Sacred Channels: The Archaic Illusion of Communication (Recursions)

Erich Hörl's 'Sacred Channels' is an original take on the history of communication theory and the cultural imaginary of communication understood through the notions of the sacred and the primitive. Hörl offers insight into the shared ground of anthropology and media theory in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and presents an archeology of the philosophy of technology that underpins contemporary culture. This singular and unique project focuses on the ethnological disciplines and their phantasmatic imaginations of a prealphabetical realm of the sacred and the primitive but reads them in the context of media cultural questions as epistemic unconscious and as projections of the emerging postalphabetical condition. Drawing inspiration from work by the likes of Friedrich Kittler, Hörl's understanding of cybernetics in the post-World War II interdisciplinary field informs a rich analysis that is of interest to media scholars and to anyone seeking to understand the historical and theoretical underpinnings of the humanities in the age of technical media Cover 1 Contents 8 From Aristotle to Hörl1 10 Jean-Luc Nancy 10 Preface to the German Edition 20 Preface to the English Translation 24 Introduction 32 Part I: In the Shadow of Formalization A History of Thinking 46 1. Blind Thinking around 1900 48 The Turn from the Intuitive to the Symbolic 48 Thinking the unthinkable 48 The symbolic and intuition 59 Leibniz as a prophet 64 2. The Symbolic and Communication 74 The Crisis of Thinking since 1850 74 The dead bones of logic 75 Symbolist subversion 82 Operations research of the human mind 90 Unrepresentable communication 109 Structuralism and field theory 121 3. The Sacred and the Genealogy of Thinking 134 Descent into the Aristotelian Underground 134 The pre-Aristotelian situation of understanding 135 The prehistory of the categories 144 Descartes among the savages 160 Paths of reason 175 Part II: The Specter of the Primitive A Hauntology of Communication 198 4. The Night of the Human Being 200 Being and Experience under the Conditions of the Unrepresentable 200 Primitiveness and crisis 201 Savage media 206 Sacred communication 226 Note on heresy 239 5. The End of the Archaic Illusion 252 Communication, Information, Cybernetics 252 Desacralizing the channels 252 Coding the real 263 Cybernetics and coolness of mind 270 A new mythology of the binary 281 Appendix 300 Heidegger and Cybernetics 300 Bibliography 324 Index of Names 344 Contents[-][-]From Aristotle to H rl by Jean-Luc Nancy[-][-]Preface to the German Edition[-]Preface to the English Translation[-][-]The Sacred Channels[-]Introduction[-][-]Part I [-]In the Shadow of Formalization: A History of Thinking[-]1 Blind Thinking around 1900: The Turn from the Intuitive to the Symbolic[-]Thinking the unthinkable[-]The symbolic and intuition[-]Leibniz as a prophet[-]2 The Symbolic and Communication: The Crisis of Thinking Since 1850[-]The dead skeleton of logic[-]Symbolist subversion[-]Operations research of the human mind[-]Unrepresentable communication[-]Structuralism and field theory[-]3 The Sacred and the Genealogy of Thinking: Descent into the Aristotelian Underground[-]The pre-Aristotelian situation of understanding[-]The prehistory of the categories[-]Descartes among the savages[-]Paths of reason[-][-]Part II [-]The Specter of the Primitive: A Hauntology of Communication[-]4 The Night of the Human Being: Being and Experience under the Conditions of the Unrepresentable[-]Primitiveness and crisis[-]Savage media[-]Sacred communication[-]Note on heresy[-]5 The End of the Archaic Illusion: Communication, Information, Cybernetics[-]Desacralizing the channels[-]Coding the real[-]Cybernetics and coldmindedness[-]A new mythology of the binary[-][-]Appendix: Heidegger and Cybernetics[-][-]Bibliography[-]Notes[-]Index[-] Erich Hörl's 'Sacred Channels' is an original take on the history of communication theory and the cultural imaginary of communication understood through the notions of the sacred and the primitive. Hörl offers insight into the shared ground of anthropology and media theory in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and presents an archeology of the philosophy of technology that underpins contemporary culture. This singular and unique project focuses on the ethnological disciplines and their phantasmatic imaginations of a prealphabetical realm of the sacred and the primitive but reads them in the context of media cultural questions as epistemic unconscious and as projections of the emerging postalphabetical condition. Drawing inspiration from work by the likes of Friedrich Kittler, Hörl's understanding of cybernetics in the post-World War II interdisciplinary field informs a rich analysis that is of interest to media scholars and to anyone seeking to understand the historical and theoretical underpinnings of the humanities in the age of technical media This book is an original take on the history of communication theory and the cultural imaginary of communication understood through the notions of holy and the primitive.