I'd like to offer a different view to this discussion. Most of the people who have contributed so far say that they are not religious, for the most part. I, however, am deeply religious. In my opinion, Cartesian logic has led our society in a way that is necessary. We make all of our day to day decisions based on this logic and the reason our society has had so much success is because of this Cartesian logic. I would in no way say that logic is a mistake or a fault of our civilization because we would be nowhere without it. However, I do believe that our society has made the mistake of making it the ONLY way to see truth.
Anne Fausto-Sterling, coming from such a wide variety of backgrounds, recognizes this. Although science has led us to great heights, it cannot be the only way to know things. Why do we have to fit people into the two categories that we as logical humans have created when there is such a variety of natural humans that just don't fit. Why cant Blessed Theresa bleed out of her hands like Jesus did? The trouble with asking these questions is that we cannot find an answer that will satisfy our Cartesian minds because the answer may perhaps lie outside of the realm of logic.
National Geographic, Pinker, Descartes, all try to find solutions to these unexplainable things within the system of logic. If the answer is not attainable this way, we make it up or label it as an odd phenomenon and put it in a box for later study when we have the technology or whatever to figure out the logical reason. Even if we make a step towards less-Cartesian thinking, we cannot as humans escape from it. Now instead of 2 genders, there's 6. We a have a more complicated system of organizing genders, but a system just the same. As humans were confined to this.
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I think that it is interesting the way that we Fausto-Sterling suggests the idea of 6 genders. One thing that I found unclear, however, was if she suggested that there were six different sexes as will. In the early pages of her book she talks about the differences between sex and gender, and how we as a society have linked them to similar roots. In reality, they are different entities and the things that make up the "gender-sex dualism." I agree with you in that it is interesting that by saying there are 6 genders, we are only further classifying something that we do not understand in order to "Cartesianize" every aspect of our life that we come across. Maybe some day there will be more than two options to check in the male/female box on informational forms to be filled out. This may be the next big wave of a "rights or awareness" movement.
ReplyDeleteI think that while breaking down current categories into more smaller ones may complicate things as you said, I think that it is necessary to understanding the world we live in and this continuation of Cartesianism will, also like you said, never stop. On a side note, I find it interesting that Descartes got his name associated with logical thinking as he can't have been the first guy to use reasoning to come to a conclusion about the world, but maybe the first guy to classify that type of thinking.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed your post Alena, mostly because I agree. Without logic, there would be complete chaos, but logic as also led to boundaries. It is true that for every cause there is an effect. We know that, but the part we cannot quite seem to grasp is not knowing one of the two.
ReplyDeleteLauren Daggett
Logic is very useful, and I believe essential to science. However, the scientific procedure we are all used to is better at making observations than it is at conclusions. We have come to the point where we must look outside of the boundaries that "hard science" imposes. However, I do not think it means we must resign ourseleves to settling for supernatural explanations for things like blessed Theresa. To do so implies that we have given up an finding an explanation that certainly exists.
ReplyDeleteAlena's voice is really needed. It's easy to take the reason side (Thanks Rene), but harder to take the faith side.
ReplyDeleteAnd Teresa certainly CAN bleed as a manifestation of God. It's just hard for many of us to accept it in this age.