Death of Man Narrative

Admittedly, postmodern skepticism in the faith of man is heavily influenced by French philosophies of the nineteen sixties. In French Philosophy of the Sixties: An Essay on Antihumanism, Luc Ferry and Alain Renault discuss Foucault's genealogy of man: classical man, Stoic-Christian man, and Cartesian man (Ferry&Renault, 111). Ferry and Renault discuss Foucault's genealogy of the subject in order to show the contingent and accidental nature of man, and the in-commensurability of man. They hope to undermine the humanistic assumption of an a priori subject called man by showing how the concept of man has been organized in radically different manners in time, which are in commensurable with one another.

On Foucault's view, ancient Greeks exhibit "the care of self" (Ferry & Renault 111). In classical society, the Greeks construct the "technology of existence" in order to live as well as possible within the framework of the polis.But Foucault does not believe that ancient Greek philosophers have a modern conception of man as a subject: "And since no Greek philosopher ever found a definition of the subject, and never looked for one, I will say simply that there is no subject (Foucault, 121). Aristotle's notion arete is a classic example of the Greek "technology of existence." Aristotle regards man as various opportunities of perfecting his virtues: courage, wisdom, temperance, etc. Aristotle's ethics are not concerned with universal norms, from which individuals determine conduct of others. Instead, Aristotle's ethics are only concerned with caring for oneself by making oneself a work of art.

Secondly, the Stoics of late Roman society lay the foundation of what Foucault calls "the quasi self" (Ferry and Renault, 114). The early Christians would make further advances upon "the quasi self," because "beginning with Christian morality is confiscated by the theory of the theory of the subject" (113). The "quasi self" involves the idea of universal obligation or duty. A moral act becomes a universal obligation to everyone. Christianity extends the Stoic "quasi self" to include the notion of salvation. In Christianity, the classical care of self becomes egotistical love. Pleasure gives way to the denunciation of the flesh. Christian virtues are self sacrifice and self renunciation. Individuality disappears in the triumph of universal salvation.

Thirdly, Descartes initiates the modern sense of self or subject. The Cartesian "I think" becomes the foundation of the modern self (115). Unlike the Greeks who regard the body as the bases of the self, the Cartesian self is completely alienated from the body, because the self is metaphysically distinct from the body. Access to the self means access to knowledge, because the self is the necessary prerequisite to knowledge. In Descartes' ontology, the "I think" must always submit to the universal values that define scientific truth. As Foucault says, "to gain the truth, all that is necessary is that I be any subject at all capable of seeing what is obvious" (Foucault, 125).

In conclusion, even with this basic genealogy of man, moving from classic man to Cartesian man, doubt about the a priori nature of man is very likely. Accordingly, who will have as much faith in man as one has in a three sided form is a triangle? Once God dies, so the man, as a fixed construct, equally dies. Humanism is no longer interesting; but the legacy of replacing different constructs of the subject in time is the postmodern concern.