alain badiou truth, ethics and the formal imperative

8/13/2019 Alain Badiou Truth, Ethics and the Formal Imperative

1/35

Revista Portuguesa de ilosofia

Alain Badiou: Truth, Ethics and the Formal ImperativeAuthor(s): Christopher NorrisSource: Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia, T. 65, O Dom, a Verdade, e a Morte: Abordagens ePerspectivas / The Gift, Truth, and Death: Approaches and Perspectives (2009), pp. 1103-1136Published by: Revista Portuguesa de FilosofiaStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41220921 .Accessed: 15/01/2014 10:33

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to RevistaPortuguesa de Filosofia.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 129 .237.28.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 20 14 10:33:17 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=rpfhttp://www.jstor.org/stable/41220921?origin=JSTOR-pdfhttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/stable/41220921?origin=JSTOR-pdfhttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=rpf


2/35

n3kvi RPF-n3kvi(Akg 65 2009

AlainBadiou:Truth, thics nd the Formal mperative

Christopher Norris*

AlainBadiou is generally hought f as an anti-ethical hinker, ot east

on account f his own many nd often ery orceful eclarationso ust thateffect.1husherarelymisses chance o denouncewhatheregards s the ol-lusive elationshipetween thics orthekinds fmoralizingalk hat ypicallygounder hat ame) ndvarious resently ominant orms f ocial, olitical,class-or ender-based,nd - increasingly global-strategicnterest.2 tillweshouldn't akehis disclaimers ntirely t face value ince heywill hen erveonly o obscure r conceal conception f thics hat s heterodox o thepointof repudiating ny suchdescription ut none the ess cogent nd (to use aclichd ut n this ase perfectly pt expression) hought-provokingor hat.For,whatever is scruplesn this egard, adiou has devoted good propor-tion f hiswork o ssues hat ossess clearly-markedthical imension ndthat igure s test-cases or he exercise f ntellectual onscience. use thisphrase intellectualonscience'rather hanfalling ack to the more bvious'moral', social', r political' ualifiers) ot because Badiou is a peculiarlyrarefied r hyper-theoreticalpproach utrather ecause hat workmanifestsan exceptional egree f dedication o the project f thinking hrough hatis required y any genuine thical ommitment. t is also an apt choice ofphrase n so far s he rejects ny thics hatwouldfall hort f that tandardby resorting ovarious as he sees them) vasive ubstitute ppealssuchasthose hat

lacetheir ltimate rust n consensus

alues,hared

eliefs,om-

munal ife-forms,iberal pinion, r the phere f presumptivelynlightenedpublic pinion.

Indeed t had better e said plainly hat adiou s an anti-ethical hinker njust aboutevery efinition r conception f ethics' hat hasplayed signifi-cant ole n modern ebate. Abovell,he has resisted hat Kantian onception

* Cardiff niversityCardiff, nited ingdom).1See especiallyAlainBadiou, Ethics: An Essay on the Understanding f Evil. Trans. PeterHallward

London:Verso, 001).2Seeespecially .Badiou,MetapoliticsTrans. ason arker London: erso, 005);Polemics.Trans. teve CorcoranLondon:Verso, 006);TheCentury. rans.Alberto oscano Cambridge:Polity ress, 007).

I n^l rt r- RevistaPortuguesa de Filosofia283 1 LMEL

t r-65(Supl.)2009 1103-1136

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp


3/35

1104 Christopher Norris

according o which he mperativesf ethical practical) eason re thought

of as resulting rom he moral gents xercise f a purely ational, utono-mous, elf-legislativeilloblivious o the pathological'romptings f ppet-itivedesireor self-interest.3or has Badiou any time for hatother,moresocially-groundedspectof Kantian hinking hich onceivesmoralvaluesasfinding heirustificationhrough he egulativedea of truly nlightenedsensus ommunis or public phere f open participant ebate)wherein hatwillfinds ollective xpressions the product f suitably armonized aluesandbeliefs mongst hosebestqualified o udge.4Moreover,nd for imilarreasons, e s squarely pposed othekind f ommunitarianhinking oftenwith ts source n lateWittgenstein that ocates thical alue n the kindsof udgment pon which he members f some given ommunity r cultural'form f ife' wouldmost ikely onverge n keepingwith heir hared alues,beliefs, ommitments, nd priorities.5 his atter e regards s indeednoth-ingmore han he philosophic orm urrently akenby an abjectreadinessto throw n one lot with omeregnant deology r receivedcommonsense'doctrine. t must be seen as falling amentablyhort f the critical ocation- or the prime mperative oquestion ll such dominant iews whichhetakes o define he taskofphilosophyt anytime nd all the more o in anageofmassively istorted ince ystematically isinformedonsensus elief.Badiou hasgoneout of his wayto denounce his nd other ariants f thepresently idespreadinguistic urn'which e sees as just a latter-day evivalof ancientGreek ophistry nd its resort o the arts of rhetoric r suasivelanguage,most ften eployedo rrational r downright endacious nds.6It s against his ervasive oxa that Badioubrings o bear ll theforce f hispolemical s well s his exceptionallycute nalytic ntelligence.

Thus the maintarget f his criticism s the notion hatmere onsensusbelief r agreement ver sufficient ange f culturally alient ssues mightsomehow ffer basis for thical hinking. his s merely hecomplicitousmirror-imagef a Kantian-deontologicalpproach hatplacesmoralvalues

outside nd above ll the messy ontingencies f historicallyituated umanchoice, nd whichmoreoverfor ust that eason) ery ften omes down asin the hinking f iberal deologuesuch s HannahArendt to a counsel fcontemplativeetachment rom he rgenciesndpressures f fully ngaged

3 A.Badiou, Manifesto or Philosophy. rans. Norman Madarasz(Albany, y: State UniversityofNewYorkPress,1 99);Infinite hought: ruth nd the Return o Philosophy. rans.Oliver elthamand Justin lemens London:Continuum, 003);TheoreticalWritings. d. and trans. Ray Brassierand Alberto oscano London: Continuum, 004).

4 See for nstance . Kant,PoliticalWritings. d. Hans Reiss (Cambridge:CambridgeUniver-sity Press, 1991).

0 bee especiallyLudwig Wittgenstein, hilosophical nvestigations. rans. G.E.M. Anscombe(Oxford:Blackwell,1951).

6 Badiou,Manifesto or Philosophy, it.

RevistaPortuguesade Filosofa pig] I65(Supl.)2009 LJglKPF I 284



4/35

Truth, thics and the Formal mperative 1105

practico-politicalife.7 t he ametime adiou s notably nimpressed y he

various lternatives urrently n view. Among hem re those that eek tomaintain critical dge nd avoid he harge f deep-laid onservatismftenleveled t the communitarian pproachby espousing qualified ersion ftheKantian eontologicalppealto values hat ranscend nymerely efactoconsensus f beliefwhileheading ff he tandard ange f anti-foundation-alist objections y endorsing likewise ualified ersion f the communi-tarian rgument.8 ere againthe result s a compromise reedthat makesroomfor ertain ocal adjustments o the trength r scopeofsuchcriticismindeferenceotheweight fmajority pinion, eceived isdom, r the domi-nant ensus ommunis. adiou finds uch notions oliticallys well s philo-sophically ankrupt ince hey etray r negate hepotential or hange forthe transformation f presently xisting ocial realities that provides hesole meansbywhich o assess thevalidity r truth f ny thicsmeriting^thename. ndeed one couldarguewith eference otonly o his short, assion-ate and highly olemical ook on the topicbut also to numerous assageselsewheren his work hatBadiou- likemanyMarxists nd others who sus-pect the deologically otivated haracter f various uasi-universalaluesandprinciples is against thics' n ust bout very urrently ccepted enseof he erm.

In which ase clearly hequestion rises:what can he offer y wayofreplacement or hese arious ailed andidates? nadequate nswer o thisquestion onethatwouldfollow ut the ntricate ogicofBadiou argumentacross widerange f ubject-areas iswellbeyond he copeofthis rticle.However ne can best ummarize y saying hat ny suchtreatment ouldinvolve onsideration f the central oleplayed n his thinking yfour uchsubject-areas.hese re mathematicsin particular hatmodern ranch f tconcerned ith et-theoretical onceptions f the multiple nd the nfinite),the ubject especially s theorized n the wakeof Lacanianpsychoanalysis),art where is commitmentsiesquarelywith he more dvanced r formallyadventurous odesof iterary, isual, nd musicalproduction), nd politics(inwhich egard ehaskept aithwith he egacy f May1968 nd continuesto denounce very ign f whathe sees as the Thermidorian' etrayal f thatlegacyby the nouveaux hilosophesnd other media-sawy epresentativesof mainstream rench ntellectual ulture). uch are the fourfold nabling'conditions' f philosophy hichBadiou definesmore broadly s science,love, rt, ndpoliticswith cience elating o mathematicsna fairly bvious

7For some highly elevantommentary,ee RonaldBeiner nd Jennifer edelskieds.),

Judgment, magination,nd Politics:themes romKant and Arendt Lanham, md: Rowman and

Littlefield,001).8See for nstance vital himony nd D. Weinsteineds.),TheNewLiberalism:econcilingLibertynd CommunityCambridge: ambridge niversity ress, 001).

I PMI r- RevistaPortuguesa de Filosofa I285 I LPRPF

r-65(Supl.)2009 I 1103-1136



5/35


way nd ovebyno means educible o but finding t east onepartialmeans

of theoretical rticulation n the discourse f psychoanalysis.n the otherhand- crucially philosophymust t all costs void becomingsutured' oanyone of those onditions hose xclusive r single-mindedursuit s thenapt to leave the philosopher xposed o the worst kindsof temptation, switnessHeidegger's azismor (albeit n a very ifferent,essplainly isas-trousmode) he echnocraticndun-self-criticalcientism spoused ymuchanalytic hilosophy.

If this ll seems o leave my uestion anging ery much n the air thenperhaps hatvery act the fact hat, uite simply, here s nowhere lse tolookoutside r beyond hose ourfoldonditions or n ethical imension oBadiou thought is itself he best nswer. n eachcasehis most mphaticpoint s that thical hoices, cts, decisions, r commitments an never esubject o evaluation rom ny standpoint f pure hencepurely llusory)detached r contemplativeeasonnor gain themost avored urrent lter-native byexisting ommunal orms. ather hey rise t the point f nter-section etween ome prevalent tate f ffairs hathas hitherto etthe ermsforwhat ounts s a proper, alid, ermissible, r meaningfulontributionnsome pecific omain nd that which rrives o disrupt, hallengend trans-form ll those rexistenttandards f validity nd truth. uch s the dialecticof

being' nd event'hat

Badiou works ut with xtraordinary riginalitynhis book of that itle nd which mounts o a radical,mathematically-basedre-thinking f the relationship etween ruth nd knowledge or ontologyand epistemology across all the above-mentionedisciplines r fields fhuman ndeavor.9 hus thought nd action hould lwaysbe conceived nterms f specificngagementith r ntervention nsomeparticular, istori-cally ocated pisode f cientific iscovery,rtistic reation, olitical ctivity,or (Badiou'sfavoredword)amorousencounterwhichaloneprovides herelevant valuative ontext hereby o assess the truth-procedure'n ques-tion.Whathe s concernedbove ll to emphasisenrelation oeach of these

subject-domains even here taking qualified eadfrom acan's rumina-tions n the topic) n the case of sexual ove - is the absolute entrality ftruth oany dequate onceptualization f the omplex, ften npredictabledynamics hrough hich hose ransformativepisodes ome bout.10

At takehere s the ssue of ontinued idelityo an event' hose ffect asbeen to raise such a challenge osome well-establishedcientific aradigm,artistic ractice, olitical rder, r other uch dominant ystem fvalues nd

9A.Badiou, eing ndEvent. rans. liver eltham London: ontinuum,005); lso Chris-topher orris, lainBadiou'sBeing nd Event:AReadersGuide London:Continuum,009).

10SeeespeciallyuzanneBarnard nd Bruce ink eds.),Readingeminar x:Lacan'sMajorWork n Love,Knowledge, nd FeminineSexuality Albany, NY: State University f New YorkPress, 002).

RevistaPortuguesade Filosofa Pigi I65(Supl.)2009 LPRPF I 286



6/35


beliefs. idelity f his indmay ften e manifest nvery ifferent ayswithin

a single ife-history,s with he wo highly ifted renchmathematicians eanCavaills nd Albert autman whowereboth Resistancemembers hot bythe ccupying erman orces.11 hile heir ourage nd sheer moralheroismarebeyond oubt hey houldbothmost ptly e seen, n Badiousestimate,as thinkers hose deployment f rigorous, xiomatic-deductiveroceduresin theirmathematical ork was likewise isplayed ostriking ffect n theirperfectlyonsistent arrying-throughfethico-politicalrecept ntopractice.For t ust his point one that placesBadiouverymuch n the company fSpinoza,despite eep disagreementsetween hem n other espects thatethics an bestbe savedfrom ts various resent-daydeological istortionsand abuses by precisely his mphasis n fidelity o a truth-procedure.12tthen ecomes irst nd foremost mutter f rigorouslyonsequent easoningrather han of goodfaith r moral onscience n the commonplaceliberal-humanist) enseofthose erms.

i

Thathis two xemplarshould e mathematicianssyetmore ppropriategiven hecentrality f set-theoretical oncepts, ategories, perations, ndprocedures o Badiousproject s a whole. n brief, is claim s that math-ematics lone has the conceptual esources oprovide s with discoursecapableof hinkinghrough hevarious aradoxeschiefly hat f he ne andthe many) hathave vexedphilosophers rom lato down, nd whichhavenow reached he point f adequate i.e.,productive nd thought-provokingrather han hought-disablingformulationnly s a consequencefCantorepochalrevolutionn mathematicalhought.13 hat hismadepossiblewasa working rasp f the nfinite and the nfinitely ultiple rders f nfinity)thathad once struck hilosophersnd mathematicianss a conceptualcan-daland a breeding-groundf paradoxwhichhadto be avoided t all costs f

reasonwas not to find tself ied nto knots f self-contradiction. therwise- amongst hemore heologicallyr mystically-inclinedit was sometimestreated s a pointer oregions f peculativehought eyond ll such prosaicrational imits. adiou argument oes bywayof n intensive ritical-expos-itory ccount f all the main developmentsn set-theoreticalhinking romDedekind nd Cantor o the present. oweverwhatgives hat rgument tsquite extraordinary copeand reach s that Badiou conceives verymajor

11SeeBadiou,Metapoliticscit.12Badiou,Spinoza",

nBeing

nd Event, it.,pp.

112-20 nd"Spinoza's

losedOntology",in TheoreticalWritings, it., pp. 81-93.13See Badiou,Beingand Event and Theoretical Writings; lso Michael Potter, et Theory nd

itsPhilosophy:CriticalntroductionOxford: xford niversity ress, 004).

I pT*>l RevistaPortuguesa de Filosofia'

287 1 LIH RPF 65(Supl.)2009 1103-1136



7/35


scientific, olitical, reative nd ethical dvance s brought bout through

just thekind f discoveryhat s best,most trikinglyxemplifiedyCantorsway of turning aradox nto concept'. hus, again, t is an event f thatepochal rderwhereby hathad hitherto igureds an obstacle o progressssuddenly ransformednto source f evermoreproductive ince onceptu-ally ensile r paradox-drivennsights.n political erms his nvolves chal-lenge o the dominantcount-as-one',hat s to say, he deologicallymposedconception f what ualifies ormembershipn good standing f this r thatnation, thnic roup, olity, r other uch collective hose dentity s main-tained gainstalien' ntrusion recisely ydefining ndenforcinghose amemembershiponditions.

It shere hatBadiou makeshisboldand to saythe east)philosophicallyheterodoxtep rom xpoundingertain echnical evelopmentsnmodern ettheory oaccounting or he variousmechanisms f social victimage,thnicpersecution,ndpolitical isenfranchisementhat ontfriue otypify he ivesof manywho nhabit he margins f present-dayiberal-democratic'tates.His main xamples that f he French ans-papiers,r migrant mainly orthAfrican) orkersacking nyofficial ocumentation ho therefore xist n akind f ocial imbo denied ecognitionythe tate nd deprived f even hemostbasiccitizenly ights. heir redicaments best understood, eclaims,through hedistinction etween elongingnd nclusion hich, ogether iththat betweenmember nd part, lays crucial ole n set-theoreticalhink-ing.What hat istinction rings utwith high egree f formal-conceptualrigor s the lways recarious inceforciblymposed haracter f the ount-as-one nd the ver-presenthreat f ts disruption yan errant, ncounted,or anomalousmultiple hat inds o place no egitimate r recognized lace- within he presently-existingocio-political-culturalrder.Moreover,t isprecisely hrough hepressures rought o bear by that which ounts fornothing n somegiven ituation through heVoid' that nhabits ny suchorder n account f ts xcludingr working omarginalizeertainmultiples- that he mostdecisive ransformationsomeabout,whether n the historyofmathematicalhought r n the ourse f political vents.ndeed he event'in Badiou'sstrongly ualitative ense of that term s just what transpiresat the critical ointwhere xisting onceptual esources un out or wherethinking onfronts roblems o far beyond ts power o contain r compre-hend hat heymust e taken o herald ome mminent hallenge o tsmostbasic structures ndpresuppositions.

Limits f pace precludemydoing ustice oBadiou'sworking-outf thishomologous elationship etween ignal dvancesn the realm f set theoryandsignal vents npolitical istory sometimesfailed' r, n his reckoning,as-yet nfulfilled evolutionaryortents which ikewise equire hatwedistinguish hat counts' s a matter f official, ext-bookecord romwhat

RevistaPortuguesade Filosofa p[|g| I65(Supl.)2009 LPRPF I 288



8/35


genuinelyounts s a matter f human iberatory otential. encehis stress

on the needfor 'subtractive' ather han positive ntology, ne that wouldregister hesymptomatic tress-points r eventai ites'where ome newlyemergent onflict r nomalymight et urn ut for he ssue s never ecidedin advance f ts ultimate orking-throughto have marked he nception fa 'truth-procedure' ithmomentous onsequences. hismaytakethe formof logical aradox r dilemma uch s those hat oth vexed nd fascinatedthe ancient Greek hinkers nd which ontinued o playa tantalizing olethroughout he ongcenturies f baffled eflectionn the nfinite hen, ormost hilosophersnd mathematicians,t seemed o posea massive hreat othe coherence r integrity f their whole nterprise.14r again, t may risefromwithin he very ystem hich t then forces o the verge f conceptualruin, s famously ccurred henBertrand usselldiscoveredheparadoxesof self-predicationthe et of all sets that re not members f themselves',etc.)and therebyeopardized is own great roject f placingmathematicson a perfectly onsistent incepurely ogicalbasis.15 owever as Badiouis keen o establishwith eferenceo certain istorical vents one can seethe ameprocessworkingtself ut at ust those rucial unctures hennewsocio-politicalorces merge,most ften t an unexpectedmoment r a 'site'far removed romwhat ppear to contemporary bservers nd perhaps oa

greatmanymainstream hroniclers hereafter) s the most ignificant r

world-transformativepisodes.An event n this authentic r qualitative enseis what typically ccurs

when some existing ituation s suddenly rought o crisis-point y thecoming-to-lightf a hitherto uppressed nomaly, njustice, onflict f nter-ests or case of exclusion rom he tally f thosewhoproperly, egitimatelycount ccording oprevalent e.g., iberalor social-democratic)otions finclusivity. t uch moments nly 'subtractive'rather han positive)ocialontology an tellus what ranspired ince t alone makes dequate enseofthe waythat ertain ppressed, isregarded, r disenfranchised inorities

maynone he esscome oexert force f politicaleverage enied o commu-nitymembers those ncludedn the dominant ount-as-one whose tatusdenies hem ny uchrole.Aswithmathematics nd thephysical ciences,olikewisen the political phere t s at ust these eventai ites' hat herequi-siteconditionsmaybe seen to have existed or breakthrough iscovery ra radical hallenge odominant ocialstructures. n the other hand thereis absolutely oguarantee t such times hat he hancewillbe taken r themoment eized n such a resolute, ommitted, nd clear-sighted ayas toenable ts ffectivearrying-througho the nd-point nvisaged y thosewho

14For omehighlylluminatingiscussion,eeA.W.Moore, he nfiniteLondon: outledge,2001).15Bertrand ussell,ntroductionoMathematicalhilosophyLondon:Allen Unwin, 930).

I pr| RevistaPortuguesade Filosofia I2891 LIB RPF 65(Supl.)2009 11103-1136



9/35


first espondedo ts all. Hencehisclose ttention o failed' evolutions r to

episodes,ike he 1871ParisCommuneas well s the events' f May1968),that have incegonedown mong hinkers n the eft s terrible etbacks ras melancholy itness o the folly f premature, ll-organizedevolt.16orBadiou,conversely,hey igure s touchstone vents n so far s their eryfalling-shortr the distance etween heir ims nd their utcome s a test ffidelity or hosewho nherit oth he problems nd the promise f their ofar nredeemed oliticalegacy.

Tophrase t ike this s perhaps o risk eaving false mpression f histhinking incethe anguage f fidelity or of keeping aithwith hose whosuffered uchdefeats might eemwithin each f that iberal-humanitariantalk r all-purpose hetoric f human ights' o whichBadiou s so stronglyaverse.At best, o he argues, uch languagemerely erves s a means ofconcealinghemassive apbetween hat s commonlyoutedfor ome on-sumption r for xport) s 'representativeemocracy'nd the ctually xist-ingversion f t alongwith ll its manifold xclusions, istortions, tructuralinequalities, altreatmentf targetminorities, tc.Atworst t does duty s apioussmokescreenor hekinds f maraudingnterventionistoreign olicythat eek o passoff heir ealmotives f conomic nd militaiy-strategicelf-interest nder over f a human-rights octrine ith mphatic but n this

context ntirely pecious)universalist ppeal.As Badiounotes n his bookTheCentury ith eference o the nvasion f raqand other ecent pisodes,such alk s all too readily o-opted o the ervice f hegemoniciberal reedwithdecidedlylliberal esigns n the iberty f those whomight resumeto resist ts more forceful landishments.17llthe same,as we haveseen,fidelitys a core value n Badiou's thical hinking ven f t s often efinedmore y tandards f ogical onsistencyndrigour evenby hose f xiom-atic-deductiveeasoning than hrough nydirect ppealto ethical leastofallKantian) rounds.

Nor houldweconclude rom is attack n thefake niversalismnvokedby politicians ho abuse the rhetoric f human ights hatBadiou must nthat ase belong o the company f those whoadopt flatly pposed, .e.,aradically articularist r anti-universalisttance.These re thinkers nowa-daysa large nd diverse ompany for whom difference'whether thnic,cultural, inguistic, r gender-related)s a notion often aised, ronicallyenough, o the tatus f n absolute r a priori rinciple nd one that s takento trump ny ppealto the ypecast elusiveEnlightenment'deaof shared,e.g.,cross-cultural r trans-gendernterests nd values.18ndeedBadiouis

16Seeespeciallyadiou, olemics,it.17A.Badiou,TheCentury,it.18See for nstance ris Marion Young, usticend the Politics f DifferencePrinceton, j:

RevistaPortuguesa de Filosofa pigi I65(Supl.)2009 LPRPF I 290



10/35


among hemostvigorous efenders f a true universalism as opposedto

themendacious hetoric urrently eddledn thatname whichwould llowhuman eings o transcend ather han nnul, uppress r forciblyubdue hevariousdifferenceshat tand n its way.Hencethe remarkable iversity fthinkers nd activists hom he is able to recruit n theprocess f explainingthis n theface f t highly aradoxical r even downright ontradictoryela-tionship etween idelitynd universalism. t ts most xtreme heparadoxspushed o the pointwhere adiou - an avowed theist can take t. Paul asanexemplar f fidelity o the vent f Christ life, eath nd resurrection utalso as an early xemplar funiversalismnso far s he nsistedalbeit o thetolerant musement f his Greek nterlocutors)hat n Christ here ould beneither ewnor Greek ut only he ingle verriding uestion f acceptanceornon-acceptanceoncerninghat vent.19

Badiou s here ver-indulgingis own somewhat auline aste or chal-lenging aradox.Howeverhis generalpoint comes across clearly nough:that difference-thinkingf the kindpromoted y a greatmanypresent-day'advanced' r radical' hinkers n the ultural eft s in truth politicallyndethically etrograde ovementf hought hich erves nly oblock nypros-pectofachieving enuine revolutionary)ocialchange hrough herecogni-tionof sharedhuman nterests bove and beyond hedivisions, isparities,

and conflicts f nterest hat resently bstruct uchchange. t sprimarilynorder o make hispoint to emphasize hehumanuniversalityf anytrulyprogressiver emancipatoryolitics thatBadioustakes is claimformath-ematics s the discipline est uited oprovide hat rojectwith n adequateconceptual nd social-ontologicalrounding.t is also whyhe comesout sostrongly gainst very ersion f the turn o anguage r discourse togetherwith heir arious urrogate erms uch s paradigm',framework',r concep-tual cheme') s the furthest hat hilosophyanpossibly o in the questfortruth. hiscan be seen to havefollowedtraight n from ant's elf-avowed'Copernicanevolution' hich eclared ntologicalssues trictly ff-boundsbygiving pistemologyride f placeanddefiningts proper emit n repre-sentational erms, .e.,with eferenceo the scopeand limits f the humancapacity or ringingntuitions nder oncepts.20t went longwithhis dea- oneto which Badiou s likewise trongly, venfiercely pposed ofpracti-

Princeton niversity ress, 990); lsoToddMay, heMoralTheoryfPoststructuralismPhila-delphia, a:Pennsylvaniatate Universityress, 994)and- for critique f such thinkingChristopher orris, heTruth bout ostmodernism Oxford: lackwell, 993) nd Truth nd theEthics fCriticismManchester: anchester niversity ress, 994).19A.

Badiou,aintPaul:TheFoundation

fUniversalism.rans.

ayBrassier

Stanford,a:

Stanford niversityress, 003).For ome lluminatingultural-historicalackground,eealsoBruceW.Winter,hilo nd PaulAmonghe ophistsCambridge:ambridge niversityress, 97).20I. Kant, ritique fPureReason. rans.N.Kemp mith London:Macmillan, 964).

I pTl RevistaPortuguesade Filosofa 291 I LMEL 65(Supl.)2009 1 103-1 136



11/35


cal moral) eason s best xercised nthemode f detached r contemplativejudgment ather han hrough hose orms f direct ctivist ngagementhatKant quatedwithmerelympulsiveehavior r with he worst,most estruc-tivekinds f revolutionaryeal.21 or him, n the contrary, thical ommit-ments nvolve oth readiness oact decisivelyn response ospecific res-sures f ircumstance ndalso- quite ompatibly ith hat a willingnessoapply hemost igorouslyonsequent tandards f reasoning oanydecisionand course f ction hus rrived t.

II

HenceBadiou invocationf hose wo mathematician-rs/stanss exem-plary igures n this espect, reference hatgains dditional orce rom isshowing n meticulous etail how certain mathematical,specially et-theo-retical rocedures f thought avea valid pplicationn our thinking boutissues of social ustice.Hence also his emphasis n the ethico-politicalswellas the formal r logicalforce f a truth-procedurehat tarts ut fromthe threemainprecepts f set theory. irst s the rreducible ultiplicityfbeing, hat s,the ntological riority f the inconsistent' ultiple ver veryapplication f the count-as-one hat eeks to contain hat unruly xcessbyreducing t to a mode ofconsistent,.e.,paradigm-preservinginceparadox-avoiding onceptualization.22his s why adioudevotes onsiderable ffortsto revealing he nadequacy f various ttempts ocopewith he endemicproblems nd aporiasof set-theoretical hought y adopting omestopgap(pseudo-)solutionhatresorts ither o a preconceivedormalism r, s inBertrand ussell Theory f Types, o a stipulative ule hat imply xcludesthem or easons f ntellectual ygiene.23econd, nd closely elated o this,is the power-setxiom ccording o which here s always as a matter f thestrictest ormal r ogicalnecessity an excess f subsets ver ets, f nclu-sion overbelonging, r of parts overelements, n excess that of course

surpasses ll the imits f finite eckoningr calculation nce thinking ntersthe ealm f nfinite ultiples. hird s the oncept f hevoid, r the null et,as that whichmust e thought f s included neach and every ther et ndas the ocus ofthat ame ubiquitousack, hat tructural bsence r subtrac-tive imension hereby nygiven ntological rdermight lways esubjectto disruption y nomalous vents eyond tsutmost ower ocomprehend.So muchhas been evident t least since Plato and the troublesome pshotof those passages n the Parmenides hich demonstrate, lbeit gainst he

21I. Kant, Critique f PracticalReason. Trans. Werner Pluhar Indianapolis: Hackett, 2002).22See also A. Badiou, Number nd Numbers. Trans. Robin MacKay(London: Polity Press,

2008).23Badiou, Number nd Numbers, it.

RevistaPortuguesa de Filosofia P^g I65(Supl.)2009 LMPL I 292



12/35


authorswill, hat the one is not' nd therefore hat ny ppearance f con-

sistentmulti-plicity ust lways nvolve he concealment r suppression fan inconsistent ultiplicityhatwould otherwise xceed and destroy hatappearance.24

This ppliesmost trikinglyo cases where he multiplesnquestion re ofthe ransfinite rder hat Cantor penedup to mathematical hought hroughhisdiscovery against ll the dds of ntuitive nd,up until hen, onceptualor logical elf-evidence that here ould, ndeedmust be thought o existdifferent rders r sizes' of nfinity. husmathematics rovides hatBadioufindswoefullyacking cross he wholerange f post-structuralist,ostmod-ernist nd other uch inguistically-orientediscourses,.e.,those hat laimtoradicalize he urrency f he human nd social ciences hrough heir hal-lenge o the modeof ignification the naturalized iebetween ignifier ndsignified upon which according o these superstructuralist'heories)herecan be seen to rest he entire pparatus f ate-capitalistultural nd socialhegemony.25nly hrough he urn o mathematics s a needful orrective othat arlier inguistic urn an philosophy egain omething f ts true oca-tion. his heequateswith ts ritical ower ochallenger resist hose ariousforms f ideologicalmisrecognition hat are scarcelydisturbed ratherconfirmed r eft ecurelyn place- by the notion f anguage in whatevertheoretical

uise)as the

endpointr ultimate orizon f

thought.owever

Badiou s ust s critical oward he kinds f pproach hat re nowadays omi-nant mongst othworking athematiciansnd mainstream hilosophersfmathematics,hat s to say, hose hat lso (inhisview) ell themselves hortbydisowningnyontologicalmbitions r any dea that mathematics ightprovide more xacting onceptualizationf ssues n the xtra-mathemati-cal(especiallyhe ocialor political) omain.26or t s precisely is eadingclaim one that nables he therwise mprobable,ven bsurd onjunctionfset-theoretic ith olitical-activistoncerns that uite imply mathematicsisontologynsofar s itprovides urbest,most racticallyfficaciouss well

as conceptuallyigorousmeansof thinking ur way through nd beyondgreat ariety f real-world roblems,ssues, onflicts, nd dilemmas.Badiou is thus using he term ontology'n a sense that ranges ver he

abstract mathematical),hephysical including atural-scientific),nd the

24Plato, armenides.rans.Mary . Gill nd Paul Ryan Indianapolis: ackett, 996); lsoJohn . Palmer, lato's eceptionfParmenidesOxford: larendon ress, 002).25For an extended nd sharply-angledritical reatment f these hemes, ee Richard .Harland, uperstructuralism:hePhilosophyf Structuralismnd Post-structuralismLondon:Methuen, 987).26The orts f

pproachhat adiouhas nmind re

fairly epresentedyhe

ssaysollected

in Paul Benacerraf nd Hilary utnam edsj, ThePhilosophyf Mathematics:elected ssays.2nddn. Cambridge: ambridge niversityress, 983) ndW.D.Hart edj, ThePhilosophyfMathematicsOxford: xford niversityress, 996).

I rWI noi- RevistaPortuguesade Filosofia293 I LMPL

oi-65(Supl.)2009 1103-1136



13/35


14/35


This nturn equires conception f ruth s inherently ranscendingoth

the scopeof knowledget this or that particular emporal tage of humancognitive dvance nd the sundry isagreements oncerning ruth etweenvariousparties r claimants o knowledgecross different aradigms, on-ceptual chemes, heoreticalrameworks,ife-forms,iscourses,nd so forth.Here should cknowledgehat adiou s careful o mark is distance romfully-fledgedlatonist utlook s concernsmathematics incehe thinks hatunlesswe takedue account f themethods, echniquesnd proof-proceduresby whichmathematical nowledgeccrueswe shall fall backinto ust thekinds f tale nd unprofitable rangling hathave ypifiedo much nalyticdebate etween ard-line ealists r objectivistsn the ne side and anti-real-ists r constructivists fvarious echnical ersuasion n the ther.30 oweverhe s also very irm nmaintaininghat hosemethods nd procedures ouldmakeno sense that we could have no grasp f what 'proof onsisted nor what ounted s valid xiomatic-deductive easoning were t not for urprior graspof the necessity hat ruth hould be conceived s verification-transcendent, r as always otentially urpassing he imits f humanknowl-edge.Otherwise,n theformal s in the physical ciences, herewould implybe no accounting orour knowledge f the growth f knowledge r ourcapacity o understand ow t s that ur present est onceptual r explana-

tory owers mightall hort f truth n

ustthe ame

waythat we can now

see other hinkers ohavefallen hort nthepast.What ives adiou thoughtits extraordinary epth nd speculative each s the waythat he extends hiscrucial nsight rom he realm f mathematics here ruth an be attainedonly by means of formal axiomatic-deductive)roof-procedureso thedomain f politics nd social ethics not to shy way from uch anguagedespite is avowed ntipathy owardt where hose rocedures ind morethanmerely uggestivepplication.

The most bvious oint t which he et theory nd the politics onvergeis on the fact hat here xist ertainhard-to-quantifyut objectivelyxis-

tent umerical isparities etween he um-total f human eings n a givensociety uite sidefrom ny thnic, ocio-economic, ender-relatedr other'identifying'raits nd the um of those who count for lectoral, elfare, reducational urposes y the ights f a prevailingsocial-democratic'rder.Severalmain omponents f Badiou thinking ometogether n making hiscase.They nclude is version othe dea of difference'r radicalotherness'that has lately cquired uch a cachet no doubt s the tructural omple-ment f dentity-politicsand also his insistence n a purely xtensionalistapproach oset-theoretical rocedures,.e.,one that reats ll the parts orelements f a set as strictly ndistinguishablene from nother or formal-

30Seeentries nder Note 6, bove.

I PrSl rrn- RevistaPortuguesa de Filosofia I295 I LMRPL

rn-65(Supl.)2009 M 103-1 136



15/35


operational urposes.31n this he stands pposedto thosemathematicians

(or moreoften hilosophers f mathematics) ho adoptan 'intensionalist'approachwhereby here re significant istinctions o be made in termsof qualifying ttributes r membership riteria.32t is not hard to see howBadiou'spreferencen this respect although irmly ased on formal, .e.,mathematicalnd ogico-semanticonsiderations goes alongwith is com-mitment o a standard f ocial ustice onceivednstrictly galitarian erms.This s also whyhe is strongly pposedto that otherwise iverse angeofdoctrinesn recent hilosophyf mathematics anti-realist, ominalist, or-malist, ntuitionist, ictionalist,nstrumentalist,nd soforth which espondto the much-touted roblemwith bjectivismthat t appears oplacetruthforever eyond each of humanknowledge) y veering o one or anotherof hose verly eactiveallbackositions. hushe has no time or he orts fdiscussion arried n by nalytic hilosophers hostart yposing he ssueas a flat ilemma either bjectiveverification-transcendent)ruth r knowl-edgewithin he ompass fhuman pistemic rasp andwho henmost ftengoon to endorse omethird-waylternative,uch s 'truth' ythe tandardsof this or that recognized xpert ommunity, hich n fact omes down toanti-realism nder more mollient escription.33

WhatBadiousets n placeofthisdeadlocked nd argely terile ebate s

a detailed ccount f various ignal pisodes n the history f mathematicalthought, speciallyhose from armenides nd Platoto Dedekind, antor,and beyond whenknowledgeameup against he imits mposedby tsfailure o grasp hefurther mplications f someprevious iscoveryhat eftit facing n as yet rresolvable aradox.Hence his focus n precisely hatoccurs t the breakthroughtagewhen paradox s turned nto oncept' ndwhen, s happened n exemplary ashionwithCantor's evolution,hinkingis irresistibly rawn r mpellednto wholenewrealm f conceptual-onto-logical nquiry hathad hitherto een marked ff-bounds n account f tspresenting ucha downright ffront ocommonsensentuition r acceptedideasofrational rocedure.t s bywayofthis ngoing ialectic this ecur-rent pattern f advancesthat exposesomehitherto nsuspected aradoxwhich n turn ecomes hedriver f another uch advance nd thereby hesourceof another uchproductive incethought-provokingaradox that

31See Note 18, above; also Badiou, Number nd Numbers, it. and The Conceptof Model:An Introduction o the Materialist pistemology f Mathematics. tems. Zachaiy Luke Fraser andTzuchienTho (Victoria: e-press, 007).32See Potter, et Theory nd its Philosophy, it.33See Note 26, above; also Hilary Putnam, Mathematics, Matter nd Method Cambridge:Cambridge University ress, 1975);Crispin Wright, Wittgenstein n the Foundations of Mathe-matics Cambridge,Mass.: HarvardUniversity ress, 1980),Realism,Meaning nd Truth Oxford:Blackwell,1987)and Truth nd ObjectivityCambridge,Mass.: Harvard University ress, 1992).

RevistaPortuguesa de Filosofa ngl 165(Supl.)2009 UegRPF I 296



16/35


Badiou s able to achievewhatmany nalytic hilosophers eem mpossible,

that s,to maintain robustly ealist onception f truth hilenonethe essmaking dequateroomfor he various iscovery-proceduresnvolved,longwith heir evelopmento date.Thushe aysfair laim o haveovercome otonly he et-piecenalytic ilemma s characterizedbovebut lso its conti-nental1 ear-equivalent,hat s, the ntinomy f structure nd genesiswhichhasdogged pistemologyrom lato o Descartesnd thereafter inayetmoreinsistent ndvexing orm) rom ant o Husserl ndbeyond. ere tconcernstheproblem somewould aythe trictly nsoluble roblem ofreconcilingtruth onceived n terms f absolute deal objectivity ith he dea of truthsashaving een rrived t through ertain ppropriateknowledge-conducive)meansbycertain hinkers hronologicallyocated t certain rucial tages fdiscoveryr progress ithin certain istory f thought.34

So whenDerrida,n his earlywritings n Husserl, emarks hat his rob-lem s nowadaysmost harply osed by the encounter etween tructural-ismandphenomenologye is not taking narrowly presentisi' iewbut, nthe ontrary, reating hosemovementss the atest heirs o a deep-laid on-flict f philosophicims nd priorities.35 hatBadioubrings ut through isfocus n various andmark dvancesn the copeandpower f mathematicalthought s the way hat 'subtractive' onception f truth n the et-theoret-ical model llowsus to conceive t both s

transcendingr

surpassing nygiven tate f mathematical nowledgend as a conceptualacuna, nomaly,paradox r other uch defect hat igures owherenthe urrent tate f posi-tiveknowledge et heexistence f whichmay ignal hepath o some deci-sivefuture dvance. his s the point t which adiou manages hat witch fontological omains rommathematics opolitics r from he formal o thesocialand human ciences hat will urely trikemany hilosophers at anyrate hose n the nalytic amp as a category-mistakef the first rder r agross onfusion fproperly istinct, ven trictly on-communicatingealms.Howeverheywould, think, ehardput o show ustwhere nBadiou often

highly omplex ut alwaysmeticulously easoned rocess f argument onethat derives ts validity-conditionsrommathematics nd the procedures faxiomatic-deductivehought)his lagrantrror ssupposed ohave ccurred.Indeedhe is well ble to turn ack charges f this ort yremarking some-

34For detailed ccount, eeChristopher orris, indingheGap:EpistemologyndPhilos-ophy fSciencen the TwoTraditionsAmherst, ass.:Universityf Massachusettsress, 000);also LeilaHaaparantaed.),Mind,Meaning,nd Mathematics:ssays n the hilosophicaliewsofHusserl nd FregeDordrecht nd Boston:Kluwer, 994).35See for nstance acqueserrida,"GenesisndStructure"ndPhenomenology',nWritingand

Difference.rans. lan Bass London:

Routledge KeganPaul,1978),

p.154-168;dmund

Husserl 'Origin f Geometry':n ntroduction. rans. ohn . LeaveyLincoln, eb.:UniversityofNebraska ress, 989);TheProblemf Genesisn Husserl's hilosophy.rans.MarianHobson(Chicago: niversityf Chicago ress, 003).

I n^L.- Revistaortuguesae Filosofa I297 I LP RPF 65 sop.)2009 I 11 3-1136



17/35


times ndisdainful ashion that he kinds f erritorial mperativehatmost

often ive ise osuchobjectionsre also those hat havedrivenmuch ecentanalytical ebate nto he dead-end f realism ersus nti-realism onceivedin merely bstract erms uite apart from ny detailedworking-throughfparticular roblematicpisodes. or t s Badiou's laim hat ecent pproachesin the nalytic einhaveoften ondemned hemselves otedious rrelevancebyendorsing healtogether alse dea that n so far s mathematics spiresto a condition f formal igour t cannot e conceived s offering nypointsof conceptual-exploratoryurchasefor disciplinesoutside' r beyond1tsspecialist omain.

mHisemphatic ejectionf hiswholewayofthinking ppearsmost lainly

in Badiou's oncept f the count-as-ones an imposed r purely tipulativelimit n the ange fmultiples hatmeet he onditions oqualify ormember-ship to count s properly,egally elonging) nder omegiven ispensation.Thushe devotes gooddeal of omplexnd demandingrgument oexplain-ing ust how t s that ertain pochal ransformationsome bout whetherin themathematical-scientificr the ocio-politicalpheres through pro-cess that nvolves wo crucial oncepts thoseof forcing' nd the generic')that Badiouderives rom et theory nd, more pecifically,rom hework fthemathematician aul Cohen.36n brief, hey aveto do with he preciselyspecifiedonditions nder which given ituation r state f knowledge ayturn ut to contain r to generate nomalies hat re not ust easily orri-gibleerrors wing o some localizedbreakdown r lapseof logicalgrasp.Rather hey unction at whateveratent r so-far nacknowledgedevel asan index f the failure ofollow ut the further mplications f a previousdiscoverynd hence,whenviewed rom he tandpoint f a more dvancedstage of knowledge, s having ffectivelyor symptomatically)ointed

wayforward hrough hevery act f their allinghort n some crucial ndnowspecifiable espect. adioudevotes gooddeal of highly oncentratedlogico-mathematicalommentaryoCohen's ormal emonstrationhat hink-ing s indeed ossessed f this apacity ogo beyond he imits f conscious(let lone elf-consciousr reflective)wareness nd register he xistence ftruths hat urpass ts present-best ower f conceptual rticulation.37hisit s able to do in virtue f the waythat ertain nresolvednd even s-yetunrecognizedroblems anexistwithin he tate f mathematical nowledgeat anygiven ime nd exert none he ess powerful estabilizingorce, hatis to say, pressure pon thought o elaborate ew methods nd truth-proce-

36Paul J. Cohen,SetTheory nd the ContinuumHypothesisNewYork:W.A.Benjamin, 1966).37See especiallyBadiou,Beingand Event, it., pp. 325-343.

RevistaPortuguesade Filosofa n^l ^ _ I65(Supl.).2OO9

Portuguesa n^lLMPL

^ _1298



18/35


dureswhereby obring hoseproblemsmore learly ntoview nd then eek

out solutions o them. ThusTt]he erm generic" ositively esignates hatwhatdoes not allow tself o be discerned s in reality hegeneral ruth f asituation, he ruth f ts being, onsidereds the foundation f ll knowledgeto come'.38

Nor should t seem so very aradoxical o claimthat hinking ay oftenpress head of what s accessible o consciousness r grasped s a matter fknowledge,nderstanding,r epistemic arrant. hat ppearance s merelythe result f philosophy's aving o longbeenin thrall othe presumption- one that found ts classic tatement n Descartes ut was already here nPlato nd became retty uch ommon oin mongst ationalists,mpiricists,andepistemologistsrom ant n down that hought nd consciousnessreso closely oundup eachwith he other s to make them oint conditions(alongwith ruth) or nowledgen any dequate ccount. et t s clearly hecase that nyradicalnewdeparture n thinking hether s concernsmathe-matics, hysical cience, olitics, thics, r the reative rtswill t some tagerequire decisivemovement f advance beyondwhat s currently vailableto consciousnessn terms f established rocedures r accustomedwaysofcarrying n. n which ase - a conclusion hat Badioufully ccepts philos-ophyhas longbeenkept n ignorance f its true ontological-mathematical

vocation y thosevariousfalse turns from herationalist/empiricistwayof deas' to its present-daylinguistified'pin-offs)hathaveall in somewayfallen rey o this rror, venwhere hey ave eemed oreactmost igorouslyagainst t. On this view heWittgensteinian/Heideggerianotion f anguageas the end-point f all human nquiry s just another howing f that ameold reactive attern hereby he ophists quared up to Socrates n defenceof rhetoric ersus he claims of purebred ationalism, r hermeneutically-oriented hinkers uch s Herder nd Hamannrejectedwhat hey aw as thegroundlessndoverweeninglaims fKant's ritical hilosophy.39

However adiou chief oint s that his false dentification f the copeand limits f thoughtwith the scopeand limits f consciously vailableknowledgeas often laced drastic nd disabling estrictionn philosophy'sgrasp f howthinking roceeds t its moments f most ignificant reative,intellectual,nd ethico-politicaldvance. t is for his reason lso - ratherthan nygreat ttachment o the herapeutic irtues f psychoanalysisthatBadiou setsgreat tore yLacan's structuralist' eading f Freud longwithhis insistence n the need to conceptualize reud's iscovery f the uncon-scious and its complex opological eatures n rigorously ormal, ndeed

38Ibidem,p. 327.39See especiallyA.Badiou,Manifesto or Philosophy, it.

I n^L.- Revistaortuguesae Filosofa I2991 LP RPF

Portuguesa65 Supl.)2009 11103-1136



19/35


mathematicalorquasi-mathematical)erms.40ere gainwhatBadioumost

wishes ostress s the relative aucity nd limited emit f conscious, elf-conscious r reflective hought hen omparedwith he kinds f ntellectualbreakthroughr creative-exploratorydvance hat hinkings able to achieveat a levelwellbelow' hat artesian hreshold. n the ther and, s becomesclear n his oint reading f Lacan and Descartes, adiou is very arfromendorsing henowdistinctly asspost-structuralist/postmodernistoctrineaccording o whichnothing ould be salvaged rom hat ld figment f thebourgeois-humanist-rationalistmaginary, he Cartesian ubject-presumed-to-know.41or t s his contention hat fwe ook lsewhere han o the Medita-tions or Descartes'most mportant ontributions ifwe focus ather n theDiscourse n Method nd Rules for heDirectionf theMind thenweshallsee that his own thinking xemplifiedhat ame capacity or unning headof anyconscious rasp r apodictic elf-evidencehatBadiouconsiders heprecondition orgenuinely round-breaking r innovative hought.42t alsohelpsto emphasise iscardinal oint: hatprocesses arried n outside rbeyond he potlight f phenomenologicalwareness whether hese ountas unconscious' r preconscious'ccording o the tandard istinction willoften ar urpass hose arried n under he potlightn terms f their om-plexity, ormal igor, nd conceptuals well s creative r maginativeeach.

Thus Badiougoes alongat least up to a pointwith Lacan's claim thatDescartes' rguments ere ubverted y Freud's iscovery that nstead f'cogito, rgo sum' we should rather ay "'cogito rgo sum" ubi cogito, binonsum' 'where think Ithink, herefoream", hat s ustwhere am not').43However e s ust s keen o nsist hat what s thereby ery artially xposedto view s a range f thought-processes,perations nd procedures hatmaybe unconscious ot o much n account f their elongingosomerealm frepressed r subliminal esire utrather n account f their o far xceedingour present-best owers f conceptual r logicalgrasp.This s whyCohen'sideas of the generic' nd forcing' re of uchcrucial ignificanceo Badiou's

project.What hey llowhimto expresswithmaximum ormal recisionsthe always onceivableurpassing f knowledge y truth nd of consciousknowledge y preconscious rasping-in-thoughtf thatwhich as yet o be

40See Note 10, above; also J. Lacan, Ecrits: A Selection. Trans. A. Sheridan (London:Tavistock, 977)and TheLanguageof the Self:TheFunction f Language n Psychoanalysis. rans.AnthonyWilden Baltimore:Johns Hopkins University ress, 1968).41Badiou,Being nd Event, it., pp. 391-435;alsoE. Cadava,P. Connor nd J.-L. Nancy eds.),WhatComesAfter heSubject? London: Routledge,1991)and Paul Smith,Discerning heSubject(Minneapolis: University f Minnesota Press, 1988).42Ren Descartes,SelectedPhilosophicalWritings. d. By J. Cottingham Cambridge:Cam-bridge University ress, 1988).43J. Lacan, The Insistence of the Letter n the Unconscious,or Reason Since Freud . Trans.Jacques Ehrmann. n: Yak French tudies, vol. 36/7 1966),pp. 112-147.

RevistaPortuguesade Filosofa fifl I65(Supl.)2009 LMRPL I 300



20/35


21/35


the ongoing ffort, y analytic nd continental hinkers like, ofind ome

viable hird-way ay lternative otherealist/anti-realisttalemate.46I haveargued lsewhere hat his lternative s really o suchthing utrather fuzzily onceivedndhighly nstable ompromisesolution' hat anbe seen to ean over n one or theother irection toward ruth s objectiveandrecognition-transcendentr truth' s epistemicallyonstrained accord-ing othe heorist'swnpredilectionr the rea ofdiscourse nder eview.47Mypoint ere,more pecifically,sanyproposallikeBadiou's)hatweshouldthink f mathematics nd of ethics r politics s subject oequally igorousstandards f nvestigativehought s apt to strike many s misconceivednaccount f ts willfullyollapsing oth heHumean act/valueichotomyndthe far more laborate ystem f distinctions roundedn Kant's octrine fthe faculties. ither hat, r t will most ikely uffer yassociationwith heabove-mentionedypes f rgument rom esponse-dependencend their arfrom onvincing laimto established common cale uponwhich an beranged albeit t opposite nds- both a truth-oriented iscipline uch asmathematics here here might ust be room to this wayof thinking) orappeals obest udgment r expert pinion nd a variety f ubject-areas,uchasprototypicallyolor-perception,here he usual pproach asbeen hroughsomeversion f the Lockean ppealto secondary ualities'.48n these atter

sorts f case the furthest ne can get toward rans-individualtandards fassertorie arrant s widespreadgreement mongst hosewhoseresponsesqualify s normal y what lse?)commonlyccepted tandards nd whoseperceptualudgments re elicited nder ikewise ormal non-distortingrnatural) mbient onditions.

IV

I havetaken hisbrief etour ia Kant and the travails f present-dayepistemologyn order o bring ut by harp ontrast heperfect ndifference

that Badioudisplays oward ll such in his view)grossly nadequate ndmisconceivedpproaches oquestions f truth, nowledgend responsibil-ity.What hey ypicallyerve o promote r sustain s that Kantian dea ofthe subject whether heepistemologicalubject-presumed-to-knowr thedeliberativeubject f practical eason as properly eployingts capacities

46See for nstance he essayson this topic collected n Roberto Casati and Christine appolet(eds.),Response-Dependence.n: European Reviewof Philosophy, (1998).47For further iscussion see Christopher Norris, Truth Matters:Realism,Anti-realism, ndResponse-dependenceEdinburgh: Edinburgh University ress, 2002).

48See for nstance MarkJohnston, How to Speakof the Colours". n: Philosophical tudies,68 (1992),pp. 221-263 and various contributions o J. Haldane and C. Wright eds.), Reality,Representation nd Projection Oxford:OxfordUniversity rs, 1993).

RevistaPortuguesade Filosofia P|g| I65 Supl.)2009 LMRPF_ | 3Q2



22/35


andpowersna mode f detached r contemplativeudgment hat eepstself

as far s can be from he pressures nd temptations f political ngagement.It s this onception f ubjectivity,nnomatter hat transcendental'egister,that Badiousets out to contest nd repudiate y everymeansat his com-mand. Chief mong them s his own radically pposeddefinition f thesubject s any ocalconfigurationf generic rocedure romwhich truthissupported', r of subjectivization's that hrough hich truth spossible,[since]t turns he vent owardshe ruth f he ituation orwhich he ventis an event'.49

It is in this sense- and in this senseonly, s distinct rom ther, essdiscriminatee.g., ost-structuralist)ersions f he hesis that adiou eeksto demote he ubject rom ts erstwhile rivilegedtatus s arbiter f truthin its variousmodalities.50hat s to say, heconcept emains erymuch ttheheart fhisthinking utonly n so far s it pertains o the gency f omeparticular ubject n achieving r promoting omeparticular dvancewithinsomeparticular ield f endeavor t some crucialpoint n the field-specifichistory f changes, evelopments,r transformationsodate.Of course hisis not o exclude hepossibilityindeed, n socialor political erms, henear-necessity) hat uch a rolewillbe assumednot by an individual ut ratherby somecollectivityf ike-mindedubjects a Sartrean group-in-fusion'

brought ogethery nexceptionalense f hared redicamentndpurpose.51ThusBadiou operative otion f the subject s one that depends ponhisCohen-derivedoncepts f forcing' nd thegeneric' ince t refers ot oanyconscious, ransparent, elf-reflexiver transcendental ocusof knowledgebutrather o a certain ower f indiscernment' roughly araphrased: pre-conscious rasp f theblind-spotsnd anomalies hatmark n existing tateofknowledger social relations which hereby otentiallypens heway osome as yet ll-definedr barely onceivabledvance.Above ll, as Badioustresses n his reading f Descartes, hisrequires hatwe avoidthe peren-nial confusion etween onsciousnessnd thought hathas so longbedeviled

philosophy nd continues o exert distorting nfluence n a great manycurrent ebates n epistemology,ognitive sychology,nd philosophy fmind. ts main ffect sto skew he ssue othat conscious' ecomesmore rlesssynonymous ith advanced',progressive',knowledge-conducive',self-critical', r illusion-free' hile nything onceiveds lying utside r beyondthe focus f conscious hought s treated s byvery efinitionunconscious'

49Badiou, eing ndEvent, it., p.391 and 393.50SeeNote 1,above.51Jean-Paulartre, ritiquefDialecticaleason.Vol.1:TheoryfPracticalnsembles.rans.

AlanSheridan-SmithLondon:New Left ooks,1976)and Vol.2: The ntelligibilityf History.Trans uintin oare London:Verso, 994).

I prfl RevistaPortuguesa de Filosofa I3031 LMEL 65(Supl.)2009 11103-1136



23/35


andhence s prey o all the commonsense'rrors hat esult rom ccepting

thenave elf-evidencef first-handntuitive elief.To be sure, adiou s as emphatic s anyofthe eventeenth-centuryatio-nalists nmaintaininghat nowledgerrived t through he xercise f easonor critical ntellect an and mustbe regarded s properly ossessing deci-sivepower fveto ver rguments hat an claimno better arrant han heappealto sensory-intuitiveitness. n this espect isthought ays onstanthomage othat distinctive ritical-rationalisttrain n French pistemologyand philosophy f science whichhas its source n the other', cientifically-oriented spect f Descartes'hinkingndwhich escends ia Bachelard ndCanguilhemo certain ighly ualified etnonethe ess recognizablemani-festationsn Foucault nd Derrida.52owevert s also important o seethatthe kinds f truth-procedure hich hey, ikeBadiou,consider rerequisiteto progress r advancement hether n mathematics,hephysical ciences,politics, r ethics re in no sense beholden o the subject onceived s aconscious r reflective nower. or gain houldwethink f them absurdly)as belonging o the unconscious'n anything ike the received sychoana-lytic, .e.,pre-logicalr sub-rationalense.After ll, the proceduresn ques-tionhere re those hat haveproduced among ther hings someof themost dvanced nd sophisticatedheorems nd proofs n mathematics, swell s a

rangefcomparable

chievementscrossvariouseemingly

emotebut as Badiouwouldhave t)closely nalogous ubject-domains. sregardsthis atter hraseweshould emark ow the term subject' enotes otonlysomeparticular opic-area ut also,to his wayof thinking, hefact hat hesubject =thinker r agent) s so much part both roducer ndproduct oftherelevant ruth-events to havenoexistence,t east for resent urposes,outside heparticular pisodewherein r whereby hey chieved hat tatus.

Hencehis cryptic tatement n Being nd Event hat I term ubject nylocalconfigurationf generic rocedure rom hich truth ssupported'.53And gain: subjectivizations that hrough hich truth s possible,since]it turns he vent owards he ruth f the ituation orwhich he vent s anevent'.54 oreovert s in ust this ense hatwe shouldunderstand he om-plexrelationship etween sychoanalysis, athematics,olitics nd truth sBadiouconceivest. f hisconceptions maximally emote rom nyvulgar-Freudiandeaof he unconsciouss a repository frepressed nd narticulatedesires hen t s ust as far rom hat hiefly s-acculturatedgo-psycholog-icalapproach muchreviled y Lacan andhis acolytes that wouldtreatthe talking ure as primarily matter f bringing uchrepressedmaterial

52See Norris, Minding heGap, cit., for a detailed account of the relevant pisodes in thiscritical-rationalist ine of descent.53Badiou,Beingand Event, it., p. 39154Ibidem, p. 393.

RevistaortuguesaeFilosofia ITE ddp VZZ765(Supl.)2009 UsgRprdp | 304



24/35


back nto hedaylight ealm f onscious, eflective,elf-controlledndhence

(sothese riticsmaintain) ocially onformablehought nd conduct.Whatlocalizesthe subject', adiouwrites, is the point t which Freudcan onlybe understood ithin heheritage f the Cartesian esture, nd at which hesubverts, iadislocation,he atter's urecoincidencewith elf, ts reflexivetransparency'.55hat s to say, here s no possibility f thinking oanypur-poseabout hese ssues xcept n the win remise1)that heunconscioussaccessibleoreason, r to a discourse whether hat f thepracticing sycho-analyst r the philosopher) hich laims validity eyond hat f nstinctualor commonsense elief, ndyet 2)that his ational iscourses itself t anygiven ime ubject ocertain imiting onditions hat an only merge r beshown pas suchby xposure o that which iesbeyondtsutmost onceptualor explanatory rasp.

This swhy adioudevotes hefinal ection BeingndEvent o a closely-worked emonstrationf how Lacan supposed adicalbreakwith he heri-tageof Cartesian ationalisms in fact omethingmore ike an unresolvedand indeedunresolvableension etween hose wopremises. t is also whyhehaskept ocarefully efined distance etween is own hinkingnd thatof hemore ogmatic r card-carryingost-structuralistswhateverheir ro-claimed uthorizing ources n Lacan,Althusser, oucault, arthes, errida,or elsewhere whowould

egardthe

ubject's

merely figmentf he bour-

geoisor liberal-humanistmaginary it nlyfor deconstruction y the tan-dardrange f theoretical oves.56 hatBadioubrings ut to such powerfuleffect n every spectof his work whether hoseparts of it addressed otechnical ssuesin mathematics r those passagesconcerning he historyof political vents is the llusory ature f subjectivity henconceivednhumanist r Kantian-autonomisterms ut alsoits absolute ndispensabilityas a means of explaining owknowledge nd politicalhistory ouldeverachieve ny kind of advance gainst ll the odds of entrenched rejudice,'commonsense' elief, r intuitive elf-evidence.his was alwaysthe chief

stumbling-blockor ost-structuralistheory n so far s it espoused thor-oughgoing ersion f inguistic-discursive-culturalonstructivismndtherebyinvited he twofold harge f reducing ruth nd reality oa dead levelofideologicalmis)recognitionnddepriving uman gency nd thought f nypower o ntervene r affect he ourse f events.57

ThusBadiouis fully ustified in ethico-politicals well as mathemati-cal and scientific erms in roundly ejectinguchblanket enunciationsf'the ubject' nd insisting hat t offers heonlymeansto explainhow such

55Idem, p. 431.56See especiallyBadiou, Infinite hought, it.57SeeNorris, Truth nd the Ethicsof Criticism, it.; also Uncritical heory: ntellectuals, ost-

modernism, nd the GulfWar London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1992).

I pi^l RevistaPortuguesade Filosofa I305 I LJggJRPF 65SupL)2009 I 11 3-1 6



25/35


advancesmight omeabout.Allthe ame this s not to invoke nything ike

its raditional ole spresumptiveocusof utonomous elfhood r as the eatofthose arious onstitutive ttributes thinking, easoning,udging, illing,acting) hat etween hem upposedlyefine hat t s to be human. ather, tis a question f ust hat reciselypecifiable argin f hoicewhich pensupbefore he ubject t ust hat ritical tage nsomeongoing roject whetherof advancedmathematicalnquiry r resistance o the dominant tructuresof ocio-politicalower when hey aneither espond s militants f truth'andpress n with hat roject hrough ommitment nd fidelity oprevioussuchevents r else (moreoften) eekrefuge n adherence oexisting, on-formistmodes of thought nd conduct. What s most mportant o graspaboutBadiou'sheterodox onception f the ubject s that he always eploysit with pecific eferenceo somegiven uncture n the history f thought rpolitical vents, nd that orhim ts chief ask s to explainhow revolutionscan occurdespite nd against hemassiveweight f received elief, rthodoxthinking, r deologicalonsensus. hus the ubject',nBadiou's sageof heterm, s byno means ust a theoretical lace-filler ut precisely isterm orthat which rives orward hekinds f signal dvancehere n question. t iswhat mpels heprocess hrough hichmathematics eriodicallyucceedsn'transforming aradox nto oncept', r through hich history f failed rabortive evolutionssuch s the vents f 1848) anat some ater ate withthe dvent f hat which t strove o achieve come oassume strongly ro-leptic r prefigurativeole.58 o ust this xtent since Badiou s not given oover-stretchedr vaguely uggestive nalogies mathematics nd politics recapableof treatment n formally omologouserms. failed evolution asthevirtue f defining,n andthrough tsvery ailure, hatmight avebeenandtherefore asyet o be accomplished,ust as a longdisputed heorem rconjecturenmathematics oneforwhich o adequate roofwas availablemay t ength after ecades r centuries) ttain uchproof nd henceforth eadmitted o the lass ofknownmathematicalruths.

Thiscomparisons all themorepointed or he fact hat ommitted nti-realistsmost ften xtend heir asic precept o all three isciplinesr areasof discourse mathematics, istory, nd ethics) hat re under onsiderationhere.Thus, or thinker ikeMichaelDummett,t makes bsolutely o senseto sayofsomeunprovenmathematicalheorem hat t s either rue r false- objectivelyo- even hough e cannot et ndmight ever ome upwith nadequateformal roof; r again, o assert f omewell-formednd truth-apthistorical onjecture hat he episode n question ither ccurred r didn't,despite ur total ackofdocumentaryvidence;r again, o claim hat Jonesiscourageous' espite ones avingo far ed avery uiet ifewhich lacedno

58Badiou, "The Paris Commune: A Political Declaration on Politics." In: Polemics,cit.,pp. 257-290.

Revistaortuguesae Filosofa HUI n n r- Ievista65(Supl.).2oc

Portuguesae Filosofa HUILfcRPFnr- II 306



26/35


demands n him n that espectndtherefore ffers ogrounds orudgment.Any heorems,onjectures, r hypotheses entured n anyof thesedomainsmustbe thought f as falling nto he disputed lass' of statements hat reneither ruenor false ince truth s epistemicallyonstrained or subject othe copeand imits f attainable nowledge andhencebetter edefinednterms f warranted ssertibility'.59s we have seen,Badioucomesout verystronglygainst hiswhole nti-realistineof rgument ndgoes omehighlycomplexnd ngeniouschiefly et-theoretical) ays round n showing owtruth an ndeed ranscendhebounds f xisting nowledger accomplishedprovabilityndyetnot eave he realist r objectivistommitted o a doctrinethat neluctablyeads to an ultra-scepticalpshot.On his account nknowntruths an exert palpablepressure or hange a senseoftheir tanding nsomeultimately nowable elation o someanomaly, aradox, r conceptualshortfall n the present-best tate of knowledge which voids the absurdanti-realist onclusion hat ll truths re either nown r knowable.f math-ematics s the focus f Badiou most ntensive nd complex s well s mostformally laborate assagesof argument t s just as vital o appreciateusthowclose s the onnectionn histhinking etweenmathematicsas thepri-marymeans o conceptualizehe elationshipfbeing ndevent) ndpolitics(as the domainwherein hat elationship iscoversts most mportant ieldof

application).t is here hat we can best

get graspf thekindred

rocessbywhich ertain istorical vents an be seen to haveoccurred n responseto somepresumptivenomaly some bsence, on-occurrence,ymptomaticlack,unresolvedension, r failure that eft pena spaceof possibility orwhatnone he essarrived s a largely nexpectedr downright npredictableoccurrence.

v

So there s a great ealriding n the ssue between ealism nd anti-real-

ism as Badiouconstrues t, hat s, n terms f the event s that which ran-scends he imits f nygiven onceptualchemeorextent f o-far chievedontological rasp)whilst espite hatmaking ts absencefelt and therebyobliquelymanifestingomething f ts haracter through ymptoms funre-solvedparadox, poria, ogical ension, r conceptual train. hat this mustalways ethe ase if ne follows ut thefurthest ogical mplications f omepresent-best tate of knowledges a consequence f Badiou cardinal re-cept rrived t through critical-diagnosticeading f ll those hilosophers,

59MichaelDummett, lements f IntuitionismOxford: xfordUniversity

ress,1977);also Truth nd Other nigmasLondon: uckworth, 978) nd TheLogical asisofMetaphysics

(Duckworth,991).Fora critique f Dummett arguments, eeNorris, ruth atters, it., ndPhilosophyfLanguagendtheChallengeoScientificealismLondon:Routledge,003).

I rlnnr Revistaortuguesa eFilosofa I307 I LMBrL 65 Supl.)2009 II 1 3-1136



27/35


28/35


29/35


30/35


As have aid, his swhyBadiouadopts strictly xtensionals opposed

to intensional nderstanding f set-theoretic ntology, ne that reats ets,subsets,multiples, nd elements olely n terms f their umerical alues sdefined cross strictly ndifferentiatedbject-domain.t is thus oncernedwith bjectivelypecifiable elations f nclusion, xclusion, nd belongingor non-belongingather hanwith taking ccount of certain ntrinsic rdifferential eatures uch that the possessionor non-possessionf themwould ffectivelyecide he ssueofmembership rom ase tocase. f houghtis to achieve ealprogress whether n mathematical,cientific, thical, rpolitical erms then t willneedto apply hisprinciple ithmaximum igoranddeny tself he ecourseoany uch mputed istinguishingraits rmeansofdiscriminativereatment. hesehavebeendeployedmost ften ywayofconserving ld theories nd their avored ntological ommitmentsn theface f ome radical hallenge, r providing handy ationale or iscrimina-tory ractices fvarious orts, r enforcing elective rocedures hose ffectis to perpetuate xisting orms f ocial njustice. nly yespousing purelyextensionalistpproach onethat s perfectlyndifferent owhatevermightotherwise e deemed oconstitute rounds or nclusion r exclusion canthought emain pen o the hallenge f hatwhich oesn't all nder tspres-ently xisting oncepts nd categories.t will hen emore lert o ust those

signs f mergent onflict hatmost ften xert heir ubtractive orce t someeventai itewhere he ount-as-onesexposed o the hallenge fwhatevertpreemptivelynd arbitrarily xcludes, r where he dominant rder f ocio-political epresentationikewise ncounters check o ts claims f ustice runiversality.

It s solely n condition f maintaining hat ommitment oa strict xten-sionalist ntology hat he ciences, othformal nd physical, avemanagedto achieve series f decisive reakswith heorder f received r common-sense-intuitivedeas.Moreovert s bymeansof an analogous dvance hat

political houghtasalso been nabled albeit

todate)within ertain

learly-marked imits to make realprogress eyond arious orms f racial, thnic,class-based, r gender-relatedrejudice. uch progress s possibleonlyonaccount f that onflict etween he claim to inclusiveness nd the fact fexclusion hat an be shown oinhabit ll systems f representation hensubject o the kindof mmanent ritique or assessment ccording otheirownstrictest tandards f validity nd truth) hatBadioufindsmost trik-ingly xemplifiednthehistory fmathematicalhought.ts motivating orcederives hiefly rom dawning ecognitionf the gaps, bsences, rruptionsof the void,or other uch symptoms f ooming risis whether n scien-

tific iscourse r thediscourse f omedominant ocial deology that ointtoward truth eyond heir tmost ower o contain r comprehend. enceBadiou stress n theneed o reformulatessuesfrom range f ontheface

I [~i0' RevistaPortuguesade Filosofa I3111 UH RPF 65(Supl.)2009 I 1103-113*



31/35


of t) heterogeneousopic-areasn ontologicalnd therefore so far s theyallow mathematicallyormalized,.e., et-theoreticalerms. hishetakes ooffer uniquely owerful rasp f hemeansbywhich pochal hangesmostoften ome bout,whether n the cientific omain where heymaywellbesubject o a stage-by-stageormal r rational econstructionfter he vent)or nthe thico-socio-politicalphere where hey renaturally ore esistantto suchunderstandingven hough here xists closeanalogy etween hevarious rocessesnvolved).

Whatemerges hrough nalysis longthese ines s the continuing ndopen-endedialectic hat epeatedlyorces hought othe imit f omegivenconceptual cheme nd then as a result f the tension r torsion nducedbya truth eyond resent each serves s a kind f subliminal rompt robliquemeans f rientation oward reciselyhat egion f s-yet nexploredontologicalerrain here hetruth n question waitsdiscovery.o there sa sharp onflict fviews etween adiou's ealist onception f mathematicsas engagedn exploring eatures f a landscape hat ossesses hose eaturesquite sidefrom ow t srepresented r projected othebest f ourmappingability nd, on the otherhand, hat ange f current octrines anti-realist,constructivist,nstrumentalist,r conventionalist)hatwould, n effect, ivecartographyhe astword oncerninguchmatters. hilosophicallypeakingthese atter ind

upport otonly rom ummettian nti-realism ith ts in-guistic-logico-metaphysicalode fproceeding ut lsofrom hewidespreadacceptance f Quinean-Kuhniandeasaboutontological elativityccordingto which truth' houldbe thought f as internal o this or that paradigm,framework,r conceptualcheme.64ndeed t s a chiefmotivationfBadiou'swholeproject ochallengewhathe seesas the trictly reposterous r back-to-front rder f priorities hat inds o placefor ntology xcept s a deriva-tive r secondary ield f enquiry ubject othe scopeand limits f humanepistemic rasp nd which hen ooksto anguage very ften onceivednradically olistic r cultural-contextualisterms as the ultimate orizon fknowledge r intelligibility.n this respect t least and despite omeother-wisedeepdifferences f view)he is at one with herationalist pinozaasregards heabsolute recedence f truth ver verything ertaining olan-guage, nd the hronic iability f anguage evenwhen sedwithmaximumcare to confuse r obfuscate hedeliverancef ruth.65

It salso,of ourse,what utshimmarkedlyt oddswith hatwhole roadswathe fpresent-dayhinkingnphilosophynd thehuman cienceswhichpromotesust he pposite hesis,.e., heprecedencef anguage r discourse

w bee Uume, Ontological elativity nd Other ssays, cit., nd "TtooDogmasof Empiricism",in: From LogicalPoint of View, nd d. (Cambridge.MA:Harvard Univ.Press, 1961), pp. 20-46.65Badiou,Being nd Event, it., pp. 112-120.

RevistaPortuguesade Filosofia t>0' |65(Supl.)2009 UalRPF I 312



32/35


over verything ertaining oknowledgend truth. adiou seesno hopeof

significantdvance n anyofthese isciplinesxcept y rejecting he inguis-tic urn n whichever uise nd nsteadpursuing he laim fmathematicsoprovide uniquely ualified ccount f the being/event ialectic, hat s, theunpredictable etrigorous rocess f discovery hereby omecurrent-beststateof ontological rasp s subject ochallenge y that which ludesandexceeds he ount-as-onen tsvariousmodes. hat uch onsiderations ighthave n impact ar eyond he ogico-mathematicalomain that heymightbearcrucially n issuesof ocial andpoliticalustice is Badiou most trik-ingly eterodoxlaimbynormal hilosophicights, nd one that will onjurebafflementmongst hegreatmajority f nalytic hinkers. fter ll, t seems

to be in flagrant ontraventionf t least womajorprecepts the fact/valuedichotomy nd the separation f first-order 'material') rom econd-orderCformal') odes f discourse that havebetween hem haracterized gooddeal ofwork nthat 'other' ain ineofdescent. till t s worth oting,n thisconnection,hat hepost-analyticrift oward otions f truth s relative rinternal o this r that ontologicalcheme' s one that tarted ut n reactivefashion rom uine famed emolition-jobn ust thekind f thinking las-sically xemplifiedyCarnap logical-empiricistrogramme or olicing heboundary n question.66 hatBadiouswork ffers, n sharp ontrast, s anintricately easoned ccount f the relationship etween ruth n its ogico-mathematicalnd its material e.g., ocio-historicals well s natural-scien-tific)modeswhich acrifices othingnformal igour otheprime mperativethat hinking eepfaith ith he nterests f ustice r emancipatoryritique.

VI

It is on ust thesegrounds nd in ust this ense that Badioucomesoutagainst thics, r - moreprecisely against he kind of thinking hatmostoften oesunder hat amenowadaysnd which ffers et nother ymptom-atic nstance f he polarizationhat fflicts omuch resent-daynalytic hi-losophy. ere t s the rift etween ltra-formalmeta-ethical)oncerns nda first-order iscourse hat requentlyquateswhat right r ust withwhatcounts s suchbycommunal ssent r by he ights f ome given ommunalpractice r acculturated ayof ife.Again hisrift eems to have ts sourcein a reactive attern f thought hereby heunyielding ormalmperativesof Kantian moral utonomy n the one hand suffered further rocess fanalytical arefactionndon the ther ave ise oastrong ounter-movement,i.e.,a communitarian ejection f any such abstract r rigorist emands.67

66Alfred arski, TheConcept f Truth n Formalizedanguages",n:Logic, emanticsndMetamathematics.rans.J. H. WoodgerOxford: xford niversity ress,1956),pp. 152-278.67Seefor nstance Michael andel, iberalismnd the Limits f Justice Cambridge:am-bridge niversityress, 982) nd MichaelWalzer, pheres f Justice Oxford: lackwell, 983);

I n^gi RevistaPortuguesa de Filosofa I3131 UlRPF 65(Supl.)2009 11103-1136



33/35


So there s clearlymorethan one reason for Badiou's version oKantian

ethics nd, evenmore, o the political octrine hatKant derived albeitbysomehighly ircuitous outes ia his aesthetic otions f he ublime nd thebeautiful) rom is cardinal recept f subjective isinterest s a touchstoneofethical irtue.68hiswas his dea ofgreat vents like heFrench evolu-tion not as calls to active ntervention mong hosewho came later ndtook hem s a source f politicalmpetus ut rather s topics or mode ofcontemplative,.e.,non-interventionisthought hatwoulddeploy hefacultyofreflectiveudgment s a salutary heck ponthewill oactor as a meansto hold out gainst he tanding emptationf ust uchprecipitate onduct.69Moreover, hendefenders f the iberal-democratictatus uo cast aroundfor ome kind f philosophicalupport heresult s most ften vague mal-gamofKantian otions ith hepragmatist r communitarian utlookwhichin turn isplays strong lectiveffinity ith hoseWittgensteiniannd othervariants f he inguistic urn' hat Badiou takes oroundly o task.70

Thushe devotes gooddealofpolemical s well s philosophicnergy odenouncing hathe seesas thePotemkin aade f social order hat xploitssuch deas as a part f ts egitimizinghetoric. hat s,they ypically erve sa smokescreen ehindwhich o conceal hemassive isparities f economic,political, ocialand cultural ower hat xist and encounter ery ittle n

theway f ffectiveethical' esistance under urrently revailingonditionsof capitalist iberaldemocracy. ere again,manyphilosophers especiallythose f n analytic ersuasion would bject hatBadiou splaying ast ndloosewith range f ategorical istinctions,s between he orts f questionproperly ddressed n terms aid downbyontology r epistemologytakingthese o be importantly istinct ut lso mportantlyelated reasof oncern)and the orts f questions roperly ddressed yethicists nd some,not ll,political hilosophers. hat reates moreproblems orhis commentator sthe awkward wareness hatBadiou is very arfrom oing longwith hatpresent-day ashion in whichever uarter f the postmodern-pragmatist-postanalytic-Wittgensteinian-Rortian-constructivistrend thatwould ismisssuchobjections s merely symptom f continuing ttachment o variousdeluded inceplainly bsoletemarkers f expert r specialist ompetencen

also- for more philosophically uancedanti-Kantian ut not purely ommunitarian pproach- Bernard Williams, thics and the Limitsof Philosophy London: Fontana, 1985).

68For an account of these complex,often ortuous passage of argument n Kants writingson ethics, esthetics nd politics along with a critique of some of the uses to which they havebeen put by recent, especially postmodernist' ommentators, ee Christopher Norris, "KantDisfigured", n: The Truth bout Postmodernism Oxford:Blackwell,1993),pp. 182-256.69I. Kant, PoliticalWritings. d. By Hans Reiss (Cambridge:CambridgeUniversity ress,1991).

70Badiou,Manifesto or hilosophy, it.; also Norris, The Truth boutPostmodernism, it., forfurthe

alain badiou truth, ethics and the formal imperative

Documents