• The Journal of the Convergence on Culture Technology
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.446-453
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• 2021

This paper deals with two methods regarding fact and value. One is the method of H. Putnam, which is to break the boundary between fact and value and to make a world where the two have an inherent connection. The other is the method of J. Habermas, which regards fact and value as the product of an intersubjective agreement based on argumentation. Putnam, through his position of internal realism, moves from realism to pragmatism, especially by combining the rationalist tradition of Kant and Dewey's pragmatic views. Habermas also stands in the tradition of rationalism and universalism in Kant, at the same time emphasizing the practicability of truth in Hegel's tradition of historical reason. The significance of the strategy of Putnam and Habermas is that they have attempted to revive the realm of value against the strict dichotomy of facts and values and the subsequent devaluation of rationality in the realm of value. The starting point of this attempt is that the practical foundation of rationality is laid on life and practice. This could provide the room for escaping from rationality, which prioritizes only truths that reveal facts, that is, instrument-reduced rationality, the room for the revival of practical rationality through reflection on what is the purpose of life, and, in turn, the room for resisting to pass the realm of values and norms to the logic of habitual routines or customs. However, despite such common goal, there are clear limitations to Putnam's approach due to the differences in the strategies taken on facts and values. Putnam's method can demolish the whole universal framework that is the foundation where pragmatic pluralism will be fostered, eliminating the difference between the specificity of values and the universality of norms and shaking up the status of universal ethics. Therefore, Habermas' ethical theory is proposed as an alternative to establish a basis for universal ethics by relying on communication rationality and to secure the coercion of norms and blossom cultural pluralism as a diverse lifestyle based on this coercion.

• (The)Study of the Eastern Classic
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• no.32
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• pp.245-278
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• 2008

The purpose of this paper is to create an inter-religious dialogue between the Western Christian concept of the spirit and Eastern ch'i philosophy within the category of panentheism. The Hebrew term ruah means 'moving air' and 'wind' which derive from the particular experience of the ancient Hebrew people living in the desert. The Greek pnuema also means 'life' and 'wind' which denote the natural power. Both ruah and pneuma consist of the main idea of the spirit exploring the symbol of relationality of the divine in Western tradition. Eastern ch'i philosophy indicates a vital force for keeping the body and soul alive, which is unconscious and spontaneous. Ch'i as a vital force constitutes cosmogony and cosmology with the constant movement of yin and yang. Yin and Yang as representing earth and heaven are dynamic breaths, blending harmoniously to become all existence. The ethical implication of the inter-religious dialogue between the spirit and ch'i would be the integration and interconnection of heaven, earth, and human beings. The dialogue suggests becoming one body with nature and human community through embodying the non-dualistic spirit of life. The inter-relationality means that since all modalities of existence are made of the cosmic life, human beings are part of the divine cosmic process. This is related to degree of spirituality in the entire chain of being: rocks, trees, animals, humans, and goods represent different levels of spirituality based on the varying composition of the spirit and ch'i. All beings that internally embody with the spirit and ch'i are organically inter-connected, and they are integral part of a continuous process of transformation of life towards holistic liberation of human and nature community.

• Journal of Korean Philosophical Society
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• no.93
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• pp.231-260
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• 2011

Simondon's theory of individuation and methodology of transduction presents a possibility of contemporary natural philosophy and a new perspective about the relation between philosophy and sciences. According to Simondon's anti-substantial viewpoint, being, as a metastable system charged with potential energy, complicates itself with quantum leaps transversing successive equilibriums. Individuation is the becoming of phases of being which transits from preindividual state to individuated states. Physical individuation as a paradigmatic model of individuation in general demonstrates not only insufficiency of form-oriented hylomorphism, but also spontaneous formational capacity of matter and reality of energetic relational operation immanent in matter. Genesis of a individual (structure or form) occurs as a resolution of the disparation between orders of magnitude, that is, the difference of potentials immanent in nature through the internal resonance, communication by information, transductive relation between the opposites. I'm trying to show that Simondon revives 'physis' of ancient natural philosophy by his own transductive applications of contemporary physics' conceptions, and therefore suggest a new non-reductive materialism. Especially Simondon's 'transduction' which is neither induction, deduction, nor dialectic, but an original ontological process and a peculiar method of thinking, I think, is worthy of note in order to construct network of knowledge and inter-relation between various sciences.