No, the title of this post isn’t a philosophical dessert. Rather, it is a long-standing debate in philosophical and educational circles. Briefly: that praxis-action is different from theoria-thinking. That’s crudely reductive, but there we have it.

So here’s my observation. Flusser (with no to-do!) states on pg. 15 that

To think is a praxis which changes the words to fit problems [the world we live in], and the problems to fit words, and the distinction between “objective” and “subjective” thinking is one of degree, not of essence.

I anticipated that more people would pluck this out as interesting/provocative. Especially because one issue we discussed in class was whether thinking was writing. I don’t know where we came down on that issue, but it seems that there are significant arguments on either side. To help me get thru this, I consider the title of our class, “Materialities of Writing,” not “Writing is Materiality” or something like that. The title, it seems, implies that there are non-material aspects to writing. I should like to know both sides of this dichotomy. I guess with reference to above, I tend to think of theory as ineffable and praxis as material, but if Flusser claims that thinking is praxis–and my definition stands–then where are we? Does it matter?

From this, I have a two-pronged question:

(1) How vital is it to this seminar, going forward, to clarify our many meanings of “writing” or “composition” or “thinking”? Will we quickly sink into a semantic quagmire? Would the class be willing to define terms and/or create new ones to help us delineate the multiplicity of meanings?

(2) What in the world is “objective thinking”? This greatly baffles me and seems on the edge of not making sense. Any takers?

One stab: Could “objective thinking” be what computers do? Is anyone else willing to jump into that skiff with me?

KW