I find nearly every post in this supposed "breakdown" to be very
interesting. A (probably bad) book by Winograd and Flores, Understanding
Computers and Cognition, is at pains to characterize communication as a
series of breakdowns, while they bounce of of Heidegger in order to make
this point. Bennington, in the introduction to Legislations, says that
such breakdowns are where communication occurs. I only partly agree, but,
yes, there is something to that.
We are looking at a certain kind of *ethical* breakdown. In such a
breakdown, the "worldhood of the world" may become visible. It is not
the worldhood of the workshop, of course. But it has given some of us to
think of Levinas, for example, in this context. It has activated some
question of (existent or nonexistent) community on this list. It has made
me concerned, for Babich, for example.
Some general comments:
1. Vitality and flames: often, flames come in and *revitalize* a list.
Now, wait! I don't *like* that at all. I think it's usually a bad thing.
That may also be *intrinsic* to its structure *as breakdown*. But a basic
problem concerning issues of violence/nonviolence is one in which violence
can be "used", exploited, hoped-for, or *made inevitable* for the sake of
this "revitalization". Nietzsche praises of polemos apply here. The point
I'm making is that this *should* (or at least could) give one to take such
"violence" (a relatively small violence) consideration in the following
way: Why do we depend on violence to vitalize? Why does the question of
community, such as it is, come up in such a context more often? isn't
there a better way to vitalize community? To what extent are "we" (...)
dependent on violence as a paradigm for community? To take an example:
reflections by people who participated actively in the Vietnam war era in
the US often point out how it "brought them together". What kind of *being
with* is it that is dependent on the comm-unity of the threat of violence,
a draft, etc.? Exit the draft, exit community and "revolution", of course,
to its half-life (a rather vital one, it appears). I think that within the
Heideggerian problematics, the glossed over *mitsein*, which is taken as
constitutive but scarcely opened up and developed, is consigned to the
"everyday" all too fully (presumably, one "does what one does", including:
makes friends, talks, gets married, has children, virtually *everything*
but dying, as if these were not all intimately connected). Since it is not
opened up, then the only activating/vitalizing principle Heidegger can
have must always be *beyond* all issues of mitsein. Read: death.
2. The Heideggerian "prescriptions" for Mitsein seem to be limited to:
solicitude and finding one's heros, living out one's days on that basis,
once the "moment" (is it, could it be, a "moment", should it be a
moment?) of Vision is attained. I get the feeling that the Heideggerian
"progression" is bothered, somehow, by *entering* these kinds of conflict
issues. A simple Nietzschean pneumatics will help here: repressed, the
conflict forces of Mietsein surge forth, occasionally, in some
revitalizing polemos. We know enough at this point to regard such
violence as unacceptable, in the face of any virile claims to the
(probably manly) necessity of occasional violence.
3. The category of "idle chatter" seems to be a repository for everything
in interaction with others which is inconvenient for this progression,
while the logos form of speech *after authenticity* has a form that
*parallels* the death-structure of Dasein's ownmost, transcending
authentication: such *logos* is mono-logos: *hearkening*. Does
*hearkening* have *dialogue*? To hearken is in some way to call from a
distance, to send a message, but surely not to go back and forth. Should
the fullest speech be restricted to monologue? Why monologue? What is
being avoided here? What "mess"? What "trouble"? It should be borne in
mind, I think, that the mode of discourse of the tyrant is, of course,
monological. Is the Heideggerian program one in which we *all* get to be
tyrants?
4. Most study and practice concerning peace making, conflict resolution,
as well as discourses in psychotherapeutics (often the only place one can
see this take place *is* in an occasional moment of psychotherapist
intervention on the Ricki Lake or Geraldo show) and study and projects
concerning problems of political trauma on a national/international scale
(e.g. Macpherson's PSAMRA project, which works in the direction of
"working through history" as a crucial aspect of dealing with political
trauma), point to the deep need for *dialogue* to deal with the various
issues involved.
Well, some thoughts.
_______________________________________________________________
The survivors who spoke of the "electricity", the "lights", the
"metal tables" and the "needles" had a shrieking question mark
in their eyes that wasn't answered by what what we were reading
in the growing volume of material that was being published.
--excerpt from The Stone Angels survivors' journal
Vol. 6 Thunder Bay, Ontario
_______________________________________________________________
--- from list heidegger@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ---
interesting. A (probably bad) book by Winograd and Flores, Understanding
Computers and Cognition, is at pains to characterize communication as a
series of breakdowns, while they bounce of of Heidegger in order to make
this point. Bennington, in the introduction to Legislations, says that
such breakdowns are where communication occurs. I only partly agree, but,
yes, there is something to that.
We are looking at a certain kind of *ethical* breakdown. In such a
breakdown, the "worldhood of the world" may become visible. It is not
the worldhood of the workshop, of course. But it has given some of us to
think of Levinas, for example, in this context. It has activated some
question of (existent or nonexistent) community on this list. It has made
me concerned, for Babich, for example.
Some general comments:
1. Vitality and flames: often, flames come in and *revitalize* a list.
Now, wait! I don't *like* that at all. I think it's usually a bad thing.
That may also be *intrinsic* to its structure *as breakdown*. But a basic
problem concerning issues of violence/nonviolence is one in which violence
can be "used", exploited, hoped-for, or *made inevitable* for the sake of
this "revitalization". Nietzsche praises of polemos apply here. The point
I'm making is that this *should* (or at least could) give one to take such
"violence" (a relatively small violence) consideration in the following
way: Why do we depend on violence to vitalize? Why does the question of
community, such as it is, come up in such a context more often? isn't
there a better way to vitalize community? To what extent are "we" (...)
dependent on violence as a paradigm for community? To take an example:
reflections by people who participated actively in the Vietnam war era in
the US often point out how it "brought them together". What kind of *being
with* is it that is dependent on the comm-unity of the threat of violence,
a draft, etc.? Exit the draft, exit community and "revolution", of course,
to its half-life (a rather vital one, it appears). I think that within the
Heideggerian problematics, the glossed over *mitsein*, which is taken as
constitutive but scarcely opened up and developed, is consigned to the
"everyday" all too fully (presumably, one "does what one does", including:
makes friends, talks, gets married, has children, virtually *everything*
but dying, as if these were not all intimately connected). Since it is not
opened up, then the only activating/vitalizing principle Heidegger can
have must always be *beyond* all issues of mitsein. Read: death.
2. The Heideggerian "prescriptions" for Mitsein seem to be limited to:
solicitude and finding one's heros, living out one's days on that basis,
once the "moment" (is it, could it be, a "moment", should it be a
moment?) of Vision is attained. I get the feeling that the Heideggerian
"progression" is bothered, somehow, by *entering* these kinds of conflict
issues. A simple Nietzschean pneumatics will help here: repressed, the
conflict forces of Mietsein surge forth, occasionally, in some
revitalizing polemos. We know enough at this point to regard such
violence as unacceptable, in the face of any virile claims to the
(probably manly) necessity of occasional violence.
3. The category of "idle chatter" seems to be a repository for everything
in interaction with others which is inconvenient for this progression,
while the logos form of speech *after authenticity* has a form that
*parallels* the death-structure of Dasein's ownmost, transcending
authentication: such *logos* is mono-logos: *hearkening*. Does
*hearkening* have *dialogue*? To hearken is in some way to call from a
distance, to send a message, but surely not to go back and forth. Should
the fullest speech be restricted to monologue? Why monologue? What is
being avoided here? What "mess"? What "trouble"? It should be borne in
mind, I think, that the mode of discourse of the tyrant is, of course,
monological. Is the Heideggerian program one in which we *all* get to be
tyrants?
4. Most study and practice concerning peace making, conflict resolution,
as well as discourses in psychotherapeutics (often the only place one can
see this take place *is* in an occasional moment of psychotherapist
intervention on the Ricki Lake or Geraldo show) and study and projects
concerning problems of political trauma on a national/international scale
(e.g. Macpherson's PSAMRA project, which works in the direction of
"working through history" as a crucial aspect of dealing with political
trauma), point to the deep need for *dialogue* to deal with the various
issues involved.
Well, some thoughts.
_______________________________________________________________
The survivors who spoke of the "electricity", the "lights", the
"metal tables" and the "needles" had a shrieking question mark
in their eyes that wasn't answered by what what we were reading
in the growing volume of material that was being published.
--excerpt from The Stone Angels survivors' journal
Vol. 6 Thunder Bay, Ontario
_______________________________________________________________
--- from list heidegger@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ---