Friday, January 7, 2011

What Questions Do You Ask?

I like to ask questions. Sometimes I try to connect answers to different questions, but this is not my subject today. The subject is do you ask questions? If so, what kind of questions? Questions reveal something about how we think and what we think is important.

What questions are factual and practical questions. What happened.? What can be done? What purpose does it serve?

How questions are investigative questions. How did this happen? How do we understand this? How do we fix this?

Why questions are causal/motivational questions. Why do you think this happened? Why do you think this is important? Why are you pursuing this course of action? These questions are questions of value and they reveal sometimes how a person thinks about 'life" and its overall "frame".

A naturalist frame understands what happened as a matter of course. But, sometimes "the course" is not completely understood, yet. This is where scientists, social scientists, help us to understand. This framing's "cause' is nature (man and his environment). These subjects help man to understand what is 'fact" about nature, but it doesn't address what to do with nature. It only reveals "what nature is" or how "nature works".

But, what of the humanities? Where do these fit into the questions abuot life? They fit by helping us to understand the "human", and "life", and "value". The answers to "life" is found in literature and other artistic expression. These are valuable to enlarge man's heart, reveal man's common experience, and suggest alternative views about "life".

I almost never read novels. I much prefer philosophical, thematic themes...possibly because it helps me answer questions.
Questions are important, as they help us to formulate our understanding and help us to frame our lives with the values that are most important to us.

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