Right. Similarly, our current physics works as a system of knowledge that
gives us repeatable results and laws. But this does not mean that we could
not have a competitive "non-quarky" physics that gives repeatable results
and laws of a different order. Perhaps, with different cultural
circumstances, a given non-quarky physics might even be more useful in the
knowledge it produces. In other words, just because our physics works as
a system of knowledge does not make it "true" in the absolute sense. But
at the same time, who cares anymore about finding knowledge that is true
in the absolute sense?
Of course we also have to distinguish between sciences that have crossed
the epistemological threshold (like physics and pathological anatomy) and
those that have not...
Re: [Foucault-L] Foucault and "human nature"
David McInerney
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On 06/03/2010, at 7:41 AM, Edward Comstock wrote:
> It also seems to me that even what we call human nature or look for is
> going to change based on different knowledge practices, such that the
> question can only be answered within given systems of knowledge.
> Foucault,
> after all, for instance, believed that modern medicine presented valid
> abstractions against which we could gain usefull knowedges. But I
> dont'
> take this to mean that he believes modern medicine to be "true" in the
> absolute sense.
>
This seems similar to Althusser's attempts to distinguish between
discourses in terms of the 'adequacy' of their 'grasp' of the
material world, a rather tricky notion in that idealist discourses
such as empiricism always attempt to exploit it. I'm not sure how
one avoids it though, unless one accepts the extreme relativism that
would assert that the phlogiston theory is equally valid way of
looking at the generation of heat as thermodynamics. It is clear
that one gives us a more adequate grasp of material reality, but if
one attempts to 'go around' discourse to find a way to see whether it
corresponds to something outside of itself then, whoops, there we are
back with the 'subject of knowledge' etc etc.
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gives us repeatable results and laws. But this does not mean that we could
not have a competitive "non-quarky" physics that gives repeatable results
and laws of a different order. Perhaps, with different cultural
circumstances, a given non-quarky physics might even be more useful in the
knowledge it produces. In other words, just because our physics works as
a system of knowledge does not make it "true" in the absolute sense. But
at the same time, who cares anymore about finding knowledge that is true
in the absolute sense?
Of course we also have to distinguish between sciences that have crossed
the epistemological threshold (like physics and pathological anatomy) and
those that have not...
Re: [Foucault-L] Foucault and "human nature"
David McInerney
to:
Mailing-list
03/05/2010 04:26 PM
Sent by:
foucault-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Please respond to Mailing-list
On 06/03/2010, at 7:41 AM, Edward Comstock wrote:
> It also seems to me that even what we call human nature or look for is
> going to change based on different knowledge practices, such that the
> question can only be answered within given systems of knowledge.
> Foucault,
> after all, for instance, believed that modern medicine presented valid
> abstractions against which we could gain usefull knowedges. But I
> dont'
> take this to mean that he believes modern medicine to be "true" in the
> absolute sense.
>
This seems similar to Althusser's attempts to distinguish between
discourses in terms of the 'adequacy' of their 'grasp' of the
material world, a rather tricky notion in that idealist discourses
such as empiricism always attempt to exploit it. I'm not sure how
one avoids it though, unless one accepts the extreme relativism that
would assert that the phlogiston theory is equally valid way of
looking at the generation of heat as thermodynamics. It is clear
that one gives us a more adequate grasp of material reality, but if
one attempts to 'go around' discourse to find a way to see whether it
corresponds to something outside of itself then, whoops, there we are
back with the 'subject of knowledge' etc etc.
_______________________________________________
Foucault-L mailing list