Zizek: seems like a nob

[littlebabyjesus]

Then underneath that level you have the steady advance of neuroscience as well as Charlie Darwin's insight that what works reproductively sticks around and what doesn't doesn't, and from there its a short step to "its the genes/deterministic universe that
made me do it; I have no responsibility for my actions and there is nothing I could have done differently".
.

I was with you up to this bit. Certainly, I agree that there has been a tendency towards believing that capitalism as we know it is the natural order of things, which limits the ability to see alternatives. But I don't see the leap from that to strict determinism and fatalism. Indeed, often the belief in the natural order of things is accompanied by an unrealistic belief in the individual's ability to change their own circumstances on their own (see American Dream, etc).

I'd say that the current financial crises have caused a very large number of people to question their assumptions, mind you. This is the level at which you can affect people's political beliefs, not at the level of discussions about neuroscience. I don't understand thinking about the 'steady advance of neuroscience' as a threat, though. This suggests a philosophy that is scared of too much knowledge - believing that if we knew our true nature, we would not be able to live with ourselves. I think quite the opposite.

 

[butchersapron]

Hang on, all this is about some form of consciousness raising?

 

[Mad4ziz]

Perhaps the following examples help in seeing what I think revol68 means:

negative empty subject: this is a reference to the insight that when we are following the tracks of the obvious, right thing to do (eg doing what gives us pleasure without contravening any social rule-eg taking the piss out of continental philosophy) we are not actually free agents. Its only when we face up to situations where there is no pleasurable option and where we are conflicted and have no obvious right way to proceed that we become free subjects

reality constituted by discourse: this is the idea that the horizon of our meaning is set by both the social rules we follow and the other side of those rules-the illusions that unconsciously underpin them e.g. that by buying the BMW 6 I will absorb the Joy Division cool of New Dawn Fades. One insidious aspect is the illusion that those rules seamlessly cover how we should act in all situations in a conflict-free manner

infinite loop knowledge/power: if there were no gaps, no inconsistencies in the discourse, even rebellion would be subsumed within it. Its only gaps, negatives, lacks that open the space for freedom

 

[Mad4ziz]

I was with you up to this bit. Certainly, I agree that there has been a tendency towards believing that capitalism as we know it is the natural order of things, which limits the ability to see alternatives. But I don't see the leap from that to strict determinism and fatalism. Indeed, often the belief in the natural order of things is accompanied by an unrealistic belief in the individual's ability to change their own circumstances on their own (see American Dream, etc).

I'd say that the current financial crises have caused a very large number of people to question their assumptions, mind you. This is the level at which you can affect people's political beliefs, not at the level of discussions about neuroscience. I don't understand thinking about the 'steady advance of neuroscience' as a threat, though. This suggests a philosophy that is scared of too much knowledge - believing that if we knew our true nature, we would not be able to live with ourselves. I think quite the opposite.

I agree that there may be better ways to raise consciousness or change beliefs than Zizek's philosophy, but the concern is that the knowledge garnered by neuroscience may increase the tendency towards apathy or even worse towards manipulation by those with knowledge power and money.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

negative empty subject: this is a reference to the insight that when we are following the tracks of the obvious, right thing to do (eg doing what gives us pleasure without contravening any social rule-eg taking the piss out of continental philosophy) we are not actually free agents. Its only when we face up to situations where there is no pleasurable option and where we are conflicted and have no obvious right way to proceed that we become free subjects

Why? Where we are conflicted, we still in the end need to make a decision, to resolve those conflicts. And as I said earlier, neuroscience does have something to say about this, as there is a competitive aspect to our brains' functions. In the end one course of action will win out - generally the one that we feel is right emotionally. We often cannot rationalise our decisions in such circumstances - or our rationalisations are fairly arbitrary confabulations - but so what? That's because our emotional responses have dictated our course of action, and emotions cannot be rationalised.

 

[Blagsta]

By buying an expensive car, I'll absorb the cool of a song about suicide? What are you on about? Who thinks that?

 

[Blagsta]

I agree that there may be better ways to raise consciousness or change beliefs than Zizek's philosophy, but the concern is that the knowledge garnered by neuroscience may increase the tendency towards apathy or even worse towards manipulation by those with knowledge power and money.

Which advances in neuroscience?

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I agree that there may be better ways to raise consciousness or change beliefs than Zizek's philosophy, but the concern is that the knowledge garnered by neuroscience may increase the tendency towards apathy or even worse towards manipulation by those with knowledge power and money.

There is always a danger that scientific knowledge can be misused, but I don't share this concern. Take mental health, for example. On the one hand there is a tendency to medicalise and pathologise various behaviours - reach for the drugs cabinet to deal with the problem child, for instance. But there is also the opposite tendency - a growing body of work on the efficacy of non-medical models of mental illness.

But you don't oppose aspects of the medical model of mental illness that you think are wrong by seeking to prevent scientific study of the way our brains work. In fact, you use that new knowledge to show how the medical model is wrong.

 

[Mad4ziz]

What feels right emotionally may well be rationalisable on evolutionary grounds.

But what about eg hunger strikes on political grounds? Is that also simply the result of exploitation of the hunger striker by others, or could it be a sovereign decision on the part of the striker?

 

[Mad4ziz]

There is always a danger that scientific knowledge can be misused, but I don't share this concern. Take mental health, for example. On the one hand there is a tendency to medicalise and pathologise various behaviours - reach for the drugs cabinet to deal with the problem child, for instance. But there is also the opposite tendency - a growing body of work on the efficacy of non-medical models of mental illness.

But you don't oppose aspects of the medical model of mental illness that you think are wrong by seeking to prevent scientific study of the way our brains work. In fact, you use that new knowledge to show how the medical model is wrong.

I dont oppose scientific study, and neither does Zizek as far as I know. Where did you get that from?

 

[littlebabyjesus]

What feels right emotionally may well be rationalisable on evolutionary grounds.

Yes, this is true. Our understanding of our own motivation is necessarily limited, though.

But what about eg hunger strikes on political grounds? Is that also simply the result of exploitation of the hunger striker by others, or could it be a sovereign decision on the part of the striker?

'Sovereign decision'? It's a decision by the hunger striker, sure. It's an example of the way that humans are able to hold ideas in our heads and to act on those ideas. The motivation for the action is not the immediate wellbeing of the individual but a wider good. That for which we act is not just our own individual selves. We can act for the good of a collective too. We can act out of love. Many parents will willingly sacrifice themselves for their children. Some people will sacrifice themselves for a political cause.

I don't see the problem here.

 

[Mad4ziz]

Yes, this is true.



'Sovereign decision'? It's a decision by the hunger striker, sure. It's an example of the way that humans are able to hold ideas in our heads and to act on those ideas. The motivation for the action is not the immediate wellbeing of the individual but a wider good. That for which we act is not just our own individual selves. We can act for the good of a collective too. We can act out of love. Many parents will willingly sacrifice themselves for their children. Some people will sacrifice themselves for a political cause.

I don't see the problem here.

One such idea being that of freedom rather than overdetermination; another being that of sovereignty over exploitation by other agents....thats what Zizek is about: ideas

 

[love detective]

What Zizek does in his work is to.....and then salvage space for truly free acts which don't arise out of help from outside the subject, whether that help be belief in God, rules of society, philosophical systems, pre determined universes.

I admire you & revol's zeal to try and pin something much more profound & revolutionary on Zizek than what most of us see, but don't you see the contradiction in what you write above?

To talk of any kind of act as not being influenced (or helped as you put it) by something outside of the subject is bizarre - even more so when you talk about Zizek's philosophical work as something that is clearly outside the subject having the potential for something that happens within that subject and then claim that this something doesn't arise out of help from outside the subject

And are things like a 1,000 page tomb on Hegel really the key for awaking the 'boring idiots' (who constitute 99% of the world according to Zizek) from their dogmatic slumber?

 

[littlebabyjesus]

One such idea being that of freedom rather than overdetermination; another being that of sovereignty over exploitation by other agents....thats what Zizek is about: ideas

Ok. We're up against something I often come up against with philosophy, I think, particularly continental philosophy. I simply don't see the problem that Zizek appears to see, which leaves me rather bewildered by his proposed solution.

 

[Mad4ziz]

I admire you & revol's zeal to try and pin something much more profound & revolutionary on Zizek than what most of us see, but don't you see the contradiction in what you write above?

To talk of any kind of act as not being influenced (or helped as you put it) by something outside of the subject is bizarre - even more so when you talk about Zizek's philosophical work as something that is clearly outside the subject having the potential for something that happens within that subject and then claim that this something doesn't arise out of help from outside the subject

And are things like a 1,000 page tomb on Hegel really the key for awaking the 'boring idiots' (who constitute 99% of the world according to Zizek) from their dogmatic slumber?

Let me think about it!

 

[Mad4ziz]

Ok. We're up against something I often come up against with philosophy, I think, particularly continental philosophy. I simply don't see the problem that Zizek appears to see, which leaves me rather bewildered by his proposed solution.

Let me think about it!

 

[Knotted]

to what end?

Perfect question (in context). Zizek, the philosopher, is a critic of capitalism not an advocate of an alternative end (eg. communism). His radicalism could just as easily fuel fascism as anything else - he misreads Lenin atrociously as something approximating Mussolini (driving the masses forward with his revolutionary ire) and he has extraordinary difficulties trying to work out the differences between radical right and radical left. (It's something desperately obscure to do with authentic events. Who can tell whether the revolutionary event is authentic? The authentic revolutionary of course. And who is an authentic revolutionary? Anybody Zizek takes a fancy to.)

 

[littlebabyjesus]

So Zizek is a revolutionary without a cause?

 

[butchersapron]

I've been reading and following Jodi Dean pretty closely for the last few years. She's someone massively centrally influenced by Zizek and his reading of Lacan in particular. She's taken the Lenin stuff mentioned above and ran with it, going even further than Zizek himself i suspect. She has some very interesting ideas about 'communicative capitalism' as well. I had the same sort of questions of her that have been asked above by l_d and Knotted of Zizek - to what end is all this? What does it mean politically? Is it just traditional old school consciousness raising dressed up in modern langague without overcoming the problems of that model? Occupy and her reactions cleared that up for me . Nothing. A rhetorical obsession but no political content.

 

[Knotted]

So Zizek is a revolutionary without a cause?

Not quite - he has political commitments (although my feeling is he is getting more and more apolitical as he gets older), but they are only loosely connected with his philosophy (or "theory") and his philosophy would be compatible with just about anything "radical" ie. radically critically of current mainstream ideologies. His method of theorising is described by Edward Said in Orientalism (except of course Zizek applies this method to everything not just the orient). He forces social reality into Lacanian boxes and uses examples to exemplify the theory and counter examples to also exemplify the theory. He calls himself a Marxist but in practice he is completely 100% anti-Marxist (I'm not being purist here - Nial Ferguson is more of a Marxist than Zizek), there is never any attempt at understanding social/political phenomenon in terms of history, economics, social reality etc. but always in terms of these top-down Lacanian schemata.

 

[Mad4ziz]

I admire you & revol's zeal to try and pin something much more profound & revolutionary on Zizek than what most of us see, but don't you see the contradiction in what you write above?

To talk of any kind of act as not being influenced (or helped as you put it) by something outside of the subject is bizarre - even more so when you talk about Zizek's philosophical work as something that is clearly outside the subject having the potential for something that happens within that subject and then claim that this something doesn't arise out of help from outside the subject

And are things like a 1,000 page tomb on Hegel really the key for awaking the 'boring idiots' (who constitute 99% of the world according to Zizek) from their dogmatic slumber?

I think the contradiction is answered by saying that the point of Zizek is to allow subjects to recognise those situations that call for sovereign acts, and to recognise that they need no support from outside beyond the fact of that recognition to decide what to do

Since I'm not a philosopher by trade, as I said earlier I started with Zizek via the film criticism stuff and what I read in the media. As I read more deeply I think he actually is a philosopher first and foremost (ie 1000 page tomes on Hegel is his thing-as he sais to the Guardian, why would anyone ask him for advice?)

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Not quite - he has political commitments (although my feeling is he is getting more and more apolitical as he gets older), but they are only loosely connected with his philosophy (or "theory") and his philosophy would be compatible with just about anything "radical" ie. radically critically of current mainstream ideologies. His method of theorising is described by Edward Said in Orientalism (except of course Zizek applies this method to everything not just the orient). He forces social reality into Lacanian boxes and uses examples to exemplify the theory and counter examples to also exemplify the theory. He calls himself a Marxist but in practice he is completely 100% anti-Marxist (I'm not being purist here - Nial Ferguson is more of a Marxist than Zizek), there is never any attempt at understanding social/political phenomenon in terms of history, economics, social reality etc. but always in terms of these top-down Lacanian schemata.

I don't know much about Lacan. What do you mean by 'Lacanian boxes'?

 

[Mad4ziz]

So Zizek is a revolutionary without a cause?

His cause is the resurrection of the soveriegn subject

 

[butchersapron]

His cause is the resurrection of the soveriegn subject

Oh god that sounds like terrible old fashioned frankfurt school misanthropy.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

His cause is the resurrection of the soveriegn subject

When was it killed?

tbh I don't see any sense in this. I think ld touched on it - we make decisions, but our decisions can only be understood in the wider context of our relations with others. There's no contradiction here - we only exist as individuals in our relations with others, in our relations with the world. Even your hunger striker example: their decision to go on hunger strike is taken after consideration of their position in the world, ie their relations with others.


Look at how solitary confinement ultimately destroys our sense of self - destroys our ability to make decisions...

 

[Blagsta]

His cause is the resurrection of the soveriegn subject

What do you mean by "sovereign subject"?

 

[Knotted]

I don't know much about Lacan. What do you mean by 'Lacanian boxes'?

I don't know much about Lacan either (and I don't know (or care very much) if Zizek is faithful to Lacan). He theorises by putting things into theoretical boxes rather than by looking at them in their own right.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Oh god that sounds like terrible old fashioned frankfurt school misanthropy.

It sounds horribly like Ayn Rand-style nonsense - the glorious progression of humanity towards true autonomy of the 'I'.

 

[Knotted]

I think if you strip Zizek of his difficult, philosophical language then he becomes something quite banal (although I maintain that he's still interesting as a cultural commentator). I think the value of a lot of this Hegelian or Lacanian verbiage is that it allows the reader to fill it with their own content and in that way Zizek becomes all things to all men. At the risk of over generalising - that's what continental philosophy tends to do, it glorifies the reader's prejudices. I can't think of anything Zizek has said that really challenges me, or makes me want to rethink. In fact I like what he says. But at the same time I get nothing from him - especially at the theoretical level. Mad4ziz compares the use of arcane philosophical language to the struggle for gay rights - as if the language itself is somehow provoking a revolution. That's surely quite mad! Shouldn't the language used be judged in terms of what it can express?

 

[Knotted]

It sounds horribly like Ayn Rand-style nonsense - the glorious progression of humanity towards true autonomy of the 'I'.

I think with Zizek (I don't know about Mad4ziz), it's about the value of religious moral authority. The one thing Rand got right was her rejection of religious moralism.