One of the most helpful conceptual tools for taking up the study of any culture, so that the basic orientation of its ethos will be immediately understood and will illuminate the further study of the facets, is Piterim Sorokin’s categorization. In the ideational culture, temporal existence is subordinated to, and ordered in the light of, ideas about transcendental reality; an attitude which is exactly the reverse leads to the sensate culture; a vision that meaningfully integrates the two realms of being creates the idealistic culture.
July-August 1977, volume 2, No 4