2. Philosophy - Stefano Franchi

T HE ANACLASTIC ILLUSION OF A TRANSCENDENTAL UNITY
a whole series of problems that have been pointed out especially well, although from very
different perspectives, by Jean Petitot and Jacques Derrida. I will examine their critiques in
turn, and provide an outline of the problems the structuralist model runs into by avoiding
the discussion of this point and a sketch of the venues which are opened up.
I will consider first the internal reform proposed by Jean Petitot in a series of books
and articles published from the early 1980s on. He begins by pointing out that in almost
every case, biochemical biology and mathematics aside, the ontological status of the struc-
ture is deeply ambiguous. The problem may be stated as follows “As the ideal form of the
organization of a substance, structure is not a perceptible phenomenon [...] This is why ev-
ery structure is a theoretical object which is at the same time ideal and real.” 46 Because of
their ideal status, which is nonphenomenal in the classical (perceptible) sense of the term,
structures are therefore ontologically ambiguous. As eidos, the structure cannot be de-
tached from the substance in which it is actualized, from the ousia where it becomes sub-
stance. It is as the same time an intelligible framework and a structured object. But must it
be considered given or posited? In the first case an ontological (realist) conception of struc-
ture will be developed, in the second case, an epistemological (nominalist) one.” 47 Petitot
claims that the prevalent epistemological attitude is the source of all (literally) the problems
encountered by structuralism. Consequently, he wants to develop a realist conception with-
out, however, falling into naive holistic-idealist doctrines. In his own words:
[outside mathematics] the problem is no longer to abstract levels of structure
but to theorize the natural phenomena of self-organization. Then the
concept of structure no longer corresponds to properties of objects but to a
45. See Claude Lévi-Strauss, L’Homme nu …, 574; Engl. tr. 642, for example, where Lévi-Strauss affirms:
“there is a fundamental difference between the two, arising from the twofold fact, firstly, that the physical
and natural sciences operate on symbols of phenomena while the social sciences operate on symbols
of phenomena which are themselves symbols in the first place, and secondly, that, in the former
instance, the adequate approximation of the symbol to the referent is demonstrated by the ‘grip’ (prise)
exercised by scientific knowledge on the world around us, whereas the practical ineffectiveness of the
social sciences does not allow us, at least for the time being, to assume any adequate correspondence
between the representative symbols and the represented symbols.”
46. Jean Petitot, Morphogenèse du sense (Paris: PUF, 1985) 30.
47. Jean Petitot, “Structure,” Thomas A. Sebeok, ed., Encyclopedic Dictionary of Semiotics (Berlin: Mouton
de Gruyter) 993.
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