Re: Events and historical change

Greg provides a classic example of the implicit positivism in Foucualt.


>
>
>Events do indeed have 'origins' for Foucualt, but such origins are caused by
>such a diverse confluence of social factors that Foucualt finds the term
>causality quite problematic.  Causality brings to mind the readily
> identifiable source of a complex historical event (such as the development
of the prison), where the causal elements are believed to exhaust, or at least
>mostly explain, the origin of an event. 

This is pure David Hume. But is it an acurate account of causation?


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"What I try to achieve is the history of the relations which 
 thought maintains with truth; the history of thought insofar as it is the
thought    of truth. All those who say truth does not exist for me are
simple minded."
(Foucault)


Colin Wight
Department of International Politics
University of Wales, Aberystwyth
Aberystwyth
SY23 3DA

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