V.V. (20) Perspectivism: Nietzsche, Stencil (& Pynchon)

[jbor]

The excerpt from 'The Situation as N-Dimensional Mishmash' (unpubl.):

      "Short of examining the entire history of each individual
    participating;" Stencil wrote, "short of anatomizing each soul,
    what hope has anyone of understanding a Situation? It may be
    that the civil servants of the future will not be accredited
    unless they first receive a degree in brain surgery."
                                                    (470)

And then follows Sidney Stencil's cerebral excursion into his own cerebrum,
not a little bit a la Raquel Welsh et. al. in _Fantastic Voyage_ ('66).

http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0%2C4586%2C2190557%2C00.html

Though Stencil, as an English F.O. operative, is interested in the
"Situation", the implication for "History" is quite obvious. If any given
current "Situation" unfolds according to the interplay of the perspectives
(defined thus above by Stencil) of the various participants, then previous
"Situations" can only be (properly? objectively? absolutely?) understood if
and when every individual's (past and present) perspective is taken into
account and analysed. Which, likewise, isn't humanly possible either. Kinda
like what ol' F.W. Nietzsche was saying. Eg.

http://www.uccs.edu/~bpboenin/perspect.html

    Descartes formulated his conception of the world in terms of various
    dualities: subject and object, knower and that which is known, body and
    mind, the "extended, unthinking thing," and the "unextended, thinking
    thing." He established a clear dichotomy between the observer and that
    which is observed, between the external world and those entities which
    procure knowledge about it. The reigning worldview was that there was
    indeed an external, objective world that existed entirely "in itself,"
    that is, completely independent from any (human) perspective. One gets
    the impression that it was believed that external objects "emanate"
    certain properties for us to observe. Every object has intrinsic
    meaning, order, and definition. It is the job of the observer to observe
    these qualities that "belong" to, or are contained in, the objects.

    Nietzsche's view is quite different. As Mark McCreary states, Nietzsche
    held that "the world and the individual form a continuum that cannot be
    set apart." The contention that the 'world' and the mind or observer are
    distinct and independent is a fiction, argued Nietzsche. Arguing for a
    distinction between the true world and the apparent world is, according
    to Nietzsche, "reduced to the antithesis 'world' and 'nothing.'" For
    Nietzsche, there is no world apart from a perspective. As his aphorism
    goes, "No, facts is precisely what there is not, only interpretations."

Though such a prospect leads to pessimism -- perhaps even nihilism -- and
even contemplations of suicide for Stencil, this need not be the case.

'Nietzsche's Telling the Truth About History:  Nietzsche's Second "Untimely
Meditation" Interpreted Through Joyce Appleby'
by
David L. R. Kosalka

http://www.geocities.com/lemmingland/untimely.html

snip

    It is quite clear that Nietzsche's position does not require the
    complete abandonment of a search for historical knowledge. In a passage
    from the Genealogy of Morals, one of the most "historical" of his works,
    he attempted to give a description of his perspectivism that outlines
    how this knowledge is possible. There he argues "There is only a
    perspective seeing, only a perspective 'knowing'; and the more eyes,
    different eyes, we can use to observe one thing, the more complete will
    our 'concept' of this thing, our 'objectivity' be." As he presents
    it in "The Uses and Disadvantages of History for Life", "it is the task
    of history to be the mediator between them and thus again and again to
    inspire and lend the strength for the production of the great man,"
    a thriving culture filled with life. However, this can only be done, as
    Appleby indicated, in the full exposure and awareness of the
    difficulties of historical re-enactment.

And this, to me, sounds kinda like Pynchon.

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