On Mon, 16 Oct 2000 12:49:32 -0400 Gordon Fitch <gcf at panix.com> wrote:
> Etymologically, _autonomy_ is self-rule, _svaraj_ -- given the sociability of
our species, it would have to be communal anyway, and thus could be expected to
afford us some of the benefits of the division of labor and high technology.
Hmmm... I think we're bumping heads on this. From my perspective you seem to be slipping in some sort of natural law... which benefits like communality and autonomy as somehow naturally given... whether through an innate capacity for human beings to use language, technology, reason... I might be completely misunderstanding you... but I tend to resist the idea that we are "hardwired" for these things... That doesn't say what I want it to. Lacan (Psychobabble) makes a distinction between the real, the imaginary and the symbolic. The real has to do with need, the imaginary with demand and the symbolic with wants. I would argue that human beings have needs... but these needs are "transformed" (see my last post on Kant's categorical imperative) by the Other (the symbolic) and funneled, channeled, twisted, contorted... fused, mixed, blended... learned... which results in the acquision of a specific language (english, or whatever). So we might be hardwired for language... but we are not hardwired for a language... in other words, the 'social world' imprints itself, or stamps itself upon "the real" - ripping it apart from its chaotic indistinction...
> I don't think "autonomy" is a _telos_ but an intrinsic possibility which is
obscured by violence and fraud. The _telos_ would not be the construction of
autonomy but the removal of the things which obscure it. One would not
construct but de-construct, if I may use the word.
I think I lean more toward Hegel here than Aristotle (are you thinking alongside Aristotle here or is it my imagination). I'm also reminded of Aquinas's distinction between essence and existence, potentiality and actuality...
I pretty much flat out disagree that autonomy is an intrinsic possibility... I think we *create* autonomy - which isn't just living up to our potential. Autonomy can only appear under certain historical and social conditions... so 10,000 years ago... (insert: ken doesn't know what he's talking about) ... there was no possibility for human beings to be autonomous... in any 'modern' understanding of the term... Feel free to shut me down.
> You weren't. I produced it from your idea of object-free desire, which only
a god of the Genesis sort could experience in complete purity, and only before
the creation.
As I understand desire, and as psychobabble theorizes it: desire always has an object. For Kant, the desired object was "the Good." Of course, "the Good" is impossible to reach for finite (and sinful) human beings... so he postulates the immortality of the soul... which would be a logical postulate so that perfection is made possible. The immortality of the soul (and let's give Kant high marks for honesty) is the Kantian fantasy. This fantasy is precisely what sustains the authority of the moral law, for Kant - and simultaneously what makes it impossible to achive within a finite temporality. The logical form of the moral law then, is circular - a ruthlessly tautological imperative. In other words: the desire for the Good leads can to formulate a law which makes the Good impossible to reach - which reveals the truth about Kant's desire: that that desire of desire is nothing less or more than its own reproduction. Desires desires to reproduce itself. In doing so, it sets up, through fantasy, an impossible object - to guarantee that we'll never actually get what we want (otherwise our desire would disappear). This object is what Lacan calls "objet petit a." And we are willing, on pain of death and destruction, to preserve this object and maintain it. Ie. the nationalist is willing to die and kill for his or her nation - even if they can't define exactly (precisely) what their nation is: long live Canada, for without Canada - there would be no Canadians." What is a Canadian? It is our spirit! Is it in Ontario? Yes! But more than that! In British Columbia? yes, more than that! and so on...
> Is there a thing that knows in the unconscious, in the same way that the
conscious mind knows?
No. And do we "know" this. Well, that's an interesting question. What is the difference between unconscious knowledge (drive) and conscious knowledge? I guess... conscious knowledge is always uncertain of itself... because it always conflicts with drive. Conscious knowledge takes the form of langauge - conscious utterances and so on. These forms are imperfect... semantic and so on. Perhaps... propositional. 1+1=2 --> I know this to be true. But do I *act* as if it is true? Do I breathe mathematics... is it in me. I don't think so. Not in the same way that, say, a bodily reflex is "knowledge."
> In particular, I find the ontological promotion of supposed alternate selves
and voices rather suspect, something like a theory of demonic influence and
possession.
And yet... we all hear voices in our heads:
a little bird told me angel on my shoulder my ears are burning women's intuition
Memory (isn't this what started this discussion) is a "ghost" from the past that haunts consciousness. (Oh god, not an orange! That last orange sucked!!).
> I can't help noting how it strongly implies a need for authoritarian violence
under the direction of psychiatrist-kings, evidently making it very attractive
to certain prospective psychiatrist-kings.
Ah. No, that's not where this is going. In analysis, the psychobabble "says nothing." The analyst does not offer conclusions... it is the analysand that does all the work. As a social critic, I see my role as paradoxical, one the one hand I want to reflect back to society its own image. On the other, I take a stand and fight. These aims are split, without reconciliation.
It wasn't *my* apple, it belongs to the Other! ken