University of Warwick institutional repository: http://go.warwick.ac.uk/wrap A Thesis Submitted for the Degree of PhD at the University of Warwick http://go.warwick.ac.uk/wrap/4203 This thesis is made available online and is protected by original copyright. Please scroll down to view the document itself. Please refer to the repository record for this item for information to help you to cite it. Our policy information is available from the repository home page. Reviving An Ancient-Modern Quarrel: A Critique of Derrida's Reading of Plato and Platonism A Thesis Presented For the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy by Jones A. Irwin December 1997 University of Warwick Supervisors: Mr. Martin Warner Dr. Cyril Barrett ABSTRACT This thesis begins from an analysis of Derrida's specific readings of Plato and Platonism, identifying there a modernist bias, which interprets these metaphysical systems as if they were coextensive with Cartesian rationalism. Against Derrida, I argue for a repositioning of Plato and Platonism in the context of an ancient-modern quarrel. In replacing Descartes's "clarity and distinctness" with a pre-modern emphasis on "faith" (pistis), I am seeking to challenge Derrida's diagnosis of a perplexity or impasse (aporia) which cannot be overcome by philosophy. With specific reference to the Meno and the Phaedrus, one can locate a three-tiered Platonic dialectic beginning with an assertionof knowledge, followed by a necesary deconstruction of this knowledge with, thirdly, a tentative reconstruction of philosophy based on faith rather than knowing. In later chapters, I examine this dialectic as it is developedin the Neo- and Christian- Platonist traditions, particularly through the work of Plotinus, Boethius and Augustine. On my interpretation, deconstruction remains at the second level of the Platonic dialectic, that of impasse and perplexity (one of Derrida's most recent texts is in fact entitled Aporias). Again with reference to an ancient-modern quarrel, it is my contention that Derrida's unstinting stress on the "aporetic" is due to an overemphasis of the Cartesian paradigm. Derrida identifies the exhaustion of what Deeley calls "the classical modern paradigm" with the exhaustion of philosophy per se. But this identification of philosophy with Cartesianism can be seriously challenged through a renewed foregrounding of the premodern philosophical resources which Descartes (and now Derrida) have sought to obscure. 2 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Many thanks to my supervisors, Martin Warner and Cyril Barrett, for their help and encouragement over the last three years. As my main mentor, Martin has been an untiring Stoic in reviewing my explorations. This thesis would never have seen the light of day without the personal friendship of many, most especially Floris, Paul, Ben, Darren, the two Adrians. Additional thanks to the Philosophy secretaries Josie and Julia (and now Lynda) for their tolerance and humour, to Angie Hobbes for being such a stalwart of the Ancients and to Keith A. P. for infectious enthusiasm. Institutional thanks to the British Academy and Warwick University for making it all financially possible. The final honours are reserved for my parents for being so supportive and loving and to Melissa, for being the greatest force in my life, ever. Eros, friends, Jones Irwin Coventry / Ireland [December 1997]. 3 To Melissa, in eternal love REVIVING AN ANCIENT-MODERN QUARREL: A CRITIQUE OF DERRIDA'S READING OF PLATO AND PLATONISM CONTENTS LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS 8 INTRODUCTION 10 CHAPTER 1- Derrida on the "Moderns" and the "Ancients" 21 1.1 - Prefatory Remarks 22 1.2 - Derrida and Descartes 33 1.3 -A Poison (PJiarmakon) Deserved CHAPTER 2- From the Presocratics to Plato :A Meditation on a Complex Metaphysical Unity 55 2.1 - Prefatory Remarks 57 2.2 - Heraclitus and Parmenides 69 2.3 - Heraclitus and Plato Plato 76 2.4 - Parmenides and CHAPTER 3- Pla to contra Derrida I: The Case of the Meno 3.1 - Prefatory Remarks 84 3.2 - The Meno 88 3.3 - Philosophy's Doing Battle (diamkhoimen) 101 5 CHAPTER 4- Plato contra Derrida II : The Case of the Phaedrus 111 4.1 - Forms in the Phaedrus 124 4.2 - "Wisdom" in the Phaedrus CHAPTER 5- Derrida on "Platonism" : Deconstruction, Apophasis and Dialectic Remarks 144 5.1 - Prefatory Derrida's "Crisis" On the 5.2 - Questioning - Problem of the "Problem" 149 The Gift Death 160 5.3 - On "Denials" and of CHAPTER 6- Platonism contra Derrida I: The Cases of Plotinus and Boethius Remarks 180 6.1 - Prefatory "First Existent" in Plotinus 181 6.2 - On "The One" or Philosophy 191 6.3 - On The Consolation of CHAPTER 7- Platonism contra Derrida II : The Cases of Augustine and De Cusa 199 7.1 - Prefatory Remarks Wisdom 203 7.2 - Augustine's Love of "Wisdom" 215 7.3 - De Cusa on CONCLUSION I-A General Overview 227 II - Murdoch, Weil and a Postmodern Platonism 240 6 NOTES 248 BIBLIOGRAPHY 254 ABBREVIATIONS [Note: Quotationsfrom translationsgiven except where otherwise indicated] I- Works by Derrida "Cogito" - "Cogito and the History of Madness" translated by Alan Bass in WD [see below]. "Cogito et Histoire de la Folie" "Denials" - "How to avoid speaking: Denials" translated by Ken Frieden in Languages of the Unsayable: The Play of Negativity in Literature and Literary Theory. Edited by Sanford Budick and Wolfgang Iser [New York, Columbia University Press, 1989]. "Comment ne pas parler: D6n6gations" in Psyche: Inventions de lautre [Paris, Galilee, 1987] by Barbara Johnson [Chicago, Chicago DS - Dissemination translated University Press, 1981]. La Dissemination [Paris, Editions du Seuil, 1972] by Wills [Chicago, Chicago GD - The Gift of Death translated David University Press, 1995]. "Donner la mori" in L'ethique du don, Jacques Derrida et la pensee du don [Paris, 1992] "Origin Geometry ": An Introduction OG - Edmund Husserl's of translated by John P. Leavey Jr. [Lincoln, University of Nebraska Press, 1989]. Introduction a ` L'Origine de la geoinetrie" par Edinund Husserl [Paris, Presses Universitaires de France, 1962] Wood OTN - On the Naine translated by John P. Leavey Jr., David and Ian McLeod [Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1995]. This is a unified translation of three separate French texts: Sauf le None [Paris, Editions GalilCe, 1993], Passions [Paris, Editions Galilde, 1993] and Khora [Paris, Editions GalilCe, 1993] Johnson in DS. "La PP - "Plato's Pharmacy" translated by Barbara Pharmacie de Platon" in La Dissemination Theory SP - Speech and Phenomena and Other Essays on Husserl's of Signs edited and translated by David B. Allison [Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 1973]. La Voix et le phcnomene. Introduction au problente dausigne dans la phinomn nologic de Husserl [Paris, Presses Universitaires de France, 1967] by Alan Bass [Chicago, Chicago WD - Writing and Difference translated University Press, 1978]. L'Ccriture et la difference [Paris, Editions du Seuil, 1967] Platonists II - Works by Plotinus by Stephen MacKenna [London, Penguin, Enn. - The Enneads translated 1986]. Plotini Opera, editio maior in 3 volumes [Paris /Brussels, 1951-73] 8 Boethius Consol. - The Consolation of Philosophy translated by V. E. Watts [London, Penguin, 1969]. Boethii Philosophiae Consolatio edited by Ludovicus Bieler Corpus Christianorunz Series Latina XCIV [Turnholti, 1957] Augustine EA - The Essential Augustine edited by V. Bourke [Indiana, Hackett, 1964]. For Latin references for Augustine cf. Bibliography. De Cusa "CW" - "Concerning Wisdom" in UR. "De Sapientia" in "De "OLI" - "Of Learned Ignorance" UR. Docta Ignorantin" Selected Writings Nicholas De Cusa by John UR - Unity and Reform: of edited Patrick Dolan [University Of Notre Dame Press, 1962]. Opera Oinnia [Leipzig, Felix Meiner, 1932-] Iris Murdoch Mystics: Writings Philosophy Literature EM - Existentialists and on and [London, Random House, 1997] Simone Weil Ark, 1952] GG - Gravity and Grace [London, III - Other Abbreviated Titles From Thales Aristotle GP - W. K. C. Guthrie The Greek Philosophers: to [New York, Methuen, 1967] On Derrida ID - Rodolphe Gasch6 Inventions of Difference: Jacques [Harvard University Press, 1994] in Companion PL - G. R. F. Ferrari "Platonic Love" The Cambridge to Plato edited by Richard Kraut [Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1992] 9 REVIVING AN ANCIENT-MODERN QUARREL: A CRITIQUE OF DERRIDA'S READING OF PLATO AND PLATONISM Introduction Those who would like to consider "deconstruction" a symptom of modern or postmodern nihilism could indeed, if they wished, recognise in it the last in testimony - not to say the martyrdom of faith the present fin de siecle. This reading will always be possible. Who could prohibit it? In the name of what? But what has happened, so that what is thus permitted is never necessary as such? Derrida, "Denials" (p. 77) Unhappy Aristotle! Who invented for these men dialectics, the art of building up and pulling down, an art so far-fetched in its conjectures, so harsh in its arguments, so productive of contentions - embarassing even to itself, retracting everything, and really treating of nothing! Tertullian, "On Prescription Against Heretics" My aim in this thesis is in a sense quite simple: to repose the question "What is Philosophy? ". John Deeley in his New Beginnings: Early Modern Philosophy and Postmodern Thought [1] makes the claim that the "premoderns" interrogated the presuppositions of modernity more powerfully than any of the "postmoderns" have so far achieved [p. xii, Santella-Brago Preface to Deeley]. My own claim in this thesis is more moderate to the extent that it focuses on specific strands of the premodern and postmodern epochs in thought - that of Platonism on the one side and deconstruction on the other. But given this more restricted scope, my claim is perhaps more radical; that in the case of Derrida's thinking, deconstruction is not only less questioning of 10 modernity than Platonism, but is in fact a reinforcing of the modern paradigm. Derrida, on my interpretation, is a neo-modern rather than a post-modern; deconstruction is in effect a more developed form of Cartesianism.