Understanding and Being lecture 4:1

CD/mp3 141, first part of fourth Halifax lecture on Insight. Corresponds to CWL 5: 84-97. Sponsored by Jeanne Belair, in the name of Fr. Jack Belair. Common sense can be conceived adequately only by contrast with the specialized knowledge of the sciences. Knowledge is not pursued for its own sake, but is one part in the total end which is living. There is no methodical exploitation of universality. The relations rest ultimately on the relations of things to us. There is no technical language in common sense. Common sense involves insight that arises from the same intellectual curiosity that is at the root of science. But it wants an answer that does not demand specialized knowledge. The general character of the clusters of insights is to build up a nucleus such that with the minimum of further insights one will be able to deal with any concrete situations that arise in one's living. There are diversities of common sense. There can be complete incomprehension between people of different common sense and between nations. There is a fundamental incoherence in doing philosophy from common sense alone, in that what we are doing can have no guidance in its specific form from mere common sense. If philosophy is to fulfil any integrating function, it has to be cognizant of scientific knowledge. And the fundamental theological problem at the present time is one of integration, including also the human sciences.

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Audio restoration by Greg Lauzon