[MD] Dewey's Zen

[X Acto]

> > ...experiences come whole, pervaded by unifying qualities that demarcate them within the flux of our lives. If we want to find meaning, or the basis for meaning, we must therefore start with the qualitative unity that Dewey describes. The demarcating pervasive quality is, at first, unanalyzed, but it is the basis for subsequent analysis, thought, and development. Thought starts from this experienced whole, and only then does it introduce distinctions that carry it forward as inquiry.

Ron:
The pre-intellectual (pre-conceptual) is what springs to mind immediately that "cutting edge"
as the operable plug-in term.


     
> > And perhaps my favorite....
> >
> >            The crux of Dewey's entire argument is that what we call thinking, or reasoning, or logical inference could not even exist without the felt qualities of situations: "The underlying unity of qualitativeness regulates pertinence or relevancy and force of every distinction and relation; it guides selection and rejection and the manner of utilization of all explicit terms."

Ron:
That is an interesting line, simply because I just happen to be reading David Hume's enquirey concerning
human understanding and the principles of morals. Hume would say (I believe) that the guidance of
selection and rejection would be the pleasure of virtue, that felt quality of the situation and that reason
is therefore an extension of this.


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