Ken MacKendrick replied to my request for definitions by ruminating about the problems with defining things. Once I got started asking Ken what various words meant I probably got carried away. Perhaps it was distressing for Ken to get such a long list from me about what to define. In other e-mail lists I have asked him about what the word emphatic means, as it appears to me to have technical philosophical meaning for Ken that is more than just saying emphasize. I am still unable to say what I think Ken really means. I think that Ken wants to with the word, emphatic, utilize a sense of subjective meaning to what we do, as well as the "objective" meaning that culture strives to define.
Ken¹s reply does say a lot. Not what I asked for, but I will offer some opinions.
Ken Tuesday, Nov. 3,98 "Definitions": ken, the system is wrong, the whole is false
Doyle This slogan is very vague, for instance what is a whole, but it is clear from the body of the text that Ken rejects the concept of the whole. So Ken is vulnerable where ever such things do intrude. For instance the laws of gravity. Any generalization, any universal. Totality. So all anyone has to do to give Ken fits is just bring the subject up. Ken will have to find a way to reject the ideas without sounding strangely indifferent to common everyday experience.
Doyle Having rejected the whole, then Ken needs a substitute in order to understand or perhaps understanding doesn¹t fit, but something to refer to. Ken replaces the whole with an ethical and moral outlook. To me these replacements look like a strange sort of subjectivity. For example;
Ken The demand to 'define' what one is talking about is both careless and thoughtless.
Doyle Since I asked Ken to define a bunch of words, Ken says that impulse is "careless", and "thoughtless". I don¹t experience those as careless, and thoughtless, myself. But it feels like that to Ken. However, this is also a style of writing, and somewhat impersonal in the sense of that Ken has developed a ethical and moral outlook that "defines" this sort of response to my questions. Of course anyone could subjectively feel like my questions were too much, but Ken is trying to live up to certain understandings he has developed.
Doyle I will list a series of moral remarks Ken uses toward me;
Ken In order to define something one must dominate the term.
It must be possessed, controlled, and mastered.
the request to define a concept seems pretty silly - if not downright ignorant.
Who, after all, owns the 'master' language... the request itself stems from a theological / mechanical framework, where everything is set in stone and chiseled accordingly.
Doyle There is a great deal of this sort of rumination. Not quite direct, and Ken is a nice guy, so he doesn¹t seem to me to be trying to roughly treat me. But Ken wants us to know that I am trying to dominate by asking him to define something. I (Doyle) am mastering from a theological, and mechanical framework. Hence I assume Ken means positivist science, and authoritarian religion. Since I am neither religious, nor positivist this sort of thing falls like a thud on my ears. In this sense Ken no doubt can characterize me as "silly", because I am not downright ignorant. Silly is preferable in Ken's lexicon of defining how to write about ideas, silly is the preferred lightness that leavens a difficult philosophy of the mind.
Doyle So what we see is a substitution of feeling and moral statements about what I did by asking for definitions. I point to words Ken uses like "ignorant", "dominate" as the impression I seem to make upon Ken. I am the master and insensitive. This I think is related to rejecting a whole in Ken¹s world view. Without a sense of coherence to his views, which is inevitable by rejecting a sense of whole, then Ken needs something like his technical concept of "emphatic". In other words people have to be "emphatic" in the world because without a sense of whole what else is there but a subjective "emphatic". And thus everyone must seem ignorant, and trying to dominate out of the will to live I suppose.
Ken Of course this requires that one kick the bottom out of any kind of conception of truth or appropriateness. The definition becomes arbitrary and exchangeable - just like workers in the factory or cans of soup on the shelf. If one wants to retain a perspective that is reflective of and on reality then this certainly isn't an intelligible alternative. Truth probably shouldn't be sacrificed because it is convenient to do so.
Doyle Having rejected wholeness as totalitarianism Ken has no way to find coherence in the world. For instance, though Ken can make a moral statement about I "kicked" the bottom out of any kind of conception of truth or appropriateness how can Ken know truth?
Ken Given the structural impossibility of definitions, that are coherent in any reasonable kind of way, it might be best to try to give a sense of the idea in the context in which it first appeared, with the acknowledgement that even this is a distortion and merely a representation, and in and of itself, something completely new.
Doyle So Ken admits there can¹t be such a thing as defining something because a whole can¹t be known. Coherence is impossible as Ken admits here, and the idea of context is very fuzzy because that is a distortion too.
Doyle To summarize then Ken while not defining anything I asked for admits that he reject the whole. In doing so Ken relies upon a style of speech which is moralizing about what I asked for and verges on incoherent out of principle.
I reject this sort of understanding of consciousness. I do this because common grounds between people can't be formed hence Ken rejects defining things out of principle. At best one seems to connect emotionally with someone because people tend to feel such connections however tenuous that might be. Not the sort of thing to build socialism with though. Not a good way to understand equality. A hard row to hoe, because it permanently leaves the person who practices this viewpoint subjectively upset with ordinary people asking ordinary questions. An aesthetic style of a rarified sort. Fragile and lacking robustness to critical thought. Regards, Doyle -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <../attachments/19981105/5e9907c8/attachment.htm>