13 ideas
7426 | Critical philosophy is what questions domination at every level [Foucault] |
Full Idea: In its critical aspect, philosophy is that which calls into question domination at every level | |
From: Michel Foucault (Ethics of the Concern for Self as Freedom [1984], p.300) | |
A reaction: A very French view of the subject. It is tempting to say that they had their adolescent outburst in 1789, and it is time to grow up. With rights come responsibilities... |
7423 | Philosophy and politics are fundamentally linked [Foucault] |
Full Idea: The relationship between philosophy and politics is permanent and fundamental. | |
From: Michel Foucault (Ethics of the Concern for Self as Freedom [1984], p.293) | |
A reaction: This idea is one of the biggest gulfs between continental and analytical philosophy. Many aspects of philosophy are turning out to be much more social than analytical philosophers might have thought - epistemology, for example. |
7420 | When logos controls our desires, we have actually become the logos [Foucault] |
Full Idea: Plutarch says if you have mastered principles then logos will silence your desires like a master silencing a dog - in which case the logos functions without intervention on your part - you have become the logos, or the logos has become you. | |
From: Michel Foucault (Ethics of the Concern for Self as Freedom [1984], p.286) | |
A reaction: If you believe that logos is pure reason, you might be quite happy with this, but if you thought it was a cultural construct, you might feel that you had been cunningly enslaved. If I ask 'what is 7+6?', logos interrupts me to give the answer. |
8978 | Events are made of other things, and are not fundamental to ontology [Bennett] |
Full Idea: Events are not basic items in the universe; they should not be included in any fundamental ontology...all the truths about them are entailed by and explained and made true by truths that do not involve the event concept. | |
From: Jonathan Bennett (Events and Their Names [1988], p.12), quoted by Peter Simons - Events 3.1 | |
A reaction: Given the variable time spans of events, their ability to coincide, their ability to contain no motion, their blatantly conventional component, and their recalcitrance to individuation, I say Bennett is right. |
21227 | The Cogito demands a bridge to the world, and ends in isolating the ego [Velarde-Mayol] |
Full Idea: All philosophies inspired in the Cogito have the problem of building a bridge from the starting point of consciousness to the external world. The result of this is the isolation and solitude of the very ego. | |
From: Victor Velarde-Mayol (On Husserl [2000], 4.7.2) | |
A reaction: This strikes me as a pretty good reason not to develop a philosophy which is inspired by the Cogito. |
21215 | The representation may not be a likeness [Velarde-Mayol] |
Full Idea: Representationalism is the doctrine that maintains that the object is represented in consciousness by means of an image. ...One should not confuse an image with a likeness. | |
From: Victor Velarde-Mayol (On Husserl [2000], 2.4.3) | |
A reaction: Helpful reminder that sense-data or whatever may not be a likeness. But then how do they represent? Symbolic representation needs massive interpretation. |
7424 | Saying games of truth were merely power relations would be a horrible exaggeration [Foucault] |
Full Idea: When I talk about power relations and games of truth, I am absolutely not saying that games of truth are just concealed power relations - that would be a horrible exaggeration. | |
From: Michel Foucault (Ethics of the Concern for Self as Freedom [1984], p.296) | |
A reaction: I take this to be a denial of the more absurd forms of relativism. I think there is an interesting convergence between this kind of continental thinking, and the social view of justification found in the later work of Alvin Goldman. |
7422 | A subject is a form which can change, in (say) political or sexual situations [Foucault] |
Full Idea: The subject is not a substance but a form, which is not always identical to itself. You do not have the same relation to yourself when you go to vote and when you seek to fulfil your desires in a sexual relationship. | |
From: Michel Foucault (Ethics of the Concern for Self as Freedom [1984], p.290) | |
A reaction: I don't think I believe this. If it were true, the concept of 'sexual politics' would mean nothing to me. A brutal or sympathetic nature is likely to express itself in both situations. |
7419 | Ethics is the conscious practice of freedom [Foucault] |
Full Idea: What is ethics, if not the practice of freedom, the conscious [réfléchie] practice of freedom? | |
From: Michel Foucault (Ethics of the Concern for Self as Freedom [1984], p.284) | |
A reaction: Makes Foucault sound very existentialist. I'm not sure I understand this kind of remark, given that serial killers seem to be exceptionally good at 'practising their freedom'. However, the idea is akin to Kant's notion of a truly good will (Idea 3710). |
7425 | The aim is not to eliminate power relations, but to reduce domination [Foucault] |
Full Idea: The problem is not to dissolve power relations in a utopia of transparent communications, but to acquire the rules of law, the management techniques, the morality, the practice of the self, that allows games of power with minimum domination. | |
From: Michel Foucault (Ethics of the Concern for Self as Freedom [1984], p.298) | |
A reaction: If you are a democrat it is hard to disagree with this, though I am still unclear why being dominated should rank as a total disaster. A healthy personal relationship might involve domination. 'Management techniques' is interesting. |
7418 | The idea of liberation suggests there is a human nature which has been repressed [Foucault] |
Full Idea: I am somewhat suspicious of the notion of liberation, because one runs the risk of falling back on the idea that there is a human nature, that has been concealed or alienated by mechanisms of repression. | |
From: Michel Foucault (Ethics of the Concern for Self as Freedom [1984], p.282) | |
A reaction: Personally I think there is (to some extent) a human nature, and that it fails to flourish if it gets too much 'liberation. However, the world contains a lot more repression than liberation, so we should all be fans of liberty. |
10364 | Facts are about the world, not in it, so they can't cause anything [Bennett] |
Full Idea: Facts are not the sort of item that can cause anything. A fact is a true proposition (they say); it is not something in the world but is rather something about the world. | |
From: Jonathan Bennett (Events and Their Names [1988], p.22), quoted by Jonathan Schaffer - The Metaphysics of Causation 1.1 | |
A reaction: Compare 10361. Good argument, but maybe 'fact' is ambiguous. See Idea 10365. Events are said to be more concrete, and so can do the job, but their individuation also seems to depend on a description (as Davidson has pointed out). |
21219 | Find the essence by varying an object, to see what remains invariable [Velarde-Mayol] |
Full Idea: Eidetic Reduction consists of producing variations in the individual object until we see what is invariable in it. What is invariable is its essence or Eidos. | |
From: Victor Velarde-Mayol (On Husserl [2000], 3.2.2) | |
A reaction: This strikes me as an excellent idea. It more or less describes the method of science. Chemical atoms were thought to be unsplittable, until someone tried a new variation for dealing with them. |