looks, power, value
January 18th, 2008, search relatedRelated posts :: Aristotle on suicide [was Heidegger Email List?] :: hidden enemies- “To infinity and beyond!” :: Nietzsche out of Nowhere :: The communications lines of truth are power lines.
Cologne 18-Jan-2007
michaelP schrieb Thu, 17 Jan 2008 17:35:59 +0000:
> > Cologne 16-Jan-2008
> >
> > michaelP schrieb Wed, 16 Jan 2008 05:00:23 +0000:
> >
> >> MP: Allen, a little while back I was reading (slowly as is my wont) that
> >> strange
> >> text by Heidegger, ‘Parmenides’; I remember that in discussing ‘looking’
> >> which we moderns normally think in terms of looking at, an action directed
> >> towards (and subjecting) beings (as objects of knowledge, as items of
> >> aesthetic consideration, as things of value, as things of no value, etc);
> >> Heidegger, in speaking of the (ancient) Greeks in their absorption in
> >> (embraced in the life of) mythos, speaks of looking (the look) in terms of
> >> being looked at by that which is extraordinary inhabiting the ordinary; that
> >> in order for the modern notion of looking-at (capturing the appearance and
> >> appearing of) to have become possible, be-ing-in-the-world had firstly (in
> >> the sense of priority not chronologically) to ’suffer’ being looked at,
> >> which for the Greeks was being looked at by the(ir) gods, the first
> >> glimmerings of something like religious experience. This glimmering, however
> >> ‘greyed out’ now, this be-ing-looked-at, has something to do with a
> >> conferring of human-ness to the humans, beings who look (at beings and each
> >> other) and live in/with mythos & logos (the word).
> >>
> >> Or, something like that…
> >>
> >
> > ME: Reminds me of T.S. Eliot’s line:
> > “And the flowers had the look of flowers that are looked at.”
> >
> > And the phenomenon of value must not be thought subjectivistically as the
> value
> > put on beings by human looking-at, but, on the contrary, as the look offered
> by
> > beings themselves in their own potentiality, powers, possibilities.
> >
> > Such are the secret lines of communication between power (_dynamis_) and value
> > L. (valere). Don’t expect any help from Heidegger on this point.
>
> MP: Michael, without getting into our long and enlongated desultory engagement
> with the notion of value (esp with respect to the earth/moon, etc),
ME: “Long” I wouldn’t call it, since it never started. You seem to look upon this
issue with the look of a dismal moralist.
> MP: I wonder
> about the earlier/prior Greek (if any) version of your latin valere; whilst
> dynamis is a powerful term, what is the equivalent (if any) of the valuable
> (aristos? the good of Plato?)? If nothing, then did the Romanic ethos
> produce the highly-valued concept of the valuable? Why not the Greeks?
> Certainly one could, with Nietzsche, see the entire history of
> philosophy/nihilism in terms of a repeated three movement piece on value
> (valuation, devaluation, revaluation). I am attracted to, indeed intrigued,
> by the notion that value be proferred by beings themselves (rather than the
> extremely common and often destructive human (d)evaluation of things), but
> need some further elaboration. I’m not bothered whether Heidegger helps or
> provides or hinders or dissimulates, rather, I’m interested in how things
> speak to us in their gleaming/glittering, and what it is that looks at/to us
> in the things as they appear to be what, that and as they are.
ME: I’m glad you asked that question (about L. valere). With _dynamis_ we already
have the principal Greek word for value, next to _axia_ (’worth or value of a thing
or person’, from _axios_ ‘weighing as much, of like value, worth as much as’).
The original sense of value derives from L. valere which, apart from meaning to be
able-bodied, strong, powerful, influential, to prevail can also mean to be worth
something in exchange for something else, to have monetary value. Etymologically,
valere is related (via an Indo-European root *ual-; cf. Duden) to German walten
which means to prevail, again from L. prævalere to be very able, to have
greater power or worth, to prevail and thus itself a comparative or enhanced form
of possessing power. L. valere, in turn, is the standard Latin translation of
_dynasthai_, so that the connection to the Greek word for power, _dynamis_, in all
its senses, is secured.
The basic meaning of _dynamis_ is force, Kraft or power. This force may be the
physical force of brute physical strength (e.g. to bend steel or knock someone out),
or the force of armed forces such as an army or navy (e.g. to defeat an enemy in
combat, which depends ultimately on the power to physically kill by destroying the
body as a thing). It is also the power of an ability, a competence or skill based on
know-how, such as knowing how to play the guitar or make a bookshelf. In particular,
it is also rhetorical skill, the power of persuasion to win trust and bring others
around to a particular point of view. In the social realm, _dynamis_ is influence,
personal importance and prestige that carries weight, i.e. the power to impress
others, and also specifically the political power of public office. It is also
the meaning of a word, valuable assets or the monetary value of something,
i.e. the power of one thing (assets, money) to bring something else into ones
possession. One signification of the related verb, _dynasthai_, is to be worth, as
in five shoes are worth one table, i.e. five shoes have the power to exchange for,
i.e. to acquire, to bring into ones possession, one table. As I said, the standard
Latin translation of _dynasthai_ is valere which means to be strong, powerful,
influential; also, to have value, including monetary value, to be worth.
Nietzsche, of course, is focused on the devaluation of so-called Christian values,
and nowhere undertakes a deeper analysis of _dynamis_ and value, starting with
Aristotle; his thinking remains stuck in a crude productionist metaphysics. The same
cannot be said of Hegel and Marx, who are the deepest thinkers we have on Wert, who
learnt from Aristotle.
Perhaps we have to learn to experience that the value of the Earth and the moon is,
in the first place, that they are there — and prevail. The moon simply looks at us.
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_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_ Dr Michael Eldred (c)_-_-
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