COSM Workshop - What a Body Can Do
Share via
With ‘thus has been demonstrated’ Spinoza completes his famous analysis of the capacity of
the body to act, concluding ‘no one yet has determined what the body can do’. ‘Q.E.D.’ -- or ‘Quod Erat Demonstrandum’-- that definite terminus at the end of each of Spinoza’s proofs that without fail instils in the committed reader a sense of helplessness and frustration: for if you haven’t understood Spinoza’s insights by now you are never going to. So what can a body do?
This workshop aims to return to this vital issue by examining the body from within and without. A predominant idea is that above all a body needs to be ‘fit’, i.e. fitting into or with the overarching body of which it is part. Whilst a body’s fitness may provide it with its capacity to act, the relationship between overarching bodies and their constitutive parts is still an unsettled debate. Neither are overarching bodies like our societies fully determined by our individual bodies nor are our individual bodies a white canvas at the discretion of such social bodies. Based on the submissions the workshop themes are:
- Bodies of Organization
- Bodies: Physical and Metaphysical
- Bodies: Social and Political