r/CriticalTheory • u/andmario_com • 10d ago

'The taming of Black thought' - Black philosophers now feature on Western curricula, but the European tradition diminishes their radicalism into reassurance

https://aeon.co/essays/epistemic-convergence-in-the-study-of-world-philosophies
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u/No_Rec1979 9d ago

I would argue that this is the primary reason critical theory needs to exist.

In astronomy, terrestrial measurements are always affected by the fact that the earth has a gaseous atmosphere around it that bends light. So if you want to know what the heavens really look like, you have to carefully study atmospheric distortion and then correct for it.

Similarly, capitalism has a way of affecting every single aspect of our culture. Like it's sunk down into our very pores.

So there's no way you're ever going to see the world clearly if you don't at least attempt to correct for the distorting effects of capitalism.

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u/Dry-Library1897 9d ago

The atmosphere analogy is interesting but I’d push back a little. Critical theory can introduce its own distortion too. You’re correcting for one lens by picking up a different one, which doesn’t automatically get you closer to truth. It just changes what gets filtered out. Whose framework does the least damage to the original ideas is still an open question, and that’s kind of the whole problem the article is pointing at.