tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1178284085080580526.post3737444931189317782..comments2024-02-12T23:25:09.583-08:00Comments on Overweening Generalist: More Ruminations on the So-Called Free-Floating Intellectualsmichaelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13526042582094867513noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1178284085080580526.post-92055341721232770262018-03-24T11:42:33.421-07:002018-03-24T11:42:33.421-07:00Another interesting blog. I may reread Adorno'...Another interesting blog. I may reread Adorno's book on Wagner one of these years. I enjoyed Gershom Scholem's book on Walter Benjamin. For me, I just want to get healthier and pay my bills (and get my papers graded). I do hope the Democrats have success in November.Eric Wagnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04312033917401203598noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1178284085080580526.post-84551417549662976422011-06-02T02:33:12.843-07:002011-06-02T02:33:12.843-07:00I think, by around 1965, the Frankfurters - Marcus...I think, by around 1965, the Frankfurters - Marcuse esp - wanted Westerners to have a social goal in mind for their TECHNE. To what end? Leftist and liberals thought that curing world hunger, giving everyone access to clean water, education, stopping war by developing renewable energy and mutual interconnectedness were all things worthy of our TECHNE. Look at Buckminster Fuller's ideas! I think Hegel was a big influence here, for the Frankfurt School. He said that, throughout history, States were weak when they defined who they were by who they were against. It is strong to say this is what we are FOR, and stand by it. Unfortunately, Hegel was so Idealistic and so far up in his Ivory Tower he probably got nosebleeds. Still, I do think people, if not States, should decide what they're for, make their values explicit, and don't say one thing and act 180 degrees differently. I don't think Bread and Circuses are a worthy goal at all. <br /><br />The Transhumanists/Extropians/Singularitarians want TECHNE to take us to some place totally mindblowing; in fact, most of them seem to think it's teleological.<br /><br />Robert Anton Wilson and Timothy Leary thought space migration, intelligence increase and life extension (including curing the disease of death!) were worthy TELOS for our TECHNE.<br /><br />And there are plenty of erudites who really want to RETURN to some sort of Better Time in the past. <br /><br />I think all of this involves, individually, your own day-to-day negotiations with your own axiology, and I do think it is one sense in which, a hierarchy develops. But it's YOUR hierarchy, no one else's. And it's malleable, of course, subject to your embodied emotions and new information, etcmichaelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13526042582094867513noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1178284085080580526.post-58328894630077459662011-06-02T02:10:24.485-07:002011-06-02T02:10:24.485-07:00"What is the TELOS in your TECHNE?"
Goo..."What is the TELOS in your TECHNE?"<br /><br />Good question! Techne resembles episteme? "Disinterested understanding"?ARW23https://www.blogger.com/profile/12640332269499504745noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1178284085080580526.post-43765963543123004052011-06-02T01:38:12.683-07:002011-06-02T01:38:12.683-07:00He and Horkheimer had some still-never-adequately ...He and Horkheimer had some still-never-adequately -answered Qs about what they called "the culture industry."<br /><br />Adorno HATED pop culture, and that's a big problem for the Frankfurters, in my opinion, and esp Adorno: they - some moreso than others - were so hoity-toity about their tastes. And that's all it was: taste. They thought (some of them, but esp Adorno) almost all non-High Kulch was a horrifying symptom of the decline of the West. Hey, there are PhDs who love heavy metal and Star Trek. The older Frankfurters were "too Germanic" in this sense. <br /><br />But a lot of their stuff got rehashed and watered down with the pomo mvt in academia in c.1980-99 or so...Adorno's Minima Moralia is a text to graplle with, though, at least for me. And I love Benjamin's Illuminations and Reflections. Erich Fromm's critique of "having" over "being" is reflected in the No Logo and Church of No Shopping and other things like that. <br /><br />Indeed, I think the Frankfurters as a whole posed this Q: okay, you're getting more and more technology, quicker, faster, smaller, cheaper, at an accelerated rate. You're great at TECHNE, but to what end? What is the TELOS in your TECHNE?michaelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13526042582094867513noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1178284085080580526.post-22050222880056234192011-06-02T01:23:55.748-07:002011-06-02T01:23:55.748-07:00Excellent example of 'free-floating intellectu...Excellent example of 'free-floating intellectuals" - Frankfurt School - a movement associated with the Institute for Social Research founded within the University of Frankfurt in 1923. I find Adorno's voice, in his essays on mass culture: "The Culture Industry", potentially the greatest challenge to the debate over post modernity and "the banality of mass culture". He actually summarizes it in the title of his book.ARW23https://www.blogger.com/profile/12640332269499504745noreply@blogger.com