Historically, man has lived in small groups moving from one area to another hunting for his food or gathering it from trees and bushes. With the advent of agriculture man was able to generate surplus in the supply of food and expand the members of his group. In turn he was able to trade his production with other groups and their production.
The complexity of this interaction with environment and others gave rise to the formation of organized societies in a particular geographical location that in turn allowed groups of people to build cities and states. With the advent of industrial production man extended his life expectancy and portfolio of functional activity and started living in dense urban settings.
Cities and states are complicated systems of organized people to dwell together that require policies for a peaceful coexistence. This is where the forth branch of philosophy, politics and the forth branch of psychology, relationships intersect.
A policy is “a course or principle of action adopted or proposed by an organization or individual”. From Greek Politeia - citizenship, from politēs - citizen, from polis - city. And politics is “the activities associated with the governance of a country or area”.
Relationship is “the way in which two or more people or things are connected, or the state of being connected.” To relate is to “make or show a connection between” From Latin relat- “brought back”
At the core of any functional society is the institution of the family. It is through the interaction with parents and siblings that we first learn how to relate to others and how others relate to us. As we develop from infant to toddler, from a child to adolescent, to adult, we begin distinguishing policies for individual vs. collective behavior, personal vs. public relations, we develop appreciation for the freedom of production and act to achieve related values.
Metaphysically, the infant is reliant on his parents to survive, i.e., he is dependent on their ability to produce the food for him whenever he cries to indicate that he is hungry. Epistemologically, he is independent in his ability to identify when does he feel the pain and when does he feel well.
It will take long time before the child grows into an independent person, i.e., self-sufficient human being. Until then his individuality is formed by the way he interacts with people around him. It is on the basis of his accurate identification of the hunger pangs as communicated to his surroundings through crying, and on the basis of the accurate response on behalf of the people that surround him by providing food to satisfy his hunger, that moderates the dynamics responsible for the formation of individual character as related to the group and existence.
The successful interaction between infant, parents and environment will form a veridical character who can rely on his faculty of reason and depend on the faculty of reason of his parents, i.e., other people. Such bond will help the infant to grow into a self-sufficient individual, and view others as himself, i.e., self- sufficient members of the group.
As the infant grows he will discover that having hunger pangs is not specific only to him, but to others, too. His personal experience relate to how he feels, and the experience of others does not alter the body-state, nor his mind-state in identifying that he is hungry. Independent of what others, i.e., the public feels, his hunger or fullness, is directly related to his body, not the public corpus of bodies.
The realization that only he is responsible for the identification of whether or not he is hungry, is now augmented by the realization that no matter what other people say or do, his personal feelings are independent of theirs. In this sense he is better rooted at his individuality, and better suited to understand the individuality of others.
Knowing that his feelings count for his mind-state could easily be transcribed to others. This differentiation of feelings as personal and public mind-states is the foundation for his successful relationship with others. To survive he will have to project his feelings onto others, and in turn be able to read theirs.
The ability of a child to view himself as self-sufficient member of a group of like individuals gives rise to a free association with others. Until and unless a child shows metaphysically independent, in his basic function of survival characteristics, he may not take on the responsibility to produce for himself and others. To arrive at this juncture he normally waits to reach adolescence.
The production stage is the second critical period of development in human beings. The first being the development of the conceptual mechanism as expressed in the virtue of rationality. In this second stage of development the child is growing up to be an adolescent in his own right of productive genius. At this stage all basic function necessary for survival have been mastered. The child can feed himself, dress himself, seek shelter, and look after his wounds or cold. He is becoming an autonomous being.
In the freedom from dependence on others to provide for him, he now faces the responsibility to produce that which his survival requires. Every aspect of life becomes a potential value in his effort to integrate himself with the environment. His faculty of reason will guide him in the selection of the one in the many values he discovers in life. Just like seeing, hearing, smelling, touching and tasting was exciting to him as an infant, so now is the application of knowledge gained through reading, writing, arithmetic, history, science, and music.
The manifestation of maturity comes in the achievement of values driven by one’s volitional action. To do that the young adult must find inspiration to identify his values, he must select the value of his choice; find a source of motivation in the relentless pursuit of acting to achieve the value that will make him happy.
The link between action and achievement is reinforced by the realization of the young adult that his freedom is what gives rise to his ability to produce. The value of his choice must therefore be a valid representation of reality. The value he seeks to claim cannot take him back to dependence on others, as that will hinder the freedom status which gives him right to production.
To properly choose the values in his life the young adult has to assure his adherence to reality, i.e., his honesty as judged by his faculty of reason must be uncompromised: he has to pay attention to the fidelity of his thoughts to action, i.e., his integrity must not be undermined by dependence on others in his judgment of what is right and wrong; he must be independent: as an agent of justice to reality and society he must be selfish in his pursuit of values, i.e., he must know that something is of value to him, and for what: and lastly he must perceive the achievement of value as a source of celebration and boost to his self- esteem.
The link between politics and relationships as regarded as philosophical and psychological require a library of knowledge. It is one of the most intricate and challenging aspect of human development and requires much attention that I’d like to address as The One in the Many podcast charts the path of exploration and discovery.
The complexity and challenge arises from the advancement of modern human life. To withstand the insurmountable pressures of life we need to develop a sense of life supported by proportionately strong self-esteem.
In my next and final episode on the link between philosophy and psychology I’ll set the foundation for exploration between Esthetics and Sense-of-Life.