searches for the self-evident, the profoundly obvious, or to put it another way, the necessary features of human life. Technocrats are those who are highly skilled to solve specific problems and aim to arrive at precision in decision-making. Philistines are champions of common sense who think that many technocrats and most philosophers ask silly questions. Philistines believe that everyday practical questions are the essential issue, and accuse the technocrats and philosophers of over-intellectualizing and creating problems where none, in reality, exist. Real philosophy requires a child-like wonder and imaginative ideas.