Subject: Re: [HAB:] Being-in-the-World [Matt]
Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2004 01:27:21 +0000



Matt,

1) I agree with you on Heidegger Habermas relation. Interestingly at one 
point in his twelve lectures on modernity Habermas uses lifeworld almost as 
synonymous to 'being in the world' (p. 144).

2) I am not so sure about your dichotomous distinction between Habermas' 
semantics and his pragmatism though. To be frank I do not really know what 
pragmatism (as against his pragmatics) means in this context. Sometime I get 
the impression that it is a convenient way to avoid tough philosophical 
questions.

3) Having said that I see Habermas' major contribution along the similar 
line as that of Foucault. His work (like that of Foucault) can be divided 
into two distinct but mutually complementary tasks. On the hand Habermas 
aims to overcome the notion of subject that is not situated and located in 
'this world'. This is the task of detranscendentalisation whereby he 
develops his critique of the traditional conception of subject. The second 
task is to put forth a new conception of subjectivity that builds on this 
'negative critique' of the philosophy of subject. This task is that of 
developing a positive conception of subjectivity in the wake of the 
detranscendentalisation achieved through the first task. This second task is 
related to Habermas positive conception of 'transcendence from within'.

best
ali
============================================================thanks for the clarification. OTOH, Bernstein *may be* is writing with a 
little bit too much flourish :-). OTOH, I have regularly suggested that 
despite Habermas's overt antagonism towards Heidegger I think there are 
Heideggerian pre-occupations that persist in Habermas's work.

After all, if you read Matustik's excellent philosophical biography and the 
interviews with Habermas in _A&S_, it is clear that onto-existential themes 
shaped aspects of Habermas's earlier philosophical interests.

So, a dialogical-being-in-the-world! Yes, I'm not unhappy with the idea of 
an intersubjectively constructed framework of onto-existential being... 
sounds like pragmatism to me :-) and sure beats a lot of the dialectical 
scholasticism of C19th philosophy of consciousness.... and Heidegger's 
metaphysics unless one wishes to ascribe some sort of mystical content to 
the WORD.

This has always been my main problem with Habermas: what I take to be the 
incongruity between the transcendental aspects of his semantic theory (yuk) 
and his grounded, postmetaphysical pragmatism (beautiful). Still, if his 
transcendentalism is placed within the framework of his critical social 
theory and in particular his engagement with the neo-Nietzscheans (as i do 
in my thesis!) (c.f. Aboulafia's excellent introduction to the _Pragmatism_ 
collection) then i think the incongruity of Habermas's 
quasi-transcendentalism is diminished.

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