Disappearance of the Person (Part VI)

So, in the previous essay, I presented a bifurcation of the scientific project that produced an intellectual or epistemic double bind.

On one hand, rationalists like Descartes sought to map the cosmos through pure reason, reducing human life and the whole universe to a mechanism governed by impersonal laws.

On the other hand, empiricists like Hume eventually anchored reality solely in sensory observation, beyond which they recognized no valid grounds for truth.

So, they too ended up in a cosmos devoid of transcendence.

The two paths diverge from the start but end up at the same nihilistic destination.

Both the universe where everything is predetermined and the one where nothing can be known leave no room for telos or purpose or for real, which is to say free, persons.

All right, so just a refresher.

I trace it all the way back to Aristotle, and I give this mimetic psychology of Aristotle suggesting that he turned away from models and imitation or participation as a cosmological principle because he was spoiled by his own role models, chief of which was Plato.

So Aristotle, as a founding figure of science, direct science towards intrinsic logical study of essences.

That gets a boost in medieval Western Europe through scholasticism and in modern science, it reaches a sort of a peak.

Probably it's a good peak because we still have the personalization going on in postmodern times, but now it's become quite pathological, hasn't it, with all the dissolution of identities and so on.

But the point is, science, through its method, whether it intends to or not, ends up at least squeezing personhood freedom out of the universe.

As I wrote recently, the modern philosophers, the modern classical philosophers, people like David Bentley Hard or Edward Facer and many others whom I haven't read, I happen to have read those two, but they're trying to push back against it.

John Milbank, I also even exchanged emails with him at some point.

There's this pushback and trying to basically bring back this teleological participatory approach uh, view of, uh, of, um, nature that has been, uh, uh, seriously compromised by, uh, modern scientism.

So, you know, my book is on, I guess, belongs, uh, to this big, uh, project, which is cultural projects, which is gains gain, uh, gaining steam, gaining power.

Um, uh, thanks be to God.

Right.

So to go on, in retrospect, the destination of science, right, should not be surprising given the, well, the destination of philosophy or of culture, right, should not be surprising given the vehicle of travel, which is science.

So, in the previous essay, I presented a bifurcation of the scientific project that produced an intellectual or epistemic double bind.

On one hand, rationalists like Descartes sought to map the cosmos through pure reason, reducing human life and the whole universe to a mechanism governed by impersonal laws.

On the other hand, empiricists like Hume eventually anchored reality solely in sensory observation, beyond which they recognized no valid grounds for truth.

So, they too ended up in a cosmos devoid of transcendence.

The two paths diverge from the start but end up at the same nihilistic destination.

Both the universe where everything is predetermined and the one where nothing can be known leave no room for telos or purpose or for real, which is to say free, persons.

All right, so just a refresher.

I trace it all the way back to Aristotle, and I give this mimetic psychology of Aristotle suggesting that he turned away from models and imitation or participation as a cosmological principle because he was spoiled by his own role models, chief of which was Plato.

So Aristotle, as a founding figure of science, direct science towards intrinsic logical study of essences.

That gets a boost in medieval Western Europe through scholasticism and in modern science, it reaches a sort of a peak.

Probably it's a good peak because we still have the personalization going on in postmodern times, but now it's become quite pathological, hasn't it, with all the dissolution of identities and so on.

But the point is, science, through its method, whether it intends to or not, ends up at least squeezing personhood freedom out of the universe.

As I wrote recently, the modern philosophers, the modern classical philosophers, people like David Bentley Hard or Edward Facer and many others whom I haven't read, I happen to have read those two, but they're trying to push back against it.

John Milbank, I also even exchanged emails with him at some point.

There's this pushback and trying to basically bring back this teleological participatory approach uh, view of, uh, of, um, nature that has been, uh, uh, seriously compromised by, uh, modern scientism.

So, you know, my book is on, I guess, belongs, uh, to this big, uh, project, which is cultural projects, which is gains gain, uh, gaining steam, gaining power.

Um, uh, thanks be to God.

Right.

So to go on, in retrospect, the destination of science, right, should not be surprising given the, well, the destination of philosophy or of culture, right, should not be surprising given the vehicle of travel, which is science.