Re: immanent ingenuousness

["Ricardo Duchesne" <RDUCHESN@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> Date sent:      Wed, 10 Dec 1997 09:55:48 -0800
> Send reply to:  pen-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> From:           James Devine <jdevine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> To:             pen-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject:        immanent ingenuousness



Devine, don't try to sound so innocent now. Anyone who read your last
missive on "immanent critique" will know it is you who
decided to take this slipshod-personal road. Then when someone turns
around and responds, you cry like a baby.

ricardo



> After I tried to end this silly debate, Ricardo says that: >I agree, but
> there are too many disingenuous remarks on your part to let then go. <
>
> Hmm... I must have hit a raw nerve, for Ricardo is stooping to insults.
> Look it up: "disingenuous" is a close cousin of "dishonest."
>
> I initially thought that I'd compromise and skip all the merely technical
> or trivial points, to keep this missive to the absolute shortest, but after
> doing so, all I found were more insults. There's little or no content to
> Ricardo's comment, so instead of responding to it, I'll ask him to simply
> restate his position, starting from the beginning.
>
> Crucially, Ricardo says I don't understand the notion of an "immanent
> critique," but since doesn't explain what _he_ means by that phrase, I
> don't know if I understand it or not.
>
> Since a similar point came up in a discussion with Ajit, I will respond to
> one relatively mild insult in order to clarify matters:
>
> Ricardo writes>... pilling [i.e., piling] one idea (or thinker) on top of
> another is your trademark.<
>
> My method is one of reading all of the contributions I can concerning any
> specific issue and trying to synthesize them. I find folks who stick to one
> school's interpretation (e.g., Althusserian Structuralism or the Frankfurt
> school) to be overly narrow. In fact, I think this fits with the so-called
> "Germanic" method that I think old Karlos used.
>
> I reread what spurred Ricardo to insult me here and discovered that he
> didn't respond to the content at all, except that I use the word "add" (as
> in adding "'crisis theory' and the critique of political economy" to Marx's
> persistent anti-alienation theme). I never claimed that this one word
> summed up Marx's method. Rather, it's shorthand.
>
>
>
>
>
> Jim Devine   jdevine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx &
> http://clawww.lmu.edu/1997F/ECON/jdevine.html
> "It takes a busload of faith to get by." -- Lou Reed.
>
>