4 - Reasonabilism, Homeostasis and Intergenerational Justice in African Thought

Summary

This paper revisits the concept of reasonabilism, which subsumes a form of reconfiguration of an holistic conception of consciousness in a manner that ties contingent rational expressions or the principle of consistency to corresponding enabling sets of affectivities and conatus (degrees of beneficence or their negation as contained in volitional states) and vice versa, such that they become two sides of the same coin. The paper explores the basis of reasonability and reasonabilism in African thought, showing that African thought is not as long on the formal radial scale as it is deep on the substantive relational scale, including the relationalities and sociality of pure consciousness (self-reflecting intensionality, its representations and levels of reality) and the implications of these for the scale and depth of conceptions of justice, especially intergenerational justice as it relates to the environment and development generally. Contemporary Africa faces the challenge of retaining and deepening the conatal depth of beneficence in its Indigenous philosophical resources and heritage while expanding its radial of consistency to meet the global challenges of looming environmental disaster and the question of environmental sustainability, poverty, disease, etc. This paper also tries to point towards the necessary reconceptualization and reinvigorations that would further enrich African thought along the required lines.