Joe,
Thanks for you thoughtful reply. I'm not sure what your own position is
however. You say, (Oh, and thanks for the ref.):
> But, what the empiricist/materialist tradition has brought
> us is a way of NOT rely8ing on metaphysical entities,
> "occult" qualities, dispositions, faculties, etc. as sort of
> Deus ex machina which come out of the blue to get us past
> soem philosophical problems. In Berkeley's case, for
> example, we cannot establish the identity of an object, even
> despite very similar associations we moght make between
> sense impresssion, without bringing God into the picture.
> Hume, of course, disabuses us of these kinds of explanations
> - by spelling out the ground rules fro a more descriptive
> empiricism.
Now insofar as this was indeed the professed 'goal' of the empiricist
tradition I agree, (I've actually separated this position from the
materialist one because I think they are very different, I hope you don't
mind), but the question which interests me is; did it succeed? I think not.
The empiricist/materialist tradition secreted an idealist metaphysics in
which, what couldn't be percieved simply couldn't be said to exist.Thus
existence/being is tied to some attribute of the human. This, of course,
leads to some embarassing problems. Such as, are atoms 'real'?. Eventually
empiricism must give way to pragmatism (see Kolakowski 'The Alienation of
Reason' and Oldroyd 'The Arch of Knowledge, for this) wherein theoretical
entities are said to be useful fictions, or instrumental devices. And Dewey,
for example, thought that pragmatism was empiricism taken to its logical
conclusions. Still problems abound. If we can't say with any certainty that
things are 'real' how do we 'choose' between two instrumental objects which
both seem to be instrumentally effective. The chosen weapon of the logical
positivist, drawing on early Wittgenstein, was linguistics, in particular,
the verifiablity principle: everything that is must be given a meaningful
place in the axiomatic structure of language. As regards Hume, I think he
was more than a little guilty of committing performative contradiction
(leaving the seminar room by the door as oppossed to the 2nd. floor window
etc, both of which he denied existed) and his ethics were really appalling.
I mean, was it not Hume who thought that it was perfectly rational for him
to prefer the destruction of the world as opposed to scratching his finger?
(quite rational from his point of view, of course, the world didn't really
exist)
Still, I am very interested in your own position, since you seem to be happy
to see Foucault in this empiricist tradition. Is this so? If it is I think
you are probably right about it, but many Foucualtites in my discipline
would reject this, wanting the exact opposite: that is they see Foucualt
firmly one the anti-materialist side of the post-structuralist camp.
> If Foucault can be said to give any kind of "scientific"
> explanations - and I agree he does not always indicate that
> he's interested in doing so, but on the other hand he
> clearly is not loosely or randomly throwingaround
> observations and researches either; well, than his
> "science," which in some ways is a science of power
> relations, is a descriptive/materialist one (remember
> Wittgenstein: "stop explaining and start describing").
I'm afraid I'm not with Wittgenstein on this. Again it's a straight take
>from the LP handbook, given their denial of natural necessity. (Don't tell
me why tell me how?) But surely explanation as opposed to description is how
we navigate our lives. I mean, without geting trivial about it, when I ask
my three year old son about a broken vase, I am simply not happy with his
how account - "that it smashed on the floor" - I want to know why. Did he
knock it? did it fall by some mystical force? Was it divine intervention?
What about the plight of the marginalised in all of this. Are we really to
tell them that their plight can be simply described: they are poor,
dispossed, powerless, in effect, they are marginalised. But they know that
already. They want to know why, and how they can change it. And for that
matter so do I.
> The effects of power relations on bodies.
> How do yiou describe these effects? By looking at a host of
> things: the concrete practices in which power/knowledge is
> instantiated; teh "logic" of the practioners of various
> "disciplines," as well as the "logic" or even the
> statements, of discursive subjects; the technologies which
> facilitate &Make possible the administration of the
> discplines; and finally, the systems of disperdion,
> tranformation etc. through which the logic, techniques, and
> "signs" are disseminated.
I actually agree with all of this, but if you rest your analysis on the
observable you restrict you account to the actual and fail to address the
questions of what allows the actual to continue to be actualised. Besides
inherent in all of your "logics" above is the assumption that these "logics"
are hidden, not apparent, so we probably don't disagree. You seem to have a
reading of Foucault which is very close to my own, and one which doesn't
necessarily locate him in with the likes of Baudriallard et. al.
Thanks,
Colin
--------------------------------------------------------
Colin Wight
Department of International Politics
University of Wales, Aberystwyth
Aberystwyth
SY23 3DA
--------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for you thoughtful reply. I'm not sure what your own position is
however. You say, (Oh, and thanks for the ref.):
> But, what the empiricist/materialist tradition has brought
> us is a way of NOT rely8ing on metaphysical entities,
> "occult" qualities, dispositions, faculties, etc. as sort of
> Deus ex machina which come out of the blue to get us past
> soem philosophical problems. In Berkeley's case, for
> example, we cannot establish the identity of an object, even
> despite very similar associations we moght make between
> sense impresssion, without bringing God into the picture.
> Hume, of course, disabuses us of these kinds of explanations
> - by spelling out the ground rules fro a more descriptive
> empiricism.
Now insofar as this was indeed the professed 'goal' of the empiricist
tradition I agree, (I've actually separated this position from the
materialist one because I think they are very different, I hope you don't
mind), but the question which interests me is; did it succeed? I think not.
The empiricist/materialist tradition secreted an idealist metaphysics in
which, what couldn't be percieved simply couldn't be said to exist.Thus
existence/being is tied to some attribute of the human. This, of course,
leads to some embarassing problems. Such as, are atoms 'real'?. Eventually
empiricism must give way to pragmatism (see Kolakowski 'The Alienation of
Reason' and Oldroyd 'The Arch of Knowledge, for this) wherein theoretical
entities are said to be useful fictions, or instrumental devices. And Dewey,
for example, thought that pragmatism was empiricism taken to its logical
conclusions. Still problems abound. If we can't say with any certainty that
things are 'real' how do we 'choose' between two instrumental objects which
both seem to be instrumentally effective. The chosen weapon of the logical
positivist, drawing on early Wittgenstein, was linguistics, in particular,
the verifiablity principle: everything that is must be given a meaningful
place in the axiomatic structure of language. As regards Hume, I think he
was more than a little guilty of committing performative contradiction
(leaving the seminar room by the door as oppossed to the 2nd. floor window
etc, both of which he denied existed) and his ethics were really appalling.
I mean, was it not Hume who thought that it was perfectly rational for him
to prefer the destruction of the world as opposed to scratching his finger?
(quite rational from his point of view, of course, the world didn't really
exist)
Still, I am very interested in your own position, since you seem to be happy
to see Foucault in this empiricist tradition. Is this so? If it is I think
you are probably right about it, but many Foucualtites in my discipline
would reject this, wanting the exact opposite: that is they see Foucualt
firmly one the anti-materialist side of the post-structuralist camp.
> If Foucault can be said to give any kind of "scientific"
> explanations - and I agree he does not always indicate that
> he's interested in doing so, but on the other hand he
> clearly is not loosely or randomly throwingaround
> observations and researches either; well, than his
> "science," which in some ways is a science of power
> relations, is a descriptive/materialist one (remember
> Wittgenstein: "stop explaining and start describing").
I'm afraid I'm not with Wittgenstein on this. Again it's a straight take
>from the LP handbook, given their denial of natural necessity. (Don't tell
me why tell me how?) But surely explanation as opposed to description is how
we navigate our lives. I mean, without geting trivial about it, when I ask
my three year old son about a broken vase, I am simply not happy with his
how account - "that it smashed on the floor" - I want to know why. Did he
knock it? did it fall by some mystical force? Was it divine intervention?
What about the plight of the marginalised in all of this. Are we really to
tell them that their plight can be simply described: they are poor,
dispossed, powerless, in effect, they are marginalised. But they know that
already. They want to know why, and how they can change it. And for that
matter so do I.
> The effects of power relations on bodies.
> How do yiou describe these effects? By looking at a host of
> things: the concrete practices in which power/knowledge is
> instantiated; teh "logic" of the practioners of various
> "disciplines," as well as the "logic" or even the
> statements, of discursive subjects; the technologies which
> facilitate &Make possible the administration of the
> discplines; and finally, the systems of disperdion,
> tranformation etc. through which the logic, techniques, and
> "signs" are disseminated.
I actually agree with all of this, but if you rest your analysis on the
observable you restrict you account to the actual and fail to address the
questions of what allows the actual to continue to be actualised. Besides
inherent in all of your "logics" above is the assumption that these "logics"
are hidden, not apparent, so we probably don't disagree. You seem to have a
reading of Foucault which is very close to my own, and one which doesn't
necessarily locate him in with the likes of Baudriallard et. al.
Thanks,
Colin
--------------------------------------------------------
Colin Wight
Department of International Politics
University of Wales, Aberystwyth
Aberystwyth
SY23 3DA
--------------------------------------------------------