Factiality Ontology by Quentin Meillassoux?

Abstract

Quentin Meillassoux is known as one of the most ardent fighters against correlationism in modern philosophy. However, unlike the negative part of his program (aimed at criticizing correlationism), the positive part is almost never discussed by researchers in philosophy. There is no work in which Meillassoux systematically outlines his project, which he proposes to replace correlationism. We set ourselves the goal of reconstructing this section of Meillassoux's philosophy and showing whether the thinker manages to solve the problems that he proposes within the framework of his project. By correlationism, Meillassoux understands the set of post-Kantian concepts in philosophy, which rejects the possibility of knowing a reality independent of thinking, and proposes to focus research on the connection (correlation) between thinking and reality as such. It is worth agreeing with Meillassoux that this philosophical way should be fought due to the fact that it is not sufficiently reflective of its own premises. Correlationism also unduly narrows the field of philosophical work. According to Meillassoux, correlationism is overcome by factiality, understood as the absolute lack of sufficiency in anything, including correlationism. Factiality as absolute groundlessness is a reality independent of the subject. Also factiality takes philosophy beyond correlationism. The project that studies the properties of factiality, Meillassoux calls factual ontology. The philosopher substantiates factual ontology by, firstly, raising it above all discourses, and secondly, outlining the field of its activity. We come to the conclusion that the factual ontology is untenable due to the fact that it enhances correlationism, and does not overcome it. Nevertheless, in our opinion, philosophy should shift its attention to the everyday pressure of reality as such on the sensuality of the subject, since this helps to reduce the role of correlationism.