You can read the interesting article “The Importance of Philosophical Thinking for Librarians” by Nazli Alkan [http://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/~mbolin/alkan.pdf]
Here is an excerpt:
“…In librarianship and the information professions, PT reflects the critical and questioning intellectual activity of theorists and librarians engaged in exploration. PT makes it possible to disclose “whats”, “hows,” and especially “whys”; it makes it possible to explore the meaning, value, or purpose of a subject, an object, an entity, an event, a phenomenon, a concept, a relation, a practice, through systematic, consistent, logical, rational, critical, and questioning approaches and to reach a meaningful judgment. Theorists and practitioners may take different approaches. These differences stem from the fact that librarians may combinetheir thinking directly with their practices or their ability to engage in PT during their practices.
From the perspective of practitioners, PT is found in librarians who are open to conducting professional activities accompanied by thinking, questioning, and investigating. It is crucial for the librarians to know what they do not know. Reflective thinking may lead to the systematization of what is in the mind. At the end of the PT process, a philosophical thought may emerge, and this outcome, if it is completely new, may be a value created by the librarian.
PT may be influential in the emergence and development of a professional philosophy. Just as the PT exercises of reflective librarians may be initial steps in the development of a professional philosophy, the philosophical thoughts they generate may serve as basic building blocks of this philosophy. The views of Butler (1933), Danton (1934), Foskett (1962), Nitecki(1964, 1993, 1995), Mukherjee (1966) and Shera (1971) are particularly remarkable in the context of PT by librarians and the role of librarians in the formation of a professional philosophy. It may be fruitful to elaborate further and to discuss the PT of librarians in the light of the views of these authors…”
