This is something of an addendum to the last post. I’ve been reading (and so far, thoroughly enjoying) James Pawelski’s analysis of William James’ philosophical standpoint. This phrase from the first chapter stood out:
[H]uman beings cannot be infinitely concrete. We can think universally only by thinking abstractly. If we want to think concretely, we must limit ourselves to a specific part of the whole.
In my last post I went a little hard on the virtues of specificity, but James makes a good point—really it is about the dance between the abstract and the concrete. Part of the game, to my mind, is figuring out which ‘parts of the whole’ are worth time and effort.