permaculture

[Bob Howard <rmhoward@omninet.net.au>]

"S.K. Harrison" wrote:



> > From: Bob Howard <rmhoward@omninet.net.au>
>
> > Let me give you a feminist permaculture example
> <snipped big bit about women and dryland
> salinity>
>
> What you describe here should not be taken as
> some kind of departure from "science," nor as
> some point of view unique to feminists or women.
> Phil Agre calls such participation Public Reason
> and points out that an ostensible science or
> rationality is up for regular abuse by
> politicians and corporations. You can read his
> extensive piece here:
>
> www.indymedia.org/print.php3?article_id=3159
>
> Of especial pertinence to your comments, please
> note the second to last section, titled "Identity
> Politics: Public Reason Rejected in Response to
> Trauma". Nevertheless, the whole should be read;
> it will prove instructive to many of the points
> being raised in this thread.
>
> Sean.
>

I'm not entirely sure of where you're coming from here. My example about 
women's
knowledge and scientific knowledge was not meant to be about the 
particularities of
women's oppression but was about the _historical_ evolution of what is called
scientific knowledge which I was arguing is determined by who owns the means 
of
production and reproduction.

Science in the 19th Century and up until the 1920's wholeheartedly embraced 
the view
that people of colour were inferior. This was a rationalization of European 
hegemony
and a lot of science was done it's name. In my opinion the theory of 
evolution and the
biological understanding reproduction and genetics is still heavily tainted 
by this
history.


Whilst I am sympathetic with the argument for a 'public reason' as a political
extension of scientific practice. I would argue that the democratic elements 
of
science are a result of the political history of democracy. Democracy posits 
some sort
of unitary world view in which arguments may rage.

But it is still arguable that these arguments and the political conditions for
democracy can suffer leading to a collapse in scientific practice. I think 
that
science is particularly susceptible to fascism and despotism. And other 
virulent forms
of patriarchy. I should think that the recent history of pharmaceutical 
research and
commercially funded biomedical research is indicative of a collapse in 
scientific
opinion.

In conditions such as this the democratic parameters of debate shrink. 
Parliamentary
oppositions tend to agree with the government. And the shift from sterile 
pretense to
no democracy at all is just seen as part of the general downturn.


Conditions such as this are ripe for revolution and the overthrow of 
institutions and
ways of knowing - all is up for grabs. But their is scientific or even 
humanistic
guarantee that there will be progress or enlightenment or even any future at 
all.