Ray Brassier: Alien Theory: The Decline of Materialism in the Name of Matter (2001)
Filed under thesis | Tags: · capitalism, materialism, non-philosophy, phenomenology, philosophy
“The thesis tries to define and explain the rudiments of a ‘non-philosophical’ or ‘non-decisional’ theory of materialism on the basis of a theoretical framework provided by the ‘non-philosophy’ of François Laruelle. Neither anti-philosophical nor anti-materialist in character, non-materialism tries to construct a rigorously transcendental theory of matter by using certain instances of philosophical materialism as its source material.
The materialist decision to identify the real with matter is seen to retain a structural isomorphy with the phenomenological decision to identify the real with the phenomenon. Both decisions are shown to operate on the basis of a methodological idealism:- materialism on account of its confusion of matter and concept; phenomenology by virtue of its confusion of phenomenon and logos. By dissolving the respectively ‘materiological’ and ‘phenomenological’ amphibolies which are the result of the failure to effect a rigorously transcendental separation between matter and concept on the one hand, and between phenomenon and logos on the other, non-materialist theory proposes to mobilise the non-hybrid or non-decisional concepts of a ‘matter-without-concept’ and of a ‘phenomenon-without-logos’ in order to effect a unified but non-unitary theory of phenomenology and materialism. The result is a materialisation of thinking that operates according to matter’s foreclosure to decision. That is to say, a transcendental theory of the phenomenon, licensing limitless phenomenological plasticity, unconstrained by the apparatus of eidetic intuition or any horizon of apophantic disclosure;- but one which is simultaneously a transcendental theory of matter, uncontaminated by the bounds of empirical perception and free of all phenomenological circumscription.” (Synopsis)
Doctoral Thesis
Department of Philosophy, University of Warwick, April 2001
241 pages
discussion (Levi R. Bryant)
Comment (0)Finger, Guldin, Bernardo: Vilém Flusser: An Introduction (2011)
Filed under book | Tags: · cultural theory, language, media theory, phenomenology, philosophy, technical image
The first introduction to a key thinker in twentieth-century media philosophy and cultural theory
A thorough introduction to Vilém Flusser’s thought, this book reveals his engagement with a wide array of disciplines, from posthuman philosophy, media studies, and history to migrant studies, art, and anthropology. This volume shows how Flusser’s media theory works are just one part of a greater mosaic of writings that bring to the fore cultural and cognitive changes in the twenty-first century.
by Anke K. Finger, Rainer Guldin, Gustavo Bernardo
Publisher University of Minnesota Press, 2011
Volume 34 van Electronic Mediations
ISBN 0816674787, 9780816674787
200 pages
Alva Noë: Action In Perception: Representation and Mind (2004)
Filed under book | Tags: · brain, movement, perception, phenomenology, philosophy, vision
“Perception is not something that happens to us, or in us,” writes Alva Noë. “It is something we do.” In Action in Perception, Noë argues that perception and perceptual consciousness depend on capacities for action and thought—that perception is a kind of thoughtful activity. Touch, not vision, should be our model for perception. Perception is not a process in the brain, but a kind of skillful activity of the body as a whole. We enact our perceptual experience.
To perceive, according to this enactive approach to perception, is not merely to have sensations; it is to have sensations that we understand. In Action in Perception, Noë investigates the forms this understanding can take. He begins by arguing, on both phenomenological and empirical grounds, that the content of perception is not like the content of a picture; the world is not given to consciousness all at once but is gained gradually by active inquiry and exploration. Noë then argues that perceptual experience acquires content thanks to our possession and exercise of practical bodily knowledge, and examines, among other topics, the problems posed by spatial content and the experience of color. He considers the perspectival aspect of the representational content of experience and assesses the place of thought and understanding in experience. Finally, he explores the implications of the enactive approach for our understanding of the neuroscience of perception.
Publisher MIT Press, 2004
ISBN 0262140888, 9780262140881
277 pages
PDF (updated on 2013-6-2)
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