Worldview

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A worldview or a world-view or Weltanschauung is the fundamental cognitive orientation of an individual or society encompassing the whole of the individual's or society's knowledge, culture, and point of view. [1] A worldview can include natural philosophy; fundamental, existential, and normative postulates; or themes, values, emotions, and ethics. [2]

Contents

Etymology

View of the world Gazing at the Milky Way Morvan 2019-08-31.jpg
View of the world

The term worldview is a calque of the German word Weltanschauung [ˈvɛltʔanˌʃaʊ.ʊŋ] ⓘ , composed of Welt ('world') and Anschauung ('perception' or 'view'). [3] The German word is also used in English. It is a concept fundamental to German philosophy, especially epistemology and refers to a wide world perception. Additionally, it refers to the framework of ideas and beliefs forming a global description through which an individual, group or culture watches and interprets the world and interacts with it as a social reality.

Weltanschauung and cognitive philosophy

Within cognitive philosophy and the cognitive sciences is the German concept of Weltanschauung. This expression is used to refer to the "wide worldview" or "wide world perception" of a people, family, or person. The Weltanschauung of a people originates from the unique world experience of a people, which they experience over several millennia. The language of a people reflects the Weltanschauung of that people in the form of its syntactic structures and untranslatable connotations and its denotations. [4] [5]

The term Weltanschauung is often wrongly attributed to Wilhelm von Humboldt, the founder of German ethnolinguistics. However, Humboldt's key concept was Weltansicht. [6] Weltansicht was used by Humboldt to refer to the overarching conceptual and sensorial apprehension of reality shared by a linguistic community (Nation). On the other hand, Weltanschauung, first used by Immanuel Kant and later popularized by Hegel, was always used in German and later in English to refer more to philosophies, ideologies and cultural or religious perspectives, than to linguistic communities and their mode of apprehending reality.

In 1911, the German philosopher Wilhelm Dilthey published an essay entitled "The Types of Worldview (Weltanschauung) and their Development in Metaphysics" that became quite influential. Dilthey characterized worldviews as providing a perspective on life that encompasses the cognitive, evaluative, and volitional aspects of human experience. Although worldviews have always been expressed in literature and religion, philosophers have attempted to give them conceptual definition in their metaphysical systems. On that basis, Dilthey found it possible to distinguish three general recurring types of worldview. The first of these he called naturalism because it gives priority to the perceptual and experimental determination of what is and allows contingency to influence how we evaluate and respond to reality. Naturalism can be found in Democritus, Hobbes, Hume and many other modern philosophers. The second type of worldview is called the idealism of freedom and is represented by Plato, Descartes, Kant, and Bergson among others. It is dualistic and gives primacy to the freedom of the will. The organizational order of our world is structured by our mind and the will to know. The third type is called objective idealism and Dilthey sees it in Heraclitus, Parmenides, Spinoza, Leibniz and Hegel. In objective idealism the ideal does not hover above what is actual but inheres in it. This third type of worldview is ultimately monistic and seeks to discern the inner coherence and harmony among all things. Dilthey thought it impossible to come up with a universally valid metaphysical or systematic formulation of any of these worldviews, but regarded them as useful schema for his own more reflective kind of life philosophy. See Makkreel and Rodi, Wilhelm Dilthey, Selected Works, volume 6, 2019.

Anthropologically, worldviews can be expressed as the "fundamental cognitive, affective, and evaluative presuppositions a group of people make about the nature of things, and which they use to order their lives." [7]

If it were possible to draw a map of the world on the basis of Weltanschauung, [8] it would probably be seen to cross political borders—Weltanschauung is the product of political borders and common experiences of a people from a geographical region, [8] environmental-climatic conditions, the economic resources available, socio-cultural systems, and the language family. [8] (The work of the population geneticist Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza aims to show the gene-linguistic co-evolution of people).

According to James W. Underhill, worldview can periodically be used very differently by certain linguists and sociologists. It is for this reason that Underhill, and those who influenced him, attempted to wed metaphor in, for example, the sociology of religion, with discourse analysis. Underhill also proposed five subcategories for the study of worldview: world-perceiving, world-conceiving, cultural mindset, personal world, and perspective. [6] [9] [10]

Comparison of worldviews

One can think of a worldview as comprising a number of basic beliefs which are philosophically equivalent to the axioms of the worldview considered as a logical or consistent theory. These basic beliefs cannot, by definition, be proven (in the logical sense) within the worldview – precisely because they are axioms, and are typically argued from rather than argued for. [11] However their coherence can be explored philosophically and logically.

If two different worldviews have sufficient common beliefs it may be possible to have a constructive dialogue between them. [12]

On the other hand, if different worldviews are held to be basically incommensurate and irreconcilable, then the situation is one of cultural relativism and would therefore incur the standard criticisms from philosophical realists. [13] [14] Additionally, religious believers might not wish to see their beliefs relativized into something that is only "true for them". [15] [16] Subjective logic is a belief-reasoning formalism where beliefs explicitly are subjectively held by individuals but where a consensus between different worldviews can be achieved. [17]

A third alternative sees the worldview approach as only a methodological relativism, as a suspension of judgment about the truth of various belief systems but not a declaration that there is no global truth. For instance, the religious philosopher Ninian Smart begins his Worldviews: Cross-cultural Explorations of Human Beliefs with "Exploring Religions and Analysing Worldviews" and argues for "the neutral, dispassionate study of different religious and secular systems—a process I call worldview analysis." [18]

The comparison of religious, philosophical or scientific worldviews is a delicate endeavor, because such worldviews start from different presuppositions and cognitive values. [19] Clément Vidal has proposed metaphilosophical criteria for the comparison of worldviews, classifying them in three broad categories:

  1. objective: objective consistency, scientificity, scope
  2. subjective: subjective consistency, personal utility, emotionality
  3. intersubjective: intersubjective consistency, collective utility, narrativity

Characteristics

While Leo Apostel and his followers clearly hold that individuals can construct worldviews, other writers regard worldviews as operating at a community level, or in an unconscious way. For instance, if one's worldview is fixed by one's language, as according to a strong version of the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis, one would have to learn or invent a new language in order to construct a new worldview.

According to Apostel, [20] a worldview is an ontology, or a descriptive model of the world. It should comprise these six elements:

  1. An explanation of the world
  2. A futurology, answering the question "Where are we heading?"
  3. Values, answers to ethical questions: "What should we do?"
  4. A praxeology, or methodology, or theory of action: "How should we attain our goals?"
  5. An epistemology, or theory of knowledge: "What is true and false?"
  6. An etiology. A constructed world-view should contain an account of its own "building blocks", its origins and construction.

Terror management theory

In terror management theory, one's worldview helps to alleviate the anxiety caused by awareness of one's own mortality. Memento Mori! (19496674796).jpg
In terror management theory, one's worldview helps to alleviate the anxiety caused by awareness of one's own mortality.

A worldview, according to terror management theory (TMT), serves as a buffer against death anxiety. [21] It is theorized that living up to the ideals of one's worldview provides a sense of self-esteem which provides a sense of transcending the limits of human life (e.g. literally, as in religious belief in immortality; symbolically, as in art works or children to live on after one's death, or in contributions to one's culture). [21] Evidence in support of terror management theory includes a series of experiments by Jeff Schimel and colleagues in which a group of Canadians found to score highly on a measure of patriotism were asked to read an essay attacking the dominant Canadian worldview. [21]

Using a test of death-thought accessibility (DTA), involving an ambiguous word completion test (e.g. "COFF__" could either be completed as either "COFFEE" or "COFFIN" or "COFFER"), participants who had read the essay attacking their worldview were found to have a significantly higher level of DTA than the control group, who read a similar essay attacking Australian cultural values. Mood was also measured following the worldview threat, to test whether the increase in death thoughts following worldview threat were due to other causes, for example, anger at the attack on one's cultural worldview. [21] No significant changes on mood scales were found immediately following the worldview threat. [21]

To test the generalisability of these findings to groups and worldviews other than those of nationalistic Canadians, Schimel et al conducted a similar experiment on a group of religious individuals whose worldview included that of creationism. [21] Participants were asked to read an essay which argued in support of the theory of evolution, following which the same measure of DTA was taken as for the Canadian group. [21] Religious participants with a creationist worldview were found to have a significantly higher level of death-thought accessibility than those of the control group. [21]

Goldenberg et al found that highlighting the similarities between humans and other animals increases death-thought accessibility, as does attention to the physical rather than meaningful qualities of sex. [22]

Religion

Religious practices will tie closely to a religion's worldview. Religion collage (large).jpg
Religious practices will tie closely to a religion's worldview.

Nishida Kitaro wrote extensively on "the Religious Worldview" in exploring the philosophical significance of Eastern religions. [23]

According to Neo-Calvinist David Naugle's World view: The History of a Concept, "Conceiving of Christianity as a worldview has been one of the most significant developments in the recent history of the church." [24]

The Christian thinker James W. Sire defines a worldview as "a commitment, a fundamental orientation of the heart, that can be expressed as a story or in a set of presuppositions (assumptions which may be true, partially true, or entirely false) which we hold (consciously or subconsciously, consistently or inconsistently) about the basic construction of reality, and that provides the foundation on which we live and move and have our being." He suggests that "we should all think in terms of worldviews, that is, with a consciousness not only of our own way of thought but also that of other people, so that we can first understand and then genuinely communicate with others in our pluralistic society." [25]

The commitment mentioned by James W. Sire can be extended further. The worldview increases the commitment to serve the world. With the change of a person's view towards the world, he/she can be motivated to serve the world. This serving attitude has been illustrated by Tareq M Zayed as the 'Emancipatory Worldview' in his writing "History of emancipatory worldview of Muslim learners". [26]

David Bell has also raised questions on religious worldviews for the designers of superintelligences – machines much smarter than humans. [27]

Related Research Articles

Philosophy of religion is "the philosophical examination of the central themes and concepts involved in religious traditions". Philosophical discussions on such topics date from ancient times, and appear in the earliest known texts concerning philosophy. The field is related to many other branches of philosophy, including metaphysics, epistemology, logic and ethics.

In the philosophy of science, protoscience is a research field that has the characteristics of an undeveloped science that may ultimately develop into an established science. Philosophers use protoscience to understand the history of science and distinguish protoscience from science and pseudoscience. The word roots proto- + science indicate first science.

The idea of linguistic relativity, also known as the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis, the Whorf hypothesis, or Whorfianism, is a principle suggesting that the structure of a language influences its speakers' worldview or cognition, and thus individuals' languages determine or shape their perceptions of the world.

Reality is the sum or aggregate of all that is real or existent within the universe, as opposed to that which is only imaginary, nonexistent or nonactual. The term is also used to refer to the ontological status of things, indicating their existence. In physical terms, reality is the totality of a system, known and unknown.

Relativism is a family of philosophical views which deny claims to objectivity within a particular domain and assert that valuations in that domain are relative to the perspective of an observer or the context in which they are assessed. There are many different forms of relativism, with a great deal of variation in scope and differing degrees of controversy among them. Moral relativism encompasses the differences in moral judgments among people and cultures. Epistemic relativism holds that there are no absolute principles regarding normative belief, justification, or rationality, and that there are only relative ones. Alethic relativism is the doctrine that there are no absolute truths, i.e., that truth is always relative to some particular frame of reference, such as a language or a culture. Some forms of relativism also bear a resemblance to philosophical skepticism. Descriptive relativism seeks to describe the differences among cultures and people without evaluation, while normative relativism evaluates the word truthfulness of views within a given framework.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sociology of knowledge</span> Field of study

The sociology of knowledge is the study of the relationship between human thought, the social context within which it arises, and the effects that prevailing ideas have on societies. It is not a specialized area of sociology. Instead, it deals with broad fundamental questions about the extent and limits of social influences on individuals' lives and the social-cultural basis of our knowledge about the world. The sociology of knowledge has a subclass and a complement. Its subclass is sociology of scientific knowledge. Its complement is the sociology of ignorance.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Rorty</span> American philosopher

Richard McKay Rorty was an American philosopher. Educated at the University of Chicago and Yale University, he had strong interests and training in both the history of philosophy and in contemporary analytic philosophy. Rorty's academic career included appointments as the Stuart Professor of Philosophy at Princeton University, Kenan Professor of Humanities at the University of Virginia, and Professor of Comparative literature at Stanford University. Among his most influential books are Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature (1979), Consequences of Pragmatism (1982), and Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity (1989).

Pluralism is a term used in philosophy, referring to a worldview of multiplicity, oft used in opposition to monism or dualism. The term has different meanings in metaphysics, ontology, epistemology and logic. In metaphysics, it is the view that there are in fact many different substances in nature that constitute reality. In ontology, pluralism refers to different ways, kinds, or modes of being. For example, a topic in ontological pluralism is the comparison of the modes of existence of things like 'humans' and 'cars' with things like 'numbers' and some other concepts as they are used in science.

Linguistic determinism is the concept that language and its structures limit and determine human knowledge or thought, as well as thought processes such as categorization, memory, and perception. The term implies that people's native languages will affect their thought process and therefore people will have different thought processes based on their mother tongues.

Christian worldview refers to the framework of ideas and beliefs through which a Christian individual, group or culture interprets the world and interacts with it. Various denominations of Christianity have differing worldviews on some issues based on biblical interpretation, but many thematic elements are commonly agreed-upon within the Christian worldview.

Neopragmatism, sometimes called post-Deweyan pragmatism, linguistic pragmatism, or analytic pragmatism, is the philosophical tradition that infers that the meaning of words is a result of how they are used, rather than the objects they represent.

Systems philosophy is a discipline aimed at constructing a new philosophy by using systems concepts. The discipline was first described by Ervin Laszlo in his 1972 book Introduction to Systems Philosophy: Toward a New Paradigm of Contemporary Thought. It has been described as the "reorientation of thought and world view ensuing from the introduction of "systems" as a new scientific paradigm".

This glossary of philosophy is a list of definitions of terms and concepts relevant to philosophy and related disciplines, including logic, ethics, and theology.

Metaphysical naturalism is a philosophical worldview which holds that there is nothing but natural elements, principles, and relations of the kind studied by the natural sciences. Methodological naturalism is a philosophical basis for science, for which metaphysical naturalism provides only one possible ontological foundation. Broadly, the corresponding theological perspective is religious naturalism or spiritual naturalism. More specifically, metaphysical naturalism rejects the supernatural concepts and explanations that are part of many religions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Joseph Margolis</span> American philosopher (1924–2021)

Joseph Zalman Margolis was an American philosopher. A radical historicist, he authored many books critical of the central assumptions of Western philosophy, and elaborated a robust form of relativism.

Epistemology or theory of knowledge is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature and scope (limitations) of knowledge. It addresses the questions "What is knowledge?", "How is knowledge acquired?", "What do people know?", "How do we know what we know?", and "Why do we know what we know?". Much of the debate in this field has focused on analyzing the nature of knowledge and how it relates to similar notions such as truth, belief, and justification. It also deals with the means of production of knowledge, as well as skepticism about different knowledge claims.

Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that investigates principles of reality transcending those of any particular science. Cosmology and ontology are traditional branches of metaphysics. It is concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world. Someone who studies metaphysics can be called either a "metaphysician" or a "metaphysicist".

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to metaphysics:

Ethics is, in general terms, the study of right and wrong. It can look descriptively at moral behaviour and judgements; it can give practical advice, or it can analyse and theorise about the nature of morality and ethics.

In philosophy, a point of view is a specific attitude or manner through which a person thinks about something. This figurative usage of the expression dates back to 1730. In this meaning, the usage is synonymous with one of the meanings of the term perspective.

References

  1. ↑ Funk, Ken (21 March 2001). "What is a Worldview?" . Retrieved 10 December 2019.
  2. ↑ Palmer, Gary B. (1996). Toward A Theory of Cultural Linguistics. University of Texas Press. p. 114. ISBN   978-0-292-76569-6.
  3. ↑ "Online Etymology Dictionary". Etymonline.com. Retrieved 2 December 2019.
  4. ↑ "Weltanschauung – Definition of Weltanschauung by Merriam-Webster". Merriam-Webster. Retrieved 17 December 2019.
  5. ↑ "Worldview (philosophy) – Encyclopedia.com". Encyclopedia.com. 14 December 2019. Retrieved 17 December 2019.
  6. 1 2 Underhill, James W. (2009). Humboldt, Worldview and Language (Transferred to digital print. ed.). Edinburgh, Scotland: Edinburgh University Press. ISBN   978-0748638420.
  7. ↑ Hiebert, Paul G. (2008). Transforming Worldviews: an anthropological understanding of how people change. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Academic. p. 15. ISBN   978-0-8010-2705-5.
  8. 1 2 3 Whorf, Benjamin Lee (1964) [1st pub. 1956]. Carroll, John Bissell (ed.). Language, Thought, and Reality. Selected Writings of Benjamin Lee Whorf. Cambridge, Mass.: Technology Press of Massachusetts Institute of Technology. ISBN   978-0-262-73006-8. Pp. 25, 36, 29-30, 242, 248.
  9. ↑ Underhill, James W. (2011). Creating worldviews : metaphor, ideology and language. Edinburgh, Scotland: Edinburgh University Press. ISBN   978-0748679096.
  10. ↑ Underhill, James W. (2012). Ethnolinguistics and Cultural Concepts: truth, love, hate & war. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN   978-1107532847.
  11. ↑ See for example Daniel Hill and Randal Rauser: Christian Philosophy A–Z Edinburgh University Press (2006) ISBN   978-0-7486-2152-1 p200
  12. ↑ In the Christian tradition this goes back at least to Justin Martyr's Dialogues with Trypho, A Jew, and has roots in the debates recorded in the New Testament For a discussion of the long history of religious dialogue in India, see Amartya Sen's The Argumentative Indian
  13. ↑ Cognitive Relativism, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
  14. ↑ The problem of self-refutation is quite general. It arises whether truth is relativized to a framework of concepts, of beliefs, of standards, of practices.Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
  15. ↑ Pope Benedict warns against relativism
  16. ↑ Ratzinger, J. Relativism, the Central Problem for Faith Today
  17. ↑ Jøsang, Audun (21 November 2011). "A Logic For Uncertain Probabilities" (PDF). International Journal of Uncertainty, Fuzziness and Knowledge-Based Systems. 09 (3): 279–311. doi:10.1142/S0218488501000831.
  18. ↑ Ninian Smart Worldviews: Crosscultural Explorations of Human Beliefs (3rd Edition) ISBN   0-13-020980-5 p14
  19. ↑ Vidal, Clément (April 2012). "Metaphilosophical Criteria for Worldview Comparison". Metaphilosophy. 43 (3): 306–347. CiteSeerX   10.1.1.508.631 . doi:10.1111/j.1467-9973.2012.01749.x.
  20. ↑ Diederik Aerts, Leo Apostel, Bart de Moor, Staf Hellemans, Edel Maex, Hubert van Belle & Jan van der Veken (1994). "World views. From Fragmentation to Integration". VUB Press. Translation of Apostel and Van der Veken 1991 with some additions. – The basic book of World Views, from the Center Leo Apostel.[ page needed ]
  21. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Schimel, Jeff; Hayes, Joseph; Williams, Todd; Jahrig, Jesse (2007). "Is death really the worm at the core? Converging evidence that worldview threat increases death-thought accessibility". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 92 (5): 789–803. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.92.5.789. PMID   17484605.
  22. ↑ Goldenberg, Jamie L.; Cox, Cathy R.; Pyszczynski, Tom; Greenberg, Jeff; Solomon, Sheldon (November 2002). "Understanding human ambivalence about sex: The effects of stripping sex of meaning". Journal of Sex Research. 39 (4): 310–320. doi:10.1080/00224490209552155. PMID   12545414. S2CID   24419836.
  23. ↑ Indeed Kitaro's final book is Last Writings: Nothingness and the Religious Worldview
  24. ↑ David K. Naugle Worldview: The History of a Concept ISBN   0-8028-4761-7 page 4
  25. ↑ James W. Sire The Universe Next Door: A Basic World view Catalog pp. 15–16 (text readable at Amazon.com)
  26. ↑ Zayed, Tareq M. "History of emancipatory worldview of Muslim learners".{{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  27. ↑ Bell, David (2016). Superintelligence and World-views: Putting the Spotlight on Some Important Issues. Guildford, Surrey, UK: Grosvenor House Publishing Limited. ISBN   9781786237668. OCLC   962016344.[ page needed ]
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