On Philosophical Synthesis

John Dewey; S. Radhakrishnan; George Santayana

Philosophy East and West, Vol. 1, No. 1. (Apr., 1951), pp. 3-5.

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Sat Sep 29 16:49:31 2007
On PhiZos~phicdLISynthesis

JOHN DEWEY

I THINK THAT THE MOST IMPORTANT

function your journal can perform in bringing about the ultimate objective
of a "substantial synthesis of East and West" is to help break down the notion
that there is such a thing as a "WestJ' and "East" that have to be synthesized.
There are great and fundamental differences in the East just as there are in
the West. The cultural matrix of China, Indonesia, Japan, India, and Asiatic
Russia is not a single "block affair. Nor is the cultural matrix of the West.
The differences between Latin and French and Germanic cultures on the
continent of Europe, and the differences between these and the culture of
England on the one hand and the culture of the United States on the other
(not to mention Canadian and Latin American differences), are extremely
important for an understanding of the West. Some of the elements in
Western cultures and Eastern cultures are so closely allied that the problem
of "synthesizing" them does not exist when they are taken in isolation. But
the point is that none of these elements-in the East or the West-is in
isolation. They are all interwoven in a vast variety of ways in the historico-
cultural process. The basic prerequisite for any fruitful development of
inter-cultural relations--of which philosophy is simply one constituent part-
is an understanding and appreciation of the complexities, differences, and
ramifying interrelationships both within any given country and among the
countries, East and West, whether taken separately or together.
What I have just said might at other times and under other circumstances
be considered so obvious as to be platitudinous. But at the present time
and in the present circumstances, I venture to think that it is far from being
such. Under the pressure of political blocs that are now being formed East
and West it is all too easy to think that there are cultural "blocks" of
corresponding orientation. To adapt a phrase of William James, there are
no "cultural block universes" and the hope of free men everywhere is to
prevent any such "cultural block universes" from ever arising and fixing
themselves upon all mankind or any portion of mankind. To the extent
that your journal can keep the idea open and working that there are "specific
philosophical relationships" to be explored in the West and in the East and
between the West and East you will, I think, be contributing most fruitfully
and dynamically to the enlightenment and betterment of the human estate.
On Phi/osophicd/ Synthesis . . .

S. RADHAKRISHNAN
HUMANLIFE IS A PART OF HISTORY, AND
the enterprise of philosophy which is a reflection on life is, to some extent,
conditioned by the historical environment. This fact has led to certain distinc-
tive developments in philosophy in India, China, and Greece. But the
fundamentals of human experience, which are the data for philosophical
reflection, are everywhere the same. The transitoriness of all things, the play
of chance, the emotions of love and hate, fear and jealousy, the continual
presence of death, the anxiety to overcome the corruptibility of things, to
enjoy the fleeting moment-these have determined for each man his life's
meaning and value.
If the Greek origins of European philosophy have made it more intel-
lectual, in the East the emphasis has been on the unrest of the soul rather
than on metaphysical curiosity. While the Western mind asks, What is it
all about? the Eastern asks, What must I do to be saved? The two questions,
metaphysical and spiritual, are interdependent, and no system of philosophy
can afford to neglect either.
In spite of difficulties of communication in the past, East and West met
on the plane of mind and spirit. What is happening today is the same his-
torical process but on a larger scale.
Between the philosophy of the Greeks and the religion of the Jews there
has been in Western thought a continual tension. It has been either a
dualism between the two or an unstable compromise. The enlargement of
thought now taking place gives to our age an opportunity to effect a creative
union of these two forces, spiritual quest and intellectual satisfaction. It
can take place deep down in man's life.
What we want is neither a conflict between East and West nor a mergence
of the two. Each will retain its integrated structure but acquire from the
other whatever is of value. By such a cross-fertilization of the two develop
ments we will develop a world perspective in philosophy, if not a world
philosophy. The intellectual and spiritual agitation which is sweeping over
us is the prelude to a world-wide spiritual renaissance, when human con-
sciousness will take a great stride forward.
On Phi/osophicd/Synthesis . . .

GEORGE SANTAYANA
1 HAVE A GREAT RESPECT FOR INDIAN
philosophy and for Buddhism and should like to believe that I share some
of their insights. . . . I have a notion which would perhaps run counter to the
spirit and purpose of your review, and therefore ought not to figure in it as
a regular contribution, but yet might perhaps appeal to some of your Asiatic
readers. You speak of "synthesis" between Eastern and Western philosophy:
but this could only be reached by blurring or emptying both systems in what
was clear and distinct in their results. Now in natural evolution it is not the
results that are alike. They grow diverse as they grow richer and more
perfect. What is similar, perhaps identical, in all things is their origin or
starting-point. If you dig inwards and downwards in any of them you very
likely will find the same thing. Isn't this what the Indians do when they
come to Brahman? And it has often seemed to me that some subjective
Western systems, those of Berkeley and Fichte especially, do come, in "spirit"
or "the transcendental Ego," to something that is perhaps the same thing.
If, however, you attempted to synthesize Berkeley's "spirit" in God or in
man with Fichte's transcendental Ego or with Brahman, you would distort
all three clean conceptions, for one is personal, the second moral or gram-
matical, and the third (if I am not mistaken) analytical. And, if you removed
the accidental background of Berkeley and Fichte, and dug down to what
they positively reached when they touched bottom in their introspection,
perhaps it would be just what the Indians call Brahman. This would not
"synthesize" Berkeley's human or divine "spirits," which were thinking per-
sons existing separately, or Fichte's "Ego," which was a moral force, with
Brahman, in whom all distinctions disappear. But perhaps it might reveal to
those Western idealists that the reality on which they fell back when they
dismissed appearances was not what their languages indicated by the words
"spirit" or "ego" but an absolute intensity or abyss which remained when all
particulars vanished, or were sucked in and made identical in a deep sleep.
From a literary or humanistic point of view I think that it is the wariety
and incomparability of systems, as of kinds of beauty, that make them
interesting, not any compromise or fusion that could be made of them.