Hi Kevin, 11/22/2011 4:53:07 A.M. Pacific Standard Time, [email protected] writes: > I am trying to understand how to you balance ideology with pragmatism. > Brooks speaks to this issue in a way this morning:
We marry them. I see Radical Centrism as ideological pragmatism, or militantly pragmatic idealism. Yes, it is a paradox, but it works pretty well. Ideals are critical, or you have no anchor for either your reasoning or your measurement. Happiness is *a* useful measure, but hardly the only same. Same with liberty, or community, or even rationality. The best way forward is to choose a broad bundle of metrics that are important to many people, then empirically determine which ideals *in practice* (not just in theory) are capable for simultaneously maximizing most of them. When I did this exercise, I came up with my Ground Rules of Civil Society, which focused on four values: * Reality * Character * Community * Humility http://radicalcentrism.org/manifesto/ There's room for more detail, and there may be something important I'm leaving out, but I find that simply requiring theories to acknowledge all four components cuts out at least 90% of the BS. - Ernie P. -- Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community <[email protected]> Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org
