File spoon-archives/habermas.archive/habermas_2001/habermas.0111, message 27


From: "bob scheetz" <rscheetz-AT-cboss.com>
Subject: Re: HAB: liberal eugenics
Date: Mon, 5 Nov 2001 22:52:18 -0500


Matt,
    ...i agree, very badly written...only two very modest (and monotonous,
eh?) arguments.

(1)JH suggests basing the  quest for a brave new ethic on the kantian axiom,
"man is an end in himself,"  presumed the last ditch of rational morality,
and, of universal normative value.  The while he clearly recognizes that
real world liberalism universally ratifies the exact ironic inversion,
everyman for himself; and that, in fact, the normalization of liberal
eugenics is already well along.  So what does a moral stance against eugenic
intervention on the basis of the sanctity/inviolability of individual
autotelos signify in our modern world context?...a retrograde remnant which
will, over a very finite period, exhaust the last oxygen of petit bourgeois
idealism?....very like what is transpiring with the last gasps of
reliogio-metaphysico remnant in their quixotic-heroic anti-abortionism? ...I
don't see where this intersects with Power in such a way as to offer any
hope?...what does it have to offer those of us whose interest is not
scholarship?

and (2) Auto-poiesis is cognate with kant's autotelos; as efficient,
with final, cause.  Much as early Western man made a God and a Metafisic out
of himself, and thence an Ethos and ethic;
modern man, beginning with kant and robespierre,  discarding the imaginative
fundament, the myth-poiesis,  is in process of making out of himself solely
in his practice of discursive reason his own new Ethos-ethic.  Is this not,
structurally, a continuum?...does it not after all preserve the pietas of
Western Tradition?

hope this is more boring,
and thanks for your interest.
bob


----- Original Message -----
From: matthew piscioneri <mpiscioneri-AT-hotmail.com>
To: <habermas-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu>
Sent: Monday, November 05, 2001 9:30 AM
Subject: Re: HAB: liberal eugenics


> Dear Bob,
>
> I am hesitant to write this so apologies in advance :-) I worry that I am
> missing pearls of wisdom because I can't decipher your *stream of
> consciousness* posts adequately enough.
>
> Eg.
>
> >His pessimism is relieved only by a kinda wistful pis aller on the
species'
> >capacity for moral auto-poiesis. That perhaps, Woman can, beginning from
> >Kant's categorically moral  autotelic constitution of human dasein,
create
> >a
> >new, universal-secular, ethos of the species. That is, it appears, only
by
> >way of a moral-cultural rump, not a society; like the monks devotedly
> >tending the lamp of civilization thru the dark ages.
> >
> >...but, don't it seem the sub-text here is still after all not Reason,
but,
> >Traditon?...that the text begs a continuation of Aristotle-St. Paul & co,
> >all the old forms of the auto-poetic cultural heritance of the West, not
a
> >discarding?...and the q is still: how can you even think "ethical"
without
> >a
> >tradition/history? ...indeed, the case of the brave new dark age, how can
a
> >person be a person?
>
>
> That said; the problem is mine I realise. Is there any chance of you
> indulging me (and possibly others) by *boring* up some of your posts so
I/we
> might be able to engage?
>
> Cheers
>
> MattP
>
> _________________________________________________________________
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>
>
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