I wish we would consider our own culture
as something as foreign to ourselves
as cultures, let’s say, Arapesh, Hopi, or Nambikwara
or like the Chinese culture for instance
of course, since long ago, we have tried to recapture,
by the work of historians or sociologists
so, to recapture in this way our own culture
but historians study mostly economic phenomena’s
sociologists study what? Well emotional, political, sexual behavior
I think until now we have never considered as a phenomenon foreign to ourselves
our own knowledge
The list he does here, sociologist, historians
none of them would recognize themselves in these definitions
Saying sociologist are interested in sexuality.....
sociology starts, (I'm thinking of Durkheim)
when social facts are treated as things.
I am a kind and calm person (not me, it’s a picture)
almost lymphatic
and suddenly I become unrestrained
and almost mad in a stadium
because my team scored a goal.
In society my behaviors are different than they are alone.
so this is.....a little weak....
And what I tried to do
is to treat, as if it was something
here, in front of us,
as if it was a foreign and distant phenomenon
like the culture of Nambikwara or Arapesh
all this occidental knowledge formed since the antique Greek
and it this ethnological situation of our knowledge that I wanted to recapture
So it’s like looking to one self in the mirror as if we were strangers to our selves
As if we were strangers to our selves.
I waited for this reference to come twice
this reference to ethnology
At that time, it was not called anthropology yet
as it's been generalized since then.
in fact, since Levi-Strauss, this is my point
we still speak of ethnology, even Foucault
one of the most illustrious representatives of what is developing from Levi-Strauss' initiative.
It is from Levi-Strauss....
the first sentence of "Tristes Tropiques":
"One should start by killing all explorers."
the dream of the white man has always been to be the only one where he arrives.
it is François de Negroni, great Africanist, who made this statement
although he is still respectful towards Levi-Strauss
but it is so typical of white men
to wish the extermination of all other whites that are spoiling the view.
and to finish as being....
you guess whom?
there where there's still white stains in Africa
and unexplored places at that time
and one was searching in the central big forest of Congo
this kind of African amazon
and there where hopes that in this quest
we would find at last the missing link between monkey and man
a solution in evolution
a kind of Yeti
in the jungle of snowy solitudes
and indeed in the deep jungle the original man was found
it was a German: Johnny Weissmuller
which will generate the Tarzan series
Occidental mythology is incredible
and then in all the films related to the theme of Tarzan
there are always carriers
2 or 3 are first devoured by crocodiles
then some fall in the abyss with the luggage
so we are rid of the natives, there are only 2 or 3 left once arrived at the elephants' cemetery, all of them white.
So.....Levi-Strauss founded anthropology to take a distance with what was ethnology
now for Foucault...
I was waiting for him to make this second reference
before he made this blunder
Foucault is probably one of the most intelligent and cultivated men of the century
but Paris is full of fine, cultivated and intelligent men, that's not the point
and Levi-Strauss had a beautiful musical culture
the ideological blindness has nothing to do whit the level of culture and knowledge, unfortunately
this may also be valid for me, but its not for me to say.
and I don’t have the same level of knowledge and culture
I may not have half of his level
but this reference to ethnology
what makes me stop on this
because he says: "we must return it on ourselves, it has never been done "
I think I can remember....
I'm afraid to say....
maybe forty years ago
I saw this video...long ago
and what had struck me
were all these moments where he establishes a cut with all what was before him
He doesn't say "I"
he is fine, well educated, French, courteous
he says "Until Sartre " which means "before me"
I can't help myself thinking about Hegel
who in his political testament "principles to the philosophy of law"
in which he makes fun
of the libertarians of his time, the romantics
they were not left-wing people, on the contrary they were counter-revolutionary
they hated French revolution
and Hegel noticed something
they all have a common trait
maybe not a trait, a common reflex
they all say " it is precisely now....."
as if the world had been waiting for them
for a new radical thinking.
It is now and this now is always renewed indefinitely
Nearer to your generation you had a famous French president who claimed "the change is now"
so here!
this is what we are facing
I seem to be forcing the line, but I'm not ironic when I say he's intelligent and cultivated.
Foucault is not Michel Onfray, it's serious.
I envy his pictorial culture
although on music he doesn't say much, as Heidegger
I don't think there's any randomness in that regard.
but it is curious he claims to be Nietzschean
Nietzsche was an idol for him
Nietzsche who wrote "Twilight of the Idols "
said "without music life would be a mistake"
Meanwhile
he often turns back on this side
now I do care for what he says:
to practice an ethology of ourselves
to look at ourselves with objectivity
not necessarily as insects, but why not, I see no problem
all our behaviors in streets, cafés,
on the beach, during holidays, at work
whilst flirting, at lunch etc..
but where he is completely wrong
and he would know if he thought a second about it
Because I see here a self-deception not a blindness
it has always happened !....
what about the traditional so called "French moralists"
not moralizing morality, 'moraline' as would Nietzsche call it.
those who study morals
La Rochefoucauld, Pascal....
when Pascal says: all our reasoning is reduced to giving in to the feeling
That's in the 17th century!
for one of the greatest mathematicians of all time, how courageous! and such self-humiliation of intelligence
all our reasoning reduced to giving in to the feeling
as if you would have a perfect reasoning but at the very last second
what wins out is the feeling
La Rochefoucault :"Some would never fall in love if they would not have heard of it."
this is already Foucault's structuralist program
the primacy of the signifier, language
not to bring here my Lacan or their Lacan
it's still Levi-Strauss who initiated all this.
speaking of structure
his first publication was "structural anthropology"
it's to remind us of all these prerequisites
it’s good to turn the projector on the projector itself
although, Auguste Comte, 19th century, said:
"you can't be on the balcony watching yourself walking in the street"
but it's ok as a methodology
and human sciences were very recent when Foucault was speaking
just before the war
and I think of Durkheim who founded sociology
I think he is quoted somewhere in this video
I heard him on the radio, I never saw these pictures
and Durkheim says that sociology to exist
as a full discipline
not absorbed by its 2 extremes: Biology (explaining behavior as neuro science today with stimulus, reflex, enzyme)
and on the other extreme: History
I quote: "social facts must be treated as things "
that's what he says
I agree on the method
but I had to point this trait
to make us think that it is done for the first time.
we must be careful with these statement
 
In the film "Children of Paradise"
in the beginning when Baptiste's father in the funambulist theater says:
"The public always wants novelty, but novelty is as old as the world !"
Now let's turn back to structuralism.
There's here, of course, a great difficulty
because how can we know ourselves if not with our own knowledge
it is all within our own mental frames, our categories of knowledge
that helps us to know ourselves
and if we want to know about these categories of knowledge we find ourselves in a complex situation
it needs a twist of our reasoning onto itself
to manage to recapture it
as a foreign phenomenon
out of itself,
inside out as a glove
and it is the beginning of this effort I have engaged.
What would be the ideal ethnologist?
Which race? which nationality?
One could say that the good ethnologist of our own culture
would be a Chinese, an Arapesh or Nambikwara
Foucault has repeated the same ethnological series twice:
Iroquoian, Arapesh, Nambikwara, of course they have been studied by Levi-Strauss.
so, there is here a filiation, that's fine.
but he is part of what is already becoming a tradition
more important
when he says "We must..." who is this "We"?
I just heard him say "We Westerners ",
defining what we are since antic Greece
this annoys me a lot
let me use a detour to make it clear
There was this draft of the European constitution, rejected by the French, still being imposed
in 2005
Refused by a majority of French.
There had been an attempt to include the Christian reference in the European Constitution
(Giscard....who knew his right-wing electorate)
it's not about being for or against it
what bothers me is to put one reference and ommit the other.
we cannot understand our....
what he calls "Our", what he means by "We"
the modern hates modernity and the Westerner hates the West.
Let me summarize.
In order for the trees not to hide the forest.
That's the reason why we love baroque music.
because Modernity hates Modernity
and we enjoy reminding ourselves of the old regimen.
so, Us the Greeks....
Either we insist on our Christian roots
and we neglect our Greek roots which are enormous
Democracy, Plato, look at Versailles, all its aesthetic is inspired by Greek art
not only the columns, statues, everything
just have a walk in the park
not to mention literature, take away the Greek mythology
you lose all the theater of Racine.
So one cannot ignore it.
and claim "our essence is Christianity"
on the other hand, one cannot say it is Greek
here we find a reference to Foucault's idol: Nietzsche.
I don't want to ignore our schizophrenia.
we have a Greek leg and a Christian leg
we must deal with it
and what frightens me
with things that are going to break out in a movement, free for now, we will have the opportunity to sustain it.
the great counter-revolutionary face that is here testing its claws
2 years before 1968
this video is from 1966 if I remember correctly.
one of the things that characterizes it
the counter-revolution is an anti- Marxism, we must be clear
After liberation it was difficult to say anything bad about it
50 million dead, 30 were communists.
Dead fighting the Nazis
and the Americans arrived when the Reds were already in Berlin
to prevent Europe from becoming communist.
We must put events back in order.
and insist on what can explain this year (66) we are dealing with.
De Gaulle is nearing the end.
on the right he was bothering Americans
and on the left you had communists
both declined after 68. This must be understood
You can measure it, it's not an opinion.
look at statistics, forces declining after 68,
and Foucault is an emblematic thinker of that time.
for those who did 68, it's him, Deleuze,
later, Derrida.
I am not judging their values...
But it must be known that they evacuated everything that was bothering them.
I am not against America, very good things come from it.
but Atlanticism is another thing.
first, Atlanticists are not all American.
Macron, Giscard, Mitterrand,
they all brought us back to what we call "integrated command"
Americans decide on a whim to get into war with and the rest have to follow.
Something De Gaulle wanted to avoid
I voted against De Gaulle all my life
but I can admit some positive points of his foreign policy
his opposition to Vietnam war can be praised.
the French retreat from NATO
from the integrated command precisely
he never retired France from the Atlanticist alliance
with the Cuban crisis he was ready to support the U.S.
why do I this detour?
because it's revolving around
these forces who won at the "Liberation"
at that time, those who had supported Vichy, hugged the walls
from 1945 to 1968
They hugged the walls!
for a tenth of what is now being said
on Tv or on blogs
30 years ago you would have a thousand people in the street shouting "fascism won’t pass"
Now it's becoming commonplace
at far-right wing it is obvious, but often, also, in what is thought by the left wing
on the other hand
it is now returning on itself
and 1966 is a pivotal moment.
a fundamental theme of this counter-revolution
will be precisely to design arbitrarily
a cursed referent in the West
we are not far from what I call the cursed triangle
Humanism, Universalism, and Progress
All three start declining during this period.
and Foucault is one of the main craftsmen
of the discredit thrown on what we called "Historicism"
even when it's History and not Historicism
because the notion of structure is much more timeless
and you'll hear him now saying he prefers
deployment in the geographical area
than the historical reference (which took us thousands of years to obtain)
all this comment on the "We", who is this "We"?
for some it was the Christian west
and I'll finish on this
it is very well known....   and this is why this video is good since it is exhaustive at this level
Foucault's favorite and recurring targets, but not only him, also Deleuze
they are differences between Deleuze and Foucault but what they have in common, thinkers of 68 (not to speak of Derrida)
I don’t mention the positive references (Nietzsche, Spinoza, and so on)
but the negative references
is nearly always against: Cartesianism, Platonism & Christianity
now I don't what to amalgamate.
but
when one thinks of philosophers much less famous
(ones that should be taught in primary school)
not to follow their ideas but to show what it leads to
a philosopher like Alfred Bäumler
a philosopher that Hitler settled into Germans academics
to get rid of Hegel
Hegelianism, progressism...
not even Marxism, there was no Marxism in universities at that time
So this Bäumler
had as a target
Cartesianism, Platonism & Christianity
when all three are the same it looks odd
I do not agree fully in Plato or Descartes
but these 3 together....
it is like someone who tells me; "I am anti-Gaullist"
I say, "Great I am as well!"
but he goes on "I am for French Algeria and against independence for Arabs"
There would be a misunderstanding here
We would both be against De Gaulle but for opposite reasons.
I understand that someone can be against De Gaulle
I understand someone being against communism.
One may have very honorable reason to be.
Spirituality or something...
but when you are both
neither communist neither for De Gaulle.
it’s the Vichy program.
Its neither communist nor resistant.
No other choice (except a few royalists)
But only two massive organizations, Right and Left
This generalized attack against rationalism (Plato, Descartes)
I can’t help myself from quoting Goethe
A German, a good one
facing the Deutschtum
When the first national feeling was emerging
he called it Deutschtum
Dum is idiot in German
and he said:
"If you despise science and reason, the highest gifts of humanity then you abandon to the devil and you are lost"
As if he had guessed the destiny of Germany
but after all, with what category
with which frame of thought
could this Chinese or Arapesh
know us, if not with
our own mental frames
so it is us again
who would best manage
if we could turn on ourselves
and look at ourselves as a mirror.
we would probably be more able
to do this work
of ethnology of our own culture
We could of course imagine a Martian
who's thinking would manage to recapture ours entirely
Maybe this Martian would come to know us
but it’s just a supposition
Since, as far as I know it, they do not exist.
This is fascinating.
We see all the complexity and ambivalence of his statement
First, he refers to ethnology
the ethnological approach of our own culture
Considered as if it was a foreign culture
That's a good point
I must repeat again
This is what Durkheim wanted for sociology
social facts as things
not a kind of deep introspection
That's alright
after comes the question
Who would be the ideal demystification at this level?
he answers logically with his mental ethnological model
it would be a Chinese or a Nambikwara
And suddenly he says: "it's impossible"
because he should do it with Our categories
so, it means: only me Foucault can do the job
someone who belongs to our culture but
by miracle, is the only one not determined by the frames of our culture
and can exit.
A very interesting sequence
it's not an effect of grace, is it?
very curious and also
Quickly
We feel here permanently a trial of universalism
implying that as long as we won’t understand that what we believe to be universal
for us westerners is only part of our culture
and that Bantou do not consider in the same way
I'm not caricaturing, many think this way, it's called relativism
here again it is not an amalgam
but it is the dream of the Medef (Movement of the Enterprises of France)
Marx's Communist Party manifesto ends with a very famous sentence
"Proletarians of all countries, unite!"
this is lot of work! it means stop fighting
between Hutu and Tutsi, Corsican and French, gays and heterosexuals.......
between blacks and whites, Jews and Arabs
anything that is identity
a catastrophe in our actual world
any possible opposition as long as it's not the social class
because social classes are not imaginary identities
it is measurable, it’s not qualitative, it's quantitative.
That's important.
so proletarians unite!
I think of this yellow vest called Bashir
I saw his interview
they asked him "Are there any fascists in your group?"
he said: "maybe, we have fascists, leftists, blacks, whites but we don't care."
and this "we do not care" was for me so releasing.
Something is happening taking us out of 68
out of identities
because identity policy can cause millions of deaths.
Today they are commemorating
the Rwanda genocide
who started on a 7th of April
the biggest after-war genocide after the Khmer Rouges
who were more Green than Red
they emptied the city to fill the countryside
Survivalists
this universalism rejoices those who have an interest in dividing us
this is why I quoted Marx
Capital has no interest in our unification
It would be dangerous to stop identity quarrels
Man, woman, old, young
if Corsica gets independent, north and south will quarrel for who is the more authentic
when imagination is involved, it never ends.
precisely
we never find in reality what corresponds to the imaginary.
This is well illustrated by the Greek myth of Procrustes.
So this relativism that appears as a progress in thinking
is useful for obtuse dogmatics
but in general, it can be exploited in a fearful way
by the capital
"while you fight against each other, we do our profit"
it's not "proletarians unite!" its "proletarians keep quarreling!"
this is today's moto
Is this attitude a philosophical one, or the opposite?
it is very difficult to define what is actually philosophy
and for a long time, I would say until Sartre
-Sartre includes? - Yes
Philosophy has been an autonomous discipline
I would say, closed on itself
Foucault, and other thinkers of his time, want to show that they introduce a radical cut with what there was before
so he's liquidating Sartre
he may, I am not defending Sartre
but nothing is older in Philosophy than what we call a parricidal
Socrates, disciple of Parmenides
then he contradicts Parmenides
Aristotle kills Plato
then Spinoza kills Descartes
and Kant who kills both
then Hegel critics Kant and Marx critics Hegel
Marx's first publication is a critic of Hegel's philosophy
There's nothing more recurrent than parricide in history of philosophy
He wants to make a cut and the first thing he does is what all philosophers ever did since the beginning
funny
Philosophy has always thought about cultural objects
proposed, in a way, from the outside
it has been thinking about God because theology proposed so
it has been thinking about science
because all our systems of knowledge were offering this object
philosophy was an open discipline
but it had its method
Its particular forms of reasoning, deductions,
but now, it appears to me that philosophy
is vanishing
I don't mean we are at an age where finally all the knowledge has become positive
I think philosophy dissolves and dissipates
in many other intellectual activities
which we can hardly tell if they are properly science or philosophy
we are reaching an age that is perhaps of pure thought
thought in action
after all, a discipline so abstract and general as linguistics
as fundamental as logic
an activity as literature
since Joyce, for instance
Well, all these activities are intellectuals
they serve as a substitute to philosophy
they don't take the place of it
but they are a kind of deployment of what philosophy used to be
- philosophy is a "has been"
since when? since me, Foucault
up to Sartre it was still philosophy
he's cute ...
of course, I'm not deciding on the substance
to agree on words is one of the philosophical objects
Socrates started in the street of Athens: "what do you name this? and that?"
what do you name wisdom, gymnastic, music and so on
not "what is it?" but " what do you name?"
there have been deep thoughts long before Socrates
in China or India
they did not wait for the birth of philosophy in Athene
to express deep thoughts
but there are only thoughts, religious, spirituality, mysticism.....
what becomes specifically philosophical with Socrates....
(we must recall these specificities to check if they are effectively vanishing)
it starts when the problem
is not the thing we are talking about
but the word that design it
rightly or wrongly, maybe philosophy is useless making fuss with words
in Plato's Gorgias for instance
Socrates whose subject was the speaking skills, so important to Greeks
you couldn't access a political position without speaking skills
the art of convincing the mass
to be elected
it is important in a culture, as a democratic progress,
to give power to word not to force
the parliament, agora....
but you need to learn to talk
and sophist where well paid for that
so, Socrates (freely) ask a question to the famous Gorgias
- what is the art of speech?
the other answers: "one of the most beautiful thing "
- you didn't answer, what is it?
- well... it's the art of persuading
-ok, so you are a geometer
- why?
-when you demonstrate in geometry you persuade...
- no! I didn't mean that
so we progress and discover at the end it is not the most beautiful thing
it's a sordid thing
the big difference between geometry and the art of speaking
think of a corrupt lawyer.
he defends his client even if he's the worst scumbag
that what he is paid for
in geometry we demonstrate to find a truth
but in speaking, we care less about the truth than about persuading the audience
it's sordid
This reflection on words is far from useless
or far from being concrete
there is a very curious writing of Hegel about that
a kind of humorous entertainment:
"- who thinks abstractly?
" -philosophers?"
"- no it is the man in the street who thinks abstractly because he doesn’t question himself about the words he uses "
when we look at philosophy's specificity, I am not sure it is dead
Foucault's work, that he does often perfectly,
his best side is his archaeologist side
asking from when.....
he studied how we went from sovereignty to suddenly talk about population, people
this shift in meaning and words he was very attentive to it
and this philosophy is not dead
the dream of every philosopher is to put an end to philosophy
not only Foucault
Hegel already claimed he was putting the end point to philosophy
Spinoza built a system that was supposed to answer every problem
Descartes:
"These long chains of reasons, all simple and easy, that surveyors usually use to achieve their most difficult demonstrations, had given me the opportunity to imagine that all things, which can fall under the knowledge of men, follow one another in the same way ".
"and that, provided only that we refrain from receiving any for true whoever is, and that we always keep the order necessary to deduce them from each other, there can be no such distance from which we finally do not reach, nor so hidden that we do not discover".
as we would discover a woman in a bed
Descartes was a mousquetaire, beware
so yes, every philosopher claim he has ended philosophy
philo-sophia, the love of wisdom
so the desire to have it
is ended since now I got it
Last Plato for instance
it has been noticed that in his Dialogues, Socrates is the only one to speak
so why not, philosophy is maybe dead
I will finish on a precise point
the three thinkers, I use here an expensive term that can contain what is philosophical and what is not
linguist, writers, Joyce...
in Joyce you find everything
theater, poetry, philosophy, physics, religion, psychoanalysis
whatever you want, as in Proust
the 3 thinkers who have caused the most philosophical ink flow
and inspired reflection of other philosophers
in the common or academic sense
Marx, Nietzsche, Freud
these three are precisely
none of the three is a philosopher
Marx writes "misery of philosophy"
philosophy as an ideology
Marx improved the science of history
in philosophy and its and its fantasized reflection
Nietzsche makes fun of philosophers
ruled by the will power written in the language
in the way of speaking
and Freud, no use to comment
Freud is a doctor not a philosopher
None of 3 wished to situate himself in philosophy
the 3 have considered philosophy as outdated
and in the same time
there has never been so much philosophical work
than in the comments of those 3
an interesting paradox to remember
and you can check that with Foucault
since Foucault said philosophy is dead, most of the philosophers are studying Foucault more than anyone else
I think he is the most quoted in the world, statistically, among human science authors
the French doctor as he is called in California
- what idea have you of Man?
I think man has been, if not a bad dream, if not a nightmare,
at least a very particular and determined figure
situated historically inside our culture
- you mean it’s an invention? - Yes, it is
in the 19th century
and in the first half of the 20th
it was thought than Man was the fundamental reality in which we could be interested
An impression that it was the quest of truth on Man
who had, since antic Greece, animated all researches
maybe of science
certainly, of moral
and for sure of philosophy
When we look more closely
One can wonder if this idea of Man existing from the beginning
and was here, waiting to be taken care for
by science, by philosophy....
one can wonder if this idea is not an illusion, a typical 19th century illusion
effectively, until the end of the 18th century
roughly until French revolution
Man was never cared for
let me rewind, not to the 18th century, but 2000 years ago
Terence, the Roman playwright,
during the Roman republic
there is nothing new here and Foucault knows it very well
but obviously he doesn't want to know
Terence is the one who said this famous sentence:
"Homo sum, humani nihil a me alienum puto"
"I am human, and I think nothing human is alien to me."
it has been said that it heralds Christianity
it is universality
it's written in the Bible that none is a prophet in his own country
Christianity had more success out of its original country
but this is exaggerated, we didn’t wait the 19th century to speak of man in a generic way
-It is still curious that this notion of humanism
that we attribute to the Renaissance
notion of humanism is very recent
you don't find the word humanism before the 19th century
because this word is a 19th century invention
the end of this century
before the 19th century it is as if man did not exist
what exist was a certain number of issues
a certain number of knowledge and reflection forms
where it was about the nature, truth, movement, order,
it was about imagination and representation and so on
but not actually about men
- he starts here with a historical inaccuracy
precisely an inexactitude
the word itself did not exist or very unusual
man, humanism,
but he adds: it was out of the question
but all the questions he just agitated
god, truth, nature, and so on
I don't see which animal is asking them outside men.
Man is a figure that constituted itself at the end of the 18th century
at the beginning of the 19th
and gave birth to what has been called human sciences
this Man, brand new, invented at the end of 18th century, also gave birth to all this humanism
whose Marxism, existentialism, are a testimony to it,
the more visible actually
it's curious that he would attack progressive thoughts
there is a Man's trial done before Foucault, during the third Reich
it was clear that all the Nazi theorists, read Rosenberg, read Kriek
one should know these guys
it would warn some people
who think they have new ideas today
and are very near what I am illustrating
Baumler, I also quoted earlier
spend their time criticizing Goethe or Hegel
why? because for them, it is Weimar's humanism
let me remind you that Weimar was the summit of German culture at that time
but it is also, 2 centuries later, the Weimar republic that Nazi were fighting to take power
One must be careful with these things
there is a precedent for the liquidation of humanism: the third Reich
I don't mean Foucault would have been please to militate in the SS
Is he only aware of how this kind of lyricism can be exploited?
I don’t really care, it's not the question
for victims it's useless to know if it was intentional or not
what matters is that it goes in the same direction,
we needed to change gears at that time.
precisely, since I am speaking of the third Reich, in relation to all what was politically issued
from horrors of war and everything that appeared at Liberation of France
as I said earlier, Gaullism on the right and communism on the left
beside their opposition, they historically illustrated themselves in the French Resistance
we are now so shameful of this word that the word is disappearing
and the word resilience is used instead just to avoid "resistance"
this started in this 68, not the one of workers
- but I think that paradoxically
development of human sciences
lead us know rather to a disappearance of Man than to an apotheosis
Effectively, what's happening now with human sciences?
Well, Human sciences do not discover the individual concrete kernel
positive, in a way, of human existence
on the contrary, what we see, when we study the behaviors and structures of, let's say, the family (Levi-Strauss)
or the big European myths (Dumézil)
or when we study the history of our knowledge
we find out that what is discovered is not Man in his truth
the positive side of Man
what is discover is a kind of system of thinking
large formal organizations
that are, in some way, as the ground
on which historic individuality appears
this leads thinking, reflection, to inverse itself
in relation to what it still was a few years ago
it is necessary to note here this notion of historical individuality
you have historical individuality in the Indians of Mato Grosso
who would have nothing to do with the Indo-European studied by Dumézil
so, there's a kind of archipelago
where peaces of humanity are isolated from each other with no communication
this is rehabilitation by Foucault, (and his followers at the time) of the discontinued
in relation to a historical continuity you have in Marxism with the history of production modes
from carved stone to polished stone, from bronze to iron, there is a continuity
and even a progress, not in the sense of a value judgment but in the measurable sense, objective
I mean, to make this table you may need two minutes with a machine when it took a full day before
this is the only way to mention objectively progress, after that anyone can make a value judgment about it.
So it is a way to introduce discontinuity and discreet in these society
in fact, all these themes overlap
It is a way to separate humanity
into entities
which don't rejoin
and to divide when common interest would be to stay united
this is very significant
the more you look at Man the less you see, (and he says it strangely enough), what is positive
so we don’t know if it means positive on the moral level
and human sciences, if they exist,
I am not sure there is really something called «Human science"
in the sense of the hard sciences
there are not many anthropologists that agree together
and luckily Man is not object of these "science"
because it would mean Man is determined
the same way planet's movement are determined
or carbon chemistry
There is an edifice of human sciences to be done
but since (I quote here Clouscard)
Human sciences did not develop to bring out precisely what constitutes human universality
but more to lock in the nascent Marxism
they go nowhere.
and it's easy for him to say after that we have only outlines
With Lévi-Strauss we have an identity, that of the Amazonian Indians
and with Dumezil we have Indo-European
if we look closely we realize myths always tell the same story
an example before we go further
when you see the role of the blacksmith
in the Germanic epic of Nibelung which Wagner used to make the Ring
as described in the Scandinavian states
the blacksmith god, the god with a hammer, Thor in the Viking mythology
when you look at the blacksmith god
who plays a fundamental part,
who forges the weapon that makes it possible to be invulnerable
you find the same in the Manding epic of Sahelian Africa
for those who know, not many except French speaking  African scholars
the young Soundiata Keïta of this African Illiad that is the Manding epic
Manding, Malenke
in Malenké you find the word malicious
it was a great empire at that time, 11th to 14th century, before there were beaten by the Songhaï .
it is the blacksmith, the same, who forges the weapon that will make Soundiata Keïta invulnerable.
and allow him to access to his role of Epic fonder
while apparently there is nothing in common
Nazi would have been furious if they knew this common point between the Germanic and the African blacksmith
remember Hitler calling the French "white niggers"
So, I am not sure all these things are separated
like archipelagos, his example is good, or like mountain peaks without footbridges
and without any possible communication between populations
-I think we live actually the big cut with the 19th century
and this cut, after all, we experience it
not as the refusal or rejection
but has a distance taken towards Sartre
Sartre who is a great philosopher
Sartre is still a 19th century man
I'd rather take on the role of the nerdy progressive than the hip reactionary.
he's blaming Sartre for being a man of the past.
that's not an argument, it doesn't mean if he is right or wrong philosophically or scientifically
it just means "the old man is a little crazy"
he enjoys listening to New Orleans jazz
not Sartre, i mean...
he knew no other jazz...
he is still on Beethoven's symphonies
it's the best way to be a dissuasive to a worldly level
like when someone tells you "it's not that simple!"
so easy! I have the complexity you have the simplicity
this makes a big effect on masses because being simple is not popular
these are the argument that Clouscard called "these fundamental worldly categories"
- why? because the whole enterprise of Sartre has been to make Man adequate to his own meaning
Sartre's entire enterprise was to find what is absolutely authentic in human existence
he wanted to bring the man back to himself
make him possessor of meanings that might have escaped him.
and after all, in a philosophy of alienation
and alienation that must be overcome
that Sartre thinking is situated
while for us it is all the contrary we are aiming at
we want to show that what is individual, singular, properly experienced in Man
is just a kind of surface flicker
above large formal systems
and current thinking must reconstruct these formal systems
on which float from time to time the cumulus and clouds of the existence itself
what is this formal system? it's not very clear
it's neither a critique....
I mean, it's not to criticize but to try and make it clear
he tells us what it is not
but he is replacing it by " we, what we want is.."
instead of this surface flicker to use his expressions.
he wants to show that instead of Man there are formal systems...that's not very clear
but from the point of view of code between philosophers it's much clearer
to come back to his Levy-Strauss preface, it's in "the raw and the cooked" that we find it
and in this preface of a book marked by music
Levi-Strauss claim that his model used to be linguistic but now it was more music
he made me understand how one must listen, very interesting, in relation to time
and at one moment he says: "Mr Ricoeur said my system was a Kantism without a transcendental subject...
...I admit I agree with this designation"
So Levi-Strauss himself ratifies his attachment to Kantism
except that the fact there is no transcendental subject is more an advantage for him than a inconvenient
now, why such a development?
because Clouscard says that the common gender, the generic theme common to all counter-revolutionary thinking is neo-kantism
Not Kant!
Kant was at the forefront of the thinking of his time, not someone going backwards
but neo-Kantism, using Kant
to lock down the progress that has occurred since French revolution, to summarize.
now if this is confused, it can be clarified with the extraordinary correspondence of the "3 young people"
in the seminar of theology where they grew up
at that time, they had not many choices
Hegel, Schelling and Holderlin;
the greatest philosophers and poet of all time in the same student bedroom!
I wish I would have been a little mouse
and in their correspondence as they leave school and start teaching for some
they write a lot
Kant was not even dead yet, old but alive
and they said: "the priests are recovering all of Kant's teaching"
to show you that you must distinguish a critique of Kant and a critique of Kant's recuperation.
for the benefit of counter-revolutionary thinking
at the time it was to fight against what were called French ideas
i.e. revolutionary
So you see, Kantism without transcendental subject
let me finish this long parenthesis since we are properly in philosophy here
by reminding what Levi-Strauss says himself to explain what Foucault tells in a relatively more transparent way
when he talks about these formal constraints, these formal fields in which we are unknowingly immersed
which are- a Kantian term- a priori in relation to my own thought that I believe to be sovereign, independent and autonomous.
Levi-Strauss goes so far as to say: "I'm not trying to say what men think in huts, but how myths are thought through men."
and even, why not, how myths themselves think about each other.
An example of that:
When in the myth of the Tower of Babel, humanity is punished for trying to get to the level of God
not punished this time by fire (Sodom and Gonorrhea)
neither by the punishment of water, the flood
but much smarter than all that, by the confusion of languages
God decode that from now on, all the workers of this work site
underscores the fact that until then humanity knew only one language
and now we're scrambling languages
so people don't get along anymore and start fighting.
and the site remains as it is now: eternally unfinished
now this apart let’s take Greek philosophy which these guys fully oppose as Nietzschean
"Greece owns nothing to Orient or Semites "
the myth of Prometheus is the same
Prometheus is punished for having wanted to fetch from the gods something to make man equal to the gods: fire
myths think themselves to each other, I will conclude
to approve Foucault when he says in the frame of structural thought
and this one of Kant's big achievement
for instance, I think I watch what I want, no,
space must be given, because if not I see nothing at all
and my knowledge of space does not come from my vision, I am not an empiricist, he breaks with the Anglo-Saxon tradition
on the contrary, to have an experience, space must be given first, how could I see if space (not to mention time) is not given?
-To make sure I got it well, I don't see how an awareness, a political latitude could result from your work's attitude
- Of course, it's always these questions that are asked to those who are destroying a myth
and who have not still reconstructed a new mythology
for instance, for a very long-time philosophy maintained such a close relationship with theology that it was up to philosophy to say what morality or politic could and should be deduced from the existence of God
When philosophy and culture discovered the death of God
then immediately it has been said: "if good is dead everything is allowed"
if god is dead there is no morality possible
if god is dead what politic should we follow?
I make a cut here because it illustrates what was said earlier
reference to Nietzsche is here transparent: the death of God
but modern thought, or post modern
since it is the beginning of post modernity, which has a grudge against modernity
the movements deployed since the French revolution
Maybe even a revenge, maybe "horribile dictua” Nietzschean reproach: a resentment
against modernity, re-sentimental thinking
accumulates corpses
the 18th century solved its problems with metaphysics: Age of Enlightenment
After Kant one cannot do metaphysics as before without the suspicion that we're in an illusion
so, metaphysics is dead
with Nietzsche God is dead
with Foucault Man is dead
interesting ...
and now it's the gender
- Experience has shown that moral and political reflection has never been more alive
had been stronger and more abundant
from the moment we knew God was dead
- but human figure, Man was here
- Now that man is disappearing
we are asked the same question as those who once proclaimed the death of God
we are told: if man is dead then everything is possible
or more precisely we will be told everything is necessary
- There are some excellent things in all these developments
that's what I appreciate most, but....
paradoxically, it is when he joins thoughts that he rejects elsewhere
what is being said?
That which we believe to be an obstacle to reflection, to philosophy because if we take away God we take away morality
It's from Dostoyevsky, the Karamazov brothers
When Yvan Karamazov says:
"if god does not exist everything is allowed"
and Foucault replies: no, it is the beginning of a new reflection
when Kant says "I have reduced knowledge to make room for faith" it means it all
the fact of no longer drawing the laws from his action, his morals, his principles, a pre-established religion or a revelation....
but to decide between men as since the French revolution
and democratically as it should be done
it's a field of new and very interesting issues
but precisely what makes me laugh is that it's in line with Hegel's great thesis
whom he hates and recuse
(recuse is not of his words, he is not Deleuze)
but he recuses by rejecting a continuity in the central stories
for Hegel the reflection, philosophy is always fueled by the crisis, and that is what he is saying
I really like the part where Foucault says: "when the pillar on which a culture was based has just collapsed and we don't have a new one"
as Rilke says: "What was once is gone and what is about to be is not yet"
coming to late in a world to early
no, coming to late in a world to old
and indeed, these are the most fertile periods
but this is Hegel's thesis: philosophy is the daughter of the crisis
it is the collapse of the Greek city that throws Socrates into the streets, to question
it is the decline of the old regime that spreads the enlightenment until Rousseau
Rousseau marks a break (Kant called him the Newton of morality)
it is at the moment when something disappears that a whole new field of problems appears
for centuries of monarchical feudalism, it has been the struggle, in Marxian terms, of peasants against the owners of the land
since the industrial revolution it completely collapsed
and it's the workers' struggle against the bosses
it is very different
employees ...to take a more extensive term
So yes, it's very fruitful, but it's not a very new idea either.
- What this great absence, the death of God, uncovered
was the space of freedom?
what we are now uncovering after the disappearance of the man
in this thin gap left by Man now erased
what we see emerging is the fabric of a kind of necessity
the large network of systems to which we belong
and then we are told everything is necessary
well, it is likely, just as in the space of freedom left by God's death
the great political and moral systems; Marxism, Nietzsche, existentialism
could have been built in the same way
we will see above this framework some of the needs that we are now trying to address
we will see the emergence of major political and moral options
- colder, no?
maybe, and I must say
even if we don't see any of them coming up because after all, you can't predict the future, well it's not a big deal
we've discovered over the past 50 years that literature is no longer meant to distract
nor music to give visceral sensations
Well, I wonder if thought has anything else to do but prescribe to men what they have to do.
It would be nice if the thought could think of itself entirely.
if the thought could discover what is unconscious in the thickness of what we think
- curious statement "it has been realized for 50 years that literature can do more than entertaining"
so me, Foucault the modern, to deploy a radical new sequence I must first reduce the old one
who will make us believe that the adventure entrusted by Rimbaud....
Rimbaud never claimed that poetry was made to distract us
it is so reductive with regard to the past
so much have happened in literature
Madame de Mentenon told Racine to make plays for the moral education of young girls from Saint Cyr
an orphan where there were girls from high society
who were supposed to be moralized by that scoundrel Racine
I love Racine, don’t take me wrong,
but it was to moralize these young girls that he wrote "Esther and Athaliah"
which are the most dreadful plays.
when you see Aethalia’s dream
it would take a great filmmaker to direct it
"the bones that the dogs dragging in the mud were fighting over"
"it was during the horror of a deep night"
what's interesting about his conclusion is that he's relativizing
he is right to say that after the death of God we believed that it was the end of philosophy whereas it was in many ways a beginning
and the major cut, it's funny that it makes an appearance in what he said.
he said very well that what appears at the death of Man is the establishment of a necessity
it takes no great clerk to see in the history of thought that necessity is traditionally opposed to freedom in philosophical dichotomy
necessity is on the determinism side, y= f(x)
the moon revolves around the earth it is forced to do so
the moon doesn't say "let's turn around Saturn for a change "
it hasn't the choice
there is a law of gravitation (Newton) that makes it determined, it's necessary, it's the opposite of free
but it's paradoxical this rehabilitation of necessity
the death of Man implies the reign of the necessary
I find it very worrying, there are no more men, it is necessity that prevails
so there's no freedom.
if there is a crime, the justice system seeks to know if it was done deliberately or if it was an accident, or with attenuating circumstances.
if we think that there is a whole bundle of determinations that meant that there was no choice but to kill, there is no more justice
- accused please rise
- sorry sir I was born with a gene that forces me to kill anyone
no justice possible
it is scary because it is very consistent
it is consistent to claim " there is no Man, there is no liberty"
liberty belongs to a 19th century valor, for Marxists, quite astonishing
there are many worrying things today like the dissolution of Man, there is only one gender left: animal gender
some say that Man is a species in the animal genus.
you can't say there is no animal in Man
you have to eat to live, this proposal remains valid, so this is the animal part
it's not a man decision
but what makes us Man is precisely is all that's not provided for in this program
when I say: please help yourself
this never happens between dogs
when we take distances with what nature impose to us
instinct is on the side of necessity
not institution. the institution of marriage goes against spontaneous sexuality
the Bible says grow and multiply
the monogamist marriage is not serving this "grow and multiply"
I'm not criticizing marriage, I notice that the institution always goes in the opposite direction of instinct
and at lunch I do not rush on food
I say to the lady next to me, because I was educated not be rude, ( if I want to flirt)
- Please help yourself first
Although I am hungry
so this inverse relation of necessity to liberty, from nature to culture, on which this conversation ends
is an almost worrying confirmation
as if we were happy to close a page that was progressivism, universalism, humanism
yet very recent because in historical terms the French revolution is not old
what we call modernity, not post-modernity in which we struggle
modernity, that will be my conclusion, to give some chronological guidelines
it begins for us with the English industrial revolution and the French political revolution
so, end of 18th century
so, it's not so old
we're so much in it, we think......
if you travel across the world you see it's not very old
I have the impression that we are now tempted by a neo-localism, a neo-medievalism
unity is not the nation state
it is the fiefdom
a local entity
maybe because I was born here I grew up elsewhere and I live in a third entity
I like the wandering Jewish side, the ghost ship side that makes mankind originate from a huge migration
which comes from the African jungles and is later found in the glaciers of northern Europe with Neanderthal
or in Asia with the Peking man
pithecanthropus electrus or Java man
man is a migratory and, in my opinion, this is the most profound thing about him
and that he's not about to disappear precisely because he doesn't have any essence.
It is obvious he hates Sartre
but Sartre said that if we could define man
and give him an essence
as for instance: the essence of lead is to melt at 500 degrees
heavier than water
and doesn't float as cork and whatever
if we could define Man like that, then Man would be finished, the contrary of free
man's own thing is to recuse every time we try to lock him in an essence.
he exceeds it
so, it is said that man didn't invent anything, you can hear it a lot in the naturalist discourse today
the fireflies invented the led lamp,
the badger invented the excavator machine with its claws
but the badger does nothing else
and the white bear can only live in a white environment where he is not perceptible
in Amazonia he would be immediately killed
the characteristic of man is to live in Greenland if he likes or the Amazonian forest, or in the desert or an American base in Antarctic
precisely to be not specific
this human concern, the sense of never being satisfied hence the nomadism
it is at the same time a metaphor in the literal and figurative sense
Man moved geographically but it is also a metaphor
even if he doesn't move physically, he is never satisfied of what he is
and that's all that makes his greatness his indetermination his infinitude
and I don't think it's over yet.
on the other hand, there can be great and terrifying temptations
to want to naturalize man, to make him something that would be like a new species
a termite or bee society, why not
I hope that this is not the case for today's young lovers, that's my conclusion
