In Defense of the Science of the Philosophical Solution

Abstract

The article discusses the way philosophy tries to deal with science by co-opting it, designating it as its own completion and merging with the latter: the Philosophical Solution. By the Philosophical Decision, Laruelle understands some absolute constructive principle that remains unchanged in any of its (historical and quasi-transcendental modulations. Accordingly, Laruelle distinguishes four forms of philosophical practices, two of which betray the immanence of science to philosophy: these are (1) the reduction of philosophy to its history and (2) the critique of metaphysics in any of its variants (and its reduction, therefore, to positive — in the sense of validity — philosophy); and two other practices that assert vise versa the immanence of science to «philosophical solution»: 1) the unfolding of philosophical ideas through the limited input of scientific operations (mathematical, chemical, etc); 2) the supposition of science as the unfolding of a pure (but philosophical same) idea, an infinite telos. The proposal that Laruelle puts forward in spite of this unsatisfactory scheme is to suspend the smooth operation of such a solution. It is necessary, Laruelle argues, «to place philosophy in a school of science, <...> so that philosophy will let itself be thought through it» (without abandoning its legitimate desire to be a rigorous science). By «school of science» is meant a way of dealing with the Real-One, where this latter is postulated axiomatically by science and does not require its justification by philosophy, while science itself can be conceived as allowing the Philosophical Solution as one of its objects. It is necessary to destroy, in Laruelle's thought, the recursiveness of the Philosophical Solution by suspending it — not by modeling a new solution, as happens in philosophical self-criticism — which is what the science of the Philosophical Solution is devoted to.

Translation from French by Alexander Skovorodko according to the publication: Ⓒ Pour une science de la décision philosophique // Le Cahier (Collège international de philosophie). No. 4 (novembre 1987).