FS & Praxis

[matthew piscioneri]

Bob,

The following quotes from H. & A.'s _DoE_ seemed pertinent to our previous 
discussion:

Formal logic was the major school of unified science. It provided the 
Enlightenment thinkers with the schema of the calculability of the world. 
The mythologizing equation of Ideas with numbers in Plato’s last writings 
expresses the longing of all demythologization: number became the canon of 
the Enlightenment. (1995: 7)

To the Enlightenment, that which does not reduce to numbers, and ultimately 
to the one, becomes illusion; modern positivism writes it off as literature. 
Unity is the slogan from Parmenides to Russell. The destruction of gods and 
qualities alike is insisted upon. (1995: 7-8)

Man imagines himself free from fear when there is no longer anything 
unknown. That determines the course of demythologization, of enlightenment, 
which compounds the animate with the inanimate just as myth compounds the 
inanimate with the animate. Enlightenment is mythic fear turned radical. The 
pure immanence of positivism, its ultimate product, is no more than a so to 
speak universal taboo. Nothing at all may remain outside, because the main 
idea of outsideness is the very source of fear. (1995: 16)

I still think you have awkwardly lumped Habermas in with positivism. Clearly 
JH takes the side (as it were) of Word (story?) over the functionalist 
reason set free by the enlightenment's idolatry of the number/calculation.

Pragmatism is about working through all the fears, so that it doesn't have 
to be myth OR enlightenment. If there is one thing "wrong" with 
communicative reason it's probably that it is boring. It doesn't have the 
magic or mystery of poetic-mythic reason, the visceral brutal thrill of 
instrumental reason, or the calculating precision of functionalist reason.

It's all about sitting down talking, re-talking, listening and re-listening 
etc. Put simply, communicative reason has a poor showing at the box office. 
Given the bloodiness of the last 200 centuries, a little bit of boringness 
might go a long way. The worst outcome of communicative reason will be 
ushering in of the reign of administrative reason. God forbid. Quick Eugene. 
Sharpen the axe.

Regards,

MattP



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