ABSTRACTLate Enlightenment German materialism has hardly attracted any scholarly attention in the past, in spite of the fact that there were quite a few exponents of it. In this paper, I identify the philosophically most important ones and examine to what extent they were connected with each other. In fact, there are local concentrations of materialists at universities and academic circles in Göttingen, Halle, and Gießen. I then discuss the spectrum of materialist positions held by them, from empiricist naturalism (...) in the case of Michael Hißmann to emergentism and Spinozism in the case of Karl von Knoblauch. Finally, I examine how German materialists conceived of the nature of soul and its immortality. It turns out that most of them were mortalists, with the exception of August Wilhelm Hupel, and some of them also endorsed Socinianism. (shrink)

Logical empiricism and the Austrian School of economics are two of the internationally most influential intellectual movements with Viennese roots. By and large independently of each other, both have been subject to detailed historical and philosophical investigations for the last two dec-ades. However, in spite of numerous connections and interactions be-tween the two groups, their relationship has captured surprisingly sparse attention. My dissertation focuses on the many-faceted juxtaposition of two supposedly antagonistic championsof Viennese Late Enlightenment: logical empiricist Otto (...) Neurath and Austrian economist Ludwig Mises. I rationally reconstruct and critically compare their epistemological, meth-odological, and economic positions and demonstrate that a closer look reveals more compatibilities and similarities than acknowledged by the received view and by the protagonists themselves. Over and above the historiographic task of challenging and amending this received view, the analytic components of my thesis inform contemporary debates in phi-losophy, politics, economics, and other sciences. (shrink)

Austrian engineer, philosopher, and political economist Josef Popper-Lynkeus (1838–1921) was a renowned public intellectual of Viennese Late Enlightenment. In this article, we unearth and explore Popper-Lynkeus’s social program. It sought to implement social conscription to unconditionally guarantee a basic level of goods and services for every human individual. We appraise the economic and ethical justifications provided by Popper-Lynkeus for his allegedly “rational” proposals and the intended consequences for the discipline of economics. Finally, and based on our disambiguation of (...) different notions of “unconditionality”, we clarify similarities and differences between Popper-Lynkeus’s social program and contemporary proposals for a universal basic income, characterising both as alternatives to traditional welfare states. (shrink)

SummaryThis introductory article sketches out the evolution of the concept of sociability in moral and political debates from Grotius to the German Romantics, so as to elucidate the range and scope of the contributions to this special issue. The article argues that the concept of sociability serves as a bridge between moral theory, domestic politics and international relations, just as it also connects the jurisprudential mode of enquiry to subsequent Enlightenment enquiries into political economy, aesthetics, individual and collective moral (...) psychology, forms of government and philosophical history. Particular attention is paid to sociability's relationship to moral scepticism, and to its position between morality and anthropology. The article highlights the central role of Rousseau in radically reformulating the debate and in sparking new controversies up to the nineteenth century. (shrink)

In the late eighteenth century the principle of accommodation became so closely associated with the historical-critical approach of Johann Salomo Semler (1725–1791), a prominent theologian at the University of Halle, that he has on occasion been deemed its originator. As some scholars have, however, noted, accommodation as a principle of scriptural hermeneutics has a far longer history, extending back to the patristic writings. What by contrast has eluded closer investigation is the affinity that this principle exhibits to notions of (...) deception. Nor has much consideration been given to the manner in which accommodation as an interpretative scheme has on occasion inspired accommodation as a form of strategic action. This article uses the opportunity provided by Semler in his interaction with a number of other figures associated with the late Enlightenment in Protestant Germany to explore these neglected aspects of accommodation. (shrink)

The natural evolution of ethics is commonly understood in terms of the development from the selfish struggle to survive, via prudent cooperation, to altruism. However, cooperation that is prudent in the sense of serving basically selfish interests is not really altruistic. Besides, Christian ethics should not identify morality with absolutely disinterested altruism. Self-interest is only selfish when it is disproportionate or unfair; otherwise it is morally legitimate. Therefore the natural evolution of ethics is better understood as the gradual diversification of (...) the goods in which human beings have an interest. And evidently, whatever their origins, humans do have an interest in a range of goods, not just the preservation of their genes or their kin or themselves. Therefore the reductionist, Hobbesian assumptions about human motivation that game theory makes are empirically untrue of human behaviour in general, and so the range of cases to which it applies is accordingly narrow. Rather than using biology to interpret human motivation reductionistically, we should use zoology and anthropology to track the evolution of interest in diverse goods. The fact that eudaimonistic Christian ethics, as represented by Thomas Aquinas and Joseph Butler, has long recognised this diversity of human goods is one sign of its continuing explanatory power, and counts towards its truth. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to shed light on Nietzsche’s late investigation of the Western human being, with particular reference to Twilight of the Idols. I shall argue that this investigation can be seen as a “pragmatic anthropology,” according to the meaning that Kant gave to this notion in 1798. Although the paper focuses on Nietzsche’s thought, an analysis of Kant’s anthropology and the comparison between and Nietzsche’s late views of the human being, will show (...) both their differences and similarities on the topic. (shrink)

Between 1750 and 1830, two key cultural achievements - the sixteenth-century Reformation and the late eighteenth-century birth of "German" philosophy - became fused in public discussion. Enlightenment's Reformation explores how the Reformation was transformed into a narrative of progress, and why it has had such a long-standing impact.

In this illuminating and wide-ranging philosophical treatise, Brian Morris critiques broad swathes of recent theory as he seeks to reclaim anthropology as a historical social science. He achieves this by grounding it within a metaphysic of "dialectical naturalism" or "evolutionary realism"--a tradition long ignored by academic philosophy. After reviewing the anthropological background of this worldview--the Greeks and the Enlightenment--Morris explores two essential themes. First, he critically assesses the main forms of dialectical naturalism, including Darwin's evolutionary theory, Marx's historical (...) materialism, and the hylo-realism of the philosopher-scientist Mario Bunge. Second, he offers a strong plea to retain the dual heritage of anthropology as a historical science that combines both humanism and naturalism. A powerful philosophical manifesto, the book cogently upholds dialectical naturalism as the most grounding philosophy for anthropology and the social sciences. (shrink)

Enlightenment Cosmopolitanism brings together ten innovative contributions by outstanding scholars working across a wide array of disciplines in the humanities and social sciences. Interdisciplinary in its methodology and compass, with a strong comparative European dimension, the volume examines discourses ranging from literature, historiography, music and opera to anthropology and political philosophy. It makes an original contribution to the study of 18th-century ideas of universal peace, progress and wealth as the foundation of future debates on cosmopolitanism. At the same (...) time, it analyses examples of counter-reaction to these ideas and discusses the relevance of the Enlightenment for subsequent polemics on cosmopolitanism, including 21st-century debates in sociology, politics and legal theory. (shrink)

Johann Gottfried Herder initiated the modern disciplines of philosophical anthropology and cultural history, including the study of popular culture. He is also remembered as a sharp critic of colonialism and imperialism. But what types of social, economic and political arrangements did Herder envision for modern European societies? Herder and Enlightenment Politics provides a radically new interpretation of Herder's political thought, situating his ideas in Enlightenment debates on modern patriotism, commerce and peace. By reconstructing Herder's engagement with Rousseau, (...) Montesquieu, Abbt, Ferguson, Möser, Kant and many other contemporary authors, Eva Piirimäe shows that Herder was deeply interested in the potential for cultural, moral and political reform in Russia, Germany and Europe. Herder probed the foundations of modern liberty, community and peace, developing a distinctive understanding of human self-determination, natural sociability and modern patriotism as well as advocating a vision of Europe as a commercially and culturally interconnected community of peoples. (shrink)

Enriched by the methods and insights of social history, the history of mentalites, linguistics, anthropology, literary theory, and art history, intellectual and cultural history are experiencing a renewed vitality. The far-ranging essays in this volume, by an internationally distinguished group of scholars, represent a generous sampling of these new studies.".

The Nobel Laureate Illya Prigogine compares the recent breakthroughs in human biology to the major changes that occurred when the Neolithic period succeeded the Paleolithic, 12,000 years ago. Although there is disagreement about the meaning of these changes, most opposing views recognize that a “major transformation” took place. Some interpret the recent breakthroughs in neuroscience as the first step toward “our posthuman future” whereas others see the consequences of these achievements as the end of humankind. Genomics and neuroscience are the (...) main fields that, at this point, give rise to such a debate, some authors stating that neuroscience raises even greater anthropological and ethical challenges than does genomics. This article focuses on neuroscience. Its main object is to critically assess these diverging opinions on the impact of neuroscience and to determine whether both sides are not telling us something important about ourselves and how neuroscience could enlighten healthcare ethics. (shrink)

Online supplement, "Mulsow: Additions to Notes drawn from the 2002 edition of Moderne aus dem Untergrund" full versions of nearly 300 notes that were truncated in the print edition. Hosted on H. C. Erik Midelfort's website. Martin Mulsow's seismic reinterpretation of the origins of the Enlightenment in Germany won awards and renown in its original German edition, and now H. C. Erik Midelfort's translation makes this sensational book available to English-speaking readers. In Enlightenment Underground, Mulsow shows that even (...) in the late seventeenth century some thinkers in Germany ventured to express extremely dangerous ideas, but did so as part of a secret underground. Scouring manuscript collections across northern Europe, Mulsow studied the writings of countless hitherto unknown radical jurists, theologians, historians, and dissident students who pushed for the secularization of legal, political, social, and religious knowledge. Often their works circulated in manuscript, anonymously, or as clandestinely published books. Working as a philosophical microhistorian, Mulsow has discovered the identities of several covert radicals and linked them to circles of young German scholars, many of whom were connected with the vibrant radical cultures of the Netherlands, England, and Denmark. The author reveals how radical ideas and contributions to intellectual doubt came from Socinians and Jews, church historians and biblical scholars, political theorists, and unemployed university students. He shows that misreadings of humorous or ironic works sometimes gave rise to unintended skeptical thoughts or corrosively political interpretations of Christianity. This landmark book overturns stereotypical views of the early Enlightenment in Germany as cautious, conservative, and moderate, and replaces them with a new portrait that reveals a movement far more radical, unintended, and puzzling than previously suspected. (shrink)

Theodor W. Adorno often made reference to Immanuel Kant’s famous essay on enlightenment. Although he denied that immaturity is self-incurred, the first section of this article will show that he adopted many of Kant’s ideas about maturity in his philosophically informed critique of monopoly conditions under late capitalism. The second section will explore Adorno’s claim that the educational system could foster maturity by encouraging critical reflection on the social conditions that have made us what we are. Finally, this (...) article will demonstrate that Adorno links enlightenment to Kant’s idea of a realm of ends. (shrink)

Philosophical personalism has generated a very powerful field of study in the twentieth and twenty first centuries but has not produced a systematic exposition. This book fills this big gap by offering for the first time a full systematic personalistic vision of the human person. This ambitious volume offers a pedagogical and integrated exposition of philosophical personalism, answering vital questions about human identity and existence in a way that the reader can achieve an integrated view of the person. The book (...) points to the real life of each person so that, by partially unraveling the mystery of the personal being, it becomes a philosophical guide for life. For these reasons, the book can be used both for academic purposes, as a manual of philosophy of man or for personal enlightenment. Divided in five parts, the first part of the book works as an introduction, offering an overview of the human person and of the notion of person. The second part describes the internal structure of the human being addressing topics as corporeity as a personal fact; sensibility and the senses; affectivity; intelligence; freedom understood as choice and self-determination and, finally, the personal self. The third part analyses the person in action and some special types of action such as work and language. The fourth part deals with interpersonal relationships beginning with I-You relationship and following with the family and the social structure. Finally, part five deals with the so-called ultimate questions, that is, those that decide the final meaning of each person's life, namely, time, death, immortality, and religion. (shrink)

My discussion in this essay begins with a short rehearsal of Kant’s approach to anthropology and history in order to provide the framework for my subsequent focus on the political commentary that has surrounded the Black Lives Matter movement. This movement presents the most recent political challenge to white America’s belief in the inevitability of progress and I am interested in the light that might be shed on this challenge when viewed through the lens of Enlightenment conceptions of (...) not just history, but cultural and racial fitness for progressive development. I conclude with suggestions for the direction a new political imaginary might take, one capable of acknowledging the real history of race in America even as it makes room for the still necessary role played by our hope for progress, and the possibility of an expanded moral horizon. (shrink)

Bertrand Russell was a renowned thinker who has exerted great influence over the Western intellectual circles of the 20th century. In particular, his criticism and reflections on Western religious traditions have become important symbols of contemporary Enlightenment. He deepened the past scholars’ accomplishments in sociology, anthropology, and psychology into atheistic views, through which he revealed the psychological motives and social functions of the origin of religion. He analyzed the types and disadvantages of religion from the aspects of historical (...) development, social function, and religious form, deeply criticized the dogmatism of religion and the institutional cruelty of the Catholic Church, and positively affirmed the function of religion in expressing emotion in human spiritual life. Through the analysis of Russell’s enlightening thoughts, this article points out that the origin and functions of religion most likely find expression in people’s universal “desire for knowledge.”. (shrink)

Nicolas Gueudeville's 1715 French translation of Utopia is often dismissed as a “belle infidèle,” an elegant but unfaithful work of translation. Gueudeville does indeed expand the text to nearly twice its original length. But he presents Utopia as a contribution to emergent debates on tolerance, natural religion, and political anthropology, directly addressing the concerns of many early advocates of the ideas we associate with Enlightenment. In this sense, it is not as much an “unfaithful” presentation of More's project (...) as it is an attempt to introduce Utopia to eighteenth-century francophone audiences—readers for whom theses on political economy and natural religion were much more salient than More's own preoccupations with rhetoric and English law. This paper introduces Gueudeville and his oeuvre, paying particular attention to his revisions to Louis-Armand de Lom d'Arce, Baron de Lahontan's 1703 Nouveaux Voyages dans l'Amérique Septentrionale. Published in 1705, Gueudeville's “revised, corrected, & augmented” version of Lahontan's Voyages foregrounds the rational and natural religion of the Huron as well as their constitutive aversion to property, to concepts of “mine” and “yours.” Gueudeville's revised version of Lahontan's Voyages purports to be an anthropological investigation as well as a study of New World political economy; it looks forward, moreover, to his edition of Utopia, framing More's work as a comparable study of political economy and anthropology. Gueudeville, in other words, renders More's Utopia legible to Enlightenment audiences, depicting Utopia not in terms of impossibility and irony but rather as a study of natural religion and attendant forms of political, devotional, and economic life. Gueudeville's edition of Utopia even proved controversial due, in part, to his insistence on the rationality as well as the possibility of Utopia. (shrink)

The study of religion by social anthropologists, as distinct from the classical philosophical approach of the Greeks and their medieval heirs, began in the late 19th century with Edward Tyler’s Primitive Culture (1871). Tyler’s approach was completely a priori in style in that it did not rest on systematic field work or empirical observation. The same approach characterized James Frazer’s famous book, The Golden Bough (1891). Baldwin Spencer, the founding father of Australian anthropology, was persuaded by Frazer to (...) see the sophisticated religious beliefs and rites of the Aboriginal groups he studied in central Australia as mere ‘magic’. By the 1960s, a new generation of anthropologists, influenced by Claude Lévi-Strauss and English thinkers like E. Evans Pritchard, had arrived on the scene. This new ‘turn’ in anthropology led a number of contemporary scholars to the radical position that Western anthropology itself is a socio-cultural phenomenon that can be investigated in a broadly anthropological way. To see what this involves, it is worthwhile examining a number of crucial misunderstandings of Australian Aboriginal beliefs and practices that have been the artefactual result of various anthropological approaches. (shrink)

That the Enlightenment shaped modernity is uncontested. Yet remarkably few historians or philosophers have attempted to trace the process of ideas from the political and social turmoil of the late eighteenth century to the present day. This is precisely what Jonathan Israel now does. In Democratic Enlightenment , Israel demonstrates that the Enlightenment was an essentially revolutionary process, driven by philosophical debate. The American Revolution and its concerns certainly acted as a major factor in the intellectual (...) ferment that shaped the wider upheaval that followed, but the radical philosophes were no less critical than enthusiastic about the American model. From 1789, the General Revolution's impetus came from a small group of philosophe-revolutionnaires , men such as Mirabeau, Sieyes, Condorcet, Volney, Roederer, and Brissot. Not aligned to any of the social groups represented in the French National assembly, they nonetheless forged " la philosophie moderne "--in effect Radical Enlightenment ideas--into a world-transforming ideology that had a lasting impact in Latin America, Canada and eastern Europe as well as France, Italy, Germany, and the Low Countries. In addition, Israel argues that while all French revolutionary journals powerfully affirmed that la philosophie moderne was the main cause of the French Revolution, the main stream of historical thought has failed to grasp what this implies. Israel sets the record straight, demonstrating the true nature of the engine that drove the Revolution, and the intimate links between the radical wing of the Enlightenment and the anti-Robespierriste "Revolution of reason." Acclaim for earlier volumes in the trilogy: "His vast--and vastly impressive--book sets out to redefine the intellectual landscape of early modern Europe. Magnificent and magisterialwill undoubtedly be one of the truly great historical works of the decade." -- Sunday Telegraph "The scholarship is breathtaking. Israel has read everything, absorbed every nuance, followed up every byway." -- New Statesman "An enormously impressive piece of scholarship. The breadth and depth of the author's reading are breathtaking and Enlightenment Contested is set to become the definitive work for philosophers as well as historians on this extraordinary period." -- Tribune. (shrink)

Protestant anthropology: between secularity and postsecularity. In this article the analysis of main problems of the Protestant anthropology late XX – early XXІ centuries. It is shown that the theological discourse on the merits of the man and his life unfolded within the paradigm of secular and post-secular.

Historians have long since rejected the dubious assertions of the conflict model, with its narratives of perennial religion versus science combat. Nonetheless, this theory persists in various academic disciplines, and it is still presented to university students as the authoritative historical account of religion–science interactions. Cases of this can be identified within modern anthropology textbooks and reference materials, which often recapitulate claims once made by John W. Draper and Andrew D. White. This article examines 21st-century introductory anthropology publications, (...) demonstrating how such works perpetuate religion–science myths and the notion that history has been replete with inevitable religion versus science warfare. In particular, this study reveals how such introductory materials propagate discord narratives associated with the Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment. Affiliated with these anecdotes are oversimplified accounts of religious responses to heliocentrism and evolutionary theory, as well as claims that science has invariably led to the usurpation of religious belief and secularization from Galileo onwards. (shrink)

In a late discussion of Kant’s essay, “Was ist Aufklärung?,” Foucault credits Kant with posing “the question of his own present” and positions himself as an inheritor of this Kantian legacy.1 Foucault has high praise for the critical tradition that emerges from Kant’s historical-political reflections on the Enlightenment and the French Revolution; Kant’s concern in these writings with “an ontology of the present, an ontology of ourselves” is, he says, characteristic of “a form of philosophy, from Hegel, through (...) Nietzsche and Max Weber, to the Frankfurt School,” a form of philosophy in which Foucault, perhaps surprisingly, situates his own work. (shrink)

‘Universalist’ moral principles have fallen into disfavour because too often they have been pretexts for unilateral impositions upon others, whether domestically or internationally. Too widely neglected has been Kant’s specifically Critical re-analysis of the scope and character of rational justification in all non-formal domains, including the entirety of epistemology and moral philosophy, including both justice and ethics. Rational judgment is inherently normative because it is in part constituted by our self-assessment of whether the considerations we now integrate into a candidate (...) judgment have been integrated as they ought, so as to form a cogent, justifiable judgment. Constitutive of this self-assessment is that rational judgments must be based upon considerations which can be communicated to all others, such that they too can assess them as sufficiently cogent justification; also constitutive of this rational self-assessment is that we actually engage with others who do assess our judgments. Kant’s Critical principles rule out in principle any unilateral imposition upon others, whether in cognition or morals. Using Kant’s Critical principles and methods in connection with ‘practical anthropology’ and the enormously important domain of acquired rights and obligations shows how Kant had already justified fundamentally universal principles of justice which can be institutionalised in variously distinctive cultures, and which form the proper bases for our acquired, specifically social rights and obligations, including those of friendship and community. (shrink)

The semantic confusion in Europe about the term “anthropology” has of late been considerable. On the one hand there is meant by it, and quite justifiably, human biology and medical anthropology. On the other hand, the work of some contemporary thinkers, under the name of “philosophical anthropology,” has recently gone beyond the narrower compass. This has been noticeable at both the German and the international European philosophical conventions since the last war. In addition to this, there (...) appeared the term “Kulturanthropologie,”—for the first time probably as the title of E. Rothacker's contribution to Systematische Philosophie, a collection of essays edited by Nicolai Hartmann and published in 1942. But “Kulturanthropologie,” in Rothacker's sense, is not a translation of “cultural anthropology,” which has in recent years grown to such eminence among scholarly fields in England and America. In the United States, “anthropology” designates a group of scholarly fields ranging on the one hand from biological anthropology to archaeology and the study of the beginnings of history on the other, often including history, linguistics, and other realms of research; it is neither one of the natural sciences nor of the humanities but one of the social sciences; and the actually new results of this young discipline, especially at Harvard, Yale, and the University of Chicago, are arrived at by means of team work by anthropologists, psychologists, and sociologists, which in Germany has not been the case so far. (shrink)

This book collects published and unpublished work over the last dozen years by one of today's most distinguished and provocative anthropologists. Johannes Fabian is widely known outside of his discipline because his work so often overcomes traditional scholarly boundaries to bring fresh insight to central topics in philosophy, history, and cultural studies. The first part of the book addresses questions of current critical concern. The second part extends the work of critique into the past by examining the beginning of modern (...) ethnography in the exploration of Central Africa during the late nineteenth century: the justification of a scientific attitude and the collecting of ethnographic objects. A final essay examines how the Congolese have returned the 'imperial gaze' of Belgium by the work of critical memory in popular history. The ten chapters are framed by two meditations on the relevance of theory and the irrelevance of the millennium. (shrink)

Through a detailed study of Herder's Enlightenment thought, especially his philosophy of literature, Kristin Gjesdal offers a new and sometimes provocative reading of the historical origins and contemporary challenges of modern hermeneutics. She shows that hermeneutic philosophy grew out of a historical, anthropological, and poetic discourse in the mid-eighteenth century and argues that, as such, it represents a rich, stimulating, and relevant engagement with the potentials and limits of human meaning and understanding. Gjesdal's study broadens our conception of hermeneutic (...) philosophy - the issues it raises and the answers it offers - and underlines the importance of Herder's contribution to the development of this discipline. Her book will be highly valuable for students and scholars of eighteenth-century thought, especially those working in the fields of hermeneutics, aesthetics, and European philosophy. (shrink)

Herder is often criticized for having embraced cultural relativism, but there has been little philosophical discussion of what he actually wrote about the nature of the human species and its differentiation through culture. This book focuses on Herder's idea of culture, seeking to situate his social and political theses within the context of his anthropology, metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, theory of language and philosophy of history. It argues for a view of Herder as a qualified relativist, who combined the conception (...) of a common human nature with a belief in the importance of culture in developing and shaping that nature. Especially highlighted are Herder's understanding of the relativity of virtue and happiness, and his belief in the impossibility of constructing a single best society. The book will appeal to a wide range of readers interested both in Herder and in Enlightenment culture more generally. (shrink)

In the late eighteenth century, an array of European political thinkers attacked the very foundations of imperialism, arguing passionately that empire-building was not only unworkable, costly, and dangerous, but manifestly unjust. Enlightenment against Empire is the first book devoted to the anti-imperialist political philosophies of an age often regarded as affirming imperial ambitions. Sankar Muthu argues that thinkers such as Denis Diderot, Immanuel Kant, and Johann Gottfried Herder developed an understanding of humans as inherently cultural agents and therefore (...) necessarily diverse. These thinkers rejected the conception of a culture-free "natural man." They held that moral judgments of superiority or inferiority could be made neither about entire peoples nor about many distinctive cultural institutions and practices.Muthu shows how such arguments enabled the era's anti-imperialists to defend the freedom of non-European peoples to order their own societies. In contrast to those who praise "the Enlightenment" as the triumph of a universal morality and critics who view it as an imperializing ideology that denigrated cultural pluralism, Muthu argues instead that eighteenth-century political thought included multiple Enlightenments. He reveals a distinctive and underappreciated strand of Enlightenment thinking that interweaves commitments to universal moral principles and incommensurable ways of life, and that links the concept of a shared human nature with the idea that humans are fundamentally diverse. Such an intellectual temperament, Muthu contends, can broaden our own perspectives about international justice and the relationship between human unity and diversity. (shrink)

Accession Number: ATLA0001712194; Hosting Book Page Citation: p 271-289.; Language(s): English; General Note: Bibliography: p 287-289.; Issued by ATLA: 20130825; Publication Type: Essay.

The paper defends the idea that Jamesian pragmatism, Nietzschean perspectivism, and philosophical anthropology represent a consistent triad, for the similarities and connections between the first two positions rest in their engagement with the anthropological question. As will be argued, a) pragmatism is concerned with anthropology and that it deals with a fundamental issue of Nietzsche’s late thought; b) the problem of the type of man (der Typus Mensch) is involved in Nietzsche’s questioning the value of truth, and (...) perspectivism is an alternative view to Platonic and Christian metaphysics which arises from the same phenomenalist conception of knowledge defended by James ; c) Nietzsche’s interest in developing a philosophy that affirms the perspectival character of existence is primarily anthropological, and this is in fact the pragmatic criterion of validity that one can attribute to Nietzschean perspectivism. (shrink)

Melanesian societies, like village societies in many parts of the world, are frequently portrayed as existing in a timeless, traditional present. The effects of this view are seen not only in overall popular and academic understandings of these societies but also in more abstract debates within anthropology about the nature of kinship, exchange, or social organization. History and Tradition in Melanesian Anthropology offers an alternative view, from authors who believe that historical evidence can and must inform our understanding (...) of contemporary cultures. This collection of original essays brings together scholars in anthropology and history. They point out ways in which the "timeless-traditionalism" approach of anthropology is inadequate. Life in the existing societies of Melanesia cannot be understood, they say, without taking firmly into account how these societies are shaped by their interactions with Western influences. In different ways all the contributors bring the history of Melanesian societies into their analyses, whether discussing the generally dismissive attitude of ethnographers toward the large numbers of Melanesian Christians; the ethnocentrism that led European observers to interpret fighting among the Melanesians solely according to whether it was for or against the Europeans; or the mechanism by which a practice such as kerekere (the soliciting of goods or services in Fijian society) became reified as a "custom." While the essays are critical of much of the anthropology that is done in Melanesia, they also exemplify a responsible, historically informed approach to the study of Melanesian societies - sober, constructive, and ideologically disinterested. Historians and anthropologists of Melanesia and the Pacific in general will find here original and enlightening work that is sure to influence the theoretical orientation of Melanesian anthropology. (shrink)