Date: 	Sat, 4 Apr 1998 18:46:12 -0500
Subject: Re: HAB: Fairness in language-centric understanding



On Wed, 1 Apr 1998 00:54:40 -0500  Gary wrote:

> It's also good to keep in mind that understanding precedes 
critique. If you don't understand what a writer is *intending* to 
do, your critique is likely a "straw man" critique.

This is an interesting statement.  To understand something 
one must *know* the intention of the speaker *know* the 
particular circumstance of the statement (Albrecht's Wellmer's 
essay, "What is a Pragmatic Theory of Meaning?" discusses 
this nicely in Phil Interventions in the Unfinished Project of 
Enlightenment).  To understand, one must know the conditions 
under which such a statement are valid.  To understand a 
statement is to understand what the statement means.

So understanding is both a comprehension of the validity (the 
reasons for) and a comprehension of meaning.  Mutual 
understanding would be an agreement on both - the validity of 
a statement and the meaning of a statement.  Which is to say 
that the statement must have an affective element.  Mutual 
argeement, in this sense, must have an affective tug.  The 
statement in question must speak to us - and, in the 
agreement, one must adopt such a statement as part of their 
narrative - in an autobiographical way.

Oddly enough this presents a challenge to Habermas's 
articulation of the reconstructive sciences (as Jay Bernstein 
aruges in Chptr 3 of Recovering Ethical Life).  For Habermas 
the reconstructive science, through self-reflection, 
demonstrate and bring to light intuititive know-how (see 
Reconstruction and Interpretation in the Social Sciences, 
MCCA).  For Habermas the reconstructive sciences discover or 
illuminate knowledge about the dynamics of something 
(language, etc.).  However to agree about something, for 
instance - to agree about the intuitive know-how of language 
use - is to incorporate it within a specific self-identity or 
personal story.  In other words - the reconstructive sciences 
do not discover theoretical knowledge - rather they contribute 
to self-interpretation - knowledge about the self - ie. they 
contribute to the self-creation.

So the depth hermeneutic of the reconstructive sciences does 
not actually reach behind reality or reflect itself out of history - 
rather the reconstructive sciences provide understanding 
about the self.  As such they are therapeutic and clinical.  A 
depth hermeneutic of this sort provides understanding beyond 
grammar - since, at the root, the affective dimension of 
understanding also entails an incorporation of grammar *with* 
images, narratives, and scenes that constitute a personal 
idenity.  Depth hermeneutics never leaves the perspective of 
a participant in dialogue, and insofar as agreement is 
possible, it renders and agreement about something which 
speaks to the self and shapes ones' personal identity.

To bring this back to the discussion about performative 
contradictions - a performative contradiction is a form of 
self-understanding and, in this way, cannot be used as a 
criticism of one form of life - rather a mechanism for 
illuminating the narrative characteristics of a specific form of 
life.

To relate this to Gary's comment - critique cannot precede 
understanding.  Understanding something is akin to 
agreement about something, in other words - if you 
understand something - you can not longer critique it because 
you are in agreement with it.  Criticism is based upon 
disagreement (a lack of understanding), a place where 
understanding does not exist - where a statement or validity 
claim is *not* considered valid or meaningful.  So, to 
reformulate Gary's interesting comment: criticism exists in the 
absence of understanding.  All criticism is, in this respect, is a 
staw person.  Because the object of the critique is precisely 
what is in question - that which is not understood.

ken, who cannot critique what is understood

"True thoughts are those alone which do not understand 
themselves."  - T. W. Adorno




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