Significance of Domain Name (URL)
of the Union of the Whys
- / -
The web address of this site (the URL) is designed to challenge easy assumptions
about this initiative. Use of the prefix "un-" (www.un-whys.org)
may therefore be variously understood as:
- stressing the value of a contrarian approach by also implying the merit
of a "negative
capability",
in contrast to uncritical contemporary emphasis on "positive" approaches
-- thereby challenging:
- the wisdom of "conventional wisdom"
- the elitism and presumption typically implicit in
understandings of "wise"
- the unfruitful manner in
which questions of "why" may be raised and answered
- those acclaimed as wise as to why they are apparently so unwise
regarding their dysfunctional relationship with one another and their
seeming inability collectively to address the question
- highlighting the widespread challenge of the "unwise" in
a period when a pattern of more insightful responses -- whatever that may
mean -- may perhaps be one of the few possibilities of avoiding a range of
disasters
- recognizing the need for humility regarding ignorance and misunderstanding
in the face of what may subsequently be determined to be "wise" --
that may call for a new appreciation of ignorance as a source of wisdom
- introducing a healthy degree of self-mockery as a corrective to unfruitful
presumption
- pointing to the fundamental importance of the set of unasked questions,
why they remain unasked -- and why others remain unanswered
- provocatively implying that the initiative is in some way related to those
of the United Nations -- whether or not a United Nations of the future should
indeed be specifically associated with some such approach to wisdom
- implying a conventional static form of "union" -- when the intention
is rather to favour understandings of union as characterized by continuing
emergence from a dynamic process
An alternative URL (www.u-whys.org),
associated with this site, makes the point that in a very important sense it
is the individual who is the source of fruitfully wise questioning -- rather
than any collectivity of the "wise".
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