It is essential that one not succumb to the fallacy of completeness in either of its guises–namely, either in the sense that one claims completeness with respect to evidences employed, or in the sense that one requires completeness in the use of evidence. Some degree of specialization is essential. The question is this, however: Has the specialized employment of evidences determined the omission of important areas of experience which may in fact be seasonally relevant in our period of cultural activity? To respond affirmatively to this question involves one in the criticism of the manner in which the inertial character of the past has overdetermined the nature of the cultural present.
David L. Hall
As I said before, I am not proclaiming the virtues of any one mode of perception over all others. I am only concerned that our society encourages us to ignore some of those modes.
David Lewin
"Music Theory, Phenomenology, and Modes of Perception"
reprinted in
Added December 9th:
The chief danger to philosophy is narrowness in the selection of evidence. This narrowness arises from the idiosyncrasies and timidities of particular authors, of particular social groups, of particular schools of thought, of epochs in the history of civilization. The evidence relied upon is arbitrarily biased by the temperaments of individuals, by the provincialities of groups, and by the limitations of schemes of thought.
For consciousness in post-industrial homo sapiens as a "reducing valve," see Robert Silverberg, "Dying Inside" (riffing on Aldous Huxley, "Heaven & Hell").
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