How To Make Better Decisions
Channel: Rudolf Steiner Philosophy Of Freedom
Date: 2015-05-16

Here are 4 steps to make better decisions using the skills of scientific inquiry, idealistic inspiration, creative imagination and technical research. They are based on Rudolf Steiner's Philosophy Of Freedom which describes his Ethical Individualism.

This life philosophy based on Rudolf Steiner's Philosophy Of Freedom can be described as science based, humanist, activist, idealist, and progressive. New videos will be posted regularly. 

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Thank-you
Tom

SCRIPT
Your decisions will be better if you apply these 4 skills: scientific inquiry, idealistic inspiration, creative imagination and technical research.
We call this Ethical Individualism.

Scientific Inquiry
The first skill is scientific inquiry, with it we can make informed decisions.
The Scientist relies on attentive observation and conceptual thinking skills to understand what is happening.
In billiards we universalize the situation by connecting the concept of an elastic ball with the concepts motion, impact, and velocity.
With universal conceptual thinking the scientist can understand how things work. 
We construct a conceptual model in our mind that corresponds to the observed event.
In this way we can predict what will happen.
When we predict an unfavorable future of budget problems, we may want to change it.
To change something you need to be motivated.

Idealistic Inspiration
For motivation we look to Skill 2, idealistic inspiration.
With it we are inspired by our ideals.
Personal bias is not an ideal.
Bias makes us narrow-minded and one-sided so we unfairly favor one group or point of view over others.
Unbiased idealism is possible.
The philosopher rigorously pursues unbiased truth just as the scientist does, with the use of conceptual thinking.
With conceptual thinking we can make unbiased ethical decisions.
Our example is a workplace situation where we observe that Jack the manager is upset with Julie the receptionist.
What should you do?
My friendship with Jack could cause me to unfairly take his side.
To overcome bias we use conceptual thinking to select the right ethical ideal that will guide our action.
We first add general concepts to construct a conceptual model of the situation in our mind.
By universalizing the situation with general concepts like "manager" and "worker" we avoid triggering personal emotional bias.
We add that the manager's behavior should be termed "bullying".
Conceptually, we have a manager who is bullying a worker.
The situational concepts meet our various ideals in the conceptual realm.
Pure reason now reflects on the conceptual content.
You've got it!
Thinking leads to an empowering insight, an "intuition" to protect our co-worker from harm.
We call this experience Moral Intuition.
Even though your ethical decision has universal characteristics, it remains an "individual" decision because our life situations are different, and the depth of each ones thinking is different.
We now have our inspiring guiding principle, next we need to decide what specific action to take.

Creative Imagination
Skill 3 is creative imagination.
A decision is better if we envision a clear goal.
The ideal principle we selected in the previous step, "protect from harm", needs to be imaginatively translated into a specific goal of action.
We call this Moral Imagination.
But artistic creativity seems mysterious.
Not really, we can all have creative ideas when we place a pure, unclothed concept at the center of our focus.
This sparks creativity to add detail.
You've got an idea!
The idea is to offer donuts to Jack and Julie to calm the situation.
Having envisioned our goal we are driven by love, our love for the objective to protect Julie from harm.
The power of love overcomes our fear and we act.

Technical Research
We conclude with skill 4, technical research.
A decision is better if when we carry it out we do no harm.
We need a plan for how to skillfully implement our goal into the world.
We call this Moral Technique.
The world that we want to change already exists, and operates according to natural and social laws.
Unnecessary disruptions are caused by violating the laws of nature.
Unnecessary disruptions are caused by violating the existing social customs that hold things together.
To avoid disruption technicians study the existing science in their field.
The workers did some research to learn about the work place and the rights of workers.
They convinced management to provide training to prevent workplace bullying.
All workplace bullying stopped.
Your decisions will be better using the skills of the scientist, the philosopher, the artist, and the technician.