Talk:Alain Badiou

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Minor editing issues

In the second sentence it is said: "Badiou is a prominent figure in an anti-postmodern strand of continental philosophy". Now I of course don't disagree with Badiou being anti-postmodern, but the formulation of the sentence is such that it gives one the idea that that his whole œuvre is about anti-postmodernism. Now I don't know him that well, but what I've heard is just enough to know that that isn't the case, and that is of course also not the case for Žižek and I presume that also counts for Agamben, although I know literally nothing about him. So the sentence should be changed, but I don't feel like I have the knowledge of Badiou's thought to do that without possibly making a big mistake.--Tomvasseur (talk) 22:08, 7 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I agree with you Tomvasseur. The sentence should be changed. I've thought that misleading also, and it jumps out at me almost every time I re-read the article. That's kind of how it needs to sound in a Wikipedia style lead paragraph, but here it comes across as cursory at best. Maybe you can come up with a revision later on, and/or propose it here. And if I can come up with something, I'll bring it here. Check back in another month or so, or put "Alain Badiou" on your watchlist if you haven't done so, and you can keep track of the changes. I suspect someone else will read this and make a change soon, or state why it should "stay"Christian Roess (talk) 00:33, 8 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Should there be a specification as to what kind of postmodernism Badiou is against? Durygordonn (talk) 14:22, 10 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Untitled

It would be good if someone could actually summarize his rather baroque ontology. Alas, that is beyond my abilities for now. Mporter 01:52, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I had the same idea, and hesitated too. But I'll try to add a philosophy section this week. What concepts do you suggest should be treated? I was thinking about something like this:

1. Something general; contrast with "anti-philosophers" and "sophists"

2. Mathematics = ontology

3. Sets and Situations

3.1 "evental site"

4. The Event

5. The Subject

5.1 Four conditions

5.2 Ethics

5.3 E-vil

David Sneek

Perhaps also the "four conditions of philosophy", the history of philosophy in "Manifesto for Philosophy", modern philosophy as a new sophistry. Something also about how he uses mathematical concepts, which is, so far as I can tell, just as metaphorical and disconnected from actual mathematics as anything attacked by Sokal and Bricmont. In fact, Badiou might be the supreme example of the 'poetic' use (or misuse) of mathematics in modern philosophy, precisely because he goes about it with such comprehensiveness (e.g. he has an ontological exegesis for each separate axiom of ZF set theory). Badiou's relationship to real mathematics is one of the things I'd like to figure out about him. Is he casting light on what mathematics is really about, or is his mathematics just an inspiration and a launchpad for a speculative metaphysics which is really about other realms of being entirely? Mporter 01:24, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I think that to describe the rigor and correlation between mathematics and ontology that Badiou enumerates as 'poetic' usage is tantamount to saying the same regarding physics. I believe what he is doing is describing a strict adherence of the world to the mathematical set-theory, and not simply providing an incredibly detailed metaphor about how ontology seems-like math. When you look at Badiou as compared to perhaps Deleuze or other thinkers who have dabbled with mathematico-poetic philosophies, a clear difference comes out, and not only in the comprehensive ability of the system to explain situations. This is my cursory answer to your question. Sgaber

Ok, I've updated the schema above a little, and will write something later ~~today~~. I don't think, btw, that Badiou intends his use of mathematics to be metaphorical or poetic; if ontology is mathematics, axiomatically, then for example the description of 'the event' as 'undecidable', in Gödel's sense, should be taken literally...David Sneek 09:16, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I especially doubt that Badiou's undecidability is the same as Gödel's. Even if he is earnestly trying to 'ontologize' the latter, I think that ultimately he must be conflating two different things. But my access to Badiou's works is too limited to be sure. Mporter 13:04, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I read Badiou's 'undecidability' to be very much like that of Jacque Derrida. If he attempts to related it to Goedel, it may be categorically incorrect since it would be an attempt to find mathematical justification for a moral concept. Derrida presented undecidability as an aspect of authenticity in contrast to Heidegger's 'decision', which can be found in Sein und Zeit, Beitraege, and other 'middle' works. Zeusnoos 20:34, 5 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

From the dictionary in Being and Event: Undecidability - "...a fundamental attribute of the event(+): its belonging to the situation in which its eventual site (+) is found is undecidable. The intervention (+) consists in deciding at and from this standpoint of undecidability. A statement of set theory is undecidable if neither itself nor its negation can be demonstrated on the basis of the axioms. The continuum hypothesis (+) is undecidable; hence the errancy of excess (+)." and it should be kept in mind that he insists that 'situation' be cleansed of its Sartrean connotations. I dont, personally, think that Badiou's concept of undecidability is a moral one specifically.Jimmyq2305 09:06, 14 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Indiemonkey

I think the article needs to reflect his theses on art, I know there is an externel link but my feeling is that it has a place within the body of the article. Also if you are going to critise Badiou's use of mathematics I would put that entirely under a new heading and not let it seep into any of the other presentations, and I would be very careful and only do it with credible knowledge as Badiou originally studied math.

Getting the ball rolling

Seeing as there was still no actual writing beyond a bio, I've tried to give a brief run through of Being and Event. (Which for the record is very hard!) It's a veritable balancing act between oversimplification and overcomplexity writing this but I think it grapples with the fundamental cornerstones of the book. (Or some anyway, if I did them all it'd last forever - and I'm mainly using this to get practice writing a paper on him.)

Anyway, feel free to tweak. I've purposefully left out the parts on Evil and religion because they'd probably be better covered in a different section. I've also tweaked the bio myself, primarily because it cast him as a mainline Marxist, which he really isn't.

Cheers,

SHJ.

Great work! VoluntarySlave 18:58, 28 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Broken Links

Politics: a Non-expressive Dialectics (PDF) is a broken link. Should it be removed? I can't find this PDF anywhere.--Paul Adams 22:20, 12 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It's working again. David Sneek 16:44, 14 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

List of Badiou's books

I hope it is useful; I only copied from the back of his last one.--Cleversnail 13:08, 14 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Citations

The point about the slow uptake of Badiou's work (where there's a flag saying a citation is needed) is taken from Badiou's introduction to the English version of Being and Event (By Continuum, 2005), if anyone feels like adding that in.

I find this amusing - straight from the horse's mouth, eh? Next we'll have Badiou saying he's figured out

Everything for sure and I suppose it's going to be published on Wikipedia. Self-advertising, anyone? 193.198.8.211 (talk) 16:44, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Maoist?

Well, I really dont know well the philosophy of badiou, but the article says that he's a maoist (school: maoism) and do not explain it (only this stpd one sentence: Another philosopher Jean-Claude Milner identified him with Maoism and has accused Badiou of Anti-Semitism.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.230.63.160 (talk) 14:57, 14 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Um, the article also says Badiou was a member of the Maoism UCFML, and is currently a member of L'Organisation Politique, founded with Maoists from the UCFML; so the connection to Maoism seems pretty clear. The external links section also includes som articles in which Badiou discusses Maoism, e.g. "The Cultural Revolution: The Last Revolution?" and "An Essential Philosophical Thesis: 'It Is Right to Rebel against the Reactionaries'". It would probably be good, though, if the article talked more about some of the specific cases in which Badiou uses his theory of the event; for instance, the discussion of the Bolshevik Revolution as an event, as well as examples of events in art and science.VoluntarySlave (talk) 17:43, 14 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I question the opening paragraph, which labels him as committed to the "Marxist tradition." While this statement is certainly true, proper Marxists have a lot of problems with Badiou (see the external links in this article!). I feel it would be more appropriate to say that he is committed to a "communist" tradition.75.82.89.248 (talk) 16:23, 9 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Use in Third World Radical Movements

Does anyone have any further information on Badiou's adoption by revolutionary movements where he is "often read together with Frantz Fanon?" What specific organizations see him as a notable influence? I am not suggesting this is not true, I am just personally curious. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.249.220.73 (talk) 02:49, 30 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Original research in this article? OR tag? And therefore the article needs to be rewritten?

Original research is the tag at the top, just added by user Bigdaddy1981.

I don't believe this is correct, and does not justify making major changes to the article. But nonetheless more references could be added to support some of the claims. Nothing wrong with backing up the "facts". User BigDaddy has a point.

Some minor quibbles however. Quickly set down here, so apologies for the awkward syntax.

I don't believe it was necessary to remove the line "He had a lively and constant interest in mathematics.". This is true. This is inarguably correct. Badiou's interest was there EARLY. And lively. It is STILL lively.

So an EARLY interest. Little to doubt there, and it would be difficult not to point to Badiou's father Raymond Badiou to back this claim up. Raymond Badiou was a mathematician, a professor of mathematics at lycée Pierre de Fermat. His father was also part of the French resistance and Mayor of Toulouse. These two facts concerning Badiou's father Raymond could arguably point to the origins of what are now recognizable features or obsessions in Alain Badiou's own work: a politics of resistance (see his book Metapolitics, especially the initial chapters) and mathematics The link provided is to Raymond Badiou's Wikipedia page in French for verification.

When Alain Badiou studied under Althusser in the 1960's, Althusser was consistently wary of Badiou's mathematical "coordinates" into the philosophical. Badiou was in Althusser's class which was the initial thrust for the book "Philosophy and the Spontaneous Philosophy of Scientists" by Althusser. And of course, Badiou's first published book was "The Concept of Model" (subtitled: An Introduction to the Materialist Epistemology of Mathematics) which came directly out of a course Althusser initialized. The "course" here was a lecture series, and "The Concept of Model" was Badiou's contribution. (However, May '68 and the student revolts preempted this lecture series by the way, and Badiou was only able to give the first part of his talk "The Concept of Model". Obviously he was "on the barricades" himself and stesses the importance of "fidelity" to the "event" of May '68)

Anyhow, the interest in mathematics seems to have been there from the beginning.

But I'll try to make some changes and recommendations that Big Daddy suggests through these tags that have been added. I don't have time right now. I'll wait to see if someone else takes the initiative, or wants to discuss these issues some more on the talk page before changes are made.Christian Roess (talk) 21:54, 27 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Definitely too much OR in the "Mathematics as Ontology" section. Billbrock (talk) 16:20, 3 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The degree of original research in the "Mathematics as Ontology" section is totally unacceptable. This section is basically an apologia for Badiou against a variety of critics. I would suggest that we remove all of the OR, leaving only the summary and the direct quotations from critics. Otherwise, the author should cite a reputable source that defends Badiou. Describing criticisms as "specious" has no place on wikipedia. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 160.39.55.203 (talk) 21:15, 6 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed with the above. It's pretty clear that Badiou, someone who studied under him, or someone who is a dire fan of his completely took over that section after the first criticism; even the terminology ("matheme") changes after the first critical quote. I am removing the apologia entirely -- this is a disgusting use of Wikipedia. I've deleted the particularly bad last paragraph of the section, which is actually an unintelligible (to the lay reader) defense of his own work, but left the rest marked with appropriate warnings for dubiousness and subjectivity. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.94.1.209 (talk) 05:02, 23 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Alain Badiou: A Life in Writing

Alain Badiou: A Life in Writing, The Guardian, 18 May 2012

Good article. Green Cardamom (talk) 16:07, 19 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Russell's paradox

The article states: "...a set cannot contain or belong to itself. Russell's paradox famously ruled that possibility out of formal logic." I don't know if this was stated in the book or not, but it is completely and embarrassingly wrong. Russell's paradox says nothing about the existence or non-existence of a set containing itself; it is the Axiom of Regularity (mentioned later) that does this. If Regularity is omitted or even denied (i.e. stated that there exist sets belonging to themselves), Russell's paradox would continue to hold.

Russell's paradox is about sets that don't belong to themselves, i.e. "ordinary" everyday sets such as the empty set, the singleton, the set of natural numbers, etc. It states in effect that there are so many such ordinary sets that asserting the collection of all of them is also a set leads to a contradiction: if it belonged to itself, then it wouldn't belong to itself; but if it didn't belong to itself, then it would belong to itself.

In fact, Russell's paradox can be derived from pure first-order logic without any axioms of set theory at all (or in some formulations of it, a mild use of the Axiom of Extensionality, such as the version on my site).

Nmegill (talk) 14:32, 9 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

You're quite right. I've removed the incorrect sentence. Thanks for pointing this out. VoluntarySlave (talk) 15:20, 9 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The article still says "there is a strict prohibition on self-belonging; a set cannot contain or belong to itself. Russell's paradox famously ruled that possibility out of formal logic." But still Russell's paradox did not rule this out, it remains possible in formal logic, and indeed several well known set theories has sets with themselves as elements (Aczel's AFA, any set theory with a universal set, and many versions of set theories with urelements). ZF does preclude it, by the axiom of Regularity. Colin McLarty (talk) 18:40, 26 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

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