BHA: Santa

[MSPRINKER@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

               State University of New York at Stony Brook
                       Stony Brook, NY 11794-3355

                                            Michael Sprinker
                                            Professor of English & Comp Lit
                                            Comparative Studies
                                            516 632-9634
                                            05-Jun-1998 09:59pm EDT
FROM:  MSPRINKER
TO:    Remote Addressee                     ( _bhaskar@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx )

Subject: Santa

Colin,

Well, so transitive objects don't exist?  Which means, for
example, that the special theory of relativity or the second
law of thermodynamics, or Marx's hypothesis that the history
of all hitherto existing society--none of them exists or is
real?

You mistake me when you call an "imaginary relation" a "belief"
(you might go back and read Althusser on the disappearance
of this pseudo-concept in his own account of ideology in
the ISAs essay).  As I wrote, more or less quoting Althusser:
ideology is "an imaginary relation to real conditions of
existence embodied in material practices."  The key terms
here are "relation" and "material practices."  I happen not
to think God exists, viz., I am not successfully interpellated
(any longer) by religious ideology.  But "God" does "exist"
in the sense that he/she/it is embodied in a complex and
variegated set of religious rituals or practices.  As Althusser
says, quoting Pascal:  "Kneel down and you will believe."
"Belief" is a function of observing religious rituals, not
the other way round.  That, I feel, is the way ideology
works.

Cheers,

Michael


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