O my! Scheler got this right! I once had a debate with someone who told me that my view of goodness was not necessarily universal. I normally like to dispense with trying to figure out how many angels dance on the head of a pin. However, THIS discussion was extremely relevant. How do we at least learn to understand other people's values even if we don't share them? Read Return to Laughter, an account of an anthropologist in Africa who learned the hard way that she didn't have to give up her own values while attempting to understand the values of the tribe she was embedded in. Thank you for this. It's so important these days!
Thanks Billie! I think you're right to tie this to anthropology - if we have a universal framework for values, then it explains how different things can come to occupy similar places (e.g. what counts as holy), and this can then form the grounds of our understanding across cultures. Will check out Return to Laughter, sounds great! I love the classics in anthropology. You can learn so much about the world from them!
O my! Scheler got this right! I once had a debate with someone who told me that my view of goodness was not necessarily universal. I normally like to dispense with trying to figure out how many angels dance on the head of a pin. However, THIS discussion was extremely relevant. How do we at least learn to understand other people's values even if we don't share them? Read Return to Laughter, an account of an anthropologist in Africa who learned the hard way that she didn't have to give up her own values while attempting to understand the values of the tribe she was embedded in. Thank you for this. It's so important these days!
Thanks Billie! I think you're right to tie this to anthropology - if we have a universal framework for values, then it explains how different things can come to occupy similar places (e.g. what counts as holy), and this can then form the grounds of our understanding across cultures. Will check out Return to Laughter, sounds great! I love the classics in anthropology. You can learn so much about the world from them!