On Mon, 11 Mar 1996, Joe Cronin wrote:
> Perhaps the goal of "rational communication" is amiss
> because it requires an essentially rational subject to get
> off the ground. The idea of a form of rational
> communication which is non-essentialist is not, of itself,
> an impossible ideal. But we have to make allowances for
> different kinds of rationality; this, unfortunately, is
> habermas' fatal weakness. he's not interested in
> rationalities - in that Kantian/Hegelian/(Hitlerian?)
Slow down! I've never seen this combination before. Where Hegel is
potentially the most "Hitlerian" (though I would be very careful with ths
connection) he is the most non-Kantian. But those who saw in Hegel's
praise of the Reich a proto-fascism, did't really read Hegel.
> tradition, the REAL is The rational, and so on. Sorry, but
> in that discourse, there's only one form of rationality (and
> communication, really) available.
Well, Hegel believed that one form of rationality would in the end win
out, but he was very sympathetic to the struggle between conflicting
rationalities. His is not a philosophy of the imposition of a single
rationality. Read his prefaces and see that his philosophy is directed
precisely against this sort of imposition.
This form can't have a
> history id it is to serve as the ground and measure of
> history.
Not in the Hegel I know and love (if I understand you here). Hegel's
texts are the history of the historical form of history. The measure of
everything in Hegel is immanent.
> we can, as Focuault does, speak of divegernt rationalities,
> and forms of communication within and among them. That not
> only seems to be a much clearer description of how things
> actually do happen, it is not overladen with a
> transcendental subjekt either.
>
>
Erik D. Lindberg
Dept. of English and Comparative Lit.
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Milwaukee, WI 53211
email: edl@xxxxxxxxxxx
------------------
> Perhaps the goal of "rational communication" is amiss
> because it requires an essentially rational subject to get
> off the ground. The idea of a form of rational
> communication which is non-essentialist is not, of itself,
> an impossible ideal. But we have to make allowances for
> different kinds of rationality; this, unfortunately, is
> habermas' fatal weakness. he's not interested in
> rationalities - in that Kantian/Hegelian/(Hitlerian?)
Slow down! I've never seen this combination before. Where Hegel is
potentially the most "Hitlerian" (though I would be very careful with ths
connection) he is the most non-Kantian. But those who saw in Hegel's
praise of the Reich a proto-fascism, did't really read Hegel.
> tradition, the REAL is The rational, and so on. Sorry, but
> in that discourse, there's only one form of rationality (and
> communication, really) available.
Well, Hegel believed that one form of rationality would in the end win
out, but he was very sympathetic to the struggle between conflicting
rationalities. His is not a philosophy of the imposition of a single
rationality. Read his prefaces and see that his philosophy is directed
precisely against this sort of imposition.
This form can't have a
> history id it is to serve as the ground and measure of
> history.
Not in the Hegel I know and love (if I understand you here). Hegel's
texts are the history of the historical form of history. The measure of
everything in Hegel is immanent.
> we can, as Focuault does, speak of divegernt rationalities,
> and forms of communication within and among them. That not
> only seems to be a much clearer description of how things
> actually do happen, it is not overladen with a
> transcendental subjekt either.
>
>
Erik D. Lindberg
Dept. of English and Comparative Lit.
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Milwaukee, WI 53211
email: edl@xxxxxxxxxxx
------------------