--- abstract: 'Is there such a thing as a philosophical method? It seems that there are as many philosophical methods as there are philosophies. A method is any procedure employed to achieve a certain aim. So, before proposing a method, we have to tackle the delicate question: “what is the aim of philosophy?”. At the origin of philosophy, there is a questioning about the world. The worldview approach developed by Leo Apostel (Apostel, Van der Veken 1991) elegantly explicit those fundamental questions. As we answer them, we come up with a worldview. Using this framework, this paper consider answering this enduring philosophical agenda as the primary aim of philosophy. However, we argue that philosophical worldviews constitute a particular class of possible worldviews. With the help of three analogies, we give guidelines to construct such worldviews. The next step is to compare the relative strength of philosophical worldviews. Precise evaluation standards to compare and confront worldviews are proposed. Some problems for worldview diffusion are then expounded. We close with basic hypotheses to build an integrative philosophical worldview. ' altloc: - http://ecco.vub.ac.be/~clement/vidal2007-wp.pdf chapter: ~ commentary: ~ commref: ~ confdates: ~ conference: ~ confloc: ~ contact_email: ~ creators_id: [] creators_name: - family: Vidal given: Clément honourific: '' lineage: '' date: 2007-02 date_type: published datestamp: 2007-05-28 department: ~ dir: disk0/00/00/55/50 edit_lock_since: ~ edit_lock_until: ~ edit_lock_user: ~ editors_id: [] editors_name: [] eprint_status: archive eprintid: 5550 fileinfo: /style/images/fileicons/application_pdf.png;/5550/1/vidal2007%2Dwp.pdf full_text_status: public importid: ~ institution: ~ isbn: ~ ispublished: ~ issn: ~ item_issues_comment: [] item_issues_count: 0 item_issues_description: [] item_issues_id: [] item_issues_reported_by: [] item_issues_resolved_by: [] item_issues_status: [] item_issues_timestamp: [] item_issues_type: [] keywords: 'metaphilosophy, worldview, weltanschauung, philosophical method, philosophical agenda, task of philosophy, systematic philosophy, speculative philosophy. ' lastmod: 2011-03-11 08:56:51 latitude: ~ longitude: ~ metadata_visibility: no_search note: Comments welcome! number: ~ pagerange: ~ pubdom: FALSE publication: ~ publisher: ~ refereed: FALSE referencetext: |- Apostel, L., Van der Veken, J. (1991) Wereldbeelden, DNB/Pelckmans. Translated with some additions in (Aerts et al.1994). Pagination refers to the English translation. Aerts D., Apostel L., De Moor B., Hellemans S., Maex E., Van Belle H., Van der Veken J. (1994) World views. From fragmentation to integration. VUB Press. http://www.vub.ac.be/CLEA/pub/books/worldviews.pdf Bahm, A. (1979) The Philosopher's World Model, Greenwood Press. Broad (1924) Critical and Speculative Philosophy, in Contemporary British Philosophy: Personal Statements (First Series), ed. J. H. Muirhead (London: G. Allen and Unwin, 1924): 77-100. Broad, C.D. (1947) Some methods of speculative philosophy. Aristotelian Society Supplement 21, p1- 32. http://www.ditext.com/broad/smsp.html Broad, C.D. (1958) Philosophy, Inquiry I, p99-129.http://www.ditext.com/broad/philo.html Carnap, R., Neurath, O., Hahn, H. (1929) Wissenschaftliche Weltauffassung der Wiener Kreis, Vienna : A. Wolf. Descartes, R., (1637) Discours de la Méthode. Vrin, 2002. Durkheim, E. (1893) The Division of Labor in Society. The Free Press, New York.Translated by George Simpson (1984). Elchardus M. (ed.) (1998) Wantrouwen en Onbehagen, VUB Press, Brussels. Gershenson, C. (2007) Design and Control of Self- organizing Systems, PhD Thesis, VUB, Brussels. http://ecco.vub.ac.be/~carlos/thesis.pdf Heylighen F. (1997) Objective, subjective and intersubjective selectors of knowledge, Evolution and Cognition 3:1, p. 63-67. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/Papers/KnowledgeSelectors.pdf Heylighen, F. (2000): "World View", in: F. Heylighen, C. Joslyn and V. Turchin (editors): Principia Cybernetica Web (Principia Cybernetica, Brussels), http://cleamc11.vub.ac.be/WORLVIEW.html Heylighen F., Bernheim J. (2000) Global Progress I: empirical evidence for increasing quality of life, Journal of Happiness Studies 1 (3), p. 323-349. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/Papers/ProgressI&II.pdf Joslyn C., Heylighen F. & Turchin V. (1993): “Synopsys of the Principia Cybernetica Project”, in: Proc. 13th Int. Congress on Cybernetics (Association Internationale de Cybernetique, Namur), p.509. http://pcp.vub.ac.be Kant, E. (1781) Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Echo Library, ed 2006. Kant, E. (1788) Kritik der praktischen Vernunft. Walter de Gruyter 1968. Körner, S. (1969) Fundamental Questions of Philosophy. One philosopher's answers. 4th edition, Redwood Burn Limited. Myers, D. G. (1993), The Pursuit of Happiness (Avon Books) Naugle D. K., (2002) Worldview: The History of a Concept. Eerdmans Newell A., Simon H.A. (1972) Human Problem Solving, (Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs). Passmore, J. (1967) Philosophy entry, p. 216-226. The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, P. Edwards (ed.), Macmillan, London. Pascal, B. (1670) Pensées, fragment 233 in the L. Brunschvicg edition. Polya, G. (1957) How to Solve It, 2nd ed., Princeton University Press. Popper (1958) On the Status of Science and of Metaphysics Ratio, 1, No. 2, pp. 97-115. in: Conjectures and Refutations. The Growth of Scientific Knowledge (5th edition, revised; London & New York: Routledge, 1989), 184-200. Rescher, N. (2001) Philosophical Reasoning. A Study in the Methodology of Philosophizing. Blackwell publishers. Ricoeur (1979) (reporter). Main Trends in Philosophy. Holmes & Meier. Russell, R. J. (1988) (editor) Physics, Philosophy, and Theology: A Common Quest for Understanding. Vatican Observatory. Shackel, N. (2005) The Vacuity of Postmodernist Methodology, Metaphilosophy, 36, 3, 295-320. Stewart, J. (2000) Evolution's Arrow: The direction of evolution and the future of humanity, Chapman Press, Canberra. von Bertalanfy, L. (1968): General Systems Theory, (Braziller, New York). Wang, H. (1986) Beyond Analytic Philosophy, MIT, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Wolters, A. M. (1989) “On the Idea of Worldview and Its Relation to Philosophy.”In Stained Glass: Worldviews and Social Science. Christian Studies Today, edited by Paul A. Marshall, Sander Griffioen, and Richard J. Mouw, 14-25. Lanham, MD: University Press of America. relation_type: [] relation_uri: [] reportno: ~ rev_number: 13 series: ~ source: ~ status_changed: 2007-09-12 17:10:40 subjects: - phil-metaphys succeeds: 5408 suggestions: ~ sword_depositor: ~ sword_slug: ~ thesistype: ~ title: "An Enduring Philosophical Agenda. Worldview Construction as a Philosophical Method\n" type: preprint userid: 6933 volume: ~