Noumenon

noumène

Worked through in 4 videos · 5 passages.

What Dominique Pagani says

Dominique Pagani understands the noumenon as the thing as it is in itself: it cannot be known, but it must be thought1. He specifies that we have no positive knowledge of it. We have only negative knowledge: there is neither space nor time in it2. He gives an image to make this clear: space and time are like yellow glasses; if I know that the yellow comes from me, I know of the noumenon that it is not yellow3. From this absence of space and time he draws a consequence: determinism does not concern the thing in itself, and freedom becomes possible again4. This freedom is thought without being known. He also applies the notion to another domain, in a session devoted to music: the love, or the music, of a classless society is a noumenon, which can be thought but not known5. From 2015 to 2024, his formulation stays the same.

Summary produced automatically from 5 of the passages below, to be reviewed; the numbers link to the moment in the session.

Season 12 · 30 May 2024From fidelity to grace - From substance to Subject

1:28:40Space and time are like yellow-tinted glasses; if I know that the yellow comes from me, I know of the noumenon that it is not yellow.

Series · 3 Dec 2020Musicosophy 2. From Lévi-Strauss to Nerval on music

1:29:52Love, or music, in a classless society is a noumenon: one can think it, not know it.

Season 5.2 · 29 Jul 2019#5.9 Kafka: An Imperial Message

35:00We have no positive knowledge of it, but a negative knowledge: there is in it neither space nor time; freedom must be thought without being known.

Season 1 · 10 Dec 2015#1.6 Between crisis and war: Philosophising?

1:02:59The thing as it is in itself cannot be known but must be thought; it gives negative knowledge.
1:06:22Since the thing in itself is neither in time nor in space, determinism does not concern it and freedom becomes possible again.