Meaning [Paperback]

Michael Polanyi (Author), Harry Prosch (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 15, 1977 | ISBN-10: 0226672956 | ISBN-13: 978-0226672953

Published very shortly before his death in February 1976, Meaning is the culmination of Michael Polanyi's philosophic endeavors. With the assistance of Harry Prosch, Polanyi goes beyond his earlier critique of scientific "objectivity" to investigate meaning as founded upon the imaginative and creative faculties.

Establishing that science is an inherently normative form of knowledge and that society gives meaning to science instead of being given the "truth" by science, Polanyi contends here that the foundation of meaning is the creative imagination. Largely through metaphorical expression in poetry, art, myth, and religion, the imagination is used to synthesize the otherwise chaotic and disparate elements of life. To Polanyi these integrations stand with those of science as equally valid modes of knowledge. He hopes this view of the foundation of meaning will restore validity to the traditional ideas that were undercut by modern science. Polanyi also outlines the general conditions of a free society that encourage varied approaches to truth, and includes an illuminating discussion of how to restore, to modern minds, the possibility for the acceptance of religion.

Product Details

• Paperback: 260 pages
• Publisher: University Of Chicago Press (January 15, 1977)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0226672956
• ISBN-13: 978-0226672953
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #595,214 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Intellectual Freedom, October 31, 2010

By 

J. Scott Shipman (Annandale, VA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Meaning (Paperback)

Polanyi offered an alternative take on his title for this small volume as "intellectual freedom." I believe this was Polanyi's last book, and he appeared to be tying up lose ends. I preferred the first half of the book to the second. In the first half he provides a quick but potent recap of "personal knowledge" (which for the curious, is a good synopsis of the Polanyi volume of the same title). In this chapter Polanyi sets up the triangle of tacit knowledge where the point of the triangle are subsidiary particulars, the knower, and the focal target.

In his chapter called "Reconstruction" Polanyi wrestles with the implications and barriers to the transfer of tacit knowledge. My favorite chapter was "From Perception to Metaphor." Polanyi correctly points out, "...our personal judgement is what it is because of the clues we dwell in, including, of course, the general views to which we are committed about the nature of things and the nature of knowledge. We ought, therefore, to adopt the kind of general views about the nature of things and the the nature of knowledge that will not prevent our belief in the reality of those coherences that we do, in fact, see." (From the supposition that perception is reality.) In this chapter, Polanyi emphasizes the importance of words in the integration of new ideas, and this chapter finds the author presenting a formula of sorts to describe how we "integrate" new ideas by identifying subsidiaries and their relationship(s) to focal meaning.

The second half of the book is very good, but it held little interest compared to the mechanistic first half. The closing chapter on Freedom has a "preachy" tone, but it is not objectionable; Polanyi makes no mystery of his reliance on his Faith.

This volume is recommended, however for those curious about Polanyi, start with The Tacit Dimension, and move to Personal Knowledge (I have not read Knowing and Being, but I have been told it is very good.).