From 1c4a046571a4ce3f034e1dee60a413e616c0720e Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Silvio Rhatto Date: Fri, 23 Feb 2018 09:38:41 -0300 Subject: Books: One-dimensional man: chapter nine --- books/sociedade/one-dimensional-man.md | 167 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 167 insertions(+) (limited to 'books/sociedade') diff --git a/books/sociedade/one-dimensional-man.md b/books/sociedade/one-dimensional-man.md index 2e2574b..b1f752a 100644 --- a/books/sociedade/one-dimensional-man.md +++ b/books/sociedade/one-dimensional-man.md @@ -1637,3 +1637,170 @@ greater productivity without destruction. In other words, the higher historical truth would pertain to the system which offers the greater chance of pacification. + +### Negative Thinking + + To the degree to which the established society is irrational, the analysis in + terms of historical rationality introduces into the concept the negative + element—critique, contradiction, and transcendence. + + This element cannot be assimilated with the positive. It changes the concept in + its entirety, in its intent and validity. Thus, in the analysis of an economy, + capitalist or not, which operates as an “independent” power over and above the + individuals, the negative features (overproduction, unemployment, insecurity, + waste, repression) are not comprehended as long as they appear merely as more + or less inevitable by-products, as “the other side” of the story of growth and + progress. + + True, a totalitarian administration may promote the efficient exploitation of + resources; the nuclear-military establishment may provide millions of jobs + through enormous purchasing power; toil and ulcers may be the by-product of the + acquisition of wealth and responsibility; deadly blunders and crimes on the + part of the leaders may be merely the way of life. One is willing to admit + economic and political madness—and one buys it. But this sort of knowledge of + “the other side” is part and parcel of the solidification of the state of + affairs, of the grand unification of opposites which counteracts qualitative + change, because it pertains to a thoroughly hopeless or thoroughly + preconditioned existence that has made its home in a world where even the + irrational is Reason. + + The tolerance of positive thinking is enforced tolerance—enforced not by any + terroristic agency but by the overwhelming, anonymous power and efficiency of + the technological society. As such it permeates the general consciousness—and + the consciousness of the critic. The absorption of the negative by the positive + is validated in the daily experience, which obfuscates the distinction between + rational appearance and irrational reality. + + [examples follow] + + These examples may illustrate the happy marriage of the positive and the + negative—the objective ambiguity which adheres to the data of experience. It is + objective ambiguity because the shift in my sensations and reflections responds + to the manner in which the experienced facts are actually interrelated. But + this interrelation, if comprehended, shatters the harmonizing consciousness and + its false realism. Critical thought strives to define the irrational character + of the established rationality (which becomes increasingly obvious) and to + define the tendencies which cause this rationality to generate its own + transformation. “Its own” because, as historical totality, it has developed + forces and capabilities which themselves become projects beyond the established + totality. They are possibilities of the advancing technological rationality + and, as such, they involve the whole of society. The technological + transformation is at the same time political transformation, but the political + change would turn into qualitative social change only to the degree to which it + would alter the direction of technical progress—that is, develop a new + technology. For the established technology has become an instrument of + destructive politics. + + Such qualitative change would be transition to a higher stage of civilization + if technics were designed and utilized for the pacification of the struggle for + existence. In order to indicate the disturbing implications of this statement, + I submit that such a new direction of technical progress would be the + catastrophe of the established direction, not merely the quantitative evolution + of the prevailing (scientific and technological) rationality but rather its + catastrophic transformation, the emergence of a new idea of Reason, theoretical + and practical. + + The new idea of Reason is expressed in Whitehead’s proposition: “The function + of Reason is to promote the art of life.”1 In view of this end, Reason is the + “direction of the attack on the environment” which derives from the “threefold + urge: (1) to live, (2) to live well, (3) to live better.”2 + +Then read the rest of the whole chapter 9. It's interesting enough that deserves +to be quoted on its entirety. It talks about the completion of the +Technological Project. Like this: + + Civilization produces the means for freeing Nature from its own brutality, its + own insufficiency, its own blindness, by virtue of the cognitive and + transforming power of Reason. And Reason can fulfill this function only as + post-technological rationality, in which technics is itself the instrumentality + of pacification, organon of the “art of life.” The function of Reason then + converges with the function of Art. + + The Greek notion of the affinity between art and technics may serve as a + preliminary illustration. The artist possesses the ideas which, as final + causes, guide the construction of certain things—just as the engineer possesses + the ideas which guide, as final causes, the construction of a machine. For + example, the idea of an abode for human beings determines the architect’s + construction of a house; the idea of wholesale nuclear explosion determines the + construction of the apparatus which is to serve this purpose. Emphasis on the + essential relation between art and technics points up the specific rationality + of art. + + [...] + + In the contemporary era, the conquest of scarcity is still confined to small + areas of advanced industrial society. Their prosperity covers up the Inferno + inside and outside their borders; it also spreads a repressive productivity and + “false needs.” It is repressive precisely to the degree to which it promotes + the satisfaction of needs which require continuing the rat race of catching up + with one’s peers and with planned obsolescence, enjoying freedom from using the + brain, working with and for the means of destruction. The obvious comforts + generated by this sort of productivity, and even more, the support which it + gives to a system of profitable domination, facilitate its importation in less + advanced areas of the world where the introduction of such a system still means + tremendous progress in technical and human terms. + + However, the close interrelation between technical and political-manipulative + know-how, between profitable productivity and domination, lends to the conquest + of scarcity the weapons for containing liberation. To a great extent, it is the + sheer quantity of goods, services, work, and recreation in the overdeveloped + countries which effectuates this containment. Consequently, qualitative change + seems to presuppose a quantitative change in the advanced standard of living, + namely, reduction of overdevelopment. + + The standard of living attained in the most advanced industrial areas is not a + suitable model of development if the aim is pacification. In view of what this + standard has made of Man and Nature, the question must again be asked whether + it is worth the sacrifices and the victims made in its defense. The question + has ceased to be irresponsible since the “affluent society” has become a + society of permanent mobilization against the risk of annihilation, and since + the sale of its goods has been accompanied by moronization, the perpetuation of + toil, and the promotion of frustration. + + Under these circumstances, liberation from the affluent society does not mean + return to healthy and robust poverty, moral cleanliness, and simplicity. On the + contrary, the elimination of profitable waste would increase the social wealth + available for distribution, and the end of permanent mobilization would reduce + the social need for the denial of satisfactions that are the individual’s + own—denials which now find their compensation in the cult of fitness, strength, + and regularity. + + [...] + + The crime is that of a society in which the growing population aggravates the + struggle for existence in the face of its possible alleviation. The drive for + more “living space” operates not only in international aggressiveness but also + within the nation. Here, expansion has, in all forms of teamwork, community + life, and fun, invaded the inner space of privacy and practically eliminated + the possibility of that isolation in which the individual, thrown back on + himself alone, can think and question and find. This sort of privacy—the sole + condition that, on the basis of satisfied vital needs, can give meaning to + freedom and independence of thought—has long since become the most expensive + commodity, available only to the very rich (who don’t use it). In this respect, + too, “culture” reveals its feudal origins and limitations. It can become + democratic only through the abolition of mass democracy, i.e., if society has + succeeded in restoring the prerogatives of privacy by granting them to all and + protecting them for each. + + [...] + + To take an (unfortunately fantastic) example: the mere absence of all + advertising and of all indoctrinating media of information and entertainment + would plunge the individual into a traumatic void where he would have the + chance to wonder and to think, to know himself (or rather the negative of + himself) and his society. Deprived of his false fathers, leaders, friends, and + representatives, he would have to learn his ABC’s again. But the words and + sentences which he would form might come out very differently, and so might his + aspirations and fears. + + To be sure, such a situation would be an unbearable nightmare. While the people + can support the continuous creation of nuclear weapons, radioactive fallout, + and questionable foodstuffs, they cannot (for this very reason!) tolerate being + deprived of the entertainment and education which make them capable of + reproducing the arrangements for their defense and/or destruction. The + non-functioning of television and the allied media might thus begin to achieve + what the inherent contradictions of capitalism did not achieve—the + disintegration of the system. The creation of repressive needs has long since + become part of socially necessary labor—necessary in the sense that without it, + the established mode of production could not be sustained. Neither problems of + psychology nor of aesthetics are at stake, but the material base of domination. -- cgit v1.2.3