T.
T
Watercolor on paper - 49x32 cm
Mexico, 2022
This series is a step forward «The Bottom Line: a cartography of silence»
I remember having read about William James (1842-1910) in an article describing the intellectual background leading the great Nishida Kitaro to his «place of absolute nothingness». I hadn’t planned that his concept of “pure experience” would be one of the first notions I'd concretely interact with in this art project regarding History & Philosophy of science.
Considered as one of the founders of American philosophy and pragmatism, James seems to have been quite an original thinker. He isn't especially remembered for any fantastic quote or definitive judgment, but his corpus of writings in its whole (from physiology to psychology and philosophy) was to inspire great thinkers: Bertrand Russel, Husserl or Wittgenstein among the most famous.
Though, his concept of «pure experience» -as an intent to substitute/complete the notion of consciousness (which himself considered as deadly infected by the classical duality spirit/matter or physical/physical)- may have been a strong point of reference for the later development of German phenomenology.
His writings and original theories still reappear in our XXI century, since they are mentioned/questioned/discussed within the QBism approach of science (Quantum Bayesianism / an extension of the Copenhagen Interpretation), which aims to replace the subjective figure of the researcher in the center of the theory of knowledge in fundamental research in particle physics.
To be continued...