Thirty-Seven

THE DOMAINS OF CULTURE

In a tradition that goes back to , three primary domains of culture exist: (1) theoria, (2) praxis, and (3) poiesis. Religio was adds a fourth domain. But the Greeks treated religion as a part of moral action, praxis. Reason plays a crucial role in all three domains. Theoria is recta ratio speculabilium—right reason about theoretical matters. Praxis is recta ratio agibilium—right reason about things we can do. Poiesis is recta ratio factibilium—right reason about things we can make. Poiesis considers making things. Traditionally, it includes the imitative arts, later called the fine arts, and industry, manual arts, servile arts, or craftsmanship. Other cognitive powers, such as the senses and imagination, and the emotions play an essential role in artistic creativity. Reason directs the creative process, but does not supplant the other faculties. If we understand this relationship between reason and the other faculties we can avoid falling into the traps of poetic intellectualism and irrationalism. The creative process is not the work of the intellect or senses alone. Many faculties work together under the guidance of reason to realize an idea or vision. Realization of such a vision is the aim of creative production. The aim of the fine arts is to delight the viewer. The aim in industry or craftsmanship is to achieve a proper functionality.1 Praxis includes the entire field of morality: (1) personal morality, which studies; (2) family morality, which economics studies; and (3) social morality, which studies. Ethics considers personal good. Economics considers familial good. Politics considers social good. Each field requires the proper direction of reason. But thought alone cannot replace actions the other faculties perform. Morality requires reason to acquire skill in finding effective and honest means to the end. Reason also shows the other faculties what is their proper measure. Justice is an acquired disposition of the will inclining the will to render another what is due. Fortitude and temperance are acquired emotional dispositions inclining us to hold to the so-called . In prudence reason must learn to direct us in matters of morality. In the other reason should show the other faculties where good and evil are, so we may seek good and avoid evil. God is the main point of reference in religion. When we perform acts of religion, we engage all our powers, inferior and superior, intellect and will, imagination, emotions, and senses. Since God is immaterial and infinite, our immaterial faculties (will and intellect) are central in religion. In the act of faith the will and the reason work together in different ways, depending upon which aspect of faith we emphasize. A unique problem because God is transcendent to us in terms of being and knowledge. While we may strongly engage and express 224 SCIENCE IN CULTURE our feelings, the act of faith finds its basis primarily in spiritual acts, not feelings. In view of God’s and our human , spirituality should be the basis for personal relations between us and God, because the spiritual sphere is characteristic of personal beings. From the formal viewpoint, faith is an act of the reason, which acknowledges the revealed truth as truth by of the will. As St. states, “[C]redere est actus intellectus, secundum quod movetur a voluntate ad assentiendum.” (“To believe is an intellectual act according to which the will moves the intellect to assent.”)2 Theoria takes in the whole sphere of knowledge called science. It is an acquired disposition and skill of reason to know the truth about reality for the sake of the truth. When, at the start, we reject truth as the end of theoretical knowledge, we virtually destroy this, and every other, domain of culture. While particular scientific disciplines may remain, they will belong to some other domain: praxis, poiesis, or religio; not to theoria. This has been the recurrent situation in the history of Western culture. When we subordinate science to ethics or politics, art or technology, religion or mythology, science departs from truth as its proper end, and presents a distorted picture of reality. Then appears a univocal conception of science conditioned by the particular field to which we subordinate science. This conception then serves to support a paradigm of science. And, in the name of the new paradigm, we start to reject formerly recognized sciences as unscientific, and we elevate other disciplines to take their place. If science does not belong to its own cultural domain and has no primary connection with truth, then, if it appears at all, it will bear a priori presuppositions from some other domain of culture and will have some end other than truth. If we develop science within the framework of theoria, we should understand science analogically, not univocally. Science is analogical because science’s object is analogical. Being, or reality, is the first object of scientific knowledge. Science is about knowing the truth about what is real. And reality is analogical. Knowledge, therefore, must be analogical if, indeed, it addresses reality. To know the truth for its own sake about being as being, about any of being’s categories, or some aspect of being, we must apply different methods of knowing fitted to a different material object (what we are studying) and a different formal object (the aspect we are studying). This analogical variety reflects being’s structure. Since we want to know truth for its own sake, we will know the truth about different categories of being in different ways. Scientific knowledge’s analogical character also reflects human knowl- edge’s varied modes. Human knowing is varied and works through cognitive powers that perform different functions. A crucial point, because our mode of knowledge is inadequate to the way things exist. All the more, variety can exist in scientific knowledge. While many types of scientific knowledge exist, we cannot suppose that no common definition of science exists or that we apply the designation of science