Date: Sat, 16 Sep 1995 20:28:26 -0400 (EDT)
From: John Ransom <ransom-AT-dickinson.edu>
Subject: Cang Intro


Foucault provides an interesting sketch of his understanding of
Enlightenment in his Introduction to Canguilhem's _Normal and
Pathological_. He breaks down the tradition of Enlightenment according to
several criteria. This argument concerning the intellectual outlines of
Enlightenment thought is interesting in itself, and also as a kind of
proposed study guide for positioning Foucault.

First Foucault divides the post-WWII European intellectual scene into two
camps: Sartre and Merleau- Ponty developed "a philosophy of experience,
of sense and of subject" while Cavaill=E8, Bachelard and Canguilhem took up
"a philosophy of knowledge, of rationality and of concept" (p. 8).

The two trends could be traced back to Husserl's _Cartesian Meditations_
and to phenomenology generally which, it turns out, can be read in two
ways: (1) as a philosophy of the subject. Here F refers to Sartre's
"Transcendence of the Ego." (2) in terms of "formalism and intuitionism."
Clearly, F prefers the Canguilhem version of phenomenology. But what's
this "formalism and intuitionism"? I think what Foucault is referring to
is the tendency in modern histories of science to focus on the
truth-producing structures of discrete scientific eras. For all their
genuine concreteness, however, these regimes of scientific truth have
their origin in the value- and truth-creating intuitions of their
founders. The result is a study of the "formalism" of the truth-producing
structures of science that can itself be traced back to an intuitive
creative leap.

These two forms of phenomenology--Sartre's theory of the subject and
Canguilhem/Kuhn's histories of value- and subject-*creation*--are,
according to F, "profoundly heterogeneous."

I have more to say, but perhaps I'll stop here and see if anyone has a
comment. Future discussion will have the same subject line as above so
that members can dispose of these comments as the mood strikes them.

--John
ransom-AT-dickinson.edu

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