I may be going into the weeds here with Against False Universals by Seyla Benhabib (Boston Review). Then, too, my inclination is to the skeptics and pragmatists - Hume, Montaigne, Nietzsche, and William James.
Put succinctly: Arendt as well as Adorno believed that thinking must free itself from the power of false universals. This means not only refuting historical teleologies, but at a much deeper level, it involves a categorical critique of all philosophical attempts at totalizing and system-building. For Arendt, honest thinking can only be accomplished in fragmentary constellations that bring together historical, cultural, and socioeconomic trends that converge at certain moments in history, but all of which could have happened otherwise. For Adorno, thinking must resist the temptation to overpower the object, letting it instead appear and assert itself over and against the epistemic imperialism of subjectivity. Such Adornian concepts as “natural history” (Naturgeschichte) and “the primacy of the object” are nodal points around which the legacy and influence of Walter Benjamin are revealed.
Yeah, that is a bit thick for me nowadays. Too long gone from such thinking. I can go with Arendt easier than Adorno. That is because I can understand her quicker than him.
Yet this excites my brain, never being one for the Marxist theory of history (a too-mechanical program leading to utopia).
Undoubtedly, between the 1931 essay on “The Actuality of Philosophy” and the 1937 programmatic essay written by Max Horkheimer on “Traditional and Critical Theory,” which announced the general direction of a critical theory of society, Adorno’s own thinking underwent transformations, but he never accepted the view of history as emancipation through social labor, as subscribed to in the Marxist tradition. Instead, he turned philosophy’s search for the totality into a materialist critique of an irrational reality. This was a materialism which did not celebrate human beings’ transformation of nature; rather, it was a materialism which mourned the passing away of the “recollection of nature” in the subject.
Which then goes onto the theme of the lecture:
Let me briefly recall the aporia of the Dialectic of Enlightenment: that the history of humanity’s relation to nature does not unfold an emancipatory dynamic as Marx would have us believe. The development of the forces of production, humanity’s increased mastery over nature, is not accompanied by a diminishing of interpersonal domination; to the contrary, the more rationalized the domination of nature becomes, the harder it is to recognize societal domination which itself seems to become increasingly natural, that is, in the sense of being objective and without alternatives. The Marxian view of a possible transition from the realm of necessity to the realm of freedom as a result of the development of the forces of production is an illusion. It is a false universal.
Although at one time these theses seemed to express a relentless pessimism embedded in a negative philosophy of history which extended from the story of Odysseus to the gas chambers of Auschwitz, in the age of the Anthropocene they appear astute and clairvoyant. The irreversible impact of industrial-technological civilization upon nature is no longer a contested claim; disagreement exists among scientists only about when and how tipping points occur beyond which certain climactic conditions become irreversible. In fact, even concepts such as “natural history” reveal insights consistent with contemporary theories. Natural history does not mean the history of nature, as can be found in geology books about the earth’s formation, or in geography books about the changing of frontiers, coastlines, and mountains. Adorno writes: “The question of natural history is . . . that of the inner composition of elements of nature and elements of history within history itself.”
And then I heard the whispering of Henry David Thoreau, that most non-conformist of non-conformists. It was from him that I came to identify some of the phenomena happening around me - that those rebelling the loudest were conforming to their non-conformity. Metalheads could not interact with punks.
By contrast, I am going to read Adorno’s critique of identitarianism politically, as an anti-authoritarian moment, which has normative implications for the project of a critical theory of society. Adorno insists that the false universals of world history, the nation, and the tribe ought never conquer the individual, the particular, the other—in short, they must remain and retain a moment of difference. However, just being different is a simple abstraction; in dialectical thought everything is the same and yet different. But in what does the “otherness of the other” consist? We can only achieve such understanding through encounters with the other that permit the other to communicate her otherness without exoticism and estrangement. In other words, it is in the medium of communicative interaction that the other can transcend mere difference and become the non-identical.
In one of his few definitions of utopia Adorno writes: “Utopia would be the non-identity of the subject that would not be sacrificed.” I am suggesting that we think of this moment of non-identity not only in communicative terms and as a “struggle for recognition.” As opposed to reconciliation and recognition, I want to insist on the democratic potential of the non-identical as a political struggle, as a struggle against closure and against rigid definitions of who we are or ought to be.
There was a waiter at my second job who talked about people putting other people into pigeonholes, and that we needed to resist doing that. I spent much time trying to do that. I compartmentalized my life. As my first fiancée liked to say, I wanted to have my cake and eat it too. However, there was another aspect of it: it was fun to have separate lives. Well, that is over. I also managed to fit myself into an unforeseen pigeonhole by the government. CC asked what did I think they would think, and I said I thought they would think the same thing she did. Thankfully, I have professional opinions upholding my estimation of myself. Incongruities amuse me, but this one is wearing thin. I am relieved by thinking someone somewhere is reading this record. Maybe it will even help them with their problems.
By contrast, I am going to read Adorno’s critique of identitarianism politically, as an anti-authoritarian moment, which has normative implications for the project of a critical theory of society. Adorno insists that the false universals of world history, the nation, and the tribe ought never conquer the individual, the particular, the other—in short, they must remain and retain a moment of difference. However, just being different is a simple abstraction; in dialectical thought everything is the same and yet different. But in what does the “otherness of the other” consist? We can only achieve such understanding through encounters with the other that permit the other to communicate her otherness without exoticism and estrangement. In other words, it is in the medium of communicative interaction that the other can transcend mere difference and become the non-identical.
In one of his few definitions of utopia Adorno writes: “Utopia would be the non-identity of the subject that would not be sacrificed.” I am suggesting that we think of this moment of non-identity not only in communicative terms and as a “struggle for recognition.” As opposed to reconciliation and recognition, I want to insist on the democratic potential of the non-identical as a political struggle, as a struggle against closure and against rigid definitions of who we are or ought to be.
Against my student loan debts and the limits of my practice, I felt my life had become futile. That I was ill did not help - that only fed my despondency.
One thing I decided about myself while in prison was that I was not going to do what I had done before prison. No more compartmentalized life. No more craziness. The only creative talent I have is for writing, so I wrote.
I believe my PO thinks he is being played. Although I do not want female companionship, he thinks CC is shacked up with me. I think he expects I would be jumping out of bushes if he were not in my life. My wanting to live a quiet life, wrapping up my business while awaiting death, does not jibe with his expectations of what a sex offender is supposed to be. That kind of thinking seems to me to be one of false universals. Well, I am what I am and not meeting his expectations does not bother me. I have my ideas on how I want to live, and I am trying to live it.
While the programmatic statements of a Geert Wilders, a Nigel Farage, a Donald Trump, and even a Narendra Modi based on the hatred of otherness should not surprise us, there is a failure in our own democratic cultures at large which stultifies judgment and the capacity to understand the perspective of the other. It was the promise of the Enlightenment to attain an “enlarged mentality,” in Kant’s words, and this is increasingly disappearing. In her reading of Kant’s Critique of Judgment, Arendt interpreted an “enlarged mentality” in a fashion fully consistent with Adorno’s critique of identitarian thought. Enlarged thought is not empathy, for it does not mean feeling the standpoint of the other or even accepting and agreeing with it. But it does mean making present to oneself the perspective of others involved, and it means asking whether I could “woo for their consent.” Enlarged thought displays the qualities of judgment necessary to retrieve the plural quality of the shared world. By contrast, authoritarian politics encourages projection and paranoia, thus constructing the standpoint of the other in the light of one’s needs and neuroses.
The capacity for enlarged thought has atrophied in contemporary liberal democracies. Some will characterize the concept of an enlarged mentality as being based on a naïve humanism, and even on an arrogant humanitarianism which believes that enlightened liberal individuals can really understand the miseries of the homeless, the marginalized, the impoverished elderly, the sexually marginal. Others will argue that this concept is imperialistic in that its source is Kantian cosmopolitanism in the eighteenth century. Such cosmopolitanism justified not only seeking access to the shores of the others in search of refuge when one’s own life and well-being was in danger. Kant, according to Derrida, displays Enlightenment naiveté in not recognizing that hospitality may also harbor hostility; enlarged thinking may be an instance of hostipitality, of good will and antagonism at once. Still others will argue that only members of affected groups, defined by race, ethnicity, sexuality, or gender, can take certain standpoints. Intergroup empathy is met with suspicion. Enclosed in our media bubbles and social networks, our likes and dislikes on Facebook and other platforms monitored by the agents of surveillance capitalism, we have lost the capacity not only to reach toward the other; we are even told not to bother because such attempts represent false politics.
I wrote in another post drafted today, we suffer from a poverty of imagination. Here, the failure is in imagining our politics and philosophy.
May I end by suggesting more Walt Whitman?
sch 12/8
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