Theory, Critical Method & the Vocation of Philosophy
The expert solves problems formulated by those in power; the true intellectual first questions whether the problem is correctly posed.
In his words 5
“Our duty as theorists is to hurt people.”
“if facts don't fit theory so much worse for the facts”~1:00:24 Slavoj Žižek: God, Marxism, Philosophy, and Quantum Mechanics | Robinson's Podcast #213 · Hegelian trust of theory over data
“Theory is precisely the first step of theory is not to answer problems formulated by others, but to formulate the problem correctly.”4:23 Slavoj Zizek on Importance of Theory: Psychoanalysis, Belief, Deconstruction, Cognitivism · theory's defining first move
The stories that teach it
the jokes and anecdotes he reaches for when he works in this idea, ranked by how many of its talks they turn up in; each card is one story, with every retelling on its page
Shouting at the TV during football
Žižek uses the image of shouting at a television during a match, 'boys!', knowing the players cannot hear you, as an analogy for the meaningless performativity of individual recycling gestures.
Easier to imagine death of capitalism than death of Jameson
Žižek inverts Jameson's famous phrase as a eulogy: since Jameson lived until death 'happened to him,' it is now easier to imagine capitalism's end than Jameson's death.
Santa Claus Belief
Parents deny believing in Santa while buying presents; children deny believing while pretending so as not to disappoint parents. No one believes in the first person yet the ritual functions perfectly.
Breivik: anti-semitic and pro-Zionist simultaneously
Norwegian terrorist Breivik's manifesto is openly anti-semitic (Jews are a problem, Hitler did the work in Europe) yet simultaneously pro-Israel (support them there, just not here), exemplifying the logic of politically correct anti-immigration that uses the 'other' as a conve…
James Bond Quantum of Solace, no sex at the end
Žižek notes that Quantum of Solace is the first Bond film where the love affair is not consummated, the protagonists simply split apart, as evidence that even Hollywood has abandoned the ideology of passionate love.
Glasgow Climate Conference
The Glasgow conference said all the right things about acting now, yet things continued unchanged, illustrating the paradox of modern cynicism where speech replaces action.
Where it comes up 26
27 moments located in the transcripts, click a timestamp to play from there