Postmodernism And Denotative Knowledge

Efficiency is a concept that is intuitively associated with business and economics, rather than philosophy. For most of philosophy's history, efficiency was largely untouched, and was largely secondary to the ahistorical, metaphysical and epistemological questions. In modern times, this has changed and the concept of efficiency has played an increasingly important role within the various contemporary philosophical traditions. This is no more apparent than in postmodernism. Although difficult to categorize as a unified system of thought, postmodernism does seem to have an overall fixation on efficiency's crucial role in society and structures of meaning. Two thinkers that especially focus on this issue are Jean-Francois Lyotard and Michel Foucault; this essay will analyze how efficiency is a crucial element in their philosophies. Lyotard's initial conception of efficiency is as one of many language-games. Lyotard borrows from Wittgenstein by formulating that various linguistic utterances are governed by a set of rules determining their use and properties; this is much like a game of chess (Lyotard 10). Within language there is an addressee and addressor; each utterance by the addressee is like a specific "move" in a game. This applies to all discourse and the rules of one language game, do not necessarily apply to the rules of others.The efficiency language games is that of technical qualification (Lyotard 18). The rules of this game are to minimize input while maximizing output (Lyotard 45). There are different rules for the other language games: science, justice/ethical wisdom and beauty (Lyotard 18). Lyotard's basic conception of efficiency is one of the numerous distinct language-games. These language games are categorized into denotative and narrative knowledge. Narrative knowledge is unique in that it has no external referent and is self-referential. This is because narrative knowledge is legitimated within its own performance. Denotative knowledge is distinct in that it depends on some form of external referent in order to legitimate itself. Denotative knowledge has a contradictory relationship with narrative knowledge; it needs a narrative to legitimate itself but it is hostile towards denotative knowledge (Lyotard 26). This hostility is largely based upon a failure to understand the different rules of narrative knowledge; to understand something as true is not the same as understanding it to be just (Lyotard 40). There is a fundamental distinction between denotative and narrative knowledge. Historically, denotative knowledge was legitimated by two forms of grand narratives. …show more content…
Legitimation refers to the process in which a legislator is authorizes to determine whether a given statement should be included in the discourse of the scientific knowledge (Lyotard 7). Denotative knowledge faces a "crisis of legitimation" in which it needs to refer to narrative knowledge in order to be accepted. These two grand narratives were emancipatory narrative and speculative narrative. Emancipatory knowledge held that denotative knowledge was essential to humankind's liberation; the more that we understood, the greater our society would become. Speculative knowledge held that knowledge was done "for its own sake"; knowledge finds legitimation within itself and states what the state and society are (Lyotard 38). These two grand narratives were what legitimated denotative knowledge until recent times. These two grand narratives eventually broke down since the end of the second world war, leading to the death of narrative knowledge. Speculative knowledge always had an ambiguous relationship with positive knowledge in the first place; knowledge must repudiate itself to be considered knowledge …show more content…
Power-relationships are what constitute knowledge; knowledge's empirical roots are found in the various organizations of power. Efficiency is in the Foucauldian context is simply the most efficient method of control and organization over bodies. Efficiency ultimately serves the axis of power; the most efficient method of control creates knowledge; which in turn helps to strengthen the power structure. This is similar to the Lyotardian sense in that power is self-legitimating (Lyotard 47). The difference between the two conceptions is that truth as concept has always been a result of the most efficient way to control people; Lyotard at least distinguished the language-games of truth and justice from the ones of power (Lyotard 49). For Foucault, all knowledge stems from power. Foucault differs in that there never was a grand narrative in which legitimated knowledge; the discourses changed only when more efficient means and methods of control became available. Foucault differs from Lyotard, in that the relationship between knowledge and efficiency has always been