19th Century Philosophy Research Papers (original) (raw)

In THE GENEALOGY OF MORALITY Nietzsche assess the value of the value judgments of morality from the perspective of human flourishing. His positive descriptions of the “higher men” he hopes for and the negative descriptions of the decadent humans he thinks morality unfortunately supports both point to a particular substantive conception of what such flourishing comes to. The Genealogy, however, presents us with a puzzle: why does Nietzsche’s own evaluative standard not receive a genealogical critique? The answer to this puzzle, I argue, lies in recognizing the centrality of the notion of “life”, and its connection to power, in Nietzsche’s overall account. Leiter has argued that his “Millian Model” provides the most charitable reconstruction of appeals to a privileged evaluative standard of power; this model ascribes an inference from a strong doctrine of the will to power according to which only power can be desired. I propose a “Benthamite Model” that ascribes an inference from the inescapability of a tendency towards power, a tendency that is essential to life. I argue that this model avoids the objections Leiter directs at the Millian Model.

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- Meta-Ethics, Genealogy, Friedrich Nietzsche, 19th Century Philosophy

In this paper, I will try to establish what sets Mill's and Whewell's theories of induction apart and argue that it is not the frequently supposed distinction between inductivism (Mill) and hypothetic-deductivism (Whewell) about the scientific method. First, I will analyze their disagreement about the role and nature of concepts in induction. Whewell argued that in scientific discovery, e.g., when Kepler discovered his law of planetary motion, a new concept, in Kepler's case that of an ellipse, is provided by the mind and then "superinduced" upon empirical facts. In contrast to this, Mill argued that the concept of an ellipse was present in the facts themselves, therefore nothing new was added by the mind. In other words, what Whewell calls "colligation of facts" and understands as a crucial part of his theory of induction, Mill dismisses as a mere description of observed facts. I will show that the argument about colligation of facts ends in a disagreement about their underlying epistemological views. Given their different epistemological commitments, the two authors respective theories have different emphasis. Mill’s theory is a theory of inductive inference – he hopes to provide a rigorous, logically sound, method of verification of generalizations. Whewell, on the other hand, thinks about induction as a method of scientific practice and thus puts emphasis both on the discovery of an appropriate concept (or a theory) and on its verification. Rather than accepting that Mill is an inductivist and Whewell a deductivist about scientific method, I will argue that they differ in their understanding of philosophy of science, its scope and aims.

The paper aims to explain the concept of the single individual as well as what de Silentio means by the paradox of faith. It relates this to de Silentio’s account of the paradox and the distinction between the tragic hero and the knight of faith. In this discussion, the concepts of interiority and exteriority, subjectivity, and mediation will are associated with the broader explanation.

This paper argues for continuity in purpose and specific results between some hand drawn nebulae, especially those ‘descriptive maps’ by John F.W. Herschel and E.P. Mason in the late 1830s, and the first photographs made of the nebulae in the 1880s. Using H.H. Turners’ explication in 1904 of the three great advantages of astrophotography, the paper concludes that to some extent or other Herschel’s and Mason’s hand-drawings of the nebulae were meant to achieve the same kinds of results. This is surprising not only because such drawings were conceived and achieved over forty-years earlier, but also because the procedures used in the production of these pictorially and metrically rich images were those directly inspired by cartography, geodesy, and land-surveying. Such drawings provided the standard for what was depicted, expected and aimed at by way of successful representations of the nebulae; standards that seemed to have been used to judge the success of nebular photographs. Being conditions of expectation and possibility for later photography, these drawings were themselves made possible by such techniques of representation and measurement as isolines and triangulation, so fundamental to Imperial and ‘Humboltian science.’

- by Christopher Macleod
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- 19th Century Philosophy, Immanuel Kant, John Stuart Mill

There is a disagreement over how to understand Nietzsche’s view of science. According to what I call the Negative View, Nietzsche thinks science should be reconceived or superseded by another discourse, such as art, because it is nihilistic. By contrast, what I call the Positive View holds that Nietzsche does not think science is nihilistic, so he denies that it should be reinterpreted or overcome. Interestingly, defenders of each position can appeal to Nietzsche’s understanding of naturalism to support their interpretation. I argue that Nietzsche embraces a social constructivist conception of causality that renders his naturalism incompatible with the views of naturalism attributed to him by the two dominant readings

- by Jasper Doomen
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- Philosophy, Ethics, Philosophical Anthropology, Meaning of Life

One of the most common-sense assumptions made by scholars today is that any
text which is printed and given to the public by a publisher, with the authors permission, is meant to be read. One of the interesting and historically confounding
cases concerns a line in Nietzsche’s Human, All-Too-Human (MA) that was printed
and delivered into the hands of the public, but was never intended to be read. This
line, I argue, demonstrates that our contemporary assumptions about the publishing process in 19th century Germany can sometimes be wildly wrong. These assumptions often distort and cover over the actual history of texts as material objects. I
hold that it is only through dealing with the materiality of texts themselves in their
unedited form that we can begin correcting these distortions. That is, when we as
scholars work with edited complete editions and do not also deal with the manuscripts themselves, we are often persuaded to philologically unsupportable conclusions.

- by William A B Parkhurst
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- Philosophy, Book History, Archives, Friedrich Nietzsche
- by Gregory Sadler
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- Philosophy, Kant, Pragmatism, Marxism

In Maurice Blondel's work, the problem of immortality is dealt with in terms of one's resolution of the problem of human destiny articulated in the forms of a self-determinative option. Although this option can take many forms, it is ultimately one between egoism (or selfishness) pr mortification and charity. I outline this opposition and indicate how it bears on intellectual life and culture.

La Genealogia della morale si presenta al lettore come un compatto ma articolato crocevia di temi e di problematiche del pensiero di Friedrich Nietzsche. L'opera è caratterizzata da una particolare unità tematica, ma è al tempo stesso ricca di spunti che offrono accessi a questioni di non secondaria importanza e che, nel loro complesso, definiscono la trama di un pensiero che manifesta la propria ricchezza e originalità al lettore più accorto. Di tale ricchezza rende conto il presente volume, attraverso una serie di incursioni nel testo di Nietzsche che, illuminando alcuni passaggi cruciali della Genealogia della Morale, rendono conto della rilevanza filosofica di quest'opera e del ruolo che essa gioca nella storia del pensiero occidentale.

- by pietro gori
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- Philosophy, History of Ideas, Continental Philosophy, Friedrich Nietzsche

This latest volume in the Cambridge History of Philosophy series, The Cambridge History of Philosophy in the Nineteenth Century, brings together 28 leading experts in the field and covers the years 1790–1870. The 28 chapters (provided here in watermarked proof pages to download, 5.9 mb) give a comprehensive survey of the period, organizing the material topically. After a brief editor’s introduction, 3 chapters survey the background of nineteenth-century philosophy; followed by 2 articles on logic and mathematics; 2 on nature and natural science; 4 on mind, language, and culture, including psychology, the human sciences, and aesthetics; 4 on ethics; 3 on religion; 7 on society, including chapters on the French Revolution, the decline of natural right, political economy, and social discontent; and 3 on history, dealing with historical method, speculative theories of history, and the history of philosophy. The essays are framed by an editor’s introduction and a bibliography.

- by Susan Songsuk Hahn
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- History, Logic And Foundations Of Mathematics, Philosophy Of Language, Ethics

Nietzsche regarded Thus Spoke Zarathustra as his most important philosophical contribution because it proposes solutions to the problems and questions he poses in his later books – for example, his cure for the human disposition to vengefulness and his creation of new values as the antidote to nihilism. It is also the only place where he elaborates his concepts of the superhuman and the eternal recurrence of the same. In this Critical Guide, an international group of distinguished scholars analyze the philosophical ideas in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, discussing a range of topics that include literary parody as philosophical critique, philosophy as a way of life, the meaning of human life, philosophical naturalism, fatalism, radical flux, human passions and virtues, great politics, transhumanism, and ecological conscience. The volume will be invaluable for philosophers, scholars and students interested in Nietzsche's thought.

Several commentators have offered careful and detailed accounts of Hegel’s analysis of sense-certainty, either defending his starting point and analysis or challenging it on its own terms for presupposing too much. Very few, however, have considered directly what Hegel means by the “certainty” (Gewißheit) that sense-certainty is alleged to exhibit, and what role this notion plays in his text as a whole. In fact, much of the disagreement regarding both the subject matter and success of Hegel’s chapter on sense-certainty can be traced to misunderstandings regarding the nature and role of certainty itself in the Phenomenology of Spirit. Specifically, such confusions can be traced to a failure to appreciate the connection between sense-certainty as a particular way of approaching and knowing the world, and the assumptions regarding the nature of the world it comes to know that Hegel attributes to sense-certainty. In this essay I give an account of the nature of "certainty" as Hegel describes and employs the term in the Phenomenology of Spirit, and show that this conception helps to clarify the nature and legitimacy of his examination of sense-certainty.

- by Nathan Andersen
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- Philosophy, Phenomenology, Hegel, 19th Century Philosophy

Invasion Biology, the study of biota redistributed via human agency, has traditionally traced its founding to Charles Elton’s 1958 book The Ecology of invasions by Animals and Plants. But there were many substantial, scientific pre-Eltonian accounts and analyses of redistributed biota dating back at least to the mid-1700s; and non-Eltonian treatments appeared into the late 1950s. Elton began writing on the topic by 1925. From 1931 to 1948 he developed his ideas on conservation in association with Aldo Leopold. Their “competitive collaboration” is explored and documented, showing that each supported and contextualized the other. Elton was, in part, inspired to write The Ecology of invasions by Animals and Plants in dissatisfied response to an earlier effort by American Marston Bates. The two authors, and these works, are compared and contrasted. The Ecology of Invasions by Animals is analyzed in detail, showing how Elton framed his arguments in terms of warfare and cold-war era nuclear alarmism, making a plea for action without providing a strong theoretical basis for preventing the redistribution of biota. The republication of Elton’s book in 2000 iincited a new round of interpretation, but even while its proponents hailed the book as invasion biology’s ‘bible,’ they prepared to replace it with more modern texts. The narrative shows how a ideas about the origins of life on earth, the role of humans in nature, a sense of place and biogeographical belonging, and concerns about the unintended consequences of human agency motivated scientists to attempt to impute order to, and impose it upon, the historically contingent distribution of biota.

La question de la dimension morale de l'homme politique émerge avec puissance au moment de la Révolution. La mission que celle-ci préconise – fonder un nouvel ordre et une nouvelle société conforme aux principes de la liberté et de l'égalité – ne peut être accomplie que par des hommes vertueux. Si la vertu est demandée au simple citoyen, elle devient un devoir absolu pour le représentant du peuple. La figure de Robespierre « l'incorruptible », incarnation de la vertu républicaine elle-même, en est l'ultime et plus éloquent exemple.
Dès 1789, les qualités morales des hommes politiques sortent donc des débats philosophiques et entrent directement dans l'arène publique pour ne plus en sortir. Matière de réflexion pour ministres et députés – comme le prouvent leurs Mémoires et Souvenirs – elles sont mises en avant et mobilisées comme outils de légitimité pendant les campagnes électorales. Elles sont exigées par les citoyens. Les défauts moraux des hommes politiques sont immanquablement stigmatisés par les journalistes et caricaturistes. Les changements qui, à partir de la Révolution, surviennent dans la sphère du politique fournissent matière à de nouveaux questionnements. La progressive professionnalisation de l'activité politique change, d'un point de vue moral, l'image de l'homme qui s'y consacre. Au milieu du XIXe siècle, apparaît ainsi la distinction entre l' « homme d'État », dont les qualités personnelles sont les meilleurs, et le « politicien », homme sans positions et sans qualités, faisant de la politique une source de revenus ou de pouvoir pour lui et ses associés. L'existence d'une morale proprement politique pose aussi la question des rapports entre celle-ci et les règles de la morale religieuse. Comment se comporter lorsque les devoirs envers l'État sont en conflit avec les obligations de la morale religieuse ? Est-il possible de concilier les deux morales? Ces questions, qui avaient tourmenté depuis des siècles les croyants qui décidaient de se consacrer au service de l'État, se proposent à nouveau, et traversent le siècle, dès la proclamation de la Constitution civile du clergé au Décret communard de 1871 de séparation de l'Église et de l'État.
Quelles sont donc les qualités morales d'un homme politique ? Comment sont-elles mobilisées dans la lutte politique ? Et quelles qualités morales le citoyen exige de ses représentants ? Comment changent, sous le profil de la morale, les représentations des hommes politiques pendant le XIXe siècle ? Le sujet est vaste et complexe car il touche plusieurs domaines (histoire politique, histoire des idées, histoire sociale, histoire des représentations). Cette ouvrage, issu de la journée d’étude « La morale de l’homme politique dans la France du XIXe siècle » (septembre 2012), réunit les contributions des spécialistes de plusieurs champs disciplinaires (historiens et philosophes) autour de la construction d'une morale de l'homme politique dans un arc chronologique compris entre la Révolution de 1789 et la Troisième République.

- by Corinne Doria and +1
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- Political Philosophy, 19th Century Philosophy, 19th Century (History), Moral phylosophy

In a now classic paper, Karen Carr argues that Kierkegaard is a religious “anti-rationalist”: He holds that reason and religious truth exist in necessary tension with one another. Carr maintains that this antagonism is not a matter of the logical incoherence of Christianity, but rather the fact that genuine submission to Christ precludes approaching him through demonstration. In this essay, we argue that while Kierkegaard is in fact an anti-rationalist, the literature has failed to appreciate the full strength of his position. It is not just that reason and obedience are in tension; rather, Kierkegaard holds the stronger view that reason is actively offended by Christianity’s primary claims. Not only is reason incapable of generating any positive evidence for the truth of Christianity, more radically, it provides evidence against it. In order to make this case, we offer a close reading of Practice in Christianity, developing a typology of Kierkegaard’s account of Christ’s “offense.” Finally, having motivated Kierkegaard’s strong anti-rationalism, we consider why, on his account, anyone would want to be a Christian.

- by Ryan S Kemp and +1
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- 19th Century Philosophy, Kierkegaard, The Theology of Søren Kierkegaard, 19th-Century American Literature

In this essay, I attempt to carve out interpretive space for a so-called “straightforward” reading of Fear and Trembling. Toward this end, I argue that recent attempts to challenge the reliability of Johannes de Silentio and/or emphasize the presence of a “hidden message” succeed, in large part, by: (1) misconstruing the goals and method of Kierkegaard’s indirect communication and (2) relying too heavily on elements of the text that lend only circumstantial support to their interpretation. Given this, interpreters should be considerably more open to the possibility that Kierkegaard means what Fear and Trembling explicitly says.

- by Ryan S Kemp
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- Philosophy, Continental Philosophy, 19th Century Philosophy, Kierkegaard
- by Ryan S Kemp
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- German Studies, Moral Psychology, Romanticism, Transformative Learning

This paper examines the relationships between Romantic painting, poetry, and philosophy, historically tracing the circulation of images used to communicate sublimity (for example, images of ruins, storms, volcanoes, and so on). Kant's "Critique of Judgment" deployed the same vocabulary of images that appear in Coleridge and Shelly, in Church and in Turner. The discussion thereby places Kant's 3rd Critique within its cultural context. But it also reveals the massive shift from Enlightenment rationalism to 19th century historicism that Romanticism enacted, and Kant's resistance to, and unwilling participation, in that shift. For the nostalgic logic of ruins, and the irruption of geological time, both of which were conceived and negotiated through sublimity, cannot be assimilated within Kant's philosophy. The treatment of the sublime in the "Critique of Judgment" represents Kant's philosophy straining at its own limits in the attempt to develop a philosophy of history and to articulate an historicized philosophical anthropology. Therefore, read through art history, Kant's 3rd. Critique represents a vital transition between Enlightenment rationalism and Romantic historicism, along with the work of Beethoven, Goya, and the Marquis de Sade. With illustrations.

- by Peter W Fettner
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- History, Philosophy, Aesthetics, Humanities

Although its origins stem from theological debates, the general will would ultimately become one of the most celebrated and denigrated concepts emerging from early modern political thought. Jean-Jacques Rousseau would make it the central element of his political theory, and it would take on a life of its own during the French Revolution before being subjected to generations of embrace or opprobrium. James Farr and David Lay Williams have collected for the first time a set of essays that track the evolving history of the general will from its origins to recent times. These essays include attention to the general will’s theological, political, formal, and substantive dimensions with a careful eye to the concept’s virtues and limitations as understood by its expositors and critics, among them Pascal, Malebranche, Locke, Spinoza, Montesquieu, Constant, Tocqueville, Adam Smith, and John Rawls.

- by David Lay Williams
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- Intellectual History, Philosophy, Political Philosophy, Ethics

A contextual study of the development of Alfred Marshall’s thinking during the early years of his apprenticeship in the Cambridge moral sciences. Marshall’s thought is situated in a crisis of academic liberal thinking that occurred in the late 1860s. His crisis of faith is shown to have formed part of his wider philosophical development, in which he supplemented Anglican thought and mechanistic psychology with Hegel’s Philosophy of History. This philosophical background informed Marshall’s early reformulation of value theory and his subsequent wide-ranging reinterpretation of political economy as a whole. The book concludes with the suggestion that Marshall conceived of his mature economic science as but one part of a wider, neo-Hegelian social philosophy.

- by Simon J Cook
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- Intellectual History, Macroeconomics, Political Economy, Philosophy of Science
- by Brian Schroeder
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- Philosophy, Ethics, Subjectivities, Deconstruction

Chapters on Nietzsche's Philological Beginnings (J. Latacz); Nietzsche's Radical Philology (J. Porter); The Sources of Nietzsche's Rhetoric (G. Most and Th. Fries); Apollo and the Problem of Unity in Nietzsche (D. Burnham); N's Valediction and First Article (A. Jensen); N and Diogenes Laertius (J. Barnes); N's Influence on Homeric Scholarship (A. Zhavoronkov); N's Lectures on Ancient Literature (C. Santini); Greek Audiences (V. Vivarelli); The Ancient Quarrel between Philosophy and Poetry (M. Meyer); N's Genealogy of Early Greek Philosophy (H. Heit); N's Philology and the Science of Antiquity (B. Babich); Religion of the 'Older Greeks' (H. Cancik and H. Cancik-Lindemaier)

- by Helmut Heit
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- Ancient History, Presocratic Philosophy, Friedrich Nietzsche, 19th Century Philosophy
- by Justin Marquis
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- Epistemology, Continental Philosophy, Friedrich Nietzsche, 19th Century Philosophy

The early German Romantics are often construed as irrationalist or proto-postmodern. As this reading goes, being critical of the myopic vision of modern science and the systematic tendencies of discursive reason, they prefer the openness of the fragment and the semantic inexhaustibility of poetic imagery and the feelings aroused by aesthetic experience. Novalis, like the other early German Romantics, is indeed pessimistic about the worldview endorsed by Enlightenment science and philosophy, which, he contends, disenchants nature by exclusively explaining its phenomena by quantification and mechanism, thus leading to alienation and nihilism. But Novalis envisages the then-emerging Romantic poetry as a distinctive a type of rational practice that can establish a new, more life-affirming conception of nature, one in fact already suggested by various developments in the science of his time. It accomplishes these feats by permitting us to gain, through the aesthetic experience of the beautiful whole of nature, a non-discursive, yet objective awareness of nature itself as a God-like organism to which we belong like limbs or organs to a body. However, not only is this poetic act of romanticizing, whereby we re-enchant a now disenchanted nature, “similar to algebraicizing” and hence on par with mathematical rigour, but also it, rather than philosophy, is the vehicle for truth. As Novalis encapsulates his approach: “Poesy is the truly absolutely real. This is the core of my philosophy. The more poetic, the more true.”

- by Joseph Carew
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- Metaphysics, Aesthetics, Romanticism, Philosophy of Art

In this article, I outline a logic of design of a system as a specific kind of conceptual logic of the design of the model of a system, that is, the blueprint that provides information about the system to be created. In section two, I introduce the method of levels of abstraction as a modelling tool borrowed from computer science. In section three, I use this method to clarify two main conceptual logics of information (i.e., modelling systems) inherited from modernity: Kant's transcen-dental logic of conditions of possibility of a system, and Hegel's dialectical logic of conditions of in/stability of a system. Both conceptual logics of information analyse structural properties of given systems. Strictly speaking, neither is a conceptual logic of information about (or modelling) the conditions of feasibility of a system, that is, neither is a logic of information as a logic of design. So, in section four, I outline this third conceptual logic of information and then interpret the conceptual logic of design as a logic of requirements, by introducing the relation of " suffici-entisation ". In the conclusion, I argue that the logic of requirements is exactly what we need in order to make sense of, and buttress, a constructionist (poietic) approach to knowledge.

- by Luciano Floridi
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- Engineering, Philology, Computer Science, Computer Architecture

During the romantic period, various authors expressed the belief that through creativity, we can directly access truth. To modern ears, this claim sounds strange. In this paper, I attempt to render the position comprehensible, and to show how it came to seem plausible to the romantics. I begin by offering examples of this position as found in the work of the British romantics. Each thinks that the deepest knowledge can only be gained by an act of creativity. I suggest the belief should be seen in the context of the post-Kantian embrace of ‘intellectual intuition’. Unresolved tensions in Kant’s philosophy had encouraged a belief that creation and discovery were not distinct categories. The post-Kantians held that in certain cases of knowledge (for Fichte, knowledge of self and world; for Schelling, knowledge of the Absolute) the distinction between discovering a truth and creating that truth dissolves. In this context, the cognitive role assigned to acts of creativity is not without its own appeal.

- by Christopher Macleod
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- Kant, Romanticism, Creativity, Nineteenth Century Studies

Il pragmatismo italiano, nelle persone di Giovanni Papini e Giovanni Vailati, rappresenta un caso di ricezione originale del pensiero di Nietzsche, dal momento che presta attenzione ad aspetti meno considerati dalla letteratura dell'epoca. Il presente contributo mostra in particolare come Papini e Vailati seppero mettere in luce l'influsso che il moderno evoluzionismo e, più in particolare, Herbert Spencer ebbero su Nietzsche, anticipando con questo ricerche più recenti dedicate allo studio delle fonti del suo pensiero.

- by pietro gori
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- Philosophy, History of Ideas, Friedrich Nietzsche, 19th Century Philosophy

This book addresses the question of the nature and the immortality of the human soul in the context of Immanuel Hermann Fichte's philosophical anthropology. In particular, it undertakes a systematic and immanent reconstruction of Fichte's argument for the substantiality, individuality, preexistence, and perduration of the human soul. This monographic investigation fills a research gap which is long pending and offers not only impulses for research on late idealism, but also and above all important insights and guiding principles for a philosophy of the human spirit adequate for the present.

Online technologies enable vast amounts of data to outlive their producers online, thereby giving rise to a new, digital form of afterlife presence. Although researchers have begun investigating the nature of such presence, academic literature has until now failed to acknowledge the role of commercial interests in shaping it. The goal of this paper is to analyse what those interests are and what ethical consequences they may have. This goal is pursued in three steps. First, we introduce the concept of the Digital Afterlife Industry (DAI), and define it as an object of study. Second, we identify the politico-economic interests of the DAI. For this purpose, we develop an analytical approach based on an informational interpretation of Marxian economics. Third, we explain the practical manifestations of the interests using four real life cases. The findings expose the incentives of the DAI to alter what is referred to as the ''informational bodies'' of the dead, which in turn is to be seen as a violation of the principle of human dignity. To prevent such consequences, we argue that the ethical conventions that guide trade with remains of organic bodies may serve as a good model for future regulation of DAI.

- by Carl Öhman and +1
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- Psychology, Computer Science, Philosophy, Philosophy of Mind
- by Mark Sinclair
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- Art Theory, History of Religion, Historical Theology, Stoicism

Au cours du XIXe siècle, l’histoire de la philosophie s’est imposée comme une discipline centrale dans l’institution philosophique française. Ce processus reposait sur l’influence intellectuelle et politique exercée par Victor Cousin (1792-1867); il a coïncidé avec l’élaboration d’un schéma interprétatif conférant à la Renaissance, en tant qu’époque philosophique, un statut controversé, caractérisé par l'infériorité conceptuelle. L'ouvrage éclaire les enjeux idéologiques des débats sur la Renaissance dans la France du XIXe siècle. Il propose une approche globale des reconstructions érudites et des utilisations polémiques de la Renaissance centrée sur une relecture politique de la pratique historiographique, ainsi que sur ses réseaux personnels, académiques et transnationaux.

- by Mario Meliadò and +1
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- Renaissance Studies, Renaissance, Renaissance Philosophy, Giambattista Vico

Abstract: Brentano’s conception of scientific philosophy had a strong influence on his students and on the intellectual atmosphere of Vienna in the late nineteenth century. The aim of this article is to expose Brentano’s conception and to contrast his views with that of two traditions he is said to have considerably influenced: phenomenology and analytic philosophy. I will shed light on the question of how and to what extent Brentano’s conception of philosophy as a rigorous science has had an impact on these two traditions. The discussion will show that both took their liberties in the interpretation of the thesis, a move that allowed them to liberate themselves from Brentano’s inheritance and to fully develop their own philosophical positions.

- by Wolfgang Huemer
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- Philosophy of Science, Metaphilosophy, Phenomenology, Franz Brentano

Carnap famously argued that metaphysics unavoidably involves a confusion between science and poetry. Unlike the lyric poet, who does not attempt to make an argument, the metaphysician attempts to make an argument while simultaneously lacking in musical talent. Carnap’s objection that metaphysics unavoidably involves a blend of philosophy and poetry is not a 20th century insight. Plato, in his beautifully crafted Phaedo, presents us with the imprisoned Socrates, who having been condemned to death for practicing philosophy in the Apology, has a dream in which he realizes that he ought to make music. In this dialogue, however, Plato indicates no hint of the scorn that Carnap has for metaphysics—rather Socrates’ friends find him setting Aesop’s fables to verse. In the modern era, Nietzsche re-introduced the ‘music making Socrates’ in his Birth of Tragedy. But Nietzsche is not the first to revive the concept in modern philosophy. Before Nietzsche’s call for a new music-making Socrates, the early German Romantics, in particular Schlegel, explicitly called for the identification of poetry and science in the concept of Poesie. As Schlegel writes: ‘Alle Kunst soll Wissenschaft werden, und alle Wissenschaft Kunst werden; Poesie und Philosophie sollen vereinigt sein.’ On the one hand, in Ion Socrates is not wrong to critique Ion for not knowing the significance of his own work. On the other hand, Socrates himself recognizes in Phaedo that he is guilty of failing to heed the call to make music. Long misunderstood, the Romantic concept of Poesie is not mere irrationalism, for it offers an aesthetic metaphysics of the Absolute that recognizes that the Absolute can only exist if it is known. Romanticism is indeed a philosophy of the Absolute, but one which cannot conceive of any solution to the profound impasses that confront philosophical knowing except by learning to make music.

- by Gregory S Moss
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- Romanticism, Philosophy of Literature, German Idealism, German Romanticism

Russian philosopher Pyotr Chaadaev (1794–1856) declared Russia to be a non-place in both space and time, a singular nothingness without history, topos, or footing, without relation or attachment to the world-historical tradition culminating in Christian-European modernity. This paper recovers Chaadaev’s conception of nothingness as that which, unbound by tradition, constitutes a total, even revolutionary ungrounding of the world-whole. Working with and through Chaadaev’s key writings, we trace his articulation of immanent nothingness or the void of the Real as completely emptying out the mechanisms of history and tradition, thereby putting also into question the basic conceptual machinery of modernity. Chaadaev’s position appears, as a result, not only as a neglected genealogical element to contemporary critiques of modernity and its logic of reproduction through tradition and futurity but also as a contribution to the ongoing critical rethinking of this logic in contemporary theory.

- by Kirill Chepurin and +1
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- Critical Theory, Intellectual History, Russian Studies, History of Ideas
- by Brian Schroeder
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- Religion, Philosophy, Metaphysics, Philosophy Of Religion