Inhuman
Jean-FranCois Lyotard’s “Can Thought go on without a Body?” is quite probably the most confusing, frustrating, and inexplicably difficult to read essay I have ever ventured to comprehend in the history of my existence. From the first paragraph his musings seem to strike a chord between poetry, philosophy, and outright fanatical gibberish written by a person that may not have even understood it himself. Take for example this line from page 10 “But the death of the sun is death of the mind, because it is the death of death as the life of the mind.” oddly poetic and hard to decipher at first. The essay uses needlessly long words such as “phenomenological” and wording that rivals Yoda. Upon deeper inspection, however, there is substance; you just have to be looking hard enough. Many of the points Lyotard makes are coded in quizi-riddles seeming to run backwards and forwards at the same time. One paragraph in particular stood out as more confusing than the rest though and, fittingly, it was the last paragraph of the essay.
The paragraph begins with the line “but once again that analogizing power, which belongs to body and mind analogically and mutually and which body and mind share with each other in the art of invention, is inconsequential compared to an irreparable transcendence inscribed on the body by gender difference. Not only calculation, but even analogy cannot do away with the remainder left by this difference. The difference makes thought go on endlessly and won’t allow itself to be thought. Thought is inseparable from the phenomenological body.” To properly understand the argument presented here dissection is necessary as the parts are more easily decipherable than the whole and once we have the parts the whole will become clearer. To begin with take “once again that analogizing power, which belongs to body and mind analogically and mutually and which body and mind share with each other in the art of invention” First one must notice the use of analogy as pertaining to the mind and body. Analogy in the paragraph previous was intertwined with thought mentioning that thought “makes lavish use of analogy.” This creates a sense that the line deals with the need to resolve the issue of the mind needing the body as a vessel to create analogy or thought. Although further down, Lyotard claims, “art of invention, is inconsequential compared to an irreparable transcendence inscribed on the body by gender difference. Not only calculation, but even analogy cannot do away with the remainder left by this difference. The difference makes thought go on endlessly and won’t allow itself to be thought. Thought is inseparable from the phenomenological body”. This section articulates that this problem is insignificant compared to the problem presented by replicating gender difference in non-human beings. Lyotard continues by asserting that this difference cannot be done away with by calculation or analogy and must be addressed for thought to propagate. Without this perception of gender thought cannot be had for they are inseparable from each other, gender creates thought.
After piecing this section together Lyotard’s argument in this section, by my estimation, is that although solving the problem that is presented by replicating a facsimile of the human body and mind is important it pales in comparison to the effort that must be made to create a sense of gender difference in this creation for otherwise thought is not reasonably possible.
1 comment:
There are a couple moments here I particularly liked. Your characterization of Lyotard's thought a "poetry, philosophy and outright fanatical gibberish" is both funny and worthwhile - I suspect he himself would see that as more than I compliment than an insult.
I also deeply admire this line: "Many of the points Lyotard makes are coded in quizi-riddles seeming to run backwards and forwards at the same time." I would admire it more if you had continued with that thought as a way of opening up Lyotard's difficulty, rather than dropping it, but it's still worth responding to. I'd argue that, with Lyotard as with most difficult texts, we must re-read (and re-re-re-read, etc.) in order to get a handle on it. You are _literally_ correct that things go simultaneously backwards and forwards - you need to understand the ending to get the beginning, and vice versa.
You switch strategies, though. You movement to discussing gender difference at the end is certainly fine (it is, after all, arguably Lyotard's main point) but it only adds to my feeling that you are generating some great responses to Lyotard, but rather than unpacking any of them, you're moving on to the next potentially great response.
More depth, less breadth next time, I think.
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