--jks
>At 06:29 PM 7/23/01 +0000, you wrote:
>
>>I think I am morte Humean, or Marxian, or something. I think you have
>>exaggerated faith in the persuasive and motivational powers of mere
>>ratiocination.
>
>It isn't faith, other than arguing with one another - other than reaching
>understanding, there is no way to have a relationship with another person.
>It isn't about motivation or persuasion, in a sense... it is about the very
>constitution of who we are as human beings. Is all language just
>self-assertion? This does not account for how a self comes to be a self,
>which is a learning and developmental process. In the assertive model, the
>idea of internalization becomes problematic... If we maintain the extreme
>thesis that all linguistic utterances are assertive, then we are left with
>an extraordinary deficient understanding of cognitive-social-psychological
>development (which there is a great deal of support for). In short:
>persuasion is the means through which human coexistence is conduct. Even
>enemies relate to one another (you have to know you enemy to hate them
>properly [and effectively]!). This implies that, as linguistically bound
>creatures, we are, for all intents and purposes, doomed to communicate. In
>many respects, we can't even choose to be or not to be rational, we just
>are. Language is oriented by truth, and this can be brought to a
>propositional level through argumentation. We can give up on theory, that's
>fine, but this has more to do with knowing that we can know something and
>then backing away from it in any event, which is a motivation question...
>which can only be understood by communicating with one another... and so
>on. A sheerly strategic life cannot be lived.
>
>> I believe in ratiocination, and I even enjoy it. I hope to hold true
>>beliefs, and think that thinking about them is the only way to be as sure
>>as one can that they are true--in general. There are, however, fixed
>>points, like one I mentioned (freedom is better than slavery); sure, I
>>might come up with a brilliant argument to show why. But I am more
>>confident in the conclusion that I am in any argument I could give for
>>it. To quote myself, I think using this very example: explanations can
>>only illuminate these truths. We will take then in the dark if we have
>>to. Might we be wrong? Yes, about them or anything. C'est la vie. Anyway,
>>I think we have reached an impasse, here. Better stop unless we have
>>something new to say.
>
>You can't use an argument to demonstrate that arguments don't persuade
>people. I mean, you can, but it doesn't make much sense. If I accept your
>argument, that a good argument for arguments cannot be made, I'm a logical
>idiot. So I don't accept it, and you'll have to give reasons, or hit me
>over the head with something (which just means you'll have to argue with
>someone else, or perhaps barter, for an appropriate object) to dissuade me
>otherwise. In any event, reasoning is what we have at our disposal, there
>is no point in tossing it away simply because convincing people - arguing -
>is a painstaking task (and I've noted that you agree here). We people sit
>down together to organize a protest, they are all (for the most part)
>interested in the most effective means of success. I'm sure that arguments
>/ reasons have a tremendous weight in these situations. Likewise, when
>you're trying to fix up the apartment, you give reasons for why you want
>the desk in the blue room instead of the red room, it might be trivial, but
>if we're going to live together, that's how it gets done. And, through some
>sort of weak messianic power, we an agreement is actually reached, there is
>a sense of communicative gratification: that something one has struggled
>for, through action and thought, has been realized. It might suck to see
>happiness as a result of communicative / successful understanding, but
>after that - you pull out the wine, the chocolates... and take a stroll
>on... well, wherever!
>
>To drapes this a little less intimate.. if there is a 'Leftist' ethic, then
>this is it: it is ground immanently in the experience of intersubjective
>interaction. We can argue about whether or not this can be turned into a
>principle of discourse or something like that, but to some degree, the fact
>of reason is manifest in the process of understanding, which is essential
>not only to our lives, but also to of immediate perceptual consciousness.
>This is most richly developed in a communicative ethics, whereby
>communication can be understood as communication only under specific
>material and social circumstances. If we're going to chat, domination
>*must* be eliminated, otherwise anything communicated cannot be said
>without suspicious of being ideology / false consciousness and so on. It
>might be a bit of a stretch to say that from our very first word we
>presuppose a universal discursive moral theory... but...
>
>hugs,
>ken
>
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