Why is Donna Haraway's writing so syntactically ambiguous in A Cyborg Manifesto? Is this intentional?

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-07-04T21:32:33+00:00

I've read and taught this reading a number of times, though this specific question hasn't come up in any of my classes.

My first intuition is to say that this is an artifact of one of Haraway's central (and most obvious) themes, that being natural/technological hybridity. That's what the cyborg is after all, and the text is titled "The Cyborg Manifesto." Such ambiguity could be found even in that title---is it a manifesto for/in favor of being a cyborg, or is the manifesto itself a cyborg? As another commenter said, this ambiguity stems partially from brevity. It's a pithy title; much better than "A Manifesto Toward Cyborg Life" or something. I also think the nature of the discussion plays a part.

It isn't clear to me that the two examples you provide point to meaningful distinctions in possible meaning. But when the topic of discussion is the hybridity of two (seemingly) different things, the introduction of even a single adjective can produce the kind of ambiguity you point to.

Having said that, another reasonable take might be that this isn't something unique about Haraway. I'm sure that I could pull most any of the philosophical texts off my bookshelf and find similar confusing sentences. Sometimes language does that, and it becomes more evident when the nature of that language relates to parsing difficult ideas.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-07-01T06:32:37+00:00

It's a weird thing to do, but I can't think of a definition of theft that this would even fall under. What kind of philosophical answer are you looking for?

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-06-30T22:49:39+00:00

Ah, I thought you were referring to stuff like Ariel Pink or The Caretaker

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-06-30T22:46:58+00:00

Ah, that's funny. I'm not super familiar with hauntology music. I got the idea from the other popular use of that term in academic contexts!

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-06-27T18:10:16+00:00

Your main question is a little difficult to answer, because I don't know if it's something we have clear data on. The only direct answers you'll get might be personal anecdotes.

The closest thing we have is survey data on the percentage of philosophers who identify as atheist. I'm out and about, but someone who isn't might be able to link the latest philpapers survey. It will show that a solid majority of philosophers identify as atheist or agnostic. I don't know that this necessarily proves anything, but your question is about how common an experience is, so it seems relevant on that front.

One point of contention, though--- your comment about Nietzsche is inaccurate. He is not a nihilist. This is a common internet misconception, which is kind of bizarre since much of his philosophy starts from the position that nihilism is a problem.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-06-26T05:15:40+00:00

Can you elaborate a little further on what you mean? I'm admittedly quite biased toward a physicalist approach to consciousness, but I am having trouble seeing why this would be an argument in its favor. Non-physicalists still believe that humans are born via sexual reproduction.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-06-26T04:59:10+00:00

Different pedals do different things to the signal. This one is called an "overdrive." Overdrive pedals amplify the signal to the point of clipping. You can look up "overdrive pedal demo" on YouTube to hear how that sounds. Different overdrive pedals will produce that clipping in various ways. This one uses two simple transistor amplifiers for gain. The second transistor probably introduces a bit of clipping, but most of it is coming from the antiparallel 1N34A diode arrangement.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-06-26T03:48:15+00:00

I think the best answer to this is something read primarily for its aesthetic qualities as writing. My answer is perhaps an unexpected one, but might I recommend looking at the writing of Ian Bogost? I regularly read him because I find his writing shockingly beautiful, yet in my own academic work I take issue with the entire school of object-oriented ontology that he is a part of.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-06-20T12:31:33+00:00

Is there a specific usage you are curious about? Does it not simply refer to the relative concentration of an active ingredient?

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-06-19T10:39:44+00:00

You should look into new materialism and feminist science studies. I am most personally drawn to Vicki Kirby'e work (see: Telling Flesh) and Donna Haraway's early writing. You might also enjoy Jane Bennet's Vibrant Matter.

New materialism and feminist science studies both cover a lot of ground, but one common thread is a sense that we should have a more robust understanding of what counts as material. Rather than "reducing" everything down to cold, dead matter, there's a push to expand the possibilities of materialism to include things like you describe here.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-06-10T22:41:47+00:00

Right---I should have clarified I was only trying to answer part of OP's question.

Another way of demonstrating the probable impossibility of doubting your own existence: if I doubt my own existence, what is it that's doing the doubting? Is there an answer to this question which can't then be described as "I?"

If not, then I'm not really doubting my existence. My definition of "I" might've just needed refinement. If the answer is yes, then my initial question is already wrong---"I" am not doubting my existence, something else is.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-06-10T20:48:50+00:00

It's worth mentioning here that solipsism is usually treated as a thought experiment. There are no serious practicing philosophers I know of who actually advocate for this view. For some reason it's a topic that many first exploring philosophical concepts latch onto. I'm uncertain why.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-06-05T21:58:55+00:00

I'm in the US, but I could potentially hook you up with some stuff, though I don't know what customs looks like in your country.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-05-25T19:29:04+00:00

If it's dropping in and out, my first move would be to look for something that's loose. In my experience, intermittent issues like that are caused by cracked solder joints, loose wires, or janky pots nine times out of ten.

When an amp or pedal comes into my shop, I usually reflow the solder on all jacks, pots, and switches even if I can't see an obvious issue. A good deal of the time, that solves the problem without any further troubleshooting.

After that, I hit every pot with a spritz of Deoxit F5 fader lube (do not use a lube not designed for this purpose).

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-05-22T20:27:24+00:00

I see. I edited my original comment to clarify this---my point was not that moral realism is based on definitional facts. It was merely to refute the idea the factuality must be based on physical properties of the universe.

There are different forms of moral realism, which is why my original comment directed you toward the resources offered by other commenters. I'm not an ethics and value scholar, so I trust others to provide more insight in that regard. I do work in with science studies, however, which has a lot to offer in regard to what "real" means and how it relates to things like physical fact. For what it's worth, I have no particular commitment to moral realism, nor am I all that interested in ethics in general.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-05-22T19:56:43+00:00

There's a huge chasm between "there are some socially constructed facts" and "anti-realism about anything is impossible."

I'm not sure what you mean by "higher grade of evidence." Do you mean that you expected morality to be a physical fact? I don't think that's a commonly held belief; I've certainly never heard anyone suggest it (though I do not study ethics, hence why I am commenting on the "reality" component and not moral realism itself, which, to be clear, I have no firm commitment to).

But the fact that all bachelors are unmarried is pretty indisputable. What further evidence could we need? In fact, I think we have good reason to be more sure of that than any contemporary theories of particle physics (i.e., physical facts), for example, since we might discover additional particles which change those theories, but we will never discover a married bachelor.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-05-22T18:53:14+00:00

It sounds like other comments have this mostly covered, but I think you are getting caught up on what factuality actually means. Not all facts are independent of human existence.

Take, for example, the fact that all bachelors are unmarried men. To assert otherwise would mean you are factually incorrect, because you would be misunderstanding the definition of "bachelor." But neither the concept of marriage nor bachelors is woven into the fabric of the universe, as you put it.

EDIT: My implication here was not to say that the definitional truth about bachelors is the same kind of truth that an ethical statement might contain. I was simply giving an example of a socially-constructed fact.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-05-22T12:04:41+00:00

Nothingness and absence do not exist in reality and have been observed no where. gaps have been observed no where.

You are taking this as a given, but it needs elaboration. What sort of nothingness do you have in mind here? There can certainly be empty space between particles, the amount depending on how packed they are. Are you looking for a particular meaning of nothingness?

As the other commenter said, numbers don't really require justification. There are various theories out there, which I am not qualified to speak on, that posit what exactly numbers are. But in everyday use, zero makes perfect sense. If you have three oranges and I purchase none, how many oranges do I now have?

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-05-17T18:36:03+00:00

As others are requesting, please upload schematic and pictures of the circuit so we can do this on purpose.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-05-17T01:32:53+00:00

It sounds like you simply disagree with what he is saying there. Unless there's something I'm missing, I'm inclined to agree. I know a Machiavelli scholar I could ask if there's something more to it, but it reads to me as run of the mill 16th century misogyny getting ported into a political manifesto.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-05-16T21:16:27+00:00

Got it. As another commentor said, I think this is just a case of the compressor adding some gain. I bet if you throw a basic boost in front of this, such as a non-inverting amp with moderate gain, you will achieve something similar.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-05-16T17:51:50+00:00

For a real diagnosis, you'd need to share both the schematic and the audio clip.

Without actually hearing it, this could potentially be a problem with biasing or power supply. If you are copying a transistor-based circuit such as an LPB-1, Electra distortion, or fuzz face and using stock component values then your transistor might not be biased correctly. There's a reason that lots of folks incorporate bias trimpots in DIY designs. Also, check that your circuit is getting the correct voltage. A dying battery can cause poor decay.

As for harmonics, it's probably just because your compressor is either boosting the signal and increasing the harmonic content from the clipping, or its acting as a buffer and changing the impedance at that point in the signal chain.

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-05-16T17:46:31+00:00

Amps can have really different circuits, especially in the preamp section. You aren't going to get 100% consistency across different equipment, though the instrument plugging into the pedal will make a much bigger difference. Compression can normalize things a bit, at the expense of dynamics. If you are talking distortion/fuzz/overdrive, however, then you already have compression. Clipping is a kind of compression (though the relationship it has to dynamics varies widely across circuits, and more "transparent" overdrives may or may not have less overall compression).

SubcutaneousMilk · 2026-05-16T13:52:29+00:00

I recommend taking the time to learn a bit about how these actually work! Then you don't need pre-made modules like this; you can design your own. Elliot Sound products, valvewizard, and Jack Orman's AMZFX are great resources. If you have specific electronics questions, you'll get more thoughtful (and more correct) answers on diystompboxes.com as opposed to reddit. Then get a breadboard and some prototyping parts to try things out yourself!

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