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--- phd:book-journals:communicative-action [2020/02/26 17:39]
avnerus [Instrumental Reason]
+++ phd:book-journals:communicative-action [2020/03/30 12:16] (current)
avnerus [Concluding Reflections: From Parsons via Weber to Marx]
@@ Line 12: / Line 12: @@
 <poem>
-Only with the conceptual framework of communicative action do we gain a perspective from which the process of societal
+//"Only with the conceptual framework of communicative action do we gain a perspective from which the process of societal
 rationalization appears as contradictory from the start.
 The contradiction arises between, on the one hand, a rationalization of everyday communication that is tied to the
 structures of inter-subjectivity of the lifeworld, in which language counts as the genuine and irreplaceable medium
 of reaching understanding, and, on the other hand, the growing complexity of subsystems
-of purposive-rational action, in which actions are coordinated through steering media such as money and power.
+of purposive-rational action, in which actions are coordinated through steering media such as money and power."//
 </poem>
@@ Line 110: / Line 110: @@
 //The "dialectic of enlightenment" is an ironic affair: It shows the self-critique of reason the way to truth, and at the same time contests the possibility "that at this stage of complete alienation the idea of truth is still accessible."//
+Adorno tried to approach this //mimesis// non-discursively through aesthetics and art, and their correspondence with his //negative dialectics// (**perhaps a relation to Merlaeu-Ponty's theory of the corporeality of art? this hidden qualities of the flesh. Habermas compares Adorno's "mindfulness" to Heidegger's "being"**).
+Habermas resents this approach:
+//As the foreword to Dialectic of Enlightenment clearly explains, they had given up the hope of being able to redeem the promise of early critical theory. Against this, I want to maintain that the program of early critical theory foundered not on this or that contingent circumstance, but from the exhaustion of the paradigm of the philosophy of consciousness. I shall argue that a change of paradigm to the theory of communication makes it possible to return to the undertaking that was interrupted with the critique of instrumental reason; and this will permit us to take up once again the since neglected tasks of a critical theory of society.//
+==== Communicative rationality ====
+Instrumental reason cannot explain social solidarity in metaphysical terms, because it formulated only from the point of view of the subject operating for its own self-preservation. Inter-subjective rationality is explained by the 'non-identical' idea of //mimesis// Something that is outside of reason:
+//Even though they cannot provide a theory of mimesis, the very name  calls forth associations—and they are intended : Imitation designates a relation between persons in which the one accommodates to the other, identifies with the other, empathizes with the other. There is an allusion here to a relation in which the surrender of the one to the example of the other does not mean a loss of self but a gain and an enrichment . Because the mimetic capacity escapes the conceptual
+framework of cognitive-instrumentally determined subject-object relations, it counts as the sheer opposite of reason, as impulse. Adorno does not simply deny to the latter any cognitive function.
+In his aesthetics he attempts to show what hte work of art owes to the power of mimesis to unlock, to open up. But the rational core of mimetic achievements can be laid open only if we give
+up the paradigm of the philosophy of consciousness—namely, a subject that represents objects and toils with them—in favor of the paradigm of linguistic philosophy—namely, that of intersubjective understanding or communication—and puts the cognitive-instrumental aspect of reason in its proper place as part of a more encompassing **communicative rationality**.//
+Adorno:
+//"The state of reconciliation would not annex what is unfamiliar or alien with philosophical imperialism; instead, it would find its happiness in the fact that the latter, in the closeness allowed, remains something distant and different, something that is beyond being either heterogeneous or proper." **(This reminds of Simone Weil)**//
+There is a reference to the theory of reflection and self-consciousness by Henrich, and a critique of it by Tugendhat who exposes its circularity - **Much like Merleau-Ponty's critique of the theories of reflection on //The Visible and the Invisible//**. Thus consciousness is unable to address itself 'naturally' only as an object, as in the theories of instrumental reason and self preservation.
+//"A subjectivity that is characterized by communicative reason resists the denaturing of the self for the sake of self-preservation. Unlike instrumental reason, communicative reason cannot be subsumed without resistance under a blind self-preservation. It refers neither to a subject that preserves itself in relating to objects via representation and action, nor to a self-maintaining system that demarcates itself from an environment, but to a symbolically structured lifeworld that is constituted in the interpretive accomplishments of is members and only reproduced through communication. Thus communicative reason does not simply encounter ready-made subjects and systems; rather, it takes part in structuring what is to be preserved . The Utopian perspective of reconciliation and freedom is ingrained in the conditions for the communicative sociation of individuals; it is built into the linguistic mechanism of the reproduction of the species." //
+In Volume II Habermas will develop a communicative theory of rationality, that decentralizes the focus from studies of consciousness and instrumental reason, to a rationality that is developed through communication, reaching understanding and agreement, and under the effect of steering media such as money and power.
+===== Volume two =====
+==== Concluding Reflections: From Parsons via Weber to Marx ====
+After analyzing society through new paradigms of system's theory, Habermas goes back to Weber's reflection on rationalization and the loss of freedom and meaning - moving from Weber's //purposive rationality// to //'action oriented to mutual understanding', 'symbolically
+structured lifeworld', and 'communicative rationality'//:
+//Then we could analyze the rationali-
+zation of action systems not only under the cognitive-instrumental aspect, but by bringing in moral-practical and aesthetic-expressive aspects
+across the whole spectrum.//

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