Re: Quantum mechanics of the human sciences (Re: Eva's concerns)

Eva Ekeblad (eva.ekeblad who-is-at ped.gu.se)
Sat, 26 Jul 1997 12:34:37 +0200

At 15.52 -0700 97-07-25, Edouard Lagache wrote:
>Actually here is where I start to argue with Bateson. My
>"being-in-the-world" doesn't cut down any trees. On the contrary, the
>slippery bit of existence labeled "me" flows freely in and out of
>comporting various pieces of "equipment"...

Actually that was where I refrained from starting an argument with Bateson,
too. Or where I realized that HIS way of phrasing the argument didn't QUITE
suit MY point as well as I initially thought. I suppose that while engaged
in the act of cutting down that wizened old plum tree, that no longer
carries fruit, the minded body of GB would be in just as dynamically
flowing an inter-union with the world as any existentialist would wish.
He'd BE there and KNOW it.

However, the point of difficulty that he is arguing is the difficulty of
THINKING relationally (while "at it"). From the way he goes about
explaining the difficulty by an example, I hear him saying something that
transported into the current context would rather be phrased as the
difficulty of TELLING Just Plain Folks about what he's doing; telling his
neighbours; telling Just Plain Old Himself in that inaudible mumbling
dialogic accompaniment...

I don't know whether YOUR neighbours are hippie enough to be up to talking
about everyday events in terms of slippery bits of extant subjectivity
flowing freely in and out of emergent dealings with mutually constituting
objectivities... I suppose not. We live so much of our lives as and among
Just Plain Folks, speaking the lingo of fixed entities, and finding it very
useful for getting around -- I guess I just wanted to say it's pretty
unwarranted to impute a non-relational ontology to people just because they
tell us about somebodies doing somethings without giving the full
complexity of 200+ pages in this context of one or two screenfuls.

Eva