Constellations, Volume 29, Issue 2, Page 131-145, June 2022.

This article examines recent scholarly work on boredom by drawing on Mikhail Bakhtin’s account of modernity, irony, and mass skepticism. In The Arcades Project, Walter Benjamin noted that, beginning in the 1840s, Western societies had been gripped by an “epidemic of boredom.” He was referring to a peculiarly modern form of mass boredom, associated with the “atrophy of experience” in a mechanized and urbanized social life—a boredom Elizabeth S. Goodstein has characterized as the “democratization of skepticism.” Although Bakhtin says little (...) about “boredom” directly, he probes the sociocultural conditions that give rise to it. Bakhtin, for example, celebrates the liberatory and egalitarian promise of modern vernacular speech, which displays a healthy suspicion of “monotonic” qualities of elite genres, and which springs not from the pulpit or the palace, but from the street, the marketplace and the public square. Bakhtin is concerned about the nihilistic implications of this disenchantment of the world and the threats it poses—indifference, reification and alienation—to the “participative” mode of social life he favours. (shrink)

The relationship of Marxist thought to the phenomena of everyday life and utopia, both separately and in terms of their intersection, is a complex and often ambiguous one. In this article, I seek to trace some of the theoretical filiations of a critical Marxist approach to their convergence (as stemming mainly from a Central European tradition), in order to tease out some of the more significant ambivalences and semantic shifts involved in its theorization. This lineage originates in the work of (...) Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, then stretches to Georg Lukács and the so-called ‘Gnostic Marxism’ of Walter Benjamin (as mediated by the important figure of Georg Simmel), and culminating most recently in the work of Agnes Heller. Such a Marxist theory is inseparable from a political project that seeks to unveil and critique what it takes to be the debased, routinized and ideological qualities of daily existence under the auspices of modern capitalist society, but also attempts to locate certain emancipatory tendencies within this selfsame terrain, an orientation that can be summed up in the phrase ‘everyday utopianism’. Although there are occasional lapses into dualistic modes of thinking in the work of these writers, the key insight they present to us is the need to overcome the pervasive dichotomy between the everyday/immanent and the utopian/transcendental, of a sort that has bedevilled the work of many other theorists and intellectual traditions. (shrink)

The global financial crisis beginning in 2008 has encouraged the revitalization of a wide spectrum of leftist theorizing, but arguably the most audacious is that of ‘accelerationism’. Left-accelerationism sees the intensification of certain tendencies in late capitalist society as a way to escape its gravitational orbit and ‘repurpose’ the very material infrastructure of capitalism itself, to universally emancipatory ends. The central task here is to engage accelerationism with a thinker of the post-Autonomist tradition, Franco ‘Bifo’ Berardi. Contrary to Williams and (...) Srnicek, co-authors of the #Accelerate manifesto, Bifo asserts that acceleration per se only augments the power and dynamism of capital, and posits instead a ‘post-politics’ of ironic detachment, aesthetic cultivation, and ‘therapy’. Contrasting Bifo and accelerationism clarifies each of their assumptions and core arguments, and points the way to a more nuanced perspective on these issues, in a contemporaneous moment marked in equal measure by inestimable threat and liberatory promise. (shrink)

One of the key concepts in autonomist Marxism is the ‘general intellect’. As capitalism develops, labour and its products become increasingly ‘immaterial’, inasmuch as the physical side of production is taken over by automated systems. The result is that all aspects of the collective worker's affective, desiring and cognitive capabilities are now brought to bear on production itself. This problematises capitalistic notions of proprietary control, because it raises the possibility that the mass ‘cognitive worker’, and the inherently co-operative principles it (...) embodies, can detach itself from neoliberal mechanisms of subsumption and valorisation and lay the foundation for a new communalistic ethos. What is intriguing is that several autonomists evoke the work of Mikhail Bakhtin vis-à-vis the ‘general intellect’. Bakhtin did maintain that dialogism is an irreducibly collective phenomenon, and that we all contribute to the continuous making and remaking of language. We do not ‘own’ the words we use; as such, meaning is necessarily plural and heterogeneous, the product of the interaction of many texts and voices that can only be pragmatically and contingently unified. The present article seeks to explore the connection between Bakhtin and autonomism, focusing on the insight that communication is always ‘more than myself’, and hence integral to the ‘social brain’ that is a shared legacy, our ‘commonwealth’. It also raises the possibility of a more ‘troublesome’ Bakhtin than is generally countenanced by the liberal academy, and a concomitantly ‘dangerous’ dialogism that haunts a digitalised and networked world marked in equal measure by tremendous emancipatory promise and catastrophic threat. (shrink)

Although several writers have noted significant complementary features in the respective projects of Russian philosopher and cultural theorist Mikhail Bakhtin (1895–1975) and the French social thinker Henri Lefebvre (1901–91), to date there has not been a systematic comparison of them. This article seeks to redress this oversight, by exploring some of the more intriguing of these conceptual dovetailings: first, their relationship to the intellectual and cultural legacy of Romanticism; and second, their respective assessments of irony (including Romantic irony), and, more (...) specifically, of the ironic register as a potential vehicle for socio-cultural criticism. Although the positions Bakhtin and Lefebvre stake out vis-à-vis these issues reveal many similarities – such as extensive use of Socrates in the writings of each – there are also significant differences, not least because Lefebvre’s understanding of Romanticism is more fully developed than Bakhtin’s. Accordingly, the central argument advanced here is that Bakhtin’s fairly disparaging account of Romanticism, together with his scattered and often contradictory remarks on irony, can be subjected to re-envisioning and potential enrichment by reference to Lefebvre’s more considered thoughts, especially the latter’s notions of ‘Revolutionary romanticism’ and ‘Marxist irony’. (shrink)

The French sociologist and philosopher Henri Lefebvre developed an account of modernity that combined rigorous critique, a rejection of nostalgia, left pessimism or transcendental appeals, and the search for utopian potentialities in the hidden recesses of the everyday. This article will focus on a topic that is arguably central to his ‘critique of everyday life’ but has been entirely overlooked in the literature thus far: that of boredom. Although often dismissed as trivial, boredom can be understood as a touchstone through (...) which we can grasp much wider anxieties, socio-cultural changes and subjective crises that are intrinsic to our experience of modernity. Curiously, although Lefebvre was very interested in boredom, he did not analyse it systematically, and he used terms like ‘boring’ or ‘boredom’ in loose, elliptical and seemingly contradictory ways. Such a lack of clarity reveals his ambivalence about this phenomenon, but also highlights a subtle pattern of differentiation he makes between particular modalities of boredom that can be highly illuminating. Through a careful reading of the full range of Lefebvre’s writings, we can begin to understand how he discriminates between different experiences and expressions of boredom, some of which are unambiguously negative, whereas others are judged more positively. With respect to the latter, as he says in Introduction to Modernity, under certain conditions boredom can be full of desires, frustrations and possibilities. Through such an investigation, we start to glimpse latent connections between boredom and utopian propensities that caught the attention not only of Lefebvre but also such thinkers as Ernst Bloch, Siegfried Kracauer and Walter Benjamin. (shrink)

Although many philosophers espouse anti-realism, the only sustained arguments for the position are due to Michael Dummett and Hilary Putnam. Gardiner's unpretentious style and lucid organization make sense of Dummett's and Putnam's discourse.

Logicians disagree on (1) criteria for the presence of an argument, (2) criteria for adding implicit premises and (3) criteria for linking premises. I attempt to resolve all three problems, and in the process to remove the main obstacles to teaching diagramming. The first problem is resolved by working with real discourse that students find on their own, rather than the artificial examples and problems found in logic texts; it is further reduced by examining the different uses of argument and (...) understanding the extent to which the basic rules of diagramming are the same for the various uses. The other disagreements persist because logicians neglect to clarify the principal type of eakness we remedy by adding implicit premises and linking premises: in real discourse we do so to block substantive counterexamples, an idea correlated with that of substantive deduction, discussed by Govier, Wright and others. (shrink)

Radical ecology typically brings to mind media images of ecological activists standing before loggers' saws, staging anti-nuclear marches, and confronting polluters on the high seas. Yet for more than twenty years, the activities of organizations such as the Greens and Earth First! have been influenced by a diverse, less-publicized group of radical ecological philosophers. It is their work—the philosophical underpinnings of the radical ecological movement—that is the subject of _Contesting Earth's Future_. The book offers a much-needed, balanced appraisal of radical (...) ecology's principles, goals, and limitations. Michael Zimmerman critically examines the movement's three major branches—deep ecology, social ecology, and ecofeminism. He also situates radical ecology within the complex cultural and political terrain of the late twentieth century, showing its relation to Martin Heidegger's anti-technological thought, 1960s counterculturalism, and contemporary theories of poststructuralism and postmodernity. An early and influential ecological thinker, Zimmerman is uniquely qualified to provide a broad overview of radical environmentalism and delineate its various schools of thought. He clearly describes their defining arguments and internecine disputes, among them the charge that deep ecology is an anti-modern, proto-fascist ideology. Reflecting both the movement's promise and its dangers, this book is essential reading for all those concerned with the worldwide ecological crisis. (shrink)

"Writing in a lively and refreshingly clear American English, Zimmerman provides an uncompromisingly honest and judicious account... of Heidegger’s views on technology and his involvement with National Socialism.... One of the most important books on Heidegger in recent years." —John D. Caputo "... superb... " —Thomas Sheehan, The New York Review of Books "... thorough and complex... " —Choice "... excellent guide to Heidegger as eco-philosopher." —Radical Philosophy "... engrossing, rich in substance... makes clear Heidegger's importance for the issue of (...) technology, ethics, and politics." —Religious Studies Review The relation between Martin Heidegger’s understanding of technology and his affiliation with and conception of National Socialism is the leading idea of this fascinating and revealing book. Zimmerman shows that the key to the relation between Heidegger’s philosophy and his politics was his concern with the nature of working and production. (shrink)

Recent disclosures regarding the relationship between Heidegger’s thought and his own version of National Socialism have led me to rethink my earlier efforts to portray Heidegger as a forerunner of deep ecology. His political problems have provided ammunition for critics, such as Murray Bookchin, who regard deep ecology as a reactionary movement. In this essay, I argue that, despite some similarities, Heidegger’s thought and deep ecology are in many ways incompatible, in part because deep ecologists—in spite of their criticism of (...) the ecologically destructive character of technological modernity—generally support a “progressive” idea of human evolution. (shrink)

This review of Gigerenzer, Todd, and the ABC Research Group's Simple heuristics that make us smart focuses on the role of heuristics in discovery, invention, and hypothesis-testing and concludes with a comment on the role of heuristics in population growth.

Two studies are reported in which participants’ reports of altered states of consciousness were manipulated using priming methods. Study 1 used both subtle and blunt supraliminal priming methods, while Study 2 used a subliminal priming method. Across the two studies, two different methods for inducing ASC were used. In both studies a direct and an indirect measure of ASC was employed in order to separate the more nonconscious and spontaneous from the more conscious and directive reports of ASC. As predicted, (...) results indicated that the indirect measures of ASC were consistent with the ASC primes participants received. Implications and future research directions are discussed. (shrink)

I. Avicennan studies -- II. Ghazālian studies -- III. Other studies.

Recently several philosophers have argued that environmental reform movements cannot halt humankind’s destruction of the biosphere because they still operate within the anthropocentric humanism that forms the root of the ecological crisis. According to “radical” environmentalists, disaster can be averted only if we adopt a nonanthropocentric understanding of reality that teaches us to live harmoniouslyon the Earth. Martin Heidegger agrees that humanism leads human beings beyond their proper limits while forcing other beings beyond their limits as weIl. The doctrine of (...) the “rights of man” justifies human exploitation of nonhuman beings. Paradoxically, however, the doctrine of rights for nonhuman beings does not escape the orbit of humanism. According to Heidegger, a nonanthropocentric conception of humanity and its relation to nature must go beyond the doctrine of rights. We can dweIl harmoniously on Earth only by submitting to our primary obligation: to be open for the Being of beings. We need a new way of understanding Being, a new ethos, that lets beings manifest themselves not merely as objects for human ends, but as intrinsically important. Heidegger calls this ethos the “fourfold” of earth and sky, gods and mortals. Humanists argue that Heidegger is wrong to abandon the principle of human rights in favor of the notion that we are obligated to “let beings be,” while some radical environmentalists accuse hirn of being a humanist because he supposedly overestimates the importance of humankind’s ability to speak. Heidegger insists, however, that language makes possible culture, without which thereis no human experience of nature. An environmentally sound ethos. can arise, according to Heidegger, only from a shift within the cultural heritage of the West. Richard Rorty agrees that we must become open for a new “conversation” with the West, even if this requires abandoning traditionally important fields such as epistemology. The need to develop a new understanding of Being is so great that thinkers from the analytic and continental traditions of philosophy are finally initiating a long-overdue dialogue. (shrink)

To what extent can Nietzsche's idea of the Overman be used in connection with transhumanist notions of highly advanced humans and even posthumans?

Radical ecology typically brings to mind media images of ecological activists standing before loggers' saws, staging anti-nuclear marches, and confronting polluters on the high seas. Yet for more than twenty years, the activities of organizations such as the Greens and Earth First! have been influenced by a diverse, less-publicized group of radical ecological philosophers. It is their work—the philosophical underpinnings of the radical ecological movement—that is the subject of _Contesting Earth's Future_. The book offers a much-needed, balanced appraisal of radical (...) ecology's principles, goals, and limitations. Michael Zimmerman critically examines the movement's three major branches—deep ecology, social ecology, and ecofeminism. He also situates radical ecology within the complex cultural and political terrain of the late twentieth century, showing its relation to Martin Heidegger's anti-technological thought, 1960s counterculturalism, and contemporary theories of poststructuralism and postmodernity. An early and influential ecological thinker, Zimmerman is uniquely qualified to provide a broad overview of radical environmentalism and delineate its various schools of thought. He clearly describes their defining arguments and internecine disputes, among them the charge that deep ecology is an anti-modern, proto-fascist ideology. Reflecting both the movement's promise and its dangers, this book is essential reading for all those concerned with the worldwide ecological crisis. (shrink)

Deep ecologists have criticized reform environmentalists for not being sufficiently radical in their attempts to curb human exploitation of the nonhuman world. Ecofeminists, however, maintain that deep ecologists, too, are not sufficiently radical, for they have neglected the cmcial role played by patriarchalism in shaping the cultural categories responsible for Western humanity’s domination of Nature. According to eco-feminists, only by replacing those categories-including atomism, hierarchalism, dualism, and androcentrism - can humanity learn to dweIl in harmony with nonhuman beings. After reviewing (...) the eco-feminist critique both of reform environmentalism and of deep ecology, I sketch a critical dialogue between eco-feminism and deep ecology. (shrink)

Integral Ecology uses multiple perspectives to analyze environmental problems. Four of Integral Ecology's major analytical perspectives (known as the quadrants) correspond to the four divisions of the liberal arts and sciences: fine arts, natural science, social science, and humanities. Integral Ecology also utilizes the analytical perspective provided by the idea of cultural moral development. This perspective helps to reveal how stakeholders at different developmental stages disclose a phenomenon, in this case, a tropical forest that loggers propose to clear-cut. Integral Ecology (...) takes into account all pertinent perspectives, in order to arrive at the best possible solution to environmental problems and conflicts. (shrink)

MacIntyre, Clark, and Heidegger would all agree that the current problem with moral theory is its lack of a satisfactory conception of human telos. This lack leads us to resort to such fictions as rights, interests, and utility, which are “disguises for the will to power.” Ibid., p. 240. These thinkers would also agree that modern nation-states are cut off from the roots of the Western tradition. Modern political economy, with “its individualism, its acquisitiveness and its elevation of the values (...) of the market to a central social place”Ibid., p. 237. is leading us into “the coming age of barbarism and darkness.”Ibid., p. 244. MacIntyre's grim depiction of the future, which Heidegger calls “the time of the darkening of the earth” and “the flight of the gods”,Heidegger, “What Are Poets For?” in Poetry, Language, Thought. can only be met by re-appropriating our own tradition. Although Aristotle has much to tell us, I believe Heidegger is right to turn to Heraclitus for a non-anthropocentric conception of humanity's place in Nature. Other writers, however, such as Arne Naess, George Sessions, and Stuart Hampshire, argue that the writings of Spinoza may offer the most helpful vision of humanity needed to guide our efforts to find a more appropriate basis for our behavior toward each other and toward the non-human world as well.George Sessions, “Spinoza and Jeffets on Man in Nature,” Inquiry 20 (1977):481–528. Sessions' essay was criticized by Genevieve Lloyd in “Spinoza's Environmental Ethics,” Inquiry 23 (1980):293–311. In reply, Arne Naess wrote “Environmental Ethics and Spinoza's Ethics: Comments on Genevieve Lloyd's Article,” Inquiry 23 (1980):313~ 325. Cf. also Stuart Hampshire, Two Theories of Morality (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977). Yet Aristotle, Qark, Heidegger, Heraclitus, Maclntyre, and Spinoza all agree that in order to behave fittingly, we must understand what it means to be human. At this time, I would like to acknowledge the importance of the following objection to what I have been arguing here: While it may be true that the concept of human rights is a fiction, it is nevertheless a very useful fiction for changing how human beings relate to each other. Tom Regan has frequently pointed out that even if the concept of rights proves to be ficticious, it can be helpful in protecting non-human beings from abuse by humans. Cf. his essay “Exploring the Idea of Animal Rights,” Animals' Rights - A Symposium (Sussex and London: Centaur Press Ltd., 1979); Regan, “Animal Rights, Human Wrongs,” Environmental Ethics 2 (1980):99–120. The doctrine of the rights of man justified the American and French revolutions, which brought forth new and important human freedoms. Today, most of humanity still lacks the protection afforded by constitutionally guaranteed human rights. Moreover, even in constitutional democracies there are frequent abuses of and attempts to curtail human rights. Until far more people become committed to protecting human rights, it is unlikely that there will be a big movement to extend rights to non-human beings, much less to overcome the anthropocentrism inherent in the concept of rights. What the Buddhist tradition calls “skillful means” is appropriate in our current situation.My thanks to Professor David Levin of Northwestern University for having reminded me of the importance of approaching the question of human rights in a “skillful” way. We must approach people in a way sensitive to their current self-understanding. Before we can pass on to the stage of planetary unity made possible by non-anthropocentric thinking, we need to find ways that promote mutual respect among human beings.On the topic of the relation between spiritual-psychological growth and the shift in human morality, cf. M.W. Fox, “Animal Rights and Nature Liberation,” in Animals' Rights - A Symposium. Out of such respect there can also arise respect for the non-human as well. While largely in agreement with this point of view, I would like to note that our means must be very skillful, indeed, if we are to transform our relationships to each other and to the natural world before irreparable damage is done to the earth, through nuclear war or environmental destruction. The time grows short for the transformation needed to bring us from the stage of anthropocentrism to a deeper awareness of our internal relationship to the whole world. Some people, such as Peter Russell, argue that we are witnessing the evolution of a non-anthropocentric mode of planetary consciousness that will be supported by the revolution in communications and computers. Peter Russel, The Global Brain: Speculations on the Evolutionary Leap tp Planetary Consciousness (New York: J.P. Tarcher, 1983). Other people, such as Jeremy Rifkin, maintain that the coming computer age promises ever greater intrusions into natural processes, such as the drive for control of genetic structures.Jeremy Rifkin, Algeny (New York: Viking, 1983). In my view, while it is important to extend the idea of human rights wherever possible, it is also crucial that we consider seriously the possibility that the idea of human rights is merely a transitional way of conceiving of morality. As we learn more about the interrelationship of human life with all other aspects of the earth's life, our self-understanding will no longer be in harmony with the human-centered morality we know today. We will either learn to respect all beings and act toward them in appropriate ways, or else we will continue down the road we are now headed - a road which seems to have a very disturbing destination. Learning to dwell appropriately on earth is the most pressing moral issue of the day. (shrink)

The practical thought of planning agents is subject to distinctive rationality norms. In particular, there are norms of intention consistency and of means-end coherence. I discuss the normative significance of these norms and their relation to practical reasons. I seek a path between views that see these norms as, at bottom, norms of theoretical rationality, and views that see the idea that these norms have distinctive normative significance as a 'myth'. And I seek to distinguish these norms from principles about (...) the transmission of practical reasons. In the end, my view draws on claims about what is involved in being a self-governing planning agent. (shrink)

Ray Kurzweil and others have posited that the confluence of nanotechnology, artificial intelligence, robotics, and genetic engineering will soon produce posthuman beings that will far surpass us in power and intelligence. Just as black holes constitute a ldquo;singularityrdquo; from which no information can escape, posthumans will constitute a ldquo;singularity:rdquo; whose aims and capacities lie beyond our ken. I argue that technological posthumanists, whether wittingly or unwittingly, draw upon the long-standing Christian discourse of ldquo;theosis,rdquo; according to which humans are capable of (...) being God or god-like. From St. Paul and Luther to Hegel and Kurzweil, the idea of human self-deification plays a prominent role. Hegel in particular emphasizes that God becomes wholly actualized only in the process by which humanity achieves absolute consciousness. Kurzweil agrees that God becomes fully actual only through historical processes that illuminate and thus transform the entire universe. The difference is that for Kurzweil and many other posthumanists, our offspringmdash;the posthumansmdash;will carry out this extraordinary process. What will happen to Home sapiens in the meantime is a daunting question. (shrink)

This book challenges the dominant approach to problems of justice in global normative theory and offers a radical alternative designed to transform our thinking about what kind of problem injustice is and how political theorists might do better in understanding and addressing it. It argues that the dominant approach, ideal moral theory (IMT), takes a fundamentally wrong-headed approach to the problem of justice. IMT seeks to work out what an ideally just society would look like, and only then outlines our (...) moral obligations in realizing that ideal. In other words, it ignores the realities of everyday politics. As Michael Goodhart asserts, IMT postpones engagement with actually existing injustices and distorts our understanding of them, and it normalizes many problematic features of our world. On the other hand, the leading alternatives to IMT struggle to make sense of the role values play in politics. This book sees justice as an ideology and develops an innovative bifocal theoretical framework for making sense of it. This framework provides two complementary perspectives on justice: a theoretical perspective that situates competing ideological claims about justice in a broader political context and a partisan perspective that evaluates the structure and coherence of particular conceptions of justice. As opposed to IMT, it focuses on barriers to justice and advocates an activist political theory that takes sides in political struggles against injustice. Goodhart argues that theorists can help to generate the countervailing power necessary for social transformation through the work of articulation, translation, and mapping, work which contributes to a more comprehensive social science of injustice. (shrink)

The Strange Situation procedure was developed by Ainsworth two decades agoas a means of assessing the security of infant-parent attachment. Users of the procedureclaim that it provides a way of determining whether the infant has developed species-appropriate adaptive behavior as a result of rearing in an evolutionary appropriate context, characterized by a sensitively responsive parent. Only when the parent behaves in the sensitive, species-appropriate fashion is the baby said to behave in the adaptive or secure fashion. Furthermore, when infants are (...) observed repeatedly in the Strange Situation,the pattern of behavior is said to be highly similar, and this pattern is said to predict the infants' future behavior in a diverse array of contexts. After an exhaustive review of the literature, it is shown that these popular claims are empirically unsupported in their strong form, and that the interpretations in terms of biological adaptationare misguided. There is little reliable evidence about the specific dimensions of parental behavior that affect Strange Situation behavior, although there does appear to be some relationship between these constructs. Temporal stability in security of attachment ishigh only when there is stability in family and caretaking circumstances. Likewise, patterns of Strange Situation behavior only have substantial predictive validity in similarly stable families. Implications for future research and theorizing — particularly as they relate to the use of evolutionary biology in psychological theory — are discussed. (shrink)

J. Baird Callicott seeks to resolve the problem of the intrinsic value of nature by utilizing a nondualistic paradigm derived from quantum theory. His approach is twofold. According to his less radical approach, quantum theory shows that properties once considered to be “primary” and “objective” are in fact the products of interactions between observer and observed. Values are also the products of such interactions. According to his more radical approach, quantum theory’s doctrine of internal relations is the model for the (...) idea that everything is intrinsically valuable because the “I” is intrinsically valuable and related to everything else. I argue that humanity’s treatment of nature will become respectful only as humanity’s awareness evolves toward nondualism, and that such nondualistic awareness will not be produced by changes in scientific theory alone. Nevertheless, as Callicott suggests, such changes may be harbingers of evolutionary trends in human awareness. I conclude with a sketch of how nondualism, especially in its panentheistic version, provides the basis for environmental ethics. (shrink)