adorno 347which concern an era, is also a confrontation with society. Liberally
interpreted, this can be a valid way of seeing how philosophers respond
to their socio-historical location, insofar as their responses can differ in
different locations, even as they seek universally valid responses.
However, the passage cited comes from Adorno’s analysis of
Schoenberg, in which he argues that the use of tonality and all
the means of ‘traditional music’ are made into ‘powerless clich ́es’
by the ‘most advanced state of technical procedure’ (ibid.: 40 )in
Schoenberg’s atonal music. The parallel with philosophy might be
extended to this view of the ‘most advanced state’ of the material as
well, but this leads us to the main problem. Against his often-stated sus-
picion of the idea ofphilosophicalprogress – ‘The assumption that there
is progress from Hegel to the logical positivists, who dismiss the for-
mer as unclear or meaningless, is just comical’ ( 10. 2 : 636 )–Adorno’s
reliance on the idea of progress inmusicis in some respects echoed
precisely in philosophers like the logical positivists, who think of them-
selves as in a discipline with specialised techniques which can be said
to be more or less advanced.
Stephen Toulmin has suggested the problem here: ‘Philosophy and
social science are sharing the experience of music. Little now remains
of the twelve-tone music of Berg and Webern...Asinmusic, so in
philosophy and the human sciences, the price of intellectualism has
been too great, and we are now having to work our way back to broader
modes of self-expression’ (Toulmin 2003 : 13 ). Adorno can hardly be
said to adhere to the analytical perception ofphilosophyas a technical
discipline, so why is he often attached to the idea of unilinear tech-
nique and progress inmusicwhich culminates in one specific kind of
music being regarded as the most advanced? He does not, admittedly,
advance a crude progressivist view, but his emphasis on technique tends
to obscure other considerations: ‘All progress in cultural domains is
progress in the command of the material, of technique. The truth-
content ofGeistis not indifferent to this. A quartet by Mozart is not
just better made than a symphony of the Mannheim School, but also
ranks, as better made, more right, higher in the emphatic sense.’^21 At
the same time, however, ‘progress in the command of material in art
is not at all immediately identical with the progress of art itself’ ( 10. 2 :
634 ), because, as we saw in the work on musical reproduction, once21 This particular aesthetic judgement may be true, but such a judgement would not always
apply to Mozart and Bach.