was always there, it is a problem - and an irresolvable problem - that we learn in

the physical activity of balancing weak fingers with strong fingers and two hands
with each other. A way to put this, for pragmatism, I think at least in the kind of
pragmatism I understand, is that there can be no art without craft. However, the
distinction gets to be that the artist becomes more willing, at the moment when
we are actually making art, to take the risks of uncertainty that are made on the
basis of physical security. That is to make a wrong motion; to make a sound that
we do not know how it relates to other sounds; to take a part. But we are always
doing this on the basis of having a set of practices which have become tacit to
us. They are not instrumental because they are always being revised by this kind
of experiment. This is what I reproach Hannah Arendt for, because she made
this absolute divide between a homo faber, which is basically an instrumental
creature - practical, pragmatic - she danced around all of this. And then the
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world of action, which is a world of process and risk and so on; these were two
different domains rather than a language that folded over to each other. All
technical work is expressive.

HJ: Of course.

RS: Of course to you.. .

HJ:Yes! I agree. I think Hannah Arendt is completely overestimated today. But,

systematically,a comparison between Arendt and Dewey on this point would be
constructive. Both have a sort of communicative understanding of democracy.
But the relationship between democracy and the practices of work is completely
different in the two authors. In Arendt, I think it always has something to do
with her fixation on classical Athens. Manual work is something for those who
do not participate in political discussions. And political discussion has nothing
to do with the structures of production. This is exactly not how John Dewey
tried to think about production because he was of course, maybe also roman-
tically, thinking about a democratisation of the work sphere. How everybody
participates even in manual work. Also children are raised doing something
practical, some work. Work is perhaps not the right word, but learning bodily
practices in very different realms.

RS: It is curious why Arendt is such a dualist; I am often puzzled. I will tell you
a story about her. When I was a practicing musician, I met her and she came
to one of my concerts in Chicago. She came to the concert and she said 'sehr
geistlich' -very spiritual. And one of the people I played with, who understood
German very well, said 'Oh, I am so sorry, we failed'.

HJ: That is a good one.

RS: It is a good anecdote, isn't it? I mean there are wonderful things about
Arendt, but I think the issue here is that the kind of living philosophical effort
pragmatism is trying to do, is to overcome those dualisms but still provide a kind
of structure for the activity of investigation and expression. And it does have a