The Myth of the Framework and the Mysteries of the Intellect - Ethical Perspectives on Knowledge and Understanding

1. INTRODUCTIONIn the present day context, characterised by the demystification of some defining episodes of history and national and international politics, it is necessary to go back to research in the methodology of ethics and epistemology, in what is implied by the myth of the framework, in the sense of what Karl Popper reveals to us. As long as members of the public space perceive and assimilate ideas in the absence of a critical apparatus, which implies factio knowledge on the basis of their own critical representations, we are forced to question the forms of ethical manifestations and reasoning. This is the result of the fact that the public or the historical space - in certain frames of time and in certain contexts - is characterised by the tendency to omit or allot certain meanings to events. For instance, many people think that we can accept or reject only the whole framework or 'system' of 'communism' or of 'capitalism'. If we think about these so-called 'systems', we have to distinguish between the systems of theories - the ideologies - and certain social realities. Both have considerably influenced each other. But the social realities have little resemblance to ideologies1. In the key of these differences and realities, it is necessary to interpret a series of frameworks and events from the Romanian space which remind us of communism, political dissidence and political detention. The nature of framework is characterised by limitations on the level of thinking, because, as a rule, frameworks refer to extreme situations and forms of individual freedom to which the collective freedom is opposed. But, in obtaining freedom and getting rid of the myth of the framework, it is necessary to fight against the chimaeras of the past, understanding them and establishing new coordinates, in other words, to capitalize the resources of suffering on the basis of the intellect and beliefs. This reasoning improves the forms of answering and of living in any space, creates the ethical premises for self freedom, but especially freedom from the others. The way man relates to the outside world on the basis of what he has known, learnt and experienced is one of the fundamental criteria which differentiate people, because, on this basis, man memorizes and preserves realities which make him live his life, his change into a human being. Masses have no more substance than has any individual. In ethics the question is not one of action and result, but of willing, and willing itself occurs only in the individual. What is decided morally is not the fate of nations, which exists only in the phenomenon, but that of the individual2.The myth speaks about the triad belief-truthassertion3 without a compulsory logical connection between them. Language is the one which makes communication more difficult and throws a veil upon the hidden meanings of truth, which can take the shape of faiths or a simple assertion referring to a framework. This character of events can change the course of history or can stop the evolution of peoples' destiny, and, saying this, we consider the phenomenon of communism, where we include the individuality of political detention and the life course of intellectuals in communist prisons. Starting from here and pondering upon some historical, political, philosophical episodes, we try to outline the common nature of the phenomenon, where these can be placed, that, basically, considers the same great human problem, namely : the nature of human thinking and of the way of acting.2. THE MYTH OF THE FRAMEWORK AND THE ROLE OF THE INTELLECT IN FACTUAL KNOWLEDGEA retrospective view upon the various forms of knowledge and understanding leads us to four great representations of what myth, but also the framework, can imply. It is necessary to think of the myth of the cave and the forms of social knowledge, as a general human form of perception and representation of the informational content, which can come from the public space. …