Date: Sun, 7 Sep 2003 23:54:30 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [HAB:] re: Freedom, reflection, distance, evolution..... [Ali, Matt]


Actually, this isn't about any of the above subject line's
items  substantively, but is a short response to 4 emails
about all that. 

Ali, 

I hoped to do some follow-up comment to your earlier
posting ("Freedom, Reflection and distance," very
thought-provoking, 0309.34, 7 Sept.) and said that to Matt
earlier today, off list. But when I looked at your
discussion again, I realized that an exponentiation of
response was beckoning, since I disagree (which you might
expect) as well as agree.  So, I have to settle with a
lament, since my vacation is over, and time will be again
scarce (and it's late night now. I wrote over a week ago
that I wouldn't post at all this past week, yet look what
happened).

Matt, 

I see that your pleasant response doesn't really call for
reply ("Freedom evolves," 0309.37, 7 Sept.), though I'd
anticipated that it would, before I dwelled with it. Thanks
again for your interesting comments. (*California*: Just
mentioning the state brings a smile, doesn't it? "Great
cheese from happy cows," goes the California Milk Board tag
line--*very* funny ad campaign over the years. Also, we can
say: Great *politics* from happy cows. )

----------------------------------

As *our* issues---Habermasian things---get detailed, one
might wonder how topics vis-a-vis free time can stay
constructively manageable, as fair reply to good reply
increasingly calls for an exponentiation of attention to
sub-topics that emerge. I imagine a facilitator pulling out
topics from within topics and starting sub-lists (JH as
philosopher, JH as ideology critic, JH as social theorist,
JH as public intellectual, JH and Foucault, JH and Derrida,
etc.). But the problem of exponentiation would return in
the sub-topic, limited only by available time. Internet
discourse is a bush of short strings (like the bush
structure of the Internet itself)---waves of thematology
among very individualized readers. 

But it's fun!

cheers,

Gary






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