GRGR3: Discussion Opener for Section 3

[Paul Murphy]

Finally up to speed on the GR reading, and have a couple of tidbits and
gratuitous name-drops to add, in response to two of Andrew's questions
(which, I think, go together):

>2)  Why is TRP including all this spiritualist, voodoo shit?

>7)  "It's control. All these things arise from one difficulty: control"
>    (30.26) "the Invisible Hand" (30.30) Is this a major policy in
>    GR's manifestoor just a throwaway introduced merely to set up a
>    sneer at psychology or 'uspenskian nonsense'? (30.31). Remember
>    that `Invisible hand' becomes visible, to Slothrop at least, when
>    it materialises later on with a ponting middle finger sayign this
>    way to the `Rocket cartel'.

Both questions remind me of the old faith/reason dialectic as it played out
from Kant down to Marx (and beyond). Before Kant became the master of
transcendental idealism, he wrote a book bashing Swedenborgian nonsense and
'spiritualist, voodoo shit' in general, thereafter preferring the dry
scholastic categories of the pure concepts of the understanding (which make
possible scientific cognition of natural appearance, especially in its
orderly causal structure). This critique gives rise, of course, to the
question of freedom in all of its deontological glory; the autonomy /
heteronomy dichotomy looms large, I think, precisely at this point (and
throughout) GR.

Remember that heteronomy means 'determination from the outside', the
outside being whatever supreme entity or force historical reason throws up
as first cause: God being the prime suspect, confirmed by the GR line:
"Putting the control inside was ratifying what de facto had happened --
that you had dispensed with God" (30). The other main candidate for the
controller is fate (like in the case of poor ol' Oedipus). In recent times,
as Marx stressed, the market takes on this 'second nature' appearance
(i.e., the workings of capitalism appear to transpire beyond actual human
agency).

To assume control -- to put human subjectivity in the centre, defining or
determining itself -- is to presume to act autonomously, independent of
external factors. This is the true condition of freedom according to
Idealist doctrine (self-determination becoming equivalent to self-positing
a la Fichte).

The way the passage continues calls this quest for autonomy into question,
by (presumably) unmasking it as illusion ("No one can *do*. Things only
happen"). This anti-causal line (which, I think, echoes Nietzsche in many
ways) is also the anti-paranoia line: there is no They pulling the strings,
there is no locus of manipulation, no hegemonic centre, just this acausal
holistic continuum of happening ("A and B are unreal, are names for parts
that ought to be inseparable").

GR elaborates numerous alternatives within this (broadly sketched)
philosophical debate: is such a thing as human autonomy possible; is
everything controlled by some inconspicuous authority, earthly or divine;
or is there no control whatsoever, control being illusory and unattainable?

Cheers,
Paul

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
                             Paul Murphy
                       paul.murphy at utoronto.ca
                 ------------------------------------
              "But memory is taken and given by the sea"
                      -F. Hoelderlin, "Andenken"