Asian-Arab philosophical dialogues on globalization, democracy ...

Cultivating Philosophy from the Ground
These excursions into Filipino linguistic structures demonstrate how a local culture can be imbued
with universal aspirations that can be elevated to the realm of <strong>philosophical</strong> discourse from within the
context of peculiar linguistic practices. Language elevates human activity from the immediacy of objects
and events to the realm of intersubjective and even universal understanding. When we communicate
something to another, we transform the opacity of things and events from their palpable and audible
materiality towards the transparency of linguistic utterances that can, by means of their intentional
forms, be appropriated by others.
A joke among two adjacent provinces in the Philippines, such as the Pampango and Bulakeno speakers,
for example, claims that the longest bridge is the one that spans their provinces because they use similar
words for eggs (ebon) and birds (ibon). They claim that when one enters the bridge with an egg from
one province, one would have to travel as far the required hatching time span of an egg before one can
reach the other province. The human capacity to share jokes that come from different contexts shows
how meanings be shared and that the abyss that divides human communication can in principle be
bridged by collective efforts towards mutual understanding.
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Asia-<strong>Arab</strong> Philosophical Dialogues on Globalization, Democracy and Human Rights
The inherent dignity of being human lies in this capacity to recognize fellow humans (kapwa-tao) who
can, in principle, be understood as oneself and as another. We become human in the manner by which
we treat others as fellow human beings. Transgressions against humanity rests, in most cases, in the
failure to accept the equally valid claims made by others about their humanity. The process of becoming
human, therefore, begins when we recognize in others the inherent humanity in us.
This process of recognition assumes that beneath the veneer of our cultural differences lies an underlying
similarity that binds our humanity. Philosophers, with their distinctive discipline of coming to terms
with the history of ideas and encounters with a variety of perspectives, are in a distinctive position
to articulate the fundamental aspirations that traverse the matrix of their local cultures, on the one
hand, and the universal aspirations of human identity, on the other hand. Philosophers, after all, are first
and foremost, human beings who were born and bred within particular contexts. Even the advent of
modernity, with its claims for freedom, equality and fraternity, were precipitated by <strong>philosophical</strong> texts
written in national, rather than universal languages.
Transversality VS. Multiversality and Universality
If philosophy is to revitalize its vocation to speak for the collective aspirations of humanity, it can only
begin by considering the particular local contexts that philosophers find themselves in. Philosophers
can best philosophize from the perspective of their mother tongues. This is most evident not only in the
translation of the most important <strong>philosophical</strong> texts into the language of other cultures; but also in the
production of new concepts that express the multiple dimensions of our humanity. This multiplicity,
however, is merely a manifestation of the material receptacle that individualizes the formal aspirations
of humanity.
The multiple expressions of our humanity that emerge from our cultural diversity can become dissipated
if they cannot anchor themselves on insights and ideals that can be shared with others. Monological
claims of universal humanity, however, have been found to be empty of content if such claims cannot
be rooted in a particular expression of a distinctive cultural epoch. Between the empty formalism of
universalism and the dissipated voices of multiplicity, lies the realm of ardous thinking that considers
both the abstract universality of humanity and the concrete particularity of cultural expressions. The
path of enhancing human dignity lies in traversing this delicate balance between universality and
multiplicity.