Seen from the perspective of the inconsistency of the Other, the post-truth era can be considered to be an era emerging from a crisis in belief in the existence of the Other, which is to be taken in a twofold sense: as a belief in the Other of the Other, that is, the Other of Law, and a belief in the Other considered as the subject supposed to know. Insofar as the contemporary subject does not want to know anything about (...) this “condition of belief” without which no knowledge, and therefore no truth, are possible, the crisis of belief affect both, the Other and the subject. This can be seen in the fact that the failing belief in the Other and knowledge, considered as a distinctive feature of our profoundly unbelieving times, is accompanied by an unprecedented rise in anxiety at the social level, as contemporary subjects who do not believe in the (existence of the) Other are singularly defenceless before the irruption of the real. With truth losing its power to name the real, the subject itself as a singular response to the real is becoming ever more precarious. Which is why, when faced with the erratic irruption of the real, contemporary subjects are condemned to a desperate search for certainties. (shrink)

Knjiga je poglobljena analiza mutacije etike, do katere je prišlo z zamenjavo aristotelovske etike prave mere z moderno, kantovsko etiko zakona. Avtorica izpostavi kot osrednji problem obeh etik soočanje s čezmernostjo, da je namreč za etiko prave mere, ki se ravna po načelu ugodja, čezmernost obsojena kot zlo in izločena iz etike, narobe pa etika zakona ne priznava nobene mere, ker sam zakon prelomi z načelom ugodja. Vendar avtorica zamenjave etik ne obravnava zgolj v zgodovinski perspektivi, pač pa raziskuje tudi (...) potenciale obeh etik v globaliziranem svetu. Avtorica pri tem pokaže, da se glede tega vprašanja filozofija in psihoanaliza razhajata. Za filozofijo je atribut neskončnega pripisan volji. Zlom koncepta avtonomne volje zato etiko danes obsoja na bioetiko, to je, na obrambo gole somatičnosti. Narobe pa psihoanaliza, ki umešča neskončno v samo telo, namreč v užitek, nakazuje možnost nove etične paradigme, ki zagovarja nezastarljive pravice užitka, ne da bi podlegla pastem newageovske ideologije. (shrink)

Traditionally, emancipatory politics is a question of knowing which parts of society are capable of counting for something, and which ones are not. Formulating the question of emancipatory politics in terms of existence, more specifically, in terms of “political subjects who are not social groups but rather forms of inscriptions of the count of the uncounted” , means acknowledging that the proper place for emancipatory politics is the very terrain in which the system of domination operates, a system that radical (...) political theorists characterize as a system of placement, identification, or counting. At present, however, this question of counting the uncountable, crucial for emancipatory politics, cannot be raised at all to the extent that globalization means that everybody is always already included, the exclusion of the uncounted is necessarily obscured, indeed, it has become invisible. Beginning with a discussion on an enigmatic remark: “the infinitization of the value of the subject”, taken from Lacan’s Seminar The Four Fundamental concepts of Psycho-analysis, this paper examines a conceptual shift in the articulation of the relation between the subject and the figures of the Other in an epoch of the Other which does not exist. Taking as her point of departure Lacan’s theory of the cut, the author shows how, in an era of the “generalized metonymization”, only an act constitutes a way out of a discourse that knows no closure. (shrink)

Avtorica obravnava alternativo med skeptično in racionalno argumentacijo kot izsiljeno izbiro, s katero se konstituira tako subjekt v navadni govorici kakor subjekt v demokraciji. Članek analizira skeptično in racionalno argumentacijo kot dva načina, kako se subjekt lahko izogne izsiljeni izbiri in nemožnosti govorice na eni strani in neutemeljenosti demokracije na drugi. Subjekt skeptične argumentacije se izogne temu, da bi vzel nase brezopornost govorice in demokracije, tako, da ubeži v neskončno ponavljanjerefutacije, subjekt racionalne argumentacije pa v neskončno približevanje pogojem idealne argumentacije.

Članek obravnava Hartovo pojmovanje obveznosti spoštovati zakon kot temeljne razlikovalne poteze glede na tradicionalni pravni pozitivizem in jusnaturalizem. Zahteva spoštovati zakon je po Hartu utemeljena v strukturi prava samega, v sekundarnih pravilih, predvsem v pravilu za prepoznavo kot temelju vseh drugih zakonskih norm.

The paper attempts to give an account of two different ways of relating to mathematics: Lacan’s and Badiou’s. Its starting point is Badiou’s and Lacan’s interpretations of Russell’s infamous definition of mathematics, according to which mathematics is a discourse in which no one knows what one is talking about, nor whether what one is saying is true. While for Badiou, the ignorance that is supposed to characterise mathematics according to Russell only concerns the role philosophy assigns to it, namely, it (...) being identified with the science of being qua being, for Lacan the ignorance constitutive of mathematics should rather be seen as a symptom resulting from the reduction of truth to a mere truth value. In discussing the detected divergences in these two readings, the paper shows how the access to psychoanalysis as well as the access to philosophy coincides with a certain access to mathematics, although we are not dealing with the same type of access. (shrink)

Suivant les quelques indications de Lacan sur le changement radical du statut du sujet tel que l’implique le nouveau rapport, à la fin de l’analyse, entre volonté et désir, l’auteur interroge deux modalités de la confrontation du sujet avec la volonté de l’Autre : celle du sage stoïcien, d’une part, et, d’autre part, celle de Sade. Jouant sur les convergences et les divergences de ceux deux positions subjectives au regard de la volonté de l’Autre, il s’agit d’aborder, à partir de (...) l’éthique stoïcienne, la question d’une éthique sans l’Autre, une éthique qui permet une transgression non-perverse du principe du plaisir. (shrink)

Psychoanalysis’ primary aim is to reveal the emergence of the subject, beyond its identifications, as a response of the real. More specifically, psychoanalysis considers the realization of the subject as a response to the impossibility of the sexual relation. Claiming that “everyone is a poem”, Lacan signals that psychoanalysis aims not at that which is universal in the subject, but rather at what in the speaking being is most singular: the emergence of a way of enjoyment that would make up (...) for the inexistence of the sexual relation. Taking up the articulation of writing and jouissance as a point of departure, the paper examines the mystical experience as a specific mode of such a making up. In so doing, the paper insists on the relation between jouissance and language in order to show to what extent the mystical experience can teach us about the possible ways of breaking with the lethal relationship with jouissance where one seems to be reduced to “the partner of one’s own loneliness”. (shrink)

In this essay I propose to explore the status of the not all in politics and psychoanalysis by analyzing and bringing into question the seemingly self-evident relationship of the mutual exclusion between politics and psychoanalysis. I would argue that in order to expose an affinity in dealing with the ‘not all’ in politics and psychoanalysis, it is necessary to move beyond the traditionally hostile polarities of the singular and the universal and to reverse the usual perspective according to which there (...) is no passage between the domain of the singular and the domain of the universal. I then move on to considering the relationship between psychoanalysis and politics from the point of view of the community ‘for all’ constituted through a complex practice of disidentification and the production of the ‘whatever’ singularities. (shrink)

Članek obravnava Perelmanovo teorijo racionalne argumentacije z gledišča političnega diskurza in njegove vloge pri konstituciji skupnosti in njene identitete. V prvem delu analizirmo dve »formuli« komunikacije, kot ju ponujata politični diskurz in racionalna argumentacija, v luči pojmov homonimije in homologije, ki ju razumemo kot predpostavki za konsenz. V drugem delu pa obravnavamo etične in juridične implikacije Perelmanove konceptualizacije konsenza, pri čemer razkrijemo skrito platonovsko in aristotelovsko dediščino, ki postavi pod vprašaj Perelmanov poskus utemeljiti svojo »novo retoriko« v retorični in sofistični (...) tradiciji. (shrink)

Sous ce titre, «Philosophie, psychanalyse: alliance ou mésalliance?», qui ne définie aucun privilège, aucun ordre de priorité, nous nous proposons d’interroger le rapport discret mais constant que la psychanalyse, depuis Freud, entre-tient avec la philosophie, rapport dont il convient pour le moins de souligner l’extraordinaire ambivalence.

What is the peculiar evocative force of the notion of the real? Rather than succumbing to the temptation of forcing appearance in order to accede to the real supposed to be lurking behind it, for Lacanian psychoanalysis the access to the real is that of the semblance. While one of our aims in this paper is to briefly outline the development of Lacan’s rather peculiar “realism”, we would also wish to emphasize the relation between the real and the semblance as (...) being the crux of Lacan’s later teaching. Indeed, for psychoanalysis, the question of the real is inseparable from the interrogation of the semblance, a term forged by Lacan in the last period of his teaching in order to rework the relation between the truth and the real. This is why although the semblance is relevant to numerous contemporary discourses, it is only in psychoanalysis that this problem is raised to the level of one of the central theoretical and practical issues. Omnipresent, unsettling, yet unresolved, this problem comes to the fore at the critical moments in the history of psychoanalysis, thereby marking turning points at which the orientation of psychoanalysis is at stake. (shrink)

Individuals often revise their beliefs when confronted with contradicting evidence. Belief revision in the spatial domain can be regarded as variation of initially constructed spatial mental models. Construction and revision usually follow distinct cognitive principles. The present study examines whether principles of revisions which follow constructions under high task demands differ from principles applied after less demanding constructions. We manipulated the task demands for model constructions by means of the continuity with which a spatial model was constructed. We administered tasks (...) with continuous, semi-continuous, and discontinuous conditions as between-subject factor (experiment 1) and as within-subject factor (experiment 2). Construction and revision followed distinct cognitive principles in the changeless conditions of experiment 1. With increased task demands due to switches between different continuity conditions (experiment 2), reasoners adapted the principles they used for model revisions to the principles which they had used during antecedent constructions. (shrink)

While praising Agamben for his attempt to formulate a radically immanentist conception of redemption, Negri nevertheless points out that Agamben’s novel vision of redemption, according to which the world in which we live is also a source of possibility, remains singularly unproductive. This is because in Agamben’s universe, according to Negri, productive power is attributed to sovereign power alone, thus leaving no room for a radically inventive and transformative activity – except in the guise of passive marginal resistance. In this (...) article, I will discuss how the dialectic of immanence and transcendence implied in Agamben’s identification of the irreparably profane world with God throws into relief what is at stake in his singular conception of redemption. If nothing is more urgent in the contemporary state of exception in which we allegedly live today than finding a way to wrench from it a potential for transformation, as Agamben claims, this is because the present regime of mastery succeeds in creating through this very lawlessness an interminable status quo, immune to all change. In examining the implications of Agamben’s analysis of the self-generating immanentism of the state of exception, I explore the possibility that his commitment to redemption might make a contribution to contemporary theorisations of resistance by identifying the difficulties of contemporary immanentist theories of resistance, such as Negri’s, in finding a way out of the present impasse and by developing the basis for an explanation of how the restoration of the possible is given only through the restoration of always-already missed opportunities. (shrink)

Why was Hufeland’s work on Macrobiotics so successful? It can neither keep its promise to prolong people’s lives nor does it contain any new information (the proposals are indeed most traditional). The article suggests a double answer: Looking back to antiquity was fashionable at the time, and Hufeland managed to combine classical elements with the late 18th century discourse. Second, Hufeland’s point was the holeness of human existence. In his eyes, health is not only a question of the body, but (...) also of character and soul. This concept seems to cope with some deplorable defects of modern medicine. (shrink)

Prispevek obravnava nekatere pojme politične filozofije Clauda Leforta. Pokazati želi, da za rekonstrukcijo politične filozofije, ki se je loteva Lefort, ni toliko konstitutiven njen prelom z znanstvenim diskurzom, ampak vse prej pojem simbolnega, ime za družbeno, ki je zavezano razliki in delitvi.

The objective of the present essay is to show that the traditional dilemma of philosophy, namely, does science think or does not think, has today become the problem that science itself has to solve. To assert that science thinks means first that science, when it thinks, constructs its object in an always specific manner; second, in construing its object, it adds to it the real, i.e., a reference, external to the scientific construction itself, which science then discovers as the basis (...) and source of its construction. This article argues that it is for strictly scientific reasons that science is today faced with the task of affirming itself as a domain of thought in both aforementioned meanings. Affirming the view that science thinks is a scientific struggle for the existence of politics of emancipation. (shrink)

In medieval medical anthropology, emotions are closely tied up with humoral pathology, e.g. joy with blood, anger with yellow bile, and sorrow with black bile. The face and body are external signs of a person's constitutional emotionality. Health is based on mental stability: Rage should be channelled into something constructive; love-sickness can even cause death. The use of drugs must respect emotional side effects: While some herbs and gems can brighten the mind, others cause sadness und discomfort. Inadequate emotions not (...) only cause mental illnesses, but can also be mental illnesses in themselves, e.g. raving madness or deep depression. Thus, calming and cheering psychotherapy complements dietary, physical, medicinal, and surgical treatment. (shrink)

Der Beitrag geht, sich auf die Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten und die Kritik der praktischen Vernunft beziehend, der Frage nach, ob es möglich ist, Kants praktische Philosophie, jenseits des Dilemmas abstrakter moralischer Universalismus vs. Rechte des Partikulären als Ansatz einer Theorie des subjektivierten Handelns zu begreifen. Das heisst eines Handelns, in dem das Individuum nicht nur im "Dienste der Güter" bzw. seiner empirisch-pathologischen Interessen und Neigungen steht. In der Beantwortung dieser Frage wird die Aussage des kategorischen Imperativs "ich soll (...) so oder so handeln, ob ich gleich nichts anderes wollte" im ersten Schritt als eine Forderung verstanden, die nicht einfach nichts Empirisches zu wollen verlangt, sondern das Wollen an ein Nichts als Etwas bindet. Im zweiten Schritt wird dann gezeigt, dass am Ort dieses Nichts als Etwas das Vernunftfaktum als abgründiger Grund eines Handelns steht, das mit dem Anspruch auftritt, für niemanden zu gelten, wenn es nicht bedingungslos für alle geltend gemacht werden kann. (shrink)