Anglo-American empiricism blocks political connection-making by isolating individual facts

Evidence

One cannot write for a reader formed in this tradition—one cannot even come to terms with one’s own historical formation—without taking this influential conceptual opponent into account; and it is this, if you like, which makes up the tendentious part of my book, which gives it its political and philosophical cutting edge, so to speak. For the bankruptcy of the liberal tradition is as plain on the philosophical level as it is on the political: which does not mean that it has lost its prestige or ideological potency. On the contrary: the anti-speculative bias of that tradition, its emphasis on the individual fact or item at the expense of the network of relationships in which that item may be embedded, continue to encourage submission to what is by preventing its followers from making connections, and in particular from drawing the otherwise unavoidable conclusions on the political level. — Fredric Jameson, Marxism and Form, 12 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

I think these definitions describe pretty accurately the factual state of affairs in the American elections of 1952, which is the subject of the analysis. In other words, the criteria for judging a given state of affairs are those offered by (or, since they are those of a well-functioning and firmly established social system, imposed by) the given state of affairs. The analysis is “locked”; the range of judgment is confined within a context of facts which excludes judging the context in which the facts are made, man-made, and in which their meaning, function, and development are determined. … Its very empiricism is ideological. — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 454 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: In late capitalism cultural theory displaces tactical political questions; Revisionism neutralizes a theory by deleting its praxis-demanding content; Empiricism’s atomism prevents followers from connecting facts into political conclusions — Fredric Jameson, Marxism and Form, 12 (+2 more)

Related

• Empiricism’s atomism prevents followers from connecting facts into political conclusions (similarity 0.92)
• Empiricism that excludes man-made context becomes ideology (similarity 0.83)
• Science and art converge into ideology when their separation is absolutized (similarity 0.80)
• In late capitalism cultural theory displaces tactical political questions (similarity 0.79)
• Pure empiricism in criticism is a contradiction in terms (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Empiricism’s atomism prevents followers from connecting facts into political conclusions #corroborates (1.00) — Fredric Jameson, Marxism and Form, 12
• Empiricism that excludes man-made context becomes ideology #expands (0.85) — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 454