[FRIAM] Object Oriented Ontology

[uǝlƃ ☣]

I realize I'm that tool who always invites himself to these parties.  But I'm intrigued enough to read along with you.  At first I was skeptical because of this:

https://philpapers.org/archive/BLAMSR.pdf
> Harman's objectal reduction is an apodictic posit, invulnerable to empirical testing.

But this revived my interest:

http://www.re-press.org/book-files/OA_Version_Speculative_Turn_9780980668346.pdf
> In this spirit, then, when we reflect on the basic questions of philosophy we note that in one way or another they all revolve around issues of difference. What are the relevant differences? How are differences to be ordered or hierarchized? How are dif- ferences related to one another? Let us therefore resolve straight away to begin with the premise that there is no difference that does not make a difference . Alternatively, let us be- gin with the premise that to be is to make or produce differences. How, in short, could difference be difference if it did not make a difference? I will call this hypothesis the ‘Ontic Principle’. This principle should not be confused with a normative judgment or a statement of value . It is not being claimed that all differences are important to us. Rath- er, the claim that there is no difference that does not make a difference is an ontological claim. The claim is that ‘to be’ is to make or produce a difference.

In part because there's something counter-intuitive, self-contradictory, or paradoxical about *not* starting with a method like criticality, yet starting with the assumption that all the basic questions revolve around issues of difference.  What is critique *except* pointing out differences?  So, that question will force me to learn more about OOO.



On 07/04/2018 06:51 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> One of you [wretches], assigned me this book <https://www.amazon.com/Object-Oriented-Ontology-New-Theory-Everything/dp/0241269156/ref=sr_1_fkmr1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1530754578&sr=8-1-fkmr1&keywords=Graham+Harmon+Object+Oriented> for a little light summer reading before I left SF in March.  It was a seductive assignment.  In the first place, the book is a little book.  I LIKE little books.  Cheap and easy to carry.  In the second place, as I read around in it, I see echoes of Peirce in its monism and realism and fascination with metaphors (aka “signs”?).  Every chapter begins in an ingratiating introduction that gives promise of progress in the rational construction of a complex idea. 
> 
> There my praise ends.  I have started all the chapters with the greatest of good will and have gotten thoroughly lost in every one. 
> 
> I deeply suspect that whichever one of you [wretches] who assigned it to me has never read it from cover to cover. 
> 
> SO:    Will you now do that with me?  And will others join?  It would be best if we could snare a few philosophers to join us because the author does seem to be rather deeply into philosophy, both post modern and the other kind. 
> 
> It’s hard to believe that it has /nothing/ to do with object oriented programing, but it may not.

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