Date: Fri, 27 Jun 2003 22:14:35 +0100
From: "steve.devos" <steve.devos-AT-krokodile.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Marx's critique




Lois

It depends  on whether you accept the proposal that 'critique' does 
remain within the existing system. It is around the false consciousness 
of cultural theorists and philosophers, the incredible but nonetheless 
real mystification that translates "social relations into the 
propositions of things themselves (reification...) still more explicitly 
transforming the relations of production itself into a thing" The notion 
of critique is consequently then the incessent labor of consciousness 
against our own neo-religious representations in what is after all a 
socially and historically determined society.   Without going deeper 
into this, fundamentally Hegalian and Marxist undeerstanding of what 
'critique' means,  it does seem that given the current impossibility of 
constructing a radical understanding of our societies without the use of 
some aspect of critique then the question that Lyotard proposes needs to 
be inverted.  

In 2003 the necessity for critique, the critique of political economy (a 
wierd german science)and an understanding of Hegel's logic seem more 
necessary than ever.  Can one say the same of the strange positivism 
that occupied us (who are sadly old enough to remember it) during the 
70s and 80s - now that we are gradually emerging from a dark and 
unpleasent tunnel ?  

regards
steve

Lois Shawver wrote:

>  
> Here is the Lyotard sentence Steve and I were talking about:
>  
> "Everywhere, the Critique of political economy (the subtitle of Marx's
> Capital) and its correlate, the critique of alienated society, are used in
> one way or another as aids in programming the system."  PMC, p.13
>  
> I like your answer.  As you suggested, then, the critique remains 
> within the language game of the original ideology.  It simply negates 
> the key phrases, leaving all the linkages intact.  In other words, the 
> critique has not yet invented a new language game in which can emerge 
> a new form of life, a new way to live.
>  
> So, is it in this way, in keeping us within the conceptual circles 
> established by the language of the old ideology that the critiques 
> aids the programming of the existing system?  I think it can also be 
> read that the critique prepares the ground for the new system to 
> emerge.  What does he mean by "the system"?  The old system or the new?
>  
> ..Lois Shawver
>  
> .
>
>     -----Original Message-----
>     From: owner-lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
>     [mailto:owner-lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu]On Behalf Of
>     steve.devos
>     Sent: Wednesday, June 25, 2003 11:48 AM
>     To: lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
>     Subject: Re: Marx's critiqu
>
>     Early in his Career Lyotard accepted and argued that the notion of
>     'Critique' implied that the critic was unable to leave the ground
>     established by the adversary's domain. By implication, given that
>     marxism is a critique of capitalism it follows that Lyotard would
>     at some stage argue that marxism cannot leave the ground on  which
>     capital stands.   The question is whether in 2003 the sentence
>     means the same thing that it did in 1979 - plainly for the
>     majority of postmodernists the sentence must be meaningless as the
>     dream of socialism and communism is defined as over. 
>
>     In his review of Anti-Oedipus he states this very clearly: "In
>     spite of its title, Anti-Oedipus is not a critical book. Rather,
>     like the Anti-Christ, it is a positive, assertive book, an
>     energetic position inscribed in discourse, the negation of the
>     adversary happening not by Aufhebung, but by forgetting. Just as
>     atheism is religion extended into its negative form--is even the
>     modern form of religion, the only one in which modernity could
>     continue to be religious--so does the critique make itself the
>     object of its object and settle down into the field of the other,
>     accepting the latter's dimensions, directions and space at the
>     very moment that it contests them. In Deleuze and Guattari's book
>     you will see everywhere their utter contempt for  the  category 
>     of  transgression  (implicitly  then  for  the  whole  of
>     Bataille): either you leave immediately  without wasting time  in
>     critique, simply because you find yourself to be elsewhere than in
>     the adversary's domain; or else you critique, keeping one foot in
>     and one out, positivity of  the negative, but in fact nothingness
>     of the positivity. And this is the critical  non-potence one finds
>     in Feuerbach and Adorho. Marx said in l844 that  socialism doesn't
>     need atheism because the question of atheism is positionally  that
>     of religion; it remains a critique. What is important in the 
>     question is not its negativity, but its position (the position of
>     the problem)...."
>
>     regards
>     steve
>
>     Lois Shawver wrote:
>
>>Anyone feel inspired to comment on this passage from Lyotard?
>>
>>"Everywhere, the Critique of political economy (the subtitle of Marx's
>>Capital) and its correlate, the critique of alienated society, are used in
>>one way or another as aids in programming the system."  PMC, p.13
>>
>>..Lois Shawver
>>
>>  
>>
>

HTML VERSION:

 

Here is the Lyotard sentence Steve and I were talking about:

 

"Everywhere, the Critique of political economy (the subtitle of Marx's
Capital) and its correlate, the critique of alienated society, are used in
one way or another as aids in programming the system."  PMC, p.13

 

I like your answer.  As you suggested, then, the critique remains within the language game of the original ideology.  It simply negates the key phrases, leaving all the linkages intact.  In other words, the critique has not yet invented a new language game in which can emerge a new form of life, a new way to live.

 

So, is it in this way, in keeping us within the conceptual circles established by the language of the old ideology that the critiques aids the programming of the existing system?  I think it can also be read that the critique prepares the ground for the new system to emerge.  What does he mean by "the system"?  The old system or the new?

 

..Lois Shawver

 

.

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu [mailto:owner-lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu]On Behalf Of steve.devos
Sent: Wednesday, June 25, 2003 11:48 AM
To: lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
Subject: Re: Marx's critiqu

Early in his Career Lyotard accepted and argued that the notion of 'Critique' implied that the critic was unable to leave the ground established by the adversary's domain. By implication, given that marxism is a critique of capitalism it follows that Lyotard would at some stage argue that marxism cannot leave the ground on  which capital stands.   The question is whether in 2003 the sentence means the same thing that it did in 1979 - plainly for the majority of postmodernists the sentence must be meaningless as the dream of socialism and communism is defined as over. 

In his review of Anti-Oedipus he states this very clearly: "In spite of its title, Anti-Oedipus is not a critical book. Rather, like the Anti-Christ, it is a positive, assertive book, an energetic position inscribed in discourse, the negation of the adversary happening not by Aufhebung, but by forgetting. Just as atheism is religion extended into its negative form—is even the modern form of religion, the only one in which modernity could continue to be religious—so does the critique make itself the object of its object and settle down into the field of the other, accepting the latter's dimensions, directions and space at the very moment that it contests them. In Deleuze and Guattari's book you will see everywhere their utter contempt for  the  category  of  transgression  (implicitly  then  for  the  whole  of Bataille): either you leave immediately  without wasting time  in critique, simply because you find yourself to be elsewhere than in the adversary's domain; or else you critique, keeping one foot in and one out, positivity of  the negative, but in fact nothingness of the positivity. And this is the critical  non-potence one finds in Feuerbach and Adorho. Marx said in l844 that  socialism doesn't need atheism because the question of atheism is positionally  that of religion; it remains a critique. What is important in the  question is not its negativity, but its position (the position of the problem)...."

regards
steve

Lois Shawver wrote:

Anyone feel inspired to comment on this passage from Lyotard?

"Everywhere, the Critique of political economy (the subtitle of Marx's
Capital) and its correlate, the critique of alienated society, are used in
one way or another as aids in programming the system."  PMC, p.13

..Lois Shawver