Kant's Prolegomena, pt. 2
In the Third Part, Kant elaborates on one of the practical outcomes of his metaphysics, saying that though the understanding will not list into absurdity (b/c it's grounded in experience), the reason might, so a critique of pure reason is needed to prevent reason from extending the "transcendental ideas" (those grounded in cognition) from being extended into "empirical use." He then explores a few such transcendental ideas: the psychological idea, the cosmological idea, and the theological idea. Hume arrived at a similar conclusion when he sed that "custom" and "habits" of thought had led us to many irresolvable philosophical, moral, and political debates. Hume decides that these debates should be left to "practical" efforts at arguing by common sense in the specific historical situation. In class, we discussed a similar reading of Kant--one supported by textual evidence from the _Prolegomena_: Kant wants to make a small space for metaphysics and to leave the rest of human interaction for practical/rhetorical hashing out in specific circumstances and by appeals to imperfect "common sense."
But we also explored another possible reading of Kant, this one supported by textual evidence in the exploration of the second antinomy (freedom and necessity). Here, Kant argues that people have an experience of personal freedom (in their possession of reason) and an experience of necessity (in their experience of an apparently deterministic nature). He insists that "ought" arises from reason (freedom) and "is" from nature (experience), and then contends that this tension between "ought" and "is" shapes the possibility for human morality. So here's the question: When Kant supposes an "ought" in universal reason, does he then lay the groundwork for a moral/ethical/political science that has a transcendental componenet? If he does, then can we say that he snatches politics, morality, and ethics from the contingent realm of rhetoric shortly after promising to leave all that stuff up to the chisel of common sense and rhetorical deliberation? Based on your reading of this second section and on our discussion in the last class, argue for Kant as either pro-rhetoric (allowing common sense and deliberation a place in figuring out how prudently to get along in contingent circumstances)or anti-rhetoric (insisting that, despite the contingency of nature/experience, there is a transcendental component of human nature that can ground and therefore guide human action). If "yes" to the latter, here's a follow-up: Does Kant make the metaphysician the sovereign?
Matthew Reilly post 3/27
I’d like to approach the question for this week from a slightly different standpoint, which takes up where we left off last week. The question we asked of Foucault: “what is a discourse” (or “what is a discursive formation”) seems applicable to the task of comparing the sovereign and the metaphysician.
Foucault distinguishes discourse from both words and things, placing discourse at the limits of language enabling our semantic, practical, orderly, institutional inquiry into things. In Foucault’s account, discourse resembles the principles of general necessity that Kant requires for an inquiry into objects of possible experience and a foundation of the synthetic a priori as a condition for judgment (moral or otherwise). Foucault, however, is seeking to explain phenomena (symptoms) by which we understand noumena that are not tangible objects in a Lockean sense—Foucault’s “noumena” pertain to a field of concepts and relations that structure consciousness (both as individual psyche, as biological entity, as public agent, moral and intellectual agent, and so on). Furthermore, the pursuit of knowledge, for Foucault, does not uncover the synthetic a priori insofar as discursive shifts are historical and contingent (synthetic a posteriori?).
If I’m right so far, I think it would be interesting to consider a set of words to which Foucault frequently recurs in AK: “norms,” “rules,” “laws,” “forms.” Each of these terms implies judgment within a given context—a slight deviation from the idea of a transcendental morality. These terms seem to fit best into a C17 vocabulary of political sovereignty (even further from Kant, the terms might also apply to fields ranging from prescriptive aesthetics to probability-based activities such as manners or gambling.)
Foucault’s norms, forms, rules, and law seem inconsistent with a metaphysical inquiry into morals, insofar as one is contingent and the other universal. The function of discourse, however, which “makes it possible to delimit the group of concepts” in “relations that [constitute] a system of conceptual formation” (AK 60) seems fairly close to an inquiry into universal relation of the objects of possible understanding. Both inquiries are internal to a system of understanding and both have the power to structure judgment. The forms, norms, and rules that Foucault describes, though, are products of discourse—he says they are not expressive works of an individual. Similarly, a faithful metaphysician would only serve as sovereign in a sense closer to that described by Pufendorf, who understands universal natural law as confined to life in order to regulate human action. While Hobbes understands a relation between sovereignty and efficacy that might appear entirely arbitrary, a (faithful) Kantian sovereign-metaphysician would have the capacity to regulate norms and forms for judgment under the aegis of all that can be known at a given time.
Kantian Dogma
These several questions of where Kant leaves us at the end of Prolegomena are (I think) partly about how Kant’s legacy influences later thinkers and maybe even statecrafting. The ‘ought’ of universal reason he describes has a bearing on the new moral science in several interesting ways. First, since ‘ought’ is the new limit through the idea of freedom, it justifies the space of moral/ethical/political action on new grounds—through some universal reason rather than through the deity. The important question then becomes who will determine what universal reason is and that seems to be Kant, in this case. Later metaphysicians could presumably fill this role if they learned the “principles of the Critique” (105). This remaking of authority does start to sound a lot like the metaphysician is the new sovereign. He plays the role of setting the terms and interpretation of reason, much like a sovereign would previously play the intermediary between the deity and the multitude. An old explanation of Romanticism in literary criticism goes just like that: the poets and philosophers of this age replaced God with reason and nature but kept the same basic Christian framework—they naturalized supernaturalism. Kant fits into this narrative well and by looking at his (mis)characterization of commonsense, I think his hostility to rhetoric becomes clear.
While initially Kant allows that commonsense is valuable so long as it remains out of metaphysics, he refuses to grant that commonsense is useful for speculation, thereby giving what looks like a lot of ground but actually taking much more for metaphysics (they get speculation). Reason, not the commonsense established by experience, holds the reins of the future. By showing the limits of all possible experience, reason allows us to see more possibilities through metaphysics (95). So these propositions might make Kant anti-rhetorical as I’m understanding rhetoric as the prejudices, commonplaces, and commonsense of contingent public discourse. Yet I’m really tepid in thinking that because when I’m reading Kant I don’t sense that he is addressing the status of rhetoric. His fits of rage are addressed at previous and contemporary philosophers that didn’t use HIS principles of critique. Hume has a big target on him the whole time even as Kant tries to grapple with his conclusions. It seems like there is some real anxiety there and I wonder if Kant deals with this through his own dogmatism. Perhaps this is why he reaches for this metaphor near the end: “Whoever has once tasted critique will be ever after disgusted with all dogmatical twaddle which he formerly put up with because his reason had to have something and could find nothing better for its support” (99). Once you’ve tasted Kant, there’s no going back.
Citations from Hackett, 2001
It seems that, as with
It seems that, as with pretty much everyone else we've read, we can say that Kant is hostile to particular types of/contexts for rhetoric and not hostile to others. I agree with Bo that Kant seems to be fixated on his own particular type of reasoning, and to me he never really justifies this. He also seems hostile to rhetoric inasmuch as he critiques other philosophers who have used, for him, imperfect methods to arrive at conclusions that, for Kant, are simply wrong. This is of course all over the Prolegomena but I'm thinking specifically of the part at the end where he says that people will always be interested in metephysics, but most of them will approach it in the wrong way. However, there are also places where Kant seems to think that rhetoric can be used to approach that which we cannot in experience (if we use his particular brand of critique, which here I equate with rhetoric); even if noumena is inaccessible, we can use reason and critique to try to approach that which we cannot fathom.
Can he be pro-rhetoric and still have a metaphysician sovereign?
I'm thinking specifically about this short excerpt in which Kant discusses how metaphysics can be achieved in his Conclusion/Solution: "In order that metaphysics might, as science, be able to lay claim, not merely to deceitful persuasion, but to insight and conviction, a critique of reason itself must set forth the entire stock of a priori concepts, and the analysis of all of them together with everything that can be derived from that analysis; and then, especially, such a critique must set forth the possibility of synthetic cognition a priori through a deduction of these concepts, it must set forth the principles of their use, and finally the boundaries of that use; and all of this in a complete system" (119 in my book). He above suggests that he wants to create a system of thought/rhetoric/insight and use this system not for that wicked sophistry that we have discussed, but for clear insight into ideas. Because those ideas are based simply on those a priori concepts (which I still think are a load of crap), I'm not sure how far we are capable of extending this knowledge into the transcendental, yet Kant seems sure that we can establish a system for using those synthetic a priori concepts (the basis of his metaphysics) and determine the boundaries of their use.
In this system, however, the metaphysician's categorization of these concepts and his determination of their proper use puts him in place of the sovereign at least in this instance. He has the power to determine the direction of rhetoric though he may not necessarily be capable of controlling its outcome. By establishing boundaries for their use (still hazy on what those boundaries are), the metaphysician-king could limit the space for rhetoric.
Is rhetoric possible in a system that has already been created by a metaphysician sovereign? One might argue that rhetoric is impossible if our system of reasoning is predetermined by anyone, even ourselves. Yet if there are the universal concepts common to every human being as Kant suggests, or even a level of common sense in Hume, we already exist in a system that is predetermined. All we can do is attempt to find some sort of freedom within Kant's concepts to be able to use rhetoric, as we must do in any method of thought. Where that freedom exists is the place for rhetoric. Where it is, I still haven't figured out.
Still not hostile to rhetoric
I agree with Lauren. Kant comes close to offering a transcendent basis for morality, political science, etc., but he doesn't go all the way there. I'm still where I ended my post last week: the science of metaphysics is hard work and not suited to much of everyday life. Kant says that "whatever errors may slip in unawares [into out thinking] can only be discovered by pure reason itself--a discovery of much difficulty, because this very reason naturally becomes dialectical by means of ideas; and this unavoidable illusion cannot be limited by any objective and dogmatic inquires into things, but on by a subjective investigation of reason itself as a source of ideas" (329). It seems that critique is a slow, careful, hard process. So slow that its most useful end is not the establishment of new knowledge but of finding out the errors of dogmatic tradition and pseudo-metaphysics. Any moral or political program would have to be established through negation: we shouldn't do what doesn't work.
Kant tries to argue that knowledge of limitations is in some sense positive and satisfying, but I'm not buying it. His distinction between bounds and limits may hold up in the heady realm of metaphysics, but in the practical world they seem one in the same and far from positive or satisfying. Seeking out "transcedental ideas" allows us to "determine the bounds of pure reason. For in all bounds there is something positive (e.g., a surface is the boundary of corporeal space, and is therefore itself a space...), whereas limits contain mere negations" (354). Whence this sense of positivity from boundary/limit? Metaphysics exists because it feeds a fundamental intellectual appetite of humanity: "We cannot indeed, beyond all possible experience, form a definite notion of what things in themselves may be. Yet we are not at liberty to abstain entirely from inquiring into them; for experience never satisfies reason fully, but in answering questions, refers us further and further back and leaves us dissatisfied with regard to their complete solution" (351). This want only finds satisfaction in an assumed sense of God and other fundamental anchors: "We must therefore think an immaterial being, a world of understanding, and a Supreme Being (all mere noumena), because in them only, as things in themselves, reason finds that completion and satisfaction, which it can never hope for in the derivation of appearances from their homogenous grounds..." (354-5). Kant is definitely looking for an arhetorical project/method, but his optimism is unwarranted.
Kant hopes the Prolegomena will infuse new life into philophsophy, and in answer to those who ask upon what such hope rests Kant replies, "Upon the irresistible law of necessity" (367). That the human mind seeks the transcendent may be a necessity, but its likely also a necessity that in trying to find it (whether or not it exists and can be known) the mind will latch onto arbitrary dogma. Having admitted this and having defined a narrow space for metaphysics at the beginning of the Prolegomena, I don't think Kant makes a convincing case for changing that position. Questions of morality and politics are continuously problematic because the matters of a people are always unsatisfiable. The satisfaction classical-type rhetoric seeks is a satisfaction with the certainty of dissatisfaction (or in less paradoxical terms (though paradox is well suited to rhetoric) satisfaction with contingency: we are satisfied for this moment, for this purpose).
Bah!
ALRIGHT, I still think he's pro-rhetoric. We can't know anything beyond experience, so the "transcendental component of human nature" wouldn't be able to give us all the answers in order to make rhetoric obsolete. He says, "We cannot indeed, beyond all possible experience, form a definite concept of what things in themselves may be. Yet we are not at liberty to abstain entirely from inquiring into them" (100). It's that last "inquiring into them" part that I think leaves room for rhetoric.
On the other hand, at the end of the Conclusion he says, "Thus the transcendental Ideas serve, if not to instruct us positively, at least to destroy the narrowing assertions of materialism, of naturalism, and of fatalism, and thus to afford scope for the moral Ideas beyond the field of speculation" (112). Here he comes close to describing transcendental Ideas as some sort of universal understanding that that would allow us to get rid of rhetoric--BUT he doesn't seem to go that far. He's saying the transcendental ideas give us room to discuss beyond simple empirical observation--or at least I think that's what he's saying.
The only way I can see that he's anti-rhetoric is if the transcendental Ideas were some sort of universal language, which would form the basis for universal understanding--that would leave us with little to argue about. And in some places, like the one above, he comes close to saying that. But I just don't think he's saying that we all think and perceive in the same way. It seems like the fact that we can never get beyond appearances to things in themselves makes such a universal understanding possible. However, I do think Kant believes we can get to a situation where we don't need rhetoric as much because of the acknowledgment of transcendental ideas.
Summary of Kant's "Perpetual Peace"
Jim Brown
Indecision in Kant’s “Perpetual Peace”?
A century before The Treaty of Versailles established the League of Nations, Immanuel Kant was theorizing such a league with an eye toward “perpetual peace.” Kant’s essay by this name sets out to trace a “constitution” of sorts—one that would set rules for perpetual peace between different nations. But is Kant exposing an existing constitution or creating a new one? At different moments in the essay, he seems to move back and forth between these two poles (one might characterize these poles as “ought” and “is.”) Sometimes he describes what “nature” has created and urges us to notice it, and other times he proposes political laws/maxims/rules that would provide a more hospitable planet. The body of the essay is comprised of two main sections, and Kant also included two supplements and two appendices. I will provide a brief summary of all these different portions and will then conclude with a discussion of whether Kant is describing or proposing “perpetual peace.”
Section I is entitled “CONTAINING THE PRELIMINARY ARTICLES FOR PERPETUAL PEACE AMONG STATES,” and it lays out three rules upon which Kant will base his proposed “league of nations”:
1. "No Treaty of Peace Shall Be Held Valid in Which There Is Tacitly Reserved Matter for a Future War." (Here Kant warns against the “artifice” or “casuistry” (rhetoric?) of those who look for reasons to violate a treaty and make war.)
2. "No Independent States, Large or Small, Shall Come under the Dominion of Another State by Inheritance, Exchange, Purchase, or Donation." (States are not property, they are “trunks” with their own “roots,” and to attempt to “graft” a state onto another “is to destroy its existence as a moral person, reducing it to a thing.”)
3. “Standing Armies (miles perpetuus) Shall in Time Be Totally Abolished." (Standing armies lead to arms races. Periodically creating armies of volunteers is entirely acceptable.)
4. "National Debts Shall Not Be Contracted with a View to the External Friction of States"
5. "No State Shall by Force Interfere with the Constitution or Government of Another State"
6. "No State Shall, during War, Permit Such Acts of Hostility Which Would Make Mutual Confidence in the Subsequent Peace Impossible: Such Are the Employment of Assassins (percussores), Poisoners (venefici), Breach of Capitulation, and Incitement to Treason (perduellio) in the Opposing State."
Upon stating these rules, Kant explains 1,5, and 6 hold “regardless of circumstances,” while rules 2, 3, and 4 are “sub-jectively broader.”
Section II of the essay is entitled “CONTAINING THE DEFINITIVE ARTICLES FOR PERPETUAL PEACE AMONG STATES.” Kant sounds distinctly Hobbesian when he describes man’s natural state as one of war; however, Kant does not favor an autocracy as Hobbes would have. Instead, he argues that a republican constitution—based on “the political principle of the separation of the executive power (the administration) from the legislative”—is the best way to guarantee peace. For Kant, an ideal republic is governed by a small group of people: “the smaller the personnel of the government…the greater is their representation and the more nearly the constitution approaches to the possibility of republicanism.” Upon establishing republicanism as the system most fit to provide perpetual peace, Kant moves on to establish the ground rules for a “league of nations.” Such a league is necessary due to the actions of powerful nations, and Kant makes this clear by comparing the savagery of European colonialism and certain Native Americans:
The chief difference between European and American savages lies in the fact that many tribes of the latter have been eaten by their enemies, while the former know how to make better use of their conquered enemies than to dine off them; they know better how to use them to increase the number of their subjects and thus the quantity of instruments for even more extensive wars.
Rather than allow powerful nations to exploit weaker ones, Kant calls for a “league of peace” and not a “treaty of peace.” While the latter would prevent one war, the former attempts to prevent all wars. What makes such a league possible? Kant argues that the very formation of a republic is “objective” proof that such a league could be formed: “if fortune directs that a powerful and enlightened people can make itself a republic, which by its nature must be inclined to perpetual peace, this gives a fulcrum to the federation with other states so that they may adhere to it and thus secure freedom under the idea of the law of nations.” This league of nations would be grounded in “universal hospitality.”** Such hospitality would allow “the stranger” to “not be treated as an enemy when he arrives in the land of another.” However, Kant points out that there are limits to such hospitality, and that such rights would not allow anyone to claim the status of “permanent visitor.” This law of hospitality is rooted in each person’s right to “possession of the surface of the earth,” a right that Kant argues was ignored by colonialist impulses:
America, the lands inhabited by the Negro, the Spice Islands, the Cape, etc., were at the time of their discovery considered by these civilized intruders as lands without owners, for they counted the inhabitants as nothing. In East India (Hindustan), under the pretense of establishing economic undertakings, they brought in foreign soldiers and used them to oppress the natives, excited widespread wars among the various states, spread famine, rebellion, perfidy, and the whole litany of evils which afflict mankind.
Kant closes this section by once again pointing out that his notion of a “world citizenship is not high-flown or exaggerated notion.” Rather, it is “a supplement to the unwritten code of the civil and international law, indispensable for the maintenance of the public human rights and hence also of perpetual peace” (emphasis added).
In the first supplement, Kant provides an argument that perpetual peace is guaranteed by “nothing less than that great artist, nature (natura daedala rerum).” However, perpetual peace is not a mandate provided by nature: “If I say of nature that she wills that this or that occur, I do not mean that she imposes a duty on us to do it, for this can be done only by free practical reason; rather I mean that she herself does it, whether we will or not.” Thus, regardless of our “will,” nature finds ways to guarantee perpetual peace. Instead of fighting nature’s “preparatory arrangements,” we would do better to work with them. The second supplement explains a “secret agreement” between politicians and philosophers: "The opinions of philosophers on the conditions of the possibility of public peace shall be consulted by those states armed for war." However, direct consultation would be embarrassing, so these politicians merely allow philosophers to publish their opinions and provide advice indirectly. In his two appendices, Kant argues that ethics and politics are in harmony with one another, and that any politics has to begin from the assumption that “morality is in itself practical.” For Kant, those arguing for a separation between ethics and politics have a flawed definition of ethics: “there is no conflict of practice with theory, unless by ethics we mean a general doctrine of prudence, which would be the same as a theory of the maxims for choosing the most fitting means to accomplish the purposes of self-interest. But to give this meaning to ethics is equivalent to denying that there is any such thing at all.”
Certain remarks at the end of the essay and in the supplements seem to gesture toward an “always already” (transcendental?) law, one that is “unwritten.” This unwritten law provides every person equal access to the surface of the earth and suggests that universal hospitality is the best fit for what nature has provided. Further, when Kant disregards human “will” and explains that nature will have its way, regardless of the political structures we build, it’s difficult not to see Kant’s project as one of “description” (of the “is”) rather than “prescription” (of the “ought.”) At this point, it is helpful to return the preface of the essay, where Kant describes an inscription of the words "perpetual peace" on a Dutch innkeeper’s sign:
Whether this satirical inscription on a Dutch innkeeper's sign upon which a burial ground was painted had for its object mankind in general, or the rulers of states in particular, who are insatiable of war, or merely the philosophers who dream this sweet dream, it is not for us to decide.
It seems plausible that Kant was happy to remain in between the “is” and the “ought”—oscillating between the two—in a zone of indecision. Picking one of these might negate his claim that morality and politics are forever intertwined.
**Kant’s discussion of hospitality and cosmopolitanism has been taken up by contemporary theorists. See: Jacques Derrida and Anne Dufourmantelle, Of Hospitality, Cultural Memory in the Present (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2000).; Jacques Derrida, On Cosmopolitanism and Forgiveness, Thinking in Action (London ; New York: Routledge, 2001), Jacques Derrida, Adieu to Emmanuel Levinas (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1999), Jürgen Habermas, Jacques Derrida and Giovanna Borradori, Philosophy in a Time of Terror : Dialogues with Jürgen Habermas and Jacques Derrida (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003).
References
Derrida, Jacques. Adieu to Emmanuel Levinas. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1999.
---. On Cosmopolitanism and Forgiveness. Thinking in Action. London ; New York: Routledge, 2001.
Derrida, Jacques, and Anne Dufourmantelle. Of Hospitality. Cultural Memory in the Present. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2000.
Habermas, Jürgen, Jacques Derrida, and Giovanna Borradori. Philosophy in a Time of Terror : Dialogues with Jürgen Habermas and Jacques Derrida. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003.
--Vico Summary--
Vico, Giambattista. On The Study Methods of Our Time, Translated by Elio Gianturco. Ithica, NY: Cornell University Press, 1990.
Although he never mentions the author of the Discourse on Method by name, Giambattista Vico has been recognized as one of the most important critics of the shift in philosophical studies to a Cartesian mindframe that privileges skepticism and the methods of attaining knowledge outlined in the Discourse. Although Vico does argue that the Cartesian method is felicitious when it comes to mathematical applications, and acknowledges that it has led to a number of excellent discoveries, Vico argues that the predominance of this method leaves little room for the imagination and can stunt the grown of young intellects if such a method is privileged over studies that spark the imagination and one’s development of common sense. Vico frames his inquiry within the commonly circulating debate between Ancient and Modern systems of philosophy and science, claiming that he will illustrate the advantages and drawbacks involved with the different methods: “My goal…is to indicate in what respect our study methods are superior to those of the Ancients; to discover in what way they are inferior, and how we may remedy this inferiority” (6). In other words, as Vico later states, the Study Methods can be seen as an attempt to reconcile the ancient and modern methods of research and pedagogy (79).
Throughout the Study Methods, Vico expresses an interest in educating the youth, and given his role as Professor of eloquence, it is not surprise that Vico is interested (and invested) in the education of young lawyers. In discussing the education of youth, Vico criticizes the current trend of “speculative criticism,” which places unproven probabilities upon the same plane as falsities and thus requires the student to jettison both before pursuing an inquiry of “pure” primary truths (what Descartes would call the “clear and distinct ideas”) (13-14). Vico finds this approach to be “distinctly harmful” because he holds that inhibits the development of the faculties of common sense, imagination, and memory. These faculties are especially important because Vico argues that one can be “stifled” by too much skepticism without them. Common sense is especially important to Vico because he views it as “the criterion of practical judgment” and the “guiding standard” of eloquence—a skill that Vico states can be threatened by too much “abstract intellectualism” (13).
But why is the practice of eloquence so important for Vico, and how should one’s eloquence be developed? Drawing a stark contrast with Antoine Arnauld, who is more directly criticized than Descartes in this work (and was summarized by Todd a few weeks ago), Vico argues that topics or commonplaces (ars topica) provide good starting points for inventing new arguments as well as a means of making sure that one has covered enough ground and understands all of the relevant lines of argument to be used in a given situation. This is especially helpful in cases wherein one has to respond quickly to urgent matters: whereas an orator who is well-trained in the strategies of argumentation will be able to defend someone who is before the courts, Vico argues that “our experts in philosophical criticism….are wont to say: ‘Give me some time to think it over’” (15). In addition, knowledge of different lines of argumentation are important because an orator has to arrange one’s thoughts “in tune with the opinions of the audience,” which might involve persuading people with arguments that have less logical weight to them than those that might be more technically “true” yet less effective (15-16). This does not mean that there should be a tyranny of commonplaces or that one should have an overdetermined reliance on tradition. In the tenth chapter, for example, Vico argues that common sense subjects that demand sound judgment, such as oratory, poetics, and the art of history writing, should not be restricted to systems of precepts or general maxims; rather, maxims should be treated as general “road signs” that point to a general direction (46-47).
Vico does acknowledge that too much of an adherence to the topics can lead to difficulties since they are capable of being false on a case-to-case basis. Vico’s solution to this dilemma is to suggest that people should “be taught the totality of the sciences and arts, and their intellectual powers should be developed.” In other words, Vico supports a more balanced system of education. Ideally, this educational plan would involve developing the common sense, memory, and imagination before introducing the students to criticism, skills in debating, and logic “so that they can apply the fullness of their personal judgment to what they have been taught.” According to Vico, this educational program would improve the students’ approach toward the whole range of the arts and sciences, and, at the same time, would encourage the students to neither be too rash about jumping into discussions about topics they are “still in the process of learning,” nor cause them to “refuse to accept any viewpoint unless it had been sanctioned by a teacher” (19).
Apart from the humanities field, Vico criticizes the overreliance modern physicists have had upon mathematical approaches, which he would like to distinguish from pure descriptions of the world: “The principles of physics which are put forward as truths on the strength of the geometrical method are not really truths,” Vico argues, “but
wear a semblance of probability”. Furthermore, Vico states that “we are able to demonstrate geometrical propositions because we create them; were it possible for us to supply demonstrations of propositions of physics, we would be capable of creating them ex nihilo as well." (23) After revealing the constructed nature of this discipline, Vico argues for what amounts to be an argument for a rhetorical approach to physics. In this "rhetoric" of physics, Vico argues that physicists should be more like good orators because knowledge cannot be transmitted without compelling arrangement. For Vico, the geometrical method “enables us to set forth matters in a purely geometrical, apodeictic form,” giving one the possibility of presenting them “in a plain way...devoid of any aesthetic charm.” However, given the fine distinctions involved in this reasoning, and the fact that learning physics requires the comprehension of many subtle ideas, those who are accustomed to these fine and subtle points might not be able to convey their ideas with eloquence (24). This is especially important when it comes to pedagogy, because "men with no tincture of letters find it extremely difficult to following a long chain of reasoning." Instead of overtaxing the listeners to an intense effort, Vico holds that the orator should thus "adopt a free, ample manner of utterance." Furthermore, instead of placing primary axioms first, a practice that was common in that day, Vico argues that strategically arranging such axioms can help the listeners feel that they are making connections themselves and thereby reinforce the learning process (25).
If Vico’s argument that physics has been encroached upon by too much of an emphasis upon mathematical propositions, Vico is all the more concerned that ethics and political sciences have been similarly handled. In the seventh chapter, Vico warns against applying “abstract” arguments to matters of virtue and vice, behavior, age-specific characteristics, characteristics of the the sexes (interestingly enough, presented as a social construction here), and other “factors of public life and eloquence” (33). Since human events are rife with probability or “Chance and Choice,” Vico argues that “those whose only concern is abstract truth experience great difficulty in achieving their means, and greater difficulty in achieving their ends” (34). He is especially critical of the fact that recent philosophical method has dried up “every fount of convincing expression, of copious, penetrating, embellished, lucid developed, psychologically effective, and impassionate utterance” in favor of dry propositions. (37) Instead of applying abstract knowledge to political affairs, Vico argues that we should have our ideas be adjusted to fit the affairs at hand. In a passage that appears to fire back at Descartes’s analogy of taking a “straight path” when one is lost in the forest, Vico argues that the “sage” who keeps both eternal truth and the here-and-now in mind “manages to follow a roundabout way whenever he cannot travel in a straight line, and makes decisions, in the field of action, which, in the course of time, prove to be as profitable as the nature of the thing permits” (35).
In his strongest defense of eloquence, Vico argues that it is essential for inculcating knowledge in a way that pure reasoning cannot. While the rational part of us “may be taken captive by a net woven of purely intellectual reasonings,” Vico argues that “the passional side of our nature can never be swayed and overcome unless this is done by more sensuous and materialistic means” (38). By thus acting upon the body, Vico argues, eloquence can entice the soul with “corporeal images” and act upon the audience like a “contagion.” This can then convince an audience to believe and will in accordance with the speaker. In other words, Vico holds that mere reasoning might convince us to agree with a precept, but it is a “dull and inert thing” compared to the power of a rhetoric that should be used in the service of good (38-39).
In spite of the fact that Vico is interested in limiting the privileged position of Cartesian methodology, Vico does call for the reconciliation of disparate disciplines to develop a “coherent body of learning” (77). This reconciliation ultimately requires a fine balance between knowledge of logical methods and eloquence. Taken as a whole, Vico’s Study Methods remains an important work not only as a document of resistance to the rise of Cartesian methodology, but also as an example of how rhetoric can be perceived as an essential enabler of progress in other disciplines. In addition, Vico’s Study Methods is an important work for those who are interested in the history of the philosophy of child development and the role of the educational system in shaping many different aspects of society. Finally, Vico’s interest in the visceral power of language upon the body and the understanding should be of interest to those who are interested in performative rhetorics.
Foucault Chapters 3-6/7
At the end of last class Mark asked, “What the f*ck is discourse?”
In Chapters 3-6, Foucault discusses four discursive formations, previously introduced in Chapter 2. Dispersed among these discursive formations is an answer to Mark’s question, which I’ll present in the next paragraph. But first, who might care about these four chapters and why? First the student of rhetoric will be fascinated by Foucault’s explanation/apology for deliberately leaving res et verba out of his explanation at the end of Chapter 3 (48-9). Foucault prefers to remain at “the order of discourse itself” (48). Moreover, he states, “’Words and things’ is the entirely serious title of a problem; it is the ironic title of a work that modifies its own form, displaces its own data, and reveals, at the end of the day, a quite different task” (49). This text could appeal to historians, philosophers, doctors, grammarians and Foucault fans in general because of his frequent references to his own past works on medicine, grammar, madness, and “the order of things.”
What all of these readers will find spread amongst these four chapters is the formation of objects, of enunciative modalities, of concepts and of strategies which together explain Foucault’s idea of discourse by describing the contents, operation and boundaries of this epistemological system-space. Discourse can be interpreted as a system of dispersion of enunciations or statements formed by subjects or groups of subjects related by a system of concepts or group of relations to some object or group of objects held in common. The boundaries of such a system are defined by strategic decisions and points of diffraction, which determine not only what is included but also what is left out.
Considering the immensity of Foucault’s idea while acknowledging that we are not philosophers but rather aspiring literati, I present you with a metaphor—space. Imagine that a discourse is like a planet. A planet is a huge system composed of dispersed matter, kind of like statements, held together by a system of relations (the laws of physics). Like a discourse the planet is the system yet is also the object. In other words Earth is a system but it is also considered to a be a unity—a place. Like a discourse the boundaries of Earth are a bit fuzzy and ever changing thanks to the gradual thinning of its atmosphere towards the exteriority of “outerspace”.
How is all of this matter kept together or related and yet keeps moving? The concept formation (56) would be, for simplicity’s sake, the laws of gravity and inertia. In Chapter 5, Foucault discusses the place of fields in discourse. To better understand this let’s expand our idea of Earth to include the Moon. Earth is a planet. The Moon is a moon. Nevertheless, they seem to have a field of concomitance (58)—matter actually passes back and forth in small amounts between the two carried by humans and other phenomena. In addition, the laws of inertia and gravity hold on both Earth and the Moon. Even more interesting is the common field of presence (57) in which the gravity and inertia of the Earth and Moon are acting upon one another. The Moon spins around the Earth’s center of gravity while its gravitational pull moves Earth’s oceans in what we call the tides. The Earth and Moon also have common and distinct fields of memory (58). This existence of common fields between the two make it possible to consider either one as a discourse but also to see them together as a larger discourse because of the way they interact and are related to one another.
This helps explain Foucault’s notion that discursive relations are neither internal nor external to discourse (46), but rather like the effects of inertia and gravity are the discourse as practice. The Earth as a unity would not exist without inertia and gravity; nor would a discourse exist without the relationships that hold its enunciations together; nor the strategic decisions that define the outer limits of both planets and discourse.
In order to understand Chapter 6 regarding the formation of strategies expand the model to include the Sun and the Solar System. What is included in the Solar System? Will it include the planets and their related moons and satellites or will it include all of the space and space junk from the Sun to the outer reaches of the orbit of Pluto. Why does one grouping emerge and not the other? How does this “economy of the discursive constellation occur (66)? Foucault would argue that it is because of strategic choices and the principle of exclusion (67). Another decision to be made is if Pluto will be included as a planet. Over the past 30 years it has been promoted and demoted from planetary status several times. The most important part to defining the Solar System again comes down to the relationships between matter either as planets, moons, junk—they are all in the gravitational pull of the Sun and orbit the same thanks to inertia, it is the nature of these relationships to the Sun and to each other which define the Solar System.
This raises the question of what to do with Foucault’s subject, which I have carefully avoided. Who is enunciating? Who is making strategic decisions? Who is defining planets and discourse? People. This ties into and brings us full circle back to how Foucault can so casually exclude words and things (48-9). When one considers that the notion of a planet named Earth is both a real physical system of matter, governed by real relationships, which are strategically chosen by humans who are made of matter and held together by the principles they are using to define the system of which they define, take part in and practice. Similarly, subjects are part of the system of discourse while they simultaneously practice it. It is because the subject is integrated so thoroughly into the system that discourse seems autonomous and Foucault’s language seems strangely passive. In this way, Foucault’s idea of discourse can be seen as having a higher dimension than mere res et verba. There is room for rhetoric at the levels of discursive formation but it is part of, not separate from, the complicated knowledge systems that Foucault calls discourse.
Kant Dictionary
Hey everybody,
I just wanted to let you know that Howard Caygill's Kant Dictionary is available as an electronic resource through the UT library catalog. Just look up the keywords "Kant Dictionary" and you can find some helpful definitions.