PHILOSOPHER OF THE WEEK
Michel Foucault.
Michel Foucault, (born October 15, 1926, Poitiers, France—died June 25, 1984, Paris), French philosopher and historian, one of the most influential and controversial scholars of the post-World War II period. The son and grandson of a physician, Michel Foucault was born to a solidly bourgeois family. He resisted what he regarded as the provincialism of his upbringing and his native country, and his career was marked by frequent sojourns abroad. A distinguished but sometimes erratic student, Foucault gained entry at the age of 20 to the École Normale Supérieure (ENS) in Paris in 1946. There he studied psychology and philosophy, embraced and then abandoned communism, and established a reputation as a sedulous, brilliant, and eccentric student.
His Philosophy Works.
Epistemology.
This term, which Foucault introduces in his book The Order of Things, refers to the orderly ‘unconscious’ structures underlying the production of scientific knowledge in a particular time and place. It is the ‘epistemological field’ which forms the conditions of possibility for knowledge in a given time and place. It has often been compared to T.S Kuhn’s notion of paradigm.
Ethics.
Ethics concerns the kind of relation one has to oneself. The essential condition for the practice of ethics is freedom, the ability to choose one action, not another. Foucault makes a distinction between moral codes (which are simply collections of rules and precepts) and ethics. He suggests there are four aspects to how the individual constitutes him/herself as the moral subject of his or her own actions. The first aspect relates to the part of the individual which acts as the focus of moral conduct. The second aspect concerns what makes an individual recognize their moral obligations. The third aspect relates to the means by which individuals transform and work on themselves. The fourth aspect concerns what sort of person an individual might want to be.
Foucault’s ethics.
Foucault, in spite of the accusations levelled against him of political and ethical nihilism, had firm views on the kind of ethical approach that he wanted to take in his work. He argued that he wanted to render certain taken-for-granted exercises of power ‘intolerable’, by exposing them to scrutiny. He argues that the exercise of power only remains tolerable by covering up its tracks. He saw it as part of his task, to make people aware of how intolerable some previously taken-for-granted exercises of power actually were and show them that things could be different.
Freedom.
Foucault notes that he believes ‘solidly in human freedom’. He also argues against nineteenth century and existentialist views of an abstract freedom and a ‘free’ subject, and says that freedom is a practice rather than a goal to be achieved. Knowledge starts with rules and constraints, not freedom. Freedom is also a condition for the exercise of power.
Government.
Foucault originally used the term ‘governmentality’ to describe a particular way of administering populations in modern European history within the context of the rise of the idea of the State. He later expanded his definition to encompass the techniques and procedures which are designed to govern the conduct of both individuals and populations at every level not just the administrative or political level.
History and historiography.
Foucault’s entire philosophy is based on the assumption that human knowledge and existence are profoundly historical. He argues that what is most human about man is his history. He discusses the notions of history, change and historical method at some length at various points in his career. He uses history as a means of demonstrating that there is no such thing as historical necessity, that things could have been and could be otherwise. Foucault describes his work on a number of occasions as the history or the diagnosis of the present, as the analysis of ‘what today is’. He notes that our own times and lives are not the beginning or end of some ‘historical’ process, but a period like, but at the same time unlike, any other. The question should simply be ‘how is today different from yesterday?’
Foucault changed his mind many times about the role played by philosophy and the philosopher or intellectual. One thing that remained constant however, was that philosophy should be firmly rooted in a historical context. Foucault frequently emphasized that philosophy should deal with the question of what is happening right now. He also defines the task of philosophy as being not a way of reflecting on what is true and what is false, but instead a way of reflecting on our relations to truth and how we should conduct ourselves.
:- Find out more about Michel Foucault in your further readings. Have a blessed week.
0 Comments