The Quadruple Object

by Graham Harman

In this book the metaphysical system of Graham Harman is presented in lucid form, aided by helpful diagrams. In Chapter 1, Harman gives his most forceful critique to date of philosophies that reject objects as a primary reality.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction, Theory, The United States Of America, Metaphysics

157 pages, Paperback

First published November 10, 2010

About the author

Graham Harman (born May 9, 1968) is a professor at the American University in Cairo, Egypt. He is a contemporary philosopher of metaphysics, who attempts to reverse the linguistic turn of Western philosophy. He terms his ideas object-oriented ontology. A larger grouping of philosophers, Speculative Realism, includes Harman and the philosophers Iain Hamilton Grant, Quentin Meillassoux and Ray Brassier.

Reviews

[Mjhancock · Rating 3 out of 5]

Graham Harman goes into depth on his version of object-oriented ontology, including the philosophical movements it's responding to, what it is, and what it does. I have to say, I've been reading my Graham Harman books all out of order--I read Circus Philosophicus and Weird Realism: Lovecraft and Philsophy before I was able to track down a copy of 4X Object. The book consists of ten chapters. The first explains the basic problem, that theories of philosophy tend to dismiss objects, either by undermining them and saying that they're composed of some smaller universal unit or overmining, treating objects as only relevant in so far as they manifest in the mind, or are part of some event that affects other objects. The second chapter goes deep into Husserl's version of the object, where its real features lie in tension with its shifting sensual features. The third is the object via Heidegger, where the tension becomes the difference between the sensual features of the object and the real object, which always withdraws from being entirely known. There's a lot of Heidegger's Tool-Being, for those familiar with that discussion. In fact, those who come into this book with a lot of Heidegger and Husserl under their belt will have a distinct advantage; you don't need either to fully get Harman, but they don't hurt. Chapter 5 expands on the polarities that have been established thus far, creating four categories--real objects, sensual objects, real qualities, and sensual qualities, noting that, given these configurations, there are ten basic ways objects can interact.

Half way through! In chapter six, Harman returns to Heidegger, tackling his four-fold concept. The trick, he argues, is that the four shouldn't be taken literally, but as ways of thinking about the difference between being and beings, or absence and presence. Ultimately, though, this fourfold is insufficient, and so Harman creates his own. Having established the four terms previously, this chapter looks at the tensions between each of them. Sensual objects, for example, have sensual qualities, but these change over time, the first tensions. And the real object is different from its real qualities, which is a tension of essence. And then he tosses in ANOTHER four terms, for when those tensions are ruptured, or objects merge. A rupture in time is a confrontation. Ruptures involving essence is an issue of multitude. Chapter 8 clarifies some points, that the sensual is not just human and animal experience, and that real and sensual aren't fixed sites; every real object is composed of relations between component objects, and the hammer is a sensual object in relation to them, and vice versa. Chapter 9 solidifies the sets created in chapter 7 into further systems. And Chapter 10 clarifies Harman's position with regards to the larger Speculative Realism movement.

Having read those previous Harman works, I'm already familiar not just with some of the terminology Harman's using, but how it actually plays out when he applies it--something that's missing a bit from the book at hand. But it was still extremely useful to see the ideas worked out in a more expanded manner. I'll admit, the book loses me toward the end. The explication of previous object approaches is great (if a bit fast if you're not familiar with continental German philosophy) as is the original explanations of the fourfold. But somewhere around the tension ruptures, the terms start proliferating a little too quickly for my tastes. I will say that my favorite part is chapter 4, where Harman directly addresses one of my favorite philosophical questions, how can we think about the world outside of human thought? Harman's answer: there's a difference between saying there's no world without thought and saying there's no thinking about a world without thought. And that, in a nutshell, without bringing all the definitions into it, is the real value of OOO to me--taking philosophical and real-life questions that are inherently, often unconsciously, human-centered, and offering a different perspective.

[Asim Bakhshi · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is very difficult to place Harman in a popular philosophical tradition since he is among the unique philosophical currents of 21st century. He achieves a number of things here; foremost being the forceful reminder how the human mind overmines or undermines objects. He reminds the naive realists as well as self-assured idealists that philosophy is not wisdom, per se; it is rather the love of wisdom. True to Meno's paradox, we never attain the wisdom, the true objectivity, but nevertheless keep trying. Are we just striking our heads to the wall? Harman kind of circumvents this question by transposing the Kantian Copernican revolution, the revolutionary idea that human subject is the mysterious epistemological center of all quest. He strongly objects to this by showing that all relations including the object-object relations are equally mysterious. For this purpose, he posits a fresh interpretation of Heidegger's tool-being and merges into speculative realism where all causality is essentially mysterious. Is he moving towards much neglected medieval occassionalism? Well there are strong hints that since his four-fold object is structurally linked through indirect causality. I would love to read him more. Absolutely loved this one.

[Nicolas Calfas · Rating 1 out of 5]

Mocht dit boek niet uitgeleend zijn, zou ik het moeten verbranden.

[Nick Greer]

imagine liking the number four so much you build a whole cosmology out of it

[Benjamin · Rating 4 out of 5]

A brilliant introduction to a Heidegger-influenced form of ontology that doesn't stray into the unintelligible world of high continental philosophy, but doesn't remain in the drab lifeless world of analytic thinking.

[Rhys · Rating 3 out of 5]

I may have actually caught a glimpse of what Harman is on about. He interprets Heidegger in an interesting and effective way.

[Luís M Inácio · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Quadruple Object (2011), de Graham Harman, é o mais compacto livro sobre a filosofia orientada-para-objectos (termo cunhado pelo próprio Harman).

Para Harman a filosofia tem andado esquecida dos objectos, optando nas suas teorias por muitas das vezes fazer "undermining" sugerindo que os objectos não interessam, apenas os seus constituintes (materiais, partículas, átomos, ou um "apeiron"); ou a fazer "overmining" promovendo que os objecto apenas têm importância na sua constituição mental da percepção sobre eles ou nas suas relações e efeitos com outros objectos; ou então a fazer as duas ao mesmo tempo, como no "materialismo" que define um elemento primordial para os objectos, mas ao mesmo tempo define qualidades desse próprio elemento.

Estas posições servem apenas para destruir os objectos, e para Harman, o que interessa, são precisamente os objectos. E são eles que têm de tomar a prioridade.

Advindo da tradição filosófica da fenomenologia husserliana e, mais peculiarmente, da heideggeriana, Graham Harman apresenta um projecto distinto, mas não único no contexto filosófico contemporâneo. Aliás, para quem está habituado à teoria dos sistemas de Niklas Luhmann, muitas das teses e posições parecem ser bastante semelhantes, embora sobrevindas de outras preocupações.

É um livro muito interessante e lê-se muito bem. E como o autor explica logo no início, é um livro que foi sujeito a alguns constrangimentos editoriais, e por isso mesmo tem uma certa assertividade dos argumentos, o que para mim, o torna mais refrescante de o ler.

[Poiq Wuy · Rating 1 out of 5]

El libro no me ha gustado. En [[2018 - Object-oriented ontology_ A new theory of everything - Graham Harman]] explica que su noción de filosofía es más cercana al arte que a las ciencias: creo que este es el problema que me suscita. (Algo similar en p.63<) No argumenta sus posiciones, solo las expresa y las compara con su interpretación de las posiciones de otros autores, todo de forma muy somera (esa es la intención del libro, argumenta que no tiene espacio para más detalla), pero si tiene tiempo de florituras retóricas (nada destacables) y de repetir insistentemente listados heterogéneos de objetos en los que parece fascinado por ser capaz de juntar en el mismo saco de su teoría al Quijote con una ampolla en el dedo gordo con el número 23; los animales que acaban de romper el jarrón con los dibujados con un pelo finísimo de camello. Después se congratula ufano de lo extraño que resulta su sistema (v.g. p.107).

Su posición metafísica es interesante: una especie de ontología horizontal a lo [[Bruno Latour]] pero añadiendo a cada objeto una suerte de «núcleo interno» que es el verdadero objeto tras su apariencia, el en-sí kantiano que siempre se retira de nuestro alcance ([[Martin Heidegger]]). Heidegger y Latour son las mayores influencias del autor. Esto le lleva a un esquema cuádruple en el que diferencia el [[objeto real - Harman]] del [[objeto sensible - Harman]], y ellos a su vez de sus correspondientes [[cualidades reales - Harman]] y [[cualidades sensibles - Harman]]. De las relaciones entre estos cuatro objetos (presentes en todo objeto) de un mismo objeto, y las relaciones entre los cuatro objetos de distintos objetos, obtiene todo un artilugio conceptual en el que intenta forzar conceptos tradicionales como tiempo, espacio, percepción, etc. O, si se quiere, bautiza con tales nombres las relaciones de su esquema. El propio ser humano en cuanto sujeto está dividido en estos cuatro objetos.

El esquema final de relaciones es:

- OR-OR: Retiramiento (*withdrawal*)
- OS-OS: Contiguidad
- CR-CR: Contracción
- CS-CS: Emanación
- CR-CS: Duplicación
- OR-OS: Sinceridad
- OR-CS: Espacio
- OR-CR: Esencia
- OS-CR: Eidos
- OS-CS: Tiempo

Los objetos reales no pueden tocarse entre sí, solo pueden tocar los objetos sensibles (p.75). El sujeto es uno de estos objetos reales y por tanto los objetos de nuestra experiencia son todos sensibles (no comenta esto más que de pasada). Los objetos sensibles no pueden tocarse entre sí, solo pueden coexistir en la experiencia de un objeto real.

Lo más rescatable, en mi opinión, es su insistencia en la horizontalidad ontológica: todos los objetos y sujetos tienen la misma estructura metafísica, no hay excepciones (ni el ser humano, ni el espíritu, ni Dios, etc.). También sus conceptos de [[undermining - Harman]] y [[overmining - Harman]].a

Lo menos, su insistencia en que detrás de cada objeto hay algo inalcanzable para todo otro objeto —algo que no puede ser aceptado sin contradicción metodológica más que como superstición individual.

Una pena que entienda (implícitamente) que la defensa de sus teorías ha de hacerse simplemente en base a su potencia de satisfacción explicativa y estética una vez expuestas en su totalidad, y no que tengan que sostenerse sobre argumentos sólidos de algún tipo.

## Ascendencia reivindicada

De [[Edmund Husserl]] dice obtener la distinción entre **cualidades sensibles** y el **objeto sensible** (heredero del objeto intencional), y de ambas con las **cualidades reales** (herederas de las propiedades eidéticas).

La distinción con el **objeto real** dice obtenerla de [[Martin Heidegger]] y su distinción entre [[vorhanden - Heidegger]] y [[zuhanden - Heidegger]]: las cosas pertenecen a un reino subterráneo que elude nuestra conciencia. Considera que el análisis de la herramienta de Heidegger es, quizá, el momento más importante de la filosofía del siglo pasado. El pretende extender las relaciones del [[Dasein - Heidegger]] con los objetos, en las que estos se retiran, a la totalidad de relaciones entre objetos —una suerte de «giro anticopernicano», ver:: [[contrarrevolución - revancha ptolemaica - Melliasoux]]— (p.44<).

La relación entre el **objeto real** y las **cualidades reales** dice obtenerla de [[Leibnitz]].

Refutación pretendida del [[correlacionismo - correlacionalismo - Melliasoux]] en p.66<.

# Cosas sueltas

Refutación (pretendida) del relacionalismo en p.12. Según el autor, el relacionalismo no es capaz de explicar el cambio: si una cosa modifica sus relaciones y las relaciones la definen, dejaría de ser ella misma en lugar de cambiar. Creo que simplemente asume como cierto lo que el relacionalismo trata de impugnar: la existencia de cosas en sí mismas independientes de sus relaciones y a las que las relaciones se «atan». Si consideramos que la identidad entre momentos temporales distintos de un objeto es algo que se añade *a posteriori y en base a* la red cambiante de relaciones, no hay ninguna contradicción en el relacionalismo. Pero esto es justo lo que no acepta: que haya las relaciones puedan ser lógicamente previas a los relata, y no argumenta por qué. Curioso que al mismo tiempo considere las cualidades como algo que hay que ligar a los objetos, como si les preexistieran (v.g. p.105).

Contra el materialismo (p.13<): al tiempo hace [[undermining - Harman]] de los objetos —los reduce a sus componentes— y [[overmining - Harman]] —reduce los componentes últimos a sus cualidades—.

Considera la posibilidad de objetos sin ninguna relación, los llama [[objeto durmiente - dormant objet - Harman]] (p.125). Considera que no podrían ser parte de un objeto mayor, pero, por algún motivo, considera que sí podrían tener partes. (Al parecer la relación todo-parte no es una verdadera relación, solo la de parte-parte).

Llama [[ontografía - Harman]] al mapeo del espacio de objetos, del que se encarga la ontología (p.125).

Resumen del libro en p.125-6.

Comparación con otros realistas actuales en c.10. Considera que lo que les une es la oposición al [[correlacionismo - correlacionalismo - Melliasoux]].


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24 07 17

[Attentive · Rating 4 out of 5]

Felt a little disappointed in this by the end—it's not as powerful a text as Tool-Being, since after Harman continues expounding his own "fourfold" of object ontology, dividing existence into sensual objects and their qualities, and real objects and their qualities, he gets into pretty extemporaneous territory.

That having been said, I've really enjoyed reading pretty much every book on speculative realism I've read because of the way the ideas provoke the sensual imagination. Filled with this post-Heideggerian stuff, you can look out over a room full of objects and furniture and imagine each existing, partly veiled, partly exposed, across a smear of sensual and real qualities, partly withdrawing into an inaccessible fusion of reality. The Quadruple Object has a few passages which achieve this effect.

[Arianne X · Rating 4 out of 5]

An Attempt at ‘Harmanization’

Before starting this review, I must ask, is the subject just another object within the 'Harmanization' in the world of object orientated ontology? It appears that object orientated ontology implies the denial of the modern Cartesian subject. Is this not just a return to old fashioned realist or materialist metaphysics?

In in any case, what Graham Harman describes is four alternative modes of being for objects rather than four different types of objects. It is by combining the phenomenological insights of Edmund Husserl with the revolution in Being by Marin Heidegger, Harman reorients the trajectory of western metaphysics from exclusive focus on the contents and perceptions of the human mind to the stuff (the objects) of the world. But this is not an empiricist move. There is no attempt to analyze objects as anything other than as they appear to us in experience. Harman thus introduces the Quadruple object. Ironically, so abstract is the Quadruple Object itself, Harman’s “…strange new refreshing geography of objects…”, that it must be a product of the human thought from the human mind, Harman objections notwithstanding. Does not the existence of a book to explain the ‘Quadruple Object’ prove this to be the case?

If we try to think about the Quadruple Object, then we are thinking ‘it’ and ‘it’ cannot be outside of human thought. The Quadruple Object sounds ‘objective’ but it is a structural abstraction that cannot exist outside the realm of ‘subjective’ human thought. The heart of the abstraction is the difference between ‘reality’ and experience, and how these two pairs unite and divide. In a sense, this book offers an intricate ‘Harmanization’ of Plato and Kant by expanding the difference between what is real and what is experienced beyond the limits imposed by a philosophy limited to human access or reductionist empiricism. However, all statements about the ‘Quadruple Object’ are human statements made from a purely human perspective.

Harman regards this objection to the existence of the Quadruple Object as claustrophobic; that it amounts to restricting the philosophical method to the method of geometry. Geometry requires deductive progression from axiomatic first principles which is unduly restrictive when employed in philosophical reflection. Philosophical reflection has autonomy from its predecessors (no axiomatic first principles) in a way the geometrical reasoning does not. Harman sites Whitehead’s famous insight that systems of philosophy are not refuted, they are simply abandoned. For Harman, the ‘Philosophy of Human Access’ makes the mistake of positing human access as the first axiomatic principle from which all subsequent philosophical thinking must proceed. Harman’s point is that objects have relationships to each other independent of human access. Objects have their own reality apart from us thinking of them. Humans only have direct access to human experience and indirect access to the objects of that experience.

Harman is correct in that there is a reality of objects apart from human awareness of them, and apart from their relations to other things, which is just another form of human awareness, but a ‘Quadruple Object’? Surely, such an abstract and esoteric object is the result of privileged human access to human thought. The ‘Quadruple Object’ is a construction of human thought and is not like the ordinary objects of the world that do indeed have an existence apart from human thought. Harman claims that the difference between human and non-human is not ontological, thus it must be epistemological, though he does not say so. An epistemological difference is a knowledge difference and thus one based on thought, human thought versus non-human thought. Thus, reality becomes commensurate with knowledge with no path to knowledge privileged over any other. Something as abstruse as the ‘Quadruple Object’ is only accessible with the present-at-hand broken tool of human thought. That is, ‘Quadruple Objects’ are not trees and we should not conflate them into the general category of ordinary physical objects. The “Quadruple Object’ is really a four-fold thought experiment offered to view the ordinary objects of experience and existence from four different perspectives. Harman’s contention is that object-object relations should be put on the same basis as subject-object relations.

The four objects (four models of human thought) of Graham Harman are as follows. They are a paradoxical and exotic mix of objects that could only be the product of human thought that creates a new duality, viz., Real Objects versus Sensual Objects. How can such objects exist without human thought? Note: substitute the word ‘experience’ for ‘sensual’ in reading the following.

From the Harman Lexicon we find:

Real Objects - Objects that withdraw from our experience and exist regardless of human experience.

Sensual Objects – Objects that exist only within human sensory experience. This object exists only in relation to the perceiver.

Real Qualities – Accessed only through the intellect.

Sensual Qualities - Those found in sense experience.

Pairing Sensual and Real objects and qualities yields the following framework:

1. Real Object-Real Qualities: Real objects differ from one another by their real qualities and are not the product of a more fundamental substratum or super-stratum of reality. Their 'reality' remain inaccessible to us.
2. Real Object-Sensual Qualities: As in the tool-analysis of Heidegger. Real objects always withdraw from us and are translated into experience via our senses and perceptions (sensual apprehension) of the ostensible surface of real objects accessed only through thought and/or action.
3. Sensual Object-Real Qualities: This can only be characterized as an exotic or esoteric object This is an object formed from conscious awareness of vivid experience and interpretation of an object through human reason.
4. Sensual Object-Sensual Qualities: Yet another exotic or esoteric object. Experience of an object but embellished with the adumbrations and accretions from human consciousness and subjectivity.

An Alternative Quadruple Object:

I found the above overly abstract but have inferred an additional or alternative ‘Quadruple Object’ embedded in the conflations of the Harman Lexicon:

Undermining: This is a conflation of two different concepts. 1) Ontological Reduction. That is, reducing an apparent object to what is alleged to be its fundamental constituents. For example, the claim that a table is not ‘really’ a solid object but just a collection of atoms and empty space. The problem is that objects cannot be reduced to anything else and must by addressed as we encounter them in our experience. 2) Monism. This is to say that apparent objects are just fragmented pieces of the ‘real’ oneness of existence. The unified substratum of reality has been fractured. I agree with Graham Harman that the application of both concepts can be misleading when trying to clarify the ontological status of the apparent objects of our experience. But I also believe that combining Reductionism and Monism into a single concept such as ‘Undermining’ is a conflation.

Overmining: Again, another conflation. 1) Relation-ism. That is, objects only exist as they relate to, effect, or are affected by, other objects. An object itself is nothing but a collection of properties, a purely relational idea with its only reality being its relationship to, or correlation with, other objects. Harman’s example is that of casting an apple as a collection or bundle of related properties (red, sweet, cold, hard, solid, juicy, etc.). Existence consists solely of an object’s relation to other objects. Graham’s point is that the apple constitutes a unified object, just in the way we encounter it in our experience, not as a collection of individual properties. The error is that the observation of relations and properties dissolves objects into manifold of subjective perceptions. As Graham puts it, objects are real and “… not a tapestry of perceptions woven together from outside.” The translation of the object by relation and correlation only leads to distortion of the object in our awareness of it. 2) Ontological Inflation. This is the exact opposite of ontological reduction. This is the other extreme where, instead of reducing objects to underlying substratum, objects are inflated to the super-stratum of meaning. This is the tendency to add another dimension to the existence of an object by imbuing an object of experience with the manifestation of additional or special meanings. For example, awards and religious icons are objects that are idealized and thus ontologically inflated.

The Overmining and Undermining concepts proved to be useful in inferring the alternative Quadruple Object based on scalable ontology. But perhaps this just another example of one of those “…homespun private ontologies…”

From Undermining (The Realm of the Idealists):

1. The object resulting from ontological reduction
2. The object resulting from the substratum of Monism

From Overmining (The Realm of the Realists):

3. The object resulting from relation and correlation. I call this object coherence
4. The object resulting from ontological inflation to the super-stratum of meaning

Unlike the abstract Quadruple Object offered by Harman, here at least is a concrete example of the alternative Quadruple Object in terms of Haman’s apple.

1. The real apple is no more than its molecular, atomic or subatomic structure.
2. The real apple is just an individuated piece of the unified oneness that grounds all reality.
3. The apple is only real in that it has relations, correlations and connections with other objects.
4. The apple has a higher meaning that cannot be captured by its physical properties or relations.

Apples aside, it is consciousness itself is most often subjected to all four of these fallacies.

1. Consciousness is no more than brain chemistry and neurons.
2. Individual consciousness is just an individuated piece of the unified consciousness.
3. Consciousness is only real in that it has relations/correlations with/to other consciousnesses
4. Consciousness is a separate and autonomous sphere outside of the material world.

Ultimately, I believe Harman is correct in imploring us to take objects as they are presented to us in our experience of the world, at our ontological level, the world of medium sized dry goods. This brings up the Quintuple Object. Number five:

The Quintuple Object:

5. The real qualities of real objects, and our sense perceptions of them, simply meet in the same place. The place where the object's properties or qualities and our sense perceptions meet just is what we call experience. We need only take an object as is, where as, in the experience of our existence.

[Avşar · Rating 4 out of 5]

Actually doing a better job of explaining Harman's OOO approach at times better than Object-Oriented Ontology: A New Theory of Everything. I still seem to fail to understand Heidegger references -maybe because I don't understand Heidegger-, but I'd say you'll get a real good sense of why everything is an object, how objects could be overmined and undermined and how they are not equal to their qualities. Graham Harman, Timothy Morton, Levi Bryant, Ian Bogost are fresh and intelligent OOO philosophers to follow.

[Mitchell Chatfield · Rating 3 out of 5]

The flow and lucidity (in my reading) of this ebbed and flowed. The Heideggerean recap I found to be generally quite good, leaning towards 4/5 stars. However the necessary but complex dive into the sensual/real split lost me. This wasn’t aided by the number of permutations which were addressed by name but not necessarily given a history (these came from the interactions between real objects (RO), sensual objects (SO), real qualities (RQ) and sensual qualities (SQ)).

In short, the recap of the landscape of object ontology is quite interesting. However the elaboration of the quadruple object with its three radiations and three junctions ran a little too fast for me to keep up with.

[Viktor · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,5

Objejt-orienteret ontologi er et super interessant og vigtigt pluralistisk ståsted i det 21. århundredes filosofi. Harmans bog er en god indgangsvinkel til det overordnede projekt. Han skriver dog alt for didaktisk til min smag. Men totalt respekt for, at han kører fire-folds-strukturen i gennem hele bogen, også kapitel-inddelingsmæssigt. Ret gennemført, som Platons dialogform også er det ift. hans dualistiske ontologi.

[Madison Delaney · Rating 1 out of 5]

Absolute nonsense, convincing only for the first few pages before being a fascinatingly terrible answer to the nature of objects. Undermining and overmining? No, just mining, because understanding takes work. This book is simply an attempt to liberate philosophy from science by turning it into quietist, unhelpful, and ultimately questionable drivel. Amazing that OOO went anywhere with its founder making such guff.

[Zac ?̸̳̙͈̙́̌̈́̚͝͝ͅ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Harman has gained an unenviable reputation and one that for various reasons I suspect he deserves. Nevertheless, this book was quite interesting as far as hand-wavey phenomenological theory goes, if you want to get a concrete synopsis of what is really going on in Object-Oriented Philosophy this is probably a good bet.

[el jel · Rating 3 out of 5]

a pocket-size overview of Harman's ooo and its fundamental unit, written clearly, explaining the influence of his philosophical ancestors
however heavy on generating new terms and concepts while lacking in explaining some crucial problems such as the position of knowledge and phil inquiry or sufficient arguments for postulating the real object

[Igor Capelari · Rating 3 out of 5]

Melhor que o outro livro sobre a OOO. Ainda sim não são apresentados exemplos de como objetos são analisados na teoria. Além disso, quase nada é falado sobre o que me pareceu o mais importante, as dez categorias da OOO. Existe sim alguma coisa de interessante no projeto do autor, mas enquanto ele não optar por uma exposição mais concreta, vai ser difícil ver com a utilidade da sua ontologia.

[Larry · Rating 4 out of 5]

The whole ontography stuff sounds like a waste of paper to me but the anti-transcendental idea that the opposition is not between man and world but between thing and relation is very interesting.

[Wendi · Rating 3 out of 5]

I see his point, but also feel like he was too caught up in a mathematician’s pursuit for symmetry

[0:50 · Rating 1 out of 5]

Let it just be said that this shares a 1-star with Berkeley.

[Unies Ananda Raja · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good book for a clear introduction to what Graham Harman's doing. From what I get, Harman is building his own system of metaphysics. It is a brave new way and I am anticipating to see more of him. Maybe Harman is the next big thing in philosophy. But, I don't know. The thing is I like his way of philosophizing. His writing is clear. He has no intention of making the reader bored, at all. His explanation of the system is vivid. But, there are many things to address and right now I don't really get it all. It is a process, I know.

[Mac · Rating 3 out of 5]

All a bit weird and rather unfeasible.

This feels like it was written in 19th century along with Schopenhauer, who sided with Spinoza and created a post-Kantian monism where single will objectifies everything into phenomena, but instead, Graham sides with Leibniz, and splits everything into separate entities that objectify themselves as realities. This poses something badly shot, and crazy. He does feel more like an idealist rather than a realist; says that I cannot see things as they are, and then idealises these magical fourfold structures of access.

Siding with Leibniz I find is the ultimate flaw and nail to the coffin; it causes all kinds of problems like the impossibility of object interactions, and inconsistent definition of substance in terms of modern science. It just works much better in Spinozian and neo-Spinozian philosophy, especially considering that there it poses no problem. There, physics confirms metaphysics without forcefully trying to bend reality as we know it in 21 century to Graham's speculative theoretical framework. It feels very backwards and reverse. For example, the world is all built of the repetitive states of matter that stretch along and replicate with the universe expansion. And there are five states of matter, out of these entities are lumped together in many deterministic combinations. The transition of the solid matter into the air is soft, it is maintained by laws of surface tensions. These scientific truths of universal substance are completely compatible with Spinoza, but not with Leibniz.

To account for relations between Leibnizian objects, he brings occasionalism to the table but its workings are not explained at all and remain a mystery. There are hints to David Hume's scepticism, and some secular thesis of occasionalism, but again, Hume's stance was proven wrong and adjusted many many times by a wide variety of people. There simply exist necessary connections, especially in intentionality and laws of physics. Again, in Spinozan determinism, it just works by the means of matter put in constant motion so matter in its variety of states interacts casually. Neuroscience confirms deterministic model and another point is scored by Spinoza.

Some phenomenological bias is also present and not helpful, I see no reason as to why I cannot directly interact and see things-in-themselves, but going by Harman's definition I can't because it would mean to apprehend thing's being and having contact with its whole existence. There remains Husserlian/Heideggerian influence, so we always interact with sensual objects, but interaction and sensual experience do not have to be described as such, through Phenomenological lens of access; disjunctivism explains experiencing reality directly very well without phenomenology. It's just one example.

Harman keeps putting Kant into an idealist camp, but Kant was more really an empirical realist. Kant did not deny us noumena and their existence; German idealists did. Kant actually thought that they are real and somehow exist, but just thought that thinking about them is rather pointless. I can think of galaxies on the other end of the universe, or what it's like to be a toaster but what is the chance of me being correct? Small. It is clear that Kant wasn't idealist in Critique but mainly in Prolegomena where he criticises idealism and distances himself with idealist movement. Although he uses term Transcendental idealism, he uses it in a way that transcends empiricist and idealist division giving a third possible way.

Graham isn't the first that tried to think things in themselves, already mentioned Schopenhauer did so also. That is why I put this as neither revolutionary, nor particularly promising, it's another take at noumena in the spirit of the past.

[Andrew · Rating 2 out of 5]

The Quadruple Object: Review 1

and

The Quadruple Object: Review 2

Two full, linked posts reviewing The Quadruple Object. Somewhat from a hermeneutical and rhetorical perspective, but check them out and see what you think.

[Ricardo Vega · Rating 5 out of 5]

Helped me to clarify the ever confusing world of Husserl, Heidergger and Kant. A very appealing proposal to retake the object as a center for reflection and point of balance to the human self-centered way to see reality.

[Laura Gonzalez · Rating 4 out of 5]

http://www.lauragonzalez.co.uk/2014/0...