File spoon-archives/deleuze-guattari.archive/deleuze-guattari_1998/deleuze-guattari.9812, message 256


Date: Tue, 15 Dec 1998 02:49:47 -0500 (EST)
From: Matthew King <making-AT-yorku.ca>
Subject: Re:  Re:  Homeopathic thread is relevant; think again


On Sun, 13 Dec 1998, Michael Rooney wrote:

> While your jargon-laden criteria are ornamented with
> the usual leftist watchwords and catch-phrases, it's
> utterly vague on the obvious, important, *practical*
> issues: which desires are revolutionary?  which are
> "recuperative"?  which scripts underline performativity?
> which are everyday?  How do you tell the difference?

Maybe it would help (no sarcasm intended!) if you would tell us how *you*
tell the difference, Michael.  Thinking back to your illustration of why
"decency" isn't any moral help--i.e., you might think you're being decent
to (un)leash by sacrificing him--I wonder what you think *would* be a good
moral standard which would show that sacrificing people is *wrong*?  (You
said that showing that the god doesn't exist would be a start--but it
isn't the start of a *moral* argument.)  Notice that if "decency" isn't
any help, then Kant isn't any help either--if, for whatever reason, you
think you're being decent to (un)leash by sacrificing him to the god, then
clearly you're acting with a good will, not treating him merely as a
means, etc.  Utilitarianism isn't any help, because you think that
everybody (including even (un)leash!) is going to be better off because of
the sacrifice.  So, say you appeal to (un)leash's inalienable right to
life and liberty ... now what will you stand *that* on?  Or say, even,
that you appeal to a somewhat more sophisticated theory like Habermas's
and say that you can't do anything to anyone that they wouldn't consent to
under idealized conditions (though (un)leash's sacrificer could still
argue that (un)leash *would* consent under the appropriate conditions) ...
still, what do you stand *that* on, ultimately?  (Ultimately, what you
find Habermas's theory standing on are some ethical assumptions about how
a healthy society should function ... assumptions which, while I for the
most part happen to share them, are not unassailable.  Good moral
standards, meanwhile, *are* supposed to be unassailable.  They're supposed
to show that sacrificing (un)leash is wrong, no ifs, ands, or buts about
it--because if they're not unassailable, then ultimately they're not any
better than mere preferences, which are what you and Nathan have been
accusing (un)leash of basing his moral thinking on.)

Matthew

 ---Matthew A. King---Department of Philosophy---York University, Toronto---
       "In the conviction that it is possible you may depart from life 
        at once, act and speak and think in every case accordingly."
 ----------------------------(Marcus Aurelius)------------------------------


   

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