- Weimar
Henning Schmidgen
Bauhaus-University-Weimar, Faculty of Media, Faculty Member
- History of Science, Media Studies, Actor Network Theory, Gilbert Simondon, Friedrich Kittler, Gilles Deleuze, and 10 moreFelix Guattari, Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, Bruno Latour, Anthropology of Media, Historical Epistemology, Science and Technology Studies, Computer Networks, Databases, Software, and Wireless Sensor Networksedit
This is a general paper dealing with the history of the history of science, with a special focus on historians and epistemologists who bolster their historiographic approach by making reference and/or relying on science, e.g. Popper,... more
This is a general paper dealing with the history of the history of science, with a special focus on historians and epistemologists who bolster their historiographic approach by making reference and/or relying on science, e.g. Popper, Bachelard, and Canguilhem
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Here are some excerpts from my thesis dealing with Félix Guattari and the question of technology. The German version was published in 1997 under the title “Das Unbewusste der Maschinen” with Fink Verlag. I hope to finalize the translation... more
Here are some excerpts from my thesis dealing with Félix Guattari and the question of technology. The German version was published in 1997 under the title “Das Unbewusste der Maschinen” with Fink Verlag. I hope to finalize the translation and add some updated reflections over the course of next year
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Twelve years after his famous Essay on Some Problems Concerning the Normal and the Pathological (1943), the philosopher Georges Canguilhem (1904–1995) published a book-length study on the history of a single biological concept. Within... more
Twelve years after his famous Essay on Some Problems Concerning the Normal and the Pathological (1943), the philosopher Georges Canguilhem (1904–1995) published a book-length study on the history of a single biological concept. Within France, his Formation of the Reflex Concept in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries (1955) contributed significantly to defining the ''French style'' of writing on the history of science. Outside of France, the book passed largely unnoticed. This paper re-reads Canguilhem's study of the reflex concept with respect to its historiographical and epistemological implications. Canguilhem defines concepts as complex and dynamic entities combining terms, definitions, and phenomena. As a consequence, the historiography of science becomes a rather complex task. It has to take into account textual and contextual aspects that develop independently of individual authors. In addition, Canguilhem stresses the connection between conceptual activities and other functions of organic individuals in their respective environments. As a result, biological concepts become tied to a biology of conceptual thinking, analogical reasoning, and technological practice. The paper argues that this seemingly circular structure is a major feature in Canguilhem's philosophical approach to the history of the biological sciences. Keywords Georges Canguilhem Á Historiography Á Concepts Á General Biology Concepts are not in your head: they are
Many of the methodological restrictions associated with the traditional history of ideas can be overcome by focusing more closely on the history of the material substrata which served to transmit knowledge. This argument is substantiated... more
Many of the methodological restrictions associated with the traditional history of ideas can be overcome by focusing more closely on the history of the material substrata which served to transmit knowledge. This argument is substantiated here with respect to the relationship between the early work of Jacques Lacan (1901-1981) and the disciplines of phenomenology (E. Husserl, M. Seheier), phenomenological psychopathology, and dynamic psychiatry (K. Jaspers, E. Minkowski, E. Kretschmer). By examining in detail the genesis of Lacan's 1932 doctoral thesis on paranoia and related texts, one realizes that it was not so much Husserl, but rather Scheler's book on the nature and forms of sympathy (1913/1923) which contributed most to the elaboration of Lacan's later theory of the imaginary. lt also becomes evident that Lacan's incorporation of certain German philosophical terms (Ausschaltung, Aufhebung) into his French writings was not devoid of productive misreadings (»Aufha...
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1947 hat Daniel Lagache (1903 bis 1972) an der Sorbonne eine Vorlesung gehalten, die fur die Entwicklung der Nachkriegspsychologie in Frankreich Signalwirkung haben sollte. In "L'unite de la psychologie" konzipierte Lagache... more
1947 hat Daniel Lagache (1903 bis 1972) an der Sorbonne eine Vorlesung gehalten, die fur die Entwicklung der Nachkriegspsychologie in Frankreich Signalwirkung haben sollte. In "L'unite de la psychologie" konzipierte Lagache die Psychologie als eine allgemeine Theorie der Verhaltensweisen, in der Klinische Psychologie, Experimentalpsychologie und Psychoanalyse gleichberechtigt nebeneinander stehen. Mit diesem Programm begrundete Lagache die Unabhangigkeit der Psychologie von Philosophie und Medizin. Auserdem legte er den Grundstein zur Etablierung einer psychoanalytischen Forschung und Lehre an der Universitat. Der hier unternommene Ruckblick auf Lagaches Antrittsvorlesung versucht, ihre diskursiven Voraussetzungen aufzuzeigen: einerseits Jaspers' Zusammenfuhrung von verstehender und erklarender Psychologie, andererseits eine Konzeption der Psychonanalyse, die deren naturwissenschaftliches Erbe produktiv zu wenden versucht. Die Vorlesung von Lagache ist aber nicht n...
Research Interests: Philosophy and DDC
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Zwischenräume sind jene Schnittstellen, Intervalle und Abstände, in denen sich elementare Prozesse der Wissensproduktion ansiedeln. Zwischenräume sind eine epistemologische Kategorie für sich. Das gewohnte Bild geordneter... more
Zwischenräume sind jene Schnittstellen, Intervalle und Abstände, in denen sich elementare Prozesse der Wissensproduktion ansiedeln. Zwischenräume sind eine epistemologische Kategorie für sich. Das gewohnte Bild geordneter Wissenschaftlichkeit schwindet, wenn die Produktion von Wissen auf spezifische materielle Kulturen zurückgeführt wird: auf die Begegnung von Instrumenten, Schreibgeräten und experimentellen Verfahren, aber auch auf das Zusammenspiel von Diskursen, Medien und Mythen. Verknüpfungen und Trennungen werden so zu epistemischen Ereignissen, die dem Zufall stärker verpflichtet sind als dem Geplanten und Erwarteten. Dieses Buch verdeutlicht, dass es die Lücken und Leerstellen in der medialen Wissenschaftspraxis sind, die wesentlich zur Entstehung des Neuen beitragen.
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Abstract Toward the end of the 1840s, Hermann von Helmholtz (1821–1894) began to investigate experimentally the propagation of stimuli within nerves. Helmholtz’s experiments on animals and human subjects opened a research field that in... more
Abstract Toward the end of the 1840s, Hermann von Helmholtz (1821–1894) began to investigate experimentally the propagation of stimuli within nerves. Helmholtz’s experiments on animals and human subjects opened a research field that in the following decades was intensively explored by neurophysiologists and experimental psychologists. Studying the concrete experimental settings and their local contexts shows how deeply the work of Helmholtz, Adolphe Hirsch (1830–1901), Franciscus Donders (1818–1889) and others was embedded in the history of culture and technology. In particular, the rapidly growing technologies of electromagnetism, which gave rise to telegraphy and electric clocks, facilitated the time measurements of 19th-century physiologists and psychologists. However, the transition from frogs to human beings as model organisms confronted the time-measuring psychophysiologists with a whole range of experimental parameters that were difficult to control (temperature, attention etc.). It is no wonder then that it took some 20 years before this branch of research stabilised.
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Mid-19th-century chemistry constituted a practically and theoretically important resource for experimental psychology as conceived by Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920). In the early 1850s, Wundt began working in Gustav... more
Mid-19th-century chemistry constituted a practically and theoretically important resource for experimental psychology as conceived by Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920). In the early 1850s, Wundt began working in Gustav Herth's private chemical laboratory in Heidelberg. The experimental work Wundt conducted under Herth's direction provided the practical model for the psychological methods advocated in Wundt's pioneering publication on visual perception in 1862. With respect to theory, Wundt relied on John Stuart Mill's System of Logic, a book often referring to the chemical writings by Justus Liebig. Wundt not only read and quoted Mill's logic but also was personally acquainted with its German translator, the former Liebig student Jacob Schiel. Thus, in various ways, chemistry influenced Wundt's early theory and practice of experiment.
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Many of the methodological restrictions associated with the traditional history of ideas can be overcome by focusing more closely on the history of the material substrata which served to transmit knowledge. This argument is substantiated... more
Many of the methodological restrictions associated with the traditional history of ideas can be overcome by focusing more closely on the history of the material substrata which served to transmit knowledge. This argument is substantiated here with respect to the relationship between the early work of Jacques Lacan (1901-1981) and the disciplines of phenomenology (E. Husserl, M. Scheler), phenomenological psychopathology, and dynamic psychiatry (K. Jaspers, E. Minkowski, E. Kretschmer). By examining In detail the genesis of Lacan's 1932 doctoral thesis on paranoia and related texts, one realizes that it was not so much Husserl, but rather Scheler's book on the nature and forms of sympathy (1913/1923) which contributed most to the elaboration of Lacan's later theory of the imaginary. lt also becomes evident that Lacan 's incorporation of certain German· philosophical terms (Ausschaltung, Aufhebung) into his French writings was not devoid of productive misreadings (»Aufhaltung phenomenologique«, »Aufhebung husserlienne«). Hence, it can be suggested that both Lacan's psychoanalytic work and his early texts are rooted in a space >in-between languages<, i.e. French and German, while remaining marked through the media of their transmission.
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In his writings on art, the later Felix Guattari repeatedly addresses the issue of style. In his discussion of painters and architects such as Roberto Matta, George Condo, and Shin Takamatsu, Guattari explores the ways in which the... more
In his writings on art, the later Felix Guattari repeatedly addresses the issue of style. In his discussion of painters and architects such as Roberto Matta, George Condo, and Shin Takamatsu, Guattari explores the ways in which the artistic production of subjectivity depends on specific styles and their relations to continuity and discontinuity. His interest in style is not restricted to the writings on art, however. The link between the issue of style and the production of subjectivity was already established in Guattari's early work in the psychiatric clinic of La Borde. In particular, the case study of "RA." shows his interest in methods that would allow moving from the specific features of signifying chains to the stylistic characteristics of drawings, body movements and other modes of expression. In contrast to Lacan's orientation on the model of structural linguistics, Guattari develops a kind of"rhythm analysis" that, in turn, refers to and relies on artistic practices. The conclusion is that these early writings should be taken into account when re-evaluating Guattari's later claims on singularity and style.
With studies like Discourse Networks 1800/1900 and Gramophone, Film, Typewriter, Friedrich A. Kittler contributed significantly to transforming the history of media into a vital field of inquiry. This essay undertakes to more precisely... more
With studies like Discourse Networks 1800/1900 and Gramophone, Film, Typewriter, Friedrich A. Kittler contributed significantly to transforming the history of media into a vital field of inquiry. This essay undertakes to more precisely characterize Kittler's historiographical approach. When we look back on his early contributions to studies of the relationship between literature, madness and truth-among others, his doctoral dissertation on the Swiss poet and writer Conrad Ferdinand Meyer-what strikes us is the significance that Jacques Lacan's structuralist psychoanalysis had in shaping the orientation of Kittler's later studies. His intensive engagement with Lacan galvanized Kittler's concern with the question of sex and/or gender in the evolution of the humanities as well as his concern with the media history of the university. At the same time, Kittler's reliance on Lacan led him to a kind of history that is interested above all in the internal logic of discourse. As we see, for instance, in Kittler's anecdotic treatment of 19thcentury physiologist Hermann von Helmholtz, this historiography does not involve any original research in archives and/or museums. Rather, it builds upon existing historical accounts and focuses its analyses on the issue of symbolic structures. Instead of investigating the history of the material culture of science and technology, what is thereby ultimately reinforced is a philosophical idealism in which knowledge and paranoia become superimposed in and by means of an 'original syntax' (Lacan).
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This paper explores the aesthetic and epistemic potential of data physicalization in the Digital Humanities. The collected works of various philosophers (Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche etc.) were investigated by means of a linguistic model of the... more
This paper explores the aesthetic and epistemic potential of data physicalization in the Digital Humanities. The collected works of various philosophers (Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche etc.) were investigated by means of a linguistic model of the human body. Inspired by the Penfield homunculus results were projected into the explicit space of the human body. Drawing on Computational Design and 3D printing, these projections were transformed into physical data sculptures. In contrast to standard forms of data representation (curves, cards, etc.) such sculptures facilitate developing new research questions and presenting results of such projects in the Digital Humanities in analogue contexts, making them accessible to different and potentially broader audiences.
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Le psychiatre français Jean Oury (1924‑2014) est bien connu à la fois comme l’un des principaux promoteurs de la « psychothérapie institutionnelle », comme fondateur et directeur de la clinique psychiatrique de La Borde, et comme un... more
Le psychiatre français Jean Oury (1924‑2014) est bien connu à la
fois comme l’un des principaux promoteurs de la « psychothérapie institutionnelle », comme fondateur et directeur de la clinique psychiatrique de La Borde, et comme un important défenseur de la psychanalyse lacanienne. Cet article se concentre sur la thèse de médecine soutenue par Oury en 1950 à la Faculté de Médecine de Paris, ayant pour objet la créativité artistique. Notre but est de montrer que ce travail se fonde sur une théorie de la subjectivité inspirée par la biologie et partagée, à cette même époque, par des auteurs aussi distants que Georges Canguilhem et Frantz Fanon. Différemment de ce que l’usage du terme spinozien « conation » employé par Oury semble suggérer, cette théorie n’indique pas une pulsion instinctuelle qui pousserait le sujet à demeurer au sein des formes de l’être existantes. Elle indique bien plutôt la poussée vitale vers
la transgression de ces formes pour créer un milieu ou « Umwelt » dans lequel le sujet peut exister et déployer son potentiel spécifique. L’article montre qu’Oury, en expliquant cette théorie du sujet, se réfère à la philosophie de Jean-Paul Sartre et à la théorie psychanalytique de Jacques Lacan. Cependant, sur ce point, de même que chez Canguilhem et Fanon, la référence cruciale d’Oury est la philosophie biologique de Kurt Goldstein. Par conséquent, la théorie de la conation esthétique développée par
Oury s’inscrit dans l’histoire franco-allemande du savoir psychiatrique.
fois comme l’un des principaux promoteurs de la « psychothérapie institutionnelle », comme fondateur et directeur de la clinique psychiatrique de La Borde, et comme un important défenseur de la psychanalyse lacanienne. Cet article se concentre sur la thèse de médecine soutenue par Oury en 1950 à la Faculté de Médecine de Paris, ayant pour objet la créativité artistique. Notre but est de montrer que ce travail se fonde sur une théorie de la subjectivité inspirée par la biologie et partagée, à cette même époque, par des auteurs aussi distants que Georges Canguilhem et Frantz Fanon. Différemment de ce que l’usage du terme spinozien « conation » employé par Oury semble suggérer, cette théorie n’indique pas une pulsion instinctuelle qui pousserait le sujet à demeurer au sein des formes de l’être existantes. Elle indique bien plutôt la poussée vitale vers
la transgression de ces formes pour créer un milieu ou « Umwelt » dans lequel le sujet peut exister et déployer son potentiel spécifique. L’article montre qu’Oury, en expliquant cette théorie du sujet, se réfère à la philosophie de Jean-Paul Sartre et à la théorie psychanalytique de Jacques Lacan. Cependant, sur ce point, de même que chez Canguilhem et Fanon, la référence cruciale d’Oury est la philosophie biologique de Kurt Goldstein. Par conséquent, la théorie de la conation esthétique développée par
Oury s’inscrit dans l’histoire franco-allemande du savoir psychiatrique.
Der französische Psychiater Jean Oury (1924‑2014) ist als einer der Hauptvertreter der „Institutionellen Psychotherapie “, als Gründer und medizinischer Leiter der Reformklinik "La Borde" sowie als Anhänger der Lacanschen Psychoanalyse... more
Der französische Psychiater Jean Oury (1924‑2014) ist als einer der Hauptvertreter der „Institutionellen Psychotherapie “, als Gründer und
medizinischer Leiter der Reformklinik "La Borde" sowie als Anhänger der Lacanschen Psychoanalyse bekannt geworden. Dieser Aufsatz lenkt die Aufmerksamkeit auf die medizinische Doktorarbeit über das Problem der künstlerischen Kreativität, die Oury 1950 an der Faculté de Médecine in Paris verteidigt hat. Das dabei verfolgte Argument lautet, dass im Mittelpunkt dieser Doktorarbeit eine letztlich biologisch fundierte Theorie des Subjekts steht, die etwa zur selben Zeit und in ähnlicher Form auch von so unterschiedlichen Autoren wie Georges Canguilhem und Frantz Fanon
vertreten wurde. Oury spricht in diesem Zusammenhang von „conation “. Anders als dieser spinozistische Ausdruck vermuten lässt, zielt seine Auffassung des Subjekts aber nicht auf das instinktive Bestreben, im eigenen Sein zu verbleiben, sondern auf den vitalen Drang, über dieses Sein hinauszugelangen, um eine Umgebung zu schaffen, in der das Subjekt gemäß seinen Möglichkeiten existieren kann. Der Aufsatz verdeutlicht,
dass Oury bei der Erläuterung dieser Theorie auf die Philosophie von Jean-Paul Sartre ebenso rekurriert wie auf die Psychoanalyse von Jacques Lacan. Vor allem aber verlässt sich Oury auf die biologische Philosophie von Kurt Goldstein, auf die sich auch Canguilhem und Fanon stützen. Insofern lässt sich Ourys Theorie der ästhetischen Konation in die deutsch-französische Geschichte des psychiatrischen Wissens einschreiben.
medizinischer Leiter der Reformklinik "La Borde" sowie als Anhänger der Lacanschen Psychoanalyse bekannt geworden. Dieser Aufsatz lenkt die Aufmerksamkeit auf die medizinische Doktorarbeit über das Problem der künstlerischen Kreativität, die Oury 1950 an der Faculté de Médecine in Paris verteidigt hat. Das dabei verfolgte Argument lautet, dass im Mittelpunkt dieser Doktorarbeit eine letztlich biologisch fundierte Theorie des Subjekts steht, die etwa zur selben Zeit und in ähnlicher Form auch von so unterschiedlichen Autoren wie Georges Canguilhem und Frantz Fanon
vertreten wurde. Oury spricht in diesem Zusammenhang von „conation “. Anders als dieser spinozistische Ausdruck vermuten lässt, zielt seine Auffassung des Subjekts aber nicht auf das instinktive Bestreben, im eigenen Sein zu verbleiben, sondern auf den vitalen Drang, über dieses Sein hinauszugelangen, um eine Umgebung zu schaffen, in der das Subjekt gemäß seinen Möglichkeiten existieren kann. Der Aufsatz verdeutlicht,
dass Oury bei der Erläuterung dieser Theorie auf die Philosophie von Jean-Paul Sartre ebenso rekurriert wie auf die Psychoanalyse von Jacques Lacan. Vor allem aber verlässt sich Oury auf die biologische Philosophie von Kurt Goldstein, auf die sich auch Canguilhem und Fanon stützen. Insofern lässt sich Ourys Theorie der ästhetischen Konation in die deutsch-französische Geschichte des psychiatrischen Wissens einschreiben.
The importance of Hegel's, Husserl's and Heidegger's philosophy for Jacques Lacan's early work is rather well-known. Lacan had heard of them around the years 1935-1940 through the seminars of Koyré and Kojève. This paper tries to show how... more
The importance of Hegel's, Husserl's and Heidegger's philosophy for Jacques Lacan's early work is rather well-known. Lacan had heard of them around the years 1935-1940 through the seminars of Koyré and Kojève. This paper tries to show how much the impact of phenomenology was already present as Lacan wrote his medical thesis in 1932, e.g. through Binswanger, Minkowski and Gurvitch. The details of these early transmissions were somewhat bizarre, however. Thus, Lacan refers to Husserl when mentioning terms such as "Aufhaltung" and "Aufhebung" when in fact such notions were foreign to Husserl's philosophy. The paper shows that these misreadings occurred partly because of a spelling mistakes in Gurvitch (Ausschaftung, *Auschaltung), and partly because of the preconceptions of French philosophers of these days who identified Husserl's phenomenology and Hegel's – and vice versa. However, without ever correcting or aven noticing such mistakes, Lacan developed them in a original perspectives thus bringing out some aspects of Freud's thought and of his own.
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This article sheds new light on Bruno Latour’s sociology of science and technology by looking at his early study of the French writer, philosopher and editor Charles Péguy (1873–1914). In the early 1970s, Latour engaged in a comparative... more
This article sheds new light on Bruno Latour’s sociology of science and technology by looking at his early study of the French writer, philosopher and editor Charles Péguy (1873–1914). In the early 1970s, Latour engaged in a comparative study of Péguy’s Clio and the four gospels of the New Testament. His 1973 contribution to a Péguy colloquium (published in 1977) offers rich insights into his interest in questions of time, history, tradition and translation. Inspired by Gilles Deleuze’s philosophy of difference, Latour reads Clio as spelling out and illustrating the following argument: ‘Repetition is a machine to produce differences with identity’. However, in contrast to Deleuze’s work (together with Feélix Guattari) on the materiality of machines, or assemblages [agencements], Latour emphasizes the semiotic aspects of the repetition/difference process. As in Péguy, the main model for this process is the Roman Catholic tradition of religious events. The article argues that it is this reading of Péguy and Latour’s early interest in biblical exegesis that inspired much of Latour’s later work. In Laboratory Life (Latour and Woolgar, 1979) and The Pasteurization of France (1988) in particular, problems of exegesis and tradition provide important stimuli for the analysis of scientific texts. In this context, Latour gradually transforms the question of tradition into the problem of reference. In a first step, he shifts the event that is transmitted and translated from the temporal dimension (i.e. the past) to the spatial (i.e. from one part of the laboratory to another). It is only in a second step that Latour resituates scientific events in time. As facts they are ‘constructed’ but nevertheless ‘irreducible’. They result, according to Latour, from the tradition of the future. As a consequence, the Latourian approach to science distances itself from the materialism of Deleuze and other innovative theoreticians.
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Dass Kultur nicht einfach von Natur getrennt werden kann, ist keine Einsicht, die der neueren Soziologie oder Anthropologie zu verdanken wäre. In jüngster Zeit hat Bruno Latour viel Aufmerksamkeit für sein Vorhaben erhalten, eine... more
Dass Kultur nicht einfach von Natur getrennt werden kann, ist keine Einsicht, die der neueren Soziologie oder Anthropologie zu verdanken wäre. In jüngster Zeit hat Bruno Latour viel Aufmerksamkeit für sein Vorhaben erhalten, eine »symmetrische Anthropologie« zu entwickeln. Dieser Essay lenkt die Aufmerksamkeit auf die Arbeiten des späten Félix Guattari, der 1989 in seinem Manifest über "Die drei Ökologien" programmatisch feststellte: »Immer weniger kann die Natur von der Kultur getrennt werden.« Der Essay spürt dem Verhältnis von Ökologie und Ökonomie nach, um erneut die Aufmerksamkeit auf die "Gemeinschaftseinrichtungen" ("equipments collectifs") zu lenken, die Guattari zufolge entscheidende Ansatzpunkte der gesellschaftlichen Veränderung sind.
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This is the second part of a long interview I did with Oury at La Borde clinic in 1994. It was part of the research I undertook for my PhD thesis on Guattari but remained unpublished.
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Here is another of these interviews... more coming soon...
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Here is the (German) Foreword and Table of Contents of this upcoming book... The interviews were mostly done in the mid-1990s, some of them in La Borde clinic, but never published (except for one). Today, they may serve as an introduction... more
Here is the (German) Foreword and Table of Contents of this upcoming book... The interviews were mostly done in the mid-1990s, some of them in La Borde clinic, but never published (except for one). Today, they may serve as an introduction to the work of Guattari. One of the guiding threads is the issue of machine thinking, in particular Guattari's concept of desiring machines and its relation to Institutional Psychotherapy. Additional features will be a timeline (updated) and a bibliography of selected works by and about G.