Cologne, 17-May-2000
Kyle Arnold schrieb:
Betreff: Re: Things versus Devices
Datum: Tue, 16 May 2000 03:24:49 GMT
Von: Kyle Arnold <hypnoid77@xxxxxxxxxxx>
> >Kyle,
> >Presumably both are possible. There can be a self-misunderstanding of one's
> >own >habitual comportment and one's selfhood, on the one hand, and there
> >can be on >the other a misunderstanding on the part of psychology in how
> >to think through >the "disturbance" called a "complex".
>
> Michael,
> Right. And to me, it seems that the two misunderstandings may
> be analogous. Which leads me to wonder how tightly analogous they are, and
> what this analogy means in a cultural-historical kind of way. If the
> analogy turned out to be really, really tight, for instance,
> we might, I would think, begin to wonder whether that which psychology
> misunderstands as a complex is grounded precisely in a
> misunderstanding emanating from "psychology" or "psychologizing" itself, if
> it were understood in a radical enough way...
Kyle,
So this conjecture would have to fleshed out, which you proceed to do.
> We definitely need to clarify where we are starting from- I had
> assumed, based on Michael S.'s examples of complexes, that the complex
> was being understood here, more or less, in the Jungian sense of the
> term: a feeling-toned group of associations clustered around a
> particular theme (essentially the same as what the OED says). I also
> assumed that we were speaking specifically of "psychopathological"
> complexes involved in "mental disturbance." Now I have very little
> idea of what I mean by the words "psychopathological" or "mental
> disturbance" except that these things involve some kind of motivated
> unconsciousness that leads to problems in living. If one were to
> stick to Jung here, one would have to say that we were speaking of
> "autonomous complexes," or complexes split off from the main locus of
> consciousness, the ego-complex. But I don't know if digging more deeply
> into Jung would be productive right now...
> Anyway, there are, of course, all sorts of problems with the concept
> as it appears here- there is a Cartesian emphasis on cognition
> (associated ideas here) to the exclusion of most everything else,
> moodedness, bodily comportment, etc., which perhaps find a weak
> substitute in the form of the "feeling-tone" or "charge" the complex
> is supposed to be imbued with- And cognition itself seems to be
> tacitly understood here in a thinglike way, with the "subject matter"
> or theme of the complex treated as something like a magnet that
> attracts atomistic associations. The latent presence of this or some
> similar metaphor becomes very evident in the writings of Jung at least, who
> sometimes talks of the associations clustered in the
> complex as "matter" "attracted" by the "core" of the complex... and
> I'm sure you would have many other criticisms as well...
The task, as I see it, is to attempt phenomenological translations
(carryings-over) of what psychoanalytic and other psychological theories have in
view when constructing their concepts.
> > > Specifically, I guess I'm suggesting that the development of
> >complexes > > involves some instrumental distortion of a person's being.
> >
> >The development of a complex (ontogenetic) is to be distinguished from what
> >a >complex _is_ (ontologically).
>
> Oops. I guess I was confusing the chronologically prior with the
> ontologically prior. In this case, doing so would create the
> misguided idea that the instrumental distortion would have to occur
> before the complex did, which isn't true, since both could pop into
> being at once. Thanks for catching me.
The prior in a non-temporal sense is, in a certain sense, where philosophical
thinking starts. So I am glad to see you are sensitive to this distinction.
> >Distortion is a kind of covering up, an obscuring >of how a person's >being
> >discloses itself of itself. The ontological distortion I
> >see you pointing to here is a person misunderstanding their own >selfhood.
>
> Yes, this sounds right.
>
> > What does the phenomenon of
> >"reification of oneself" look like?
> >In what sense does such a reification involve an instrumentaliized
> >understanding >of one's own selfhood, i.e. one's being-as-self?
>
> I will try to give some concrete examples: Perhaps the most striking
> example I can think of is the "influencing-machine" delusion had by many who
> have been diagnosed with schizophrenia. The delusion
> involves the sense that there is some kind of machine, malevolent in
> tone and indeterminate in location, that is responsible for
> controlling the person's thoughts and actions. Often it is felt to do so by
> means of rays, radio transmissions, or sometimes wires, hooked into the
> person's brain. Here the sufferer of the delusion figures him or herself as
> a kind of automaton, a device that can be controlled by wires, radio
> transmissions, etc..
> What is particularly interesting in this delusion, at least to me, is that
> it often looks like the sufferer not only feels himself to be the machine
> that is controlled but also in some way the the machine that does the
> controlling. As master of himself-as-technology, he is also the slave of
> himself-as-technology, which to me seems to resonate with Heidegger's
> understanding of technology. (and it may, I think, be in technology,
> understood radically, that the origin of much of what we call
> "schizophrenia" lies)
I find this example interesting because the misunderstanding of the selfhood of
the self is so blatant. The sufferer regards themself as a radio-controlled
machine (with or without intermittent access to the machine's control panel).
The free will vs. determinism problem that was born along with Cartesian
philosophy would be the philosophical counterpart, since Descartes himself
attempted a mechanical casting of human being itself. And today's science
abounds with machine-like ways of thinking human being, even though the
'machines' are now more subtle (biochemical, genetic, neuronal, ...).
> But anyway, this example may be too out-of-the-ordinary to be useful in
> teasing apart the structure of something as common as a complex- Another,
> more common example, similar in some ways, could be that of a person who,
> having had experiences of profound psychological usurpation and manipulation
> by others, feels themself to be deeply helpless, impotent, dependent, and at
> the mercy of others' whims. Such a person might, in order to efface his
> sense of being usurped and controlled, become the controll_er_ and usurp_er_
> himself- let us imagine, he might become a kind of control freak and
> compusively micromanage the behavior of his employees, children, or
> students. (am I again conflating the chronologically prior with the onto.
> prior? I'm not sure)
> At any rate, in doing this it looks to me like our little control freak is
> unconsciously using himself as a kind of machine, a set of resources
> available in order to help him flee from his sense of helplessness. (Gary
> alluded to this sort of thing in his posting, as I interpreted it) His
> existence is always an in-order-to. "I exist
> in-order-to-flee-my-sense-of-helplessness."
> What do you think of this so far?
This second example fits nicely under the heading of 'cybernetics'. The
ontogenesis of experiences of helplessness being transformed into an obsessive
need to control all aspects of one's life is one thing. The understanding of an
(obsessively) cybernetic way of being itself is another.
In a way, Dasein being cybernetic conforms with the essence of technology as a
set-up in which every being has its place in the incessant circulation of beings
in achieving success, where success is nothing other than attaining the
transitional objective towards which the cybernetic circuit is always already
steering. Dasein needs to take a step back from this blind conformity with the
set-up.
In trying to steer others minutely in their actions there can be, on the one
hand, simply the attempt to enforce compliance with the requirements of the
set-up to ensure that 'success' is achieved. On the other, control over others
can enhance the self-aggrandizement of the controlling subject who experiences
the control as emanating from themself as subject, i.e. as that which underlies
and controls the movement of other beings, including human beings. The question
of domination/subordination is situated within the problematic of human freedom
and how humans can be free in a shared world.
The question of conformity with the requirements of the set-up, however,
involves a subtler problematic. Even in the reflected historical beginnings of
technology, with Greek _technae_, the latter is thought by philosophy as
knowledge which enables dominion over other beings by pro-ducing a product, i.e.
bringing it forth, or acquiring another being, i.e. bringing it within one's
grasp.
Seen from this broad and deep historical perspective, we are all caught up to
varying degrees in the phenomenon of control, which has many faces and sits very
deep. Understanding oneself as a controller is thus not necessarily a delusion,
but rather a usual state of affairs. The line beyond which one becomes a
'control freak' is not easy to define. The example you mention of micromanaging
others' behaviour, for instance, would look very different in different
contexts, ranging from normal to abnormal.
Getting back to the issue of complexes, your example of experiences of
helplessnes at the hands of others being transformed into an inordinate need to
control points to Dasein not being transparent to itself. An aspect of its
existence is covered up and needs to be uncovered to get free of the hidden hold
of painful experiences. The ontological condition of possibility for this is
that Dasein _is_ this existence in the truth of being and thus is affected (i.e.
aimed at, from L. ad facere) by the play of encryption and decryption.
Michael
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