Date: Tue, 06 Jun 2000 12:23:51 +1000
From: Gary MacLennan <g.maclennan-AT-qut.edu.au>
Subject: Re: BHA: From RTS to FEW


I haven't spotted a copy of FEW yet but I'm an academic so that would never 
stop me commenting on it.  Unlike Ruth I *believe* in alethia. Though 
perhaps I should rephrase that by saying that I feel alethia is the logic 
of the search for an ontological basis for truth.

But what currently interests me is a comparison between Bhaskar's alethia 
and Heidegger's aletheia. Indeed I think that Heidegger and the early 
Wittgenstein may be key influences in Bhaskar's current orientation.

My proposed conference paper, if I ever get the bloody thing written, hopes 
to reconcile these two versions of truth.  For me alethia is truth as 
discovery, while aletheia is truth as revelation.  A student of mine is 
currently grappling with the problem of the alethic status of documentary 
photography.  Apart from the problem of digital fakery the question she has 
trouble answering is what is the alethic status say of a photograph such as 
Dorothy Lange's "Migrant Mother'.   George Steiner in his book on Heidegger 
asks an analogous question about what is the truth of a Mozart 
Symphony.  Alethia does not seem to be of much use here.  The question I am 
seeking an answer for is whether aletheia is more useful.

It seems to me that it is no coincidence that alethia works best in science 
while aletheia functions remarkably well in the realm of aesthetics. But 
all the way through Bhaskar's work he has inveighed against Prometheanism; 
a critique which can easily turn from the limits of scientific knowing to 
alternatives to scientific ways of knowing.

  Nor is it a coincidence that Heidegger turned to the poetry of Holderlin 
during the crisis of the collapse of his hopes (absolutely alethically 
true) for the Hitler regime.  Nor do I think it is a coincidence that 
Bhaskar essays a novel at the time of the collapse of almost everyone's 
hopes for a decent world.

There is much to talk about here. A good comrade on the list has 
recommended I read Adorno's Jargons of Authenticity and I think this attack 
on Heidegger and also the Adornoian critique of Kierkegaard's call for 
universal love are particularly relevant to the current phase of TDCR.

Hopefully I will have time to post on them before the conference.

regards

Gary


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