Etopoetska vednost: Seneka in Foucault

The antique term “ethopoetic knowledge” designates the kind of knowledge that is able to generate an individual's ethos, i.e. way of life. The notion is revived in the late work of Foucault, who emphasises that also seemingly “objective” knowledge can produce ethical effects. The aim of this paper is to show how Seneca's and Foucault's writings can themselves function as this kind of knowledge; how they, without explicitly pointing to it, provide for the possibility of an ethical attitude. Thus Seneca in his Natural Questions describes nothing but nature, but through this very description the subject can comprehend its own place in the universe. In a similar way, Foucault through his “historical” writings presents the mechanism of discursive and non-discursive practices that leaves only a small role for the allegedly autonomous subject. It is this indirect demonstration of the subject's place in the world that enables it to take a strategic position from which it can resist the above mentioned practices.Pojem etopoetske vednosti, torej vednosti, ki ni sama sebi namen, temveč je sposobna generirati posameznikov ethos, način življenja, izvira iz antike, ponovno pa ga v svojem poznem delu obudi Foucault. Kot poudarja Foucault, ima etične učinke lahko tudi navidez »objektivna« vednost. Cilj pričujočega sestavka je skozi paralelno branje Seneke in Foucaulta pokazati, kako njuni spisi funkcionirajo prav kot tovrstna vednost, oz. kako na »hrbtni strani«, brez eksplicitnega opozorila, lahko prispevajo k določeni etični drži. Tako se Seneka v svojih Vprašanjih narave posveča deskripciji narave, vendar pa prav skoznjo posameznik lahko dobi uvid v lastno mesto v svetu. Na podoben način Foucault skozi navidez »zgodovinopisna« zgodnja dela predstavi delovanje diskurzivnih in nediskurzivnih praks, v katerem ima domnevno avtonomni subjekt le majhno vlogo. Šele tovrstni posredni prikaz subjektove pozicije v svetu pa temu omogoči zasesti strateško mesto, s katerega se lahko zoperstavi temu, česar proizvod je