Protestantism

» redback - Enduring Faith?

I was inclined to leave this topic light but you incite serious thought, doncha know.

To me, philosophy is like a familiar blanket. Like our minds, the blanket needs a good shake every now and then to get the dust...and dust mites...out but makes you hot in summer or in over-use and shouldn't be dragged into the swimming pool with you when you need to totally chill out.

"Mind, according to Mead, arises within the social process of communication and cannot be understood apart from that process." So...we can't read minds nor automatically speak a foreign language nor universal jargon.

"...Individual psychology, for Mead, is intelligible only in terms of social processes..." So, sociology and group interaction or reaction is more interesting to analyse than what makes an individual tick, to Mead. Is this the 'pragmatic' thinking which encourages conclusions about more important things eg "...what most people think..." with less regard for exclusions and individual variations?

Mead is described as the founder of pragmatism and that kinda pricks my ears up. I read somewhere:

"...Definitions need to be pragmatic. If you push any definition they break."

so I ponder the definition of 'pragmatism' within the USA worldview or community view.

-- posted by redback