People try to talk to and with you and all you do is insult. Okay.
Have fun.
--John Ransom
On Thu, 6 Mar 1997, Doug Henwood wrote:
> At 2:42 PM -0500 3/5/97, John Ransom wrote:
>
> >No, I don't think we can have or should try to establish a "standard."
> >Don't look for philosophy to do this kind of thing for you. Philosophy
> >can, I think, be a resource, like lots of other resources. We decide what
> >to oppose. Or: parts of us decide, often against the interests and desires
> >of other parts of us, to oppose something.
>
> ...and...
>
> At 4:01 PM +1300 3/6/97, Campbell Jones wrote:
>
> >Who defines standards of sloppiness? And how does such standards function?
>
> So much of this reminds me of the early undergraduate discovery of
> relativism carried out to the postdoctoral level.
>
> Of course "philosophy" can't define a standard; philosophy is a corpus of
> texts that often contradict or talk past each other. But as human beings we
> have to come to some sort of ethical/moral conclusions, don't we? Why is it
> that, say, sloppy scholarship is an acceptable form of transgression while
> infant sacrifice isn't? Why is it that Foucault's sloppy scholarship - and
> even many Foucault fans concede this, Malgosia, but excuse it in the name
> of "theatricality" or "higher" quasi-truths - would be acceptable but, say,
> the Protocols of the Elders of Zion isn't? There must be some
> unacknowledged set of "standards" behind this.
>
> Later, John Ransom says:
>
> >You may decide to dismiss Foucault's approach, but here, at least, is what
> >he says, with reference to the Soviet gulag:
> >
> > [We should refuse] to adopt for the critique of the Gulag a law or
> > principle of selection internal to our own discourse or dream.
> > By this I mean giving up the politics of inverted commas, not
> > attempting to evade the problem by putting inverted commas,
> > whether damning or ironic, round Soviet socialism in order to
> > protect the good, true socialism -- with no inverted commas --
> > which alone can provide a legitimate standpoint for a politically
> > valid critique of the Gulag.
>
> Ah yes, this appalling passage. How interesting that a writer of the 1960s
> who embraced some of the most extreme forms of heads-on-sticks French
> Maoism should adopt this chic neoconservatism in the 1970s. This passage is
> almost indistinguishable (in content, not style) from something of Irving
> Kristol's or Hilton Kramer's. Political principles and/or ethical standards
> lead straight to the gulag. The dream of social transformation must be
> dropped - apparently there's some standard, arrived at by some
> unacknowledged process, that tells us gulags are bad - in favor
> of...transgressive practices?
>
>
>
>
>
> Doug
>
> --
>
> Doug Henwood
> Left Business Observer
> 250 W 85 St
> New York NY 10024-3217 USA
> +1-212-874-4020 voice +1-212-874-3137 fax
> email: <mailto:dhenwood@xxxxxxxxx>
> web: <http://www.panix.com/~dhenwood/LBO_home.html>
>
>
Have fun.
--John Ransom
On Thu, 6 Mar 1997, Doug Henwood wrote:
> At 2:42 PM -0500 3/5/97, John Ransom wrote:
>
> >No, I don't think we can have or should try to establish a "standard."
> >Don't look for philosophy to do this kind of thing for you. Philosophy
> >can, I think, be a resource, like lots of other resources. We decide what
> >to oppose. Or: parts of us decide, often against the interests and desires
> >of other parts of us, to oppose something.
>
> ...and...
>
> At 4:01 PM +1300 3/6/97, Campbell Jones wrote:
>
> >Who defines standards of sloppiness? And how does such standards function?
>
> So much of this reminds me of the early undergraduate discovery of
> relativism carried out to the postdoctoral level.
>
> Of course "philosophy" can't define a standard; philosophy is a corpus of
> texts that often contradict or talk past each other. But as human beings we
> have to come to some sort of ethical/moral conclusions, don't we? Why is it
> that, say, sloppy scholarship is an acceptable form of transgression while
> infant sacrifice isn't? Why is it that Foucault's sloppy scholarship - and
> even many Foucault fans concede this, Malgosia, but excuse it in the name
> of "theatricality" or "higher" quasi-truths - would be acceptable but, say,
> the Protocols of the Elders of Zion isn't? There must be some
> unacknowledged set of "standards" behind this.
>
> Later, John Ransom says:
>
> >You may decide to dismiss Foucault's approach, but here, at least, is what
> >he says, with reference to the Soviet gulag:
> >
> > [We should refuse] to adopt for the critique of the Gulag a law or
> > principle of selection internal to our own discourse or dream.
> > By this I mean giving up the politics of inverted commas, not
> > attempting to evade the problem by putting inverted commas,
> > whether damning or ironic, round Soviet socialism in order to
> > protect the good, true socialism -- with no inverted commas --
> > which alone can provide a legitimate standpoint for a politically
> > valid critique of the Gulag.
>
> Ah yes, this appalling passage. How interesting that a writer of the 1960s
> who embraced some of the most extreme forms of heads-on-sticks French
> Maoism should adopt this chic neoconservatism in the 1970s. This passage is
> almost indistinguishable (in content, not style) from something of Irving
> Kristol's or Hilton Kramer's. Political principles and/or ethical standards
> lead straight to the gulag. The dream of social transformation must be
> dropped - apparently there's some standard, arrived at by some
> unacknowledged process, that tells us gulags are bad - in favor
> of...transgressive practices?
>
>
>
>
>
> Doug
>
> --
>
> Doug Henwood
> Left Business Observer
> 250 W 85 St
> New York NY 10024-3217 USA
> +1-212-874-4020 voice +1-212-874-3137 fax
> email: <mailto:dhenwood@xxxxxxxxx>
> web: <http://www.panix.com/~dhenwood/LBO_home.html>
>
>