Date: Sun, 11 Nov 2001 18:06:09 +0000
Subject: Re: The Sublime




Walter,

In the brevity of these emails I wish you would expand on these elements -

later perhaps.
regards

steve

walter a davis wrote:

>Reg,  One last notion.  When you speak of the aestheticization of terror I
>assume you are aware that this was Walter Benjamin's definition of fascism
>in his essay on art. (My point re. Kant--and again I'm collapsing here what
>I take over 100 pages to demonstrate--is that in his thought on the sublime
>he projects and denies the disorders of his psyche--that psyche being the
>ratio in its desperate effort to realize its desires while calling them
>something else.) walter 
>At 04:15 PM 11/11/01 +0000, you wrote:
>
>>Reg/Walter/Eric
>>
>>1) Whilst I disagree with Walters' hyperbole, simply because so much 
>>philosophy has wilfully refused to understand the issues that are raised 
>>by science - the clearest moment being the Darwin event. There is a 
>>sound point in the below related to the comprehensive industrialisation 
>>of the media, which derives its power from the comprehensive aesthetics 
>>of terror, which can be understood through the invocation of the 
>>'sublime' - Lyotard invokes the sublime in relation to the aesthetic not 
>>to the social itself - in the sections of the inhuman where he addresses 
>>the social he invokes the notion of 'development' which is a heavily 
>>overcoded version of capital. But this is insufficient given that this 
>>does not help in producing an analysis and understanding of the miseries 
>>and slavery of a society that at present has extended its domination 
>>over the whole planet - this is to re-state,  that this is the society 
>>of the spectacle in which we all, the humans and animals on this planet 
>>live.
>>
>>2) Because we live in the society of the spectacle, and let us remember 
>>that the spectacle is 'the social relationship between people that is 
>>mediated by images', images  that dominate and degrade any notion of the 
>>sublime.  In effect it denies any possibility of the 'sublime' having 
>>purchase in this society - for the space of the sublime has been, as 
>>Lyotard hints in the inhuman, industrialised to the extent that 
>>'judgements on the beautiful' seem absurdly out of place. (Lyotards much 
>>loved Avant-Garde has become merely a traditional subset of the 
>>industrialised spectacle). An inevitable beyond of the society of 
>>spectacle is the rise of post or inhuman forms, a blurring of the lines 
>>between humans and machines, which need to be understood as going well 
>>beyond the current medical protheses. The InHuman argues for the 
>>spectacular reassessment of the significance of the human and the 
>>realignment of the relationship between the human/animal and technology 
>>(which I approve of). This is what the late Lyotard, for all of his 
>>anti-humanisn, was so terrified of and which he wrote against in his 
>>later writing.... But to write against the relationship has to start 
>>
>>from the spectacle (Debord) and commodity fetishism (Marx), and not from 
>
>>an approval of the fetishism of the avant-garde. What can be more 
>>fetishistic than Lyotard writing on avant-garde painting where he argues 
>>-that it enters into the sublime because of its concerns with form and 
>>its revealing the invisible through its concerns with the visual? 
>>Whereas the spectacle announces that these are primarily commodities - 
>>possibly best understood through the falling rate of use value... The 
>>avant-garde was a 19th and 20th C pre-post-modern concern - it does not 
>>exist anymore...
>>
>>3) Perhaps then, for us, the sublime is simply the spectacle written 
>>large across our, into our imaginaries - and nothing else.
>>
>>4) Eric - the point at issue with the Kantian and Hegelian differences 
>>is that early 21st Century radical critiques of the European 
>>Philosophical kind are all descended in some sense from the Hegelian 
>>line... Lyotard's Lessons on 'the analytic of the sublime' - makes a 
>>very poor improper weapon for the fugitive to pick up and insert hastily 
>>inside their jacket - to usea rather wonderful image from Deleuze... 
>>Whereas the Debord's texts make are rather wonderful weapons...
>>
>>5) Perhaps the return of the sublime as a useful liberatory concept can 
>>never be achieved - what cannot be commodified? Were my responses to my 
>>daughter's birth sublime or codified responses of capitals last 
>>metamorphsis? The metamorphosis of capital has achieved the position of 
>>completely eclipsing use-value and has managed to achieve the status of 
>>absolute and irresponsible over all known life, having falisifed the 
>>entirety of social production.
>>
>>6) The understanding of the 'aestheticisation of terror' has two 
>>starting points - the first seems an adequate point for the impact of 
>>Kant's sublime on literature and society  - the second is the point 
>>where the radical critique and refusal of the sublime, of the 
>>aestheticisation starts from - 1) the romantics  - with the fetishism of 
>>the post-Kantian concept of philosophy  2) Marx and the chapter in 
>>Capital on Commodity Fetishism. From the latter standpoint Hiroshima can 
>>be instantiated as a sublime effect - just as Auschwitz is rendered as a 
>>sublime effect by hollywood...
>>
>>regards
>>steve
>>
>>Reg Mifflin wrote:
>>
>>>Walter,
>>>
>>>Are you jesting? If you are serious then I couldn't agree less.
>>>The sublime is not terror, it is the aestheticisation of terror, there's a
>>>big difference.
>>>If actual terror/violence etc. is conflated with the sublime then we have
>>>just lost a useful  idea in philosophy.
>>>To call Hiroshima a sublime affect, apart from being plain wrong, says more
>>>about the 'affected' person than the aesthetic term.
>>>
>>>Reg
>>>
>>>At 09:37 AM 11/10/01 -0500, you wrote:
>>>
>>>>The issue is, indeed, the sublime and maybe after 9-11 we're finally ready
>>>>to see that Kant on the sublime is really a call for the development and the
>>>>use of the atomic bomb.  I know it sounds preposterous but so much was
>>>>slumbering in the great acts of a priori rationality.  And thus we can begin
>>>>to see the psyche hiding behind the ratio--in Kant and all who continue to
>>>>draw on him both for their hyper-rational superstructures and the covert
>>>>prosecution of their deepest desires.  Because yes, the horror of 9-11 was
>>>>that at one register of the psyche it was experienced as a sublime image.
>>>>And thus shocking the need of so many to moralistically deny this and attack
>>>>all who want to understand it.  For the understand is perhaps this: a
>>>>sublime affect can only be replaced by another sublime affect.  As on 8-6-45
>>>>and 8-9-45 and on .....???
>>>>When traumatic events happen historicity within the psyche turns on the
>>>>sublime register.
>>>>I have tried to discuss these matters---and Kant on the sublime at
>>>>length--in Walter A. Davis, DERACINATION; HISTORICITY, HIROSHIMA, AND THE
>>>>TRAGIC IMPERATIVE (Albany: SUNY P, 2001). 
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>At 06:03 AM 11/10/01 -0600, you wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>All,
>>>>>
>>>>>I want to deal with some of these other issues in another post, when I
>>>>>have a little more time.
>>>>>
>>>>>But, first of all, there is clearly a difference between interest and
>>>>>the ethical, certainly within both the Aristotlean and the Kantian
>>>>>traditions.  
>>>>>
>>>>>Kant clearly distinguishes between duty and interest and says that
>>>>>ethics is only concerned with the former and not the latter.  I realize
>>>>>the word duty is not a popular one today.  Put in its place something
>>>>>like 'the right thing' or justice and what Kant says makes more sense.
>>>>>
>>>>>It is also interesting that Kant make a similar distinction between
>>>>>interest and beauty, but I digress...
>>>>>
>>>>>Also, there is a clear concept of the sublime that can be described in
>>>>>both Burke and Kant and it is something that is very different from the
>>>>>ineffable. My next post will deal with sublime in greater detail. 
>>>>>
>>>>>I also think, contrary to Steve, that there is a Kantian side to Badiou
>>>>>and not merely a Hegelian paternity.
>>>>>
>>>>>More later....
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>eric
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>><html>
>><head>
>></head>
>><body>
>>Reg/Walter/Eric<br>
>><br>
>>1) Whilst I disagree with Walters' hyperbole, simply because so much philosophy
>>has wilfully refused to understand the issues that are raised by science
>>- the clearest moment being the Darwin event. There is a sound point in the
>>below related to the comprehensive industrialisation of the media, which
>>derives its power from the comprehensive aesthetics of terror, which can
>>be understood through the invocation of the 'sublime' - Lyotard invokes the
>>sublime in relation to the aesthetic not to the social itself - in the sections
>>of the inhuman where he addresses the social he invokes the notion of
>>
>'development'
>
>>which is a heavily overcoded version of capital. But this is insufficient
>>given that this does not help in producing an analysis and understanding
>>of the miseries and slavery of a society that at present has extended its
>>domination over the whole planet - this is to re-state,  that this is the
>>society of the spectacle in which we all, the humans and animals on this
>>planet live. <br>
>><br>
>>2) Because we live in the society of the spectacle, and let us remember that
>>the spectacle is 'the social relationship between people that is mediated
>>by images', images  that dominate and degrade any notion of the
>>
>sublime. 
>
>>In effect it denies any possibility of the 'sublime' having purchase in this
>>society - for the space of the sublime has been, as Lyotard hints in the
>>inhuman, industrialised to the extent that 'judgements on the beautiful'
>>seem absurdly out of place. (Lyotards much loved Avant-Garde has become merely
>>a traditional subset of the industrialised spectacle). An inevitable beyond
>>of the society of spectacle is the rise of post or inhuman forms, a blurring
>>of the lines between humans and machines, which need to be understood as
>>going well beyond the current medical protheses. The InHuman argues for the
>>spectacular reassessment of the significance of the human and the realignment
>>of the relationship between the human/animal and technology (which I approve
>>of). This is what the late Lyotard, for all of his anti-humanisn, was so
>>terrified of and which he wrote against in his later writing.... But to write
>>against the relationship has to start from the spectacle (Debord) and commodity
>>fetishism (Marx), and not from an approval of the fetishism of the avant-garde.
>>What can be more fetishistic than Lyotard writing on avant-garde painting
>>where he argues -that it enters into the sublime because of its concerns
>>with form and its revealing the invisible through its concerns with the visual?
>> Whereas the spectacle announces that these are primarily commodities
>>
>- possibly
>
>>best understood through the falling rate of use value... The avant-garde
>>was a 19th and 20th C pre-post-modern concern - it does not exist anymore...
>><br>
>><br>
>>3) Perhaps then, for us, the sublime is simply the spectacle written large
>>across our, into our imaginaries - and nothing else. <br>
>><br>
>>4) Eric - the point at issue with the Kantian and Hegelian differences is
>>that early 21st Century radical critiques of the European Philosophical kind
>>are all descended in some sense from the Hegelian line... Lyotard's Lessons
>>on 'the analytic of the sublime' - makes a very poor improper weapon for
>>the fugitive to pick up and insert hastily inside their jacket - to usea
>>rather wonderful image from Deleuze... Whereas the Debord's texts make are
>>rather wonderful weapons... <br>
>><br>
>>5) Perhaps the return of the sublime as a useful liberatory concept can never
>>be achieved - what cannot be commodified? Were my responses to my daughter's
>>birth sublime or codified responses of capitals last metamorphsis? The
>>
>metamorphosis
>
>>of capital has achieved the position of  completely eclipsing
>>
>use-value and
>
>>has managed to achieve the status of absolute and irresponsible over all
>>known life, having falisifed the entirety of social production. <br>
>><br>
>>6) The understanding of the 'aestheticisation of terror' has two starting
>>points - the first seems an adequate point for the impact of Kant's sublime
>>on literature and society  - the second is the point where the radical
>>
>critique
>
>>and refusal of the sublime, of the aestheticisation starts from - 1) the
>>romantics  - with the fetishism of  the post-Kantian concept of
>>
>philosophy
>
>> 2) Marx and the chapter in Capital on Commodity Fetishism. From the
>>
>latter
>
>>standpoint Hiroshima can be instantiated as a sublime effect - just as
>>
>Auschwitz
>
>>is rendered as a sublime effect by hollywood...<br>
>><br>
>>regards<br>
>>steve<br>
>><br>
>>Reg Mifflin wrote:<br>
>><blockquote type="cite"
>>
>cite="mid:3.0.5.32.20011111110553.0091d140-AT-mail.space.net.au">
>
>> <pre wrap="">Walter,<br><br>Are you jesting? If you are serious then I
>>
>couldn't agree less.<br>The sublime is not terror, it is the
>aestheticisation of terror, there's a<br>big difference.<br>If actual
>terror/violence etc. is conflated with the sublime then we have<br>just lost
>a useful  idea in philosophy.<br>To call Hiroshima a sublime affect, apart
>from being plain wrong, says more<br>about the 'affected' person than the
>aesthetic term.<br><br>Reg<br><br>At 09:37 AM 11/10/01 -0500, you
>wrote:<br></pre>
>
>> <blockquote type="cite">
>>   <pre wrap="">The issue is, indeed, the sublime and maybe after 9-11
>>
>we're finally ready<br>to see that Kant on the sublime is really a call for
>the development and the<br>use of the atomic bomb.  I know it sounds
>preposterous but so much was<br>slumbering in the great acts of a priori
>rationality.  And thus we can begin<br>to see the psyche hiding behind the
>ratio--in Kant and all who continue to<br>draw on him both for their
>hyper-rational superstructures and the covert<br>prosecution of their
>deepest desires.  Because yes, the horror of 9-11 was<br>that at one
>register of the psyche it was experienced as a sublime image.<br>And thus
>shocking the need of so many to moralistically deny this and attack<br>all
>who want to understand it.  For the understand is perhaps this: a<br>sublime
>affect can only be replaced by another sublime affect.  As on 8-6-45<br>and
>8-9-45 and on .....???<br>When traumatic events happen historicity within
>the psyche turns on the<br>sublime regis
>
>>ter.<br>I have tried to discuss these matters---and Kant on the sublime
>>
>at<br>length--in Walter A. Davis, DERACINATION; HISTORICITY, HIROSHIMA, AND
>THE<br>TRAGIC IMPERATIVE (Albany: SUNY P, 2001). <br><br><br>At 06:03 AM
>11/10/01 -0600, you wrote:<br></pre>
>
>>   <blockquote type="cite">
>>     <pre wrap="">All,<br><br>I want to deal with some of these other
>>
>issues in another post, when I<br>have a little more time.<br><br>But, first
>of all, there is clearly a difference between interest and<br>the ethical,
>certainly within both the Aristotlean and the Kantian<br>traditions.
><br><br>Kant clearly distinguishes between duty and interest and says
>that<br>ethics is only concerned with the former and not the latter.  I
>realize<br>the word duty is not a popular one today.  Put in its place
>something<br>like 'the right thing' or justice and what Kant says makes more
>sense.<br><br>It is also interesting that Kant make a similar distinction
>between<br>interest and beauty, but I digress...<br><br>Also, there is a
>clear concept of the sublime that can be described in<br>both Burke and Kant
>and it is something that is very different from the<br>ineffable. My next
>post will deal with sublime in greater detail. <br><br>I also think,
>contrary to Steve, that there is a Kant
>
>>ian side to Badiou<br>and not merely a Hegelian paternity.<br><br>More
>>
>later....<br><br><br>eric<br><br><br><br></pre>
>
>>     </blockquote>
>>     <pre wrap=""><br><br></pre>
>>     </blockquote>
>>     <pre wrap=""><!----><br><br></pre>
>>     </blockquote>
>>     <br>
>>     </body>
>>     </html>
>>
>
>

HTML VERSION:

Reg,  One last notion.  When you speak of the aestheticization of terror I
assume you are aware that this was Walter Benjamin's definition of fascism
in his essay on art. (My point re. Kant--and again I'm collapsing here what
I take over 100 pages to demonstrate--is that in his thought on the sublime
he projects and denies the disorders of his psyche--that psyche being the
ratio in its desperate effort to realize its desires while calling them
something else.) walter 
At 04:15 PM 11/11/01 +0000, you wrote:

Reg/Walter/Eric

1) Whilst I disagree with Walters' hyperbole, simply because so much 
philosophy has wilfully refused to understand the issues that are raised 
by science - the clearest moment being the Darwin event. There is a 
sound point in the below related to the comprehensive industrialisation 
of the media, which derives its power from the comprehensive aesthetics 
of terror, which can be understood through the invocation of the 
'sublime' - Lyotard invokes the sublime in relation to the aesthetic not 
to the social itself - in the sections of the inhuman where he addresses 
the social he invokes the notion of 'development' which is a heavily 
overcoded version of capital. But this is insufficient given that this 
does not help in producing an analysis and understanding of the miseries 
and slavery of a society that at present has extended its domination 
over the whole planet - this is to re-state,  that thi
s is the society 
of the spectacle in which we all, the humans and animals on this planet 
live.

2) Because we live in the society of the spectacle, and let us remember 
that the spectacle is 'the social relationship between people that is 
mediated by images', images  that dominate and degrade any notion of the 
sublime.  In effect it denies any possibility of the 'sublime' having 
purchase in this society - for the space of the sublime has been, as 
Lyotard hints in the inhuman, industrialised to the extent that 
'judgements on the beautiful' seem absurdly out of place. (Lyotards much 
loved Avant-Garde has become merely a traditional subset of the 
industrialised spectacle). An inevitable beyond of the society of 
spectacle is the rise of post or inhuman forms, a blurring of the lines 
between humans and machines, which need to be understood as going well 
beyond the current medical protheses. The InHuman argues for the 
spe
ctacular reassessment of the significance of the human and the 
realignment of the relationship between the human/animal and technology 
(which I approve of). This is what the late Lyotard, for all of his 
anti-humanisn, was so terrified of and which he wrote against in his 
later writing.... But to write against the relationship has to start 

>from the spectacle (Debord) and commodity fetishism (Marx), and not from 

an approval of the fetishism of the avant-garde. What can be more 
fetishistic than Lyotard writing on avant-garde painting where he argues 
-that it enters into the sublime because of its concerns with form and 
its revealing the invisible through its concerns with the visual? 
Whereas the spectacle announces that these are primarily commodities - 
possibly best understood through the falling rate of use value... The 
avant-garde was a 19th and 20th C pre-post-modern concern - it does not 
exist anymore...

3) Perhaps then, for us, the sublime is simply the spectacle written 
large across our, into our imaginaries - and nothing else.

4) Eric - the point at issue with the Kantian and Hegelian differences 
is that early 21st Century radical critiques of the European 
Philosophical kind are all descended in some sense from the Hegelian 
line... Lyotard's Lessons on 'the analytic of the sublime' - makes a 
very
 poor improper weapon for the fugitive to pick up and insert hastily 
inside their jacket - to usea rather wonderful image from Deleuze... 
Whereas the Debord's texts make are rather wonderful weapons...

5) Perhaps the return of the sublime as a useful liberatory concept can 
never be achieved - what cannot be commodified? Were my responses to my 
daughter's birth sublime or codified responses of capitals last 
metamorphsis? The metamorphosis of capital has achieved the position of 
completely eclipsing use-value and has managed to achieve the status of 
absolute and irresponsible over all known life, having falisifed the 
entirety of social production.

6) The understanding of the 'aestheticisation of terror' has two 
starting points - the first seems an adequate point for the impact of 
Kant's sublime on literature and society  - the second is the point 
where the radical critique and refusal of the sublime, of the 
aesthetic
isation starts from - 1) the romantics  - with the fetishism of 
the post-Kantian concept of philosophy  2) Marx and the chapter in 
Capital on Commodity Fetishism. From the latter standpoint Hiroshima can 
be instantiated as a sublime effect - just as Auschwitz is rendered as a 
sublime effect by hollywood...

regards
steve

Reg Mifflin wrote:

Walter,

Are you jesting? If you are serious then I couldn't agree less.
The sublime is not terror, it is the aestheticisation of terror, there's a
big difference.
If actual terror/violence etc. is conflated with the sublime then we have
just lost a useful  idea in philosophy.
To call Hiroshima a sublime affect, apart from being plain wrong, says more
about the 'affected' person than the aesthetic term.

Reg

At 09:37 AM 11/10/01 -0500, you wrote:

The issue is, indeed, the sublime and maybe after 9-11 we're finally ready
to see that Kant on the sublime is really a call for the development and the
use of the atomic bomb.  I know it sounds preposterous but so much was
slumbering in the great acts of a priori rationality.  And thus we can begin
to see the psyche hiding behind the ratio--in Kant and all who continue to
draw on him both for their hyper-rational superstructures and the covert
prosecution of their deepest desires.  Because yes, the horror of 9-11 was
that at one register of the psyche it was experienced as a sublime image.
And thus shocking the need of so many to moralistically deny this and attack
all who want to understand it.  For the understand is perhaps this: a
sublime affect can only be replaced by another sublime affect.  As on 8-6-45
and 8-9-45 and on .....???
When traumatic events happen historicity within the psyche turns on the
sublime
 register.
I have tried to discuss these matters---and Kant on the sublime at
length--in Walter A. Davis, DERACINATION; HISTORICITY, HIROSHIMA, AND THE
TRAGIC IMPERATIVE (Albany: SUNY P, 2001). 


At 06:03 AM 11/10/01 -0600, you wrote:

All,

I want to deal with some of these other issues in another post, when I
have a little more time.

But, first of all, there is clearly a difference between interest and
the ethical, certainly within both the Aristotlean and the Kantian
traditions.  

Kant clearly distinguishes between duty and interest and says that
ethics is only concerned with the former and not the latter.  I realize
the word duty is not a popular one today.  Put in its place something
like 'the right thing' or justice and what Kant says makes more sense.

It is also interesting that Kant make a similar distinction between
interest and beauty, but I digress...

Also, there is a clear concept of the sublime that can be described in
both Burke and Kant and it is something that is very different from the
ineffable. My next post will deal with sublime in greater detail. 

I also think, contrary to Steve, that there is 
a Kantian side to Badiou
and not merely a Hegelian paternity.

More later....


eric

<html>
<head>
</head>
<body>
Reg/Walter/Eric<br>
<br>
1) Whilst I disagree with Walters' hyperbole, simply because so much philosophy
has wilfully refused to understand the issues that are raised by science
- the clearest moment being the Darwin event. There is a sound point in the
below related to the comprehensive industrialisation of the media, which
derives its power from the comprehensive aesthetics of terror, which can
be understood through the invocation of the 'sublime' - Lyotard invokes the
sublime in relation to the aesthetic not to the social itself - in the sections
of the inhuman where he addresses the social he invokes the notion of

'development'

which is a heavily overcoded version of capital. But this is insufficient
given that this does not help in producing an analysis and understanding
of the miseries and slavery of a society that at present has extended its
domination over the whole planet - this is to re-state,  that this is the
society of the spectacle in which we all, the humans and animals on this
planet live. <br>
<br>
2) Because we live in the society of the spectacle, and let us remember that
the spectacle is 'the social relationship between people that is mediated
by images', images &nbsp;that dominate and degrade any notion of the

sublime. 

In effect it denies any possibility of the 'sublime' having purchase in this
society - for the space of the sublime has been, as Lyotard hints in the
inhuman, industrialised to the extent that 'judgements on the beautiful'
seem absurdly out of place. (Lyotards much loved Avant-Garde has become merely
a traditional subset of the industrialised spectacle). An inevitable beyond
of the society of spectacle is the rise of post or inhuman forms, a blurring
of the lines between humans and machines, which need to be understood as
going well beyond the current medical protheses. The InHuman argues for the
spectacular reassessment of the significance of the human and the realignment
of the relationship between the human/animal and technology (which I approve
of). This is what the late Lyotard, for all of his anti-humanisn, was so
terrified of and which he wrote against in his later writing.... But to write
against the re
lationship has to start from the spectacle (Debord) and commodity
fetishism (Marx), and not from an approval of the fetishism of the avant-garde.
What can be more fetishistic than Lyotard writing on avant-garde painting
where he argues -that it enters into the sublime because of its concerns
with form and its revealing the invisible through its concerns with the visual?
 Whereas the spectacle announces that these are primarily commodities

- possibly

best understood through the falling rate of use value... The avant-garde
was a 19th and 20th C pre-post-modern concern - it does not exist anymore...
<br>
<br>
3) Perhaps then, for us, the sublime is simply the spectacle written large
across our, into our imaginaries - and nothing else. <br>
<br>
4) Eric - the point at issue with the Kantian and Hegelian differences is
that early 21st Century radical critiques of the European Philosophical kind
are all descended in some sense from the Hegelian line... Lyotard's Lessons
on 'the analytic of the sublime' - makes a very poor improper weapon for
the fugitive to pick up and insert hastily inside their jacket - to usea
rather wonderful image from Deleuze... Whereas the Debord's texts make are
rather wonderful weapons... <br>
<br>
5) Perhaps the return of the sublime as a useful liberatory concept can never
be achieved 
- what cannot be commodified? Were my responses to my daughter's
birth sublime or codified responses of capitals last metamorphsis? The

metamorphosis

of capital has achieved the position of  completely eclipsing

use-value and

has managed to achieve the status of absolute and irresponsible over all
known life, having falisifed the entirety of social production. <br>
<br>
6) The understanding of the 'aestheticisation of terror' has two starting
points - the first seems an adequate point for the impact of Kant's sublime
on literature and society&nbsp; - the second is the point where the radical

critique

and refusal of the sublime, of the aestheticisation starts from - 1) the
romantics  - with the fetishism of  the post-Kantian concept of

philosophy

 2) Marx and the chapter in Capital on Commodity Fetishism. From the

latter

standpoint Hiroshima can be instantiated as a sublime effect - just as

Auschwitz

is rendered as a sublime effect by hollywood...<br>
<br>
regards<br>
steve<br>
<br>
Reg Mifflin wrote:<br>
<blockquote type="cite"

cite="mid:3.0.5.32.20011111110553.0091d140-AT-mail.space.net.au">

 <pre wrap="">Walter,<br><br>Are you jesting? If you are serious then I

couldn't agree less.<br>The sublime is not terror, it is the
aestheticisation of terror, there's a<br>big difference.<br>If actual
terror/violence etc. is conflated with the sublime then we have<br>just lost
a useful  idea in philosophy.<br>To call Hiroshima a sublime affect, apart
from being plain wrong, says more<br>about the 'affected' person than the
aesthetic term.<br><br>Reg<br><br>At 09:37 AM 11/10/01 -0500, you
wrote:<br></pre>

 <blockquote type="cite">
   <pre wrap="">The issue is, indeed, the sublime and maybe after 9-11

we're finally ready<br>to see that Kant on the sublime is really a call for
the development and the<br>use of the atomic bomb.  I know it sounds
preposterous but so much was<br>slumbering in the great acts of a priori
rationality.  And thus we can begin<br>to see the psyche hiding behind the
ratio--in Kant and all who continue to<br>draw on him both for their
hyper-rational superstructures and the covert<br>prosecution of their
deepest desires.  Because yes, the horror of 9-11 was<br>that at one
register of the psyche it was experienced as a sublime image.<br>And thus
shocking the need of so many to moralistically deny this and attack<br>all
who want to understand it.  For the understand is perhaps this: a<br>sublime
affect can only be replaced by another sublime affect.  As on 8-6-45<br>and
8-9-45 and on .....???<br>W
hen traumatic events happen historicity within
the psyche turns on the<br>sublime regis

ter.<br>I have tried to discuss these matters---and Kant on the sublime

at<br>length--in Walter A. Davis, DERACINATION; HISTORICITY, HIROSHIMA, AND
THE<br>TRAGIC IMPERATIVE (Albany: SUNY P, 2001). <br><br><br>At 06:03 AM
11/10/01 -0600, you wrote:<br></pre>

   <blockquote type="cite">
     <pre wrap="">All,<br><br>I want to deal with some of these other

issues in another post, when I<br>have a little more time.<br><br>But, first
of all, there is clearly a difference between interest and<br>the ethical,
certainly within both the Aristotlean and the Kantian<br>traditions.
<br><br>Kant clearly distinguishes between duty and interest and says
that<br>ethics is only concerned with the former and not the latter.  I
realize<br>the word duty is not a popular one today.  Put in its place
something<br>like 'the right thing' or justice and what Kant says makes more
sense.<br><br>It is also interesting that Kant make a similar distinction
between<br>interest and beauty, but I digress...<br><br>Also, there is a
clear concept of the sublime that can be described in<br>both Burke and Kant
and it is something that is very different from the<br>ineffable
. My next
post will deal with sublime in greater detail. <br><br>I also think,
contrary to Steve, that there is a Kant

ian side to Badiou<br>and not merely a Hegelian paternity.<br><br>More

later....<br><br><br>eric<br><br><br><br></pre>

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