Fearless Speech -Michel Foucault
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Transcript of Fearless Speech -Michel Foucault
7/29/2019 Fearless Speech -Michel Foucault
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Fearless Speech6 lectures given by Michel Foucault
in the Fall of 1983
Contemporary Philosophy: Douglas Olena
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Outline
The Word Parrhesia
The meaning of the word
The evolution of the word
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Outline
Parrhesia in Euripides
The Phoenician Woman
Hippolytus
The Bacchae
Electra
Ion
Orestes
Problematizing Parrhesia
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Outline
Parrhesia in the care of the self
Socratic parrhesia
The practice of parrhesia
in human relationships
in techniques of examination
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11 “The word parrhesia appears for the first time in
Greek literature in Euripides [c.484-407 B.C.], andoccurs throughout the ancient Greek world of letters
from the end of the Fifth Century B.C.”
It is also found in the patristic texts in the 4th and 5th
centuries A.D. That is not all. Kittel’s TheologicalDictionary of the New Testament records a long
tradition in the Hellenized Hebrew world, in Philo
and Josephus, in the Septuagint and New Testament.
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11 “Parrhesia is ordinarily translated into English as
‘free speech.’” The “parrhesiastes is the one who uses
parrhesia, i.e., the one who speaks the truth.”
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The Meaning
of the Word
Frankness p. 12
Truth p. 13
Danger p. 15
Criticism p. 17
Duty p. 19
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12 Frankness
“the parrhesiastes, is someone who says everythinghe has in mind: he does not hide anything, but
opens his heart and mind completely to otherpeople through his discourse.
The word parrhesia, then, refers to a type of
relationship between the speaker and what hesays.”
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13, 14 Truth
There are two uses of the word parrhesia. “First,there is a pejorative sense of the word not very farfrom ‘chattering,’ and which consists in saying any-
and everything one has in mind without
qualification.”Second, “To my mind, the parrhesiastes says what is
true because he knows it is true; and he knows thatit is true because it really is true.”
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14 Truth
Contrast the Cartesian view of evidence with Greek
parrhesia and with a modern scientific view of truth.
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15 Truth
In the Greek way of thinking having the truth has todo with the moral qualities of the speaker. “Truth-having is guaranteed by the possession of certain
moral qualities.”
15 Foucault talks about the ‘parrhesiastic game’throughout the lectures where the parrhesiastes has
the moral qualities required to convey truth toothers.
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What is a game on Foucault’s account?
A game is a rule governed activity like the use of language. There is a play of representations and
forces, proofs and excuses and words and peopleare the game pieces.
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15 Truth
Foucault wants to know how we can tell whethersomeone has the requisite qualities to be a
parrhesiastes and how can he “be certain that whathe believes is, in fact, the truth.”
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15-16 Danger
“Someone is said to use parrhesia and meritsconsideration as a parrhesiastes only if there is risk or danger for him in telling the truth.”
“Parrhesia, then, is linked to courage in the face of
danger: it demands courage to speak the truth inspite of some danger. And in its extreme form,
telling the truth takes place in the ‘game’ of life ordeath.”
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16 Danger
The game is not necessarily life and death. It mayhave to do with a friend warning another not to dosomething dangerous. The risk is loss of
relationship.
17 “But the parrhesiastes primarily chooses aspecific relationship to himself: he prefers himself as
a truth-teller rather than as a living being who isfalse to himself.”
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17 Criticism
The function of parrhesia is “criticism: criticism of the interlocutor or of the speaker himself.”
18 “The parrhesiastes is always less powerful than
the one with whom he speaks.” The parrhesiastes isin an inferior position politically, socially etc., so has
some risk in saying the truth.
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19 Duty
“in parrhesia, telling the truth is regarded as a
duty.”
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19 Duty
“To summarize the foregoing, parrhesia is a kind of verbal activity where the speaker has a specific
relation to truth through frankness, a certainrelationship to his own life through danger, a
certain type of relation to himself or other peoplethrough criticism (self-criticism or criticism of other
people), and a specific relation to moral law through
freedom and duty.”
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19 Duty“More precisely, parrhesia is a verbal activity in
which a speaker expresses his personal relationshipto truth, and risks his life because he recognizes
truth-telling as a duty to improve or help other
people (as well as himself).”
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Evolution
of the Word
Rhetoric p. 20
Politics p. 22
Philosophy p. 23
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Evolution
of the Word
Why does Foucault talk about evolution of
words?
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20 Rhetoric
Rhetoric stands in opposition to parrhesia in Greek thinking. Why?
Flattery, the great enemy, is, as well, in opposition to
parrhesia.
“The dialogue through questions and answers is
typical for parrhesia; i.e., dialogue is a majortechnique for playing the parrhesiastic game.”
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21 Rhetoric
In the Phaedrus in Plato, the problem is thedifference between “logos which speaks the truth
and the logos which is not capable of such truth-
telling.”The logos which does not tell the truth corresponds
with argument meant to distract from the issue.
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21 RhetoricIn the Roman Empire, parrhesia is equated to freespeech in some forms of rhetoric.
It is “a sort of ‘figure’ among rhetorical figures” that
is a completely natural expression, without pretenseor device.
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22 PoliticsIn Athenian democracy parrhesia plays a central role.
“We can say quite generally that parrhesia was aguideline for democracy as well as an ethical and
personal attitude characteristic of the good citizen.”
Its field is the agora or marketplace.
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22 PoliticsIn the Hellenistic period, parrhesia has to do morewith advisors speaking to the king, to prevent the
abuse of power. This is no longer in the agora.
23 A good ruler is able to play the parrhesiasticgame well.
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23 Politics
“A sovereign shows himself to be a tyrant if hedisregards his honest advisors, or punishes them for
what they have said.”
The parrhesiastic game has three players here, theadvisors, the king and the silent majority the
advisors speak for.
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23 PhilosophyPhilosophy can be thought of as an art of life, astherapeutic.
Socrates plays the part of a parrhesiastes when he
speaks to the citizens of Athens, urging them to carefor themselves by pointing out the truth to them.
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23-24 PhilosophyIn the Apology , he bids “them to care for wisdom,truth, and the perfection of their souls.”
In the Alcibiades , Socrates urges the young man, to
care for himself, unlike others who flatter him.Socrates risks Alcibiades’ anger.
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24 Philosophy
“Philosophical parrhesia is thus associated with thetheme of the care of oneself (epimeleia heautou).
By the time of the Epicureans, parrhesia’s affinity
with the care of oneself developed to the pointwhere parrhesia itself was primarily regarded as the
techne [art] of spiritual guidance…”
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Outline
Parrhesia in Euripides
The Phoenician Woman
Hippolytus
The Bacchae
Electra
Ion
Orestes
Problematizing Parrhesia
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29 The Phoenician Woman
“Parrhesia is linked […] to Polyneices’ social status.”
“If you are not a regular citizen in the city, […] then
you cannot use parrhesia.”
no free speech –> no power –> slave
women, blacks, Japanese, children
no parrhesia –> can’t oppose ruler’s power
without right of criticism –> tyranny
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29 The Phoenician Woman
“The man who exercises power is wise only insofaras there exists someone who can use parrhesia to
criticize him, thereby putting some limit to hispower, to his command.”
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30-31 Hippolytus
“Citizenship by itself does not appear to besufficient to obtain and guarantee the exercise of
free speech.
Honor, a good reputation for oneself and one’sfamily, is also needed before one can freely address
the people of the city.”
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30-31 Hippolytus
“Parrhesia thus requires both moral and social
qualifications which come from a noble birth and a
respectful reputation.”Cultural capital.
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31-33 The Bacchae
Bearers of bad news were punished.
The herdsman has bad news for the king.
The herdsman asks King Pentheus if he may use
parrhesia because he fears the king’s wrath. The kingagrees on the condition that the herdsman speak thetruth. No harm will come to the herdsman.
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31-33 The Bacchae
Parrhesiastic contract
The sovereign who lacks truth agrees with thepowerless who has it that the powerless will not
come to harm.
32 This contract was “granted to the best and mosthonest citizens.”
“The ‘contract’ is intended to limit the risk he takes
in speaking.”
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33-36 Electra
Electra makes a parrhesiastic contract withClytemnestra to avoid being punished.
Electra is, asymmetrically, in the position of a slave
in relation to Clytemnestra.But Orestes and Electra kill Clytemnestra for herconfession
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33-36 Electra“The one who was granted the privilege of parrhesia is not harmed, but the one who granted the right of
parrhesia is.”
“The parrhesiastic contract becomes a subversivetrap for Clytemnestra.”
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36-57 Ion, a parrhesiastic play
38 As part of the shift of oracular truth from Delphito Athens, “truth is no longer disclosed by the gods
to human beings (as at Delphi), but is disclosed to
human beings by human beings through Athenian parrhesia.”
The Story…
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36-57 Ion, a parrhesiastic play
The right of political parrhesia is reserved only forthose born free and male in Athens.
44 “The main motif of Ion concerns the fight for
truth against god’s silence: human beings mustmanage, by themselves to discover and to tell the
truth.”
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36-57 Ion, a parrhesiastic play
44 Ion and Creusa play parrhesiastes while Apolloplays an anti-parrhesiastes.
Apollo keeps silent, lies, and uses his power to
cover up the truth.The roles of Ion and Creusa as parrhesiastes aredifferent.
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36-57 Ion, a parrhesiastic play44 Ion’s Role
48 Even though Ion would be the son (of a foreignerand a bastard) of king Xuthus husband of the
legitimate heir Creusa, he would be powerless andshunned by all classes of Athenian citizens.
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36-57 Ion, a parrhesiastic play
50 If Ion is the son of Xuthus by an unknown non-native mother, then he would not be a native son of
Athens and thence not be able to practice parrhesia.
He would be as a slave.51 If however his mother were Athenian, he would
have the right of free speech.
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36-57 Ion, a parrhesiastic play
Creusa’s role
52 Being a woman, Creusa cannot be a parrhesiastes to the king, but will “publicly accuse Apollo for his
misdeeds.”“Truth thus comes to light as an emotional reactionto the god’s injustice and his lies.”
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36-57 Ion, a parrhesiastic play
55 “Creusa’s accusation is a public maledictionagainst Apollo.”
But in the parrhesiastic discourse with her servant,
the roles are reversed. It becomes a confession of sorts with her servant as parrhesiastes extracting
painful details of the events.
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36-57 Ion, a parrhesiastic play56 “Ion’s parrhesia takes the form of truthful politicalcriticism.”
“Creusa’s parrhesia takes the form of a truthful
accusation against another more powerful than she,and as a confession of the truth about herself.”
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57-71 Orestes
One witness at Orestes trial is called an
Athuroglossos.
62 “It literally refers to someone who has a tongue
but not a door. Hence it implies someone who
cannot shut his mouth.”63 “You cannot distinguish those occasions when
you should speak from those when you shouldremain silent.”
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57-71 Orestes
64 “Athuroglossos is thus almost synonymous with
parrhesia taken in its pejorative sense, and exactly
the opposite of parrhesia’s positive sense.”
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57-71 Orestes
67 The first characteristic of the 4th speaker is thathe is a man (not a woman) who is courageous.
The second characteristic is that he doesn’t spend
his days in constant discussion in the agora.
68 Thirdly he is one who works his own land, an
autourgos , what we would call a self reliant person.
69 Last, he “is a man of moral integrity,” blameless.
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71 “Around 418 B.C., [during the life of Socrates] parrhesia was presented as having only a positive
sense or value.”
“freedom to speak one’s mind”
“a privilege conferred on the first citizens of Athens” (those born of Athenian parents)
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In the Orestes parrhesia is seen in both its positive and
negative aspects.The first problem arises when one asks whether
being born a citizen or whether one is a moralcitizen gives the right to parrhesia.
The second problem relates to “the relation between
parrhesia and mathesis , to knowledge andeducation.”
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73 “The crisis regarding parrhesia is a problem of truth:for the problem is one of recognizing who is capable
of speaking the truth within the limits of an
institutional system where everyone is equallyentitled to give his own opinion.”
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74 In conclusion: “I am trying to analyze the wayinstitutions, practices, habits, and behavior become aproblem for people who behave in specific sorts of
ways, who have certain types of habits, who engage in
certain kinds of practices, and who put to work specific kinds of institutions.”
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74 “The history of thought […] is the history of theway people begin to take care of something, of the
way they become anxious about this or that—for
example, about madness, about crime, about sex,about themselves, or about truth.”
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Parrhesia in a democracy becomes a competition for an
audience.
All citizen voices have equal weight so the important
voices are drowned out.
Only when an oligarchy reemerges does the positiveform of parrhesia find a place again between the rulers
and their advisors.
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87 “For Aristotle, parrhesia is either a moral-ethical
quality, or pertains to free speech as addressed to a
monarch.”
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Socratic parrhesia is a new kind of speech.
How is it new?
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Parrhesia in Socrates is linked to the care of oneself.
Socrates tests (like a basanos , touchstone) people to see
if they are taking proper care of themselves
97 This is done in a truth game which is concernedwith the discovery of one’s character, a “rational
accounting of a person’s life.”
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First, Socratic parrhesia is a philosophical activity.
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“Insofar as the philosopher had to discover and toteach certain truths about the world, nature, etc., he
assumed an epistemic role.
Taking a stand towards the city, the laws, political
institutions, and so on, required, in addition, apolitical role.
And parrhesiastic activity also endeavored to
elaborate the nature of the relationships between truth
and one’s style of life, or truth and an ethics and
aesthetics of the self.”
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“Secondly, the target of this new parrhesia is not topersuade the Assembly, but to convince someone thathe must take care of himself and of others; this means
that he must change his life.” One must change “one’s
style of life, one’s relation to others, and one’s relationoneself.”
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Conversion to oneself is important from the fourth
century BC on into the Christian era.
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107 “Thirdly, these new parrhesiastic practices imply a
complex set of connections between the self and truth.
The circle implied in knowing the truth about oneself
in order to know the truth is characteristic of
parrhesiastic practice since the Fourth Century, andhas been one of the problematic enigmas of Western
Thought.”
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Finally, this new parrhesia is not linked to any
particular venue, the agora, the palace, or the schools.It can be practiced anywhere.
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Practice of Parrhesia
In Human Relationships
Community Life
Public Life
Personal Relationships
In Techniques of Examination: Preliminary
Remarks
Solitary Self-examination
Self-diagnosis
Self-testing
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In Community Life
108 “Although the Epicureans, with the importancethey gave to friendship, emphasized community life
more than other philosophers at this time,nonetheless one can also find some Stoic groups as
well as Stoic or Stoico-Cynic philosophers, whoacted as moral and political advisors to variouscircles and aristocratic clubs.”
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In Community Life
Philodemus 110-~40,35 BC110 “Philodemus regards parrhesia not only as a
quality, virtue, or personal attitude, but also as atechne comparable both to the art of medicine and
to the art of piloting a boat.”
111 “…we can say that navigation, medicine, and
the practice of parrhesia are all ‘clinical techniques.’”
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In Community Life
114 “In one’s own salvation, [with no reference to an
afterlife or judgment] other members of theEpicurean community […] have a decisive role to
play as necessary agents enabling one to discoverthe truth about oneself, and in helping one to gain
access to a happy life.
Hence the very important emphasis on friendship
in the Epicurean groups.”
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In Public Life
Diogenes of Sinope ~404,412 - 323 BC
There are parallels between Christianity and Cynicpractice.
Cynic practice took place from the late 1st centuryBC to 4th century AD and took Diogenes as theirmodel.
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In Public Life
117 “The Cynics thus taught by way of examples
and the explanations associated with them. Theywanted their own lives to be a blazon of essentialtruths which would then serve as a guideline, or as
an example for others to follow.”
“The Cynic idea that a person is nothing else but hisrelation to truth, and that this relation to truth takes
shape or is given form in his own life—that is
completely Greek.”
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In Public Life
118 “But now in the Cynic tradition, the main
references for the philosophy are not to the texts of doctrines, but to exemplary lives.”
“The idea that a philosopher’s life should be
exemplary and heroic is important inunderstanding the relationship of Cynicism to
Christianity, as well as for understanding Cynic
parrhesia as a public activity.”
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In Public Life
119 “The three main types of parrhesiastic practice
utilized by the Cynics were:
1. critical preaching;
2. scandalous behavior; and
3. what I shall call the ‘provocative dialogue.’”
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In Public Life
Critical preaching: “Cynic preaching about
freedom, the renunciation of luxury, Cynic
criticisms of political institutions and existing moralcodes, and so on, also opened the way for some
Christian themes. But Christian proselytes not onlyspoke about themes which were often similar to the
Cynics; they also took over the practice of
preaching.”
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In Public Life
120 “In short, their preaching was against all socialinstitutions insofar as such institutions hindered
one’s freedom and independence.”
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In Public Life
(2) Scandalous behavior: (p 120-122)
Dio Chrysostom 40-120 CE
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In Public Life
(3) Provocative dialogue: (p 122-133) Most of this
is a dialogue between Diogenes and Alexanderwhere Diogenes displays 132 “three faulty modes
of royal life.”
“The first one is devoted to wealth, the second tophysical pleasure, and the third to glory and
political power.” Diogenes continually prods the
king, endangering himself.
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In Public Life
133 In the discourse between Diogenes and
Alexander “…the main effect… is not to bring theinterlocutor to a new truth, or to a new level of
self-awareness;
it is to lead the interlocutor to internalize thisparrhesiastic struggle to fight within himself
against his own faults, and to be with himself in
the same way that Diogenes was with him.”
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Personal Relationships
133-4 “Plutarch tries to answer the question: How is
it possible to recognize a true parrhesiastes or truth-teller? And similarly: How is it possible to
distinguish a parrhesiastes from a flatterer?”
135 “We are our own flatterers, and it is in order todisconnect this spontaneous relation we have to
ourselves, to rid ourselves of our philautia , that weneed a parrhesiastes.”
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Personal Relationships
136 How does one recognize a parrhesiastes?1. There is a connection between his logos and bios.
2. “There is a second criterion, which is: the
permanence, the continuity, the stability andsteadiness of the true parrhesiastes, the true
friend, regarding his choices, his opinions, and his
thoughts:”
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In Techniques of Examination
143 Foucault moves from the necessity for avoiding
self-delusion and requiring permanence of spirit tothe disciplines necessary for capturing these statesof being.
In Epicurean, Stoic and Cynic thinking, the need for
a method of ensuring parrhesiastic legitimacydrives the establishment of disciplines. This is also
the case because philosophy is seen as a therapeutic
discipline on par with medical practice.
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In Techniques of Examination
143 First, there is a shift in the use of the word
parrhesia meaning courage “to tell the truth to other
people.”
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In Techniques of Examination
144 “Secondly, this new kind of parrhesiastic game—where
the problem is to confront the truth about yourself—requires
what the Greeks called askesis”, where askesis “has a very
broad sense denoting any kind of practical training or
exercise” unlike “Christian asceticism” which “has as its
ultimate aim or target the renunciation of the self, whereasthe moral askesis of the Greco-Roman philosophies has as its
goal the establishment of a specific relationship to oneself—a
relationship of self-possession and self-sovereignty.”
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In Techniques of Examination
144 “Thirdly… most of these texts written in lateantiquity about ethics are not at all concerned with
advancing a theory about the foundations of ethics, but are practical books containing specific recipes
and exercises one had to read, reread, to meditateupon, to learn, in order to construct a lasting matrixfor one’s own behavior.”
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In Techniques of Examination
145 Foucault will look at these exercises (roughly
“examination of conscience”), in terms of
1. how they differ from one another; “
2. what aspects of the mind, feelings, behavior, etc.,
were considered in these different exercises;
3. that these exercises, despite their differences,implied a relation between truth and the self.”
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Solitary self-examination
Seneca 4 BC - 65 AD
149 About Seneca: “These mistakes are only
inefficient actions requiring adjustment betweenends and means.” They are not sins.
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Solitary self-examination
149 “The point of the fault concerns a practical error
in his behavior since he was unable to establish aneffective rational relation between the principles of
conduct he knows and the behavior he actuallyengaged in.”
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Solitary self-examination
149-150 “Seneca does not analyze his responsibilityor feelings of guilt; it is not, for him, a question of
purifying himself of these faults.
Rather, he engages in a kind of administrative
scrutiny which enables him to reactivate variousrules and maxims in order to make them morevivid, permanent, and effective for future behavior.”
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Self-diagnosis
150 Foucault examines the text by Seneca De
tranquillitate animi [“On the Tranquillity of Mind”]which has to do with the “constancy or steadiness
of mind.”
“It denotes stability, self sovereignty, and
independence.But tranquillitas also refers to a certain feeling of pleasurable calm which has its source, its principle,
in this self-sovereignty or self-possession.”
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Self-diagnosis
157 Serenus talks to Seneca about this disturbance of soul in
terms of sea-sickness, as if he is coming to a doctor who cancure him:
“I beg you, therefore, if you have any remedy by which you
could stop this fluctuation of mine, to deem me worthy of
being indebted to you for tranquillity.
I know that these mental disturbances of mine are not
dangerous and give no promise of a storm; to express what I
complain of in apt metaphor, I am distressed, not by a
tempest, but by sea-sickness.”
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Self-diagnosis
160 “Serenus’s instability does not derive from his ‘sins,’ or
from the fact that he exists as a temporal being—as inAugustine, for example. It stems from the fact that he has not
yet succeeded in harmonizing his actions and thoughts with
the ethical structure he has chosen for himself.
Because he does not possess the tranquillitas, the firmitas,which comes from complete self-sovereignty. And Seneca’s
reply to this self-examination and moral request is an
exploration of the nature of this stability of mind.”
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Self-testing
160 These remarks are about one form of self-testing
recommended by Epictetus (55-135 AD).“Epictetus’ problem consists in knowing how to distinguish
those representations that he can control from those that he
cannot control, that incite involuntary emotions, feelings,
behavior, etc., and that must therefore be excluded from his
mind.
Epictetus’ solution is that we must adopt an attitude of
permanent surveillance with regard to all our
representations.”
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Self-testing
161 He suggest the use of two metaphors, that of anight watchman and that of a “money-changer.”
The night watchman is to prevent the entrance of any representation “without first checking his
identity,” andthe money-changer is one who “verifies theauthenticity of the currency” the representation.
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Self-testing163 Epictetus gives another exercise.
One should ask whether what one sees lies “within
the province of moral purpose and will.”If it does, then keep it, if not, then get rid of it.
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Self-testing
164 “Epictetus wants us to constitute a world of
representations where nothing can intrude which isnot subject to the sovereignty of our will. So, again,
self-sovereignty is the organizing principle of thisform of self-examination.”
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Self-testing
1) 164 The use of parrhesia as frankness of speech,
moves from the master/disciple relationship wherethe master used parrhesia on the disciple, to the
disciple being trained to use parrhesia on himself,as a duty of self examination.
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Self-testing
2) 165 These exercises are not strictly designed to
teach one to “know thyself” though that is the resultof some of these exercises.
“For the various relationships which one has to
oneself are embedded in very precise techniqueswhich take the form of spiritual exercises… dealing
with deeds… states of equilibrium of the soul… theflow of representations, and so on.”
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Self-testing
3) 165 “What is at stake is the relation of the self to
truth or to some rational principles.”
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Self-testing
165-166 “The truth of the self involves, on the onehand, a set of rational principles which are
grounded in general statements about the world,
human life, necessity, happiness, freedom and soon, and, on the other hand, practical rules for
behavior.”
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Self-testing
166 “One can comport oneself towards oneself inthe role of a technician, of a craftsman, of an artist,
who from time to time stops working, examines
what he is doing, reminds himself of the rules of hisart, and compares these rules with what he has
achieved thus far.”
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169 “My intention was not to deal with the problem
of truth, but with the problem of the truth-teller,and of truth-telling as an activity.”
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170 There are two sides to the problematization of
truth in the West.
The first side “is concerned with determining howto ensure that a statement is true […] which I would
like to call the ‘analytics of truth.’
And on the other side, concerned with the question
of the importance of telling the truth, knowing whois able to tell the truth, and knowing why we shouldtell the truth, we have the toots of what we could
call the ‘critical’ tradition in the West.”
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170-171 “And here you will recognize one of my
targets in this seminar, namely, to construct agenealogy of the critical attitude in Western
philosophy.