Thanks, Jack, for the lengthy elucication of a how a construcivist
might appropriately approach the question of REALITY. I would like to say, "I
couldn't have said it better, myself!!!"
Very, very useful.
I find myself especially sympathetic with the three paragraphs which
begin with the sentence,
"Even if our current hypotheses are of indeterminate validity in terms
or their degree of correspondence with an independent reality underlying
events, . . . . . . etc." and then ending with
"He claims that they should be evaluated in terms of their basic
function, which, according to his 'fundamental postulate,' is anticipation, or
if you prefer, 'temporal projection."
I gather, from the form of your post, that this represents a part or a
published paper. Did I miss this somewhere, or is this not yet published? If
it has been published, could you give us the reference.
By the way. . . . Michael, if one reads Jack's posting with an eye to
thinking about "utility" as a means of VERIFICATION, one could conclude that
"utility" refers only to the individual's ability to anticipate. Thus,
if we think about your example of the Brazilian cultural group, we would want
to know if they have a construction of "cure" that matches ours. That is, as
you note, the assessment of their construct system relative to their ability to
anticipate "cure," would depend on their concstruction of "cure." WE would
need to be cautious about assessing the utility of a disease related construct
system in terms of checking out its TRUTH by assessing the extent to which the
construct allows regulation of "cure" -- in our terms.
Any reaction???
Jim Mancuso
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