movingalways wrote:I wouldn't define the value of truth above all as a disease, more of a world shattering, which does require a "putting back together again" or a healing, which does include, as you say, "irrational" elements and "delusions".
Calling it a disease is a harsh metaphor, you're right; I just don't want it to be glorified as somehow inherently better than irrationality - that itself is just an irrational belief and value judgement. We happen to share this value judgement, but many people don't.
movingalways wrote:There is a story attributed to the Buddha of the raft of irrational things a man must sit upon for the sake of reasoning's fire before he safely arrives on the shore of (only) reasoning, things of faith and belief and metaphor and myth (things of mysticism and magic): the spiritual imagination at work.
I don't like that story. What's the "shore of (only) reasoning"? Does that imply a shore without irrational things? But reasoning is only useful when combined with irrational things! (Not to mention that using reasoning itself is irrational.) Any "pure" reasoning is pointless: it tells us nothing except what was already inherent in our definitions to begin with.
A. That is a wolf (by definition)
B. A wolf kills humans when they sleep (by definition)
A+B: That wolf will kill me when I sleep
That's pure reasoning; it doesn't tell us anything that wasn't inherent in the original definitions. Now let's add some irrational elements.
A. That is a wolf (by definition)
B. A wolf kills humans when they sleep (by definition)
C. Being killed is bad (value judgement)
A+B: I should not sleep
Now we've used reason to enhance our own survival utility, which is probably why reason evolved in the first place (from an evolutionary perspective). "Being killed is bad" is not "true", it's merely an arbitrary, irrational value judgement or belief that will be disputed between individuals.
The desire for truth above all is interesting infliction of suffering. In the end (enlightenment), man discovers that truth is a chimera, that it can't be the highest value, and that reasoning is only a tool which, by itself, would be useless.
movingalways wrote:If the values or philosophy that come during the process of construction are not reasoned, then by what process do they come?
I don't know... maybe they just pop into our minds, or maybe they are innate in our subconscious biology?
Why does one value staying alive? You'll say it's reasoned because they need to stay alive to accomplish X. So why do they value X? Is X a core value, or will you reason that it's because of Y? If the latter, then why do they value Y? At bottom, values can't be reasoned, they simply things that we irrationally believe in.