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Yet Another Revelation of Consistency
May. 24th, 2009 02:42 pmIn my very odd senior essay were the two things I've been interested in all along (and in the earlier ones too, but it comes out well here): intelligibility and action. The question was, how is it possible to create something new? On one side the question, as I saw it, was a pragmatic one--literally, 'how am I to go about doing this?' But the created thing, whatever it is, needs to be in some relation to all the things that existed before; and yet be new. So the other side of the question is, what is it about the world or our minds that makes this possible, and how does it work?
Parallel the Meno Paradox: how can we seek what we don't already know?
Parellel Kant's question: how are synthetic a priori judgmentts (which add to what we already know about the concepts involved, but do so through reasoning) possible?
I love reducing the history of philosophy to a single kind of question over and over again. The Meno Paradox also admits of a pragmatic reading.
It's my interest in the pragmatic sides of these questions in conjunction with the semantic or metaphysical sides that leads me afoul of the traditional foci in philosophy. I don't know whether the two are necessarily linked; but my interest in the pragmatic question probably comes from the sense that, if we're going to look for data a good place to look might be the mind of the person creating or learning something new. Partly this is my inclination because it's what I'm best at; describing my experience in excruciating detail may be my best skill. For the pragmatic side of the question, a first-personal answer is demanded. Whether the first-personal answer has any deep connection to the non-pragmatic side of the question is what I need to figure out. i.e. Are first-personal answers in any way demanded by the non-pragmatic sides of the questions for the reasons of, say, the concepts involved?
Parallel the Meno Paradox: how can we seek what we don't already know?
Parellel Kant's question: how are synthetic a priori judgmentts (which add to what we already know about the concepts involved, but do so through reasoning) possible?
I love reducing the history of philosophy to a single kind of question over and over again. The Meno Paradox also admits of a pragmatic reading.
It's my interest in the pragmatic sides of these questions in conjunction with the semantic or metaphysical sides that leads me afoul of the traditional foci in philosophy. I don't know whether the two are necessarily linked; but my interest in the pragmatic question probably comes from the sense that, if we're going to look for data a good place to look might be the mind of the person creating or learning something new. Partly this is my inclination because it's what I'm best at; describing my experience in excruciating detail may be my best skill. For the pragmatic side of the question, a first-personal answer is demanded. Whether the first-personal answer has any deep connection to the non-pragmatic side of the question is what I need to figure out. i.e. Are first-personal answers in any way demanded by the non-pragmatic sides of the questions for the reasons of, say, the concepts involved?
