Dear Vunch,
You seem to misunderstand my point. I was not arguing that Kant had
Foucault's ethical perspective, simply that Foucault took things like
considerations of power and knowledge and made these the ever present
transcendental conditions for moralities and all kinds of practices in
society. My point is that in this transcendental move he is following in a
distinctively Kantian pattern, despite widely diverging in his applications
of transcendental thinking. My point about our always knowing that morals
were sometimes influenced by power/knowledge structures was simply an
allusion to the age old threat of the corrupt manipulating morals through
power or knowledge systems, this threat is at least as old as the New
Testament critique of Phariseism. My point was that if Foucault was simply
saying that sometimes corrupt uses of power/knowledge corrupt morality, he
would be saying nothing new. In contrast to traditional thought, though,
Foucault treats power/knowledge not as external factors sometimes impinging
upon an otherwise pristine morality but rather as everpresent, necessarily
present, transcendental conditions for any morality, or any practice at all
for that matter. In this way he is transcendental, like a Kantian of sorts,
while obviously distinct from Kant in the types of particulars which you
listed. In short, what the transcendental conditions are is a matter of
disagreement between Kant and Foucault but that there are transcendental
conditions is a key agreement that I was trying to call attention to.
Hope this has been more clarifying than muddling!
All the best,
Dan
----Original Message Follows----
From: Vunch@xxxxxxx
Reply-To: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
To: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: Foucault and Kant
Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2001 22:54:49 EST
In a message dated 2/1/01 8:15:46 PM Eastern Standard Time,
thegreatfandincke@xxxxxxxxxxx writes:
> We all knew that power systems and knowledge
> systems affected people's morality. Foucault's radicality is in locating
> ALL morality within power/knowledge. In ways like this, he is
> significantly
> transcendental, and therefore, in a broad and not negligible sense, a
> Kantian after all.
>
>
Foucault is not Kantian because Kant reconstructed how the transcentental
subject, individuals if you will, reconstructed their knowledge of nature.
He did not analyze how humans form social groups and societies. The object
of knowledge for Kant was nature, that is, things which are primarily
perceived by the senses knowledge of which is constructed during the
developmental lifespan of each individual. Knowledge of society, which
Foucault reconstructs, is already existing before the individual is born and
constitutes that individual as he/she grows, something that nature does not
do. Society is a social force construing what each individual is through
both the historical background of beliefs and through the current network of
individual cognitive acts. Society is not nature. To the extent that
Kantian metaphysics is unable to harbor the difference between natural and
social epistomology (what constitutes valid knowledge) is the extent to
which
his moral metaphysics runs aground, as in his notion of the universality of
the categorical imperative. But, for Kant, we should understand that he was
attempting to free science from the binding limits of religion and so dealt
primarily with nature as an object, not as an objectivating force.
As for Juan's situation, we can easily recognize Juan as a character who has
been constructed by the prevailing societal ethos of his location and
social-historical context. Juan is unable to be reflexive about his being
constructed and so he believes that he has it figured out. When he realizes
that he 'had it' figured out, he may be able to understand Foucault's
positing of power not in terms of morality, but in terms of local practices.
For Kant, the law and morality represented the same thing. Today we
distinguish ethics from morality as that which pertains to personal private
matters but we still get embroiled in disputes over right and wrong in which
the law is often the only limiting factor between two or more disparate
ethical positions. In those cases where the law is determing individuals'
ethical consciences, resistance is surely bred, one such form being
homosexuality in its many variations. But, the homosexuality does not
necessarily occur as an ethical position, but instead as a way of exerting
or
expressing power/resistance. I tend to think of power/resistance as a
metaphor of the antibody-antigen or enzyme-substrate complex.
Vunch
_________________________________________________________________
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You seem to misunderstand my point. I was not arguing that Kant had
Foucault's ethical perspective, simply that Foucault took things like
considerations of power and knowledge and made these the ever present
transcendental conditions for moralities and all kinds of practices in
society. My point is that in this transcendental move he is following in a
distinctively Kantian pattern, despite widely diverging in his applications
of transcendental thinking. My point about our always knowing that morals
were sometimes influenced by power/knowledge structures was simply an
allusion to the age old threat of the corrupt manipulating morals through
power or knowledge systems, this threat is at least as old as the New
Testament critique of Phariseism. My point was that if Foucault was simply
saying that sometimes corrupt uses of power/knowledge corrupt morality, he
would be saying nothing new. In contrast to traditional thought, though,
Foucault treats power/knowledge not as external factors sometimes impinging
upon an otherwise pristine morality but rather as everpresent, necessarily
present, transcendental conditions for any morality, or any practice at all
for that matter. In this way he is transcendental, like a Kantian of sorts,
while obviously distinct from Kant in the types of particulars which you
listed. In short, what the transcendental conditions are is a matter of
disagreement between Kant and Foucault but that there are transcendental
conditions is a key agreement that I was trying to call attention to.
Hope this has been more clarifying than muddling!
All the best,
Dan
----Original Message Follows----
From: Vunch@xxxxxxx
Reply-To: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
To: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: Foucault and Kant
Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2001 22:54:49 EST
In a message dated 2/1/01 8:15:46 PM Eastern Standard Time,
thegreatfandincke@xxxxxxxxxxx writes:
> We all knew that power systems and knowledge
> systems affected people's morality. Foucault's radicality is in locating
> ALL morality within power/knowledge. In ways like this, he is
> significantly
> transcendental, and therefore, in a broad and not negligible sense, a
> Kantian after all.
>
>
Foucault is not Kantian because Kant reconstructed how the transcentental
subject, individuals if you will, reconstructed their knowledge of nature.
He did not analyze how humans form social groups and societies. The object
of knowledge for Kant was nature, that is, things which are primarily
perceived by the senses knowledge of which is constructed during the
developmental lifespan of each individual. Knowledge of society, which
Foucault reconstructs, is already existing before the individual is born and
constitutes that individual as he/she grows, something that nature does not
do. Society is a social force construing what each individual is through
both the historical background of beliefs and through the current network of
individual cognitive acts. Society is not nature. To the extent that
Kantian metaphysics is unable to harbor the difference between natural and
social epistomology (what constitutes valid knowledge) is the extent to
which
his moral metaphysics runs aground, as in his notion of the universality of
the categorical imperative. But, for Kant, we should understand that he was
attempting to free science from the binding limits of religion and so dealt
primarily with nature as an object, not as an objectivating force.
As for Juan's situation, we can easily recognize Juan as a character who has
been constructed by the prevailing societal ethos of his location and
social-historical context. Juan is unable to be reflexive about his being
constructed and so he believes that he has it figured out. When he realizes
that he 'had it' figured out, he may be able to understand Foucault's
positing of power not in terms of morality, but in terms of local practices.
For Kant, the law and morality represented the same thing. Today we
distinguish ethics from morality as that which pertains to personal private
matters but we still get embroiled in disputes over right and wrong in which
the law is often the only limiting factor between two or more disparate
ethical positions. In those cases where the law is determing individuals'
ethical consciences, resistance is surely bred, one such form being
homosexuality in its many variations. But, the homosexuality does not
necessarily occur as an ethical position, but instead as a way of exerting
or
expressing power/resistance. I tend to think of power/resistance as a
metaphor of the antibody-antigen or enzyme-substrate complex.
Vunch
_________________________________________________________________
Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com