tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post7574426333138428298..comments2023-11-22T04:10:49.266-05:00Comments on Dispatches from Zembla: Intelligence and Difficult WritingAlokhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12947383354732747209noreply@blogger.comBlogger17125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-64627204403950179942008-09-30T15:25:00.000-05:002008-09-30T15:25:00.000-05:00"In the last couple of years or so I have tried to..."In the last couple of years or so I have tried to read philosophy but haven't been able to make much progress."<BR/><BR/>This pretty much summarises your abilities.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-68488433090169783072008-09-29T14:34:00.000-05:002008-09-29T14:34:00.000-05:00that's the nature of capitalism, the gradual proce...that's the nature of capitalism, the gradual process of commodification. But it is ultimatley we as readers who should be aware and responsbile so that we don't treat them just as brands. I hope this blog doesn't do any such thing... (although I fear it does to a little extent)<BR/><BR/><I>What captivity afflicts us now - if anything, it is the captivity of too much freedom, characteristic of a capitalistic system.</I><BR/><BR/>yes but those freedoms are illusory freedoms and they don't interest me. It is like telling someone imprisoned in a cage that he has all the freedoms to choose the colour to paint his wall, ANY colour! What I am interested in is to get out of the cage itself and not the choice of colours.<BR/><BR/>Reading these thinkers has made me realize a lot of things and even though I haven't done much, I am now at least aware of the possiblity of freedom. I now know how complicit I am in my own self-commodification and I can also see through the mind-numbing stupidity and falseness of most social discourses in popular media. Now I am also very suspicious about unconscious ideological impulses even in the most innocent looking cultural products... these are just some of the things these thinkers have to teach us.Alokhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12947383354732747209noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-81598256410780219222008-09-29T14:10:00.000-05:002008-09-29T14:10:00.000-05:00It's just that when the issue at hand is the need ...It's just that when the issue at hand is the need for a critique, content becomes less important than orientation. And certain thinkers become important merely for what they signify rather than for what they say. There must be cultural theorists who have interesting things to say, but the obsession with trendiness concerns me. "Derrida" and "Agamben" are used in a similar way to "Gucci" or "Versace". <BR/><BR/>Also, I wonder in what sense one has to earn one's freedom? What captivity afflicts us now - if anything, it is the captivity of too much freedom, characteristic of a capitalistic system. I don't subscribe to the notion that reading Heidegger or Habermas could liberate us - at most, it could make us cultists. We do have the tools to think our way through things. Some are motivated to use them, others aren't, and I find nothing abnormal in this state of affairs.Cheshire Cathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07463645065346922684noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-61857310546204460972008-09-29T13:31:00.000-05:002008-09-29T13:31:00.000-05:00yes that is self-evident actually. You can offer t...yes that is self-evident actually. You can offer that kind of critique only from a position of authority. It is upto the reader to decide how valid this claim is. There is also I think "irony" which may do the same thing but that is less dependent on authority.<BR/><BR/>I know about the "trendy" and "postmodernist" thinkers and some of the abuses they have committed. But the arguments in their favour is that ordinary language and what we call common sense itself is a tool and a vehicle which serves to propagate the lies of culture industry and status-quo ideologies. And moreover common sense often hides philosophical truths and assumptions from us. they have no choice but to differentiate their language from the language of the newspaper op-eds, advertising and TV.<BR/><BR/>This is not supporting elitism, just recognising that for some things the reader has to make an effort...it is like doing some work to earn your freedom. <BR/><BR/>I see readers hankering for neo-victorian novels with their cute psychologizing and common sensical ideas and "well-written" but ultimatley utilitarian prose. Some of these get nominated for booker and win awards. This is what I will call conversatism and not colonisation of ideas by abstruse academics.<BR/><BR/>And you really can't say that these academics haven't had any influence outside academia. Just one example Judith Butler's idea of gender as performance (reenactment of social rituals) has become very commonplace and it is quite a remarkabe perspective through which one can see our contemporary world. and i haven't even read anything by her.Alokhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12947383354732747209noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-36555971023051336482008-09-29T10:17:00.000-05:002008-09-29T10:17:00.000-05:00That's true, but I do suspect the motives of philo...That's true, but I do suspect the motives of philosophy. Might it not be that the very origination of these phrases is an implicit claim to the purer, higher ground of meta-language - an assertion by Philosophy of its own authority? While in fact we all continue to traffic in the muddied, muddled waters of language itself. And perhaps Philosophy does acknowledge this, perhaps it does find in self-awareness a salve for its conscience, and perhaps it goes even further, delighting in paradox, insisting on the inevitable assailability of our motives. And what have we achieved then? The Foucaults and Lacans and Kristevas of this world - colonizing medicine, terrorizing science; the farce of Social Text.<BR/><BR/>We enter a world where every utterance has its evil mirror-image. And if mostpeople choose not to navigate these thickets, why, that might be a form of wisdom.Cheshire Cathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07463645065346922684noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-22791844318145040262008-09-29T09:45:00.000-05:002008-09-29T09:45:00.000-05:00But it does give you the tools and vocabularies to...But it does give you the tools and vocabularies to think about these things. I mean the concepts like "commodification", "authenticity" come from philosophy too. The problem of self-referentiality will always be there...probably the reason why heidegger's language is full of so many strange words and phrases.Alokhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12947383354732747209noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-63556537807452189692008-09-29T09:32:00.000-05:002008-09-29T09:32:00.000-05:00Well, I suspect the world of academic philosophy i...Well, I suspect the world of academic philosophy is just as commodified as the worlds, real or imagined, that it criticizes. The language of philosophy is a specialized language reliant on (rhetorical) tricks - not so different from technical language in that regard.Cheshire Cathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07463645065346922684noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-39331565132049101142008-09-29T08:01:00.000-05:002008-09-29T08:01:00.000-05:00I think it is a problem with institutionalized edu...I think it is a problem with institutionalized education itself, which turns education into a commodity, something which is to be owned. The same thing happens in humanities as well.Alokhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12947383354732747209noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-63930611308023157802008-09-29T06:55:00.000-05:002008-09-29T06:55:00.000-05:00I'm not surprised that we're so much in agreement ...I'm not surprised that we're so much in agreement on this issue... But perhaps some of the blame rests on those who insist on acquiring a technical education despite being entirely unsuited to it :)<BR/><BR/>I know I'll never escape the guilt and remorse of it. If there's any consolation, it's that things were no different for Broch and Gadda and Musil.Cheshire Cathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07463645065346922684noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-48956679427171629012008-09-28T21:21:00.000-05:002008-09-28T21:21:00.000-05:00Agree, there is a creative process in Mathematics ...Agree, there is a creative process in Mathematics too... I should have been less categorical in my original post. It is ultimately not really linked to subject (though it is definitely more prevalent in people with technical education), it is just an attitude, a way of thinking. People can read poetry in the most impersonal, abstract, mechanical way too.Alokhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12947383354732747209noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-61935002883646683112008-09-28T16:46:00.000-05:002008-09-28T16:46:00.000-05:00Re Theorem Proving: I actually coded Buchberger's ...Re Theorem Proving: I actually coded Buchberger's algorithm for proving geometry theorems in my first few months of grad school:) It is clever and fast in some cases but it's similar in spirit to a brute force enumeration of all true statements that follow from a set of axioms.<BR/><BR/>I think the creative process in math or any other field can't be automated.<BR/><BR/>But I do agree with you. It is sad that engineering colleges seem to mostly churn out a particularly annoying brand of philistine.Crphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02122442841897458051noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-52806632012160279522008-09-28T14:10:00.000-05:002008-09-28T14:10:00.000-05:00If I understood you correctly you see language jus...If I understood you correctly you see language just as a means of pragmatic, day-to-day communication but I think that's just *one* use of it. The way we use the language itself assumes so many things that modern philosophers question. For example the division between subject and object in a language is so common that nobody notices but when someone questions it, it feels strange only because we are accustomed to the habit of language. or we assume that all words stand for something concrete which is out there in the world etc.<BR/><BR/>And moreover the same kind of language is so corrupted by cliches of the culture industry that one can't but will a kind of "difficulty" if one has to retain authenticity and individuality.Alokhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12947383354732747209noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-76840224870111871822008-09-28T13:55:00.000-05:002008-09-28T13:55:00.000-05:00Not necessarily should everyone know or learn the ...Not necessarily should everyone know or learn the very language of philosophy. As you know well, language is a tool for communication. Some of us utilise it, sybolically, in a pre-Babelic fashion, some in post-Babelic, and some like James Joyce, according to Eco, applies it exactly in the middle of Babel! It is said, first, Hellenists and then The Latin of Roman Empire,created a satisfactory system of universal communication. The tow peoples that had invented the language of philosophy identified the structure of their language with the the structure of human reason.Greeks spoke THE LANGUAGE. All others were barbarians, which etymologically means "those who stammer." "We are the prisoner of the house of language!" As that great philosopher once said.<BR/>ThanxAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-7394635145453876112008-09-28T11:36:00.000-05:002008-09-28T11:36:00.000-05:00that might be just my ignorance then. I thought it...that might be just my ignorance then. I thought it was a well-established sub-discipline in Theoretical Comp Sc and Artificial intelligence.<BR/><BR/>I didn't really mean to trash mathematical reasoning but more and more at least in people with technical background I see that they take thinking to mean exactly the same - impersonal logical (deductive or inductive) reasoning. They have no clue about contemplation about philosophical assumptions. Give a typical IITian a book by Heidegger and he will scream what a bunch of bullshit. Talk to him about ethics and he will demand proof! That was my original starting point.Alokhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12947383354732747209noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-83575431103900958582008-09-28T11:16:00.000-05:002008-09-28T11:16:00.000-05:00>>If it sounds mechanical that's not sur...>>If it sounds mechanical that's not surprising. A subtopic in theoretical computer science deals with automated proving<<<BR/><BR/>Well, in addition to <I>some</I> extremely naive techniques for computer-generated proofs (There has been no substantial progress on this since the sixties and we still don't know how to make a computer "discover" theorems in any meaningful sense of that term) you also have computer generated music and computer generated poetry. So should we conclude that music and poetry are mechanical pursuits too? :)Crphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02122442841897458051noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-62206732527987712862008-09-26T13:14:00.000-05:002008-09-26T13:14:00.000-05:00Yes that's what I was trying to drive at. We need ...Yes that's what I was trying to drive at. We need to train ourselves to read and imputing political motives to writers who are obscure is not always fair.<BR/><BR/>you take care too...Alokhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12947383354732747209noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12674755.post-4715932174523804102008-09-26T13:07:00.000-05:002008-09-26T13:07:00.000-05:00I am away for a few weeks, thought w'd let you kno...I am away for a few weeks, thought w'd let you know.<BR/><BR/>This piece is well written and i agree entirely. however, we need to know what an intelligent person looks like or thinks. Genet used to dress very casually and surprised everyone when Said received him at Columbia.<BR/><BR/>Philosophizing and being one are different things. Reading it different from other texts. one must have the tools but how can one acquire everything if you are not formally trained?<BR/><BR/>anyway, take care.Kubla Khanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11973223751363547679noreply@blogger.com