This is a terrific piece. On the one hand, the world is upside-down. We need real thinking and action to set it right. On the other hand, the world, as it should be, is hidden from us, buried under all these layers of manipulation, exploitation, and repression. We have to get to the real common sense of things to set them right, to make them just. And what people believe is just can be absurd and really unjust.
Which then is common sense ? A vision of how the world really should be -- meaning, the real world below repression, provided we can see though it. Or how people perceive the world as it "really" is --- meaning when it isn't influenced by one element, usually whatever element is under discussion (i.e. taking the bate)?
In Arendt, Kant, and the German idealist, there is a debate about what constitutes common sense, which translates as gesunder Menschenverstand - something like healthy human understanding. In latin, which Arendt brings forward, its the senus communis, which places emphasis on what we understand together. Arendt places it at the center of politics - politics as the act of forming a common understanding.
There must be a discussion of sense communis in Chomsky. He believes in an innate form understanding in the form of an inner grammar. I aways wanted to read this in him but haven't yet. On a political level, he always likes to say phrases like: 'this is what any 10 year old child understands'. He loves Descartes, and in a way, hegelian/marxist thinking have driven us from Descartes. But there is a lot to be said for his vision of the autonomous freedom of common sense. It is in one of the Meditations, maybe 3, where he writes about sitting in front of the fire, in the living room, closing off all of the false and wrong impressions, impressions that can't be trusted, to get to a realm of true and pure thoughts about the world. The simplicity is hard to adapt today, considering all of the layers of repression. He is speaking about how we know things are true, rather than evil demons influencing us, giving us false ideas. But we can easily understand the world of capitalism, misogyny, heteronormativity, racism as Descartes demons, even if we cannot simply access the realm of common sense, but see it rather as a process of forming communal understanding.
and I want to read Hall now. Also reproduced here in an edited volume: http://library.lol/main/4BC7B2C05B4C0D43BA6629B5AD9069B6
This is a terrific piece. On the one hand, the world is upside-down. We need real thinking and action to set it right. On the other hand, the world, as it should be, is hidden from us, buried under all these layers of manipulation, exploitation, and repression. We have to get to the real common sense of things to set them right, to make them just. And what people believe is just can be absurd and really unjust.
Which then is common sense ? A vision of how the world really should be -- meaning, the real world below repression, provided we can see though it. Or how people perceive the world as it "really" is --- meaning when it isn't influenced by one element, usually whatever element is under discussion (i.e. taking the bate)?
In Arendt, Kant, and the German idealist, there is a debate about what constitutes common sense, which translates as gesunder Menschenverstand - something like healthy human understanding. In latin, which Arendt brings forward, its the senus communis, which places emphasis on what we understand together. Arendt places it at the center of politics - politics as the act of forming a common understanding.
There must be a discussion of sense communis in Chomsky. He believes in an innate form understanding in the form of an inner grammar. I aways wanted to read this in him but haven't yet. On a political level, he always likes to say phrases like: 'this is what any 10 year old child understands'. He loves Descartes, and in a way, hegelian/marxist thinking have driven us from Descartes. But there is a lot to be said for his vision of the autonomous freedom of common sense. It is in one of the Meditations, maybe 3, where he writes about sitting in front of the fire, in the living room, closing off all of the false and wrong impressions, impressions that can't be trusted, to get to a realm of true and pure thoughts about the world. The simplicity is hard to adapt today, considering all of the layers of repression. He is speaking about how we know things are true, rather than evil demons influencing us, giving us false ideas. But we can easily understand the world of capitalism, misogyny, heteronormativity, racism as Descartes demons, even if we cannot simply access the realm of common sense, but see it rather as a process of forming communal understanding.
Great writing Carrie I really enjoyed the article.