did foucault have a project?
> -----Original Message-----
> From: aryavartacnsrn@xxxxxxxxx
> Sent: Sat, 6 Mar 2010 12:14:41 -0600
> To: foucault-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: Re: [Foucault-L] Foucault and "human nature"
>
> Actualy I think Foucault does distinguish between truth and justification
> explicitly, except that these clarifications are often in the interviews
> and
> intersections with other professors in Dits et Ecrits and perhaps in a
> few
> lectures.
> Its an interesting pattern. Foucault assumes the reader's ability to make
> a
> distinction in his written work whereas in an informal interview, he's
> much
> more refreshingly clear about his intentions, framework, etc.
> Thus why I think anyone who wants a good understanding of Foucault needs
> to
> read Dits et Ecrits (the translated excessively abridged version being
> "Essential Works of Foucault, 3 vols).
> Only by reading that will one have a clear view of Foucault's project.
>
>
> On Sat, Mar 6, 2010 at 6:11 AM, Kay Fisher <fisherk@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> I think (philosopher and psychologist) Todd May's book "Between
>> Genealogy
>> and Epistemology: Psychology, politics and knowledge in the Thought of
>> Michel Foucault' (1993) could be helpful here.
>>
>> He believes that its important to make a distinction between
>> justification
>> and truth (something he reckons so-called 'poststructuralist' French
>> thought
>> tended not to do). He says that Foucault could be ambiguous on these
>> questions but makes the case that his position is not a relativist one
>> re:
>> truth. He claims that Foucault takes an antifoundational relation to
>> truth
>> but one that allows truth claims to be justified on the basis of
>> 'inferential networks' of already existing knowledges (this includes
>> justificatory practices). [May further argues that scientific knowledges
>> of
>> Western culture tend to have relatively 'tight' inferential networks].
>> This,
>> of course, does not guarantee any absolute truth. Rather it is assumed
>> that
>> while everything is open to question, not everything can be questioned
>> at
>> the one time (so there always has to be some taken-for-granteds). I
>> think
>> this is pretty much consistent with Edward's reading.
>>
>> May also argues (like others) that since the relativist position affords
>> no
>> grounds for truth claims it is self-defeating argument in logic terms.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Message: 11
>> Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2010 22:08:48 -0500
>> From: Edward Comstock<ecomst@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
>> Subject: Re: [Foucault-L] Foucault and "human nature"
>> To: Mailing-list<foucault-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>> Message-ID:
>> <
>> OF2850DBEE.82182B73-ON852576DE.00108388-852576DE.00114D19@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
>>
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
>>
>> 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
>> 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
>>
>>
>>
>> ------------------------------
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Foucault-L mailing list
>> Foucault-L@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>
>> http://foucault.info/mailman/listinfo/foucault-l
>>
>> End of Foucault-L Digest, Vol 10, Issue 6
>> *****************************************
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Foucault-L mailing list
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Chetan Vemuri
> West Des Moines, IA
> aryavartacnsrn@xxxxxxxxx
> (319)-512-9318
> "You say you want a Revolution! Well you know, we all want to change the
> world"
> _______________________________________________
> Foucault-L mailing list
____________________________________________________________
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> -----Original Message-----
> From: aryavartacnsrn@xxxxxxxxx
> Sent: Sat, 6 Mar 2010 12:14:41 -0600
> To: foucault-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: Re: [Foucault-L] Foucault and "human nature"
>
> Actualy I think Foucault does distinguish between truth and justification
> explicitly, except that these clarifications are often in the interviews
> and
> intersections with other professors in Dits et Ecrits and perhaps in a
> few
> lectures.
> Its an interesting pattern. Foucault assumes the reader's ability to make
> a
> distinction in his written work whereas in an informal interview, he's
> much
> more refreshingly clear about his intentions, framework, etc.
> Thus why I think anyone who wants a good understanding of Foucault needs
> to
> read Dits et Ecrits (the translated excessively abridged version being
> "Essential Works of Foucault, 3 vols).
> Only by reading that will one have a clear view of Foucault's project.
>
>
> On Sat, Mar 6, 2010 at 6:11 AM, Kay Fisher <fisherk@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> I think (philosopher and psychologist) Todd May's book "Between
>> Genealogy
>> and Epistemology: Psychology, politics and knowledge in the Thought of
>> Michel Foucault' (1993) could be helpful here.
>>
>> He believes that its important to make a distinction between
>> justification
>> and truth (something he reckons so-called 'poststructuralist' French
>> thought
>> tended not to do). He says that Foucault could be ambiguous on these
>> questions but makes the case that his position is not a relativist one
>> re:
>> truth. He claims that Foucault takes an antifoundational relation to
>> truth
>> but one that allows truth claims to be justified on the basis of
>> 'inferential networks' of already existing knowledges (this includes
>> justificatory practices). [May further argues that scientific knowledges
>> of
>> Western culture tend to have relatively 'tight' inferential networks].
>> This,
>> of course, does not guarantee any absolute truth. Rather it is assumed
>> that
>> while everything is open to question, not everything can be questioned
>> at
>> the one time (so there always has to be some taken-for-granteds). I
>> think
>> this is pretty much consistent with Edward's reading.
>>
>> May also argues (like others) that since the relativist position affords
>> no
>> grounds for truth claims it is self-defeating argument in logic terms.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Message: 11
>> Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2010 22:08:48 -0500
>> From: Edward Comstock<ecomst@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
>> Subject: Re: [Foucault-L] Foucault and "human nature"
>> To: Mailing-list<foucault-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>> Message-ID:
>> <
>> OF2850DBEE.82182B73-ON852576DE.00108388-852576DE.00114D19@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
>>
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
>>
>> 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
>> 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
>>
>>
>>
>> ------------------------------
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Foucault-L mailing list
>> Foucault-L@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>
>> http://foucault.info/mailman/listinfo/foucault-l
>>
>> End of Foucault-L Digest, Vol 10, Issue 6
>> *****************************************
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Foucault-L mailing list
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Chetan Vemuri
> West Des Moines, IA
> aryavartacnsrn@xxxxxxxxx
> (319)-512-9318
> "You say you want a Revolution! Well you know, we all want to change the
> world"
> _______________________________________________
> Foucault-L mailing list
____________________________________________________________
Receive Notifications of Incoming Messages
Easily monitor multiple email accounts & access them with a click.
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