Presumably he is also able to speak all those languages and present deep philosophical thoughts in each... that's admirable. Just being able to express philosophical ideas in your native tongue is hard enough.
Great channel. I love the selection of concepts. Zizek rambles in such a way that his point gets completely lost. These 5 - 10 minute segments make the best of him.
I think the point is: reflecting about what the question of free will means is far more interesting, relevant (and important) then thinking about what the answer might be. There's way more relevant knowledge in questioning the question itself then in trying to answer the question. For me the question: "why do we (human beings) think the question of free will is a fundamental question?" is more fundamental then "is there a free will?"
I’m not sure I agree with Zizeks interpretation of Habermas, he’s a pragmatist and also doesn’t think you can transcend the ontological gap and ask how things really are... but he was interest in practice and its results , discourse ethics doesn’t produce absolute truth it, but a sort of practical truth. A lot of his work is kind of retooling liberalism and it’s legal and political philosophy with pragmatic instead of transcendental justifications. now that I think of it I can see why zizek thinks it’s BS. But habermas is older and lived through fascism ... so we can understand why he was attached to principles of liberalism because of the social practices like civil rights and due process were products of that ideology.
Acquaint yourself with William James' take on it as argument from first movers concept. Here's my take: When examined retrospectively, one can argue that there is no free will, as one can forge numerous connections between first movements and resulting movements. But life is not lived in retrospect, but prospectively. One may argue that all prospective movements were created by prior causes, but at the point of motion prospectively, one is free to disregard all that came before and move contrary-wise. This is the infinite free will.
Okay and how do you decide wether you do "disregard all that came before" or not? This is only pushing the problem further back. Actions have only 2 forms, deterministic or arbitrary. Is "chosing arbitrarily" a free choice or not? This is probably the better question to ask. At this point it get whacky because we have no concept of randomness. It is something metaphysical that is impossible to conclusively prove. It might not even exist and if it does it would be by definition inexplicable. If you can call this free or not is a matter of semantics at this point. The question really does not make sense if you go to this length.
0:01 Yes. I have the impression that Chomsky underestimated Foucault, because he raises exactly that question that makes clear that he is in this episteme already.
@@kaidenkondo5997 you are deluded if you think Chomsky got humiliated by Foucault. I've watched the debate 3 times so far and no one got humiliated, but if I had to choose one, it would be Foucault.
When somebody asks you the question: "is there free will?" Reject the question because it is loaded with cultural and philosophical presuppositions that depend on our age.
@@Javier-il1xi But what else is there? On the basis of what other perception of reality are we denying the question, what other approach to reality is zizek talking about. I'm just confused I'll appreciate the clarification.
@@belminm.5168 I'm not entirely sure but I'd say foucault wouldn't really find that all too relevant. In my limited reading of foucault I've experienced him as more of an analyzer of current circumstances and the conditions that led to them than as someone who'd imagine, seek out or suggest an Alternative.
I think it has to do with his vocal inflection, volume, e.t.c. -- if you talk to someone with a bad stutter *and so on* , the stutter usually gets worse the louder and more pronounced their speaking gets. In the beginning with this clip, you can notice Zizek speaks quieter and gradually gets louder and then his lisps get more pronounced. I think Zizek also has an element of anxiety when he speaks, if I remember correctly. He's more in his best element in writing for sure
I think it has more to do with his enthusiasm. I believe in an interview he did he said that his tic gets worse when he gets really nervous, passionatie, anxious etc. And him being an ESL speaker I think the lisp follows that.
I think I'm beginning to get it. EVERY question you can ask already has (subconscious?) assumptions contained within. The very concepts which the question uses pre-frame reality. I can see how this critique of concepts, theories, and paradigms makes sense. However, what about raw direct experience. I see a colour for example that I label "red". How can I be wrong about that?
What discourse(s) make(s) it such that the question of “free will,” whatever one might mean by that, is so important and consistently posed? Ethics, religion…?
You have raised a wrong question here . We should concentrate how much philosophical knowledge he has already gathered and how vigorous ,potential and challenging is he to push and attract the commons and hoi polloi to taste the most critical aspects of epistemological profoundness.
it is problematic that he hardly explains why the question about free will is his example or whether or not all questions suffer this problem equally or if they don´t then why not. because depending on what one takes free will to mean (which has a BIG relevance within the discussion about "free will" within the modern philosophical literature) the question obviously asks about completely different things...
@@dneal6527 - It's not free will vs determinism. It's free will vs no free will. No free will equals either Determinism, Indeterminism, or for non events, Eternalism. There are no other options under the rules of logic, and none of those 3 allow for Libertarian Free Will. It's also not a bad thing. So yea it was wrong, but I don't know how you would go about explaining why the formatting is wrong... Given the perspective we have in our experience, we can answer the question based on that. Being pragmatic/practical. Otherwise we couldn't answer anything.
@@Siberius- The point is there is no adequate answer to that question, because the question itself is rooted in a naive interpretation of the world. Here's a quote from Nietzsche that may give you a better idea. "Everywhere accountability is sought, it is usually the instinct of punishing and judging which seeks it. One has deprived becoming of its innocence if being in this or that state is traced back to will, to intentions, to accountable acts: the doctrine of will has been invented essentially for the purpose of punishment, that is of finding guilty." Nietzsche says the idea of "free will" was invented by Religious people, namely Christian rulers, in order to control the population. And about cause and effect... "there is probably never such a duality; in truth a continuum faces us, from which we isolate a few pieces…." See it better now?
If when we ask the question, we are aleady in a certain «horizon» of understanding, I feel, taken to an extreme, we couldn't even ask the quedstion itself. It seems like an infinite regression of some sort. Or, is thought itself all that is certain (descartes)?
I'd say that it reveals the gap between the trascendental and ontological dimensions. Zizek's project is one of articulating an Absolute that is, from the get go, thwarted, divided.
Javier and I think he’s hoping that philosophy can be used to address the issues we face today that he sees as critical. Ecology, economic crisis and technological dependency. He doesn’t believe that any system of government has been able to properly confront these issues so it’s time we try something more.
Yes free will exists if free will is seen as the opportunity to change a particular system directionality. It’s not hard to say it guys. The definition of what is the system is what changes. Too much time dabbling, go make your bed or don’t!
It is not that we are "unable." The "answer" simply does not exist realistically. It is based upon a naive, quite childish interpretation of the world.
@@michaelneufeld4515 It isn't that we are 'limited by senses.' That doesn't make sense. We cannot postulate about what would be 'beyond' our senses. There is nothing 'beyond' our senses, because 'beyond' is a concept that presupposes senses.
@@michaelneufeld4515 Think about it, determinism is a condition in which everything happens in chain, cause effect cause effect and so on, no one can escape and no one can change it. To believe in this, you have: 1) to use your mind to create the concept of logic first, and decide what’s correlated and what’s not, ergo using your senses. 2) so, the concept of logic, if you are in the deterministic model, must be a process caused by your own chain of causality 3) so technically you cannot say logically if your logic is logic, or biased, because, if you are the result of your causality, there is no way for you to recognize that you are in mistake 4) so you have to put logic above causality, and assume it is correct the way it is Leading to: to believe in determinism you must use a non-deterministic concept first (an utopian, unfallacy, abstractian logic), making your believe irrational (because in determinism cannot be such things as you cannot know if the causal chains leads to a mistake or not, in the end you just believing in rationality). Ergo determinism cannot exist without the imposition we made at the beginning, using the very brain that it is the result of its own chain of event (not-provable of its own correctness), which it is a presupposition itself that determinism cannot exist. To sum up, if you say determinism exist, you are assuming your logic is above chain of event because you simply can’t know if your reasoning and rationality is correct, ignoring that that very logic is (as everything would be) a result of a chain of event you cannot say if you are right or wrong, making your assumption in determinism just another religion Logic imposes that believing in determinism, even if it is correct, is irrational.
exactly, athought the kantian "solution" to the determinism/free-will problem was 1° we can't perceive phenomens otherwise as a strictly determined (critique de la raison pure), but 2° the fact of the consciousness of the moral law "signifies" that we have the choice between pursuing pleasure and pursuing good : the Belief in free-will is a necessity from a moral point of view, which has its own "objectivity" (critique de la raison pratique), and because Kant wasnot satisfied at this point, he had to write the third Critc, to think how he could reconciliate both points of view, the point of view of knowledge, and the point of view of morality. But most would argue he didnt succeed in reconciling what can't be reconciled at all.
Yes, very Kantian. The entire percepton of the senses or raw sense data is what our view of the world is limited to. Hence the question of how things reallly are and how they are only perceived in a particular 'horizon' - our view of the world.
That s what you call critical realism, we always see 'truth' from a particular position which we are doubly assigned by language first and social structure/formation second...
People caught up in constructs tend to be tangled up in endless thought. There "simply" is no such thing as free will. Humans are nothing more than mere variables in a highly complex mathematical equation. It doesn't take more thought than that.
No, it's teaching philosophy. Most people think they know what they are talking about. The first thing to learn in philosophy is that what seems self-evident isn't, that what seems obvious and without alternative isn't, and that what seems simple, isn't. The difficult part is understanding how other people think. It is unfathomable how wrong people can be with absolute confidence. After that, things that seem complicated are simple. But until then, you are going to be confused a lot. You think you know what concept a word codifies, and it is disorienting to find out that it doesn't, or that the concept itself is not really a thing.
So we only see things in how they appear to be. Not as they truely are. Even if we would get a glimpse of how it truely is it will still be shown in the form/context of a thing that appears to be. So we never really know? We can't see the operations behind the curtains because we are that which is being operated? Is this what Zizek is pointing to?
If we understand "nature" as "the nexus of causal effect chains", (3:08) the correct answer to the question whether all of nature follows causal laws would not be a rejection of the question, but a simple yes, since it would be analytical. I don't get this "I am too smart for your question" attitude.
But it would be circular logic, and therefore prove nothing. If I assume that I am right, I can logically deduce that I am right. Therefore, I am right. If we define nature as causal chains, everything in nature follows causal chains. Therefore, the answer to the question if nature is as defined is yes. But is it true?
So the whole response by Foucault is relativisation. Instead, he could have qualified his response and we would know what he thinks from the perspective he takes. The issue though is: can we evaluate incommensurable perspectives. C. Calhoun would say that Foucault would say NO. And thats the weakness of the model according to Calhoun and I agree.
I think the point is not evaluating incommensurable theories. It's rather the idea that we're already assuming everything is causally determined as soon as we take the scientific worldview as our interpretative frame, as it is the very assumption of that worldview -- and you would be begging the question if you try to prove that assumption by scientific mean. (It's just like trying to prove the validity of induction by inductive argument.) So people want to move a step forward and ask the metaphysical question: "is the scientific worldview an accurate representation of reality?" Zizek's response was you can't meaningfully ask that question. You can't strip off all interpretative horizon and try to compare science and reality from God's point of view. So, as you said, we can only compare theories/worldviews, but as we do it, we're not comparing their ability to capture raw reality (as if we can already see reality unaided and compare it side by side with science), we are comparing them in terms of some criteria that is our own choosing. But then again, there's no neutral criterion directly given to us by Nature or by eternal Reason. We've already adopted certain cultural position when we say things like "a theory is closer to truth if it allows us to explain more phenomena and make better prediction" or "a worldview is more valid when it allows us to understand another persons as I understand myself -- as free subjects." So the question about free will really boils down to what our culture should value more. Or, do we really have to give up all those different ways of interpreting the world for a single, overarching systematic scheme?
Or, in Wittgensteinian language, can we not just be content with the nebula of incompatible language games that we have got, even if they're not reducible into a single, ultimate, meta-theory? What is the motivation behind that? Is it not something that we should be *cured* of?
Exactly. Not only Zizek says this. Thomas Nagel coined it the nonexistent "perspective from nowhere", and John Searle stated that there is "no point of exile". We are always embedded in reality. The proper way to define _objectivity,_ is to just say: A perception is objective exactly when it is fallibil. Ones perception might be wrong or it might be right. If it agrees with other perceptions it is probably right. _How_ it is fallibil is the subjectivity of perception. Objectivity are two sides of the coin that is perception. Defining objectivity this way avoids the need for some omniscient, neutral perspective that neither religion, nor science will ever really offer.
I think Slavoj is capable of giving us any number of answers to the question, while Foucault would just spin in circles in his chair never presuming never assuming and never getting anywhere, to have an actual conversation I find that deconstruction is good but not when it's for the sake of itself. Then it's just masturbatory intellectualism.
Good point. But my point is that they don't have _everything_ in common. And a spider in paraguay will have nearly nothing at all in common with a human in egypt.
Bob Rolander apart from being mad of atoms and molecules and being bound by the same laws of nature yada yada yada... It's an odd one...it's like we have nothing in common socially or culturally but many things in common naturally... But the comparison you made I think isn't very, I dunno- applicable ? Pragmatic? It reminds me of the question "what is the opposite to a chicken?"
Is the reason why the spider doesn't have a concept for conceiving the universe is because there was s absolutely no use for a spider to consider this versus humanitys type of sentience, maybe knowledge of the universe/God is essential to cope? Perhaps how much we can perceive and conceivie of is as much that is necessary. The universe is a problem for humans conciousness as well as it is a place around us in space and time. It's both concept and a thing
no we cant . So the whole response by Foucault is relativisation. Instead, he could have qualified his response and we would know what he thinks from the perspective he takes. The issue though is: can we evaluate incommensurable perspectives. Calhoun would say that foucault would say NO. And thats the weakness of the model
@@anialiandr No. Foucault believed in perspectivism not relativism. Relativism is an absolutist doctrine but Focault assumed one's thoughts and self can change depending on your experience. So his response would be the answer will be different at different points of one's life.
We are doomed to be free. Or put another way: You are always responsible for your own actions whether you want to or not. You have no choice but to choose. No sky daddy is going to take the blame for you. (But also: You have no choice in choosing what you choose.) Or put poetically: Because of circumstances beyond your control, You are master of your fate And captain of your soul
@@davidwuhrer6704 Your thesis is self contradictory. You should call it "Doomed to Determinism". If you have no choice in choosing what you choose, there is no freedom allowed. If the circumstances are beyond our control then we are simply instruments of an external Will and nothing more.
A fancier way of saying "I don't know and you have no right of asking this question". If anyone else said it we'd consider it a fallacy of argument from ignorance. In the best case, it is equivalent to saying only God knows since he's an objective observer. But saying it without even being accused of proposing an unfalsifiable hypothesis without good reason.
What does "free" even mean in this context? Lets be socratically pedantic about this. Lets say you are to chose from 2 paths a and b: Would free will be to chose a instead of b for no reason (arbitrary choice). Or is free will to consider the quality of each path and do a logical choice (like an algorithm that choses the shortest path). Case 2 is predetermined, one path will be better or worse depending on the parameter you chose. But what if both paths are equal? It is impossoble to have 2 equal paths that are not fully congruent, so that falls flat. Okay but what about chosing arbitrarily? It can only be a random choice in that case. What does random mean? Non-deterministic/independent of presuppositions. There are some quantum phenomena which might be behaving that way. So in everyday terms and applied to humans do any of these options sound "free"? Either a fully arbitrary choice or one that depends on internal and external circumstances. I dont see any way in which a human being is truly responsible for his actions. Nevertheless it is a far better perspective in life to consider oneself free. The other option most likely leads to victim mentality and stagnation. I dont see how this question is difficult. Did I leave anything out?
It's not that complicated. A random, nondeterministic choice, the metaphorical coinflip, is not free will, because it is neither will (it is arbitrary, the outcome is not the goal), nor free (it borrows the metaphorical coin's will, if you will). Free will can only expressed in choices that are free of coercion. ("Under controlled conditions of light, temperature, and humidity, the organism will behave as it damn well pleases.") As such, they are necessarily deterministic. If they weren't, they could not be anticipated, and communication itself would be impossible. That they are deterministic and as such predictable in principle doesn't make them any less free, because the apparatus that makes that decision is under no coercion to act contrary to what it deems best. The only caveat here is that this predictability could allow one to manipulate circumstances to provoke a desired choice (although that is not a limitation of will, but of agency), or worse, withhold or falsify information upon which a decision is based (which is just marketing psychology, not an abrogation of free will itself). Interpreting this as an absence of free will only makes sense on the presupposition of an omniscient creator who both arranged for the choice to be made and pre-ordained the outcome. But such a presupposition is absurd in itself.
"We cannot step out of it" You can pay closer attention to your actual experience though and not be lost in thought all the time. I think slavoj could learn something from mindfulness here, if he could practice it with all his sniffs and so on and so on.
When he said "we cannot step out of it", he explained why pure reductionist empiricism is circular logic. So he was arguing against the thing you are proposing as the solution for it.
I find this answer very disappointing tbh. This feels just like Zizek bending over backwards to avoid actually answering the question (no there is no such thing as free-will).
of course any of my opinions are already within a certain episteme, but it would be enough to preliminarily define the damn terms and words with which I define them and the problem would not arise!
Why did he talk and think so much if in the end it just describes a perspective that is wrong and can't be escaped. I'll answer the question for him, yes everything is deterministic, everything follows a set of laws of action and reaction, nomatter how small or complex or how far back in time or in the future you go, it can be pinpointed to one and only possibility. There's no choices to be made, you don't have the power to go against the laws of nature nomatter how much you try or believe that you can. You can't even not have the illusion that you are making choices, if you have that illusion. Foucaults answer was pointless, but he didn't have a choice to answer anything else, his answer is the product of the way his mind works, determined by the laws of nature.
Of course, that presupposes a certain way of seeing the world. Put simply, to arrive at this answer you are making assumptions that are supported by nothing but your answer.
Incredibly banal - Zizek's occasionally very interesting, but not often enough. Of course a question presupposes some frame of interpretation, but the answer will take that into account. There's nothing strange in that, Foucault discovered warm water.
When people speak of foucaults point as banal I cannot help but to point out that what he put into question has not so much been questioned as radically as he did. The question is not if any questions relies on presuppositions, the question is if there is anything more than presuppositions that rely on further ones. It seems banal because it is such a fundamental question, but it is something that has rarely been a culturally relevant standpoint before
And he keeps obfuscating, mentioning irrelevant names and beating around the bush. Isn't it simpler to ask: "Does anyone have evidence that free will (as "personal" freedom from causality) exists?". There's no such evidence. This question is existentially important for maturity and future of humankind.
You ignore his key point - that the hermeneutical approach to the question defines the scope of the answer, grounded in a particular epistemology. Your proposition is rooted in materialism and empiricism - if thats your position then the most meaningful way you can answer the question is: are there physical constraints on individual action in our society. The answer must be: yes, so there are limits to free will. If I was to take more of a deleuzian position I could talk about free will in the context of becoming or by deconstructing a concept of self (the anti-oedipus) free up 'line of departure' in rhizomatic space.
And of course, those who accuse of obfsucation are the ones who get it the least. He isn't talking about how or if free will exists. There is no evidence because there is no question to begin with for some people.
@@duncanunwin3261 I don't think you make the point that you're trying to make. In both example frameworks that you give, "materialism" and "deleuzian becoming" you could either answer the question with "no" or "we can't know". If your framework supports the notion of free will you can answer "perhaps", if it doesn't you can answer "no". The point is however, you don't even know what framework is true, so you might as well answer with "don't know". So yeah, I too think he's beating around the bush. A tendendy of "advanced" philosophers who realize that even after years of studying they can't arrive at any ultimate truths, so instead they're looking for a way to be wiser by outright disregarding questions that have moved humanity since forever.
@@blubblubber9460 Couldn't agree more. Its like they enjoy the spotlight therefore trying to sound good rather then just answering by acknowledging their own limitations on a certain question...
He's paid to speak ad nauseum, some of that speaking will be less effective then other speeches. this made little sense to me. I mean I knew what he was saying in reference to Foucalt, but it didn't seem applicable to the naked logic of 'do humans have free will'. Sure, if you believe in a causal determinism that presupposes an idea of the universe which is subjective blah blah blah. Doesn't change the meaning of the idea of, if there's a free will, as most suppose it, that that implies a god or a magic to consciousness which is yet to be proved. i'd see it more interesting to use postmodern critiques of how and why people make claims to free will rather than a causal universe (which, debating such a concept can get bogged down in messy physics regardless).
He has nervous tics that he cannot control fully. I have met him and know people who knew him from Paris 1980s. It's just his personal neurotic obsession. He knows but cannot do anything about it. We ought to have a bit of sympathy.
This person needs to write instead of talk. Trying to explain philosophical concepts with various speech impediments he obviously has, is an attempt lacking respect to the audience.
If you want to get Zizek's 'I WOULD PREFER NOT TO' t-shirt you can do so here:
i-would-prefer-not-to.com
Reminds me of a Buddhist saying: "Once you speak about the unity of things, you have already divided them".
Damn.
The Tao that can be named is not the real Tao.
where's this quote from?
Or Plotinus with his negative theology.
Or even Christian philosophers like Pseudo-Dionigenes
WTF xD xD xD xD
He says "but" thrice in one sentence. Is that a some kind of hegelian negation?
He speaks Slovene, Serbo-Croatian and English, I think he is allowed to make mistakes
Danilo Popović he Also speaks french and german very well
Double negation
just a freudian slip.
Presumably he is also able to speak all those languages and present deep philosophical thoughts in each... that's admirable. Just being able to express philosophical ideas in your native tongue is hard enough.
Great channel. I love the selection of concepts. Zizek rambles in such a way that his point gets completely lost. These 5 - 10 minute segments make the best of him.
often those ramblings have a larger interconnected(sometimes loosely) point so I usually prefer them
the deeper he gets the sniffing intensifies
I think the point is: reflecting about what the question of free will means is far more interesting, relevant (and important) then thinking about what the answer might be. There's way more relevant knowledge in questioning the question itself then in trying to answer the question. For me the question: "why do we (human beings) think the question of free will is a fundamental question?" is more fundamental then "is there a free will?"
Good summary!
awful summary
Mathias Mas
That wasn‘t the point at all
So, dear @@zlatkobrnovic8166 enlighten me then
Definitely not the point, at all.
I’m not sure I agree with Zizeks interpretation of Habermas, he’s a pragmatist and also doesn’t think you can transcend the ontological gap and ask how things really are... but he was interest in practice and its results , discourse ethics doesn’t produce absolute truth it, but a sort of practical truth. A lot of his work is kind of retooling liberalism and it’s legal and political philosophy with pragmatic instead of transcendental justifications. now that I think of it I can see why zizek thinks it’s BS. But habermas is older and lived through fascism ... so we can understand why he was attached to principles of liberalism because of the social practices like civil rights and due process were products of that ideology.
Acquaint yourself with William James' take on it as argument from first movers concept. Here's my take: When examined retrospectively, one can argue that there is no free will, as one can forge numerous connections between first movements and resulting movements. But life is not lived in retrospect, but prospectively. One may argue that all prospective movements were created by prior causes, but at the point of motion prospectively, one is free to disregard all that came before and move contrary-wise. This is the infinite free will.
Disregarding what came before isn’t the same as being free from what came before.
@@1999_reborn Yeah, but that's 'bondage', not 'will'.
Okay and how do you decide wether you do "disregard all that came before" or not? This is only pushing the problem further back. Actions have only 2 forms, deterministic or arbitrary. Is "chosing arbitrarily" a free choice or not? This is probably the better question to ask. At this point it get whacky because we have no concept of randomness. It is something metaphysical that is impossible to conclusively prove. It might not even exist and if it does it would be by definition inexplicable. If you can call this free or not is a matter of semantics at this point. The question really does not make sense if you go to this length.
@@NoName-qi7vx hahaha ur right...it is our destiny to believe in or not believe in free will...because different minds treat same things differently
This is brilliant, I think F would approve of this summary of the problems of episteme
Someone get this genius a tissue
0:01 Yes. I have the impression that Chomsky underestimated Foucault, because he raises exactly that question that makes clear that he is in this episteme already.
chomsky underestimating Foucault is a bit of an understatement, hahah. Chomsky came in presupposing so many things and then got humilated
@@kaidenkondo5997 you are deluded if you think Chomsky got humiliated by Foucault. I've watched the debate 3 times so far and no one got humiliated, but if I had to choose one, it would be Foucault.
I don t understand anything. As usual.
Learn philosophy if you hadn't
When somebody asks you the question: "is there free will?" Reject the question because it is loaded with cultural and philosophical presuppositions that depend on our age.
@@Javier-il1xi But what else is there? On the basis of what other perception of reality are we denying the question, what other approach to reality is zizek talking about. I'm just confused I'll appreciate the clarification.
@@belminm.5168 I'm not entirely sure but I'd say foucault wouldn't really find that all too relevant. In my limited reading of foucault I've experienced him as more of an analyzer of current circumstances and the conditions that led to them than as someone who'd imagine, seek out or suggest an Alternative.
@@Javier-il1xi Every question is loaded with philosophical presuppositions. What makes this free will question special?
Interesting... Philosophy aside, until 0:15 he speaks unusually clear. After he grabbed his nose he immediately started speaking ins lisps.
I think it has to do with his vocal inflection, volume, e.t.c. -- if you talk to someone with a bad stutter *and so on* , the stutter usually gets worse the louder and more pronounced their speaking gets. In the beginning with this clip, you can notice Zizek speaks quieter and gradually gets louder and then his lisps get more pronounced.
I think Zizek also has an element of anxiety when he speaks, if I remember correctly. He's more in his best element in writing for sure
I think it has more to do with his enthusiasm. I believe in an interview he did he said that his tic gets worse when he gets really nervous, passionatie, anxious etc. And him being an ESL speaker I think the lisp follows that.
I think I'm beginning to get it. EVERY question you can ask already has (subconscious?) assumptions contained within. The very concepts which the question uses pre-frame reality.
I can see how this critique of concepts, theories, and paradigms makes sense.
However, what about raw direct experience. I see a colour for example that I label "red". How can I be wrong about that?
Exactly. Foucault said it clearly. Your idea of even asking the question IS part of the matrix of power-knowledge.
@@GeorgeProev I like your phrase "matrix" of power-knowledge.
What discourse(s) make(s) it such that the question of “free will,” whatever one might mean by that, is so important and consistently posed? Ethics, religion…?
Cleanest I have ever seen
Slav Socrates
I wonder how many times Slavoj has touched his nose throughout his life compared to the average person
average people touch their face 500 times a day
How many times... who nose?
Not more than the number of times people mocked his disability
Almost as many times as me
You have raised a wrong question here . We should concentrate how much philosophical knowledge he has already gathered and how vigorous ,potential and challenging is he to push and attract the commons and hoi polloi to taste the most critical aspects of epistemological profoundness.
If you watch on 1.5x speed, the nasal sound isn’t so bad
it is problematic that he hardly explains why the question about free will is his example or whether or not all questions suffer this problem equally or if they don´t then why not. because depending on what one takes free will to mean (which has a BIG relevance within the discussion about "free will" within the modern philosophical literature) the question obviously asks about completely different things...
Yes....freewill vs determinism, whats the answer?
Answer is, the formatting of the question is wrong to begin with. Wrong question.
And what exactly makes something a wrong versus a right question?
What about the question; "Could I have lived a different life?"
@@dneal6527 - It's not free will vs determinism.
It's free will vs no free will. No free will equals either Determinism, Indeterminism, or for non events, Eternalism. There are no other options under the rules of logic, and none of those 3 allow for Libertarian Free Will. It's also not a bad thing.
So yea it was wrong, but I don't know how you would go about explaining why the formatting is wrong...
Given the perspective we have in our experience, we can answer the question based on that. Being pragmatic/practical. Otherwise we couldn't answer anything.
@@Siberius- bUt nO fReE WiLl mEaNs eThIcS dOn'T mAtTeR
@@Siberius- The point is there is no adequate answer to that question, because the question itself is rooted in a naive interpretation of the world.
Here's a quote from Nietzsche that may give you a better idea.
"Everywhere accountability is sought, it is usually the instinct of punishing and judging which seeks it. One has deprived becoming of its innocence if being in this or that state is traced back to will, to intentions, to accountable acts: the doctrine of will has been invented essentially for the purpose of punishment, that is of finding guilty."
Nietzsche says the idea of "free will" was invented by Religious people, namely Christian rulers, in order to control the population.
And about cause and effect...
"there is probably never such a duality; in truth a continuum faces us, from which we isolate a few pieces…."
See it better now?
Opposition isn't necessarily negation
If when we ask the question, we are aleady in a certain «horizon» of understanding, I feel, taken to an extreme, we couldn't even ask the quedstion itself. It seems like an infinite regression of some sort. Or, is thought itself all that is certain (descartes)?
“The only thing that is certain is the uncertainty of everything”
I'd say that it reveals the gap between the trascendental and ontological dimensions. Zizek's project is one of articulating an Absolute that is, from the get go, thwarted, divided.
Javier and I think he’s hoping that philosophy can be used to address the issues we face today that he sees as critical. Ecology, economic crisis and technological dependency. He doesn’t believe that any system of government has been able to properly confront these issues so it’s time we try something more.
@@nuckinfuts7502 Sorry, but I don't see any reason why we can be certain about even that one "only thing" ...
King MMD hahaha that’s the kind of the point of the quote, the second part negates the first part.
Yes free will exists if free will is seen as the opportunity to change a particular system directionality.
It’s not hard to say it guys. The definition of what is the system is what changes.
Too much time dabbling, go make your bed or don’t!
Me as a german: ya, I speak Deutsch, so what?
Me hearing Zizek using german termes: God, my mother language is so beautiful❤❤❤
Whats the term he mentions, can you spell it out plz?)
@@eugenes.8808UNHINTERGEHBAR♡ and LICHTUNG☆
LICHTUNG und UNHINTERGEHBAR
@@eugenes.8808☆
@@eugenes.8808 ☆
In other words: To Zizek, we as humans are limited by our senses to not be capable to ever answer that question. (of free will and determinism)
It is not that we are "unable." The "answer" simply does not exist realistically. It is based upon a naive, quite childish interpretation of the world.
@@NoahsUniverse then what is the equivalent, "adult" version of this question?
@@michaelneufeld4515 It isn't that we are 'limited by senses.' That doesn't make sense. We cannot postulate about what would be 'beyond' our senses. There is nothing 'beyond' our senses, because 'beyond' is a concept that presupposes senses.
@@NoahsUniverse the buddhist answer that the will exists but it's not free ,it's conditioned
@@michaelneufeld4515
Think about it, determinism is a condition in which everything happens in chain, cause effect cause effect and so on, no one can escape and no one can change it. To believe in this, you have:
1) to use your mind to create the concept of logic first, and decide what’s correlated and what’s not, ergo using your senses.
2) so, the concept of logic, if you are in the deterministic model, must be a process caused by your own chain of causality
3) so technically you cannot say logically if your logic is logic, or biased, because, if you are the result of your causality, there is no way for you to recognize that you are in mistake
4) so you have to put logic above causality, and assume it is correct the way it is
Leading to: to believe in determinism you must use a non-deterministic concept first (an utopian, unfallacy, abstractian logic), making your believe irrational (because in determinism cannot be such things as you cannot know if the causal chains leads to a mistake or not, in the end you just believing in rationality). Ergo determinism cannot exist without the imposition we made at the beginning, using the very brain that it is the result of its own chain of event (not-provable of its own correctness), which it is a presupposition itself that determinism cannot exist.
To sum up, if you say determinism exist, you are assuming your logic is above chain of event because you simply can’t know if your reasoning and rationality is correct, ignoring that that very logic is (as everything would be) a result of a chain of event you cannot say if you are right or wrong, making your assumption in determinism just another religion
Logic imposes that believing in determinism, even if it is correct, is irrational.
im very beginner to philosophy, but this is Kantian perspective, am I correct? like the questioning of causation seems this way to me
woljang yes, noumena vs phenomena
exactly, athought the kantian "solution" to the determinism/free-will problem was 1° we can't perceive phenomens otherwise as a strictly determined (critique de la raison pure), but 2° the fact of the consciousness of the moral law "signifies" that we have the choice between pursuing pleasure and pursuing good : the Belief in free-will is a necessity from a moral point of view, which has its own "objectivity" (critique de la raison pratique), and because Kant wasnot satisfied at this point, he had to write the third Critc, to think how he could reconciliate both points of view, the point of view of knowledge, and the point of view of morality. But most would argue he didnt succeed in reconciling what can't be reconciled at all.
Yes, very Kantian. The entire percepton of the senses or raw sense data is what our view of the world is limited to. Hence the question of how things reallly are and how they are only perceived in a particular 'horizon' - our view of the world.
That s what you call critical realism, we always see 'truth' from a particular position which we are doubly assigned by language first and social structure/formation second...
People caught up in constructs tend to be tangled up in endless thought. There "simply" is no such thing as free will. Humans are nothing more than mere variables in a highly complex mathematical equation. It doesn't take more thought than that.
This video makes me realize that AI subtitles are not as good as I thought
Is this guys thing taking fundamental tenets of philosophy and complicating them to the point of confusion? Great job 👍
No, it's teaching philosophy.
Most people think they know what they are talking about. The first thing to learn in philosophy is that what seems self-evident isn't, that what seems obvious and without alternative isn't, and that what seems simple, isn't.
The difficult part is understanding how other people think. It is unfathomable how wrong people can be with absolute confidence.
After that, things that seem complicated are simple. But until then, you are going to be confused a lot. You think you know what concept a word codifies, and it is disorienting to find out that it doesn't, or that the concept itself is not really a thing.
Complicating fundamental, simple things is a tenet of philosophy
So we only see things in how they appear to be. Not as they truely are. Even if we would get a glimpse of how it truely is it will still be shown in the form/context of a thing that appears to be. So we never really know? We can't see the operations behind the curtains because we are that which is being operated?
Is this what Zizek is pointing to?
If we understand "nature" as "the nexus of causal effect chains", (3:08) the correct answer to the question whether all of nature follows causal laws would not be a rejection of the question, but a simple yes, since it would be analytical. I don't get this "I am too smart for your question" attitude.
But it would be circular logic, and therefore prove nothing.
If I assume that I am right, I can logically deduce that I am right. Therefore, I am right.
If we define nature as causal chains, everything in nature follows causal chains. Therefore, the answer to the question if nature is as defined is yes. But is it true?
I needed 2 times but i got it
I put subtitles on for this... 🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️
Zizek:
This nose can hold so much itch.
Materializes nose by slapping
So the whole response by Foucault is relativisation. Instead, he could have qualified his response and we would know what he thinks from the perspective he takes. The issue though is: can we evaluate incommensurable perspectives. C. Calhoun would say that Foucault would say NO. And thats the weakness of the model according to Calhoun and I agree.
I think the point is not evaluating incommensurable theories. It's rather the idea that we're already assuming everything is causally determined as soon as we take the scientific worldview as our interpretative frame, as it is the very assumption of that worldview -- and you would be begging the question if you try to prove that assumption by scientific mean. (It's just like trying to prove the validity of induction by inductive argument.) So people want to move a step forward and ask the metaphysical question: "is the scientific worldview an accurate representation of reality?" Zizek's response was you can't meaningfully ask that question. You can't strip off all interpretative horizon and try to compare science and reality from God's point of view. So, as you said, we can only compare theories/worldviews, but as we do it, we're not comparing their ability to capture raw reality (as if we can already see reality unaided and compare it side by side with science), we are comparing them in terms of some criteria that is our own choosing. But then again, there's no neutral criterion directly given to us by Nature or by eternal Reason. We've already adopted certain cultural position when we say things like "a theory is closer to truth if it allows us to explain more phenomena and make better prediction" or "a worldview is more valid when it allows us to understand another persons as I understand myself -- as free subjects." So the question about free will really boils down to what our culture should value more. Or, do we really have to give up all those different ways of interpreting the world for a single, overarching systematic scheme?
Or, in Wittgensteinian language, can we not just be content with the nebula of incompatible language games that we have got, even if they're not reducible into a single, ultimate, meta-theory? What is the motivation behind that? Is it not something that we should be *cured* of?
Exactly. Not only Zizek says this. Thomas Nagel coined it the nonexistent "perspective from nowhere", and John Searle stated that there is "no point of exile". We are always embedded in reality.
The proper way to define _objectivity,_ is to just say: A perception is objective exactly when it is fallibil. Ones perception might be wrong or it might be right. If it agrees with other perceptions it is probably right. _How_ it is fallibil is the subjectivity of perception.
Objectivity are two sides of the coin that is perception.
Defining objectivity this way avoids the need for some omniscient, neutral perspective that neither religion, nor science will ever really offer.
Model?
Foucault probably will say yes, then no, then yes, and so on.
“He is today’s state philosopher” 😂
I dont understand the statememt
Why does he blow his snot on his fingers
I think Slavoj is capable of giving us any number of answers to the question, while Foucault would just spin in circles in his chair never presuming never assuming and never getting anywhere, to have an actual conversation I find that deconstruction is good but not when it's for the sake of itself. Then it's just masturbatory intellectualism.
Zizek talks for hours. Why is this 4 minutes?
The nose sounds make the rest inaudible so it had to be cut out from the clip
WHO DID THIS SUBTITELS?????
🌍
Anynone can cuote the german phrase? "What you cannot step, goes behind" something like """Um dir dem geba"""
For a spider the concept of "the universe", is nonexistent concept.
True but irrelevant to the human problem of being
Spiders and humans have a lot in common. Their concept of the universe stretches no further than the perceived extent of their web.
Good point. But my point is that they don't have _everything_ in common. And a spider in paraguay will have nearly nothing at all in common with a human in egypt.
Bob Rolander apart from being mad of atoms and molecules and being bound by the same laws of nature yada yada yada... It's an odd one...it's like we have nothing in common socially or culturally but many things in common naturally... But the comparison you made I think isn't very, I dunno- applicable ? Pragmatic?
It reminds me of the question "what is the opposite to a chicken?"
Is the reason why the spider doesn't have a concept for conceiving the universe is because there was s absolutely no use for a spider to consider this versus humanitys type of sentience, maybe knowledge of the universe/God is essential to cope? Perhaps how much we can perceive and conceivie of is as much that is necessary.
The universe is a problem for humans conciousness as well as it is a place around us in space and time. It's both concept and a thing
Is this a defence of correlationism?
The opposite. The Hegelian position overturns the Kantian division between noumenal and phenomenal forces.
but can we think outside of ourselves? foucault seemed to think so, or atleast would approach the question by sayimg that there is no solid self
no we cant . So the whole response by Foucault is relativisation. Instead, he could have qualified his response and we would know what he thinks from the perspective he takes. The issue though is: can we evaluate incommensurable perspectives. Calhoun would say that foucault would say NO. And thats the weakness of the model
@@anialiandr weakness if order is the goal. radicals seem to portray the chaos/order dichotomy in terms of freedom/domination
@@anialiandr No. Foucault believed in perspectivism not relativism. Relativism is an absolutist doctrine but Focault assumed one's thoughts and self can change depending on your experience. So his response would be the answer will be different at different points of one's life.
So the answer to the Free Will vs Determinism debate is
we are trapped in Free Will?
What a Cosmic Joke.
Kind of.. but what if you were trapped in something less free before?
We are doomed to be free.
Or put another way: You are always responsible for your own actions whether you want to or not. You have no choice but to choose. No sky daddy is going to take the blame for you. (But also: You have no choice in choosing what you choose.)
Or put poetically:
Because of circumstances beyond your control,
You are master of your fate
And captain of your soul
@@davidwuhrer6704 Your thesis is self contradictory.
You should call it "Doomed to Determinism".
If you have no choice in choosing what you choose, there is no freedom allowed.
If the circumstances are beyond our control then we are simply instruments of an external Will and nothing more.
@@etagged Then I welcome the upgrade for sure.
@@thenowchurch6419 Whose external will would that be?
Huh? I didn't understand because mostly I hear like sshhhkkk...!
A fancier way of saying "I don't know and you have no right of asking this question". If anyone else said it we'd consider it a fallacy of argument from ignorance. In the best case, it is equivalent to saying only God knows since he's an objective observer. But saying it without even being accused of proposing an unfalsifiable hypothesis without good reason.
Any German ? to tell us the phrase :D
tekoshar aram Unhintergehbar
he said "Unhintergehbar" which means something like "not possible to get behind it"
Dudes loaded for sure.
For a while, I mistook this for a Kleenex-ad...
I love how this channel's name is "radical revolution"... lololol. I prefer my revolutions to be tame and moderate
Sounds like Kant
What does "free" even mean in this context? Lets be socratically pedantic about this. Lets say you are to chose from 2 paths a and b: Would free will be to chose a instead of b for no reason (arbitrary choice). Or is free will to consider the quality of each path and do a logical choice (like an algorithm that choses the shortest path). Case 2 is predetermined, one path will be better or worse depending on the parameter you chose. But what if both paths are equal? It is impossoble to have 2 equal paths that are not fully congruent, so that falls flat. Okay but what about chosing arbitrarily? It can only be a random choice in that case. What does random mean? Non-deterministic/independent of presuppositions. There are some quantum phenomena which might be behaving that way. So in everyday terms and applied to humans do any of these options sound "free"? Either a fully arbitrary choice or one that depends on internal and external circumstances. I dont see any way in which a human being is truly responsible for his actions. Nevertheless it is a far better perspective in life to consider oneself free. The other option most likely leads to victim mentality and stagnation. I dont see how this question is difficult. Did I leave anything out?
It's not that complicated. A random, nondeterministic choice, the metaphorical coinflip, is not free will, because it is neither will (it is arbitrary, the outcome is not the goal), nor free (it borrows the metaphorical coin's will, if you will).
Free will can only expressed in choices that are free of coercion. ("Under controlled conditions of light, temperature, and humidity, the organism will behave as it damn well pleases.") As such, they are necessarily deterministic. If they weren't, they could not be anticipated, and communication itself would be impossible.
That they are deterministic and as such predictable in principle doesn't make them any less free, because the apparatus that makes that decision is under no coercion to act contrary to what it deems best.
The only caveat here is that this predictability could allow one to manipulate circumstances to provoke a desired choice (although that is not a limitation of will, but of agency), or worse, withhold or falsify information upon which a decision is based (which is just marketing psychology, not an abrogation of free will itself).
Interpreting this as an absence of free will only makes sense on the presupposition of an omniscient creator who both arranged for the choice to be made and pre-ordained the outcome. But such a presupposition is absurd in itself.
kind of a nosy guy, don't you think? ..
.
"We cannot step out of it"
You can pay closer attention to your actual experience though and not be lost in thought all the time.
I think slavoj could learn something from mindfulness here, if he could practice it with all his sniffs and so on and so on.
Excellent point.
Philosophers need to learn to breathe and meditate, just as much as we all do.
Who is it being mindful ?
And being mindful about what ?
When he said "we cannot step out of it", he explained why pure reductionist empiricism is circular logic.
So he was arguing against the thing you are proposing as the solution for it.
@@davidwuhrer6704 There is no empiricism or logic involved. Just your own experience.
@@Rikarth What do you think "empiricism" means?
Zizek spouts nonsense on how Foucault "would have" spouted nonsense on some nonsensical fancy.
Would u say he smells his fingers after touching his Rectum?
I find this answer very disappointing tbh. This feels just like Zizek bending over backwards to avoid actually answering the question (no there is no such thing as free-will).
Do you think he'd really be afraid of answering something like that?
@@salatino38 Yes.
@@spinophrenic3775 better question anyway is :
What would You do with free will when You have it ?
of course any of my opinions are already within a certain episteme, but it would be enough to preliminarily define the damn terms and words with which I define them and the problem would not arise!
And then you would have the Derridian problem of language
Why did he talk and think so much if in the end it just describes a perspective that is wrong and can't be escaped. I'll answer the question for him, yes everything is deterministic, everything follows a set of laws of action and reaction, nomatter how small or complex or how far back in time or in the future you go, it can be pinpointed to one and only possibility. There's no choices to be made, you don't have the power to go against the laws of nature nomatter how much you try or believe that you can. You can't even not have the illusion that you are making choices, if you have that illusion. Foucaults answer was pointless, but he didn't have a choice to answer anything else, his answer is the product of the way his mind works, determined by the laws of nature.
Of course, that presupposes a certain way of seeing the world. Put simply, to arrive at this answer you are making assumptions that are supported by nothing but your answer.
Incredibly banal - Zizek's occasionally very interesting, but not often enough. Of course a question presupposes some frame of interpretation, but the answer will take that into account. There's nothing strange in that, Foucault discovered warm water.
When people speak of foucaults point as banal I cannot help but to point out that what he put into question has not so much been questioned as radically as he did. The question is not if any questions relies on presuppositions, the question is if there is anything more than presuppositions that rely on further ones. It seems banal because it is such a fundamental question, but it is something that has rarely been a culturally relevant standpoint before
Exactly. His answer of refusing to answer also has similar if not the same presuppositions. Modern day sophistry.
Jabberwocky !
Lol. Non sensical
Porque se agarra tanto la nariz que ansias
Cocaina
put it in rice
😌
I want to know exactly what is going on with his nose.
its called cocaine
It's just anxiety and nervous ticks
I was fisted by Foucault
BRAVO ZAZEK hs to go true three Fences to Access american brain.: linguistic_ language z^ meaning.
Feel thankfull
And sho on, and sho on
*Clap*
Just spinning Yogic principles in a western vernacilur
Bulshit 😂😂
What can Yoga say about epistemes? Does it even have such a concept?does yoga have a meta-question of asking the right questions? No:(
Incrompehensible, as usual ...
It's very simple, Foucault a con-man AVOIDS the question. He's a philosopher, he doesn't have to, he doesn't Know the Answer.
Sometimes, saying you don't know is the right answer.
somebody give this mf a tissue
And he keeps obfuscating, mentioning irrelevant names and beating around the bush.
Isn't it simpler to ask: "Does anyone have evidence that free will (as "personal" freedom from causality) exists?".
There's no such evidence. This question is existentially important for maturity and future of humankind.
What would such evidence look like? His point is that we don't even have a framework to deal with free will
You ignore his key point - that the hermeneutical approach to the question defines the scope of the answer, grounded in a particular epistemology. Your proposition is rooted in materialism and empiricism - if thats your position then the most meaningful way you can answer the question is: are there physical constraints on individual action in our society. The answer must be: yes, so there are limits to free will. If I was to take more of a deleuzian position I could talk about free will in the context of becoming or by deconstructing a concept of self (the anti-oedipus) free up 'line of departure' in rhizomatic space.
And of course, those who accuse of obfsucation are the ones who get it the least. He isn't talking about how or if free will exists. There is no evidence because there is no question to begin with for some people.
@@duncanunwin3261 I don't think you make the point that you're trying to make. In both example frameworks that you give, "materialism" and "deleuzian becoming" you could either answer the question with "no" or "we can't know". If your framework supports the notion of free will you can answer "perhaps", if it doesn't you can answer "no". The point is however, you don't even know what framework is true, so you might as well answer with "don't know".
So yeah, I too think he's beating around the bush. A tendendy of "advanced" philosophers who realize that even after years of studying they can't arrive at any ultimate truths, so instead they're looking for a way to be wiser by outright disregarding questions that have moved humanity since forever.
@@blubblubber9460 Couldn't agree more. Its like they enjoy the spotlight therefore trying to sound good rather then just answering by acknowledging their own limitations on a certain question...
ah his biggest failure, to undo what Foucault did, another failure for this clown.
This guy is a mess. I can't follow him
Nobody can understand postmodernists. Chomsky explains it well if you search "chomsky on postmodernism" on youtube
He's paid to speak ad nauseum, some of that speaking will be less effective then other speeches. this made little sense to me. I mean I knew what he was saying in reference to Foucalt, but it didn't seem applicable to the naked logic of 'do humans have free will'. Sure, if you believe in a causal determinism that presupposes an idea of the universe which is subjective blah blah blah. Doesn't change the meaning of the idea of, if there's a free will, as most suppose it, that that implies a god or a magic to consciousness which is yet to be proved. i'd see it more interesting to use postmodern critiques of how and why people make claims to free will rather than a causal universe (which, debating such a concept can get bogged down in messy physics regardless).
This is beyond a mess
3:37 What the fuck is the saying? Does anyone speak zizekese? 😂🤣
he said "Unhintergehbar" which means something like "not possible to get behind it"
For those who don’t understand anything, don’t worry. There is no content in any of these. It’s just people rambling to sound intelligent.
this is stupid. all you need to do is to ask to further define "free will" and the answer should become obvious in a few minutes
and what answer did you got?
@@JeronimusJack ask better :
Who is it answering ?
WTF are those gestures...
South Slavic sign language with a slight Italian accent, I believe
Intellectual mumbo jumbo, we have evolved to pose that question, so the question important.
in that case every question is equally important?
10 seconds in and he’s already done that nose thing 🤮
He has nervous tics that he cannot control fully. I have met him and know people who knew him from Paris 1980s. It's just his personal neurotic obsession. He knows but cannot do anything about it. We ought to have a bit of sympathy.
I am no fan of Foucault but Zizek is tweaking so badly to the point I shut this video off after 2 minutes. Postmodernism at its best! 😆
This dude is coked up out of his mind
nope, he has a tic disorder
This person needs to write instead of talk. Trying to explain philosophical concepts with various speech impediments he obviously has, is an attempt lacking respect to the audience.
He wrote over fifty books.
He lacks respect as you point out his disabilities while being disabled yourself in understanding him. Next next level irony.