Date: Mon, 13 Feb 1995 10:11:44 -0600 (CST)
From: Benjamin Erik Hippen <hippen-AT-owlnet.rice.edu>
Subject: Re: Nietzsche/Foucault/Geneal...




On Sun, 12 Feb 1995 ArielS72-AT-aol.com wrote:

> on 95-02-11
> you wrote
> 
> "The result is either nihilism ("there is no truth") which may have a variety
> of consequences, or a new found freedom to create oneself.  It is this self
> creation that i believe lies at the heart of both N's and Foucault's project:
> the idea we once emancipated from particular games of truth one can create
> one's own structures"
> 
> i am not sure what N would say about "freedom to create oneself", i agree he
> at least is looking for a reduction for what you say very well as
> "emancipation from particula games of truth ( are you making reference to
> lyotard'sand wittgenstein's word games?) but i do not think N believes we are
> able to completely free ourselve.  Foucault i think explicitly conseeds to
> the fact that we can not create ourselves, power is so pervasive (in the
> language we use and derive understanding frombecause language itself dictates
> the context from which all understanding will arise.  see also N's "On Truth
> and Lies in a Nonmoral Sense,F's Discipline and Punish p.27, and Stanley
> Fish's"Is there a Text in this Class, and "There's no such thing as Free
> Speech, and it's a good thing, too") that  we can not escape, but only know
> it is there, everywhere and in acknowledging this we can perhaps reduce its
> hegeminzing effect.
> 
> ariel
> 

Perhaps "freedom" is a misnomer.  There are two ways in which I interpret 
"not being able to completely free ourselves", one I agree with and the 
other I don't.  The one I agree with, and the one I think Foucault and 
Nietzsche agree with, is that we cannot transcend games of truth.  There 
is no salvation from having to instantiate oneself in power structures, 
so in this sense we are not able to completely free ourselves.  The 
second way to interpret this statement is to say that we are not free to 
"create" because we cannot transcend power structures.  I don't think 
freedom entails transcending power structures.  Rather, I think the 
freedom of self creation is the freedom to engage in the active valuation 
of a particular set of power structures for oneself, over others.  This 
is a two part process, first of emancipating oneself from power 
structures heretofore unseen AS power structures, and second as actively 
affirming a set of power structures as one's own.

As with Quine, we never transcend a conceptual scheme.  I'm not saying 
that freedom is freedom from a conceptual scheme (or power structure, or 
games of truth), rather, it is the freedom to (1) recognize conceptual 
schemes as power structures (2) recognize the impossibility of 
transcending such power structures and (3) exercising one's freedom on 
the level of value by affirming a particular power structure for 
oneself.  "This is my way, what is yours?"

Thus "reduc[ing] its hegeminizing effect" ends up being a task for 
sensibility.  This is something I think is at the heart of an aesthetic 
of existence.

Yours,

Ben


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