Excerpt: I will take you on a tour through the idea of reality construction by travelling back and forth between the two intellectual strands in the process of modernization: the Enlightenment and Romanticism. The major part of our tour will be spent in the land of Romanticism, accepting without argument the kind of irrealism propounded by constructivists like Nelson Goodman, Richard Rorty and Jacques Derrida. But throughout I will try to give the Enlightenment its due by pointing out the important roles of technology in the processes of reality construction: in material constructions, as a basis for thought experiments, as provider of intellectual tools, and as a source for constructivist ideas in general.

Key words: Enlightenment, Romanticism, Goodman, Rorty, Derrida, irrealism, social constructivism, material construction

Philosophers and cognitive scientists have recently argued that perception is enactive (e.g., Varela, Thompson, & Rosch 1991; Noe, 2004; Di Paolo, 2009) 1 To put it simply, perception is action-oriented. When I perceive something, I perceive it as actionable. That is, I perceive it as something I can reach, or not; something I can pick up, or not; something I can hammer with, or not, and so forth. Such affordances (Gibson, 1977, 1979) for potential actions (even if I am not planning to take action) shape the way that I actually perceive the world. One can find the roots of this kind of approach in the pragmatists (e.g., Dewey, 1896), but also in phenomenologists like Edmund Husser!, Martin Heidegger, and Maurice Merleau-Ponty. Merleau-Ponty (1962) is most often cited in this regard, but Merleau-Ponty himself points back to Husserl’s analysis of the “I can” in Jdeen II (Husser! 1952), and to his analysis of the correlation between kinesthesia and perception (1973b; see Zahavi, 1994 and Gallagher & Zahavi, 2008 for further discussion) With this enactive view in mind, we revisit Husserl’s account of time-consciousness. In his analysis, the very basic temporal structure, protention-primal impression-retention, is said to characterize perception, as the most basic form of cognition as well as consciousness in general. As such, the temporal structure of perceptual consciousness should in some significant way reflect or enable its enactive character. Our question is this: if perception is enactive, then at a minimum, shouldn’t its temporal structure be such that it allows for that enactive character? In the first part of this essay, we provide a brief account of Husserl’s classical analysis. We then proceed to focus on the concept of primal impression by considering various objections that have been raised by Jacques Derrida and Michel Henry, who basically argue in opposite directions. Derrida emphasizes the relationality of time-consciousness and downplays the importance of the primal impression, whereas Henry emphasizes the irrelationality of time-consciousness and downplays the importance of protention and retention. In a further step, we consider some of Husserl’s later manuscripts on time, where he revises his original privileging of the primal impression. In the final section, we turn to the question of an enactive temporal structure.

Key words: Primal, perception, impression, enactive

Open peer commentary on the article “Constructivism and Mystical Experience” by Hugh Gash. Abstract: I explore some of the respective affinities and tensions between constructivism and mysticism. Through particular reference to Derrida’s philosophy of deconstruction, I focus on selected themes raised by Gash’s critique through an alternative lens of interpretation.

When drawing a distinction between classical philosophy of identity and contemporary philosophy of difference, we tend to overlook crucial differences between the various philosophies of difference. In this article, an argument in favour of focusing on the different uses that are made of difference is presented. Thus, it investigates four central theoreticians of difference, Derrida, Deleuze, Luhmann, and Rorty in order to show how they differ from each other in spite of the fact that they all opt for a post-ontological philosophy of difference. The investigation is undertaken with the help of two central distinctions. Firstly, the radical attack on discursive order as such (typical for Derrida and Deleuze) is opposed to the evolutionary attempt to give up classical conceptuality in order to settle on new territories (to be found in Luhmann and Rorty). Secondly, a distinction is drawn between the use of difference as the heart of a theoretical enterprise (as can be seen in Derrida and Luhmann) and the use of difference for pragmatic purposes only (shared by Deleuze and Rorty). In conclusion, it is suggested that the four philosophies of difference are used as different means for different purposes.

Key words: are: Philosophy of difference, constructivism, deconstruction, pragmatism, nomadology, systems theory.

Psychotherapy is primarily concerned with the realm of human meaning. Four theories of meaning are investigated – traditional empiricist theory, structuralism, and Piaget’s and Derrida’s positive corrections to the traditional and structuralist understandings of meaning. Piaget held that conceptual systems are open-ended and changeable, and Derrida proposed that meanings spill over individual concepts and thus are products of an entire conceptual system. Piaget’s analysis reminds psychotherapists that they are to remain open to further development of their meaning systems, and Derrida’s work calls attention to the need to appreciate that a client’s meaning and the meaning of psychological texts are more than the meaning of the particular words used.

Niklas Luhmann and Jacques Derrida start with a common assumption in their analyses of the law and the economy – the foundational paradox of social institutions. But then autopoiesis and deconstruction move into opposite directions. Luhmann pursues the question of how de-paradoxification constructs the immanence of social institutions and builds a world of autopoietic social systems. By contrast, Derrida’s thought aims at the transcendence of social institutions through their re-paradoxification. However, there is a hidden supplementarity of autopoiesis and deconstruction which makes it worthwhile to relate the theories to each other. Derrida’s distinction of writing/speech is necessarily blind toward Luhmann’s distinction of consciousness/communication, but is, at the same time, continuously provoked by it. On another level, the opposite happens. Luhmann’s autopoiesis is permanently irritated by Derrida’s différance but is at the same time unable to conceptualize it. This complementary blindness of their distinctions directrices is a permanent source of mutual irritation which requires a reformulation of the social and of the possibility of justice.

Key words: autopoiesis, deconstruction, justice, paradox, systems theory

This article introduces and discusses the difference between big theory and strong theory. While the former centres on identity, symmetry, and universality, the latter insists upon the self-reflexive, autopoietic, and paradoxical nature of theory and theorizing. Taking off from this distinction, the article investigates the crucial interconnections between strong theory, systems theory (Luhmann), deconstruction (Derrida), and form theory (Spencer-Brown), while simultaneously stressing the problematic use of ontological ideas and concepts in these theories that otherwise seek to transgress a Western tradition of a metaphysics of ontology. The article consist of three parts. First, a general sketch of the partition of big and strong theory is laid out. Second, an introduction to main aspects of the form logic of Spencer-Brown is presented in order to portray the principal, systemic apparatus of Luhmann and more generally to discuss the structural design of strong theory. Third, a comparison of Derrida’s practice of textual dissemination and Luhmann’s systems theory is focused upon. Conclusively, some tentative remarks of the inherent limits of strong theory vis-à-vis systems theory are optioned.