Examined Life: Avital Ronell

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  • Опубліковано 10 гру 2024

КОМЕНТАРІ • 135

  • @celestialteapot3310
    @celestialteapot3310 7 років тому +48

    The guy on the bench at 3.41 seems to be having "an arbitrary eruption of something that can't be grasped or explicated" possibly with "fascisoid non progressive edges"

  • @kuntumut
    @kuntumut 12 років тому +25

    she must be a really good philosopher, given her performance of generating long and seemingly deep and meaningful sentences full of charismatic phrases made of sophisticated words

    • @RedSunAcademy
      @RedSunAcademy 7 років тому

      Do I note sarcasm, umut?
      (I'm smiling with you)

  • @billmao5040
    @billmao5040 5 років тому +12

    Well, she is obviously not mega-ethical when she grab that junk

  • @natedaug1
    @natedaug1 14 років тому +5

    She is actually doing the same thing to Bush that she is complaining about. She does not "know" Bush, she might just guessing about his phenomenological inner workings like we do to everyone.

  • @victorgrauer5834
    @victorgrauer5834 6 років тому +14

    I've been trying to get a handle on this person's mind by viewing some of her lectures and interviews and so far my impression is that of someone way out of her depth intellectually. She is continually falling back on the sort of jargon that was fashionable over 40 years ago but doesn't seem to have anything original to add. She also strikes me as rather inarticulate when attempting to respond to even the most straightforward question, continually grasping for the right term and trying without much success to organize her thoughts into a coherent statement. How she became known as a "leading figure" in poststructuralism or any other field is a mystery to me.

  • @henrix999
    @henrix999 9 років тому +3

    she made me cry

  • @wehaveasituation
    @wehaveasituation 6 років тому +57

    What an insufferable caricature of academia gone mad...

    • @Jackson37737
      @Jackson37737 6 років тому +10

      Nick AGREED!!!
      Narcissism’s best friend!!!

    • @quaesitor
      @quaesitor 6 років тому

      a mad(ness) must have her. but is it so bad?

  • @plapbandit
    @plapbandit 6 років тому +18

    Ayyyy lmao back here in 2018 to say yabae Avital stands accused of grabbing a man by the package. Yet I don't see the usual lynch mobs... Peculiar.

    • @AnotherOrangeJulius
      @AnotherOrangeJulius 6 років тому +6

      You are mistaken, there is a lot of people who are extremely mad at her. She will not recover from this professionally.

    • @vickydestephano7415
      @vickydestephano7415 2 роки тому

      She may recover. We are moving toward being sex positive. We're moving away from what is deemed politically correct.

  • @jeffgross6649
    @jeffgross6649 8 років тому +3

    This woman has about 1% of the intelligence of Martha Nussbaum. The idea that dogs playing = pure contingency -- well, it's not even wrong. One could go on, but it's too depressing.

  • @chodnejabko3553
    @chodnejabko3553 6 років тому +3

    I would argue ethics is by deffinition strict obedience to meaning, and when we encounter meaningless, strict ethics are the direct violence of erasing the meaningless. Shouldn't we rather, as philosophers, learn to split our thought into the ethical method at one side, and at the reformist method at the other, and then internalise the dialog between the ethical and reformative? By reformative I mean the restructuring the ethics so that they better fit the meaningless, and therefore allow our consciousness to function deeper into the Real, not just erase it. The main flaw in ethical behaviors is that what Einstain famously said - "stupidity is doing the same thing and expecting different results".

  • @neutralpillowfight
    @neutralpillowfight Рік тому

    What does she say at 6:06? Is that french? Latin? “So anxiety is the mood -- of ethicity“ …is that a philosophy term?

    • @shoegazer8585
      @shoegazer8585 Рік тому

      "Par Excellence" - expression from French to indicate something that is "above all else". In this case, she is saying anxiety is the mood par excellence of ethicity. Also, "ethicity" is not a word, but Atival is a deconstructionist so I doubt she cares.

    • @doclime4792
      @doclime4792 2 місяці тому

      ​@@shoegazer8585deconstruct this.

  • @KeskinCookin
    @KeskinCookin 6 років тому +14

    Deep thoughts...now back to cooking...

  • @fede2
    @fede2 9 років тому +7

    Let me see if I got this straight: meaning and "spontaneity" are mutually exclusive? You can't pronounce yourself on anything about the dogs fighting because... that would be "fascist"? What exactly is the value or the point of abstaining from any pronouncement on anything? Is this somehow "better"? More "true"? More "real"?
    Undoubtedly, attributing meaning is necessarily restrictive and will never be exhaustive. Regardless, you cannot explore the potential of things without engaging with them.

    • @1nfiniteSeek3r
      @1nfiniteSeek3r 7 років тому +3

      you've got to take it in the context of what she was saying about junk food/fast food, and junk thought, people being constantly subjected to various affirmations of meaning are liable to find it in numerous preformed narratives, like religion, flags, racisms etc,.
      Ascribing meaning to things does not bring you closer to the things in themselves, in many ways it's brought us further from them.

    • @JozefLewitzky
      @JozefLewitzky 7 років тому +1

      Yea, this seems right. But the problem is that once we think we have really 'got it', bad stuff happens. She is saying we have to live in the anxiety of it all. Being too confident, while the attempt must be made as you say, has often led us to disaster.

  • @MrNewberryL
    @MrNewberryL 11 років тому +9

    I fear there is a conflation going on here between the dangers of an attitude of utter assuredness and confidence in one's own judgements and the basis for those judgements, and taking things to be meaningful at all... We cannot approach a world that does not have meaning for us. To speak of dogs playing as a spontaneous eruption or absolute contingency strikes me as as much of imputation of meaning as speaking of it as part of an evolutionary narrative, or as part of a great chain of being.

    • @zarkarimi
      @zarkarimi 4 роки тому

      Yeah, a dog is a dog is a dog. The dog shits, the dog eats, the dog fetches, the dog barks, the dog licks my face. The dog and I are friends. The only friend I've ever truly known.

    • @zarkarimi
      @zarkarimi 4 роки тому

      To conceptualize the dog would be to ignore the emotive connection that exists between us, which I think is vastly more important in our relationship to dogs rather than the former.

  • @Koko-qs8zx
    @Koko-qs8zx 6 років тому +3

    What is that thing?

  • @paulnurmi7631
    @paulnurmi7631 4 роки тому +2

    What a great bullshitter. She should win a shallow award.

  • @markmaracatu6811
    @markmaracatu6811 4 роки тому +5

    What a creep

  • @Krelianx
    @Krelianx 10 років тому +15

    This comment says everything that needs to be said about this nonsense:
    victor1eremita
    3 years ago
    HEY, AVITAL, HOW MUCH DO CLOTHES COST IN THE MATRIX???

  • @electricvalentina
    @electricvalentina 14 років тому +3

    To me, this is just very funny. Ronell's responses, the interviewers questions, the documentary itself...But I guess, what else is Ronell supposed to say to the questions she is asked? Philosophy is something that is difficult to explain. I hope viewers do not get the wrong idea about Ronell or philosophy from this...

    • @k.g.r.2682
      @k.g.r.2682 6 років тому +4

      "Philosophy is something difficult to explain." Nope. True philosophers reduce complex concepts into words to communicate them to others. Charlatans and frauds complicate simple ideas using unintelligible and needlessly complex jargon to mimic intellectualism.

  • @thenebbishroute
    @thenebbishroute 13 років тому +2

    How is boredom an offshoot of melancholy? Someone please explain this to me.

    • @jayantiraphael8655
      @jayantiraphael8655 4 роки тому +1

      Do you know what melancholy means? It's akin to when you are bored that's exactly what you are it's very similar to it, how can you not understand this?
      When you're sad and in melancholy State nothing can appease you, the same thing rings true when bored everything is stripped of its importance, engaging qualities.
      Boredom is you not being fulfilled and nothing satisfying you. Everything seeming "not worthwhile".
      The difference is the catalyst that cause the feeling. But there, you wanted it explained. The feelings are very...very similar, if not boredom being even a subranch of a melancholy state

  • @BrentHutchinson1
    @BrentHutchinson1 9 років тому +4

    How am I not myself?

    • @jasonelford4474
      @jasonelford4474 8 років тому +6

      Your "identity" is based in language. Language is always expanding so a stable "identity" is impossible. A person can never be known.

  • @Benesyed
    @Benesyed 14 років тому +1

    @Krelianx
    What exactly. I think the real issue with this sort of thought is that it hasn't done anything new or shed light on things in a new way. Which is funny since Digger was so keen on new uncovering and alethia

  • @AnotherOrangeJulius
    @AnotherOrangeJulius 6 років тому +1

    They are conflating different senses of the word 'meaning'.

  • @quaesitor
    @quaesitor 6 років тому +2

    thank you avital ronell... for this reminder. about what? about the mote. every mote counts.

  • @gonzo904
    @gonzo904 6 років тому +2

    hm "absolute contingency," that's a provocative phrase, especially when treated as the alternative to "emergency supplies of meaning." absolute contingency might be a useful way to think through the desperate attachment to preserving the "meaning" and status of the diminishing prominence of quirky deconstructionist rock star academics. weaponizing this fear of being edged out to dismiss the allegations
    made against you by one of your subordinates may be a scenario that you could describe as assigning too much meaning to retaining one's institutional status. avital, don't you think that the notion of your accumulated "respect" within higher education is perhaps a bullshit moral abstraction and maybe shouldn't get twisted into a kind of, idk, "transcendental signifier" of one's innocence? as someone who claims to lend primacy to contingency, it should be painfully obvious that the situation of mentor/student turning to abuser/abused is one that is, in fact absolutely contingent upon the status you and your colleagues cherish and fear is being phased out. anyone with an actual commitment to a critique of power should be able to see any defense of your actions as a total farce.

  • @Krelianx
    @Krelianx 15 років тому +17

    Jesus, this pretty much condenses in 8 minutes everything I believe philosophy needs to get away from. And this is coming from a former Heideggerean!

    • @cosmotraumatika7474
      @cosmotraumatika7474 Рік тому

      What's so terrifying, Krelianux Z? Contact with abductive reality? Proximity with the Real that defies narcissistic Cartesian claims that "reality must obey my assertive Will and recognize that I am very special"?
      Ronell's engagement with Heidegger pushes the theory further. We humans are not "special boys' who, akin to Descartes, get to rule the universe like Donald Trump deeming the world must be as we want it to be because we are dirty cheating dirtbags who might be going to prison. Instead, Ronell explicates the trueness of Heidegger - saving the Nazi-friendly philosopher from his associations - and explicates a thinking that is contingent, imminent and immediately relevant.
      Anyone who can't recognize these dynamics needs to workshop their own biases. I'll openly confess to being a anarcho-libertarian who adored Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and other simpletons. I evolved when I studied the ramifications of systems of thought. Can you?

  • @strangelee4400
    @strangelee4400 6 років тому +15

    #METOO #LISTENANDBELIEVE*
    *(Except when a Feminist does it)

    • @vickydestephano7415
      @vickydestephano7415 2 роки тому

      #Me Too wants sexual assault acknowledged. The days of being sexually available but without the right to desire. The movement is toward being sex positive which tolerates expression. In fact, it invites it. Sexual interactions should become richer -- not restricted. Not oppressed.

  • @traccan
    @traccan 14 років тому +2

    @ST2K She's interesting, but she's turning philosophy into performance art, and I think performance art should do performance art. Philosophy SHOULD be 'cognitively inflected', it should be about solving problems in a society, how to figure out ways of living the good life, it should be about meaning (meaning is fascist at its core? how so? you can't just say that and expect it to stand..), and most of all it should be materialistic at its core.

  • @MySaachin
    @MySaachin 10 років тому

    the emergency supplies of meaning that are brought to a given incident, or structure or theme, are cover ups ????? what the heck she means by that ... can anyone please help me to grasp the meaning of this ?!!! I need to translate this but I can't even understand what she's saying here :(

    • @NoelRayland
      @NoelRayland 10 років тому

      Without pretending to understand her precisely, the comment below by Krelianx X seems to (seems to) illustrate what she was talking about.

    • @ohd00bley
      @ohd00bley 9 років тому +5

      In a nutshell she's asking you to think about your motivations and why do you do what you do or think what you think. Is from belief and/or faith? Knowledge? At the same time she's telling you everything doesn't necessarily have meaning (as he references the dogs playing). To play for the joy of play, to explore, and not to be self conscious of being.

    • @RedSunAcademy
      @RedSunAcademy 7 років тому +1

      Thank you, ohdee. Reading your paraphrase saved me a lot of pain from finishing watching the video. Your words, however, are very interesting. I often explore what I call "my thoughts on auto-pilot" or forced thought.
      I had problems with the video because it seemed that the "superior" lady with the short hair loved herself too much and thought herself to be on a far higher plane than we mere mortals. She seemed to want to impress with her vagueness instead of seeking to truly communicate and teach.

  • @soapmode
    @soapmode 12 років тому +2

    When she recognises the dogs playing, she has already "reduced the act to meaning." (4:24)
    And on her own terms, why not also look at Bush's act of sending someone to the electric chair (6:16) as "the arbitrary eruption of something which can't be grasped or explicated but [is] just there in this kind of absolute contingency of being?" (4:19)
    She is contradictory as she is (self-admittedly) meaningless.

    • @leamercatwild3354
      @leamercatwild3354 7 років тому +1

      This is spot on [Nine Tines]. To do philosophy is to notice our own contradiction first.

    • @sylvanmoir4094
      @sylvanmoir4094 6 років тому

      No No No : she might say - the FAILURE of Bush to be in any flow of authentic being already is demonstrated by his cruel and heartless action . The test of this, how to know it is true : there is no test
      except that would come from being in a flow of authentic being , anything else would be post facto imposition of something degraded on the pure flow . You won't get your criterion Nine Times , you either see it or you miss it for the welter of lies imposed on the pure stream of experience.

  • @uchihasasuke7436
    @uchihasasuke7436 6 років тому +22

    LMAO sexual predator

    • @mikebott6940
      @mikebott6940 4 роки тому +1

      She's the epitome of a sex pest.

  • @robertitochong
    @robertitochong 12 років тому

    @thenebbishroute i think what she means by boredom being an offshoot of melancholy is that there is always something to do and if your bored and not doing anything well your not changing nothing so you become unbored. for me, being bored is never in any way close or related to being happy. i get mostly sadder thoughts when being bored. i hope this clarifies something for you lol.

  • @ianburns6218
    @ianburns6218 6 років тому +3

    Cougar or abuser?

  • @pollobionico
    @pollobionico 9 років тому +1

    "A slacker in Tompkins Sq. Park"-That was as much the location as the personality, nicely done.

  • @mistarcraw
    @mistarcraw 13 років тому

    @brokenshines you know, i dont see her really contradicting zizek here. ethics is what 'must be done', and zizek talks about how the truly ethical Act would be not to indulge in the modern injunction of 'Enjoy!' that lies at the heart of our consumer society. this all lies in the void, an abyss of freedom from which the subject acts beyond their physical and social drives

  • @mit181
    @mit181 13 років тому

    @mit181 I wrote a long reply on whether or not Other is a concept...for Hegel it is. For Derrida it not only is not, it cannot. His system of philosophy won't allow it because that would act as what she makes reference to as a 'transcendental signified'. I can't help you out past here on youtube I'm afraid.

  • @michaelrussell7806
    @michaelrussell7806 6 років тому +2

    the interviewer walking backwards in a park is so annoying.

  • @Tsubak_Yojimbo
    @Tsubak_Yojimbo 6 років тому +9

    Does this drivel really pass off as deep intellectual thought? Sounds like a bunch of word salad, lots of variety but very low in nutritional content. ThIs is like eaves dropping on a dark brooding philosopher, chain smoking in a cafe, journaling random thoughts.

  • @jrobertwood
    @jrobertwood 15 років тому

    Odd to say that "meaning has often had fascist or non-progressivist edges if not a core" when you've just been defending Heidegger's willingness to go on paths to nowhere. For him that was quite compatible with extreme right wing politics.

  • @ts121084
    @ts121084 3 роки тому +2

    Such utter tripe. Nice work if you can get it.

  • @mit181
    @mit181 13 років тому

    @jefflunar Just quickly, I think the real problem you point out is why should it lead to these hierarchies and not to some stable but innocent, democratic system of equal terms. Rather than explain something that requires huge time and patience to understand really starting with Kant, I'm going to return to being enigmatic, and borrow a phrase from Wittgenstein: 'Don't think, but look!'. Hope I've been of some help :) and if it's any help, I have my reservations about Heidegger in particular.

  • @mit181
    @mit181 13 років тому

    @jefflunar How is meaning is generated? She mentions the 'promise' of meaning, then grounds it IN reality...she calls it 'Fascist', questions the way in which different political and religious institutions have used meaning to prop themselves up. A 'politics of refusing that gratification'...where does the word 'gratification' come from? Capitalism? How is meaning appropriated, used (abused?) in a Capitalist framework? What are you assuming about your 'reality'? Who has constructed it?

  • @tupG
    @tupG 14 років тому +1

    It's an excellent documentary, however, Avital's arguments did seem somewhat familiar and they have probably been discussed in one form or another ever since philosophers started thinking about 'meaning' I have certainly not studied philosophy or anything related but her arguments should actually be common sense. To me it is...

  • @browilliams
    @browilliams 13 років тому

    6:32 : that is extremely judgmental. who's to say that they don't care? if someone made a judgment call like that against her how would she feel?

  • @samcopeland3155
    @samcopeland3155 6 років тому

    Is this Loss?

  • @Krelianx
    @Krelianx 14 років тому

    I think there are broader problems on theoretical grounds.

  • @siyuc.4472
    @siyuc.4472 Рік тому

    I just love Prof. Ronell

  • @mit181
    @mit181 13 років тому

    @jefflunar Because of the ways in which, if meaning is inherently unstable, when fixed, it is fixed for reasons other than a love of truth, learning wisdom and so forth. So the challenge that these theorists attempt is how to (re)think through truth, goodness, duty and so forth in a manner that doesn't fall back into the old, what Derrida calls 'Metaphysical' tradition, where such things were fixed in such a manner that leads to hierarchies, such as man over woman, west over east, Aryan over all

  • @thenebbishroute
    @thenebbishroute 13 років тому

    "I thought I am not good enough for physics and I am too good for philosophy. Mathematics is in between." - George Polya

  • @lloplop
    @lloplop 11 років тому +1

    someone feels threatened!

  • @danielstringham4352
    @danielstringham4352 3 місяці тому

    The quality is horrible

  • @quaesitor
    @quaesitor 6 років тому +1

    wholly Other. i meant... meh. i don't even know.

    • @quaesitor
      @quaesitor 6 років тому

      rudolf. otto. i think thats what i meant... at least his idea or something. duno.

  • @traccan
    @traccan 14 років тому

    @ST2K You can watch the dogs playing and not need a meaning for it, but you damn well ought to find a meaning for Tea Party unreason and not just watch them as a 'spontaneous eruption of contingency' at the heart of American society.

  • @quaesitor
    @quaesitor 6 років тому +1

    remember the mote, andenken!

  • @natedaug1
    @natedaug1 14 років тому +1

    @ST2K Your right, youtube is not a great place for philosophy, more like a great place for a shouting match. But I disagree Ronell, is someone who does the whole pseudo profundity, where is just uses a bunch of big words and your like "what?" at the end of it. Good philosophers can explain the basics of their philosophy at least in more basic terms so non-philosophers can understand it. Also how does she know that Bush, had no anxiety, that is an assumption, and really partisan.

  • @Madelope
    @Madelope 7 років тому +1

    For those who don't understand.. she is attributing the philosophy behind meaning to the reason for the capitalist-driven understanding of the cultural other. And this understanding is what deems them as negative to society, and can be attributed to the reason behind racism and other social issues.

  • @sodasoda2174
    @sodasoda2174 6 років тому +1

    Beam her up scotty!

  • @mountainclimb3r
    @mountainclimb3r 11 років тому +3

    She is wonderful! I absolutely love her perspective, as well as her articulations. GREAT JOB

  • @AtCw593
    @AtCw593 11 років тому +1

    no true scotsman

  • @aardvarkspleen
    @aardvarkspleen 14 років тому +3

    Lets see ST2K--pretentious quoting Derrida as an authority for justice, rambling, obfuscating nonsense by Aviral Ronell...embarrassing...the reason why poeple don't take philosophers seriously...lowlight of an otherwise good film by Astra Taylor.

  • @cococandacraig3624
    @cococandacraig3624 5 років тому +2

    She is an outstanding eccentric, bizarre, narzissistic, an antidote to PC culture and mundane banality

  • @jacobbowman2964
    @jacobbowman2964 6 років тому +1

    Listen and believe right🤣

  • @Izthefaithful
    @Izthefaithful 11 років тому +1

    Her reasoning is very flawed. By her teachings others would derive their ethics from her. How then can their ethical behavior be completely from themselves.
    Also too much of a political ax to grind. It really made her look a bit foolish.

  • @David-lo2li
    @David-lo2li 7 років тому +1

    She makes me feel like Jim Morrison.

  • @rasjvon
    @rasjvon 15 років тому +2

    this reminds me of a good intro to any porn film.

  • @mit181
    @mit181 13 років тому

    @jefflunar In moments of trauma this experience of the Other is possible too, when the mind is thrown into situations it can't contain, structure...in what? Language? Your right to bring up language and I think she agrees with you. 'Play' is set up against (italics) arbitrary eruption ... not as the 'correct' interpretation. Her use of the term 'non-meaning' i think is unfortunate...perhaps because it's for a popular audience. Unstable is better, and unstable is what she = with 'Other'

  • @arknihil
    @arknihil 12 років тому +1

    What a reactionary non-criticism.

  • @nidansandan1992
    @nidansandan1992 13 років тому +1

    yea, I like the basic premise of what she says on non-meaning, but I really don't like her. She just oozes with pretentious self-righteousness and makes irrelevant and untrue political points.

  • @AlmightyChaos
    @AlmightyChaos 6 років тому +5

    Sexual harasser...

  • @anechoicmedia
    @anechoicmedia 14 років тому +3

    Avital Drivel should be read and not heard

  • @NietzscheDevot
    @NietzscheDevot 6 років тому +3

    Hey molestor!

  • @MakeDemocracyMagnificientAgain
    @MakeDemocracyMagnificientAgain 11 років тому +1

    AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

  • @IntiqYana
    @IntiqYana 13 років тому

    congrats girl keep up the good job

  • @ComplacencyAmongUs
    @ComplacencyAmongUs 10 років тому +5

    She is not being clear.

    • @Krelianx
      @Krelianx 9 років тому +6

      +Keegan Swenson You have no idea how ridiculous that sounds.

  • @bbqbros3648
    @bbqbros3648 8 років тому +2

    Philosophers..... get a real job