Page 47 - Bulletin, Vol.83 No.1, April 2024
P. 47
HOW AND WHY
By René GUENARD
Cité seniors :
Exchanges between Sylvestre Coutinho and René Guénard
When we pull out adverbs or interrogative
pronouns such as "how" and "why" from
their grammatical context, we see the
importance of their respective meanings.
"How" answers a question. In what way?
By what means? Whereas "Why" is used to
explain a situation or an event. What is the
purpose?
But it all depends on what you want to
know. How to prune trees and why to wear
clothes do not belong to the same register
of knowledge as how did matter come to be and why there is a world instead of nothing.
While science helps us to understand how things happened, it sometimes has great
difficulty in objectively demonstrating why they happened.
We are aware that our level of reflection is still incomplete and does not allow us, for the
moment, to answer all our questions.
But let's remain clear-headed and confident. Let's continue to question the world
with wonder, because that's what makes us thinking beings.
Translation DEEPL
Revision Patricia BEAUSSARD
AAFI-AFICS BULLETIN, Vol. 83 No.1, 2024-04 46
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