Terms

Question 1

Critical Thinking

Answer 1

• using facts, evidence, logic, reasons, opinions, validity in order to form an opinion. finding the truth
• knowing what arguments and evidence are and being able to distinguish between solid and irrelevant evidence.
• teachings of Socrates - best known teaching method for Critical Thinking

Question 2

Analysis

Answer 2

• breaking a complex topic or substance into smaller parts to gain a better understanding
• looking at relationship between parts
• used since Aristotle; Descartes describes the method in his “Discourse on the Method”
• systematic thinking directed towards goal, focused upon analysis - connection to critical thinking

Question 3

Epistemology

Answer 3

• branch in philosophy about the nature or theory of knowledge and how it is produced
• study on the “body of knowledge” which has 3 further approaches: positivism, realism, interpretivism
• 2 ways to classify epistemological positions: scientific and hermeneutic position; realist and interpretivist position

Question 4

Epistemological turn

Answer 4

• before Descartes, existence was the will of a separate entity called God which was beyond reasoning
• Descartes changes it, that God exists because humans can perceive existence
• Locke, Spinoza, Hume created a change making God important while bringing the freedom of thought, which is the beginning of empirical science

Question 5

Cartesian

Answer 5

• Cartesian way of thinking by Descartes, on how perception and knowledge are built
• composed of doubt and dualism (doubt = how can we trust our own senses?; dualism = gaining reliable knowledge between consciousness and the object.)
• Consciousness is independent of the world outside (split between mind and body)

Question 6

Ontology

Answer 6

• a philosophical study with question of ‘being’, reality and existence - study of the truth of the world
• 3 subfields: Realism, Empiricism, Constructivism
• Can be either foundationalist (reality is already defined) or anti-foundationalist (reality is socially constructed)
• if we think about something we have a clear definition about, that definition might not have been understood 600 years ago

Question 7

Ontological ordering

Answer 7

• the notion of it, puts focus on the mechanisms of how ontologies are arranged in practice
• when there is ontological tension or different ontologies appear at the same time

Question 8

Foundationalist ontology (realist)

Answer 8

• every justified belief is justified by basic beliefs
• in order to arrive at the underlying reality, start with the most fundamental questions, and then work up from there to more specific questions. Those most fundamental questions are usually ontological realism
• built on the basic beliefs and build on them because these beliefs can directly justify others

Question 9

Process ontology (processual)

Answer 9

• universal model of the structure of the world as an ordered wholeness, such ontologies are fundamental ontologies
• fundamental ontologies do not claim to be accessible to any empirical proof in itself, but to be a structural design pattern, out of which empirical phenomena can be explained and put together consistently
• processes give rise to the objective character of phenomena, this actively established relations in the material world

Question 10

Relational ontology (emergent/mergent/anti-foundationalist/anti-ontological)

Answer 10

• is the philosophical position what distinguishes subject from subject, subject from object or object from object is mutual relation rather than substance
• anti-foundationalism says that phenomena are socially constructed

Question 11

Substance ontology

Answer 11

• substance theory is an ontological theory about objecthood positing that a substance is distinct from it properties (anyag különbözik a tulajdonságaitól)
• it is part of the foundationalist ontology and it means that the world is made up of a sort of substance. This is not only true for the empirical, but also the rationalist approach. Both hold that this is a substantive world

Question 12

Racialized ontology

Answer 12

• the study of existence in the terms of racialization and race, for example how different objects and activities have different meanings depending on the context of whom they are created/carried by
• e.g someone makes a watch but he is arrested because someone else thought it is a bomb

Question 13

Representation

Answer 13

• political representation is the activity of making citizens “present” in public policy making processes when political actors act in the best interest of citizens
• occurs when political actors speak, advocate, symbolize and act on the behalf of others in the political arena
  = political assistance
• this definition of political representation is consistent with a wide variety of views on what representing implies and what the duties of representatives are

Question 14

Metaphysics

Answer 14

• branch of philosophy that examines the fundamental nature of reality, including the relationships between mind and matter; substance and attribute; possibility and actuality
• deals with the ‘first principles’ of existence, seeking to define basic concepts like existence, being, causality, substance, time and space
• most known sub branch of it is ontology
• e.g Nietzsche and Foucault are against metaphysics because for them the body is very important

Question 15

Objectivity

Answer 15

• central philosophical concept, claims that methods and results of science should not be influenced by particular perspectives, values, personal interests, emotions etc.
• objectivity starts from facts (= value free research)
• judge fairly, without partiality or external influence
• important in critical thinking

Question 16

Teleology

Answer 16

• there is an inherent purpose or final cause for all that exists
• teleology is a reason or explanation for something in function of its end or purpose
• it holds that all things exist for a purpose, directed towards a final result, with everything existing holding an inherent purpose or “final” cause for its existence
• Examples of teleological ideologies: German Idealism (Hegel’s definition of history)

Question 17

Modernity

Answer 17

• refers to the social conditions, processes and discourses consequent to the Age of Enlightenment
• modernity deals with the issue of modernisation and the absence of an eternal rules or on singular idea about governance and the basis on which we can establish a foundation of knowledge of the world
• political modernity came into existence around 16th and 17th century by Hobbes, Bacon, Shakespeare, Descartes

Question 18

“Mirror of nature”

Answer 18

• metaphor upon history of Western philosophy has been founded; philosophers have constructed a doctrine of the mind as a mirror of nature but there is an external reality - an inner eye
• metaphor used by Richard Rorty in his 1979 book, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature
• truth not to be held as an object = social device; “truth” is our participation in the language game of trying to sort through multiple points of view

Question 19

Rationalism

Answer 19

• is an epistemological view that ‘regard reason as the chief source and test of knowledge’ and ‘any view appealing to reason as a source of knowledge or justification’

Question 20

Empiricism

Answer 20

• theory that states that knowledge comes only or primarily from sensory experience
• emphasizes the role of empirical evidence in the formation of ideas, over the idea of innate ideas or traditions
• originates with Locke, Hobbes, Bacon and Hume: “Our knowledge of the world is a product of our experience”

Question 21

Sovereign power

Answer 21

• sovereignty is when a state has the independent and absolute ability to rule within a territory, without interference from any outside power
• 4 elements to consider when talking about sovereign power: Territory, Population, Government, Sovereignty
• eg. China

Question 22

Jean Bodin

Answer 22

• French political philosopher in the 16th century, best known for his theory of absolute and undivided sovereignty
• Bodin favours the strong central control of a national monarchy, that serves the interest of the people
• his subordination of church to state served the goal of religious toleration which is an alternative to Locke’s separation of church and state

Question 23

Leviathan

Answer 23

• work of Hobbes in 1651
• main question is how to organize the government in order to avoid civil war? and the answer is a strong undivided government
• this theory derives from his theory of homo homini lupus (a man is a wolf to another man)

Question 24

Social contract

Answer 24

• an actual or hypothetical compact, or agreement, between the ruled and their rulers, defining the rights and duties of each. defines the duties of each individual
• goal was to justify and delimit political authority
• comes from Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau

Question 25

Nominalism

Answer 25

• relationship between language and the world that is represented in language
• 2 kinds of nominalism: 1.) One that maintains that there are no universals - realism (concepts are shaped by day to day)
  2. ) one that maintains that there are no abstract objects - platonism

Question 26

Idealism

Answer 26

• school of thought which asserts that reality as humans know it is mentally constructed thus immaterial
• claims consciousness exists before and must be considered the precondition of material existence
• describes that the current situation is being shaped by our thoughts - Plato is in favour of idealism

Question 27

Materialism

Answer 27

• physical matter is the only or fundamental reality and that all beings and processes and phenomena can be explained as manifestations or results of matter
• question about how the phenomenon of knowledge emerges from material forms of nature and product
• Hobbes, Marx and Feuerbach all deal with materialism in different forms

Question 28

Scenic hypothesis

Answer 28

• hypothesis derived from a particular imaginary situation or reconstructed scene, a ‘thought experiment’
• ‘the state of nature’ is an important scenic hypothesis since it tried to imagine what the first human beings were like - Locke and Hobbes use this scenic hypothesis as a basis for their analytical and scientific argument about the government

Question 29

Determinism

Answer 29

• all events, whether involving inanimate matter or conscious beings like humans, are completely determined by previous events/causes external to the will
• if you knew the physical state of the world in any given moment, you could in principle predict the future with accuracy
• central idea is causality (cause-and-effect)
• free will is an illusion and we distinguish external and internal determinism

Question 30

“The King’s two bodies”

Answer 30

• historical book by Kantorowicz where he describes a profound transformation in the concept of political authority that occured over the course of the Middle Ages
• The King has 2 bodies: Body Natural and a Body Politic - the notion of the 2 bodies allowed for the continuity of monarchy even when the monarch dies

Question 31

Game theory/Rational Choice Theory

Answer 31

• sophisticated mathematical approach of analysing human interaction
• assumes that people have well-defined values which can be modelled in terms of individual costs and benefits, presents an interaction between individuals as a game in which each person tries to maximize their personal benefits and minimize their personal costs
• assumes everyone seeks maximisation

Question 32

Labour theory of property

Answer 32

• by John Locke (1689) in Second Treatise on Government
• theory of natural law that holds that property originally comes about by the exertion (erofeszítés) of labour upon natural resources
• theory has been used to justify the homestead (tanya) principle, which holds that one may gain whole permanent ownership of an unowned natural resources by performing an act of original appropriation

Question 33

Montesquieu

Answer 33

• French political enlightenment philosopher with principal works such as The Spirit of Laws
• laid foundation of our modern and liberal societies
• separation of power is a political doctrine where responsibilities of government are divided in 3 separate branches: executive, legislative, judicial

Question 34

James Stuart

Answer 34

• thinker in Scottish enlightenment
• says that economics and politics are connected and laws of market governs our interests based on rational calculation, this relation with the state creates more power for the state
• these forces also control what the state does, which is a moderate mercantilist approach

Question 35

John Millar

Answer 35

• philosopher and historian with interest in the economics in a nominalist view
• society with the rise of the middle class, ends up keeping the state in check
• class and class interest becomes a new type of thinking about the market - things are embodied by the middle class - separate spheres of interest will come into conflict
• asks that ‘what does it mean to be governed’

Question 36

Physiocrats

Answer 36

• economic theory developed in the 18th century that believes that the wealth of nations derived solely from the value of ‘land agriculture’ or ‘land development’ therefore the agricultural products should be highly priced
• agrarianist philosophy which developed in the context of the prevalent European rural society of the time
• physiocratic school believes that all social factors like production and distribution are connected - reformers

Question 37

Politics of affect

Answer 37

• related to the affections in which emotions play a role in the political life - associated with the Enlightenment tradition.
• linked to David Hume who criticized the rational way of interpreting the world and emphasized on the desires, hopes and appetites that shape the basic objects we see out in the world
• emotions being used to make us see the world in a particular way that goes in line with our own interests and to make us comfortable with the world.

Question 38

Invisible hand

Answer 38

• Adam Smith - birth of modern economic thinking

- Laissez-faire principle

Question 39

Socio-metabolic process

Answer 39

• necessary transformation of nature in order to assure generational and intergenerational sustainability
• the contradiction between humans and their conditions of existence is managed through particular set of social relations that organize the metabolic process
• sustainability of society is predicted upon a transformation of nature (through which existing forms of nature are destroyed while new natures are produced)
• this transformation is always socially organised through a set of social relations

Question 40

Contradictory unity

Answer 40

• the sense in which a contradiction can only really appear within a constitutive whole
• rather than seeing each pole as a singularity, the focus is on the underlying relations that produce the antagonism (ellentét) and render it intelligible in binary terms
• this idea is very clearly presented in the Communist Manifesto
• e.g use value and exchange value are contradictory and cannot be simultaneously realized yet they form the value of production

Question 41

Romanticism

Answer 41

• artistic and intellectual movement, break from the guiding principles of the Enlightenment which established reason as a foundation of all knowledge
• it emphasises the importance of emotional sensitivity, individual subjectivity, imagination rather than reason
• Hather, Rousseau are the biggest thinkers of Romanticism
• thinkers were opposed to (szemben álltak) absolutism based on divine will, and the monopoly of power of the higher classes of nobility and clergy

Question 42

Immanent teleology

Answer 42

formulated by Aristotle, who said that just as human activity contains its actual purpose, so too natural objects contain a potential purpose: an object is directed toward an end, infinite incontent, that achieves self-realization in the course of the object’s development.
- this inner purpose is what causes nature to move from the lower to the higher stages and to reach the peak of its development in a kind of absolute, or entelechy.

Question 43

Dialectical materialism

Answer 43

• philosophical approach to reality derived from the teachings of Marx and Engels
• materialism is the material world, perceptible to the sense, has objective reality independent of mind and spirit

Question 44

“Dialectic of the Master and the Slave”

Answer 44

• Hegel’s ‘Master-Slave’ dependency is not one-directional, since the master is equally as dependent of the slave because the slave provides everything for the master
• the Hegelian process of change in which concept or its realization passes over into and is preserved and fulfilled by its opposite

Question 45

Interval vs external relation

Answer 45

• internal is between 2 or more entities, where if they would not have been in relation to each other, the nature of the entities would be different
  e. g democracy and if the losing candidate gets into power than democracy does not exist anymore
• external is between 2 or more entities where if they would not have been in relation to each other, the nature of the entities would not be different
  e. g 2 cities have positional relations with each other but if their position changed, they would be the same cities

Question 46

Creative destruction

Answer 46

• assumes that long-standing arrangements and assumptions must be destroyed to free up resources and energy to be deployed for innovation. (felszabadított energia az innovacio erdekeben)
• Schumpeter: process of industrial mutation that incessantly revolutionizes the economic structure from within, incessantly destroying the old one, incessantly creating a new one
• sees economics as an organic and dynamic process

Question 47

Commodity

Answer 47

• in classical political economy and in Marx’s critique a commodity is any good or service produced by human labour and offered as a product for general sale on the market
• Marx’s labour theory of value

Question 48

Essentialism

Answer 48

• belief that every entity has a set of attributes that are necessary to its identity and function
• Plato’s idealism held that all things have such essence and idea and form
• things have a set of characteristics which make them what they are and that the task of science and philosophy is their discovery and expression

Question 49

Commodity fetishism

Answer 49

• the mystification of an object while shadowing the work put behind it.
• the labour in the object is covered by the social relation people have to things
• it is caused by an exploitative system that makes workers produce dispossession
• the social characteristics of human labour take on the appearance of objects that appear to exist independently of social relations whilst the products of labour appear to possess magical properties that bear no relationship to the labour that produces them.

Question 50

Paradigm

Answer 50

• fundamental way of looking at the world, set of ideas, a framework that helps us make sense of the world
• typical example or a pattern of something

Question 51

Genealogy (method)

Answer 51

• historical technique in which one questions the commonly understood emergence of various philosophical and social beliefs by attempting to account for the scope, breadth or totality of discourse
• extending the possibility of analysis, the point of a genealogical analysis is to show that a given system of thought was the result of contingent turns of history, not the outcome of rationally inevitable trends
• Nietzsche and Foucault and important figures for this method: Foucault analysis challenged traditional practices of history, philosophical assumptions and established conceptions of knowledge, truth and power

Question 52

Knowledge/Power

Answer 52

• Foucault: Knowledge is linked to power; firstly because it assumes the authority of the ‘truth’ and, secondly, because it has the power to make itself true

Question 53

“Threshold of epistemologization”

Answer 53

• one of the thresholds By Foucault of an archaeological analysis
• describes how science takes shape as ‘knowledge’ within a discursive formation
• this treats the history of sciences at the level of knowledge

Question 54

“Regime of truth”

Answer 54

Each society has its regime of truth, its “general politics” of truth: that is, the types of discourse which it accepts and makes function as true; the mechanisms and instances which enable one to distinguish true and false statements, the means by which each is sanctioned; the techniques and procedures accorded value in the acquisition of truth; the status of those who are charged with saying what counts as true

Question 55

Intelligibility

Answer 55

• the capability of being understood

- Kant talks about priori knowledge

Question 56

Subjective reason

Answer 56

• determined by someone’s beliefs, a reason that depends on its subject for its existence or properties, focuses on the means rather than the ends
• term originated from Frankfurter schule, arguing that modern philosophy has advocated more for subjective reason than objective rationality

Question 57

“Hermeneutics of Suspicion”

Answer 57

The expression “hermeneutic of suspicion” is a tautological way of saying what thoughtful people have always known, that words may not always mean what they seem to mean. Sometimes a hermeneutic of suspicion may be important for more negative reasons, as when we suspect that texts are not telling us the whole truth.
- approach a text with the expectation that it doesn’t mean what it appears to mean (Marx, Nietzsche, Freud)

Question 58

Contingency

Answer 58

• it is the key to genealogy - everything could have been different
• a future event is possible but cannot be predicted with certainty
• Foucault’s historical analysis
• eshetőség

Question 59

Truth and Power

Answer 59

• Foucault claimed that truth isn’t outside of power, rather truth is produced by power and shaped by different knowledge regimes in which societies accept certain things to be true
• if there is no universal truth or no universal knowledge, how can someone be able to govern correctly? In order to make the statements as objective as possible and thus as universal as possible, critical thinking must be applied. Critical thinking and critical analysis will be the only way to govern in the ‘most correct’ way possible.

Question 60

Calculability

Answer 60

• Regulating human affairs and using them as a base for politics to represent ideas/models as natural laws
• Change that comes up since enlightenment. It’s a term used by Nietzsche and Foucault to describe how life of people became governable. Life of people became more predictable and thus easier governable.
• The first step in this cultivation was to make man “calculable, regular, [and] necessary. - men are made

Question 61

Conditions of possibility

Answer 61

• concept made popular by Immanuel Kant
• 4th important point for genealogy
• e.g space is a condition of possibility but it does not contribute in the making
• Kant is interested in the necessary conditions of experience and, specifically, what in appearances and in thought are necessary conditions for experience.

Question 62

Performativity

Answer 62

• The power of language to effect change in the world: language does not simply describe the world but may instead (or also) function as a form of social action; use language not only to represent the world, but also to constitute the world and act on it
• we use language, we bring things into existence, we do not only describe reality but form a reality that confirms to its desired intentions
• gender performativity: behaviour does not determined by being born as male or female but one does learn to act as one in order to fit in society

Question 63

Commodification

Answer 63

• the transformation of good, services, ideas and people into commodities or objects of trade

Question 64

Reification

Answer 64

• Frankfurter Schule, Marx
• tendency for products of human action to appear as they were things, products of nature rather than human choice
• eldologiasodás
• you are like a sewing machine to your boss

Question 65

Hypostatization

Answer 65

• connected to reification
• fallacy happens when someone thinks of an abstract concept as if it was a concrete thing
• justice demands - no justice

Question 66

Instrumental reason

Answer 66

• also known as an objective reason
• the use of reason as an instrument for determining the best or more efficient means to achieve a given end
• term originates from Frankfurter Schule and also used by Weber

Question 67

Hegemony

Answer 67

• Gramsci used how the dominating class contains their position and how their ideologies and beliefs become common sense
• dominance of one power or institution over the ideas of a concentrated group of people
• dominant ideology is naturalized in society

Question 68

“Accentuating the negative”

Answer 68

• negatívumok hangsúlyozása
• we are better at detecting words that carry negative meanings
• relevant in politics because more likely to remember negative images and this can be abused
• 2 possible reasons: brain might process it faster; negative words better capture our attention

Question 69

Man

Answer 69

• only functions with the idea of “other”

Question 70

Othering

Answer 70

“they are not like me”

Question 71

“Unmarked humanity is white”

Answer 71

• man is white

Question 72

“Archival power”

Answer 72

• Trouillot has contemplated the “archival power” or the ability of formal institutions to shape history in preserving it.

Question 73

“Formulas of silence’

Answer 73

• Trouillot in his book Silencing the Past

- formulas erasure + formulas of banalization

Question 74

Techniques of alienation

Answer 74

• Tsing says that the techniques used by men, to disentangle things from the complex world in which they exist in order to turn them into resources that can be used for wealth accumulation
• inspired by Marx
• man alienating himself from nature in order to gain control over it

Question 75

Proliferation

Answer 75

• concept by Tsing
• the rapid increase in the number or amount of something
• in order to survive, capitalism constantly needs to grow - Tsing compares capitalism to cancer
• sejtburjánzás

Question 76

“Eruptions of Man”

Answer 76

• Tsing: “Earth stalked by men”

Question 77

Frontier

Answer 77

• Tsing writes about frontiers. This is in the margins- not the centre of politics.
• A frontier is a boundary between countries, techno frontiers, between eg wild west, wilderness. geographical
• Frontier is a space in which the law is suspended
• No more law or culture (used to before boundaries defined between countries)
• Sense in which underpins of political modernity- constantly having to produce outside of itself and grow into

Question 78

Techno- politics

Answer 78

• Mitchell & Tsing
• Two-dimensional concept:
  1. Depoliticization - political problems have become technical problems increasingly rely on experts to find answers to them
  2. Aspects of political life have become dependent on social-technical relations
• Connected to Polanyi’s liberalization thesis - technical arrangements unleash power

Question 79

“Regime of visibility”

Answer 79

• Tsing
• Certain people have the ability to decide what is seen and what is not
• At the bottom of the competing regimes of visibility there are people: people are invisible and negatively affected

Question 80

“The state effect”

Answer 80

• Mitchell
• term used in an attempt to demystify the power of the state
• to understand the distinction between the state and society
• the state is not a free standing entity, and should be understood in terms of its real, structural effects which create appearance of a world fundamentally divided into state and society
• metaphysical effect of practices

Question 81

Political system theory

Answer 81

• a technical approach to politics in which arranging the system in such a way to get a desired outcome
• criticised by Mitchell with the state effect
• an understanding of the universal pattern of governing is established

Question 82

Statist approach

Answer 82

• political doctrine that wishes to return a degree of authority back to the state
• idea that the state is a distinct approach

Question 83

Anthropocene

Answer 83

• human activity is the dominant force on the planet so we are shaping the planet instead of vice versa
• critical concept: disruption of the earth/nature and its ecological systems

Question 84

“Multiple temporalities”

Answer 84

• different parts of the world have their own temporality
• time does not exist separately from forces of production
• can’t just follow the capitalist temporality

Question 85

“Collaborative survival”

Answer 85

• Tsing argues that staying alive for every species requires collaboration across differences, in order not to die

Question 86

Socio-technical

Answer 86

• an arrangement done in a particular way by interaction and technological process
• to get answers to a problem, answers would opt for scientific solutions
• connected to Techno politics - discusses ho technology shapes governing
• interaction societal infrastructures and human behaviour