The Other of communication: intersubjectivity in Vilém Flusser

Abstract

Tensioned by the outbreak of Covid-19 ― a phenomenon that intensifies not only the relationship with the Other in telematic networks, but the challenge of interpreting it from its several implications ―, this paper outlines the concept of intersubjectivity in Vilém Flusser’s thought. Flusser thinks that, in the transition to a technically structured culture, it is necessary to recognize the other when confronting telematic networks, despite it having fallen to a minor anthropological region, in which it remains even more out of sight. Unlike a certain Greek or Enlightenment tradition, Flusser suggests that such protocols do not only produce an interobjectivity, but an intersubjectivity in which the other, even when it is entangled with technical interactions, responds to an ethical and existential meaning. The article is divided into two major parts: first, we explain the theoretical foundations for Flusser’s approach to intersubjectivity along his trajectory from philosophy to a general theory of communication (or communicology), by which he seeks to combine an understanding of encoding and decoding processes (information) with an understanding of meaning-making. We then approach intersubjectivity across different ontological levels: intersubjectivity in thought, in relation, in knowledge and, finally, in telematic networks. We conclude that Flusser's theoretical fortune on intersubjectivity contributes to an ethical response to the problem of alterity in the context of 21st century networks, as well as to the development of a communication science, addressed to a dynamic temporality, intertwined with technology.