metonymy4u

another thought: philosophy for me also provides an important compliment to science. if we accept for the moment kant’s observation that absolute truth is unachievable, then we can easily progress to kierkegaard’s model of human existence as characterized by multiple “modes of being,” neither one more necessary or true than any other. what matters is what he called “inwardness” or the capacity to live authentically, to build a life worth living (to use DBT language) or to live with courage and love (FAP model). in such an approach to life the subjective truth is just as valuable as the objective. in fact the subjective / objective dialectic breaks down entirely, since there is no such thing as objective truth any longer. so all we have are what rorty calls redescriptions or what skinner calls verbal behaviors, at least as far as our cognitive processes are concerned. but poetry can elicit different experiences, and i think to ignore this wellspring of creativity is ineffective. just as i think we need to look to alternative cultural traditions for the “biodiversity” that may help us solve our most entrenched problems, i think we need to look to creative writing (philosophy being one form of that) for awareness and love in the face of a violent world. in difficult times, i believe we need the courage of poetry.