“Colonel Harman”

“Colonel Harman” slowly on the move
by doctorzamalek
March 6, 2009

pwcreate:

“I cannot help but imagine Colonel Harman (on horseback, of course) lining his men up along the horizon, preparing for battle. It seems that you’re really pushing for the ’science fiction’ of Post-Speculative Realism to come to fruition. I like where this is going–nothing but good things can come from such a debate.”

The fault lines have always been there, we all feel good will toward each other, and we’re all going to get tired of fighting against correlationism ad nauseum. At a certain point the debate has to move on, and the end of correlationism must be taken as an intellectual fait accompli even if not an institutional one. Institutions need time to catch up. The quantum theorists and psychoanalysts did not wait to convince everyone that they weren’t crazy before developing their doctrines.

My three colleagues are all unusually warm and wonderful people no less than stimulating thinkers, so it’s a pleasure to disagree with them in good faith, knowing that the response will always be reasonable objection rather than carping, pettifogging oneupmanship.

Others may have different views of the fault lines. But for those who may have missed the earlier posts, here’s how they look from where I stand…

Brassier is basically unsympathetic to both phenomenology and actor-network theory, which together form the pillars of my world-view. One way or another, he will be in the thick of things as the eliminativist branch of post-s.r. arises. And I expect the journal Collapse to veer permanently in that direction as well.

Grant’s theory, which I will discuss in Bristol, is a bold sort of Brunonian materialism with monistic undertones– sort of like Spinoza drunk on a few bottles of wine. Aristotle is a great enemy for Grant, a great hero for me, and a number of disagreements are clustered around this differing attitude toward The Philosopher.

Meillassoux exposes correlationism wonderfully by giving it a name, but instead of simply throwing it in the garbage (like the other three of us) he offers a turbocharged version of it, passing through correlationism toward an absolute contingency from which numerous bold deductions follow.

Piecing together the implications of these disputes may well take all of us the rest of our careers, and with any luck, younger people will take these positions in completely unforeseen or even opposite directions.

And as I said in another post, this is why you don’t wait for institutional discourse to catch up before moving forward… Institutions are controlled by people older than you are, but the fate of your work rests ultimately in the hands of younger people, including those not yet born. Don’t stop and wait for institutions to accept what you are doing, except insofar as is necessary to maintain a food and water supply to keep on moving. In military terms– don’t stop and try to reduce every fortress before moving on. It will inflict horrible casualties sometimes, and will always use up time. Just keep moving.