An Integrative Habit of Mind

John Henry Newman on the Path to Wisdom

Frederick D. Aquino

• Editore: Northern Illinois University Press
• Anno: 2012
• ISBN:
  9781609090531
• Argomento: Philosophy
• Categoria: Mind & Body in Philosophy

Searching for better ways to inspire people to pursue wisdom, Frederick D. Aquino argues that teachers and researchers should focus less on state-of-the-art techniques and learning outcomes and instead pay more attention to the intellectual formation of their students. We should, Aquino contends, encourage the development of an integrative habit of mind, which entails cultivating the capacity to grasp how various pieces of data and areas of inquiry fit together and to understand how to apply this information to new situations.

To fully explore this notion, An Integrative Habit of Mind brings the work of the great religious figure and educator John Henry Newman into fruitful conversation with recent philosophical developments in epistemology, cognition, and education. Aquino unearths some crucial but neglected themes from Newman's writings and carries them forward into the contemporary context, revealing how his ideas can help us broaden our horizons, render apt judgments, and better understand our world and how we think about it.

© 2012 by Northern Illinois University Press

Published by the Northern Illinois University Press, DeKalb, Illinois 60115

Manufactured in the United States using acid-free paper.

All Rights Reserved.

Design by Julia Fauci

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Aquino, Frederick D., 1963–

An integrative habit of mind: John Henry Newman on the path to wisdom / Frederick D. Aquino.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.

ISBN 978-0-87580-452-1 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-60909-053-1 (e-book)

1. Newman, John Henry, 1801–1890. 2. Knowledge, Theory of. 3. Cognition. 4. Education—Philosophy. I. Title.

BX4705.N5A765 2012

230’.2092—dc23

2011045835

For Michelle, David, and Elizabeth

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

1—Broadening Horizons

2—A Matter of Proper Fit

3—A Connected View

Afterword

Notes to Introduction

Notes to Chapter One

Notes to Chapter Two

Notes to Chapter Three

References

Index

Acknowledgments

Some of this material has been delivered at Oxford University, The Catholic University of Leuven, The World Universities Forum (Davos, Switzerland), The American Catholic Philosophical Association, Baylor University, The University of Dallas, and McNeese State University. Moreover, some parts of the book are derived from previously published work. Portions of chapter 1 draw from and develop material in my articles, “Thick and Thin: Personal and Communal Dimensions of Communicating Faith,” in Communicating Faith, ed. John Sullivan (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2010), 199–213, and “Broadening Horizons: Constructing an Epistemology of Religious Belief,” Louvain Studies 30.3 (2005): 198–213. Chapter 2 is a significant revision and expansion of “Externalism and Internalism: A Newman Matter of Proper Fit,” Heythrop Journal 51 (2010): 1023–1034. I thank the publishers, especially the Trustees for Roman Catholic Purposes Registered and Blackwell Publishing, for permission to use these materials.

Colleagues, students, and friends have read or discussed parts of this book. Over the course of writing and revising this book, I have benefited from the discussions, comments, suggestions, and critical observations of Michelle Aquino, Edward Enright, John Ford, Michael Paul Gallagher, John Groppe, Ben King, Carson Leverett, David Mahfood, Terrence Merrigan, Paul Morris, Derek Neve, John Sullivan, and Adrian Woods. Professors William Abraham of Southern Methodist University and Mark McIntosh of Durham University have offered critical and helpful feedback on the entire manuscript.

I thank my graduate assistants David Mahfood and Carson Leverett for their assistance in finalizing the text. Both offered invaluable editorial insights. I am also grateful to Amy Farranto, Pippa Letsky, and Susan Bean for their help in preparing the manuscript for publication. They have been wonderful and first-rate editors. The book has been improved because of their remarks.

Last, I thank my family—my wife, Michelle; my son, David; and my daughter, Elizabeth—for their patience, support, and love, without which I could not have completed this book and for whom this book is dedicated. They have taught me, in concrete ways, about the importance and challenge of forming an integrative habit of mind.

Introduction

“Usually people look at you when they’re talking to you. I know that they’re working out what I’m thinking, but I can’t tell what they’re thinking. It is like being in a room with a one-way mirror in a spy film.”

—Mark Haddon, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

“The goal of philosophy is always the same, to assist men to understand themselves and thus operate in the open, and not wildly, in the dark.”

—Isaiah Berlin, The Power of Ideas

In this book, my intention is to connect John Henry Newman’s thought with recent work in epistemology, philosophy of cognition, and philosophy of education. As I intend to show, an integrative habit of mind—the capacity to see how things fit together in light of one another and how an understanding of this sort relates to the situation at hand—serves as the underlying concept for my approach to and appropriation of particular issues in these areas. In addition, I offer some preliminary suggestions about how the cultivation of an integrative habit of mind shapes the pursuit of wisdom. I say “preliminary” because I do not attempt to flesh out a full-blown theory of wisdom, nor do I try to furnish a comprehensive definition of wisdom. Rather, I unearth and develop themes from select texts in the corpus of Newman’s writings and thereby argue that forming, sustaining, and embodying an integrative habit of mind is fundamental to the pursuit of wisdom.

Accordingly, I structure this introduction in the following way. In the first section, I unpack what an integrative habit of mind entails, especially in terms of its intellectual, social, and communal aspects. In the second section, I clarify how select texts in the corpus of Newman’s writings figure into the threefold structure of this book (chapters 1–3). In the third section, I explain how the recent discussion about broadening the desiderata (aims, features, and goals) of epistemology informs my rereading of Newman, particularly my emphasis on the evaluative qualities of the cognitive agent. In the fourth section, I provide a brief narrative about recent appropriations of Newman’s work and then locate my constructive link between an integrative habit of mind and wisdom within this new line of investigation.

Forming an Integrative Habit of Mind

An integrative habit of mind entails a stable disposition and a capacity to grasp how various pieces of data and areas of inquiry fit together in light of one another, thereby acquiring a more comprehensive understanding of the issue at hand. It also entails deciphering how this kind of understanding applies to a given situation. However, the process of cultivating an integrative habit of mind requires appropriate levels of training, reflection, and the courage to engage and learn from a circle of interlocutors. In other words, people who desire to form an integrative habit of mind engage in practices such as conducting thorough inquiries, carefully scrutinizing evidence and arguments, investigating numerous fields of study, considering alternative explanations, and giving, receiving, and responding to criticism.

Cultivating an integrative habit...