From Descriptivism to Performativity: Thinking from a Critical

Epistemology Perspective

The first three sessions of the module will cover the central debates around what has been called
“cultural turn” in opposition to claims about objective science and epistemology. We will critically
debate the idea and implications of social production of knowledge, the relations of power
implicated in such process, its cultural and philosophical sources and its material implications
over reality. We will move from a “descriptive” perspective to a “performativity” perspective,
meaning, knowledge will be theorised as producing and reproducing subjectivities and
social relations.

Bernstein, R. Beyond Objectivism and Relativism: Science, Hermeneutics, and

Praxis. University of Pennsylvania Press, 1983 (Part 1, p.1-45)

● Moving beyond the objectivism/relativism divide

● The cartesian anxiety (Either/Or approach)
● The question of Praxis and Theory

We have an urgent need to move beyond objectivism and relativism (p. 2)

“A new conversation is now emerging among philosophers -a conversation about human

rationality- and as a result of this dialogue we are beginning to gain a new understanding of
rationality that has important ramifications for both theoretical and practical life” (p. 2)

“The movement from confidence to skepticism about foundations, methods, and rational criteria
of evaluation has not been limited to philosophy” - We have witnessed the playing out of bold
attempts to secure foundations and the elaborations of new methods that promise genuine
knowledge, followed by a questioning that reveals a crack and crevices in what had been taken
to be solid and secure (p. 3)

According to Rorty - We need to abandon the very idea that philosophy is a form of inquiry
that knows something about knowing, language, or thought that nobody else knows, and
frankly admit at its best, philosophy is just another voice in the conversation (p. 6)

OBJECTIVISM RELATIVISM

“The basic conviction that the is or must be
some permanent, ahistorical matrix or
framework to which we can ultimately appeal
in determining the nature of rationality,
knowledge, truth, reality, goodness, or
rightness” (p. 8)
“In modern times, objectivism has been closely
“Relativism is the basic conviction that when
we turn to the examination of those concepts
that philosophers have taken to be most
fundamental - whether is the concept of
rationality, truth, reality, right, the good, or
norms- we are forced to recognize that in the
final analysis all such concepts must be
 linked with an acceptance of a bsaci
metaphysical or epistemological distinction
between the subject and the object. What is
‘out there’ (objective) is presumed to be
independent of us (subjects), and knowledge
is achieved when a subject correctly or
represents objective reality” (p. 9)
understood as relative to a specific conceptual
scheme, theoretical framework, paradigm,
form of life, society or culture” (p. 8)
The relativistic accuses the objectivist of
mistaking what is at best historically or
culturally stable for the eternal and permanent
(p. 9)

Relativism is different from subjectivism

“As I have characterized the relativist, his

or her essential claim is that there can be
no higher appeal than to give a conceptual
scheme, language game, set of social
practices, or historical epoch” (p.11)

THE CARTESIAN ANXIETY

Descartes’ Meditations - “the philosopher’s quest is to search for an Archimedean point upon
which we can ground our knowledge” (p. 16)
- It is less clear what is the Archimedean point in Descartes’ philosophy - Whether is the
cogito or God himself.

“Decartes urges us to a journey (...) culminating in the calm reassurance that although we are
eminently fallible and subject to all sorts of contingencies, we can rest secure in the deepened
self knowledge that we are creatures of a beneficent God who has created us in his image” (p.
17)

“It is the quest for some fixed point, some stable rock upon which we can secure our lives against
the vicissitudes that constantly threaten us” (p. 18)

“Descartes leads us with an apparent and ineluctable necessity to a grand and seductive
Either/Or. Either there is some support for our being, a fixed foundation of our knowledge, or we
cannot escape the forces of darkness that envelop us with madness, with intellectual and moral
chaos” (p. 18)

It is our cultural understanding of science, especially the physical sciences, ad the remarkable
“success” of the scientific enterprise since its modern origins that has set the context for the
intellectual and cultural problems of the modern world (p. 46)
We need to exorcize the Cartesian Anxiety and liberate ourselves from its seductive appeal.
Only if we implicitly accept some version of Cartesianism does the exclusive disjunction of
objectivism or relativism become intelligible. But if we question, we expose, and exorcise
Cartesianism, then the very opposition of objectivism and relativism loses plausibility (p. 19)

There are deep cultural reasons and causes why in the modern world the only concept of
reason that seems to make sense is one in which we think reason as an instrument for
determining the most efficient or effective means to a determinate end, and why the only
concept of activity that seems viable is one of technical application, manipulation and
control (p. 46)

(p. 48)

Rorty, R: Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature. Oxford, Blackwell, 1980 (Chapter
7: From Epistemology to Hermeneutics)

“To construct an epistemology is to find the maximum amount of common ground with others” (p.
316)

“If we deny that there are foundations to serve as common ground for adjudicating knowledge-
claims, the notion of the philosopher as guardian of rationality seems endangered” (p. 317)

Hermeneutics sees the relations between various discourses as those of strands in a possible
conversation, a conversation which presupposes no disciplinary matrix which unites the
speakers, but where the hope of agreement is never lost so long as the conversation lasts.
“Hope for agreement or at least exciting and fruitful disagreement” (p. 318)

Opposition between epistemology and hermeneutics

“For hermeneutics, to be rational is to be willing to refrain from epistemology - from thinking that
there is a special set of terms in which all contributions to the conversation should be put-and to
be willing to pick up the jargon of the interlocutor rather translating it into one’s own. (p.
318)

“More generally, normal discourse is that which is conducted within and agreed-upon set
of conventions about what counts as a relevant contribution, what counts as answering a
question, what counts as having a good argument for the answer or a good criticism of it.
Abnormal discourse is what happens when someone joins in the discourse who is ignorant of
these conventions or who sets them aside” (p. 320)

THE PRODUCT OF ABNORMAL DISCOURSE CAN BE ANYTHING FROM NONSENSE TO

INTELLECTUAL REVOLUTION (p. 320)

“We can get epistemological commensuration only where we already have agreed-upon practices
of inquiry (...) We can get it no because we have discovered something about the nature of human
knowledge but simply because when a practice has continued long enough the conventions
which make it possible are relatively easy to isolate” (p. 321)

“Hermeneutics is what we get when we are no longer epistemological” (p. 325)

“We are the heirs of three hunded years of rhetoric about the importance of distinguishing
sharply between science and religion, science and politics, science and art, science and
philosophy and so on. This rhetoric has formed the culture of Europe. It made us what we
are today” (p. 330)
“To know what counts as relevant to choice between theories about a certain subject is, in periods
of normal inquiry, to belong to what Kuhn calls a ‘disciplinary matrix’” (p. 332)

“Kuhn give us a reason to say that there is no deeper difference than that between what happens
in ‘normal’ and ‘abnormal’ discourse. That distinction cuts across the distinction between science
and non-science” (p. 333)

“The ideal of the autonomy of science from theology and politics with the image of
scientific theory as a Mirror of Nature” (p. 333) - THE GAZE

Objectivity as agreement among inquirers (p. 335)

“Objectivity in the first sense was a property of theories which, having been thoroughly discussed
are chosen by a consensus of rational discussants. By contrast, a ‘subjective’ consideration is
one which has been, or would be, or should be, set aside by rational discussants”
To say that someone is bringing in ‘subjective’ considerations to a discussion where objectivity is
wanted is, roughly, to say that he is bringing considerations which others think beside the point”
(p. 338)
For a consideration to be subjective, in this sense, is simply for it to be unfamiliar. So judging
subjectivity is as hazardous as judging relevance (p. 339)

“In a more traditional sense of subjective, on the other hand, ‘subjective’ contrasts with
‘corresponding to what is out there’” (p. 339) - In this sense, subjective is associated with
emotional or fantastical, for our hearts and imaginations are idiosyncratic, while our
intellects are, at their best, identical mirrors of the self-same external objects

“What we need, rather than a solution to the ‘problem of induction’ is the ability to think
about science in such a way that its being a ‘value-based enterprise’ occasions no
surprise” (p. 341)

“The fact that we can predict a noise without knowing what it means is just the fact that the
necessary and sufficient microstructural conditions for the production of a noise will rarely be
paralleled by a material equivalence between a statement in the language used for describing the
microstructure and the statement expressed by the noise. This is not because anything is in
principle unpredictable, much less because of an ontological divide between nature and spirits,
but simply because of the difference between a language suitable for coping with neuron and one
suitable for coping with people” (p. 355)

Working through the Cartesian Anxiety

There is no doubt that scientific discourse holds a privileged position in today’s society. For
instance, the ‘scientifically proven’ label is explicitly used to promote credibility in relation to drinks,
medicines, therapies and even public policies. Paradoxically, much of the legitimacy that is
attributed to scientific knowledge relies upon a rhetoric that highlights “the ideal of the autonomy
of science from theology and politics” (Rorty, 1980 p.333). From this perspective, following Rorty
(1980), scientific theory is perceived as being able to act as a “mirror of nature”; allowing access
to reality in itself, without the distortions of ideology, affects or beliefs.

In spite of this seemingly prevailing idea of science as a neutral practice, Bernstein (1983) points
to a movement from “confidence to skepticism” (p. 3). Since every effort to find a set of values,
criteria or methods to achieve authentic and solid knowledge has revealed: “cracks and crevices”
(p. 3). As a consequence, Bernstein (1983) argues, contemporary thinking in relation to human
rationality is characterized by an opposition between objectivism and relativism. While objectivism
relies on the basic conviction of the existence of a “permanent, ahistorical matrix or framework”
(p. 8) that functions as a secure foundation for knowledge and rationality, relativism examines
these foundational notions to reveal that they are only “historically or culturally stable” (p. 9).

Furthermore, the author traces this opposition to Descartes’ philosophy and his search for an
Archimedean point upon which he could ground knowledge. Such a quest, Bernstein (1983)
highlights, was not just a device to solve a metaphysical problem, but also a subjective effort to
find some “stable rock upon which we can secure our lives against the vicissitudes that constantly
threaten us” (p. 18). Hence, Descartes’ quest resulted in an Either/Or approach: Either we find a
stable foundation Or chaos and madness emerge. It is a dichotomy that Bernstein (1983) finds
misleading, proposing that we need to liberate ourselves from this Cartesian Anxiety.

It is interesting to accentuate the term anxiety, what is anxiety? From a Lacanian perspective,
anxiety is affect. Perhaps, instead of exorcizing the Cartesian Anxiety, it would be more fruitful to
ask where does it point to.