File spoon-archives/bhaskar.archive/bhaskar_2000/bhaskar.0002, message 43


From: "Tobin Nellhaus" <nellhaus-AT-gis.net>
Subject: BHA: Re: How is New York Today-  fate of [Social Science]?
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2000 16:03:05 -0500


Marsh wrote:

> I'm a bit confused by your comment. I don't equate transient with
material.
> Science is a material practice (just consider Los Alamos), but by my
reading
> of RB's work it's in the transient side of things.

Sorry if I seem nitpicky, but the terms are actually
transitive/intransitive, not transient/intransient.  I bring this up because
I suspect that it's causing some unclarity.  The transitive dimension (TD)
is roughly equivalent to the epistemological sphere, and the intransitive
dimension (ID) more or less the ontological sphere.  I have to admit I've
never completely understood Bhaskar's choice of terminology here, but as
near as I can make out, the idea is that the TD is the "subject's" side of
knowledge ("I think about X," which is a transitive situation), and the ID
is the "object's" side ("the thing that's being thought about"), except that
thoughts and ideas can always themselves become objects of investigation.
So materiality is an entirely separate matter.  But perhaps someone has a
better grasp of the terminological choice.

---
Tobin Nellhaus
nellhaus-AT-mail.com
"Faith requires us to be materialists without flinching": C.S. Peirce




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