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voidhorsetoday at 2:00 AM1 replyview on HN

Biopower is the most famous one, but I actually think his greatest contribution was to make philosophers pay more attention to the ways in which epistemic systems and ways of organizing knowledge are connected to political power.

I actually think his phd thesis "the history of madness" is his best work. It encapsulates much of the subject matter that would occupy him (knowledge and power) in a domain that's easier to understand than some of his later arguments, and it predates his adoption of a more contorted literary style (or maybe the translation is just better, idk).

Ian Hacking also has a great text that extends Foucault's work "Historical Ontology" that picks up many of the chief ideas in a far more lucid manner for those of us who aren't fans of the later continental style (which if I'm being honest, was always a little too concerned with being obtuse just to sound intelligent)


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Avicebrontoday at 2:13 AM

> the ways in which epistemic systems and ways of organizing knowledge are connected to political power

Right. Which was immediately weaponized but poorly and at the wrong target(s), which is why he is so reviled.

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