Date: Mon, 7 Sep 1998 12:01:36 +0100
From: Carsten Sestoft <sestoft-AT-coco.ihi.ku.dk>
Subject: RE: Bourdieu: realist, materialist...?


Dear Sergio -- some comments on yout post of Sept 2, commenting on an
earlier post of mine -- sorry for the delay:

>It seems to me that Cassirer's critical idealism intends to overcome the
>metaphysical dichotomies of thought and being, hence of realism and
>idealism, by extending the insights of his analysis into the relational
>"origins" of numbers and geometry to the different branches of science,
>and further to general epistemological discourse on the nature of
>empirical knowledge. But he does not synthesise idealist and realist
>positions really - he critically overcomes the metaphysical tendency to
>statically substantialise the origins and origination of concepts that
>are for him relational (mathematics is paradigmatic here - Bourdieu
>often follows his examples in order to adumbrate the nature of
>"relationality"), and views such conceptualisation as expression of the
>spontaneous constructive doings of the "human spirit". (It is hard to
>know what this spirit is meant to be, as it is neither objective nor
>subjective, historical nor ahistorical; the same goes for
>"spontaneous"). In this sense he is an idealist.

I am not sure that I am really competent here; I suppose that Bourdieu
takes from Cassirer what he can use (relational thinking as the "idealist"
part of an epistemology that considers scientific knowledge to be some sort
of synthesis of an "idealist" side -- categories, concepts, or theories --
and a "realist" side -- empirical knowledge, "Anschauung") and then
replaces the "human spirit" a the source of idealities with the more
materialist and historical notion of historically constructed categories,
"principles of vision and division", or "cognitive dispositions", e.g.
those that have been constructed in the scientific field.

>If that is so, then I really don't get it, and that is exactly my
>problem. If the purport of thinking relationally is to dissipate a
>tendentially metaphysical mode of thinking in terms of substance, then
>how can you step outside of the relationship of "presence" to
>"re-presentation" in order to say what reality, in itself, is? How can
>reality be, in itself, relational, if the point is that only through
>relational thinking can reality be adequately cognised and be --in end
>effect-- defined as such?

I am not sure that I follow here -- couldn't one say that if reality is
only adequately cognised by relational thinking, then this must also be an
ontological proposition on the nature of reality?

>>- You're probably right when you say that the Wittgensteinian "almost
>>pragmatism" in Bourdieu leads to a loss of conceptual clarity...
>>
>I didn't mean to say that! In fact I believe Wittgenstein's influence
>enables a great deal of conceptual clarity in Bourdieu's work!
>Philosophy sometimes forces an artificial clarity on spheres of language
>which, due to necessities of practice, require a degree of ambiguity,
>and Wittgenstein is an excellent analyst for this kind of problem, from
>whom Bourdieu seems to have learned a lot. This relates again to my
>problems with idealism, realism, materialism, etc. What practical sense
>do these monsters have? They often have political, religious, aesthetic,
>etc., etc. implications.

I think we agree here, although my way of putting it was unclear: it is the
ambiguous character of practice and practical reality that makes clear cut
philosophical distinctions artificial and inadequate -- which is to say
that conceptual clarity may often lead to misunderstanding (e.g. with the
ideal-typical notion af rational action).
>
>I wish I could tell you more of my project, but it would take too long -
>perhaps I can email some things to you privately (off-list), OK?

I allow myself to think that these discussions are of general interest and
therefore may be conducted on the list; and I look forward to the post you
announced in your post today.

best wishes
Carsten Sestoft
University of Copenhagen


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