Yeti Kang is a PhD student at the University of Chicago Divinity School. His academic pursuits are situated at the intersection of continental philosophy, critical theory, Chinese philosophy, and the history of metaphysics.
Thesis (B.A., Honors, College of Letters)--Wesleyan University, 2020., 2020
In this thesis, I investigate the work and interrelation of Emmanuel Levinas, Jacques Derrida, ... more In this thesis, I investigate the work and interrelation of Emmanuel Levinas, Jacques Derrida, and Maurice Blanchot to show the deconstructive nature of the action of reading/writing in order to establish reading/writing as an exemplary ethical action that renovates itself in its development. After World War II and the Holocaust, many European thinkers endeavored to establish a new ethical and philosophical system in order to break with the "Western philosophical tradition" with its emphasis on the empirical ego. Levinas challenged the philosophy of the ego, or egology (egologie), by prioritizing the absolute alterity of the transcendental Other (l'Autrui). Sympathetic to Levinas's challenge to the Western metaphysical tradition, Derrida also investigated the possible alternative to egology, but he criticized Levinas's unmediated ethical encounter with the transcendental Other. Their debate in the 1960s gives rise to a fundamental question of egology: how can we engage with the (transcendent) event/thing without the contamination of the ego-logical acknowledgement? I answer this question by discussing Maurice Blanchot's literature and its contribution to Levinas's and Derrida's transitions in their later works. The fundamental goal of this thesis is to construct the action of reading/writing as an exemplary deconstructive power that challenges the definite ego-logical acknowledgement by welcoming the question to come.
Jacques Derrida’s 2001 visit to China was overshadowed by one of his controversial remarks: “Chin... more Jacques Derrida’s 2001 visit to China was overshadowed by one of his controversial remarks: “China has no philosophy, only thought.” This statement, coupled with his exclusion of Chinese writing from the history of philosophy in Of Grammatology, incited a substantial and ongoing debate regarding the “legitimacy of Chinese philosophy.” The scholarly critique of Derrida’s reading of Chinese philosophy and language has undergone a convoluted path since the 1980s, evolving into a complex debate on the limitations inherent in Derrida’s criticism of Western logocentrism and ethnocentrism. This paper embarks on an exploration of the theoretical underpinnings of Derrida’s interpretation of Chinese writing in Of Grammatology. It reveals the underlying closure-breakthrough structure that governs Derrida’s deconstruction of Western logocentrism — a structure that, regrettably, obstructs the potential for a positive and constructive approach to Chinese language and philosophy. Drawing inspiration from Yurou Zhong’s study of “Chinese grammatology” (Zhong 2019), this paper envisions a positive science of Chinese writing, concurrently resonating with and critiquing Derrida’s grammatology. In doing so, this paper seeks to redirect deconstructive undecidability towards a mysterious and decentered dynamics of history and metaphysics, uncovering pathways for the convergence of Derrida’s grammatology and Chinese grammatology in a recursive progression of the xuan (玄).
In “Faith and Knowledge” (1994), Jacques Derrida addresses the fundamental duplicity of religion.... more In “Faith and Knowledge” (1994), Jacques Derrida addresses the fundamental duplicity of religion. According to Derrida, religion has not one but two sources: “the sacrosanct, the safe and sound on the one side, and faith, trustworthiness or credit on the other” (Acts of Religion, 61). Derrida thus offers two different critiques: one attacks the purity of the unscathed by demonstrating the autoimmune relation between religion and science; the other rethinks the elementary act of faith by appealing to two “historical” names, the messianicity and khōra. In light of Michael Naas’ discussion of the two essential dimensions of language implicit in Derrida’s two sources of religion, I would like to read Derrida’s two critiques in terms of two modes of deconstruction, one operating on a constructive level and the other on a performative level. By reading “Faith and Knowledge” in the context of Derrida’s writings from the late 1980s to the 1990s, this essay intends to demonstrate a quasi-progressive relationship between these two modes of deconstruction: pointing out the necessary autoimmunity in the dogmas, the deconstruction on the constative level opens up the passage between the transcendent and its deviation (i.e., between religion and science, founding law and preserving law, apophatism and atheism), which allows the deconstruction on the performative level to “name” the unthinkable opening to the given/performative time and space. This quasi-progression ensures that the two “historical” names (the messianicity and khōra) unsettle the division between the two sources of religion from within Western history. However, we shall also be wary of the inertia that arises from this quasi-progression. An overemphasis on the critique of the Judeo-Christiano-Islamic tradition from within may lead to the neglect of a certain kind of discussion of receptivity, attachment, and historicity that might have been possible in the context of metaphysical or religious diversity. Before we discuss a new religious tolerance and a democracy to come that detaches from all determinate religions, perhaps we should begin by discussing a pluralistic and heterogenous approach to the question of religion, an approach enabled by deconstruction, but still not fully discussed.
When Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz first sent his paper on binary arithmetic to the Royal Academy of ... more When Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz first sent his paper on binary arithmetic to the Royal Academy of Sciences in Paris in 1701, the Academy advised him not to publish it until he had found “better samples” to demonstrate the usefulness of his binary system. What Leibniz eventually added into his paper was a detailed account of the connection between the Yijing (易经) tri/hexagram or gua (卦) system and his binary arithmetic, based on the Xiantian tu (先天图) he received from the Jesuit missionary Joachim Bouvet (白晋). Such connection, as Leibniz suggests, not only reflects the universal applicability and metaphysical importance of his binary system, but also indicates the possibility of using Chinese writing as a sample for universal characteristic. Modern scholars tend to think Leibniz’s use of the Yijing as a strategic move, which proves at best a formal analogy between binary arithmetic and the Yijing system, and at worst a “Chinese prejudice” or “European hallucination.” In contrast, this paper argues that Leibniz’s reading reveals some profound connections and differences between the two systems at both the metaphysical and cosmo-technological levels.
To demonstrate these connections and differences, this paper compares the application of the Yijing tri/hexagrams and binary arithmetic in their cosmo-technological systems, i.e., in the Yijing divination and cybernetics. Based on the reading of Norbert Wiener’s account of cybernetic automaton and the divination system of the Yijing explicated in the Xici zhuan (系辞传), this paper outlines a recursive cosmic system in the Yijing, which not only shares certain logical and arithmetic premises with cybernetic mechanism, but also unifies the recursive system with the idea of sheng sheng (生生). However, beneath the recursive structure shared by cybernetics and the Yijing lies a fundamental divergency in their views towards the mechanism-organism relationship. Such difference leads to two radically different answers to Henri Bergson’s question about mechanism and moral mysticism. Through the journey of comparisons, this paper tries to answer two central questions: How do the two systems with strong similarities at the formal and structural levels end up producing two very different cosmo-technological and socio-ethical practices? How would the encounter of these two cosmo-technologies in the modern West shed new light on the discussions of mechanism/computationalism and moral mysticism in our information age?
Thesis (B.A., Honors, College of Letters)--Wesleyan University, 2020., 2020
In this thesis, I investigate the work and interrelation of Emmanuel Levinas, Jacques Derrida, ... more In this thesis, I investigate the work and interrelation of Emmanuel Levinas, Jacques Derrida, and Maurice Blanchot to show the deconstructive nature of the action of reading/writing in order to establish reading/writing as an exemplary ethical action that renovates itself in its development. After World War II and the Holocaust, many European thinkers endeavored to establish a new ethical and philosophical system in order to break with the "Western philosophical tradition" with its emphasis on the empirical ego. Levinas challenged the philosophy of the ego, or egology (egologie), by prioritizing the absolute alterity of the transcendental Other (l'Autrui). Sympathetic to Levinas's challenge to the Western metaphysical tradition, Derrida also investigated the possible alternative to egology, but he criticized Levinas's unmediated ethical encounter with the transcendental Other. Their debate in the 1960s gives rise to a fundamental question of egology: how can we engage with the (transcendent) event/thing without the contamination of the ego-logical acknowledgement? I answer this question by discussing Maurice Blanchot's literature and its contribution to Levinas's and Derrida's transitions in their later works. The fundamental goal of this thesis is to construct the action of reading/writing as an exemplary deconstructive power that challenges the definite ego-logical acknowledgement by welcoming the question to come.
Jacques Derrida’s 2001 visit to China was overshadowed by one of his controversial remarks: “Chin... more Jacques Derrida’s 2001 visit to China was overshadowed by one of his controversial remarks: “China has no philosophy, only thought.” This statement, coupled with his exclusion of Chinese writing from the history of philosophy in Of Grammatology, incited a substantial and ongoing debate regarding the “legitimacy of Chinese philosophy.” The scholarly critique of Derrida’s reading of Chinese philosophy and language has undergone a convoluted path since the 1980s, evolving into a complex debate on the limitations inherent in Derrida’s criticism of Western logocentrism and ethnocentrism. This paper embarks on an exploration of the theoretical underpinnings of Derrida’s interpretation of Chinese writing in Of Grammatology. It reveals the underlying closure-breakthrough structure that governs Derrida’s deconstruction of Western logocentrism — a structure that, regrettably, obstructs the potential for a positive and constructive approach to Chinese language and philosophy. Drawing inspiration from Yurou Zhong’s study of “Chinese grammatology” (Zhong 2019), this paper envisions a positive science of Chinese writing, concurrently resonating with and critiquing Derrida’s grammatology. In doing so, this paper seeks to redirect deconstructive undecidability towards a mysterious and decentered dynamics of history and metaphysics, uncovering pathways for the convergence of Derrida’s grammatology and Chinese grammatology in a recursive progression of the xuan (玄).
In “Faith and Knowledge” (1994), Jacques Derrida addresses the fundamental duplicity of religion.... more In “Faith and Knowledge” (1994), Jacques Derrida addresses the fundamental duplicity of religion. According to Derrida, religion has not one but two sources: “the sacrosanct, the safe and sound on the one side, and faith, trustworthiness or credit on the other” (Acts of Religion, 61). Derrida thus offers two different critiques: one attacks the purity of the unscathed by demonstrating the autoimmune relation between religion and science; the other rethinks the elementary act of faith by appealing to two “historical” names, the messianicity and khōra. In light of Michael Naas’ discussion of the two essential dimensions of language implicit in Derrida’s two sources of religion, I would like to read Derrida’s two critiques in terms of two modes of deconstruction, one operating on a constructive level and the other on a performative level. By reading “Faith and Knowledge” in the context of Derrida’s writings from the late 1980s to the 1990s, this essay intends to demonstrate a quasi-progressive relationship between these two modes of deconstruction: pointing out the necessary autoimmunity in the dogmas, the deconstruction on the constative level opens up the passage between the transcendent and its deviation (i.e., between religion and science, founding law and preserving law, apophatism and atheism), which allows the deconstruction on the performative level to “name” the unthinkable opening to the given/performative time and space. This quasi-progression ensures that the two “historical” names (the messianicity and khōra) unsettle the division between the two sources of religion from within Western history. However, we shall also be wary of the inertia that arises from this quasi-progression. An overemphasis on the critique of the Judeo-Christiano-Islamic tradition from within may lead to the neglect of a certain kind of discussion of receptivity, attachment, and historicity that might have been possible in the context of metaphysical or religious diversity. Before we discuss a new religious tolerance and a democracy to come that detaches from all determinate religions, perhaps we should begin by discussing a pluralistic and heterogenous approach to the question of religion, an approach enabled by deconstruction, but still not fully discussed.
When Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz first sent his paper on binary arithmetic to the Royal Academy of ... more When Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz first sent his paper on binary arithmetic to the Royal Academy of Sciences in Paris in 1701, the Academy advised him not to publish it until he had found “better samples” to demonstrate the usefulness of his binary system. What Leibniz eventually added into his paper was a detailed account of the connection between the Yijing (易经) tri/hexagram or gua (卦) system and his binary arithmetic, based on the Xiantian tu (先天图) he received from the Jesuit missionary Joachim Bouvet (白晋). Such connection, as Leibniz suggests, not only reflects the universal applicability and metaphysical importance of his binary system, but also indicates the possibility of using Chinese writing as a sample for universal characteristic. Modern scholars tend to think Leibniz’s use of the Yijing as a strategic move, which proves at best a formal analogy between binary arithmetic and the Yijing system, and at worst a “Chinese prejudice” or “European hallucination.” In contrast, this paper argues that Leibniz’s reading reveals some profound connections and differences between the two systems at both the metaphysical and cosmo-technological levels.
To demonstrate these connections and differences, this paper compares the application of the Yijing tri/hexagrams and binary arithmetic in their cosmo-technological systems, i.e., in the Yijing divination and cybernetics. Based on the reading of Norbert Wiener’s account of cybernetic automaton and the divination system of the Yijing explicated in the Xici zhuan (系辞传), this paper outlines a recursive cosmic system in the Yijing, which not only shares certain logical and arithmetic premises with cybernetic mechanism, but also unifies the recursive system with the idea of sheng sheng (生生). However, beneath the recursive structure shared by cybernetics and the Yijing lies a fundamental divergency in their views towards the mechanism-organism relationship. Such difference leads to two radically different answers to Henri Bergson’s question about mechanism and moral mysticism. Through the journey of comparisons, this paper tries to answer two central questions: How do the two systems with strong similarities at the formal and structural levels end up producing two very different cosmo-technological and socio-ethical practices? How would the encounter of these two cosmo-technologies in the modern West shed new light on the discussions of mechanism/computationalism and moral mysticism in our information age?
Uploads
Papers by Yeti Kang
Conference Presentations by Yeti Kang
To demonstrate these connections and differences, this paper compares the application of the Yijing tri/hexagrams and binary arithmetic in their cosmo-technological systems, i.e., in the Yijing divination and cybernetics. Based on the reading of Norbert Wiener’s account of cybernetic automaton and the divination system of the Yijing explicated in the Xici zhuan (系辞传), this paper outlines a recursive cosmic system in the Yijing, which not only shares certain logical and arithmetic premises with cybernetic mechanism, but also unifies the recursive system with the idea of sheng sheng (生生). However, beneath the recursive structure shared by cybernetics and the Yijing lies a fundamental divergency in their views towards the mechanism-organism relationship. Such difference leads to two radically different answers to Henri Bergson’s question about mechanism and moral mysticism. Through the journey of comparisons, this paper tries to answer two central questions: How do the two systems with strong similarities at the formal and structural levels end up producing two very different cosmo-technological and socio-ethical practices? How would the encounter of these two cosmo-technologies in the modern West shed new light on the discussions of mechanism/computationalism and moral mysticism in our information age?
To demonstrate these connections and differences, this paper compares the application of the Yijing tri/hexagrams and binary arithmetic in their cosmo-technological systems, i.e., in the Yijing divination and cybernetics. Based on the reading of Norbert Wiener’s account of cybernetic automaton and the divination system of the Yijing explicated in the Xici zhuan (系辞传), this paper outlines a recursive cosmic system in the Yijing, which not only shares certain logical and arithmetic premises with cybernetic mechanism, but also unifies the recursive system with the idea of sheng sheng (生生). However, beneath the recursive structure shared by cybernetics and the Yijing lies a fundamental divergency in their views towards the mechanism-organism relationship. Such difference leads to two radically different answers to Henri Bergson’s question about mechanism and moral mysticism. Through the journey of comparisons, this paper tries to answer two central questions: How do the two systems with strong similarities at the formal and structural levels end up producing two very different cosmo-technological and socio-ethical practices? How would the encounter of these two cosmo-technologies in the modern West shed new light on the discussions of mechanism/computationalism and moral mysticism in our information age?