Perspectivism: Ortega’s Philosophy on Truth, Knowledge, and Humanity
Perspectivism: Ortega’s Philosophy
International Relations According to Ortega, the whole truth will emerge from the union of partial truths that propose all perspectives: all life is an irreplaceable perspective and therefore must be heard. Do not forget that when Ortega uses the expression ‘individual’ he refers not only to a specific human being, but also to a town. Again, Ortega’s arguments apply to the complex framework of the relation between groups, parties, civic organizations, cultures, ethnicities, states… Everyone from the population is entitled to participate in dialogue and decision making. There is a need, in particular, for systems and institutions for participation and meeting.
The Diversity Culture
The doctrine of view becomes an antidote to any ethnocentrism that denies the value of other cultures. Every human being is a partial perspective on reality. Precisely in any circumstance, no human being can access the whole truth: intersubjectivity and dialogue are essential. Involving only being able to reach an intersubjective truth as complete as possible: partial complementary truths. There is no truth that may despise each other, it has not really true “but infinite” parts “of it. Perspectivism is therefore an instrument to articulate current cohabitation in increasingly multicultural societies.
The Value of History
The debate over the value of the study and teaching of history finds in perspectivism an interesting approach: the whole historical moment humans have captured a truth to which historical moments later have not had access. The knowledge of these times brings us closer to those parts of reality. The story is therefore an ideal forum for enrichment.
Relationship Between Rationalism of Descartes and Reality (Ontology)
For Descartes, the only true existence is perceived with certainty by reason. It is a reality that is identical and the same for all individuals who apply the method correctly. It is, in the words critical of Ortega, a world ultravita extrahistorical: no sensitive material and having links with life and with the story and is real. That reality is perspectival rationalistic or historical, is absolute. Faced with Descartes, Ortega proposes a perspectival realities. In the words of the author: “the perspective of the components of reality. Far from being its deformation, is their organization,” really shows how many subjects in many perspectives.
Knowledge (Epistemology)
For Descartes, whatever the reason, any reason, belongs to the place or moment in history where you belong, clearly perceived is true. The reason that achieves clarity and distinction is, again, a separate reason and without any contact with the body: the thinking substance. Just as the thinking is carried away by the senses and touches the senses, with the vision lose the ability to reach the truth. For Ortega, the knowledge is always knowledge from life, from a corporal being ambient conditions, specific socio-cultural and historical, that is, from a point of view, each individual circumstance determines the part of reality that has access. For no subject or any historical period can achieve absolute knowledge and definitive. However, the real hit is just that, a part of the truth.
Man (Anthropology)
Descartes advocates an anthropological dualism. Proposes the only doubt is the existence of, I think, a substance which is defined as per lie. The body is an extended substance, distinct and separate from me. Therefore, the reason of the human beings of all times and places is the same. For Ortega, what defines the human being is his life. Life is not a thing or substance can be defined as thought or as anything else. The man has no nature, has a history. He is a being that is being incessantly to himself, decided from the context of freedom it gives its circumstance. The definition of any human aspect of life that is born is an abstraction.