In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Hegel on Self-Consciousness: Desire and Death in the Phenomenology of SpiritAndy R. GermanRobert B. Pippin. Hegel on Self-Consciousness: Desire and Death in the Phenomenology of Spirit. Princeton-Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2011. Pp. viii + 103. Cloth, $29.95.If Hegel's system cannot be understood without the Phenomenology of Spirit, it is certainly impossible to understand the Phenomenology without understanding its famous transition, in chapter 4, to self-consciousness and (...) the (perhaps all-too-famous) master-slave dialectic. In these published lectures, then, Robert Pippin has compelling reasons for seeking the heart of the Phenomenology in two of its crucial assertions: that "Self-Consciousness is desire itself" and that "Self-Consciousness attains its satisfaction only in another self-consciousness" (¶¶167 and 175 in Miller's translation).Pippin's Hegel is essentially Kantian, concerned with the apperceptive nature of self-consciousness, i.e. not as mere receptivity to sensory or intellectual form, but as an activity, a judging or "taking" the world to be such and so. For Kant, this activity is transcendental or purely formal, the unification of the spatio-temporal manifold by a continuous, apperceptive "I" (31). Pippin argues that Hegel jettisons Kantian formality in favor of a broader question: how, rather than being subject to my desires, am I the subject of my desires? (32). An answer is possible only if self-consciousness is neither observational nor an immediate self-presence but instead (i) a practical achievement (15) that (ii) requires other self-conscious subjects (19). Unlike Platonic erōs, then, which points away from human life, self-conscious desire is constant self-examination of the reasons for our actions or beliefs. This is Hegel's version of Kant's insight that reason is the desire for justification, ultimately before "all others" (56–57).Thus we pivot to the claim that the successful or "satisfying" achievement of self-consciousness involves recognition by others. "Our answerability to the world," as Pippin writes, "is inextricably bound up with... our answerability to each other" (61). Unlike John McDowell's interpretation of the master-slave dialectic as an analogy for the struggle between the passive and active elements within one mind (42), Pippin argues that self-consciousness is social all the way down. It is "something like having a position," i.e. avowing a practical commitment or making a normative claim (65), which implies the presence of another self-conscious subject who recognizes my right to such claims, or challenges that right, even to the outermost—a struggle to the death over recognition and authority. Self-consciousness, then, is "not... a reflection of some substantive or metaphysical nature but... a social achievement... bound up with... social conflict" (75). On the decisive point, Pippin agrees with Brandom's neo-pragmatism: "[S]elf-conscious beings do not have natures, they have histories" (68), specifically, the history of struggle and reconciliation among rational, mutually recognizing subjects.But what, then, does recognition mean and how does it "satisfy"? And in what does our "answerability to others" consist if there is no "non-question begging... standard" (83) by which to judge our answers? Hegel, Pippin writes, "has a ‘pragmatic' or a ‘historicized' or ‘dialogical' view of what counts as the appeal to reasons.... He understands practical reason as a kind of interchange of attempts at justification among persons... " (84). Justification, however, cannot mean an appeal to nature. Indeed, in the struggle for recognition, self-conscious freedom means indifference to mere natural life or desire. Nature no longer points to philosophical wholeness, as our love of seeing does in Aristotle's Metaphysics. To paraphrase Pippin's titles, he shows with superior clarity that Hegel's idealism really is modernism: i.e. the most thoroughgoing rejection of the Greek link between eleutheria and eudaimonia.But when Hegel writes of "the point where knowledge no longer needs to go beyond itself... where Concept corresponds to object and object to Concept" as the necessary "goal" of knowledge (¶80), this suggests that the "interchange of justifications" reaches an end. Even if this end is the socio-political order of mutual recognition among rational persons, it is surely not the mere fact of recognition that satisfies us... (shrink)

The article focuses on understanding some of the self-evident premises of the philosophy of the 17th–19th centuries that make up the horizon of the Enlightenment. One of these premises is Immanuel Kant’s idea of independent thinking. Based on the analysis of the polemics of Kant and Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi about the “extrasensible abilities” of the reason, the question is raised about the possibility of understanding someone else’s concept based on other existential preferences. Answering this question, we distinguish between the concept (...) of the Enlightenment and the practical principle of the Enlightenment and show that the supporter of the ideology of the Enlightenment (Kant) and his critic (Jacobi) appear in the light of the principle of independent thinking as the spokesmen of the spirit, not the letter of the Enlightenment. A condition for understanding someone else’s concept is a productive misunderstanding, which is one of the aspects of the principle of independent thinking: the acceptance of the self-evident as incomprehensible, the shift of one’s attention to one’s own how-being and the perception of thought as a gift. (shrink)

Why are disembodied extraordinary beings like gods and spirits prevalent in past and present theologies? Under the intuitive Cartesian dualism hypothesis, this is because it is natural to conceptualize of minds as separate from bodies; under the counterintuitiveness hypothesis, this is because beliefs in minds without bodies are unnatural—such beliefs violate core knowledge intuitions about person physicality and consequently have a social transmission advantage. We report on a critical test of these contrasting hypotheses. Prior research found that among adult Christian (...) religious adherents, intuitions about person psychology coexist and interfere with theological conceptualizations of God (e.g., infallibility). Here, we use a sentence verification paradigm where participants are asked to evaluate as true or false statements on which core knowledge intuitions about person physicality and psychology and Christian theology about God are inconsistent (true on one and false on the other) versus consistent (both true or both false). We find, as predicted by the counterintuitiveness hypothesis but not the Cartesian dualism hypothesis, that Christian religious adherents show worse performance (lower accuracy and slower response time) on statements where Christian theological doctrines about God's physicality (e.g., incorporeality, omnipresence) conflict with intuitions about person physicality. We find these effects for other extraordinary beings in Christianity—the Holy Spirit and Jesus—but not for an ordinary being (priest). We conclude that it is unintuitive to conceptualize extraordinary beings as disembodied, and that this, rather than inherent Cartesian dualism, may explain the prevalence of beliefs in such beings. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to shed light on different aspects of the hermeneutical problem in post-Kantian philosophical 'constellation'. In this domain, the problem of the relationship between the text and its commentary is theorized in terms of the antithesis between 'Spirit' and 'Letter', which clearly has religious roots. Therefore, the first part of the paper examines the historical origins of this antithesis, as well as its application in philosophical discussions which developed by the end of the 18th (...) century about the problem of finding the 'true' interpretation to Kant's philosophy. The second part of the text, which is to be published in the next issue of this review, brings the duality of spiritual and literal interpretation into closer connection with the topics of Kant's moral philosophy. Namera ovog rada je da osvetli razlicite aspekte hermeneutickog problema u poslekantovskoj filozofskoj 'konstelaciji'. U ovom podrucju, problem odnosa izmedju teksta i komentara postavlja se u terminima antiteze izmedju 'duha' i 'slova', koja ima prepoznatljive religijske korene. Zato prvi deo rada istrazuje istorijsko poreklo ove antiteze, kao i njenu primenu u filozofskim diskusijama koje su se krajem 18. veka razvile povodom problema pronalazenja 'pravog' tumacenja Kantove filozofije. U drugom delu rada, koji ce biti objavljen u sledecem broju casopisa, dvojnost duhovnog i doslovnog tumacenja dovodi se u uzu vezu sa tematikom Kantove teorije morala. (shrink)

Receptive Spirit develops the thesis that the notion of self-induced mental activity at the heart of German idealism necessitated a radical rethinking of humans’ dependence on culturally transmitted models of thought, evaluation, and creativity. The chapters of the book examine paradigmatic attempts undertaken by German idealist thinkers to reconcile spontaneous mental activity with receptivity to culturally transmitted models. The book maps the ramifications of this problematic in Kant’s theory of aesthetic experience, Fichte’s and Hegel’s views on the (...) historical character of philosophy, the Fichtean model of philosophical communication, and Friedrich Schlegel’s theory and practice of literary communication and criticism. Drawing on Gadamer and McDowell, I argue that the conceptual framework established by the Idealists remains indispensable for orientation in the contemporary intellectual landscape. (See the PDF file below for a synopsis). (shrink)

I dedicate this essay to the memory of the late Wolfgang Mommsen—the subject would have been congenial to him. It is one of a series of offshoots from a central project: a scholarly edition of Max Weber's Protestant Ethic with commentary. When I first told Prof. Mommsen of my plan in 1994 he looked me full in the face and gave a characteristic growl: “All that work!” Here was a man who knew what he was about. My thanks to Ross (...) McKibbin and Keith Tribe for reading this paper in draft. The article begins by examining Max Weber's relations with Lujo Brentano, much the most important “precursor” to Weber in the field of economics. In particular, Brentano conducted a form of parallel inquiry into the rise of ‘the spirit of capital’ in England 35 years before Weber looked for the origins of “spirit” of capitalism there, and the contrast between these two ideas casts much light both on Brentano and on Weber's Protestant Ethic. This personal history leads into a broader history of the transition in German economic thought between the 1860s – the formative decade for Brentano but also the era of Marx's Capital – and that of Weber's generation coming to maturity c.1890. Marx and Weber remain the two great canonical thinkers and original minds; but any authentic historical comparison between Marx and Weber must take in Brentano. The essence of the contrast between the generations is that between Weber's novel conception of an ethical ‘capitalism’, and the materialism and naturalism underpinning Brentano's and Marx's ‘capital’, although Weber and Brentano are alike as liberals, democrats and bourgeois. ☆ Some abbreviations for Weber: AfSS for Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik; GARS for Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Religionssoziologie (Tübingen, 1920) vol. i; WL for Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Wissenschaftslehre (Tübingen, 1968); Grundriss for Grundriss zu den Vorlesungen über Allgemeine (“theoretische”) Nationalökonomie [1898], repr. Tübingen, 1990; MWG for Max Weber Gesamtausgabe ed. Horst Baier et al. (Tübingen, 1984); Briefe for letters by Weber in this edition; ‘Nachlaß Max Weber’ for unpublished letters from the Geheimes Staatsarchiv, Berlin-Dahlem, VI. HA Nachlaß Max Weber. Lebensbild for Marianne Weber, Max Weber: Ein Lebensbild (Tübingen, 1926); Zohn for idem, Max Weber. A Biography (New Brunswick, 1988) tr. Harry Zohn. For Brentano: Der wirtschaftende Mensch for Der wirtschaftende Mensch in der Geschichte (Leipzig, 1923); Konkrete Grundbedingungen for Konkrete Grundbedingungen der Volkswirtschaft (Leipzig, 1924); Der tätige Mensch for Der tätige Mensch und die Wissenschaft von der Wirtschaft (Marburg, 2006) ed. R. Bräu, H.G. Nutzinger. ‘Die Entwickelung der Wertlehre’ for ‘Die Entwickelung der Wertlehre’, Sitzungsberichte der Königlich Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Philosophisch-philologische und historische Klassen. Jahrgang 1908, 3. Abhandlung (15 Feb. 1908), 1–84; ‘Theorie der Bedürfnisse’ for ‘Versuch einer Theorie der Bedürfmisse’, ibid., 10. Abhandlung (5 Dec. 1908), 1–79; ‘Die Malthussche Lehre’ for ‘Die Malthussche Lehre und die Bevölkerungsbewegung der letzten Decennien’ [1909], Abhandlungen der historischen Klasse der Königlich Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften XXIV (1906–1909), 565–625, 1*–39*. (shrink)

The two objectives of this text are: to offer a general exposition on the originality of the Phenomenology of the Spirit of Hegel in the trajectory of German Idealism, and to outline a more specific presentation on the role of the last chapter of this work, dedicated to “absolute knowledge”, in the argumentative strategy of that science of the experience of conscience. The meaning and role of the concept of Absolute in Hegel and its historical development is studied, (...) especially from its difference with Schelling’s philosophy. (shrink)

Prvi deo ovog rada, objavljen u prethodnom broju casopisa, bio je posvecen razmatranju religijskog porekla dvojnosti 'duha' i 'slova', a zatim i pitanju njenog znacenja u kontekstu filozofije ranog nemackog idealizma. Ovaj, drugi i zakljucni deo rada usredsredjuje se na eticke implikacije tog pitanja, posto je suprotstavljanje 'duha2 Kantovog sistema njegovom 'slovu', uz cesta pozivanja na novozavetno ispunjenje mojsijevskog zakona ljubavlju i verom predstavljalo jednu od osnovnih strategija kriticara Kantove teorije morala. Krajnja konsekvenca ovog pravca kritike Kanta lezi u ukidanju (...) autoriteta transcendentne moralne norme. Ovaj korak, kojim se istovremeno ponistava autoritet teksta kao takvog, a time i stav komentara kao literarnog zanra moze se uociti vec u Hegelovim mladalackim teoloskim spisima, u kojima se zastupa ukidanje transcendencije moralnog zakona njegovim inkorporiranjem u slobodnu subjektivnost koja egzistira u zajednici verujucih hriscana. (shrink)

This comprehensive history of German philosophy from its medieval beginnings to near the end of the eighteenth century explores the spirit of German intellectual life and its distinctiveness from that of other countries. Beck devotes whole chapters to four great philosophers -- Nicholas of Cusa, Leibniz, Lessing, and Kant -- and extensively examines many others, including Albertus Magnus, Meister Eckhart, Paracelsus, Kepler, Mendelssohn, Wolff, and Herder. Questioning explanations of philosophy by the racial or ethnic character of its (...) exponents, Beck's conclusion is that German philosophy developed as a series of diverse responses to the historical experiences of the German people. The peculiarities of German philosophy must be viewed in the light of German political problems and educational structures. In particular he stresses the importance of the connections between philosophy and Germany's intellectual, literary, religious, and political history. (shrink)

This chapter examines the consequences of Nietzsche's campaign against morality for the pursuit of knowledge in philosophy, and specifically, on values and methods of the German Enlightenment. In Dawn, Nietzsche explores how an experimental approach to knowing and to knowledge involves us in adopting different ways of being toward things in the world, as well as toward ourselves and our experiences, and in using associated diverse methods of inquiry. Nietzsche's free‐spirit writings, including Dawn, are works of a particular (...) kind of enlightenment project that works against all expressions of fanaticism, especially religious and moral, and in an effort to temper emotional and mental excess. Nietzsche's primary commitment in Dawn is to experimentation in which the love of, or passion for, knowledge gives humanity back its right to engage in self‐experimentation. (shrink)

I shall speak of ghost [revenant], of flame and of ashes.And of what, for Heidegger, avoiding means.What is avoiding? Heidegger on several occasions uses the common word Vermeiden: to avoid, to flee, to dodge. What might he have meant when it comes to “spirit” or the “spiritual”? I specify immediately: not spirit or the spiritual but Geist, geistig, geistlich, for this question will be, through and through, that of language. Do these German words allow themselves to be (...) translated? In another sense: are they avoidable?Sein und Zeit : what does Heidegger say at that time? He announces and he prescribes. He warns [avertit]: a certain number of terms will have to be avoided . Among them, spirit . In 1953, more than twenty-five years later—and this was not just any quarter-century—in the great text devoted to Georg Trakl, Heidegger notes that Trakl always took care to avoid the word geistig. And, visibly, Heidegger approves him in this; he thinks the same. But this time, it is not Geist nor even geistlich that is to be avoided, but geistig.How are we to delimit the difference, and what has happened? What of this meantime? How are we to explain that in twenty-five years, between these two warning signals , Heidegger made a frequent, regular, marked use of all this vocabulary, including the adjective geistig? And that he often spoke not only of the word “spirit” but, sometimes yielding to the emphatic mode, in the name of spirit? Jacques Derrida is Directeur d’Études at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales and also teaches at the University of California, Irvine. His most recent contribution to Critical Inquiry is “Like the Sound of the Sea Deep within a Shell: Paul de Man’s War” . An English translation of De l’espirit: Heidegger et la question is forthcoming from the University of Chicago Press. Geoff Bennington, author of Lyotard: Writing the Event, is a lecturer in French at the University of Sussex. Rachel Bowlby, author of Virginia Woolf: Feminist Destinations, is a lecturer in English at the University of Sussex. (shrink)

G. W. F. Hegel's first masterpiece, the Phenomenology of Spirit, is one of the great works of philosophy. It remains, however, one of the most challenging and mysterious books ever written. Michael Inwood presents this central work to the modern reader in an intelligible and accurate new translation. This translation attempts to convey, as accurately as possible, the subtle nuances of the original German text. Inwood also provides a detailed commentary that explains what Hegel is saying at each (...) stage of his argument and also discusses the philosophical issues it raises. This volume will therefore prove invaluable to those who want to get to grips with Hegel's thought processes and to follow his complex argument. (shrink)

Converse in the Spirit is a comparative study of the writings of William Blake and the German visionary philosopher Jacob Boehme. It argues that the relationship between Blake and Boehme was a meeting of like minds that transcended place and time, that each regarded himself as part of a community of vision, and aspiration, and believed that any predominant form ofthought and understanding was only partial.

In this paper I propose to study the different combinations between temporality and the idea of totality in the beginning of Classical German Philosophy. In order to do that I will analyze the image of liberation in the philosophical and practical articulation of a new mythology in the manuscript “The Oldest Systematic Program of German Idealism”, and the outlines of a theory of the Spirit in the documents written by Hegel in the first part of his Jena (...) stage, more specifically, in the fragments of the period 1803/04. For this purpose I will take as specific objects the figures of an “eternal unity” [dieewige Einheit] to come and of an “absolute becoming” [das absolute Werden] of Spirit. The hypothesis I intend to develop holds that the confrontation of these two images can lead to duplicated consequences: on the one hand, this comparison would make it possible to relativize the binary readings that oppose as terms of a simple contradiction both conceptual lineages, Idealism and Romanticism. On the other hand it would express an insurmountable tension between two ways of thinking about the relationship between time and totality. (shrink)

The Phenomenology of Spirit was Hegel's grandest experiement, changing our vision of the world and the very nature of philosophical enterprise. In this book, Solomon captures the bold and exhilarating spirit, presenting the Phenomenology as a thoroughly personal as well as philosophical work. He begins with a historical introduction, which lays the groundwork for a section-by-section analysis of the Phenomenology. Both the initiated as well as readers unacquainted with the intricacies of German idealism will find this to (...) be an accessible and exciting introduction to this great philosopher's monumental work. (shrink)

Female Soul and Feminine Spirit. Philosophical Prolegomena to a New (Women) Culture in the Interwar Radio Lectures Alice Voinescu’s and Constantin Noica’s. The newly founded Romanian Radio (1927) invited since 1930 the most important personalities of the Romanian culture to speak in the frame of different radio conferences. Two of these personalities were the philosophers Alice Voinescu (1885-1961) and Constantin Noica (1909-1987). Although they represent two different philosophical orientations (Alice Voinescu as a post-metaphysical thinker and Constantin Noica as a (...) philosopher, who tries, like Heidegger in the German culture, to rebuild metaphysics), the two interwar Romanian thinkers meet each other in some philosophical topics. One of these is the critical manner, how they are thinking about the movement of the emancipation of women in the 20thcentury. Both of them agree that the female soul and the feminine spirit have not to lose their specific features in the tendency to become active in the frame of the public sphere. In their critical thinking, Alice Voinescu and Constantin Noica meet the philosophical ideas of German philosophers like Georg Simmel and Martin Heidegger. (shrink)

Hegel's first major philosophical work is one of philosophy's true masterpieces. Despite its notorious difficulty, it is one of the most influential philosophical works ever written. The Phenomenology is not only the first presentation of Hegel's system; it also is an account of the historical development of Geist from Greek tragedy to the triumph of philosophy as science in Hegel's own time. This volume of essays offers an interpretation of the spirit of Hegel's Phenomenology as well as a concise (...) reading of the main text. It discusses also the historical and philosophical background of Hegel's main work and takes note of its reception. Since the essays were written by philosophers from different countries—both established Hegel scholars and promising young researchers—this volume presents the reader with an international overview of recent Hegel research. The main goal of the collection is to offer students a hermeneutical tool for the reading of Hegel's masterpiece while opening up new fields of research for those who know Hegel and German philosophy well. The contributors are Christoph Asmuth, Klaus Brinkmann, Paul Cobben, Alfred Denker, Richard Findler, Jeffery Kinlaw, Angelica Nuzzo, Tom Rockmore, Dale Snow, Mike Vater, Ludovicus De Vos, Robert Williams, and Holger Zaborowski. (shrink)

In the concept of "gift," some contemporary thinkers perceive the possibility for a renewal of philosophical and theological reflection. The Parisian philosopher Claude Bruaire innovately proposes to understand "gift" ontologically rather than phenomenologically or sociologically. The purpose of this dissertation is to explore Bruaire's ontology of gift , while testing its ability to elaborate an adequate interpretation of the essence of finite and infinite spirit. ;Bruaire views gift and being as coextensive for two reasons. First, he interprets being in (...) terms of spirit and of freedom. Gift then is the name of the ternary freedom-spirit-being. Second, being-of-spirit is gift because God is not only absolute spirit, he is also Triune. ;The first part of the dissertation explains how, for Bruaire, the intimation of Christian revelation enhances philosophy and suggests the elaboration of an ontology of spirit. We then proceed to show in what way, prior to the development of his ontodology , Bruaire's systematic anthropology and his conception of absolute spirit were built around a notion of gift which was yet to be developed fully. In the course of this discussion the necessity for an ontological account of gift emerges clearly. ;The second part unfolds Bruaire's ontodology in three steps. We first of all recount how the retrieval of the concept of spirit enables Bruaire to restore the notion of being to philosophical reflection. We then explain in what way the human spirit is given to the self in order to become self. Finally, we show that, for Bruaire, the infinite, creator, and eternal spirit is gift because God is donation , reddition , and confirmation of the gift . Entering in conversation with the philosophy of Hegel and Schelling, Bruaire draws from German Idealism key themes and terms, and corrects them in the light of the principle of unfathomable positivity stemming from his comprehension of Christianity. This approach enables him to develop a cogent interpretation of being as love. (shrink)

By offering an original reading of J. G. Fichte's central philosophic work, The Science of Knowledge , through the prism of his much over looked "Journal of Animal Magnetism" this dissertation situates Fichte's later metaphysics of the image within the concerns of contemporary media theory. It does so by taking seriously the political consequences of the historical transformation of the faculty of imagination in age of materialism. Such a reading is made possible by approaching German Idealism through the critical (...) apparatus of 20th century Continental Philosophy . ;In the 19th century, Post-Kantian idealism's designation of the imagination as a faculty was called into question. For instance, with the appearance of Mesmerism and the rise of magnetic psychology, the very validity of the transcendental subject was rendered suspect. The subject's imagination was shown to be transparent to external influence. In his own search for a physical instantiation of idealism Fichte realized that the imagination and its power of imaging was no longer limited to the transcendental subject, but was shown to be a function of material technique. Such a transformation would have far reaching political consequences. Specifically, if Fichte articulated spirit---which defined social wholeness---in terms of the imagination, then the appropriation of the imagination by technological materialism demanded a fundamental rethinking of the communicative ground of the social. (shrink)

In his essayOn the History of Religion and Philosophy in Germany, of 1834, Heinrich Heine suggested to his French audience that the German propensity for ‘metaphysical abstractions’ had led many people to condemn philosophy for its failure to have a practical effect, Germany having only had its revolution in thought, while France had its in reality. Heine, albeit somewhat ironically, refuses to join those who condemn philosophy: ‘German philosophy is an important matter, which concerns the whole of humanity, (...) and only the last grandchildren will be able to judge whether we should be blamed or praised for working out our philosophy before our revolution.’ He then makes the following prognosis:the German revolution will not be more mild and more gentle because it was preceded by Kantian critique, Fichtean transcendental idealism and even philosophy of nature. Revolutionary forces have developed via these doctrines which are just waiting for the day when they can break out and fill the world with horror and admiration. … Don't smile at my advice, the advice of a dreamer who warns you about Kantians, Fichteans and philosophers of nature. Don't smile at the fantast who expects the same revolution in the realm of appearance as took place in the realm of spirit. … A play will be performed in Germany in comparison with which the French Revolution could appear just as a harmless idyll (ibid., pp. 616–17). (shrink)

The word “romanticism” designates in German as in other European languages a broad movement in literature that originated at the beginning of the nineteenth century and has often been characterized as an opposition to the preceding age of rationalism and Enlightenment. Situated between the classicist schools of taste of the previous century and the realistic and naturalistic trends in literature of the later nineteenth century, Romanticism or romantic literature is the product of the creative power of the imagination; it (...) appeals to the emotions, has a preference for the mysterious aspects of nature, and shows a strong predilection for the past, the Middle Ages, and mythological traditions. With its strong affinity to the novel, romantic literature departs from the classical forms and the classicist canon of literature, but when these classical forms were nevertheless used by the authors of this movement, something new was created – the romantic tale, the romantic drama, and romantic poetry. The great romantic authors in Germany were E. T. A. Hoffmann, Eichendorff, Brentano, Arnim, and Fouqué. There is both a narrower and a broader notion of Romanticism in Germany, the broader also relating to painting (Friedrich, Runge) and music (Schumann, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Bartholdy, Wagner). Romanticism had a great impact on the general view of the world and was influential in the rise of the historical consciousness, the revival of a religious spirit, and the emergence of a conservative political attitude. As far as philosophy and the sciences are concerned, Romanticism is associated with figures such as Schelling and Schopenhauer, the development of a philosophy of art, of nature, and of the subconscious. On the whole, Romanticism is one of those movements that shaped an entire age and manifested itself down to the most particular features of popular belief and scientific interest. (shrink)

Suppose we were to ask some students of philosophy to imagine a typical book of classical German philosophy and describe its general style and character, how might they reply? I suspect that they would answer somewhat as follows. The book would be long and heavy, it would be written in a complicated style which employed only very abstract terms, and it would be extremely difficult to understand. At all events a description of this kind does indeed fit many famous (...) works of German philosophy. Let us take for example Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit of 1807. The 1977 English translation published by Oxford has 591 pages, and as for style here is a typical passage: Self-consciousness found the Thing to be like itself, and itself to be like a Thing; i.e., it is aware that it is in itself the objectively real world. It is no longer the immediate certainty of being all reality, but a certainty for which the immediate in general has the form of something superseded, so that the objectivity of the immediate still has only the value of something superficial, its inner being and essence being self-consciousness itself. The object, to which it is positively related, is therefore a self-consciousness. It is in the form of thinghood, i.e. it is independent ; but it is certain that this independent object is for it not something alien, and thus it knows that it is in principle recognized by the object. It is Spirit which, in the duplication of its self-consciousness and in the independence of both, has the certainty of its unity with itself. This certainty has now to be raised to the level of truth; what holds good for it in principle , and in its inner certainty, has to enter into its consciousness and become explicit fork. (shrink)

In this unique and comprehensive book, George McCarthy examines the influence of Greek philosophy, literature, arts, and politics on the development of twentieth-century German social thought. McCarthy demonstrates that the classical spirit vitalized thinkers such as Weber, Heidegger, Freud, Marcuse, Arendt, Gadamer, and Habermas. With the romancing of antiquity, they transformed their understanding of the modern self, political community, and Enlightenment rationality. By viewing contemporary social theory from the framework of the classical world, McCarthy argues, we are capable (...) of thinking beyond the limits of modernity to new possibilities of human reason, science, beauty, and social justice. (shrink)

This article offers a critical review of Vittorio Hosle’s Eine kurze Geschichte der deutschen Philosophie: Ruckblick auf den deutschen Geist. The first section of this review delineates the main themes Vittorio Hosle sees as representative of what he calls German spirit in philosophy. Hosle’s criteria for inclusion in his survey of German philosophers are that they write in German and that they have sufficient importance for the progress of philosophy in the German-speaking world. In part (...) two, this review then surveys a few problems not sufficiently solved or not even considered in Hosle’s book. Hosle’s method is to lay out how each of the central figures considered approached philosophy, along with a commentary on their main works. The correlations between these main figures and their intellectual surroundings creates a tight network of information. In part three, this review summarizes the central issues at play by setting out the questions surrounding both the rightful rise and lamented crash of this approach to philosophy, e.g. between Leibniz and Kant on the one side and Marx and Nietzsche on the other. Hosle’s book is well-written, readable, and something rarely seen explains its topic in a truly gripping manner. (shrink)

The article examines individual German translations of works by Lesia Ukrainka in various genres, which activate the concept of “struggle.” To establish the linguistic and stylistic analogues, coincidences, and diff erences of the translated works, their typological comparison with the original Ukrainian sources was carried out. It was found that key motifs in the works of Lesia Ukrainka, such as aff ection, resilience, courage, confrontation, and great strength of will and spirit are factors that form the concept of (...) “struggle.” The conceptual meanings and axiological values of the concept of “struggle” created by the poetess are: internal strength and independence; free choice, freedom, and liberty; the desire to have freedom and longing for it as the beginning or continuation of the struggle, a sign of insubordination, the spirit of disobedience; the word as a future weapon for the native language and Ukraine; the desire to prevail; the antithesis of death, sad thoughts, obedience, and others. The analysis revealed that there are some linguistic and stylistic diff erences in the analyzed German translations that are related to the peculiarities of German grammar and word formation. The selection of German equivalents sometimes further reinforces the emphasis of the original text. The concept of “struggle” in Lesia Ukrainka’s works in the analyzed translations into German by well-known translators fully reveals the conceptual picture of the author’s works and expands the possibilities of the reception of Ukrainian linguistic culture for German-speaking readers. (shrink)

The German relationship to the Greeks was central to German self-understanding. It defined German identity culturally through the exclusion of democracy from the idealized image of Greece and through the emphasis on Greek originality that served to devalue the Roman, Latin and Renaissance translations of the Greek heritage. Hostility to the legacy of the Latin spirit, to legal thought and to rationality, reinforced the German rejection of French intellectual and cultural hegemony. These German fictions (...) about the Greeks were closely linked with reflections on modernity, the death of the Christian God and a disenchanted Cartesian universe. They led Nietzsche and Heidegger to more `original' interpretations of the Greeks as the source of German rebirth. (shrink)

Walter Benjamin’s treatise »The Life of Students« (1914/15) is not only an insightful document of the youth culture movement, but also an important philosophical contribution to the discussion on the idea and task of the university. In his critique of the contemporary university, the 22-year-old student develops the counter-concept of a future university that, rejecting all heteronomous functionalizations, finds its purpose in radical and risky intellectual work. This vision is rooted in the strict dichotomy of study and career, the origins (...) of which lie in German educational idealism around 1800, and in the concept of creative Eros that refers back to Plato. The promise is to restore the productive synthesis of spirit, Eros and youth under the sign of the youth movement.After a commentary on this little-noticed work (I.), the article outlines the contemporary context and the basic lines of the history of ideas between Kant, Fichte and Nietzsche, to which Benjamin refers with his concept (II.). The focus, however, is, following the concept of constellation research, on the critical comparison with the university concepts that have been developed between 1917 and 1923 by Max Weber, Martin Heidegger and Karl Jaspers (III.–V.). Although it was not a debate in the true sense, the reconstruction of this constellation in the history of ideas nevertheless allows to analyze the contradictions and deficits, but also the cognitive potential and the possible topicality of Benjamin’s treatise in a broader context. (shrink)

Karoline von Günderrode (1780–1806) has long enjoyed a reputation as a Romantic poet, but her philosophical contributions have largely been neglected. This paper is one of the first to address Günderrode’s political thought, especially her view of the interrelationship between human society and the broader environment. The paper argues that Günderrode develops resources for reconceiving the relationship of human beings to the nonhuman and to each other that work against an instrumentalizing view of nature and programmatic political ideals. Günderrode’s normative (...) restraint, concept of harmony, and view of human beings as part of and the same in kind as the rest of nature contribute to a vision of sociality, grounded in her metaphysics, that envisions small communities fostering connections between human beings and the nonhuman. On Günderrode’s model, these connections can grow and strengthen and eventually, perhaps, enable the emergence of the single, perfect organism that she calls the “realized idea of the earth.”. (shrink)

In this essay, I take on the problem of how to explain the socio-historical dimension of practical reason in Hegel. In contrast to many contemporary socio-historical readings of Hegel, I claim that a logical concept of spirit frames Hegel’s account of the historical process through which human beings have come to know their practical agency as actualized in institutional relations of mutual recognition. On my reading, Hegel conceptualizes each shape in the ‘Spirit’ chapter of his Phenomenology of (...) class='Hi'>Spirit as syllogistically working out, practically and institutionally, how to mediate the demands of individual self-determination with the universal laws and customs of the community. At the same time, logical form doesn’t determine historical development, because the content of individuality, universality, and their mediation is earned only through historical experience. (shrink)

This book offers a radically new interpretation of the entire philosophy of J. G. Fichte by showing the impact of nineteenth-century psychological techniques and technologies on the formation of his theory of the imagination—the very centerpiece of his philosophical system. By situating Fichte’s philosophy within the context of nineteenth-century German science and culture, the book establishes a new genealogy, one that shows the extent to which German idealism’s transcendental account of the social remains dependent upon the scientific origins (...) of psychoanalysis in the material techniques of Mesmerism. The book makes it clear that the rational, transcendental account of spirit, imagination, and the social has its source in the psychological phenomena of affective rapport. Specifically, the imagination undergoes a double displacement in which it is ultimately subject to external influence, the influence of a material technique, or, in short, a technology. (shrink)

Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics is important to phenomenology for a number of reasons. One chief reason is that Gadamer describes his philosophical hermeneutics as an attempt to advance beyond the early Heidegger’s introduction of a “hermeneutics of facticity” that would break from the transcendental idealism of Husserl’s phenomenology. This chapter argues that Gadamer attempts to clarify his advance beyond Heidegger’s hermeneutical turn in phenomenology, at least in part, in reference to Hegel’s philosophy. While Gadamer remains critical of German Idealism generally (...) and Hegel’s notion of “absolute” spirit in particular, Gadamer nevertheless embraces Hegel’s approach to “objective” spirit in order to elucidate historical and linguistic conditions of facticity that the early Heidegger appears to discount. (shrink)

Much recent critical theory has dismissed or failed to take seriously the question of the self. French theorists--such as Derrida, Barthes, Benveniste, Foucault, Lacan, and Lévi-Strauss--have in various ways proclaimed the death of the subject, often turning to German intellectual tradition to authorize their views. Stanley Corngold's heralded book, The Fate of the Self, published for the first time in paperback with a spirited new preface, appears at a time when the relationship between the self and literature is a (...) matter of renewed concern. Originally published in 1986 (Columbia University Press), the book examines the poetic self of German intellectual tradition in light of recent French and American critical theory. Focusing on seven major German writers--Hölderlin, Dilthey, Nietzsche, Mann, Kafka, Freud, and Heidegger--Corngold shows that their work does not support the desire to discredit the self as an origin of meaning and value but reconstructs the allegedly fragmented poetic self through effects of position and style. Offering new and subtle models of selfhood, The Fate of the Self is a source of rich insight into the work of these authors, refracted through poststructuralist critical perspectives. (shrink)

The explosion of interest in consciousness among scientists in recent decades has led to a revival of interest in the work of Whitehead. This has been associated with the challenge of biophysics to molecular biology in efforts to understand the nature of life. Some claim that it is only through quantum field theory that consciousness will be made intelligible. Most, although not all work in this area, focusses on the brain and how it could give rise to consciousness. In this (...) paper, I will support this challenge, but I will suggest that the focus of work in this area reflects the failure to fully overcome the assumptions of Cartesian thought, associated above all with a defective understanding of consciousness as a ‘thinking substance’. Firstly, as Bergson, Whitehead and Merleau-Ponty argued, consciousness is embodied. Secondly, as Jacob von Uexküll argued, consciousness is only comprehensible in relation to the organism’s world defined as such by the organism. Thirdly, in the case of humans, this is a ‘with-world’, a world shared with others. The consequent social nature of human consciousness is better captured by the German word for mind: Geist, which also translates as ‘Spirit’. And as Hegel argued, along with Subjective Spirit, there is also Objective Spirit, the realm of institutions, and Absolute Spirit, the realm of culture, with Subjective, Objective and Absolute Spirit being conditions, and even components, of each other. My argument is that this broader notion of mind as Spirit should be embraced, but without abandoning the work in biophysics. What is required is a further expansion of the notion of mind and Spirit as humanity comes to appreciate that it is part of nature and that it is through the development of institutions and culture that nature, through human subjects, is becoming conscious of itself and its significance. The development of process philosophy inspired by Whitehead, associated with the development of the concepts of field and ecology, should be seen as a development of the semiosphere and the advance of the Spirit of Gaia, essential for the creation of a global civilization able to augment the life of the current regime of the global ecosystem of which we are part. It is to orient humanity to create an ecologically sustainable civilization; an ecological civilization. (shrink)

One of Rahner's classic studies, this volume employs the German Jesuit theologian's deep understanding of the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas to explore the relationship between the spirit and matter, metaphysical and concrete realities.

The volume brings together contributions in the spirit embodied by Marek J. Siemek and Jakub Kloc-Konkołowicz, two Warsaw philosophers truly devoted to Classical German Philosophy. They were simultaneously in a relationship between thinker and adept, and thinker and thinker. They both taught philosophy, with a strong emphasis on classic German philosophy, at Warsaw University. Under the theme “Ethical Theory in Classic German Philosophy Then and Now,” students and companions continue their discussions with both of them.

In aesthetics/philosophy of art, Fichte did not produce works as great as Kant’s Critique of the Power of Judgment or Hegel’s Lectures on Aesthetics. As a result, it was long believed that he had no role to play in the aesthetics of German idealism. Nevertheless, there are a few works in which we can identify the materials for developing an innovative philosophy of art. In this article, it is argued that Fichte takes two fundamental steps in aesthetics: 1) by (...) transferring the weight of the discussion of aesthetics to the philosophy of artistic creation, he makes, as it were, a Copernican revolution in aesthetics and thus transforms the aesthetics of taste into a philosophy of art based on the creative spirit; 2) he raises the status of aesthetics (in fact, the aesthetic sense) to the level of “a (or the) condition for the possibility of philosophy.”. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain (...) in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

In Tragedies of Spirit, Theodore D. George engages Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit to explore the philosophical significance of tragedy in post-Kantian continental thought. George follows lines of inquiry originally developed by Nietzsche, Heidegger, Gadamer, and Derrida, and takes as his point of departure the concern that Hegel’s speculative philosophy forms a summit of modernity that the present historical time is called to interrogate. Yet, George argues that Hegel’s larger speculative ambitions in the Phenomenology compel him to turn to (...) the resource of tragedy in order to give voice to issues of incommensurability, discontinuity, otherness, strife, and crisis. From this standpoint, Hegel’s interest in the tragic proves to be more pervasive and to run deeper than has previously been recognized. The author shows that Hegel’s reliance upon the tragic not only stretches and tests assumptions of speculative philosophy, but also illuminates original insights into human finitude. While situating Hegel’s approach to tragedy as part of a broader response to Kant, George also contextualizes Hegel’s interest in tragedy with reference to figures in German Idealism and Romanticism, such as Schelling, Hölderlin, and Schlegel. (shrink)

The idea of Geistesgeschichte was an idealistic program. The critique of this program, however, leaves us with the task of thinking the historicity of spirit: There is no history without spirit. This thesis requires a materialist explanation.

Firstly, politicians tend to define Europe in terms of space. Scientific connotations of space, however, make such procedures less suitable for cultural expression. Since Europe is obviously constituted also by various concrete elements, it cannot be located in a purely abstract sphere. Secondly, Heidegger argues that mortals should first have to "put up" with the space they are living in before developing a "technological" relationship with this space. What is lacking in Heidegger's place is the--typically European--element of multiculture. Thirdly, Nietzsche (...) recognized the crisis of eurocentrist culture in his time, all too apparent in the bourgeois German Bildung. Nietzsche suggests however, when thinking of the future of Germany, no "regionalism" which makes him different from Heidegger. Further on, the article demonstrates that as much as Heidegger is moving from spirit to Gemüt, Nietzsche moves in the opposite direction, which is from spirit to style. (shrink)

Abstract: The present text compare the concepts of Spirit and Dialectic in Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit and Kierkegaard's Sikness unto Death respectively. For this, the clarifications made by one author and the other of the concepts to be compared are taken, as a starting point, in order to detect whether or not these concepts have some kind of relationship that serves to bring german and danish closer together. -/- .

Opening with an essay entitled »Faust und die Sorge«, the first issue of the DVjs entered the world in a year of economic crises, national bankruptcy, and hyperinflation. This situation suggests viewing the project of Geistesgeschichte as reflecting stories of care (Sorge) and crises of the spirit (Geist). The thematization of such stories is here traced with respect to various scenes: Goethe’s Faust II, conflicts regarding hermeneutic power, and finally the history of political economy itself.