tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1651908162607091292.post6549104724741002647..comments2024-01-05T01:21:21.702-08:00Comments on <center>SPECULUM CRITICUM TRADITIONIS</center>: Solomon Maimon, then & finallyskholiasthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05410057905377189336noreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1651908162607091292.post-18423743534446402582010-06-12T17:30:24.320-07:002010-06-12T17:30:24.320-07:00Jon, I am interested in the mirror-image you set u...Jon, I am interested in the mirror-image you set up (as it were) between Maimon and Harmon here. I'd be interested if you follow up on this. Regarding Meillassoux, recently in laying out what he sees as the different positions described in <i>After Finitude,</i> Harman <a href="http://doctorzamalek2.wordpress.com/2010/06/10/meillassouxs-spectrum/" rel="nofollow">recently says</a>: <i>"I’m not convinced that the difference between strong correlationism and absolute idealism can be maintained. I don’t see the difference between describing or deducing the conditions of the correlate as being pivotal enough"</i>. This is more or less what I also meant in responding to Mikhail above. But of course I am not as ill-disposed towards correlationism as Harman is. He mentions that a few people lately have seemed to treat his "correlationism says the moon is made of fingers" remark as "just a witticism;" as one of the people who has mentioned it lately, I'll say that I think it's actually quite a fine witticism at that (this is, after all, the way most philosophy enters the language for the long term--by just such <i>bon mots</i>, whether you agree with them or not (e.g., "God is dead."); but I don't think to say this is to dismiss it-- i.e., as if it were clever, and <i>merely</i> clever. I just think it's a pretty good index of what Harman thinks on the matter.skholiasthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05410057905377189336noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1651908162607091292.post-2204438600900764632010-06-11T07:52:40.309-07:002010-06-11T07:52:40.309-07:00Actually part of my interest in Maimon is that it ...Actually part of my interest in Maimon is that it leads me to look at Harman's work (on which I hope to be able to teach a few classes on in the next three years, and maybe get a book out of) in an interesting light. <br /><br />Maimon was the first to radically *interiorize* Kant's scheme/content distinction (though with Buzaglo, I think this was initially because of the problem with the schematism, not the affection problem, which is only discussed by Maimon in later works- I'll post on this in my take on Chapter 2). In Tool Being, Harman radically *exteriorizes* the scheme-content distinction by rendering Heidegger's version of it (the play between objective presence and readiness to hand) as something that always happens between any two objects.<br /><br />So getting a deeper grasp on what motivated Maimon, and how his insights were picked up into what Atlas calls speculative idealism is helping me get a nice distance to be able to evaluate where speculative realism should be going today. This will of course take a number of years to work through. . .Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1651908162607091292.post-35497616918706531002010-06-09T13:52:04.624-07:002010-06-09T13:52:04.624-07:00I wonder why you think that Maimon does not avoid ...<i>I wonder why you think that Maimon does not avoid correlationism if the former is the correlation between thoughts and objects?</i><br /><br />I guess it's because I make a less solid demarcation than some between idealism and ("strong") correlationism. The latter-- at least as I read Meillassoux-- regards the question of "real objects" as only answerable in the key of agnosticism. And I think that Maimon's (skeptical) reiteration of the <i>quid facti</i> more or less also does this. But I am corrigible on both Meillassoux and on Maimon, so maybe this will become more clear as we progress. <br /><br />I'm glad you agree that Pete's paper seemed relevant. I hope he'll have time/inclination to join in here on this.skholiasthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05410057905377189336noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1651908162607091292.post-2813342559493981552010-06-09T13:42:43.591-07:002010-06-09T13:42:43.591-07:00I also enjoyed your mention of Pete's paper. I...I also enjoyed your mention of Pete's paper. I think a lot of stuff from it would go into my reading of Maimon/German Idealism, but I hesitate to express an opinion on it just yet (mostly because I agree with a lot of it), but Pete's got some really great definitions and observations.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1651908162607091292.post-10532342330934731902010-06-09T13:40:39.049-07:002010-06-09T13:40:39.049-07:00I do think that Meillassoux would be an interestin...I do think that Meillassoux would be an interesting voice in this conversation - if you feel moved to explore that angle here, I think it would fit well with the conversation. I do find his notion of "correlationism" to be rather hastily assembled, if I could use this image. I see the point, but I don't understand how the word describes anything other than what was already described before by many people, including, say, immediately post-Kantian solutions to the problem of the thing-in-itself. <br /><br />Hopefully this will become clearer as we get into issues, but I wonder why you think that Maimon does not avoid correlationism if the former is the correlation between thoughts and objects - there aren't any objects juxtaposed with thought in Maimon, with thing-in-itself gone (or reinterpreted), there's only thought (explaining, say, his later interest in "experimental psychology") - what is thought correlating with?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1651908162607091292.post-90036916141918103442010-06-09T13:03:36.039-07:002010-06-09T13:03:36.039-07:00I sometimes think I am the most well-disposed towa...I sometimes think I am the most well-disposed towards Harman of anyone w/ whom I regularly correspond (or <i>do</i> I "correspond" with myself?) I am, for instance, still thinking hard about his way of putting the contrast between relationism and objectology (if i may put it that way. But of course my citation in this post was only intended to avail myself of a succinct and reasonable summary.<br /><br />I initially hoped to find in Maimon a "high road around" correlationism. I no longer think this is there. He definitely moves the whole "in itself/for us" dichotomy and moves reframes en bloc as an intra-psychic affair. However, he also tries hard to show how Kant got Hume's problem right (if not the answer to Hume). So while (I think) he is not likely to convince someone like Harman, who acknowledgedly considers correlationism a "form of madness," Maimon is very pertinent to engaging with Meillassoux, all the more because M. expressly invokes the post-Cantorian infinite in the shape of his arguments to the effect that correlationism mis-applies the principle of sufficient reason to the Whole.skholiasthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05410057905377189336noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1651908162607091292.post-36921998531304895622010-06-09T12:29:01.114-07:002010-06-09T12:29:01.114-07:00Yeah, I suppose. But I did actually enjoy reading ...Yeah, I suppose. But I did actually enjoy reading Guerilla Metaphysics, but not as a book of philosopher, mostly as a collection of random observations about philosophers (chapter on Derrida's metaphor is laughably shallow, but fun to read). But in this case he takes a rather serious theme, theme that has been addressed by generations of scholars, and tells us all how it really happened - we are all fool for not having seen it, it was there all alone and only Harman was able to pierce the ages and get it - it's annoying, that's all.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1651908162607091292.post-21724591454702886192010-06-09T10:21:34.510-07:002010-06-09T10:21:34.510-07:00I just got my copy yesterday. I probably won't...I just got my copy yesterday. I probably won't get to start it til the weekend. Kids are out of school this week and I'm entertainment director.<br /><br />I have been reading the previous reading group on Lee Braver's "A thing of this world" which they have been kind enough to leave available from last year over at PE<br /><br />http://pervegalit.wordpress.com/2009/06/03/a-this-of-this-world-by-lee-braver-reading-group/<br /><br />I think it's a really great thing they're doing. Now if we could only get Maimon to offer the kind of commentary to the reading that Braver does....Even the internet has its limits, I guess.<br /><br />Seems like all one has to do to ruffle Mikhail is be charitable to Harman. I'll be sure to avoid that.dy0geneshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12265699357881251867noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1651908162607091292.post-84880522301712618072010-06-09T07:33:47.620-07:002010-06-09T07:33:47.620-07:00"To be sure, it could be objected, among thes..."To be sure, it could be objected, among these same contemporaries were the worst readers of Kant, who did not understand the tremendous upheaval that was taking place in their midst, and who tried to read Kant in terms of an outmoded set of concerns and concepts."<br /><br />I think (minus Harman's citation which really makes little sense in this context - Kant's contemporaries were no fools, but they missed the main awesomeness while reading an awesome book - in my estimation it is basically saying they WERE fools, plus there were plenty of people who GOT Kant, including Maimon, it's not as though he was a misunderstood genius living in obscurity of some remote provincial town) I'm entirely with you on this point. However, I wonder if "contemporaries" in general are pretty useless at any significant recognitions of philosophical talent. Of course, here we quickly enter the area of Harman's "expertise" which consists of rounding up lists of recognized and unrecognized geniuses and fakes, real philosophers and charlatans and all sorts of amusing speculations vis-a-vis what would have been or could have been. <br /><br />I do wonder still why people reading Kant at the time read him in such a great variety of ways? In addition to that, I also wonder if people today really understand Kant's contribution (Harman certainly doesn't, otherwise his whole object-oriented philosophy would be impossible to even think up) - do we read Kant as a "great thinker" because that's what we are told? How many people actually do read Kant's first critique all the way? I mean unless you are a "specialist" you probably don't, right? <br /><br />Anyways, I'm saving my more substantial (read, brilliant) remarks for Maimon - I'll post them on PE because your comment section is sort of small for my awesome thoughts. <br /><br />Again, thanks for doing this - hopefully this reading will help not just us but the larger audience to appreciate Maimon's contributions...Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com