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TWO DIFFERENT VENUES (part.3)

I’ve shown that the 21st century can be foresee as an era where the status of knowledge is changing in such a way that it raises issues about what it means to know or to be knowledgable; I’ve shown that the increasingly easy and fast access to information via Internet and technology is the main cause behind this shift. That being said, what does it mean? What’s next? How can we make sense out of this new context; how can we make knowledge relevant still? I’d like to propose that this upcoming era might be defined by an idea of knowledge as skill-based and embodied in the subject. Therefore, in this context, I think that it’s becoming more relevant to be unique and different by embodying sets of skills that defines ourselves as different and relevant for us, others and society; instead of knowing stuff that everybody can find online anyway. This is where Style comes in to play.

Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908-1961) was a french philosopher who proposed to understand knowledge as an embodied process of actualization expressed by the body of a subject skillfully coping with the world through habits. He describes Perception as a prereflexive stance that underlies experience and understanding at a transcendental level where the object is intertwined with the subject perceiving it; appearing as an affordance, a potentiality that can only appear according to the subject’s intentionality toward it. Shortly said, this phenomenology propose a radical perspective of what it is to know, learn and understand. It means: being able to cope with the world as a skillful body, as a subject composed of skills acquired as habits defining his own existence, defining his embodiment. 

At the core of this ontology, Style is a key notion that, I think, can help us understand the major changes happening in education, culture, knowledge, etc. that can be foreseen as the 21st century unfold before us. Style is a simple notion; one word that says it all in M-P’s work. Sadly, it is vague, poorly defined, sparingly used throughout his books and always referred to like common knowledge. First, I’d like to share light on this crucial notion in M-P’s ontology, in order to show how it can allow us to understand our embodied experience as a skill-based process of Expressed Perception. Second, that will established the conceptual framework from which I’d be able to formulate a descriptive interpretation of our era in relation to the status of knowledge as discussed earlier; showing how we can understand these new realities as new capacities to be acquired as subject trying to cope with them, trying to learn and understand them. This kind of stylistic description of these realities allow us to see the growing distinction between knowledge and information more clearly; embodied skills, in a subject, as habits expressing his individuality, his existence, is not something that can be Googled, defined on Wikipedia or acquired  from a Youtube tutorial. This is how we need to understand and experience knowledge now; it differ from information which is accessed easily and fast online anytime by anyone. 

But what is Style and how can it be useful for us in that matter?

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TWO DIFFERENT VENUES (part. 2)

I’ve shown how the 21st century can be describe as an era where we experience and live ourselves on two different venues: Reality and Virtuality; this new situation that came with Internet, and the ever more important place of technology in our lives bring all kind of consequences on our existences. The one the is important for my research is the gap it’s creating between information and knowledge; before Internet and the virtual, knowledge was acquired over a long period of time by experience and education; information was a big part of it because a knowledgeable person was one that could provide information. The gap between these two instances was short and they where integral part of one another. 

Since the rise of Internet, Google, applications, search engines and smartphones, we now have a super fast and easy access to information; the status of knowledge is changing as fast as technology allow us to get information quick and for cheap. A lot of information that use to be accessible only with university education and hard work are becoming common knowledge and so accessible that it shake off the culture of knowing. When details, concepts, names, definitions and usages of ideas are easily accessed by everyone with their smartphones utilizing Google, what used to be knowledge is becoming information; so what it is to know in such an environment? Being able to search efficiently and synthesize the information promptly is more important than actually knowing what we are searching; it’s common now for people to search for stuff they know nothing about and then get some answers that helps them make sense of it for themselves in such a way that they can actually have a conversation about it even though they don’t know what they’re talking about. This is a major change for the status of knowledge and we now have to distinguish between both information and knowledge; but how?

This situation is changing education and how we should teach; it’s therefore changing culture on a sociopsychological level because the access to information gets faster and better everytime a new technology or media of information is brought forward. That’s creating a growing gap between universities and the individual who is learning faster by himself online and by experiencing stuff by himself in the world, then by going through a bachelor degree for three years, that slows him down and will never be adapted to the fast changes of these new cultural realities because of bureaucracy and admnistrative contingencies. A lot of stuff that is being tought in universities can be accessed easily online; the system is so slow that it’s becoming more advantageous for the individual to learn online by himself and by travelling to get some specific trainings than to get on the slow wagon of the education system that is expensive and so slow that can’t be updated as fast as the individuals are by themselves online and with Google. It’s not worth it anymore; what does it mean? What’s next?

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TWO DIFFERENT VENUES (part. 1)

The 21st century is just beginning and I’d like to foresee how mankind will be defined by it; internet, cyberspaces, social medias and virtual realities are new and still in development, I think that’s necessary to adress if we want to understand the profound changes happening in our era.

What is obviously different from before is that we live and experience ourselves on two different venues: Reality and Virtuality. Reality is what it is; the material venue where we perceive and encouter ourselves, others and the world in a concrete matter. Virtuality is a HUGE umbrella term for many things going from digital imagery, virtual realities, gaming, cyberspaces, etc. It’s the digital venue where we interact with others, interfaces and informations; an abstract venue that depends on the progress of technology and that is still unfolding before us as it develop really fast influencing Reality and vice versa. This a new dialectic for mankind, and I think the 21st century will be all about that dynamic between these two venues.

What does it mean? Since Reality is home and has been there forever, we tend to see it as prior to Virtuality; that’s creating all kind of tensions and frictions between the two, especially since Virtuality has been exponentialy growing in importance in our lives. In a really short period of time we got addict and we’ve been depending on it on so many levels like: knowledge, politics, bureaucracy, informations, entertainment, economy, etc. We are now in 2018 and it’s an integral part of our lives; we can probably say that our lives are experienced both on Reality and Virtuality in a half and half matter.

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THE THESIS

I’d like to propose that the notion of Style in Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s work is a good heuristic to understand what it is to be human in the 21st century. The exponential growth of technology bring forth an important transition in human history which is the ever growing importance of the Virtual as a legitimate experience just like Reality is. 

This new experience is especially happening in the cyberspace and on the social networks where the individualism is exacerbated by the atomisation of our identity throughout all the different platforms and mediums they offer to express ourselves. What makes the 21st century different from it’s predecessor is that we’re not expressing only in reality but virtualy online as well; what used to be exclusively private is now becoming more and more public and the idea of self expression is changing as fast as the new technologies, applications and mediums bring forth new possibilities of expression. This is where STYLE becomes important.

My thesis is this: The notion of Style in Merleau-Ponty’s work can help us understand, express and bring forth the different issues that comes with these new realities in a way that can help us describe what it is to be human in the 21st century by allowing us to let go of the epistemological picture that lingers in philosophy. This notion is more actual than ever because it can help us to let go of the different dogmatisms that are still present in philosophy by allowing us to shape and appreciate more a perspectivist approach to knowledge, truth and ethics.

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Here’s the Question

MC Escher - Bond of union (1956)

The 21st century is subjugated to numerical technologies and virtual spaces like social networks and cyberspace; these new ontological realities exacerbates the individualistic culture that’s been growing since The Enlightenment. We’re assisting to the coming of a new age where the individual grows in this world trying to define his self amongst others but not only in the physical space of perception but also in the virtual realities of the cyberspace where his identity is achieved publicly through social medias. These parallel experiences are creating all kind of interesting and problematic interactions which needs to be critically discussed and exposed in order to understand our zeitgeist; that is the question I will enquire: What it is to be human in the 21st century? How do these two different ontological realities and dynamics work together and what kind of skills do we need in order to define ourselves freely in this kind of ecosystem?

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Faire table rase.

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The unfinished nature of phenomenology and the inchoate style in which it proceeds are not the signs of failure; they were inevitable because phenomenology’s task was to reveal the mystery of the world and the mystery of reason.

Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception (via philosophybits)

Maurice, my man, that’s pretty much sums it all; nailing it again and again...

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I needed to RESET; this problematic was too heavy to handle, my Mentors told me that I should consider starting over on a smaller scale. I sat down and start writing again; that’s certainly not a failure, it’s a celebration of what it is to learn and grow stronger. Be Humble, be Wise.

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The Dance of Life

So many things dance in the wind…why not you?

(rights reserved, leave credits * please reblog but not to nsfw 18+)

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Papilarnie III by Janusz Jurek

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The Transcendental Method

Consisting of Kant’s epistemological procedure and reaction against Skepticism; it is a demonstration explaining the Transcendental nature of our Experience and how, starting from this Subjective standpoint, we come to achieve Universal and Necessary empirical Knowledge. It begins from this question:

« How can I accept everything there is ? What must be in order for what is, to be what it is ? »

It starts from the Sensibilia (the 5 senses). They are passively affected by stimulus coming from the external world ; they pass through the 12 Categories wich are fonctions of the mind that the mind puts ON whenever something is coming in throught the Senses. They are a priori fonctions that makes the Experience of something possible by Synthesizing Apparences into Pure Concepts of Understanding. This Synthetic procedure is the condition of possibility from wich Experience comes from, it’s what makes it possible.

Then, comes the Understanding wich consists of Ideas that the mind generates but could have never come from the Senses. In other words Pure Ideas that the senses could’ve never been affected by; for example : the World. In this era humanity haven’t seen the earth as a thing, the world as we understood it back then was not something that could be seen or perceive ; it was something we understood. 

This is exactly where Hume’s skepticism is fallacious according to Kant because it’s saying that from our sense perceptions we inductively come to the knowledge of the world wich is actually something we could not perceive by the senses at the time. The fallacy is that it’s not possible to induce infinite ideas like Pure Concepts (whole) from finite parts like sense perceptions. Therefore, Kant propose that all Metaphysical matters demands a Transcendental principle from wich we can deduct from. A Transcendental principle allowing the Subject to learn and understand the Pure Concepts of Understanding since they cannot be perceived by the Senses. For Kant, the simple fact that we talk about these things is a testimony of their existence ; therefore, they must come from somewhere else since they don’t come from the Senses.

Perspectiva Literaria by Johannes Lencker (1567)

His answer is that there must be something in the mind that is common to all Subjects; something that brings unity to the Aperception of all the data that are coming in: the Soul.  It represent the Synthetic Unity of Aperception that organizes all the incoming data affecting the senses allowing the Subject to have the Experience of something (object), to make sense out of it. Then, even though we start from a Subjective standpoint, we manage to come up with a unified Objective Experience that we share with each other (knowledge); that’s where he needs to postulate a Universal and Necessary Transcendental principle, from where an empirical knowledge can only come from. Since Induction starts from finite parts, it can never produce Universal and Necessary knowledge it can only be achieved by a Transcendental Deduction, proceeding from an apriori whole then to break down it’s parts.

I will broadly breakdown The Transcendental Method into 3 steps:

1- Starting from Sensations, understood as reactions to how the Subject is affected by stimulus coming from the external world, are a bunch of disorganized datas.

2- Those are then transformed into Apparences; they are what the Intuition get from the disorganized Sensibility. This step and these faculties are conditional to an a priori Spatio-Temporal condition of possibility called: The Transcendental Aesthetic. Here, Kant make a slick move by describing Time and Space, not as empirical objects, but as the Necessary and Universal conditions of possibility from wich Sensibility is subsumed under.

3- These Apparences are then subsumed under the 12 Categories of Pure Understanding in order to produce the coherent Experience we have of something (Object); the conditions of possibility able to do that are the Concepts of Pure Understanding. They are the Synthetic results of the subsumption of Apparences under the Categories; they are what happens to Apparences after they’ve been Universally and Necessarily Synthesized to produce a coherent Experience wich would be impossible otherwise. In other words, since the Categories are a priori Universal and Necessary they are the conditions of possibility necessary from wich we subsume Apparences (parts) under; the Concepts are the results of this Synthetic process and are the conditions of possibility from wich a coherent Experience of something depends on.

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« Le monde des théories n’est pas le mien. Ces réflexions sont celles d’un praticien. L’oeuvre de chaque romancier contient une vision implicite de l’histoire du roman, une idée de ce qu’est le roman. C’est cette idée du roman, inhérente à mes romans, que j’ai fait parler. »

Milan Kundera - L’art du roman (1986)

This quote from Kundera is key to understand what Style is; here he tells us that he can’t explain what a novel is, his idea of it is always implicit to all his novels. In other words, the only way for us to understand his conception of a novel is to read his. 

In L’art du roman, he gives us a Stylistic read of some of his favorite novels and try to describe Stylisticly what the european novel his for him; it’s a great work that applies a method similar to what I propose in my research.

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Only on tumblr...

“So, ‘sensation’ and ‘judgment’ have together lost their apparent clearness: we have observed that they were clear only as long as the prejudice in favour of the world was maintained. As soon as one tried by means of them, to picture consciousness in the process of perceiving, to revive the forgotten perceptual experience, and to relate them to it, they were found to be inconceivable. By dint of making these difficulties more explicit, we were drawn implicitly into a new kind of analysis, into a new dimension in which they were destined to disappear. The criticism of the constancy hypothesis and more generally the reduction of the idea of ‘the world’ opened up a *phenomenal field* which now has to be more accurately circumscribed, and suggested the rediscovery of direct experience which must be, at least provisionally, assigned its place in relation to scientific knowledge, and to psychological and philosophical reflection.” —from_Phenomenology of Perception_. Translated by Colin Smith, p. 62”   ~ Maurice Merleau-Ponty

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Xavier Dolan defines Style again.

« Style, to me, is not only which shirt you’re putting on your back in the morning; it’s a way of living, of behaving. Behaving with others; behaving with yourself and right now I feel that I am a young man entering a new cycle of his life so that’s where Luis Vuitton takes me. »

This quote shows how Fashion and Style can be related but not NECESSARILY. Indeed, it manifest itself on a deeper level of Expression; while Fashion is what you see (Form) Style is what you feel (Content). The correlation between the two is arbitrary and superficial BUT the concept behind this commercial is that, for Dolan, Louis Vuitton clothing line is made in such a way that it actually accent and display his Style even more. In other words, Fashion can be a great vessel for Style; designers and stylists utilize it to help their clients to reach their stylistic objectives according to: career, seduction, lifestyle, self-expression, self-confidence, etc.

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Xavier Dolan’s definition of Style.

« Style is knowing who you are. Aesthetics are nothing if there’s no connection with meaning. [...] How I wanna be seen? Who I wanna be right now? Who I am. »

By making an analogy with building characters for a movie, Dolan express the Existential importance of Style for characters; to have an Identity, which is necessary for the viewers to be able to relate on a meaningful level with the protagonists. Style is Content over Form; same goes for every Being according to my research. In order to understand what it is to be like them, their Style is the visit card allowing you to read between the lines.

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International art collective Universal Everything enlists French choreographer and LA Dance project founder Benjamin Millepied for a digitally abstracted performance at the London Science Museum's Media Space. 

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The Transcendental Argument

My research on Style is based on a Transcendental argument similar to the one formulated by Merleau-Ponty in his work; inspired by Kant’s demonstration, he established his Primacy of Perception by showing the apodictical nature of Perception as one of an Embodied Subject in a continuously active relationship with the world. It goes like this: 

The structure of our Perception, as it is, can only be possible from the standpoint of an Embodied Subject in an active relationship with the world; since we can’t deny that we have such Perceptual experience, we have to accept that we are necessarily Embodied Subjects in an active relationship with the world, denying it would be incoherent

Perception by Karine Daisay in Philomag.

In a Transcendental argument the contradiction stands between (1) the practice of performing some operation such as, in this case, Perceiving; and (2) some proposition that entails the impossibility of that operation. This is where it shine because the practice of performing something implies it’s a priori possibility. Therefore, trying to formulate it’s impossibility is always incoherent. 

It may be expressed in the form of a Modus Ponens. It’s particular subject matter consists of (1) a major premisse: the Transcendental principle that states the conditions of possibility of performing some intentional operation, like Perceiving; and (2) a minor premisse that provides a Phenomenological description of that intentional operation. From these premisses is drawn the necessary conditions of the possible performance of that operation. 

As a Modus Ponens, It formaly looks like this:

(1) If p is possible then q

(2) p is possible

(3) Therefore q

BUT this is not enough because it’s possible to object like this:

It can be so that: p is possible is true, while q is false.

Therefore, a Deductive indirect argument is necessary to defend the Transcendental principle; this second argument needs to be regressive, meaning that it shows the impossibility of it’s contrary. Here’s how Kant formulates it: 

Experience must have an Object, that is, be of something; for this it must be coherent; and to be coherent it must be shaped by the Understanding through the 12 Categories because, by being Universal and Necessary, they constitute the conditions of possibility for coherence through the Concepts of Pure Understanding actualisation. Therefore, in order to have an experience of something we need the a priori possibility of it’s coherence, which can only be done by subsuming it from the Categories (Absolutes) utilizing a Transcendental Deduction that proceeds from the whole (Absolutes) to deduct it’s parts; instead of inducing the parts to constitute a whole (Absolute), which is impossible by nature.

To make it short, a Transcendental argument shows the impossibility for something that IS, not be to be the way it IS by apodicticaly proposing that the conditions of possibility for it’s existence entails the experience we have of  it; making the contrary incoherent.

Gregory Peck in Mirage (1965)

My thesis relies on this type of reasoning; I validate the Ontological nature of Style by showing it’s Transcendental necessity like Merleau-Ponty did before me. From there, I propose a Transcendental argument that goes like this:

1- Since the Ontological realities of an Organism are not empirical;

2- Style, understood as the experience of a way of doing (how) implicitly expressed by the Form (what), is then relevant to be able to grasp them.

3- So, a Stylistic approach in Teleology is adequate because these Ontological realities needs a first person description to be formulated; which are only possible coming from a Subject experiencing them.

4- Then, by utilizing a first person descriptive method focusing on how the Organism do what he does (Style) instead of what he does (Content over Form), It allows the Subject to experience these Ontological realities, which is mandatory for a description to be produced inherently.

5- Indeed, these Ontological realities needs a Subject experiencing them in order to be described;

6- Since Style is an a priori experience, a method based on it’s interpretation is relevant for the inquiry.

7- Therefore, a third person explicative method is incoherent in that regard because it’s based on empirical observations instead of first person experiences; it places Form over Content, focusing on the what instead of the how. Ontological realities constitues meaningful and defining experiences contributing to the individuation of the Organism as Being; grasping them relies on understanding it’s Content since it expresses what it is for this Organism, to be what it IS.

Perspectiva Literaria by Johannes Lencker (1567)