From: "hans despain" <DESPAIN-AT-econ.sbs.utah.edu>
Date:          Fri, 27 Dec 1996 19:59:10 GMT-700
Subject:       Re: BHA: Transitive & intransitive


The current discussion about the (in)transivtivity of (the activity 
of) science, evolved from a discussion concerning a critic of 
postisms.  i will not deal with the latter, but to say, that it seems 
to me (as Howie 'feels' it in his "bones") that the two discussions
are very much related.  So let me first try to briefly make this 
relation.

In its "strong" (in the Achilles Heel sense) verison PoMos radically 
deny (based on a radical epistemic skepticism) the existence of real 
objects, or at least our ability to come to know them (e.g. Kantians). 
This skepticism is especially strong with respect to social objects, 
or (in more Gidden-like terms) virtual objects (based on the 
dualitites of struture and agency).

Now, i think that Michael's (Xmas) post can be interpreted to side 
with the PoMo's with respect to the "ontological" status of science 
itself.  Michael is describing science at an empirical level; where i 
agree that the activity of science belongs in the realm of 
transitive.  But at (1) a different level of abstraction, and (2) 
making the "next" dialectical transform, science itself is an 
intransitive object.

i think this becomes especially important in studying the history of 
thought, including current practices.  To be able to determine if 
some school of thought or tradition is critical realist, for example, 
requires that that activity of science be understand as intransitive 
(which does not mean non-changing; in fact the strength of critical 
realism is its ability to deal with the universal flux of reality as 
a totality).

Moreover, it seems a type of "category mistake" to use the notion(s) 
of (in)transitivity here.  In this sense, i thought that John's post 
was helpful.  There is always a type of ambiguity between 
intransitive and transitive; this necessitates the importance of 
ontology; and a strong warning against committing the epistemic 
fallacy.  Thus, to Tobin, (especially) at an empirical level the 
ambiguity between the transitive/intransitive may appear 
"perspectival"; but at a philosophical or better at the 
transcendetal and dialectical levels it is respectively *real* (or 
the condition neceessary for the existence of ...) or *necessitated* 
(e.g., historically).

Again, in this sense, the section in SHRE (which i do not have with 
me) on ontics and ontology with all the subscripts is quite useful.  
Bhaskar drops the busy and missy subscripts, but he remains loyal to 
the importance toward the idea of attempting to keep these things 
seperate (e.g., in the *Dialectic*, especially the first section of 
chapter 2; along with 2.6, and 3.1). 

Science is not merely "empirically accessible discourses"; but also a 
type of (social) structure and a type of generative mechanism.  
Hence, science can be understood to be both (respectively) transitive 
and intransitive.  

In an attempt to be clear, my dispute here does not have to do with 
the idea or use of the term science; rather it has to do with the 
meaning and use of intransitive (and it could be added ontology; both 
of which have to do with transcendental and dialectic [reasoning]). 

hans d.


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