From: onstott@a.cs.okstate.edu (ONSTOTT CHARLES OR)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.meta
Subject: Re: Philosophical Influence
Date: 18 Aug 92 03:50:40 GMT
Organization: Oklahoma State University

From article <1992Aug17.071316.14809@husc3.harvard.edu>, by zeleny@husc9.harvard.edu (Michael Zeleny):
> In article <1992Aug17.024216.1123@a.cs.okstate.edu>
> onstott@a.cs.okstate.edu (ONSTOTT CHARLES OR) writes:
> 
>>From article <1992Aug16.043209.14785@husc3.harvard.edu>, by
>>zeleny@husc9.harvard.edu (Michael Zeleny):
> 
>>MZ:
>>>Well then, try reading my article until you get its point.  I feel that I
>>>have been quite explicit in stating my grievance; however it is evident
>>>that you didn't get it, and I don't feel like belaboring the obvious.
> 
> COO:
>>Vacuous statements do not a point make..

MZ:
> The point was made earlier.  If your knowledge of classical precedent is
> insufficient to figure it out, I advise looking up the names I cited.  I
> have far too little time here to engage in remedial explication.

Continued vacuousness does not a point make.

> 
> COO:
>> Aha, so you are more Derridian than you want anyone to believe...

MZ:> 
> You have the most amazing propensity for misinterpretinf my words.  Try
> Farias instead of Derrida.  Not a great thinker, but he got his facts
> right.

It was an attempt at humor which either you do not have or intentionally
avoid.  I select the latter based on a prior statement of yours about
a "grumpy old man."
>

MZ: 
> However, if you have any ideas, I'll be happy to discuss them.

We'll see if you actually discuss them.

> 
> COO:
>>>>Second, it comes as no surprise that you find the
>>>>second task of philosophy as that which concerns meaning--this point
>>>>and your first task go hand in hand.  It turns out, Mikhail, that the
>>>>two tasks you have set forth, as divided in two, can not
>>>>be seperated.  Confused?  Always look to the function of the sign,
>>>>the function of the sign is to structure.  Since it was the structure
>>>>you were looking for, and since the sign is to structure, your first
>>>>task should have stated "find meaning."  And finding meaning, Mikhail,
>>>>is the purpose of philosophy--See...Heidegger isn't so bad, now is he?
> 
> MZ:
>>>You seem to be confusing the function of the sign with its structure.  The
>>>function of the sign is to denote; otherwise, I assure you, we wouldn't be
>>>having this conversation.
> 
> COO:
>>And what does denotation do Mikhail?  Structure..  Denotation and structuring
>>go hand in hand unless you would like to 
>>explain why they do not--I would be much appreciative. Mmm. Now you
>>are back to square one.  

MZ:> 
> Unfortunately for you, the burden of proof lies on the party making a
> positive claim.  Denotation doesn't have to do anything, except be denoted.
> If you think otherwise, try telling me why.

Denote 'denotation' and you will have formed a structure.  Thus,
denotating structures.  OH, and I am so dissapointed.  Yes, the
key verb there is 'formed.'  (BTW, I hardly felt burdened)

> 
> COO:
>>>>Your next question is probably "so what's wrong?"  The answer is:
>>>>nothing, so long as you don't pressupose reality in the finding of meaning
>>>>and here I say "reality" not "being" because being is always presupposed..
> 
> MZ:
>>>I don't presuppose much of anything these days, -- doctor's orders.
>>>Instead, I deduce things, as far as I can, and no further.  Reality of
>>>meaning is one of them; being, though decidedly not a big deal, is another.
>>>Have I mentioned Parmenides yet?
> 
> COO:
>> First, Being can not be deduced--it is always presupposed. 
>
MZ: 
> I take the _cogito_ over the overwhelming authority of your claim.

And this is your mistake--although philosophically understandable.

 
> COO:
>>							     Second,
>>meaning can be deduced, as it has been, but it is not limited to a simple
>>deduction.   Ontically, meaning is deductable.  
> 
> I fail to understand this claim.

Which claim?  If the latter, you either understand it or you don't.
As to the former, meaning should have been with scare-quotes 'meaning'
to denote that I was refering to the concept.  However, this brings me
to a critical point that I think hasn't been brought up.  
The problem that I find with the representational crap is that it
limits the "horizon" of the word.  Words are always in use.  Whenever
the word comes under analysis it is even further in use.  However, 
its use now is one which fits a particular philosophical agenda.  
There is the issue of history and world that seems to be ignored
in representational theories.  When, for example, we analyze the
meaning of a word in philosophy, or philology, we attempt to pin
it down to a particular "historical" period, within a particular
contextual arrangement under which the word is employed.  The problem
that I find with this is simply that we provide no analysis of the
analysis--we act as though the present action of analysis has no
impact on the word's meaning.  Because of this, I refer to representational
theories as "crap."


> 
> COO:
>>						Third, you fail to
>>address the reality issue--the pressupposition of reality was made in
>>your first task stated as "find the structure of reality."  The problem
>>which Plato had, which Heidegger brings up again, is that we are
>>not clear what "Being" is nor do we have any idea of what reality is either.
>

MZ: 
> Speak for yourself, kemosabe.  My intuitions differ.

You reserve the right, of course, to make the above appear as shallow
as possible.  However, I fear that you do not comprehend the 
severe philosophical ramifications.

> 
> COO:
>>						    Now, to avoid a confusing
>>equivocation of Being and Reality, we must seperate the two so that
>>they will not be confused.  On this point, reality is a world in which
>>we search(appropriate as I was reminded by Professor Dreyfus once).
>>Now, the realitivistic flag may be tripped in your mind--but you must 
>>realize that we are not certain what you mean by truth, nor are we
>>certain what you mean by reality. 
>>  A propos the relativistic elements, Heidegger reduces the looming
>>philsophical problem down to a simple determinite which is pre-analytical:
>>it claims "there is."  It claims that "truth" is that which denotes the
>>world as such.  Since the world is "in each case mine."  And since we
>>all are, the truth is a universal--not too terribly relativistic now
>>is it. 
> 
> Charles, this is getting quite hopeless.  We are really speaking different
> languages, and I have absolutely no interest in humoring you by mocking
> your idiom.

Nor do I of yours.


  I find that some of your basic claims are due either to
> ignorance, or more charitably, to unwarranted revisionism; the latter is
> what I originally tagged your master with, so you may share the honors if
> you so wish.  As for me, I prefer to converse with post-Eleatic, if not
> post-Socratic philosophers.  Your discourse, as it is presented, is a great
> illustration of the reason why Heidegger is not taken seriously by the vast
> majority of Anglo-American philosophers: you habitually indulge in
> grandiloquent, utterly unsubstantiated claims, which attempt to turn the
> clock back 2,500 years, without the least regard for the intervening
> history of progress in the subject.

  Of course this is purely a statement of ignorance on your part.
Heidegger was utterly concerned with the intervening history of the
subject.  Whether or not we want to refer to the history as "progress"
is, of course, the crux of the debate.  Further, I find no substantiation
in any of your rebuttals either--all I can find are vague
references to a history of philosophy and a smug assumption that
I have not bothered to read any of it; so, I ignore that point.  


  Unfortunately for you, you lack both
> Heidegger's sophistication and his classical erudition; fortunately, you
> are well on the way to matching him in bad faith, as I have demonstrated
> elsewhere.  

Try, "Unfortunately for you, you lack both the time and the bandwith
to reproduce the amount of material necessary to show any sort of
sophistication or erudition."  Which is, of course, what I assume
about you.  Further, you have demonstrated nothing--ranted plenty,
but demonstrated nothing.

Unless you can show me that you are capable of presenting a
> brief, cogent agrument, -- not an assertion, not a quotation or paraphrase,
> but an argument, -- this discussion is now officially over.

Oh no!  And perhaps if I could get the same from you, we might get
somewhere.  So, lets begin at the beginning.  What is 'truth' Mikhail?
I want a concrete answer, no paraphrases, no references to the history
of philosophy which I obviously heretofore have not read, no quotations,
but an argument--what is 'truth'?  Now, if you fail to provide an answer
I will simply accept that you can not and resume my studies in an
area more capable.

> cordially,
> mikhail zeleny@husc.harvard.edu
> "Nous donnons la mort, nous saurons la subir."

BCnya,
  Charles O. Onstott, III

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Charles O. Onstott, III  Account at Oklahoma State University for summer.
Graduate Student in Religious Studies           onstott@a.cs.okstate.edu
University of Chicago
 
"anticipation reveals to Dasein its lostness in the one-self, and brings
it face to face with the possibility of being itself, primarily unsupported
by conerful solicitude, but of being itself, rather, is an impassioned
freedom towards death--a freedom which has been released from the 
Illusions of the "one", and which is factical, certain of itself, 
and anxious."            Martin Heidegger  _Being and Time_
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.meta