Queloz, 'Practical Origins of Ideas', chs. 1 & 2

We began with questions:
-       1. Is Queloz right to distinguish pragmatic genealogy from Foucauldian
genealogy in the way that he does?
-       2. Is this conception of genealogy abstracting from history/facts too
much? State of nature not located in space or time
-       3. What is his theory of needs?
-       4. How do we distinguish genuine from false needs? Biological needs?
Social needs? Wants?
-       5. How central is needs to Queloz’ pragmatic genealogy? Pp. 6, 14
-       6. 2: What is his conception of tradition?
-       7. Pragmatic genealogy as primarily affirmative but also subversion?
Pp. 12, 40
-       8. How do you distinguish conceptual practice from mere practice? Pg.
24

Notes on discussion:
-       Counterfactual: concept X serves need N. Need N is presupposed, so the
origin of concept X can be secured
-       Counterfactual as a starting point juxtaposed with the present and the
past
-       Would Marx’s genealogy in capital be closer to pragmatic genealogy or
Foucaultian genealogy?
-       Foucauldians would say that truth has a history. But it doesn’t for
Williams
-       Queloz follows Fricker in prioritizing explanation in genealogy over
history
-       Car example. One genealogy could say how a car is produced. Another
would say these things have to be mobile. How do we distinguish social
needs from social wants and false needs?
-       The design of a car imposes technological limits that truth and
justice don’t.
-       Queloz seems to want needs to be somewhat timeless
-       Justification is relevance to a need and a concept is a response to a
nexus of needs
-       All genealogies are subversive and vindicatory. Always a negative and
positive moment. (Unless abnormative, or normatively unambitious.)
-       What would be the metaphilosophical context in which one would
undertake a vindication or subversion in the first place, rather than do
something else philosophically with a genealogy?
-       The argument of a PG assumes agreement about what our needs are, but if
there is fundamental disagreement about what our needs are, the argument
requires a presumed agreement around purposes.  Perhaps pragmatic
genealogy would be more helpful for epistemological inquiry than
political inquiry… how could it handle justice?  (There will be a challenge facing
PG in any context in which it is occasioned by disagreement as the problem
to which it is responding, because ultimately it seems it will need to presume
agreement around what needs are.  But the problem is now obvious: a PG
is a philosophical response to a disagreement, say a political one, but it claims to
solve that which occasions it by way of presuming agreement on something else.
PG is thus not sufficiently pluralistic for the purposes of political theory.)