General Organology: The Co-individuation of Minds, Bodies, Social Organisations and Technè
20-21-22 November 2014, University of Kent, Canterbury, UK.
A good lineup of speakers, including a closing keynote from Stiegler himself. More details here.
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Why spend your life-time on a third-rate thinker?
how exactly is he third rate?
Stiegler, like many other of today’s en vogue intellectuals, never enters the domain of philosophy proper which is called variously by the first-rate thinkers the idea (Plato), being AS beings (Aristotle), reason as opposed to understanding (Kant), speculative thinking (Hegel), the ontological difference (Heidegger). Instead you get one more anthropology. Today’s task in philosophy is to engage with the leading, bleeding edge, namely, the meaning of being itself, to take that question further.
I believe that’s the task of metaphysics rather than philosophy as a whole. Stiegler does provide an anthropology that’s for sure but it is only in order to understand the ontic condition of the human, to use the Heideggerian phrase. I mean even metaphysicians such as Deleuze acknowledge the supposed existence of outer objects to determine their metaphysics. The speculative realists do the same. I think to class Deleuze and Stiegler as third rate philosophers on the basis that they are not engaged with the question of being in the classical sense is wrong. I appreciate the need to engage with the ontological difference but it shouldn’t make a philosopher third rate if they choose to look at the ontic question of humanity as well.
I don’t think there is an “ontic question of humanity” in philosophy at all — that’s the area of work for sociology and other modern social sciences that have ‘freed’ themselves from any explicit philosophical underpinnings. Rather, they implicitly remain thoroughly captive to subjectivist metaphysics. The question concerning human being is an ontological question through and through and can never become “as well” an ontic question. To my mind, there is however the task of a social ontology well-grounded in an understanding of human being itself. The question of human being is the question of mind is the question of time is the question of being. Once that’s clarified, it’s possible also to become more concrete, step by step.
Yes so to Stiegler, following from Heidegger, these things are all linked together. To understand how we understand time we have to look at how our inherent technicity has led to formulating a common past and projecting a common future. If you agree that ‘The question of human being is the question of mind is the question of time is the question of being.’ a la Heidegger, then this is surely what Stiegler is actually trying to accomplish? Our own humanity is dependent on our understanding of time which has only been developed through our exteriorisations.
Who says anyone is? It’s a conference that I shared details of because I thought some readers would find it of interest. If it isn’t for you, no problem. I have no great interest in Stiegler’s work – I’ve read a bit and said a little about not being impressed here before, as well as linking to Peter Gratton’s thoughtful critiques. But some people, including those I respect, find his work useful or worth engaging with. I suspect this conference will be a critical engagement rather than anything else.
Reblogged this on Critical Natures and commented:
And again – wish I could be there for this one, but I’m heading back home to Australia next week