Adorno, theory & praxis & the FBI

[Ralph Dumain]

At 09:51 AM 4/8/2003 +0200, Claus Hansen wrote:
>>Not only does such rubbish reduce real history to metaphysical 
>>abstractions, it betrays an elementary ignorance of what logic, 
>>mathematics, and science are all about, as well as the varied motives of 
>>individual scientists.  This repeats the worst and most ignorant cliches 
>>about science conflating it with "positivism", ignorant of its real history.
>
>Could you elaborate this please. I think a common misunderstanding of 
>Adorno is that he was against science. He
>protested against positivism and because science was and still is 
>positivistic in the sense Adorno gave to it - it has
>to be combatted but the aim for Adorno was always to expand the conception 
>of science - very much in the way that
>Habermas later did it - although I think that is often forgotten.

Someone in the room mentioned some ridiculous thing Marcuse once wrote 
about formal logic.  The Frankfurters knew the German idealist tradition, 
but they knew nothing of natural science, and they inherited all the old 
elitist prejudices.  It is not true that science was or is 
positivistic.  Positivism is an ideology of science, one among many 
competing conceptions.  Yes, the social sciences adopted a scientism 
justified by a conception of the natural sciences (quantitative, 
predictive, etc.).  Just ask real mathematicians and physicists what they 
think of this fetishism of quantification in the social sciences.  Adorno 
shows a much more nuanced understanding in CRITICAL MODELS, but I am not 
impressed by the recently adduced quotes from DIALECTIC OF 
ENLIGHTENMENT.  I understand these statements as metaphor, but when taken 
literally they obstruct a deeper understanding of the issues.

Returning to the quotes I lifted from "Why Still Philosophy?": 
http://www.autodidactproject.org/quote/adornostill.html
At some point I want to do a detailed analysis of these statements, because 
I think they show both Adorno's subtletly and the limitations of a purely 
negative dialectic.

>>Adorno was in Germany when he delivered these lectures.  Perhaps his 1949 
>>obsession with positivism as villain has something to do with the 
>>American conditions in which he was immersed in the 1940s, which he 
>>reacted against?
>
>I dont think so - in the beginning of the sixties Adorno debated with 
>Popper in what was known as the Positivist
>Dispute in German Sociology - and in his lectures on sociology from 1968 
>he was also very criticial of positivism.
>But he never completely refused the 'good' elements american society had 
>teached him in comparission to
>the life in Germany. I think it is Martin Jay that writes something in the 
>line you're saying: when he was in
>America he was critical of the american way of life - when he was in 
>Germany he was critical of the german
>way of life. The article 'Adorno in America' deals with some of these 
>issues anyway as far as I can remember.

So perhaps my wild guess has something to it.  We shall see.