#philosophical practice

[ppinsights]

philosophical inquiry is a continuous check with alterity--you check, step by step, whether what you say is understandable--acceptable--you take it out of your mind and make it an object of joint attention--you give birth and let it be seen.

[ppinsights]

the work of patience: staying with what is already there. the work of attention: deepening what is already there. the work of critique: dissolving what is already there.

[ppinsights]

in philosophical practice, we cultivate distance by paying attention to words as words–as intersubjective–as public–not as part of what the other’s interiority. by being detached from the other’s speech, we enable her to detach from it, too.

[ppinsights]

the advantage of philosophizing by yourself is that you do not depend on others. you are autonomous. the risk is remaining inside your subjectivity and preferences--stuck with yourself.  the advantage of doing philosophy with others is that you transcend your subjectivity--the concept of "trans-subjectivity" works better here than "intersubjectivity"--but you need the presence of others to be able to see clearly that which was there all the time--the presence of others and the attention towards others' discourse that detaches you from yourself.

[ppinsights]

you bring a text to the encounter with the other, trusting that what was written by a human body is intelligible to another human body, when paid attention to and questioned and analyzed. in working with it, the conversation oscillates between two levels: what is there in the text and what is there in the subjectivity of the body attempting to make sense of the text she is reading. the text reveals subjectivity to itself, and, in doing this, subjectivity transcends itself towards something other than it.

[ppinsights]

people who like "deep" encounters and intimacy are annoyed when what they say is cut off from their subjectivity and examined by itself--questioned, rejected, made fun of, commented, made an object of wonder--without any regard for their "deep" thoughts and feelings. they look at their words as mirrors in which they contemplate their own depth and are proud of it. but the real depth is mirror facing mirror.

[ppinsights]

the mark of what is real is resistance. the surface of bodies resists to our movements--and is a terminus for our perception. if a person, in a common inquiry, resists to a certain way of seeing--or to a label you propose to her--chances are she does it because she feels its reality.

[ppinsights]

contradiction is a problem only for those who value coherence. vagueness--for those who value exactitude. a typical reproach during socratic inquiry: you force me to choose.