RE: Philosophy general debate

[<A.M.Goldfinch@lse.ac.uk>]

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Thanks for your contribution, Daniel. A few comments.

 

First, the only comment - at least that I'm aware of - that I've made about postmodernism thus far is to say that I view it as literature. I treat propositions on an analytic basis regardless of whether they came from scientific, continental, religious, or literary soil.

 

Second, I have only been discussing one aspect of one instance of postmodernism, that of Deleuze's claim about the necessary conditions for something to be philosophy.

 

Third, there seems to be a general consensus emerging here that one cannot judge propositions and arguments made by postmodernists to be true\false and valid\invalid because postmodern thinkers:

 

1.	Have different objectives.
2.	Write poetically\less precisely

However, (1) and (2) are not sufficient to immunise postmodernist claims from tests of validity and soundness.

 

Suppose I make the claim, 'All cats fly'. Suppose also that my objective for making that claim is to challenge our perceptions of what is normal. Does my objective of challenging our perceptions of what is normal prevent the claim from being judged true or false? No. The claim, 'All cats fly' is false regardless of my artistic intentions or intentions to deal with 'deep matters'.

 

Suppose I now write the claim 'All cats fly' poetically.

 

"Little kitty, little kitty, where have you been? Flying high like a kite? Yes flying up high! Like all little kitties, like all free cats!"

 

Or, perhaps more in tune with postmodernist thinking,

 

"Little kitty transgressed the sexist laws of gravity to fly, as do all cats"

 

Does a proposition phrased poetically prevent us from judging it to be true or false? No.

 

Now, it is possible that a proposition can symbolically mean something that is true. However, this has to be judged on an individual, proposition-by-proposition basis; certainly, one shouldn't merely claim 'postmodernism is mostly true when read symbolically'; one would need strong evidence for such a large claim.
 
Fourth, Daniel, you wrote, "Mr. Goldsmith claims to have
falsified D's claim that philosophy is saddening by saying that he is happy
to read D's philosophy. Has he considered either the claim that if he has
read D's philosophy and not been saddened by it then he hasn't understood
it?"
 
Even if I read - and correctly understood - Deleuze's philosophy and became saddened by it, that would not prove Deleuze's claim that for a set of premises to be philosophy it must sadden.
 
Best wishes,
 
AG

________________________________

From: owner-bups-dis@purplepancake.com on behalf of djf500@york.ac.uk
Sent: Tue 22/08/2006 17:56
To: BUPS-DIS@bups.org
Subject: RE: Philosophy general debate



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Hi,

This isn't a major contribution just a bit of heckling from the sidelines.
I've read a couple of Mr. Goldsmith's emails, and I get the impression that
his treatment of continental philosophy would benefit from a little more
charity. I've only done half a term of phenomenology, and the rest has been
nice old laconic anglo-american stuff - so i'm no european in the present
sense.

The main aid we can offer to continental philosophy is our recognition that
their writing style is different. They will not spell everything out, and
they are not aiming to create an essay that can symbolised into a bullet
proof equation. They deal with difficult and deep ideas, so perhaps the
style is necessary to draw out unfamiliar concerns. This might mean that
they contradict themselves or say something very odd. In so far as this is
the case, I agree that their language is more literary than analytic
philosophy. But, pouncing on superficial contradictions is simply not
helpful in understanding them. Recognising that their language is literary
we ought to realise that contradictions are not always 'elementary'
mistakes. Continentals (it appears to me) often deal with deeper (though
perhaps spurious) issues and so require a deeper charity. (NB Perhaps a
contradiction isn't always a mistake in the analytic trad. either - see
'dialetheism', something I know next to nothing about.)

One further suggestion: someone purporting to be on the side of reason
ought to beware the sword he claims to wield. Mr. Goldsmith claims to have
falsified D's claim that philosophy is saddening by saying that he is happy
to read D's philosophy. Has he considered either the claim that if he has
read D's philosophy and not been saddened by it then he hasn't understood
it?

And more generally - what about the interpretation that what D is saying is
that if something is not saddening then ipso facto it is not philosophy.
Although we might disagree with D here (I do!), we can't *falsify* this
with any example that claims to be genuine philosophy, because the moment
you do that D can carry out his implication and find it to be inauthentic
philosophy (because his proposition is still in place) - you have to attack
the claims logically prior to his claim, and not just present him with a
counter-example that is on the same logical level.

Cheers, i'll just butt out and watch now.

Daniel


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