PATAPHYSICS-THE-POETICS-OF-AN-IMAGINARY- SCIENCE_C_Bok

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theorem, whose ineptitude or incertitude can vanish through
cumulative knowledge; instead, "[sjolutions are engendered
st precisely the same time that the problem determines
itself" (1990:lZl). Questions always define in advance the
regime of their answers.
The problem always persists in the
very paradigm that allows the solution to make sense as a
solution.
No enigma Fs solved so well that its status as an
enigma ceases to exist.
A solution is infinitely imaginary,
'Pataphysics implies that al1 problems threaten to
operate at the infinite disposa1 of a futile inquest.
Baudrillard goes so far as to suggest that the object (with
its fatal strategies of fascination) mey pose a problem
without solution for the subject (and its banal strategies
of explanetion) since attempts by science to render reaiity
more explicable and controllable always threaten to render
reality even more inexplicable and uncontrollable (1988:89).
Science gazes at a crystal that promises to answer al1
questions, but that instead captures science with a demand
for even- more questions. Like the evil genie feared by
Descartes or the free spirit loved by Nietzsche, the crystal
takes revenge upon the will to truth.
The subject tries to
solve the object, but meanwbile the object tries to dissolve
the subject, and ultimately the object always triumphs. i 5