Interdisciplinary Studies in the Humanities (Jul 2012)

Transdisciplinary Approach of Edgar Morin and his Philosophical Foundations of Thought

  • Alireza Mahmoodnia,
  • Parvaneh Najarian,
  • Saeid Zarghami,
  • Mohammad Yamani

DOI
https://doi.org/10.7508/isih.2012.14.004
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 4, no. 2
pp. 65 – 86

Abstract

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Edgar Morin believes that the contemporary education systems get in crisis, which due to a simplified and separate approach to science and breaking it down to separate disciplines and putting overemphasis on specialization and super specialization. He suggests a transdisciplinary approach to challenge this crisis. The goal of this paper is explaining the philosophical foundations of Morin's idea. Therefore, by using the analytical method, this article is going to discuss Morin’s explicit emphasis on the necessity of reforming thought and explain his contrivance named “transdisciplinary approach”. From Morin's point of view, the transdisciplinary approach not only respects separation and detection of different disciplines, but also breaks down the boundaries between different disciplines and offers a unified, unique and integrated knowledge. As a conclusion, the transdisciplinary approach is a problem-center education and research that noting the wide range of knowledge can avoid the mono- dimensional education and alienation of disciplines.It seems that this approach prevents neglecting the problems of society and has the potential to evolve the educational systems.

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