From, for and within

Just as science is not really a body of knowledge on what is true about things, but rather the record of disciplined interactions human beings have with things, with a focus on the patterns that predictably occur when certain conditions are in place… philosophy is not really the truth of how human beings necessarily relate to existence (“the human condition”), but rather the record of individuals (who belong to societies) trying to make coherent and comprehensive sense of their own experience, as defined by what they take to be relevant, which is intimately connected with what that individual wishes to do in the world. Existence might be conceptualized in thingly objective terms, or psychological, intellectual, logical, political, experiential, moral, etc. terms.

And because what people take to be relevant varies from person to person — (and perhaps varies most dramatically between the type who decides to conceptualize his experience versus a type who simply interacts with whatever he encounters) — different people will have different philosophies, which will enable them to interact with the world in some very particular way, perhaps as a scientist or a philosopher, but maybe as a salesperson or a respiratory therapist or a concierge or a politician.

So, both science and philosophy attempt to relate to the whole of reality, but always from, for and within some purpose, outside of which there is nothing but the mystery of the possibility of learning and changing. In any intellectual activity an actor is always someone relating something, whether the emphasis is on the someone or on the something and even if that something is taken to be fellow someone/something actors.

I think my use of this approach to relating myself to existence, which includes as a consideration other people approaching existence differently from myself makes me a pragmatist. Never forget: American Pragmatism was a response to the experience of the Civil War.

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