Abstract
HUMANISTIC DISCUSSION
AND THE ONLINE CONFERENCE
by Michael Heim
|
R |
hetoric is the
theory and practice of public speech. As theory, rhetoric reflects on the
potential
gains for public life to
be gotten from applying human skills to situations of speaking and writing.
Today we cannot
really divorce human skills in speaking and writing from the technical devices
the
human race produces to
enhance the exchange of words and ideas. Public speech, evident in the
forms of politics and
religion, has become wed--for better or worse--to the technology we so glibly
call "the
media." And now, after radio and television, with the proliferation of
inexpensive electronic
devices and the orbiting
of communications satellites, rhetoric faces the introduction of yet another
new apparatus: the
computer interface.
The computer brings
us to consider rhetoric or public speech under an entirely new aspect, that of
information. The focus on
information introduces a new principle into rhetorical theory, for the new
common denominator is
information, and information technology is based on speed of transmission,
the manipulability of
encoded symbols, and a vast linkage of all the texts ever created by the human
mind. Because the
computer can reduce the alphabet to ASCII code numbers for manipulation and
electronic transmission, the
symbolic life of the human mind must learn to dwell in a new element.
To understand the
implications of this new symbolic element is something we must begin to do, if
only to make a start.
And one way to start exploring the implications of the new electronic element
is to reflect on the
current efforts to make operative the online conference. By "online
conference" I
mean the discussions or
symposia currently being planned and even now already in operation on a
small scale in the
United States and in Europe.
Such conferences
are taking place between writers and editors living in different time zones in
different parts of the
world, as well as among business associates wishing to confer with one
another in a business-like
manner without the overhead of personal conversation and the small talk
typically associated with
telephone communication. But, more significantly, there are now plans to
relocate the world of
thought and scholarship into the new symbolic element. Scholars and
researchers are just beginning
to set up computer nodes to serve as meeting places for the semipublic
discussion of ideas and
research projects.
Such a project
holds great promise as well as great peril. This is the theme I want to
elaborate on
here. I want first to
show what kind of scholarly and research needs can be satisfied by online
discussions, and then I want
to look briefly at the limitations such discussions will inevitably place
on our ways of
thinking and writing.
The Idea of Humanistic Discussion
From a certain
perspective it seems improbable that the world of thought will make such an
unlikely
journey: from the private
but printed letters of Renaissance Humanists to the patronage and
protection of European and
Russian courtly life; from the royal academies of nation states to the cafés
and salons of Europe;
from the scholarly and scientific journals of the early twentieth century
to the electronic
element of computerized texts. The terminal point of this journey seems all
that
much more unlikely when
we look directly at the current use of computer communication. As
Professor Harvey
Wheeler of the Institute for Higher Studies at the University of California
laments,
what passes for
communication today on computer networks resembles more the static-laden
chitchat
of the Citizens Band
radio than it does the profound and free intellectual flights of the symposia
attended by Socrates and
first written about by Plato.
Yet when we see
Professor Richard Slatta at the University of North
Carolina, along with many
others, struggle to
establish HumaNet and ScholarNet
as online exchanges of thought and research
in the humanities, we
must pause to wonder whether the present level of communication, which
does its best when
chatting about computer compatibility or software glitches, is the sum total of
what can be gotten for
public life from the computer revolution. After all, the first writing in the
form
of Egyptian
hieroglyphics was used not for the word of God but for the accounting records
of grain
producers and the laundry
lists of Pharaohs. One way to see the promise of the new writing
element is to consider the
intellectual needs of rhetoric or public speech today.
There is a fresh
concern for establishing new forms of communication in intellectual life today.
As
an example of what I
mean, let me describe briefly one primary example of the new developments in
intellectual interchange that
are taking place today in Europe. What I describe is an example taken
largely from the efforts
to renovate one important movement in European philosophy, a movement
known as
"Phenomenology."
To put it in a
nutshell, Phenomenology maintains that science and truth can only be built up
through
intellectual intuitions that
are corroborated and confirmed "intersubjectively"--which
is to say,
through conversations and
exchanges with others who are thinking and exploring the same or
adjacent paths of research.
This intersubjective verification (in German, "Ausweisung") is not to be
confused with the
experimental confirmation by which the results of one experimental hypothesis
are reproduced and
confirmed by another set of experiments conducted by other researchers. On
the contrary,
Phenomenology maintains that basic truths are not ultimately founded or
established
"out there" in the world of experiments. Truths are
rather first viewed individually as evidential
visions of a subject
matter. Individual visions may later become paradigmatic for a science--to use
Thomas Kuhn's
terms--if they are confirmed or corroborated by the social nexus of fellow
thinkers.
Experiments are, in
this view, only one small ingredient in the process of validating knowledge.
A philosophy of
knowledge such as that of Phenomenology obviously appreciates the need for
occasions when human
communication can take place. And during its inception early in the
twentieth century,
Phenomenology had ample occasion to bring together thinkers who stimulated,
inspired, and in various
ways corroborated one another's thoughts. Edmund Husserl's students
developed their work
together in close ensemble, though they often went in diametrically opposite
theoretical directions.
Heeding Husserl's epistemological battle-cry "to [describe] the things
themselves," they each
found their own intellectual paths as they emerged to become the renowned
Martin Heidegger,
Jean-Paul Sartre, Gabriel Marcel, Martin Buber, and Eugen
Fink.
Phenomenology not
only argued for the epistemology of interactive confirmation (Ausweisung) but it
became itself an instance
of such intellectual ferment.
But things did not
necessarily get better as Phenomenology grew and became an international
movement, eventually even
expanding to a major philosophical force in the United States. In fact,
as the philosophy
historian Herbert Spiegelberg points out:
"Time was when the Movement consisted merely of two open circles of
advanced students and
teachers at G”ttingen
and Munich in face-to-face solidarity, though not always in agreement with
one another. This type of intimacy
weakened after World War I as the Movement proliferated and
became more and more impersonal.
Increasingly, names and titles of books replaced personal
knowledge of the members of the Movement and
their work. This impersonalization was bound to
grow with the internationalization of
Phenomenology after World War II. The larger the Movement,
the vaguer became the awareness and
knowledge of other co-Phenomenologists."
In our time, Spiegelberg notes, the process of intersubjective
verification has been lost in a vast and
impersonal international
profession of academic workers. Once thought was nurtured by a closely
knit and informal
groups of thinkers who became the origin of intellectual movement and of new
ideas. Current
conditions, and the so-called "knowledge explosion" have made such
groups a mere
memory of an idyllic and
intimate past. As we are told, it is through specialization and through
more powerful
techniques that our knowledge will continue to advance. Or will it?
The Revival of Humanistic Discussion
There are still
today some few who believe knowledge is founded upon
personal human interaction,
even interaction that
is not based on shared specialties. There is one European thinker, in
particular, who has
championed the view that thinking in its most creative mode is thinking that
freely crosses
disciplines to make new connections. Ernesto Grassi
is a renowned European
scholar who has made a
careful study of the thinkers of the Renaissance in Europe, especially as it
is manifest in the
writings of men like Salutati and Vico.
Grassi is also one of the last remaining
direct witnesses to the
work of many of the early Phenomenologists. His work
over the last fifty
years is an attempt to
recover the postulate of Phenomenological methodology--which he takes to
be also the potent
source of Renaissance thought, namely, the postulate that imaginative
conversation is the ultimate
matrix of all human knowledge.
Grassi's theoretical
studies of the Renaissance and of Phenomenology have culminated in what is
known in Europe as the
"Zurich Discourses" or, in German, ®MDRVŻdie
Z•rcher
Gespr„che®MDNMŻ. The Discourses are
Grassi's attempt to revive the practice of an
intersubjective verification that goes beyond mere
casual conversation. Twice a year, Grassi invites
scholars from all over the
world to participate for three days in an international symposium in which
nearly all the
specialized disciplines of intellectual life are represented, from economics,
philosophy,
medicine, empirical and
social psychology, religious studies, linguistics, semiotics, economics,
and anthropology, to
mention but a few. The diversity of cognitive fields insures a representative
sampling of the Babel of
knowledge under current conditions. To make conversation possible, the
group is limited to 25
or 30 members on each occasion.
Because of growing
international interdependence in our time, Grassi
maintains that humanistic
conversation today, if it is to
hold itself to the highest ideal of cognitive insight, must learn to be
international. If an experiment
be set up to foster imaginative links among diverse disciplines, it
must be intrinsically
intercultural. Besides the diversity of cognitive fields, there must also be
present differences
between the Occidental and Oriental cultures. The Zurich Discourses have,
therefore, encouraged the
participation of intellectuals from Japan and India, in keeping with the
notion that the great
difference between East and West must be recognized as a constantly felt
presence. And to further
emphasize the international flavor, the Zurich Discourses take place--
where else?--in
Switzerland.
To make these
meetings work, the schedule has to be tight without, however, destroying
spontaneity through too much
intense and prolonged exposure. The structure of the talks has
some variation but
there are always three main kinds of formal verbal interchange on each day of
the
meetings. There is a brief
(half hour to forty-five minute) presentation by a speaker; discussion of
the topic then takes
place in small groups, with five or six members to a group; after an hour or
two
of discussion, the
groups return and present summaries of their results in a plenum session where
the original speaker
may respond to questions or make comments on the proceedings. There are
usually two or sometimes
even three such cycles per day; at times, too, a speaker's presentation
might be referred to as
that of the main speaker, especially if the talk has broader import for the the
theory behind the Zurich
Discourses, as when Grassi himself gives a
presentation. Informally and
throughout the three days,
the participants dine together and in this way carry the discussion over
from the formal
meetings.
How does Grassi bring off such group discussions where Peirce
scholars meet with medical
doctors, Zen Buddhists
with Hebrew theologians, Indian anthropologists with business analysts and
literary critics? What Grassi learned from the Renaissance is that it is the
imagination that plays
the central role in
cognitive discovery, especially in interactive cognitive discovery. So it is by
the
use of imaginative
metaphors that Grassi organizes and stimulates the
discussions. One of
Grassi's key notions is the
fundamental role of imaginative, metaphorical language, a way of
speaking which cuts across
areas of inquiry separated by literally different subject matters. It is
precisely the literal turn
of mind that has brought isolation and sterility to the current state of
knowledge, according to Grassi. This primacy of metaphor is nowhere more evident
than in the
formulation of the particular
topics around which each of the meetings is conducted. Following the
rhetorical tradition he
champions, Grassi organizes each of the talks around
a single theme, a
theme which is
formulated and understood metaphorically. This knack for getting just the right
formulation of a topic, for
striking the right metaphor, is what classical rhetoricians once called the
human skill of ®MDRVŻinventio®MDNMŻ.
Without going more
into specifics, let me just say that the topics Grassi
introduces attempt to
preserve sufficient
ambiguity as metaphors so as to be able to suggest thought-provoking problems
germane to many areas of
inquiry. The topics formulated must not only begin in ambiguity--as do
all metaphors; they
must also remain ambiguous, never becoming the terms of someone's
metaphysical system or
professional jargon. One example of conversational metaphor is the
central topic of the 17th
Zurich Discourses held in May 1985: "On Dealing with Borders." The
notion of borders became
the matrix for interdisciplinary conversation. One speaker began by
talking about the special
difficulties of borders in the profession of psychiatry. General categories of
mental illness are
continually called into question and lose their utility where the patient is
found to
be a "borderline
case." Such cases sometimes manifest incompatible symptoms and in their
strangeness challenge the
conventional categories of "manic-depressive,"
"schizophrenic," and
"psychotic." New concepts of the self, of selfhood, and
loss of self in general can emerge when the
borderline case is allowed to
remain on the border and where the case is taken seriously as an
individual occasion where
something new may emerge. A detailed case history presented the
material from which
discussion and clarification followed. Another speaker addressed borders from
the current
philosophical movements that challenge the fixity of conceptual limits as
promoted by
traditional metaphysics; the
tendency of metaphysics is to elaborate a set of oppositions and to
think then within the
borders of definitions ("de-fines" itself being a term from Latin
denoting
borders). The speaker
invoked the Deconstruction model of Jacques Derrida and applied this
contemporary philosophy
provocatively to a religious painting of the Crucifixion, which was laid out
in the middle of the
floor at the center of the plenum as a kind of topical shock. This
free-spirited
presentation of the fluidity
and even the limits of borders provoked the theologians. They responded
and grappled with new
understandings of religious truth. Questions were raised about nihilism and
about a degenerate
notion of the freedom from limits. A great variety of sparks were elicited by
the
introduction of a single
controlling metaphor, in this case that of borders.
What I am
describing here in very brief fashion (a considerably larger monograph on
"Grassi's
Experiment" is
cited in the bibliography) gives some notion of the novel work being done today
to
the overcome the
sterile isolation and overwhelming complexity of knowledge today. There are
many attempts being
made to bring humanistic tradition to bear on the knowledge explosion. (By
"humanistic," I mean the view that knowledge is based
ultimately on the personal imagination and
on the creative
enthusiasm of human individuals--not merely on the advance of automated
systems.)
Now what I want to
suggest is how online symposia and conferences have certain qualities that can
supplement the sort of
conversational work Grassi proposes. I also want to
suggest some of the
wide-ranging theoretical
problems that ensue from such approaches for creating new knowledge
through computer
interaction.
Possibilities and Perils of Online Discussions
When public
language takes the form of computerized information, one of the apparent
benefits
arising from the transformation
is that human interchange proceeds more directly than before.
There is greater
immediacy. Studies have shown that computerized writing is more on the order of
an exchange of inner
thoughts. Evidence for this is the "flaming" or bursts of uncensored feelings
that are frequently
found in computer-mediated communications. This means that the formality of
telephone conversation, and
even more of written or printed pages, is greatly diminished in the
computer interface. Such
immediacy suggests that what Grassi champions as
humanistic insight
through conversation might
well find an appropriate habitat in the digital environment of
computerized conferences. The
flow of ideas that crosses over compartmentalized areas may well
be facilitated by
thoughtful computer transaction. The greater directness of computer texts can
simulate something of the
directness of conversation. Through the computer thought seems to
come across like a
flowing stream from mind to mind.
Another benefit for
humanistic knowledge is that digital writing can be exchanged rapidly without
the
delays of the postal
service and without the burden imposed by differences of time zones.
Computerized
conversations or symposia would not suffer the inconvenience and expense
involved
in transporting
thinkers physically over several continents (the Zurich Discourses are
sponsored by
a wealthy German
industrialist). Because digital writing can be transmitted via phone or
satellite,
there is the convenience
of immediate access without, however, the need for different time-zone
provisions or complex
cross-checking of schedules. In this way, computerized writing provides a
symposium atmosphere with a
placeless or international quality. One is not limited to the
discussants in ones own physical environment nor burdened by the demands
of a more formal and
more time-consuming
medium. Communication time with its formalities is reduced by
computerized exchanges.
Yet, as promised, I
will have to bring up the other side of the coin to these benefits--a critical
procedure that has been
reinforced by humanistic traditions going back to the philosophers
Socrates and
Empedocles.
Charles Bowen, a
well-known writer of books about online communication, confesses: "Working
in
this electronic void
also has changed the way I interact with other human units--alas, not always
for
the better. My system
works so well that sometimes I get quite testy when things go wrong.
Equipment failures
paralyze me with rage. Then, I watch myself becoming abrupt with an
unexpected telephone call. If
I don't catch myself, I get unreasonably cranky with my face-to-face
answers to people. Most
important, I have learned that the same words that are pithy and
business-like in an
electronic message come across as downright rude when spoken. What is
missing is the measure of
small talk with which we humans balance our personal communications."
What Bowen here
suggests is that immediacy and speed may curtail the very background warmth
of conversation
against which humanistic discussion can take place. When Plato in the Dialogues
of Socrates ranked
Eros up along with Logos it was because, as an ancient Greek, he recognized
the intrinsic
connection of human emotion with the freedom of abstract thought. It may be
that the
austerity of computerized
language will undermine the sense of spontaneous pleasure in human
presence that seems
necessary for creative humanistic interchange. The immediacy of information
may militate against
joint cognitive discoveries.
Likewise with the
abridgement of time. Due to the acceleration of text
production, and due to the
lesser resistance
provided by the new writing materials, there will probably be less gestation
periods
for thought. There may
have been something essentially contemplative, meandering, musing, and
deep about the medium
of books and handwriting. With less gestation and more productivity, the
thoughts that are exchanged
may lack the imaginative connections and associations that many,
including Grassi, attribute to genuine humanistic knowledge (as
opposed to information). This
melancholy possibility was
evidenced recently in some remarks shared by two participants on the
CompuServe computer
network, on a thread of messages entitled "Liberal Arts & Computin." I
reproduce here the exchange
in unedited and complete form so as to give you evidence of some of
the things I have been
talking about:
=====================================================
#: 70339 S0/Gen/New Uploads (N) 19-Jul-86 18:59:11
Sb: #70186-#Liberal Arts
& Computin
Fm: Tom Nash 74676,3310
To: Elias Baumgarten 76167,1257 (X)
Elias, before
December 1984, I gleefully considered myself a Luddite. Liberal Arts man,
that's me.
B.A. in English
Lit, M.A. in Counseling and Human Development. My only experience with
computers was a disaster in
the Library of Congress trying to do a literature search, which occured
because I wouldn't read
the instructions (still don't read the docs enough, those who forget
history....). Then I
bought a PCjr on a whim. I felt like someone born 50
years after Gutenberg who
didn't know how to read.
Since then I've become obsessed. I now own 3 machines: my jr, now built
up to 640K and 2
drives, this Leading Edge with a 20 megger, and an
Osborne 3, an MSDOS
transportable, actually a Morrow
Pivot/Zenith portable with only a 16 line screen, which I keep at
work and take with me
when I travel (still do things the different way... my powerful desktop with HD
is at home, the
little transportable is at work). Where does it end? I'm reading far fewer
books, due
to online time, but
more writing, both personal and work-related. I guess I need to check out the
Whole Earth SIG and
see where the other Luddite turned compunerds are at.
-Tom
#: 70409 S8/Village
Inn (N) 20-Jul-86 22:28:48
Sb: #70339-#Liberal
Arts & Computin
Fm: Elias Baumgarten 76167,1257
To: [F0] Tom Nash
74676,3310
I found your
message a classic one, worth saving. I don't think I've gone quite so far yet
(only one
computer, and I managed to
get away to northern Scandinavia for five weeks with no thought of
computers), but I do know
the phenomenon very well. There isn't much on Whole Earth these days
on the subject. I
recently uploaded a short essay on DL3 of Whole Earth that deals with some of
these issues, from the
perspective of my Arctic trip. Try the keyword "ARCTIC" if you are
interested
(and
I'd be interested in your reaction). I THINK it's
ARCTIC.DOC. Basically I ask whether the
increased options provided
by the computer might actually be lessening our freedom and causing
us to lose access to
important kinds of conscious states. And here I am, "entering data"
on the
computer....
#: 70465 S8/Village
Inn (N)
21-Jul-86 23:47:15 Sb: #70409-#Liberal Arts & Computin
Fm: Chuck Wright
72667,1316
To: [F0] Elias Baumgarten 76167,1257 (X)
I don't sing too
many arias, but I'd like to put my two cents in for my alma mater as a
noteworthy
liberal arts college. Dartmouth, up in the Granite State. For some reason, after
getting a couple
800's in math, I
majored in English and graduated with a B-. After that, attended Columbia Law,
Woodstock P.C.P.,
L.S.D., United Steel Workers, Seton Hall Law too many nights. Now gainfully
employed as title counsel,
happily married and proudly daughtered. Ran the
Little League softball
league this summer.
I don't often
ponder whether computers encourage linear thinking, but I certainly don't have
that
problem. It might be hard
to imagine Keats or Joyce at a keyboard, but they must have had desks
at which they wrote,
or finished, their works. Might they have appreciated something like Sidekick?
Poetry, and perhaps
all literature and drama, is surely linear. The vidtex,
like all life, sometimes
`creeps
on in this petty pace', and then `the magical mystery tour is coming to take
you away'.
Left/right,
up/down; does reflecting upon life impede its flow or make it run more
smoothly? From
my experience,
periods of self-examination and cosmic reflection were seen in retrospect as
something close to clinical
depression; my happiest, most productive days were so busy that there
was no time to wonder
what I was doing, or why. They were right, and I knew it.
The liberal arts
are much more about pain and suffering than joy (maybe that's why so many
liberal
arts majors are lawyers
[flick cigar]). Romeo and Juliet, The Idiot, Ahab, Abraham...kill
me a son.
Perhaps it's
because nobody needs to be told how to feel happy, or rather need a reason or
explanation for it. The
classics deal primarily with the demonstration of pain, and then often pose a
way of surviving and,
perhaps, making the most of it (Sit you down, father. Rest you.)
Liberal arts helps
you live with life, to cope better, not just to think you're more educated than
someone else. It gives you
an idea of honor, and what's right, and wrong.
Dartmouth College
has a fine liberal arts program, together with comprehensive computer capacity.
Professor Kemeny was its President; he wrote BASIC. It has a lot of
beer, too. Anybody who
knows what this is
about, raise your hand.
Two final thoughts:
1) Two paths verged in a wood, and I took
the one less travelled
by; 2) And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, slouches toward
Bethlehem to be
born?
#: 70527 S8/Village
Inn (N)
23-Jul-86 21:09:38 Sb: #70465-Liberal Arts & Computin
Fm: Elias Baumgarten 76167,1257
To: Chuck Wright
72667,1316
If one's happiest
days are when one is so busy he has no time to reflect and reflecting on one's
life
leads to depression,
then the culture which created such a state is not one I wish to live in. But I
think this is for
another forum which does not (yet) exist on CompuServe.
========================================================================
This thread on
"Liberal Arts & Computin" contains a
mishmash of literary allusions with a concern
to connect somehow
the technological interface with the traditional liberal arts and sciences. The
connection obviously fails on
the personal level, and the liberal arts are conceived as academically
separate from computer
technology and from technology in general. As such, there is a
melancholy about the nature
of the liberal arts themselves, as if the free use of imagination were
doomed to "the
contemplation of pain" and "clinical depression." At the same
time, the technology
itself, in its evident
use, has failed to rise to anything like the heights of the human spirit and
imagination. It is not just
the liberal arts that seem to fail but technology itself. (Of course, there
are those who would
absolve themselves of all cultural responsibility by proclaiming that
technologies cannot fail but
only those who use them. This distinction neatly avoids the cultural
embedding of the procedures
and results of scientific thought.)
One of the points
of this paper is to suggest that the traditional liberal arts are being
transformed by
an examination of the
rhetorical basis of knowledge in general, including scientific knowledge. If
rhetorical theory proceeds
with Grassi's kind of experiments, in an effort to
cross-fertilize isolated
cognitive domains, then, we
must continue to reflect on the potential and perils of the computer
interface, for here the
liberal arts of public writing and speaking meet the culmination of our
science.
Such a meeting is
not done so much through awkward references to traditional poetry and literature,
but through an
understanding of the power of the imagination for developing and deepening the
interface itself. Grassi's experiment is but one example of the genuine
efforts to set anew the task
of liberal
education--not by turning toward an exclusive concern with pain and suffering
but by
drawing on traditional
sources in ways that meet the new conditions. The self-examination of the
liberal arts today means
not the self-indulgence of clinical depression but the daring question of how
the computer interface
can liberate human beings to new flights of creative thought. And the
question of the
technologists today is not a technical one, but is rather: Now that we have
made it,
how shall we make use
of this computer in liberating the energies of human beings?
BIBLIOGRAPHY OF SOME PERTINENT READINGS AND REFERENCES
Bowen, Charles, "On the Freedom to Interact," in ONLINE TODAY,
August 1986, p. 48.
Foss, S.K.,
CONTEMPORARY PERSPECTIVES ON RHETORIC (Prospect Heights, Illinois:
Waveland Press,
1984). This textbook has a chapter on Grassi along along with chapters on
Foucault, Habermas, and Kenneth Burke. See Chapter 6, pp. 125-51.
Grassi, Ernesto, RHETORIC AS PHILOSOPHY: THE
HUMANIST TRADITION, (University Park,
1980, Pennsylvania State University Press).
_____________,
HEIDEGGER AND THE QUESTION OF RENAISSANCE HUMANISM: FOUR
STUDIES by Ernesto Grassi, (Binghamton: Center for Medieval and Early
Renaissance Studies,
S.U.N.Y., 1983).
_____________,
editor with Hugo Schmale, DAS GESPRAECH ALS EREIGNIS:
EIN
SEMIOTISCHES
PROBLEM, (Munich: Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 1982); an
English translation of
CONVERSATION AS
EVENT: A SEMIOTIC PROBLEM has been done and is soon to be
published. This volume presents some of the
"results" of the Zurich Discourses.
_____________,
"Rhetoric and Philosophy," in PHILOSOPHY AND RHETORIC, 9, 1976, pp.
200-
216.
_____________, DIE
MACHT DER PHANTASIE: ZUR GESCHICHTE ABENDLAENDISCHEN
DENKENS (Koenigstein: Syndikat,
1979).
Heim, Michael,
ELECTRIC LANGUAGE: A PHILOSOPHICAL STUDY OF WORD PROCESSING,
(New Haven: Yale University Press, Spring 1987).
_____________,
"Grassi's Experiment: The Renaissance Through Phenomenology," forthcoming in
RESEARCH IN PHENOMENOLOGY (Humanities Press).
_____________,
"The Impact of Computerized Writing on the Human Thought Process: A
Philosophical
Investigation," in PROCEEDINGS OF THE NINTH WESTERN EDUCATIONAL
COMPUTING
CONFERENCE: 1985 (California Educational Computing Consortium), pp. 95-102,
delivered in Oakland, California; originally
given on the regular program of the American
Philosophical
Association in New York City, December 1984.
_____________,
"Topics, Topicality: The New Topos,"
PHILOSOPHY TODAY, Summer 1981, pp.
131-138.
Rorty, Richard, CONSEQUENCES OF PRAGMATISM
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press,
1982).
_____________,
PHILOSOPHY AND THE MIRROR OF NATURE (Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 1979). In both books, this widely known
American philosopher argues for "ungrounded
cultural conversation" as the basis of
knowledge. Rorty acknowledges his debt to earlier
European
Phenomenology and Hermeneutics.
Spiegelberg, Herbert, "Reflections on the
Phenomenological Movement," in THE JOURNAL OF
THE BRITISH SOCIETY
FOR PHENOMENOLOGY, Vol. 11, no. 3, October 1980, pp. 271-282. The
paper is based on a lecture given at the
annual meeting of the Society for Phenomenology and
Existential
Philosophy held on November 2, 1979 at Purdue University. Excerpts from that
lecture
were first printed in the Chronicles of MAN
AND WORLD: AN INTERNATIONAL PHILOSOPHICAL
REVIEW, Vol. 13,
nos. 3-4, 1980, pp. 477-78.
Veit, Walter, "The Potency of
Imagery--The Impotence of Rational Language: Ernesto Grassi's
Contribution to Modern
Epistemology," in PHILOSOPHY AND RHETORIC, Vol. 17, No. 4, 1984
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
Appeared in Philosophy Today, Winter 1986, Volume XXX, no. 4, pp. 278-288.
© Michael Heim
http://www.mheim.com/files/humanistic.pdf
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Academic year 2008/2009
© a.r.e.a./Dr.Vicente Forés López
© Cristina Rusu
rucris@alumni.uv.es
Universitat de Valčncia
Press