File spoon-archives/habermas.archive/habermas_1998/habermas.9803, message 47


Date: Sat, 07 Mar 1998 02:14:34 +0200
Subject: HAB: Contradictory Performances



Here's hoping somebody will read all of this...

>The Performative Contradiction Debate continues...
>
>>(K) My charge against this is that the argumentative strategy 
>that Habermas employs begs the question.  In other words the
>>case for developing the idea of a performative contradiction
>>uses one of its conclusions as a premise.  It is the logical
>>equivalent of saying that God exists because God produces
>>real effects (William James).  Logically this reads God
>>produces real effects therefore God exists.
>
>(A) No, logically that reads:
>
>Whatever produces real effects exists.
>God produces real effects.
>Therefore, God exists.
>
>>(K) The conclusion that God exists is used as a premise for 
>the statement God produces real effects.  It is a logical circle 
>and completely incoherent.

Well, no, it is not. You are the one who is adding it there,
because you cannot conceive of God producing real effects without
existing, which is indeed the conclusion - but not the premise,
which should be crystal clear from the above. God's producing real
effects requires existence (or allows to infer that) *only if the
first premise is true*. It is no different from this:

1) Any entity that has four wheels is a car.
2) Y has four wheels.
=====================Therefore, Y is a car.

(I'm not saying the first premise is true.) Your objection
amounts to claiming that premise 2 here presupposes that Y
is a car, because only cars have four wheels...

>(A) Well, see above. Given the truth of the premises, the 
>conclusion follows. You may dispute either of them, but if you 
>don't, you're behaving illogically if you don't accept the 
>conclusion. (I would personally qualify both of the premises, 
>as James probably does himself. Of course God exists in a 
>sense, like Santa does.)
>
>(K's R) Of course if God exists in the same sense that Santa 
>exists this makes nonsense out of the substance of  
>propositional truth claims. Ie. Anything that one believes is 
>true, in a sense, even more so if they actual behave if it is 
>true. 

This is very confusing. Where do you get that "anything one
believes is true"? At least you don't get it from "fictional
entities such as God, Santa and Sherlock Holmes exist as
fictional entities".

>Eg. Ken has a book with all the answers, hidden
>so that no one can find it, therefore Ken has all the answers 
>because having all the answers produces real effects.  Do I 
>have all the answers or not?  No - i don't - because NO SUCH
>BOOK EXISTS!

Well, there's one thing we agree about...

No matter how hard I think about it, I can't find in the example
anything relevant to the discussion about James's logic (which
is important here because it may reveal somebody's, well,
extraordinary understanding of logic).

>At least some language games have constitutive rules, 
>without which they would not be the games they are. These 
>rules can be extracted from them through hermeneutic 
>reflection and expressed in propositional form.
>
>(K's R) You have to assume here that the rules of hermeneutic 
>reflection expressed in propositional form CAN actually yield 
>the criteria for determining the constitutive rules - which
>requires the rules to be true a priori.

I have to assume no such thing. The hermeneutic reflection I'm 
talking about does not necessarily even have rules. If it does,
then sure, we can't question them at the same time as we use
them to discover the constitutive rules of a discourse. Doesn't
mean they'd have to be somehow a priori in the philosophical sense,
only in the etymological one.

>(A) Now, does argumentation have unavoidable rules - is there 
>a point at which we are no longer arguing? What is the 
>difference between argumentation and non-argumentation? 
>Habermas approaches it from the difference between 
>convincing and talking into. 
>
>(K's R) You have to assume a priori that the distinction 
>between communicative and strategic action here is 
>completely clear cut.  If the two moments are entwined at any 
>point then this falls apart.

Why would that be? A difference that is not clear-cut is
still a difference.

>There are different domains of argumentation, such 
>as legal, moral and scientific ones, each of which have their 
>own specific rules which constitute them as independent 
>domains - what counts as a moral argument does not
>count as a scientific argument. Habermas's work has recently 
>dealt with such more specific rules of argumentation for the 
>moral and the legal domains. (This is the status of (U), for 
>example.)
>
>(K's R) Habermas must assume here that the distinctions 
>between different discourses are valid.  This can only be done 
>in RETROSPECT and not established a priori (as Wellmer 
>demonstrates).

I'm waiting for a quote from Wellmer. Before that, I'm not sure
what you mean by "a priori". It is an empirical, a posteriori fact
that different arguments are used in these different genres of
discourse. Habermas connects these distinctions to others, such as those
of his action theory. But this doesn't make them a priori, in the
sense of being before all experience (the Kantian sense). 

>(A) Once we have identified such presuppositions of 
>argumentation (by semantic investigation and generalizing 
>from cases to rules), we can use them to look for performative
>contradictions.
>
>(K's R) How does one know that the identification of such 
>presuppositions of argumentation itself isn't a performative 
>contradiction?

Well, which of its own presuppositions it would contradict?
The burden of proof is on the side who accuses the other of
performative contradiction.

>1) Certain language games have rules the following of which 
>is unavoidable if one is to describe herself taking part in them.
>
>(K's R) How does she know this?  And why should she care? - 
>given the fact that the ideal may or may not conform to her 
>vision of a moral universe?

She knows this in the form of practical knowledge or competence,
which she or someone else can reconstruct in the form of theoretical
knowledge (to some extent). This is a general point about language
games or domains of discourse, not specific to moral ones. She should
care about following these rules exactly to the extent that she cares
about taking part in the practice they enable. If you want to play
chess, you better follow the rules or you're not playing chess; if you
want to convince someone rationally, you'd better not threaten them
with a gun or you're just not convincing them rationally. Again, it
is a different question whether or not one should care about engaging
in such practices and to what extent one can choose to. I hope
I have managed to explain this well enough not to have to do it
again very soon.

>2) Argumentation is such a language game.
>
>(K's R) How do you know when argumentation starts and the 
>strategic struggle for recognition ends?

This might be worth another thread, but isn't the whole notion
of a strategic struggle for recognition self-defeating? If you
gain someone's recognition by strategic means - say presenting
yourself as what you are not or by using force - are you really
being recognized in the first place? What's in it for you?

As Habermas acknowledges, every actual process of argumentation
has also strategic features. This in no way lessens the importance
of idealizations, because they make it possible to criticize 
and exclude what is identified as strategic. For example, if I
was trying to avoid replying to you by appeal to authority or
ad hominem arguments, you would be justified to demand better
treatment.

>3) These unavoidable rules can be identified through 
>hermeneutic reflection.
>NB: This identification is fallibilistic; the unavoidable rules are 
>not unavoidably the ones that Habermas presents.
>
>(K's R) What would it take to demonstrate that hermeneutic 
>reflection CANNOT identify these rules?  You *need* to specify 
>this in order to proceed empirically.

Well, it would take an argument that would show that it is a
priori not possible to identify such rules. Don't expect me to
present one, as I don't believe one exists. (Just out of
being pig-headed, I'll make an exception and not answer what
I suppose you're actually trying to ask. You'll have to articulate
it yourself.)

>(A) What do you mean with the "Kantian conception of 'man'" 
>and where and how does Habermas subscribe to it?
>
>(K's R) Moral 'man' in Habermas is noncontradictory man.  
>Noncontradictory mem are identical - hence the 
>noncontradictions.  To demonstrate this statement I would 
>need an army of arguments. 

Indeed. To possibly save you some trouble, I can categorically
state that there is nothing in Habermas's work that would posit
or imply lack of difference between men as the moral ideal.
On the Kantian conception the noumenal selves of men do seem to
lack distinguishing features, but even then I can't see how he
could say that should be identical in their empirical features.
And Habermas doesn't have a conception of the noumenal, non-empirical
self in the first place. He has time and again pointed out that
there are irreconcilable differences between ideals of good life
and between individual projects of self-realization guided by
them. To allow for their peaceful co-existence even when conflicts
arise, as they inevitably sooner or later do, one has to have means
of solving conflicts that all sides accept as fair. This is the
true motivation of the distinction between questions of good life
and questions of justice (as it is for Rawls). Unlike for Rawls,
for Habermas the line between the two is always shifting and contingent,
up for discussion. 

Now, given the distinction between moral and ethical questions,
moral discourses occur between people who have different values
and projects *without any need for these to become identical*.
It is true that they have to have some shared values, such as respect
for people with different values (this is, btw, not neutral in the sense
that there are people and groups who don't subscribe to this).
However, all we can say of the ideal moral man in Habermas is that
he is willing to solve possible problems of coordinating social action
through discourse aiming to find solutions everyone involved can freely
accept (ie. this is the respect in which such persons could be said to be
identical - but that leaves room for so many differences and ethical
ideals that to say it makes people clones of each other is akin to
saying that everyone who likes "Titanic" is identical). That is why 
Habermas says his is a "minimal ethics" and that it is not enough
to answer all ethical problems, not even the most important ones.

>(K's R).  I don't see it - it is narrowly construed such that, its 
>narrowness, in reality, empties the contents of ethical life (ie. 
>All of those wonderful performative contradictions).

This is incomprehensible. Discourse is, after all, always discourse
about something. The fact that as a means of solving problems it is
not tied to one or any particular content doesn't mean it isn't
always tied to some particular content. What this content is and
what happens to it in discourse cannot be prescribed in advance, but
depends on the particular problem. How does a non-coercive discourse
about, say, the rights of refugees "empty the contents of ethical life"?

>And yes, 
>the problems it does address are the problems of 
>noncontradictory man (a good superhero of sorts I
>think).  Who wants to be and live noncontradictory mans' life?
>
>>(K) It is precisely our contradictory identity that we want to 
>hold onto - because these  contradictions make us who we 
>are.  In this sense Kantian noncontradictory 'man' becomes 
>the antithesis of an actual (moral) individual identity.

I just have to ask: what the hell do you mean by "our contradictory
identity"? However you understand contradiction, it surely implies
a relation (between propositions, for example). At least, a self-
relation is implied, such as when a proposition is self-contradictory.
Earlier you were making more sense, when you spoke about contradictions
between people, although even that is elliptical (ie. I assume
you mean that their plans or projects or intentions are contradictory).
So what is the ellipsis in "a contradictory man"? The most natural
reading would be "a man who has contradictory beliefs (etc.)". But
that's hardly what you mean.

>(A) As you surely know, Habermasian moral discourse is not 
>meant to deal with identity issues.
>
>(K's R) EXACTLY.  MORAL ISSUES ARE LINKED TO OUR 
>IDENTITY INEXPLICABLY.  This is why I think the moral 
>domain in Habermas is a problem.

("Inextricably", I suppose.) All right, moral issues are linked
to identity, and identity to moral positions. I agree and think
that this is a valid insight. However, my understanding (and Habermas's)
of the nature of this linkage differs. For example, and this should
be trivial, we can reach for and come to a mutual understanding
about a moral issue without thereby becoming identical. This isn't
so complicated, really. Discourse is a way of finding answers.
Habermas claims that we won't find answers to questions about identity -
who we are, who we want to become, who we have been - the same way
we find answers to questions about what is the right thing
to do in a particular situation. This is why I say above that
moral discourse doesn't deal with identity issues, not that moral
issues are not linked to identity issues, which they are, in many
ways. I'm even willing to accept that Habermas hasn't dealt with
this adequately - he has been too busy establishing the differences
to pay attention to the linkages.

>>(K) And thirdly - all that a performative
>>contradiction can do is identify out fundamental beliefs - the
>>very things that we live and breath and wrap our lives and
>>identities around (REL, 184).
>
>(A) And that is a *problem*?? If indeed it can do that, it is a 
>very powerful and important tool, don't you think?
>
>(K's R) This isn't a problem in Hegel - because Hegel *knows* 
>that the performative self-contradiction applies on a concrete 
>basis and not on a transcendental one (which he notes would
>be question-begging).

I doubt if you find the phrase "performative contradiction" anywhere
in Hegel. Aside from that, I believe a lot of your misunderstandings
of Habermas are caused by your misunderstanding of the *quasi*-transcendental
status of his claims. It is as if you were criticizing him for not
achieving some Kantian goals, which he is not aiming for in the first
place.

>Argumentation is a 
>purified understanding of language and reason based upon 
>noncontradictory man.  If the vision of noncontradictory man is 
>not a shared vision then there is no reason to participate.  
>Only insofar as one wants to be a clone would one want to 
>participate 

I may be wrong, but it seems to me that you are participating in
argumentation right now - so whose clone do you want to be? ;)

This "no reason to participate"-thing is a result of a confusion
between different meanings of rationality. To be sure, Habermas
does not always adequately differentiate between them himself.
But that is something I want to return to in the future.

>- and hence - since this appeals to a 'want' it 
>appeals to something other than pure reason.  
>As I have said 
>before - Habermas discourse ethics is an emphatic ethics.  

Participation in a discourse demands more than pure reason, all
right. The need to find rational, internally convincing answers
comes from elsewhere. But more on that later.


Antti





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