Anek Suwanbundit, Ph.D.

Abstract

This article examines Kirti Bunchua’s Paradigmatic Philosophy in conjunction with his classification of the five paradigms of thought—primitive, ancient, medieval, modern, and postmodern. By situating Bunchua’s model within broader Western philosophical traditions, the paper explores how these paradigms constitute distinct ontological orientations through which human beings interpret reality. The study argues that Bunchua’s contribution represents a uniquely Thai meta-philosophical framework that integrates comparative historical consciousness with contemporary methodological reflexivity. Through systematic comparison with Kuhnian paradigm theory, phenomenology, structuralism, postmodernism, and process philosophy, this paper evaluates the strengths and limitations of Bunchua’s approach for understanding the complex, pluralistic ontology of the 21st century. The conclusion suggests that Bunchua’s framework neither absolutist nor relativist offers a useful model for navigating the multiplicity of ontologies that characterize the digitally mediated global world.

Keywords: Paradigmatic Philosophy; Paradigms of thought; postmodernism; Thai philosophy.

Introduction

The search for an integrative account of human understanding remains central to contemporary philosophy. In Thai philosophical scholarship, Kirti Bunchua (1929-2025) has offered a significant contribution through what he terms Paradigmatic Philosophy in 2004, a method of interpreting human knowledge and experience through culturally and historically constituted frameworks or paradigms. His classification of the five paradigms of thought—primitive, ancient, medieval, modern, and postmodern—constitutes an attempt to map the evolution of human worldviews in relation to their ontological assumptions.

Although Bunchua’s work is deeply rooted in Thai intellectual and educational contexts, his ideas resonate with global philosophical concerns, especially debates on pluralism, epistemic relativity, and hermeneutical reflexivity. This paper seeks to situate Bunchua’s paradigmatic system within broader currents in Western philosophy and to evaluate its relevance for understanding ontology in the contemporary world.

The Five Paradigms of Thought

Bunchua’s typology of paradigms represents not merely historical periods but ontological attitudes. Each paradigm encompasses distinctive assumptions about what is real, how reality is known, and how humans are situated within it.

1) The Primitive Paradigm: Ontology of Sacred Immediacy

In the primitive paradigm, reality is experienced as an animated, interconnected field of forces. Nature, spirits, and human beings are not metaphysically separated. This paradigm parallels indigenous cosmologies, early mythic thinking, and pre-Socratic natural philosophy. Its ontological strength lies in holistic relationality, although it lacks conceptual abstraction and empirical method.

2) The Ancient Paradigm: Ontology of Rational Form

The ancient paradigm gives rise to systematic metaphysics. Rational inquiry, the search for essences, and the classification of beings become central. Parallels include classical Greek philosophy and Indian and Chinese classical thought. This paradigm cultivates universal rationality but risks essentialism and philosophical dogmatism.

3) The Medieval Paradigm: Ontology of Divine Universality

The medieval paradigm is characterized by the metaphysical centrality of the divine. Being is grounded in transcendence; reality is hierarchical and purposive. Western Scholasticism, and Islamic, and Buddhist scholastic traditions embody this paradigm. Its strength lies in moral coherence, though it tends toward doctrinal rigidity.

4) The Modern Paradigm: Ontology of Scientific Rationality

The modern paradigm foregrounds empirical science and human autonomy. Reality becomes quantifiable, measurable, and governed by law-like regularities. This paradigm aligns with Descartes, Newton, and Kant. While enormously successful scientifically, it produces reductionist ontologies that marginalize value, meaning, and subjectivity.

5) The Postmodern Paradigm: Ontology of Plurality

The postmodern paradigm denies unified metaphysical structures and emphasizes plurality, discourse, power, and difference. It aligns with post-structuralism, deconstruction, de-colonialism and neo-pragmatism. Its strength is critical reflexivity, though it risks epistemic relativism and ontological fragmentation.

Bunchua’s Paradigmatic Philosophy as Meta-Ontology

Bunchua’s framework does not claim that one paradigm supersedes another. Instead, these paradigms coexist as interpretive frameworks that shape human understanding. His project is therefore meta-ontological, shifting the philosophical gaze from the nature of being itself to the conditions under which ontological claims are formed.

1) Paradigm-Dependence of Reality

Reality is disclosed through paradigms; ontology is always being-as-interpreted. This insight parallels phenomenology’s notion of intentionality (Heidegger, 1927/1962), though Bunchua emphasizes the socio-cultural rather than the purely experiential dimension.

2) Historical Layering

Modern individuals inhabit multiple paradigms simultaneously for example, scientific rationality alongside religious belief and intuitive ecological awareness. Bunchua’s model enables analysis of these layered realities.

3) Possibility of Critique and Dialogue

Unlike radical postmodernism, Bunchua insists that paradigms can be comparatively evaluated. Dialogue between paradigms forms the ethical and intellectual core of his method—a stance similar to Gadamerian hermeneutics.

Comparative Analysis with Western Philosophical Traditions
1. Kuhnian Paradigm Theory

While Kuhn’s paradigms concerns scientific revolutions (Kuhn, 1962/2012), Bunchua generalizes the notion to encompass entire cultural-historical and metaphysical systems. His work emerges as a broader hermeneutical theory of human understanding.

2. Phenomenology

Phenomenology emphasizes the pre-structured nature of experience. Bunchua shares this insight but contextualizes it historically and culturally. Where Husserl pursues transcendental subjectivity and Heidegger explores being-in-the-world, Bunchua focuses on culturally sedimented interpretive frameworks.

3. Structuralism and Post-Structuralism

Structuralism’s emphasis on linguistic and cultural codes (Foucault, 1966/1970) resembles Bunchua’s paradigms. However, post-structuralists critiques of epistemic certainty (Derrida, 1978/2001) and emphasize instability and power relations, while Bunchua retains the possibility of rational evaluation and constructive dialogue.

4. Postmodernism

Postmodernism stresses multiplicity and rejects metanarratives. Bunchua accepts plurality but resists collapsing into relativism by proposing a comparative methodology grounded in intellectual responsibility.

5. Process Philosophy

Whitehead’s process ontology offers a dynamic account of becoming (Whitehead, 1929/1978). However, Bunchua’s emphasis is methodological rather than cosmological, making his system more adaptable to cultural comparison.

Strengths for Contemporary Ontology

The contemporary world contains competing ontologies—scientific, religious, digital, ecological. Bunchua’s paradigm of thoughts helps map their differences and identify points of translation. It is especially useful for plural societies such as Thailand, where traditional, religious, and scientific paradigms coexist and overlap. However, Bunchua encourages subjects to examine how their own paradigms shape their interpretation of reality, aligning with contemporary reflexive ontology.

The position of this philosophy is a method for comparing paradigms while avoiding both the absolutism of traditional metaphysics and the relativism of postmodern thought.

Limitations and Challenges

Appreciative the good of Paradigmatic philosophy is exist, whereas this model of thought still act overgeneralization of historical periods. The five-paradigm schema risks oversimplifying intellectual histories that are more heterogeneous. The term “paradigm” may lose analytical precision when used to encompass metaphysical, epistemological, cultural, and ethical dimensions simultaneously.

Bunchua does not present a substantive ontology of being; his focus is methodological rather than metaphysical. Limited metaphysical depth is concerned.

Paradigmatic dialogue is still as imagination as it be. Power structures and identity politics can hinder the ideal of dialogue across paradigms.

Conclusion

Bunchua’s paradigmatic philosophy offers a valuable, culturally embedded framework for understanding the plurality of ontologies that define contemporary existence. By integrating historical paradigms of thought with comparative philosophical analysis, his approach provides a nuanced way to interpret the coexistence of scientific rationality, religious worldview, intuitive ecological understanding, and postmodern pluralism. Although not without limitations, Bunchua’s meta-ontological framework enables constructive engagement between diverse visions of reality, offering a middle path that aligns with the complex, interconnected world of the 21st century.

Reference

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Bunchua, K. (2018). Contextual Philosophy. Bangkok, Suan Sunandha Rajbhat University.

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