Neither/nor: a pragmatic philosophy for oscillating between conceptual and experiential knowledge
Humanities and Social Sciences Communications March 13, 2026 Bryan Kam, Isabela Granic
Neither theory nor practice alone is sufficient for personal flourishing or scientific inquiry; the two are complementary skills that can be deliberately trained and oscillated. A latent preference for abstract concepts over direct experience—termed "latent Platonism"—contributes to personal suffering and intellectual dead ends. The paper illustrates this through Type I diabetes management, where constant negotiation between abstract formulas and embodied experience is required. Five practical principles are offered: regard concepts and experience as trainable skills; commit to oscillation between them; prioritize relations and processes over objects and states; embrace trial-and-error learning; and employ conditional historicism over linear causal thinking. The framework aims to reduce suffering, enhance inquiry, and provide a pragmatic methodology for evaluating philosophical positions.