| good thinking |
enlightened being |
| from cultural values through social values to political values gary e. davis |
August 30, 2020 |
| continuing a prospective venture in light of the four leading lights of the 2020 Democratic National Convention We can see that a good cultural sense of “extraordinary possibilities” (Biden) thus “who we want to be,” thus “who we are” (Michelle Obama) evinces from we who make the continuum actual, life by life seeking the mutuality necessary for “work in common purpose” (Biden); and seeking capability of each life actualizing ideals together, which is a matter of progressively balancing ideality and reality (feasibility). That, in a so-called nutshell, is American pragmatism. Science lives uncannily in the mix, because its efficacy for social systems can be no better than appreciation of its importance, which is culturally based (educational excellence, professional insightfulness, technical efficacy). But public policy (programmatic politics) can’t be scientifically valid, if the society doesn’t expect scientific validity to prevail wherever it’s appropriate (not a matter of scientism: overextension of crypto-“scienitific” rationalization). Keeping the vital importance of science in social and political life depends on culturally-enabled appreciation of knowledge-based policy formation that a good politics implements. We, the people, actualize hope and extraordinary possibilities better, the more that astute realism serves idealized work in common purpose. Goodness in that emerges from the reality of our “fortunes [being] bound up with one another” (Obama). Biden’s declaration of the vital importance of “dignity” and “human rights” implies the generative importance of what dignity and human rights are for. They are minimal conditions for expanding the work in common purpose that we are about. Make no mistake about it (Barack might be heard to say), as Biden declares,“who we are as a nation, what we stand for,” and “democracy is on the ballot.” |
next—> being light |