Habermas-Enlightment=Shotter?

Similar to several other scholars we read this semester, John Shotter also takes a look at the concept of 'reality' and defines it in relational terms. I learnt four important things from his work:

Wittgenstein actually makes sense. He has ideas and even a robust methodology.

It is possible to talk about time in spatial or dynamic terms.(For some reason, this reminds of time dilation and relativity.)

Disease can be interpreted as dis-ease. (Also, see Seasonal Affected Disorder)

Enlightenment might not be that good. (The subject I will be writing about in this post).


I thought Enlightenment was 'cool'

The very notion of being enlightened - simply stated as the attempt to live one's life in light of reason, not a victim of the mere opinions and prejudices of others - was that of people being able to be self-determining in the conduct of their own lives (p.19).

And this has been my interpretation of the Age of Enlightenment. Individuals, who have been enchanted by traditions and religious thoughts, broke their intellectual chains. What I was not aware was the ontological approach brought in by Enlightenment. As Shotter describes 'observation' was seen the way to analyze objective (i.e. the one that exists outside our minds) reality. Enlightenment approach also claims that it is possible to create representations of the world to understand complex social mechanisms. Given the fact that Shotter claims reality is pretty much created through dynamic dialogue processes, it is not surprising to see that he accuses Enlightenment of confining our thinking... But wait! How can a 'school of values' confine our thinking? As Shotter also refers to Descartes (and as I found a nice short video), I want to pay a short visit to his ideas:



Analyzing Social World - It Ain't Easy

Let me reiterate two concepts:

1- Methodological skepticism: We should doubt everything. It is not possible to know the existence of anything for sure (except existence of ourselves).
2- Cartesian Dualism: There are physical objects and mental concepts. They are, well, separate.

I argue that Shotter will not have strong objections to methodological skepticism at a fundamental level. Because the main point in skepticism is not to take any knowledge for granted. However, the methodological part might cause some problems as Descartes argues for a logical inquiry of physical objects and mental concepts.

And this is the point I find it difficult to agree with relativist and/or interpretivist approaches. A social phenomenon might be created dynamically within a local context. However, does that necessarily mean it cannot be systematically and rationality analyzed? Shotter argues that we should replace a Cartesian view of the world with one 'in which the thins and events within are more intrinsically related to each other' (p.89). In Chapter 6 he uses the term 'eventings', experiences that occur for yet another first time (p.133). Why cannot be they categorized? Yes, they are unique events by themselves but does that necessarily mean a cross-case comparison is impossible? Chocolate ice-cream and apple pie are quite unique things, and probably have unique meanings (tastes?) to people. Yet, I am pretty sure if I am to describe the relationship between individuals and desserts - I can. There are subtle similarities (family resemblances?) among different desserts and social interactions that can be rationally extracted.

The complexities of social interactions might make such an attempt impractical, but impossible - I don't think so. Let it be a phenomenon that already exists or one that is developing (p.68), can't we still aim to explain them? Isn't a case-based detailed description of how our ways of making sense work (p.6) just one short step below explaining how our ways work?

So, two questions from me:

- If we are to assume that Descartes is right about mind/world duality, what happens to a form of rationality-achieved-through contrasts, rather than rationality-as representation (p.67) understanding?

- What if, reason and rationality (or logical inquiry) is the right way of analyzing social structures?

PS: I have to say something about his understanding of science fiction... In Chapter 6, he says that "science fiction writing....enables us to imagine other ways in which we might make sense of our own forms of life (p.133)". This is an interesting argument we need to focus on "the changing relations occurring in our inter-activities, between ourselves and our surroundings"(p.133). Science fiction is practically a way of writing about the present without calling it present. But isn't it actually changing one (or more) aspects of the social mechanisms to speculate about what might happen? What if an outer space council monitored the behavior on Earth ( The Day the Earth Stood Still)? What if resources are literally controlled by one authority (Soylent Green)? What if there is an 'all-knowing' government (1984, Logan's Run)? What I am trying to say is, science fiction is also about replacing one of the cogs of contemporary social mechanism with a less probable one and re-discussing social relations. Therefore, it is more analytical than poetic in one sense (at least for me).

PS 2: I forgot to talk about the title. Shotter's conversational reality understanding sounded very similar to Habermas's communicative action minus Habermas's stress on reason, rationality, and to an extent end-oriented approach.