The dynamics of change in scientific and philosophic thinking is
not independent of the underlying structure of the pragmatics
that leads to the civilization of illiteracy. Both involve
rationality, which connects human practical experiences to
consistent inferences (sometimes seen as logical conclusion)
and to the ability to predict events (in nature or society),
even to influence and control them. Rationality is connected to
efficiency insofar as it is applied in the selection of means
appropriate to accomplishing goals; or it serves as an
instrument for evaluation of the premises leading to a selected
course of action. In short, rationality is goal oriented. Reason,
in turn, is value oriented; it guides practical experiences of
human self-constitution in the direction of appropriateness.
Rationality and reason are interconditioned. Right and wrong,
good and bad, are the axes along which human action and emotion
can be diagrammed in the matrix of living and working that they
constituted under the guise of literacy.
The process through which human rationality and reason become
characteristics of human self-constitution is long and tortuous.
People defining themselves in different pragmatic contexts enter
into a network of interdependency. At a very small scale of
human existence and activity, rationality and reason were
indistinguishable. They began to differentiate early on, already
during hunting and gathering. But during the long experience of
settlement and taking care of plants and animals, they grew aware
of the distinction between what they were doing and how. With the
culture of artifacts, to which tools belong, reason and
rationality took separate paths. With the advent of science, in
its most primitive forms, documented in ancient China, Egypt,
India, and Greece, rationality and reason often conflicted.
Things can be right, without being good at the same time. There
is a rationality-goal oriented: how to get more goods, how to
avoid losses-with the appearance of reason-actions to please
forces supposed to control nature or matter. Parallel to
science, magic manifested itself through alchemy, astrology, and
numerology, all focused on the attempt to harmonize human beings,
constituted in practical experiences focused on goodness, with
the world housing them. In some cultures, rationality resulted
in the propensity to face, change, and eventually dominate
nature-that is, to submit the environment to a desired order.
Reason aimed at finding practical grounds for harmony with
nature.
After the phase of orality, writing served both of them equally.
It made language a mold for new experiences, a container for
storing knowledge, and an effective means for the practical
experience of evaluation and self-evaluation. The overwhelming
majority of human accomplishments leading to the possibility and
necessity of literacy were connected to the experience of human
self-constitution in writing. The science and philosophy upon
which the scientific revolution and the revival of humanities (in
particular philosophy) of the 16th and 17th centuries took place
are deeply rooted in the pragmatics that made writing necessary.
This revolution is usually summarized through three main
accomplishments. First: a new picture of the universe,
scientifically expressed in heliocentric astronomy and
philosophically a turning point in understanding the role of the
human being in this world. Second: the mathematical description
of motion. Third: the new conceptual framework of mechanics. As
impressive as they are, their meaning is revealed in the fact
that the Industrial Revolution was actually triggered by the
scientific and humanistic renewal embodied in these
accomplishments. The change from an agrarian economy,
appropriate to a relatively reduced scale of population and
work, to industrial production changed efficiency by orders of
magnitude corresponding to those of the critical mass reached
by humankind. All the characteristics of this new
pragmatics-sequentiality, linearity, centralism, determinism
(mechanical in nature), clear-cut distinctions,
interdependencies-contributed to the establishment of literacy.