From: GEVANS613-AT-aol.com
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2003 21:04:02 EDT
Subject: Re: devastating page on Husserl?


In a message dated 18/07/2003 22:06:58 GMT Daylight Time, crifasi-AT-hotmail.com 
writes:


> Subj:Re: devastating page on Husserl?
> Date:18/07/2003 22:06:58 GMT Daylight Time
> From:    crifasi-AT-hotmail.com (Anthony Crifasi)
> Sender:    owner-heidegger-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
> Reply-to: <A HREF="mailto:heidegger-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu">heidegger-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu</A>
> To:    heidegger-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Jud wrote:
> 
> > > How does he say that the phenomena are most familiar to us? Insofar as 
> >we
> > > are absorbed and interested in them, not in the detached mode of knowing 
> >or
> > > science.
> >
> >Jud:
> >This it seems to me is an ill-thought out wild generalisation on 
> >Heidegger's
> >behalf, for not all scientists adopt the same degree of detachment
> >in their modes of knowing entities/phenomena, etc. Many scientists are
> >UTTERLY absorbed and INTENSELY  interested in the
> >subjects of their study, and often feel a strong personal ATTACHMENT, some 
> >to
> >the extent that the phenomena under investigation take on an obsessional
> >nature for them.
> 
> You are misunderstanding, he does not mean that a scientist cannot be 
> passionate about what they are studying. He means that passion does not 
> constitute any part of the actual scientific experiment or result, even if 
> passion motivated the scientist to do the experiment in the first place. In 
> other words, when a scientist properly documents an experiment and its 
> results, he or she only describes objective observations or possible 
> hypothesis. 

Jud:
Ok. forget the passion bit - that leaves us with the UTTERLY absorbed and 
INTENSELY  interested in the
subjects of their study bit - what about that? Surely that qualifies to 
correspond with the phenomenologists
being absorbed and interested in the phenomena which are most familiar to 
them? 

What's the difference? 

When we talk of science we talk of scientists - 'science' doesn't carry out 
the experiments - SCIENTISTS DO [caps for emphasis only]
They get enthusiastic and their enthusiasm may well result in a continuance 
of their observations in spite of early setbacks, so that the result - when it 
comes 
can be attributed to their interest in the phenomena and their passion to see 
a result.  In that way not only do these aspects affect the result, but in 
the absence of their interest there wouldn't even BE a result.

So if Heidegger says that passion and interest does not constitute any part 
of an actual scientific experiment or result, even if 
passion motivated the scientist to do the experiment in the first place, well 
he is living in cloud cuckooland, for I can think of hundreds of instances of 
total commitment and burning interest and concentration on the artefacts 
under observation - i.e.  - just LOOKING at them - not just the results or the 
write-ups of those results on the behalf of the scientific investigators, [Marie 
Curie for example] as being the main element which produced a result - where 
other less committed investigators would have given up. Please take my caps not 
as 'shouting' but simply emphasis.

The answer probably lies in Heidegger's extraordinarily weird and childlike 
and most un-philosophical  belief that there exists something called SCIENCE, 
which presumably puts a white coat on and lights the flames beneath Bunsen 
Burners on the benches of the world laboratories, and writes the scientific text 
books by way of some ectoplasmic automatic writing - and attends conferences 
and seminars?  Its just another instance of his absurd reification of human 
activity on a mass scale like Dasein is an instance of his absurd reification of  
human activity on an individuate scale  - the man was obsessional about 
turning action-words into thing-words. 
There is no such thing exists in the whole cosmos as 'dancing,' but only the 
dancers can be found - there is no such thing exists in the whole cosmos  as 
'science'  there is only the scientists to be found,  and there is no such 
thing exists in the whole cosmos  as 'philosophy,' but only philosophers can be 
found philosophising.
,

Anthony:
> be 
> motivationally relevant. 

That is what it means to say that scientists are  > "detached," not that they 
> are unmotivated or dispassionate about their 
> subjects, but that the actual scientific method and its results are supposed 
> to be totally objective and not "tainted" by the scientists' personal 
> feelings. An experiment should be able to be reproduced by anyone, 
> regardless of how passionate they are.

Jud:
But most scientists are not the least 'detached' but on the contrary highly 
involved - so much so are some involved that they have been known to falsify 
their 'detached' results in order that those results will prove what they 
wish them to prove.

Surely this is no more than one of Heidegger's  word-games?

Cheers,

Jud.

<A HREF="http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/ ">http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/</A> 
Jud Evans - ANALYTICAL INDICANT THEORY.
<A HREF="http://uncouplingthecopula.freewebspace.com">http://uncouplingthecopula.freewebspace.com</A>


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