Fritz

The speaker discusses various topics including the concepts of Necrophie and Produktivkräfte, the idea of progress in history, the influence of religion on politics, the limitations of Kant's political theory, the impact of technological advancements on communication, and the challenges of teaching critical thinking and analogical reasoning. They also mention the need for a scientific foundation for analysis and critique of positivism in the philosophy of science. The speaker suggests that traditional metaphors and linear conceptions of progress are inadequate for understanding the complexity of scientific growth. wie sagt man, Necrophie, die Produktivkräfte, das dann alles irgendwie, und das klingt dann auch so wissenschaftlich, und ich glaube, dass er eben sagt, dass die Leute ändern sich und da haben sie verschiedene Ideen und das wird verschiedene Parameter für unsere Wahl bedeuten und vor allem eben das Skandalum, das wäre eben auch nicht sinnvoll, der ist ja auch schon mit Hegel und deswegen komme ich auch sehr christlich mit Kant her, dass die Endlichkeit des Lebens einfach gelobt wird, dass man eben dann fantasiert über die Menschheit, das singulare Tantum, das alles umfasst, und dass du nie die Menschheit irgendwo hinführen kannst. Das hat auch heute Einfluss, schlecht machen oder was auch immer, aber da hat mich das eben interessiert, woher überhaupt die Welt kommt, da kommt ja bei Koselleck dieser interessante Einwurf, dass bis ins 18. Jahrhundert es ja nicht so etwas gab wie die Geschichte, es gab Geschichten über verschiedene Reiche, und interessanterweise wurden sie meistens abgehandelt im Sinne von einer Verfallsgeschichte, also noch Gibbons und Spengler sind ja noch in dieser Tradition, sodass die Idee des Fortschritts, also die Erreichung des Paradieses, umgekehrten Paradieses, eben eigentlich eine religiöse Idee ist, die aus der Apokalyptik kommt, also aus der späten Prophetenschaft, und dann sehr stark ist, eine Wiederbelebung im 2. Jahrhundert hat, mit den Qumran-Texten und so weiter, und dann versinkt, weil interessanterweise ja die Kirche eigentlich ein völlig neues Bild der Herrschaft mit einbringt, und zwar die des Pastors, Pastoral Kingdom, und da nimmt die Kirche das auf, und die Politik ist ja eigentlich dann ein fossiles Geschäft, das durch die Adeligen bestimmt wird, das heißt, dass die Kategorien völlig andere sind, mit der Politik verstanden wird. Es geht nicht mehr ums Schaffen einer Freiheitszone, sondern es geht um Welfare. Und dann kommt zum ersten Mal so die Idee, dass ja kontrary zu der aristotelischen Bestimmung der Politik als Herrschaft und das Gleiche und Freie, die sich abwechseln müssen, wird der Herrschaftsverstand bei Baudrin und in der Renaissance und so weiter, als Haus, als Herrschaft über das Haus, über das Oikos. Das heißt, der Politikbegriff ist eigentlich auch völlig, und dann kommt ja dann auch der privatrechtliche Gedanke, dann eben mit herein, dass es nicht ein Zusammenschluss ist, sondern ein Vertrag. Der Vertrag ist aber eigentlich gar kein Vertrag, denn er wird ja nie geschlossen, er muss von allem zur gleichen Zeit, das ist eine völlig mythische Konstruktion. Und deswegen sagte ich eben, was uns Kant leider hinterlassen hat, ist, völlig schizophrene Art und Weise mit der Politik umzugehen. Erstens ist diese Diskrepanz zwischen der Theorie, oder was er denkt, dass die Einheit der Geschichte bedeutet, was ist Universalgeschichte und so weiter, der ewige Frieden und so weiter, und seine Analyse der politischen Situation. Mein Gott, was passiert da in Frankreich? Und das habe ich da in dem Buch geschrieben, an der Unterschiedlichkeit zwischen, was ist Orientierung im Denken und den anderen Schriften. Und dann ist die Zweite natürlich, dass Kant nie zu einer demokratischen Mitbestimmung kommt. Er kommt höchstens zu einer Herrschaft des Rechts. Er hat eine Rechtstheorie, aber man darf dem König höchstens mal vorschlagen, dass er vielleicht mal zuhören soll. Und da sollen die Professoren besonders gehört werden. Weil die sind ja die Chabroniere erster Ordnung. Er hat ja Recht. Nein, er hat eben nicht Recht. Er sollte die am allerletzten fragen. Moment mal, ich kenne den deutschen Professor eigentlich. Das ist ja die Tragödie in Kant. Weil er zwar eine absolut personalistische oder persönliche Freiheitslehre hat, die er aber nicht in eine Politik umsetzen kann. Denn die Freiheit ist ja nur die Befolgung des Gesetzes. Der Gesetzgeber ist um die Burschen der Absolutismus praktisch. Oder wenn es dann mal demokratisch wird, wird es gleich rhetorisch. Dass ein jeder über jeden einen Unterfällung versteht. Ja, ja, von der Habermarsche. Nein, aber das siehst du schon in den 60er-Jahren. Ja, ja, das sieht man. Dass eigentlich dann jeder das so sehen muss. Und dann diese ganze Diskussion des Idealen, auch bei Rolst. Das ist doch alles an den Haaren herbeigezogen. Ja, ja, sicher. Und dass deswegen aus diesem Grund, wenn man vor diesem Hintergrund dann versucht, mit den jetzigen Mythen usw. die Neuigkeit dieser Welt zu beschreiben oder zu begreifen, sondern dann nicht sehr weit kommt. Also zum Beispiel, ich bin fest überzeugt, und das ist ja mittlerweile auch in der Sozialpsychologie erwiesen usw., dass die nächste Generation nicht mehr schriftlich kommunizieren kann. Die sind nicht mehr in der Lage zu schreiben, man kann es später fragen, was hier aus den Volksschulen herrscht, katastrophal. Wir sehen es ja auch in den Medien. Wenn du nur noch Fernsehen schaust, wo kannst du dich da jemals auf irgendwas konzentrieren? Und sagen, das ist wichtig oder das ist nicht wichtig. Mit deiner Zeit umgehen usw. Nee, nee, es ist Participation. Entweder Halligalli oder hockst du einfach rum und tust nix. Und bleibst staubt. Die Idee der Aktion, dass du irgendwo eingreifen kannst, du vielleicht auch Unterschied machen kannst usw., geht schon deswegen, wir wollen ja keine Sozialisation mehr haben. Die Kinder wachsen auf in einem totalen Tohuwabohu. Sie können sich nicht mehr versprechen. Es geht nicht mehr, dass sie sich vertragen. Sie werden auch nicht erzogen, mal still zu sitzen. Es geht nur, dass jeder tut, was jeder andere tut. Vielleicht können wir doch den Bogen zurückspannen. Vielleicht wollen wir weiterreden zum Verfahren. Wir würden das Gespräch dann aufzeichnen und gleich eine Transkription davon haben, die wir dann überarbeiten würden, sodass das eine Grundlage werden kann für das Schlusskapitel. Wir reden jetzt auf Deutsch, es wäre vielleicht leichter, dann das Gespräch über die Männchen auf Englisch zu machen, sodass wir da eine Grundlage haben und daraus dann eine Reihe von editorischen Runden im Kapitel basteln können. Ich möchte nur eine zu bedenken geben. Wenn ihr meine Kritik als interessant oder vielleicht dazugehörig einordnet, dann ist das Problem, dass eigentlich schon Kritik am Wissenschaftsbetrieb auch mit einschließen sollte. Dass die Verschulung der Politik diese ganze Sache nicht beigetragen hat. Keiner wird auch irgendwie in den Grundlagen. Das geht alles in den Statisten, aber der kapiert schon die ganzen Inferenzen und welche Mathematik dahintersteht oder sonst was. Und das habe ich auch immer wieder gesagt, die Leute lernen nicht mehr saubere Analogien zu schließen. Und sehr viele unserer Erkenntnisse sind eben nicht Demonstrationen, was ein Obergott, ein Untergott oder ein Mastikogoten, sondern haben damit zu tun, dass du nach Sortierst, nach Ähnlichkeit und Differenz. Und dann eben feststellst, das Sprachspiel, wie sich das überlappt und so weiter. Und das ist schon eine völlig andere Art. Und da musst du auch, wenn du die Leute darin schulen willst, musst du auch völlig anders hingehen. Denn erstes Semester Statistik, zweites ein Kurs über die Entwicklung der Wissenschaft und dann drei ist, was sind so die Debatten und vier ist dann, im vierten Jahr kommst du dann gewöhnlich, ja, was ist meine Magisterarbeit und so weiter. Da musst du ja anders herangehen. Dann hätten wir eben sozusagen den disziplingeschichtlichen, aber gleichzeitig den wissenschaftsoziologischen Blick drin. Und da kann man dann auch was entwickeln im Hinblick darauf. Der Einzige, der sowas gemacht hat und der ist bei uns nicht sehr in der Stadt vertreten, ist der Jens Bortelsen. Der hat ja zum Beispiel gleich von Anfang an gewarnt vor dieser Verlierung der Zivilgesellschaft auf die Weltgesellschaft. Und das ist auch irgendwie verjüngend. Das hat man zwar teilweise zitiert, aber kapiert haben es die Leute nicht. ...Ausforderungen, um eine wissenschaftliche Grundlage für die Analyse zu geben. Das empfiehlt also genau die Art der Demonstration, über die du gesprochen hast. Und das, so weit ich verstehe, wo die ökonomische Theorie der Meister ist, zu welcher Theorie-Bildung, nach den Naturwissenschaften, irgendwie verbunden ist. Und das ist, was normalerweise als Positivismus gesagt wird. Also, wenn du uns für einen Moment vielleicht durch was du verstehst, wie dieser Prozess funktioniert. Und vor allem, was es für dich bedeutet, was Positivismus ist, weil sonst kann man nicht über die anderen Dinge sprechen. Nun, wieder einmal, ich meine, es gibt keinen einen Sinn von Positivismus. Es gibt Positivismus in einem Typus, einer Art von anderen Vorstellungen. Und was ich versucht habe, ist, nur einige der Metapheren zu debunkieren, auf denen zum Beispiel Was ist sein Name? Gott. Das ist alte Zeit. Cohen? Nein, nein, Cohen. Ah. Popper. Popper. Okay. Okay, Popper. Popper ist, für das erste Mal, er ist auf dem richtigen Weg. Er sagt, nun, um den Wachstum der Wissenschaft zu betrachten, müssen wir in eine Geschichte der Wissenschaft gehen. Und dann sehen wir, und das ist wieder einmal, wo die progressive Konzeption der Geschichte kommt, damit wir sie als automatisches Prozess zwischen Konjunktur und Reputation verstehen können und als Wachstum. Und wie ist das dann? Nun, es ist so, dass man immer mehr Polygonen in einem Kreis baut. Und es geht hinaus, und während man nie alles hat, kommt man näher an die Grenze. Das Bild ist total verpisselt. Weil er vorstellt, er vorstellt, dass es ein Kreis gibt. Es gibt eine Grenze. Und man kommt näher. Und wenn man näher kommt, muss man zuerst eine Perspektive der Grenze haben. Es ist wie, wenn man näher kommt zum Ziel, dem Zielplatz, muss man wissen, wo der Zielplatz ist. Aber das ist genau das, was es in der Wissenschaft nicht ist. Man weiß nicht, wo der Zielplatz ist, wo das Ende ist. Es ist lange her, ich habe diese andere Metapher vorgestellt, eine Art Puzzle, dass man Wörter findet, die neuen Wörter erscheinen, neue Bäume, neue Verbindungen, und man kommt nirgendwo hin, zum Ende. Und das Ende der Wissenschaft, das ist Unsinn, weil der ganze Punkt ist, dass man Fragen stellen kann, von denen man sich gar nicht erinnern konnte, die nicht existieren. Also zu denken in Bezug auf eine spätere Metapher, auf einen anstrengenden Kreis, ist schon grundsätzlich lange her. Und die Theorie, die versucht, das als Bruch der Idioten zu machen, ja, also haben wir nie die ganze Wahrheit, weil wir die Wahrheit nicht haben können, aber wir können näher und näher kommen, das ist sehr, sehr schwierig. Und wir machen nur unsere kleinen Dinge, und dann studieren wir, wie gut die Rebellen auf der Bühne aufsteigen und die Israeli-Bomben schießen. Wäre es dann fair zu sagen, dass wir uns ständig mit zwei sehr unterschiedlichen Verständnissen von Positivismus beteiligen, und vielleicht ist das auch ein Teil der Schwierigkeiten, wenn es um Post-Positivismus geht. Weil typisch, wenn wir Positivismus im Kontext der sozialen Beziehungen sagen, denken die Leute Kinko-Hein-Berber, Neopositivismus, diese Kombination von Falsifizierungen, also Populismus. Aber das ist eine Theorie. Eine Methode. Ja, aber der eine Teil von Positivismus ist, dass es eine gewisse Reihe von Regeln gibt, zu denen man sich einsteuern muss, um als der richtige Mitglied der Gruppe zu werden. Wenn man ein guter Wissenschaftler sein will, wenn man ein Degrees erzielen will, wenn man Geld erzielen will, all diese Dinge, dann macht man die richtige Forschung, und das ist, wie man die richtige Forschung macht. Das stimmt. Und das ist auch der Grund, warum er mit Kuhn zu tun hat. Aber dann gibt es auch, was wir dann kritisieren, dass Positivismus nicht unbedingt die Besonderheiten dieser Reihe von Regeln ist, die sich als universell präsentieren, sondern es ist vielleicht eher die Fetischisierung der Methode und der Ansicht auf die Befragung, die grundlegend von der Methode und der Aspiration zur Wissenschaft geführt wird. Und dann ist es nicht so wichtig, dass man die Kinkelhain-Virga oder die Fetisch-Path oder die Kinkelhain-Virga hat. Nein, es gibt immer eine Art von Regeln, die man folgt. Es gibt die Idee, dass man alles tun kann. Ich meine, das Feuerzeug war viel zu liberal. Aber es gibt etwas dazu, dass man sagt, nein, unorthodoxe Denker, die, zum Beispiel, wo kommen wir her, sind okay. Es hängt von einer gewissen Verständnis ab, dass die meisten, wenn nicht alle, normalen Dinge im Leben und in der Natur random sind. Und es ist Randomheit, die fordert, die Situationen von Extremen herauslebt. Und das ist der Grund, weil dann sind wir wieder nach Hause. Aber viele Prozesse im Leben sind positive Feedbacks, nicht negative Feedbacks. Wenn man ein Ingenieur ist, der Brücken baut, ist das das erste, was man lernen muss. Weil wenn man 200 Menschen hat, die über eine Brücke laufen, bekommt man eine Galoppin-Kirche-Art der Situation. Und viele dieser Dinge, wiederum, hängen auf dem unbefragten oder falschen Übergang einer bestimmten Metapher zu einer anderen Art von Problemen. Also gegen diesen Hintergrund, findest du den Namen Post-Positivismus hilfreich? Ja, insofern dass Post-Positivismus nicht das Ende ist. Es kommt etwas danach. Und es könnte interessant sein, zu fragen, warum Positivismus uns nicht erfüllt hat. Der Post erzählt dir etwas über die menschliche Existenz. Wir versuchen immer neue Dinge. Und Positivismus war bequem auf eine Art, für die Schmucks. Können wir etwas anderes benutzen? Ja, man lernt etwas. Es ist ein sehr mechanisches Verständnis, wie man über diese Dinge geht. Ich meine, das Interessante ist, wenn man sich anschaut, zumindest Popper war ernst daran, die Erfindbarkeit, die Erfindung, das Sehen, dafür gibt es keine Methode. Es gibt eine Methode, um etwas zu beweisen, aber nicht, um etwas zu erfinden. Man schaut in das Feuer, sieht bestimmte Dinge, und plötzlich sieht man, wie Elemente sich miteinander verbinden, auf verschiedene Art und Weise, was man nicht sehen konnte. Wie interpretiert man es? Es ist eine sehr komplexe Sache. Wir wissen nicht, wo es herkommt. Oder es schifft in die berühmten Argumente über die Gestalttheorie, dass man die Gestalt jetzt sieht, nicht dann, und so weiter. Und das ist viel mehr die praktische Schwierigkeit, die wir haben. Wie ist es? Das ist die erste Frage. Und natürlich, wenn wir die Erinnerung verlieren, weil die Vergangenheit, die wir haben, nicht die Vergangenheit ist, die passiert ist. Es kann nicht möglich sein. Es ist immer eine Selektion. Eine Selektion, die von einem bestimmten Teil geschaffen wurde. Also gibt es Dinge, die wichtig sind, die hier hergehören, und Dinge, die nicht wichtig sind. Es ist immer eine Selektion. Es gibt ein sehr bekanntes Buch, Die Vergangenheit in einem Land, also wenn ich dich verstehe, kannst du sagen, dass mit dem Regen des Positivismus kam ein Set von Metapheren, die eine Art Technik von der Wissenschaft vorgelegt haben, die aber auch eine Theorie der Politik als etwas technisch war. Und diese sehr technische Natur hat ein bestimmtes Verständnis von Raum und Zeit vorgelegt. Raum im Sinne von System, als negativen Feedback, und Zeit als etwas, dass das System auf dem Raum steht. Alles auf dem selben Raum. Was eröffnet hat, und das ist auch etwas, woran du gearbeitet hast, die ganze Idee der Korrelationen der Kriege, der wissenschaftliche Verständnis, aber auf der einen Seite, also die Statistiken und die großen Dinge, aber es hat auch die Idee des equilibrium, der strategischen ökonomischen Verständnis, das wir übersetzt haben, aber beide sind irgendwie durch die Metapheren verbunden. Wir haben nicht so viel über die Metapheren gesprochen, die diese Typen unterscheiden, die Ähnlichkeiten und dieses Gestalt und das auf andere Dinge einbeziehen. Was auch, und das ist etwas, was dann vielleicht den Faktatus der Philosophischen Untersuchungen verbindet, der Faktatus, der sehr wichtig, der Philosoph, der die Metapher verändert. Und siehst du sie, ich meine, ich sehe die Relevanz von Popper, natürlich, aber du bist viel weniger mit Popper als mit deinen anderen IR-Schülern. Ja, weil Popper war interessiert und verstanden und versucht zu verstehen und kam auch aus einem bestimmten, spezifischen Hintergrund, welches im US-Kontext nicht so wichtig war. Also war es nicht so, ja, okay, aber das macht also die Dimension des Organismus. Was du hast, ist die sogenannte behördliche Revolution, die nichts mit der behördlichen Revolution zu tun hat. Was war das? Das war die Idee der Medienwähler. Die Medienwähler übernehmen. Wir werden eine Gesellschaft haben, wo wir kommen, wo alles gut ist und die Parteien werden nicht radikal sein und so weiter, weil sie für die Medienwähler kämpfen müssen. Es ist nicht so, dass die Gesellschaft bestimmte fixe Gruppen hat und so weiter, und wenn du sie strategisch manipulierst, wirst du wissen, dass die politische Wissenschaft der amerikanischen System total fatal war. Die Medienwähler und die ganze Scheiße der der Radikalisierung hat genau zu dieser unglaublichen Radikalisierung der amerikanischen Politik zu tun. Es ist sehr viel die Idee, dass Politik Technik ist. Und die Prädisposition der Medienwähler ist genau das, dass man politische Einstellungen und Präferenzen auf einem einzigen Spektrum, auf einem einzigen Raum, so dass man die Möglichkeit verliert, dass das Problem der Politik ist, dass unterschiedliche Menschen ganz literär unterschiedliche Welten haben, die wir jetzt mit einem Atom absolut vergessen. Wie kann jemand für Trump wählen? Weil wir nicht verstehen, dass Menschen unterschiedliche Welten haben, die Prädispositionen unterschiedliche Wege der Welt machen. Ja, und es gibt die Gefühle, dass jeder in die Mitte geht und jeder... Ein perfektes Beispiel dafür ist, wenn du empirisch bist, und das ist ungewöhnlich, weil es total ideologisch ist, wenn du die Medienwähler überlassen hast, dann Städte aus dem selben Staat sollten die gleiche Weise wählen. Richtig? Und es sollte nie getrennt werden, oder wenn sie getrennt sind, sollten sie die gleiche Weise wählen, sie nicht. Also es ist total eine Idee, die falscht ist, und das ist wirklich auch eine Überraschung, aber ich meine, es wird meist so ausgedrückt, dass in den 70er Jahren und Anfang der 80er Jahre, ich meine, es gibt diese Bewegung zur Wissenschaft, es gibt auch diese echte Dominanz der USA, Markt und Akademie für den gesamten USA, du hast die Dominanz der USA-Journale, du hast die Dominanz der USA-Akademie. Aber du hast alles falsch verstanden, wo Europa zu den USA begann, weil sie für uns gearbeitet haben, sie haben die Verteidigung für uns gemacht, diese wahnsinnige Ideologie oder Ideologie, die heutzutage eine Ideologie ist, in den USA, es ist unglaublich, ich meine, ich habe mit Rob Hall gesprochen und auch mit Stephen Clark, ich meine, auch mit dem amerikanischen Vizepräsidenten, wir sind diejenigen, die die Reinigung betreuen, es ist nicht die amerikanische multinationale Koalition, es ist nicht die Bewegung, um Zahlen zu verhindern, um sie nach Mexiko zu bewegen, es ist nicht die unglaubliche Kredite, die wir kreieren konnten, weil wir nicht mehr haben, nein, wir haben die Vorteile genommen, wir sind die Gewinner, und das ist infantil. Ja, aber der Punkt, den ich versuchen wollte zu machen, ist, wenn du diese Dominanz hast, in den 70ern und 80ern, wie ist es möglich, dass Menschen wie du aufgewachsen sind, die etwas anders machen? Na, wie ist es möglich? Wie hat dieser Raum sich eröffnet? Wo ist der Knall, dass, wenn du die Dominanz hast, und wenn es diese Glauben gibt, plötzlich beginnt dieser ganze Bewegung, und es beginnt in den USA. Auch, weil die Kritik des Positivismus, die wir jetzt darüber gesprochen haben, eine Kritik ist, die in dem Sinne ist, dass sie nicht nur an einem bestimmten Punkt der Welt erfolgt, warum eröffnen wir das? An diesem Punkt der Zeit. Das hat mit dem Ende der Krieg zu tun, mit der Unmöglichkeit, zum Beispiel der deutschen Universitätssysteme, sich wirklich zu erneuern. Es war kein schlechtes System, es war nur ein System, das wenn du Max Weber bist, und du hast stolze Studenten, sie werden stolze Studenten, wenn du einen Idioten hast, und er produziert für 30 Jahre Idioten, dann ist es genau das, was du bekommst. Und in der politischen Wissenschaft war das der Fall. Ich meine, alle gute Menschen sind weggegangen. Friedrich und Moritz und so weiter. Ich meine, sie sind weggegangen. Deutschland hatte niemanden. Es gab einige Leute, die unterwegs waren, aber sie, wie du weißt, die Philosophen, wie von Anthropologie und so weiter, in Griechenland und so weiter, aber ich meine, sie waren nicht im Vordergrund. Ja, aber wenn man schaut auf den Kontext unserer Menschen, zum Beispiel die nächste Generation hat keine Ahnung, wie dieses gesamte Bewegungssystem begonnen ist, das du auch kreiert hast, ja, sehr gut. Also, wie war es möglich, dass dieses Bewegungssystem, das wir post-positiv nennen, post-strukturell nennen, was auch immer, wie wurde das entstanden? Ich meine, das hat mit dem unglaublichen Wachstum des amerikanischen Bildungssystems zu tun. Es hat mit Ja, es gab einen Wachstum, aber der Wachstum war nicht du weißt, es war Jervis' Argument immer, und er sagte, es ist interessant, Fritz, aber ist es politische Wissenschaft? Ja, also lass es sein, ich meine, verpiss dich, ich meine, okay, also sagst du etwas anderes, du weißt. Also war es weniger ideologisch als heute? Ja, viel weniger ideologisch. Viel weniger ideologisch. Aber Positivismus, sogar die teuersten Positivisten waren tatsächlich offen für die Positivisten. Ja, das stimmt, ich meine, die Dominanz damals war das Ende von diesen Leuten, wie die Realisten der ersten Ära. Ich meine, Kennen, die Leute, die Professor geworden sind, und so weiter, es war nicht so, dass die Leute, sie waren auf der Außenwelt, wie die Michigan Numbers Crunches und so weiter. Und es gab einen Pluralismus, den man heutzutage nicht hat. Ich meine, Amerika hat von ihren Erfolgen nur den Industriestrukturen, die Amerikaner sind unglaublich inventiv, die Produktion und so weiter. Und was passiert jetzt? Ich meine, es sind falsche Firmen. Ja, aber also nur um zu sagen, weil ich es sehr interessiert finde, also die Dominanz war weniger ideologisch, die Dominanz war immer noch, ich meine, es gab eine Pluralität von verschiedenen Dingen, die den Begriff Post-Positivismus benötigten. Nein, nein, ich meine, Post-Positivismus kann nur in Bezug auf diesen spezifischen Zeitraum verstanden werden, weil was wir in den 70ern hatten war eine steigende Ideologisierung. Ich meine, Leute wie Cohen haben sehr viel damit zu tun. Wir entscheiden, und es kam auch an einem Zeitpunkt, in dem die Universitätsregierung grundsätzlich veränderte sich. Also gab man die Macht zu neuen Komiteen, dass ein ehemaliger Universitätspräsident dich befeuern konnte, oder was auch immer, und das hat nichts mit Gerechtigkeit zu tun, aber man ging woanders hin, ich meine, schau dir Morgenthau an, er hat keinen Abstand in der City College of then he goes to Ohio or a midwestern school and makes it to Chicago. If you got denied twice tenure, what do you do nowadays in the US? You can shoot yourself. There is still the soft bounce, as they call it. If you are at Princeton you don't get tenure, or something like that. But if you come from North Carolina State or something like that as well, hang yourself. So there is in the 70s you see an ideologicalization a professionalization, which narrows down the liberality, which then creates that movement. Yeah. You know, it's also what you have, I mean, one of the important issues is that the growth of courts. And that is not seen. Courts are anti-democratic institutions. That is only kept in abeyance by saying it's the constitution, it's not the law that decides, it's the constitution. Yes, yes, yes. You all know that. And as soon as the courts got into policymaking, in taking up all types of social issues which formerly were not judiciable, ah, you have the weaponization that the law schools which get radicalized first. You see those who make a dent. Not in political science. In the law schools. Okay. Interesting. But then that movement happens. Can you say how did you get to it? Or how did it all start? How did it all start? I couldn't have done what I have done in Europe. That was totally clear to me. I enjoyed the academic freedom the first time I was in the United States and when I came back and I interviewed at Oxford and they were not so sure whether they could... Oxford had no studies for a PhD. The idea in Oxford was you go to somebody who gives you a topic and that's it. And you work on it and you cannot be on your board. You have to go to three other people and that's it. And when I interviewed there and I proposed them three themes and they said they couldn't help me with any of them. And I said, well, what could we do? And they said, well, sir, we give you three really pleasant requirements and a good library and we hope that you come up with something. I said, that sounds like a club for academics. It was, of course, my end in Oxford. So, I went back to the United States and I mean, I was in fool's paradise. Don't think it was easy. I mean, my first job I got, I got fired. I got the job. I finished my dissertation. I passed the review. And I said, well, do I get the contract? It was a five-year contract. They said, no. I said, how come? They said, well, it's not according to what they had agreed. The president said, sue me. So, what I hadn't realized is that the department had been deeply divided between those who thought we should have somebody in international relations and the numbers crunchers who were on the American side who wanted an Americanist. Now, the Americanist did so badly apparently in the interview that they couldn't appoint him. And I was doing well and so they appointed me. But that didn't stop the Americanist to push. As soon as my chairman was on leave, they staged a coup and told the president we don't want this guy because he should be fired. And I said, well, wait a second. And to make a long story short, I negotiated with them a year of leave of absence then went for a year to Princeton and went from Princeton to Columbia. I was dumb luck because the job was already again in the goods was promised to a lawyer. She decided that Columbia couldn't pay her enough and she would make so much more at the agency she was working for, the New York State. And for the law, she had a joint appointment with the local. And so I got the job. And that is what they constantly told me. It was a job on the grant, self-consuming grant which was for six years. And after that, I was out in the street and I hoped on a soft bounce. So the great thing about Columbia was it was a great intellectual environment and technically nobody cared about me. I wasn't part of the group. And, you know, when I got a bit antsy, when the hirings came and I had to be on the hiring committee and they appointed people which were totally unqualified and I once there was a guy who came from Hungary. He had nothing, only one English article which was written with a Canadian. And everything else was in but Franklin told me that he knows it from Oxford that he was a great student and we should hire him. And, you know, I said, now I'm not convinced. I got the other people together and, yeah, then it came to the faculty because he insisted that the whole faculty voted on that and guess what? It of course, you know, went for this guy. But before that, I got my knife in and I had to challenge this guy in front of the faculty to give an argument why this candidate was... Well, he speaks a little Hungarian but of course, English and French and Latin and Greek and so on. And I said, OK. And I said, here's my dissent. And I had taken a bottle of wine one night and written a dissent in Latin. I said, is this in Latin? And I said, well, if you know that he knows Latin, you will be able to read this and tell it to your colleagues. How to make friends. And it was an environment in which that was possible. That was possible. And the second thing was I had a rhyme in one of the senior colleagues because he wanted to pass a student, which I knew had the testosterone going. And, I mean, he fought and I won in the competition. And I won in the committee. And he nevertheless recorded it as having passed. And so I got really pissed off. So I went to the chairman and I said, look, I know you can do whatever. You can give a PhD to the bum on the next bench if you want to do that. If you want, however, to have a track for the idea was to give her an M.Phil, not a Doctoral Phil. An M.Phil entitles you later to write a dissertation on it. That was the plan. So I said, if you have here a special M.Phil, which is an M.Fuck, then it should be in the catalogue that everybody should have the same chance. And I put that to the chairman. The... Maybe let's switch from that to post-positivism and the attempt to articulate an alternative out of that environment. Can we post- post-positivism in different ways? The post is that which comes after, and then positivism is the negative foil against which we define something new. We also have the possibility of there being a line of continuation, continuity. That's how we use post in post-colonialism, for instance. An element of the old. How would I see that in the case of post-positivism? That's an interesting point, because what you have in post-colonialism, nobody in his right mind will deny that colonialism was a bad thing, and that it hurt the society, etc. The point is only that post-colonialism doesn't develop. In China it was a bit different. They researched that post-colonialism comes out of this irredentist African nationalism in America. That it's all race, and it's all post-colonialism is not a recognition. It was after all the British which abolished slavery, etc., and they did that with buying off naturally their people, but it is also not so what post-colonialism really tries to say, because they say that determines, so to speak, not only the development, but it also hurt us generations later, so to speak, the psyche of the thing. It was the run for who is the best victim. It's the victimization argument. I really would not like to teach once a course with just some of the simple data, for example, about African slaves, where they went to, and so on, and then you have wonderful arguments. For example, yes, it was the Arabs who first were the ones. It was the Arab traders which sold it to the Portuguese. Then the Portuguese, of course, knew, and then the English knew that you have to not chase the guys yourself, you have to find somebody to contract out. You give somebody a gun, right, to establish his village, and so on, and he brings you the guys and you ship them off. Then you can show that the number increases after many rifles have come to Africa, etc. Seems like a convincing argument. The only thing is, just think, do you want to have slaves to hunt them with a rifle? That's the last thing you want, because it will kill them, or shatter them, and they are totally useless. So how were these guys actually hunted? They were hunted with salt, which has venom in it, and which disabled them. And after a while, they got rid of it, and then they were taken and given to the Portuguese. Not that the Portuguese or the British were not part of this deal, but the idea that the guns enabled that the guns are only important for what? For fortifications. For you can hold yourself up behind it and defend a certain territory. It was the coming of state to the thing, and it has nothing to do with... It's a more complicated story. Certainly. Now, that argument, the old thing is still hurting us. Does that apply to post-positivism in defense? Of course. What we do under the label post-positivism has all of these hang-ups with the positivism. If you want to make it in this society, I mean, you are constantly to justify why you are doing this and not something else. They give you the... hardly anybody is interested. There is a type of creed that they are the 25 or 28 problems you can investigate. And that is okay. And the other things, looking at it in a different way, need not be even... it can be the same event or so on, but looking at it in another way is unorthodox, and that's not science. Cohen told me that's not science. And with science, of course, likewise, it's again American punitivism. It's a religious idea. The only thing you can't fuck with is the Bible. Right? And if you go against the methodological Bible, which is taught to you, you are dead. That's the same. Which is an ideological argument. And you see, the point with this bookism, it's not wrong to say that we always have certain type of prejudices. We cannot question everything at the same time. You always have to ask a question. And by asking a question, we are asking this question and not another question. And then it comes to whereaboutism. Always the first line of defense. You know, I'm interested. And what about all the hungry children in Gaza? I'm not talking about. Ah, but you should! So that's the first. The second one is then again, if you want to make it so to speak, you have to go through the hoops. And it's not incorrect to say that we always have certain prejudice and belief in certain things which are constant, and therefore things are not worth further inquiry. And in order to find out other things. The only point about them is that they say that anything you can assume is as good as anything else. And that's not true. This is like being colorblind. Anything which is not white is not black. I mean, it's obvious. And if it's not obvious, then I need not talk to you about it. Yeah, but the, because the story that I have in mind always, and that maybe links a bit to what you said before, is that one of the first points of critique was I've heard not vis-à-vis the liberal ideology, but it was disentangling the two realisms by Ashley. The theoretical and the practical. With the emphasis on the practical. The scientific realism. I mean, what is the real intellectual scandal in the United States? You wrote a very good book on Rousseau and so on, but not the stupid, but this book is so fucking stupid. It is. It's unbelievable. The only message is the Russians are rational and we can talk to them. That's essentially so it makes sense in the McCarthy era kind of understanding. Where everything is ideological and so you, I mean, you say, okay, no, no, no. They're equal. We're equal. We're playing the same game. That, in a sense, makes sense. But then Ashley comes along and emphasizes this practical aspect. But that gets lost because Ashley is always a hound trying to get in all these French types of arguments and he comes and also doesn't understand all of them, I mean, unfortunately. But he's a real name dropper and he doesn't want to fight the fight anymore. He's the first one who gives up, actually, instead of retooling. It's not that he was wrong, but, I mean, he just didn't have the guts of doing it. So how did he give up? He dropped out and became a dissenter at the, you know, Walker did his bidding, I mean, Ashley was no longer to be seen. Walker tried. Yeah. Yeah, but Walker also... I would like to talk about Walker a bit later, maybe, because then, I mean, we know about how the key ideas of Ashley get translated into Wendt and then becomes a very Americanized version and pain version and a very liberal version, maybe, also. And in that translation, the practical aspect that you mentioned somehow gets lost, because there is no practice. Well, there's no practice in there. There is a theory of practice, and it's like a wooden iron, you know, a theory of practice. But at the same time, that early phase of what we described as the umbrella term post-positivism is very much about militating against the idea that we can observe from the notorious ultra-median point of view. So, with that comes an awareness of knowledge being situated and knowledge production being situated, and knowledge also not hovering above practice, but being itself part of That's very upsetting for people. If you tell people that they are dancing around, they have a real standing. They stand here, they know where they are. If you tell them that they are swirling around and in the universe, they get all fucked up. I mean, the discoveries are at the beginning very disconcerting for people. When they look at the things, what they suddenly they find that they are standing on the other side of the globe with their heads in the on their heads or whatever. The imagination doesn't work. And it takes a long time. This is what I say. I mean, it's the metaphor that plays a very, very important part in enhancing our understanding. Which then raises the question that once it is acknowledged that theory or knowledge production is situated and part of the enterprise, we need a different kind of theorizing. A different kind of understanding. Which, to some surprise, has not materialized. The whole argument about the life world and the phenomenological part has been realized. But the Germans are too stupid to study these things. They are not being received anymore. Who knows I mean, Plessner or all these people or Gehlen and so on. Of course, then comes always the problem where there are Nazis or where there are not Nazis or whatever. But I mean, even Blumenberg, a German Jew, I mean, half-Jew, he gets a professorship, he is recognized, he is part of the Ritter circle and so on. You would think that people would pick up on him. No. No, they didn't. And Pontek has to do a whistle. I mean, write an omen into German which is hardly to be translated into English. That is the real difficulty. It is always so easy to translate in the most unbelievable way because there is nothing here. I mean, extracting a bit from the German context and sticking a bit to international relations, if we talk for the metaphor of the system and coming closer to the truth on the one hand and your metaphor of the riddle or the puzzle. Surprisingly, that metaphorical dimension is not much talked about or is not a key problematic. I mean, we have now as one of the starting points of our book, we have now 30 years of post-positivism. That metaphorical dimension hardly plays any role. Why? Not because they have not read enough Germs. No, it's more difficult to understand. You have to give up. You have to be in suspension much longer whether he can really make the point or whatever. But I mean, many of the things, just think about the one thing when you go also into the language, into the ancestry of concepts. You know, what does Entwurf mean? What is the imaging behind that? To throw. To throw something. The possibility of people standing up and having their hands free allows them to project force from afar. To hit an animal. The animal has to come to you. Here you can all types of new combinations become now possible. And if you look at many of the fundamental concepts and you go down into the history of how they develop, you see very clearly how the metaphor works itself through and also changes its main sensitivity. It is not the same. And it moves them. And that is because people are always brought up, either it's like this or like that. The misapplication of the sentence of Nuremberg. So it's the idea still so that we haven't understood the metaphor at all because still of the wish to explain things. Yeah. To tell it as it is. That's right. The point is to ask the question I have somewhere in writing a wonderful argument against this type of ethics in which you have also this thing in which you are the unknowing one and you can decide. I mean, which type of person, unless he is absolutely insecure, would even cherish such an idea that he is the king of the universe? Leave me alone. I don't want to be the king of the universe. I don't want to get through life here. What type of idiocy is this? I mean, Martha Nussbaum, a very great classicist, and I admired some earlier. Such bullshit! Absolute bullshit! The Cosmopolitan in the book. I mean, it's a shame. It's a real shame. I haven't spoken to you. First of all, it's wrong. This is always a good point to start out with. Nobody has ever talked until this skeptic that he's when Alexander stands before him and says, do you want anything that I do? And then he always says, I'm a citizen of the cosmos. Wow! Nobody has ever thought about that. They have always talked about the family, but now they are like, really got crutch. What says Aristotle about man being the only being who has language? It determines, I mean, the nature of man in terms of without any political or particular types of things. Only in terms of this particular capacity, because that is a transformative capacity. Can I ask you? But the wish to explain is inbuilt in the academic system. And is that what happened to post-positivism? At the moment when it articulates the fundamental critique of the way in which we... No, what does it mean to say what it is to contrast it to what it is not? No, but that is not an interesting thing. No, no, this is still as I understood it, this is still what haunts much of... Yes, the ontology. The ontologization of language. Yes, but this is still what haunts us. And the question that I raise is one of the reasons why it still haunts us, inbuilt in how academia works today. Because we have to explain in order to get money, to have competition. Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure. The question of what is the first explanation. Sometimes, you know, this is when you're dealing with therapy for example, explaining something is what? Not to say, ah, you have an oedipus complex. But you have to work with the person in different situations and see how he responds and whether he picks it up or not, or then trying again. It's not finding a name and pinning it on it. Which is of practical relevance. It's that you are satisfied and you act and you can go on with life. That is an explanation. Not how you can, you know, put two things together and electrical wire and then, phew, then we'll get them together. That's also an explanation, but that is not what it means. Explaining is not self evidence. And this is where the critique that was formulated at the beginning somehow is lost because of the inability to come to terms with a different understanding or different metaphors. In other words, is there a moment in post-positivism where post-positivism aspires to be a science? Yeah, yeah. At least to wear the mantle of science. What formerly the magician, the post-positivist magician aspires, now I am doing it. And the total bankruptcy of this idea is naturally then, when bookism comes in and says, since everybody is doing it, so why not me? And I'm telling you how it is. And you better believe it. To turn that around is to say, well, one of these, if there is a moment where this is opening, then one of the key moments is the rise of critical theory. And critical theory, when badly done, already presupposes a normative point to which everybody else has to agree or you belong to the other group. Which is when badly done. But this is what happened in international relations a lot. So you have critical theory reproducing that positivist understanding. No, of course, of course. They also think there is one truth. And the truth is independent of the questions you ask. This is the certainty. There is one answer. It is or is not. No, when I say is it black? And I say no. I don't say thereby it is white. It can be yellow, it can be this. Which questions do you ask? What do you want to know? Why do you want to know it? When the kid says, how do I learn the bike? You don't say, ah, that's a very interesting mechanical problem. And that's the first notion. No, you say, come here, son. Pedal, and I hold you. And when you pedal fast enough, then you're right. And the kid learns it. He could never learn anything if the theoretical understanding were correct. But, I mean, that could serve as an explanation why some of these avenues got closed. Because of the tendency to reproduce them to caps. That's a politicization. Politics is I am on the right side. Yeah. Which, again, puts up knowledge production outside the context, outside the thing to be exposed to. It's the observer. Again, in practice, the observer. But the observer is no longer impartial observer. The observer is also then, it's important to know whether he is on the right side, whether he correctly perceives this. You see, that is the point. They presuppose something which they cannot make good on their own. And that is, you know, it's like heads you win, tails you lose. You know, I mean, there is never a possibility that you could say that is a sensible thing which aims at understanding. It's always, you know, and this is also how politics doesn't become doing anything. It becomes Zeichen setzen. We are setting Zeichen all over the place. It's like ships. You can follow it from here to there. But you were telling me about Christian theory, but I'm wondering whether it might not be fair to say here that what we call post-positivism has a number of very neo-Kantian hang-ups in the sense that part of the intellectual enterprise, if we read it a bit more substantively, is to say, forget all about the classification of ideational and material factors. That's just rehearsing Cartesian dualism. We need an analytical toolkit to understand social processes. And how do we understand social processes, especially if we try and aspire to be very scientific about it, we mix up questions of value and validity. And that's precisely the lineage of Kantian epistemology, right? Yeah. So, I mean, you add values, so to speak. You know, everything stays the same, only a bit pepper and salt is... But the meat remains the same. It tastes a bit different, but neither is... But if we don't move to a bit further, and we have already started to talk about it, I mean, one of the key insights... Look, I'm sorry. Why is it so? Go again back to the metaphor. Theorein. What does it mean? Tunopeth. And, for example, even the Greek conception of Aletheia was a bit more sophisticated. You might look at it, and you might not see it. Okay. Aletheia might not always be there. It has to disclose itself. It has to be made to appear, right? So, the idea is the passive outstander is the ultimate. And that can only be what? The view of God, because he has created it, he knows everything. How does Anton of Canterbury define God? The substance who cannot think anything beyond himself. That's God. So, this is the observer. The picture is exactly that of a given world. It's created, and we are looking for it. The second part of the biblical story is that there are people who are working in there, and although they can give names to the trees and the things, they cannot be prevented from acting foolishly because they listen to the wrong message, and so on. It's all as if we are in paradise, and we just have to walk through and give the right name to everything, and then everything is okay. That's the theory from praxis. Yeah, this is a different thing, because it is not the view, it's the action. It's not the standing outside, but being inside. It is not something which is eternal, but that it will end. Situations end. Yeah. But if we move them, because see if we, I mean, it might be superficial to say, but I mean, the rise of the various approaches, maybe the aspirations, the progressive ideas, was also very much a child of the 90s. A time of where the Cold War ended, we thought that globalization takes over, and we live in happiness. It's not only positivism, it's liberalism, a particular kind of liberalism. Yeah, but that's also what happened, what made, I mean, that context was somehow was feeding into much of the theoretical debates that were going on. Look at what happened with constructivism. I mean, and then you have this spiral model, and you had the whole human rights and norms and progressives. The idea of progress, and the idea of being able to move to a world of human rights, understanding, cosmopolitan, that was inbuilt. That's a particular context which fed and built and made certain theoretical arguments plausible. Certain convictions made. Not the arguments, but certain convictions. People were convinced that, you know, like Otto Marx was convinced there must be a way in which through setting up the right system, truth emerges. Has to emerge. Now, then you say, well, okay, under ideal conditions. No, no, no, it has not to emerge even under ideal conditions. The game theory tells you that you might have dilemmas which will not emerge. Oh, then we have to have ideal speakers. Then we are opening up again the books and say, well, then we have this and this, and identity matters, and this matters. But what I wanted to say is that apparently this moment of history is changing. So the convictions that previously were convincing are increasingly less so. And what we currently see is somehow a fallback of realism. Everybody is now a realist again, and it's all about great power politics, and it's all about... So if the theorizing of the last 20 years are thrown out of the window, now the question is, what do you make of this? Do I make of this? In the sense of, it's useless. You can't talk to these people. So what I do is, I write something, and if it gets published, it's published. If not, well, I have to... No, but I mean, if you say that... How can I say that? If the context changes, and the convictions change, what do you see are the consequences for the kind of work that we do? Forget it. That's a short answer. The longer answer is, we are not asking the right questions, because we are still in this old... If the context is changing, then, for example, we would have to study the media much more carefully. And we have to see how, for example, perceptions are not molded by desires, or so on. But really, the game is on for evoking desires. The point is not about information, the information overload. The point is for convincing you that you have this desire. And the point is of getting your attention. It's not the argument which wins. It is that within 30 minutes you have something prepared. And, yeah, no action follows. It doesn't matter. That is the danger, what we have. We have to go back that the whole perceptual apparatus of people is, meanwhile, by our media, totally outfoxed. We are no longer acting. We are hopping around. We are getting into a frenzy. We are doing this. We can't concentrate on anything. When we say something, then we have to tighten the screws and so on. Great! So you can stay on the level. We are working on that. It's the first law of bureaucracy. That was never there. We are not responsible for that. And if one or two don't agree, then it's not a problem that we act. But, if you say, that's how you opened it, if you say, well, one of the key theoretical issues is action. And understanding what it means to act. In space, in time, with limited knowledge, limited time span, and getting along, moving along. Okay. How does this relate to your diagnosis of the media system fusing into the perception and directing perception into session? I mean, how can you create all that ideology as something very important to say? Formally, for example, conceptualized or thought about the society in terms of we, in general. We thought about it in terms of familial. My brother, also the brotherhood of man, etc. We never took seriously that brothers might kill each other every now and then. That's, you know, that's a blind spot. But nowadays, I mean, the whole point is we can no longer use simply, we do not use this whole shebang of concepts and brotherhood and so on. But, I mean, the real point nowadays in acting is not to enact something, but to just react to something. We are so constantly overloaded by things that we have not even the chance of, well, what does that actually mean? And that is why media are so important because, just think about it, when you see it, I came to that through a really critical reading of Habermas, what happens when you suddenly think about the state, not something of a personal relationship, written large, like a domain or so. But you think about it as a Schuldenzudammenhang, when money is introduced, simmel. And you can entschuldigen, entschuldige original men, I have to go to you and say I'm sorry, and so on, and you could release me from my guilt. If you have money, you pay him something, you pay your guilt, Schuldschein, and it works. So, money is one of the very fundamental social media now, which creates societies and so on, and of course then you have all the other things, they get pushed into the background. So media is not just physical media? No, no, no, no, no. I mean, it makes also a terrible difference whether you look at visual media or audio media. Audio media still need time, right? Visual, you lose your orientation. Right? So that is exactly why I think, you know, we really would need a serious engagement with media, not in the sense of just again describing what media are doing, like a KI over there, and then you have a little robot which marches along with it. This is stupid. The fundamental issues are behind that. What happens, for example, if a public is no longer conceived in terms of a meeting place, but as a chat room, in which you can check in and check out. I mean, Karl Sandstein's Republic Com, have you ever looked at that? No. It's very important. You can prove nowadays that there are two social psychological dynamics at work. One is that people want to avoid disagreements, and therefore they are rather silent, and that means that the screamers at the fringes will take over. That's the so-called Schweigespirale. The second one is that you are no longer interested in finding arguments. You know that you have to have an answer which basically undermines the question. Therefore, the important thing is time. How much time do I have? That's what Rimsky-Korsakov once told me, and I didn't understand. I got interviewed for about eight hours in New York. I had a station manager for NBC News in my class, and he set up, since I said some very critical remarks about Kirkpatrick at the UN, because I had Kirkpatrick as my teacher at Georgetown, and I knew the whole crowd. And so he wanted something that I say something very critical against Kirkpatrick. Actually, when I say something in my class, it's something different than I say to him. So, they couldn't elicit that to me. So, in the end, they slipped from the eight hours thirty seconds from two totally different ends of the conversation about different topics together. And I complained to Brzezinski about it, and he said, well, you made a major mistake. The first thing is always say, how much time do I have? And then you say this, and nothing else. That was my learning process. Now you're telling me? You know, it seems to me like we have at least three different balls up in the air here. One is realizing how what happens in reality that sometimes portray themselves as purely theoretical. It's always very much of its time and of its place. In the 80s, people meditate against cycling forms of Cold War thinking, and there is an opening. When those forms of thinking transform themselves into something that looks allegedly more scientific, they're breathing the air of the moment, which is liberal democratic triumphalism. So, you get an idea of progress written into it. These days, quite naturally, realism comes back, because that's the right message. We don't really understand realism. Now we have the real understanding. Exactly, and none of these moments reflect its own spatial-temporal impediment. So that's one ball that we have up in the air. The second ball that we have up in the air is the sociology of science one. There is a set of expectations, a structure of expectations that is specific to the academic field, and if we want to get a debate going, we cannot do so in ignorance of the rules of that game. So, that game funding that involves... It's difficult to maintain in the air, because meanwhile that would be my third ball, meanwhile media are changing. That would have been my third ball as well. So then we have the... because the first two give us already the argument that knowledge is produced somewhere and circulates somewhere, and your argument about media seems to zoom in precisely on the ways in which that production and circulation meanwhile happens or does not happen and is curtailed, right? And the kind of relations that they produce. But the three... and that's one of the questions that I have is... you pointed to three balls, is that the metaphor of the riddle is very much focused on the second ball somehow. Your understanding of practice is very much centered on the first ball. What about the third ball? Does it change any of that? Yes, because it will change the whole argument about science and what we can actually affect with having a sensible argument. You no longer have a type of world which is halfway fixed most of the time. You cannot refer to anything. You have impressions and you react to them, but can you socially act? The whole point of social action and that's the other thing is if you have, for example, this digging this type of self self-love of narcissism, digging constantly, you have always the idea that deep in you there has to be a self. Right? And you just have to discover you haven't found it. Take Woody Allen, and he said, now that I know who I am, I want to be somebody else. The self is not will not be discovered in something. The self is you in interaction. And if you are no longer able to interact with people, you cannot have a self. Socialization and individualization are two sides of the same coin. And we always do that socialization is only an aggregation process. Now, the whole point of socialization is that you learn like the kid learns how to bicycle by being held and by being led to and so on. Not by being taught. The third law of motion tells me that you have to solve a simultaneous equation. Which challenges the entire identity based kind of... You have an identity, but the identity you create in different situations. It's not... That I buy, but not the kind of identity kind of theorizing that we have now. So this is something that has gone wrong as well. So if we talk about ontological security, that's exactly the wrong question. That's right. It's a bogus question. Because it creates the idea of the self aside from society. It's impossible. Not just the ontological security literature does this. Some maybe aspires to observe that process. But if you can ponder, so we have media is one of the key challenges. And media changes the way we perceive the world, we enclose the world, we may... The kind of way we understand what it means to act. Do you see other challenges? So if you think about for example, what I have in mind at the moment is that we have to realize that we are not the young PhD students anymore. No, apparently not, even though I still have a hopeful career ahead of me sometime. But there is now a new generation coming. So the generations of our PhD students who now have PhD students, so those who are now in their 20s, for them, the Berlin Wall is something magical. It's like, yeah, it's Asian, it's like, it's the, it's what... I mean, I don't know what they could do, but if they were interested in pursuing the kind of work, and the kind of questions that guided guided you, how would you, what are the two or three recommendations you would give to your grand, grand, grand PhD, in the sense of what to do and what not to do? I was thinking in terms of giving them texts, critical texts, without saying this is from here, this is from there, this is from there. Just to recapture what are they saying? And why is it persuasive, and why is it not persuasive? And what does he say? And what is he silent about? For example, I brought it with you, with the ship. It's very precise, and a good metaphor in one way, and a very bad one in another way. Now, you don't have good metaphors and bad metaphors, it just depends on the question. If you want to know what to do, then the captain thing is wrong. If you have decided what to do, then the captain thing is very right. You cannot leave it up to the people to decide, now we go this way, or this is coming in, or you go that way. So, instead of starting with this is the proposition, this is the minor proposition, etc., to ask, yeah, what does he try to convey? It's always a conversation, even writing a book, it's always you are engaging somebody, or you try to engage somebody. What is he trying to say? And, why is he putting it this way, and not some other way? I just got a very interesting thing writing about Mantua, about why the church of Saint Egidius, was built that way. And the interesting point is, it makes no sense originally. It looks great in the setting, and when you enter the church, however, not through the main door, but through side doors, and then you see that the church is twice as large. And you are in the chapels, and you enter it, and then you see these enormous churches, the walls, and so on. And there was a big debate. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Okay. Yes. Yes.