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  • Interestingly, Michael Eneyo captured your view and intention. Lets continue to watch as the course evolve.
    All I know is we are making effort to develop and announce this course.
    I am trying to understand that to narrow this course down a sharp distinction should be made to avoid agglomeration of ideas which will lead to misrepresentation of peoples effort.
    Having studied Fearism/Fearology closely, I think we ought to have:
    - The Fearlessness school of thought (Fisher) and
    - Situational Fear school of thought (Desh).
    Both of you have different views about fear. And Fisher appears to me as a researcher and teacher of fear while Desh is a natural fearologist.
    This blending is an aid for Fearism development.
    When I read the Philosophy of Fearism authored by you both, I was laughing. I observed that you both were careful not to offend the other as question became an answer to a question. But then it was interesting but both of you were closed up totally and wasn't academically free.
    For example, if we are to write on a dialogue on Fearism, which three of use participates in, a clearer view about a thing should be given, instead of an open ended answer. That aside.
    One of the best thing that has happened to me is meeting you elders. I love and respect you all.
  • Michael Eneyo Philosophy of Fearism is a coinage by Desh Subba in an attempt to build a new philosophical system that explains how development and all forms of growth strive.

    In this new paradigm, Subba tries to analysis the concept "fear" in a positive perspective to x- ray how fear can be said to be the only motivating factor of human actions as well as in actions.

    Granted that every philosophical system is without its ambivalences and weaknesses, Subba's postulation still have some cases to answer in the epistemological court.

    If fear is the reason for all actions toward self realization and growth, then fear ought to have been looked at from its positive and negative horizon. Unless that, philosophy being unfinished quest for reality, Subba wishes other philosophers to look at fear in its negative view point too, while he concentrate on the positive side.

    How can we explain the scenario where a person takes his life for fear of being jailed. And a person for the fear of poverty steals to become rich?

    Philosophy of Fearism should be directed toward addressing all problems associated with humanity in both negative and positive ways, and then insists human person should always allow themselves to be driven by those actions of fear that will generate positive results for the overall interest of humanity.

    Apart from the many branches of fear therefore, fear in this context should be categorized into two broad types: positive and negative fear. Until then, philosophy of Fearism would be making frequent appearances in the epistemological court.

  • This sounds interesting. It is always a saying here in Africa that, "what an elder sees sitting, even if you a child climb an iroko tree, he won't see it". It's interesting also that am dinning with academic elders with intellectual maturity. However, what I want us to note is that, language is very important and how we play the game matters (cf Wittgenstein TLP). Philosophy of language helps me to understand that there is always something known as"Naming and Necessity" and most time, the reference and referent is difficult to sort when you play hard language game. When we adopt a concept, we need to consider the readers operation of the mind at first contact- what comes into play before research. It is to early for us to situate it on our own but having in mind it is a new academic milieu isn't bad. Some academic discipline came to be through accidental becoming (cf philosophy and existentialism).
    I appreciate your recommendation R. Michael Fisher, but then, as we sort this, we still have a lot to put into place before we start dying one by one. We don't have all the time to start chasing accidents instead of substance.
  • Kalu,

    Thanks for your challenges and may we all keep thinking of these issues. I know that Desh has also more or less over the years resisted trying to fit "Fearism" (or "philosophy of Fearism") into a particular tradition, or camp, or school of philosophy and its history. You, Kalu, have the same concern. At least that is how I understand your comment below. This will no doubt be contentious and an ongoing dialogue that will make Fearism healthier in the end. I agree with you we need to watch carefully for our own contradictions, not that they are a problem itself, but that we consciously transform them on going, they will always arise, is likely the case. We can work with them rather than become rigid and ideological in their defense. I think that is good philosophy. 

    Now to your point about "Our business shouldn't really be what people think of it but what we want it to become" is a good phrase and positioning whereupon this whole discussion here (i.e., Comments) could take us into productive territory as Fearism develops. What intrigues me is that we have this dialogue on Fearism (and Fearology) going on from a North American (Canadian) and African (Nigerian), and Nepalese perspective in cultural contexts--as well, we three have different educational backgrounds and interests, yet we have found a common ground. It's fascinating.

    So, my integral critical perspective on Kalu's statement is that we best see this "business" (meaning our mission) as being colored and textured by both "what people think" (e.g., academics and the canon of philosophy) AND we definitely maintain our unique and creative 'edge' of having it become "what we want it to become." It would be a mistake, from my long work here in this field, to take an either/or (dualism) positioning as Kalu's statement seems to take. Please remember that I have all my life more or less not taken the easy or "authoritative" (traditional) path --that is why I call it path of fearlessness. I well know the upside and downsides of trying to 'fit' into other people's ideas, histories and what they want. I've been a rebel all my life and I've paid the consequences. With my maturing years and the study of "integral theory" (via Ken Wilber and others), I am convinced either/or solutions are not likely going to be most effective in impacting the world, even though they may have some use. So, I recommend strongly that Fearism (and Fearology) proceed on at least the grounds of positioning and premise of both/and dialectical thinking, epistemology, and actions. This "integral dialectics" approach is already agreed upon by Desh and I in our book (Philosophy of Fearism: A First East-West Dialogue, 2016, pp. 33-37).  Let the dialogue continue. I encourage Kalu, and any others to also be forthright in their own unique developments to this field of inquiry and application. 

    Kalu wrote in his comment: "Fearism as a new school of thought isn't a negative critical inquiry into the ultimate causes of things." Before I say more about this point, we in the field of Fearism ought to make sure we understand what we mean by use of the word "negative"--there is a long and very powerful methodology of "negative philosophy" and "negative theology" and theorizing from many disciplines which I believe has great gifts to offer our work, especially with its basis in the tradition of existentialism. Again, the problem is interpreting what we mean by "negative"--and, I will suggest to all readers, this term has been given a negative connotation by a hegemonic way of thinking steeped in a long history of positivism going back to the 17th-century European thought and its associations with modern science and functionalism as ideology. But that is a much longer discussion, and someday I'll write more about this problematic and how it influences our discourses to this day. I recommend all of Fearism and Fearology reconfigure and re-evaluate the quick and easy connotations of the "negative" and its role in thought, values and actions. 

  • I think Dr. Michael is trying to commit both fallacy of composition and hastily generalization with regards to our notion of Fearism. Thinking of how people will look at it is not out of place but then, it beholds on the people.
    Fearism as a new school of thought isn't a negative critical inquiry into the ultimate causes of things. For me, I think that fixing Fearism under philosophy is even problematic. I think calling it Fearism or Fearology as the case may be is better, just like existentialism, psychology, phenomenology etc.
    Our business shouldn't really be what people think of it but what we want it to become.
    I mentioned earlier that a proper consideration of our assertions is very pivotal. Contradictions kills school of thought.
    Thanks
  • Thanks Desh. I have been recently (once again) returning to read bits on what has been dubbed "negative philosophy" (especially, in the Western philosophical tradition, but not only). I often reflect that my own philosophy could fall into this category but with my own variations. I'm not sure if you (or others on the FM ning) have investigated this tradition of "negative philosophy" and its counter-hegemonic move to challenge "positive philosophy" --a complex topic. However, it seems you and I and our work on the "philosophy of fearism" (at least), ought to engage with this conflicting discourse in the history of philosophy (especially, in the West). I would go so far as to say that (in your work and mine) that any focus on "fear" as foundational to philosophy is a form/trend of "negative philosophy." I realize that for most people they won't care at all about such distinctions, but I think you and I and others interested in philosophy of fearism, in order to find legitimacy in the philosophical traditions (and beyond that), will eventually need to encounter and explore why we have taken the path we have, because others in history may have (somewhat) taken a similar path to philosophy that we have (again, in part). I do think our philosophy of fearism is in beginning stages and it is unique too. Just some thoughts to consider. 

    • Why we have taken the path we have ?

      This is big question. It is not big question for merely us. It is big question for everyone. What they find one the way of life, they picked up. Everyone wants to pick up the best of society, family, country and world. It depends on time and space, consciousness, knowledge. Our time, knowledge and life pick up what we have today. Negative philosophy is notable for me. Anything can not be positive and negative itself. It depends on hand of handler. Suppose Gun, it is not negative only. It is positive too. Who has a gun ? It depends on him/her. Philosophy is that path which is always  showing light not darkness. If somebody is fan of darkness, he uses philosophy in negative way. Fear was never negative if we dig its depth. But philosophers, authors saw dark part only. They never tried to see other side. We are in that other part of all philosophy. I agree negative philosophy can be new discourse of scholars.

    • Thanks Desh. Your comment: "Fear was never negative if we dig its depth" is a good foundational statement, with very strong implications philosophically and practically. And more or less, I have understood your work as saying such a negative connotation which is far too popular and historical needs to change, making fear something less negative and thus more positive. And I agree. You also however, like myself make distinctions in definitions of what "kind" or "level" of fear we are talking about as some forms are pathological. But then the problem is where do we stand to define "pathological." Because we then have to claim such a pathological fear (e.g., phobia) is negative--do we not? Again, a complex discussion that our book also looks at and it is not like we have concluded anything strongly about it, and more work in Fearism thinking has to be done around this notion of pathology (especially, this is important in Fearanalysis and Feariatry). 

       I perceive you have an open mind here in regard to not wanting to portray that Fearism is "negative" only, nor in any absolute way ontologically or epistemologically. I too am not suggesting any such absolutism when I refer to Fearism as developing along the trail and tracks of a history of negative theories and philosophies or theologies. Your example of the "gun" not being absolutely negative or positive but beyond those categories is one based in an argument of existential meaning and cognitive interpretative framing that is produced by the agent perceiving and/or handling a gun. I agree also, yet, I am less convinced this is a holistic-integral argument that holds up when we bring in social-construction and cultural meaning and historical contexts to how an agent perceives, thinks, acts. Your approach I have often labeled as cognitive psychology and individualistic agency as the main source of creating reality and giving meaning. Part of my contention with that approach I addressed in our book as well in comparing Desh and Fisher (Appendix 1) p. 37. (I am referring to our book Philosophy of Fearism: A First East-West Dialogue, 2016).  

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