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| Law-Spheres (ie Aspects) are temporal refractions of the fullness of Time and of the fullness of Meaning. |
SPARKLING CRYSTAL OF THE TEMPORAL WORLD
It is the very nature of theoretical thought itself, in distinction from the prescientific mode of thinking, that forces the transcendental basic problem upon the critical attitude of thought. The basic problem of philosophy in its above formulation is not an arbitrary construction of mine. On the contrary, it is imposed on us by the nature of the theoretical attitude of thought itself. For wherein lies the distinction between this attitude, which is inherent in all scientific activity as such, and the pretheoretical or non-scientific attitude? Without question, this distinction lies in its character of placing itself in opposition to, or taking distance from, its field of investigation. But what does this mean?
Theoretical thought, insofar as it is placed opposite its fields of inquiry as its logical correlates, is undoubtedly logical in character. In this theoretical function it moves within the logical aspect of reality, an aspect which we can provisionally define as that of analytical distinction (or distinctness). There are, however, numerous other aspects of reality. These include the aspects of quantity (number), space, motion, organic life, and feeling; also the historical aspect, the lingual aspect, the aspect of social interaction, and the economic, aesthetic, jural, ethical, and faith aspects. None of these remaining aspects is intrinsically logical (analytical) in character.
Now, the theoretical attitude of thought demands above all that these aspects be logically separated or held apart in logical analysis or dissection. When temporal reality is theoretically pried asunder in this way into the diversity of its aspects, the non-logical aspects are necessarily placed in opposition to the logical aspect. As the German language succinctly expresses this, they enter into a Gegenstand relation to the logical aspect of thought. In the theoretical attitude, therefore, the logical function of thought is set in opposition to the non-logical aspects, which form its fields of investigation. […]
In the pre-theoretical, non-scientific attitude of thought, the attitude of so-called naive experience, the situation is entirely different. In naive experience, too, we are clearly aware of the distinct aspects of reality. We perceive a quantity or number of branches and leaves on a tree. We notice its spatial shapes and its movements. We observe that it lives. We see its sensible qualities, such as its colors and its sensible shape. We know of the logical features that distinguish it from other things. We also are conscious of its cultural properties, its name, its value in social life, its economic and aesthetic qualities, and so on.
Yet the logical function of our thought here does not adopt a theoretical distance in opposition to the non-logical aspects. It does not pry reality asunder, but rather takes its stand completely within reality. The non-logical aspects are not experienced explicitly here, that is, as discrete functions that stand opposed to the logical aspect of thought. On the contrary, our experience of them is implicit, for they are encountered together, in an indissoluble coherence with the logical thought aspect, as inherent factors of individual totalities (concrete things, concrete events, concrete people, concrete acts, concrete societal relationships in state, church, business, school, family, etc.).
There can be no doubt that naive experience alone perceives reality in the structure in which it presents itself. Its attitude of thought remains completely immersed in that reality. The theoretical dissection that reality undergoes in the Gegenstand relation does not really pry it asunder. Reality itself remains intact and integral. The logical aspect remains embedded in the unbreakable coherence of the aspects, as one of the many facets displayed by the sparkling crystal of the temporal world. It is only within our theoretical consciousness that we perform the artful trick which may be compared to the slicing apart of a whole fruit into distinct pieces.
Thus, the theoretical Gegenstand relation does not show us reality as it is; it rather presents it as it has been artificially dissected or pried asunder. For this reason, it can only have existence within the non-dissected structure of temporal reality. This means that the theoretical Gegenstand relation is not primary, but only secondary. It is the product of a theoretical analysis, in which something essential is abstracted from the structure of reality as this is given in naive experience. In other words, it is produced by theoretical abstraction.
(Extract from REFORMATION AND SCHOLASTICISM IN PHILOSOPHY – VOLUME II pp 97-98) [Free PDF download of this book available HERE]
Moreover…
DOOYEWEERD: THE FALL AND COMMON GRACE
Whoever holds that the original creational ordinances are unrecognisable for fallen humankind because they were supposedly fundamentally altered by the advent of sin, essentially ends up denying the true significance of God’s common grace which maintains these ordinances. Sin did not change the creational decrees but the direction of the human heart, which turned away from its Creator. Undoubtedly, this radical fall impacts the way in which humankind discloses the powers that God enclosed in creation. The fall affects natural phenomena, which humankind can no longer control. It impacts itself in theoretical thought led by an idolatrous ground-motive. It appears in the subjective way in which humankind gives form to the principles established by God in his creation as norms for human action. The fall made special institutions necessary, such as the state and the church in its institutional form. But even these special institutions of general and special grace are based upon the ordinances that God established in his creation order. Neither the structures of the various aspects of reality, nor the structures that determine the nature of concrete creatures, nor the principles which serve as norms for human action, were altered by the fall. A denial of this leads to the unscriptural conclusion that the fall is as broad as creation; i.e., that the fall destroyed the very nature of creation. This would mean that sin plays a self-determining, autonomous role over against God, the creator of all. Whoever maintains such a position denies the absolute sovereignty of God and grants Satan a power equal to that of the Origin of all things. (Herman Dooyeweerd, Roots of Western Culture, pp 59, 60)
