Author: Byung-Chul Han
Claim: Mental illnesses (depression, adhd, burnout syndrome etc.) are a symptom of today’s “violence of positivity”, and by positivity he does not mean optimism and whatnot, but excess, sameness. It is a neuronal problem, not an immunological one, for the technology for treating viral infections has improved in the past years.
Immunological pattern - describing the way contemporary society deals with threats, the Other.
Examples: defense/attack, us vs. the other (foreigners).
The Cold War marked the end of this immunological paradigm.
In 21st century there is paradigm shift in seeings things. Such a world (for which others have called the disciplinary society) has been replaced by a society of fitness studios, office towers, banks, airports, shopping malls, and genetic laboratories.
We are no longer the “obedience-subjects” of disciplinary society, but the “achievement-subjects” of achievement society.
The complaint of the depressive individual, ‘Nothing is possible,’ can only occur in a society that thinks, ‘Nothing is impossible.’
Positivity - sameness, absorption, assimilation, excess
Negativity - space in between, non-positive, non-productive
Viva activa - doing, active engagement with the world
Viva contemplativa - understanding, contemplating the world. It connects the experience of being in which what is beautiful and perfect does not change or pass, a state that eludes all human intervention. Offers resistance to crowding, intrusive stimuli.
The Human Condition by Hannah Arendt: She mentions framing birth as a hopeful/heroic source for action, and places importance in viva activa. In the western tradition, Plato/Arsitotle elevate the life of thought, but we should restore dignity to the active life.
Modern society turned viva activa into a caricature of itself and annihilates the conditions for viva contemplativa.
Han praises deep immersive attention, as the upmost activity one can do, vs. multitasking, which animals need to do for their survival (e.g. case where they’re eating their pray, but also have to pay attention to their environment so as to not be killed and so on). We owe the cultural achievements of humanity, which include philosophy, to deep, contemplative attention. Contemplative life restores human depth.
Our minds are broad but flat.
Culture presumes an environment in which deep attention is possible. Increasingly, such immersive reflection is being displaced by an entirely different form of attention: hyperattention
Profound boredom benefits the creative process.
Tasks for which pedagogues are necessary
Nietzsche Twilight of the Idol, 3 tasks for which pedagogues are necessary:
- see
- think
- speak and to write
Noble culture - goal of education according to Nietzsche.
Learning to see means “getting your eyes used to calm, to patience, to letting things come to you.”—that is, making yourself capable of deep and contemplative attention, casting a long and slow gaze. Such learning-to-see represents the “first preliminary schooling for spirituality.” . One must learn “not to react immediately to a stimulus, but instead of take control of the inhibiting, excluding instincts.
Negativity keeps Dasein alive. Without negativity we become autistic machines, how computers mechanically execute operations.
The world has lost the gift of interruption. Acceleration abolishes intervals. “Betweens” and “between-times” are lacking.
But if we replace boredom, with that are we replacing it?
Zen meditation as way of attaining this negative state, void, while being an active process.
Potencies
Positive Potency - the power to do. The most valued form of action, of power, for the achievement subject.
Negative Potency - the power not to do. To be able to say “no” to stimuli. Essential idleness, viva contemplativa.
Impotency - the inability to act.
Hyperactivity as passive activity
Contemplation requires sustained attention, an active form of action, in contrast to hyperattention. When we surrender our attention to the external impulses of doing, consuming, achieving, producing, we engage passive behaviour. Without the ability to say “no”, we are mere vessels for the content we consume.
Other thoughts
I listened to a podcast episode from Critical Media Studies on this book, and I did agree somewhat to their view, that, while this text is not meant to provide any advice, it is a philosophical study after all, how to bring this into praxis? The contemplative life, being more disconnected, while some people have to fight for their survival? This is the caveat with many books in this genre.
However, I dislike when people say “capitalism is inescapable so you might as well participate”, because there is something at the individual level that can be done. Individual resistance to digital overload, to fragmented action, matters, and you cannot organize without internal integrity first.
I’m also torn between my ambitious “achievement subject” tendencies and the book’s critique. That’s what made it so powerful for me.
Not to mention the somewhat pessimism that arises when discussing such subjects. How to combat that?
Lastly, after listening to the last chapter, I feel so blurry that I need to revisit it again.