In Praise of Anger

Anger, as archetypal, is met with ambivalence. Buddhism considers it toxic, and Christianity holds it as a sin and as righteousness itself. Ancient Hebrew and Hindu cultures locate it in the seat of divinity. This article aims to explore and psychologically redeem anger in its everyday manifestations and in its background in the Western tradition. The Christian Bible, Ancient Greek literature, Dante, Blake, and Shakespeare are all visited. An image emerges of a force that paradoxically graces us with its benefactions as well as destroys us.     

In Praise of Convergent Thinking

ABSTRACT: Free production of variability through unfettered divergent thinking holds out the seductive promise of effortless creativity but runs the risk of generating only quasicreativity or pseudocreativity if it is not adapted to reality. Therefore, creative thinking seems to involve 2 components: generation of novelty (via divergent thinking) and evaluation of the novelty (via convergent thinking). In the area of convergent thinking, knowledge is of particular importance: It is a source of ideas, suggests pathways to solutions, and provides criteria of effectiveness and novelty. The way in which the 2 kinds of thinking work together can be understood in terms of thinking styles or of phases in the generation of creative products. In practical situations, divergent thinking without convergent thinking can cause a variety of problems including reckless change. Nonetheless, care must be exercised by those who sing the praises of convergent thinking: Both too little and too much is bad for creativity.     

In Praise of a Cumulative Prevention Science

Durlak and Wells (1997) provide a pivotal appraisal of prevention research on children and adolescents. Their meta-analytic approach has the advantages of reducing scientific misjudgments based on single studies, and providing a more balanced evaluation of impact of various interventions; it provides an opportunity for hypothesis finding, helps set methodological standards, allows assessment of working classifications in the field, and an evaluation of the maturity of the prevention field itself. New developmental tasks for the field include incorporating and pursuing the leads produced by these findings, conducting similar research syntheses with other populations and outcomes, and using the results as an impetus to increased operational precision and parsimony.     

In Praise of Austerity: A Reply to Forrest

This is an invited response to Peter Forrest’s review of my trilogy on the philosophy of religion, which appeared in a previous issue of this journal.     

In Praise of Objective-Subjectivity: Teaching the Pursuit of Precision

Building upon aspects of Isreal Scheffler's philosophy, this essay takes up the search for forms of education that will lead to increased participation in a universal conversation in the making. In particular, it looks at how the rational passions may either enhance or impede the possibility of intelligible discourse between opponents. On the impediment side, the phenomenon of 'communicative isolation' is investigated, along with the nature of arrogant perception and the problematic role played by negative rational passions. The conclusion reached is one that advocates the cultivation of 'objective-subjectivity' – a practice that combines reflexivity and precise self-awareness with the conscious exercise of positive rational passions.     

In Praise of Clutter as a Necessary Part of The Feminist Perspective

A comment on Susan Wendell's paper “Oppression and Victimization; Choice and Responsibility” that appeared in Hypatia 5(3).     

In Praise of Natural Philosophy: A Revolution for Thought and Life

Modern science began as natural philosophy. In the time of Newton, what we call science and philosophy today ?C the disparate endeavours ?C formed one mutually interacting, integrated endeavour of natural philosophy: to improve our knowledge and understanding of the universe, and to improve our understanding of ourselves as a part of it. Profound, indeed unprecedented discoveries were made. But then natural philosophy died. It split into science on the one hand, and philosophy on the other. This happened during the 18th and 19th centuries, and the split is now built into our intellectual landscape. But the two fragments, science and philosophy, are defective shadows of the glorious unified endeavour of natural philosophy. Rigour, sheer intellectual good sense and decisive argument demand that we put the two together again, and rediscover the immense merits of the integrated enterprise of natural philosophy. This requires an intellectual revolution, with dramatic implications for how we understand our world, how we understand and do science, and how we understand and do philosophy. There are dramatic implications, too, for education, and for the entire academic endeavour, and its capacity to help us discover how to tackle more successfully our immense global problems.     

In Praise of Scholarly Reactions: Thoughts on Tinsley's and Mahoney's Insights

The reactions of Tinsley and Mahoney raise important and challenging points. Such scholarly comments further our common goal of understanding the human capacity for freedom of the will.