Philosophers debate the death of philosophy as much as they debate the death of God. Kant claimed responsibility for both philosophy's beginning and end, while Heidegger argued it concluded with Nietzsche. In the twentieth century, figures as diverse as John Austin and Richard Rorty have proclaimed philosophy's end, with some even calling for the advent of "postphilosophy." In an effort to make sense of these conflicting positions—which often say as much about the philosopher as his (...) subject—Isabelle Thomas-Fogiel undertakes the first systematic treatment of "the end of philosophy," while also recasting the history of western thought itself. Thomas-Fogiel begins with postphilosophical claims such as scientism, which she reveals to be self-refuting, for they subsume philosophy into the branches of the natural sciences. She discovers similar issues in Rorty's skepticism and strands of continental thought. Revisiting the work of late-nineteenth and early-twentieth-century philosophers, when the split between analytical and continental philosophy began, Thomas-Fogiel finds both traditions followed the same path—the road of reference—which ultimately led to self-contradiction. This phenomenon, whether valorized or condemned, has been understood as the death of philosophy. Tracing this pattern from Quine to Rorty, from Heidegger to Levinas and Habermas, Thomas-Fogiel reveals the self-contradiction at the core of their claims while also carving an alternative path through self-reference. Trained under the French philosopher Bernard Bourgeois, she remakes philosophy in exciting new ways for the twenty-first century. (shrink)

All that remains of Western Philosophy is the History of Ideas. 1 Ulrich de Balbian Meta-Philosophy Research Center ( Meta-Philosophy) Death of Philosophy Part 1 (essays on philosophy, it subject-matter, methods, omtology, metaphysics, episetemology, art, religion and other topics).

In this essay, we read Derrida’s Theory and Practice seminar against the backdrop of the theme of the “death of philosophy,” prominent in 1960s French philosophy. This theme takes two forms—one Nietzschean-Heideggerian and the other Hegelian-Marxian. We summarize both before turning to Derrida’s treatment of Althusser’s views on the Hegelian-Marxian form of this death. Althusser posits a distinction between theory in the general sense and Theory as a designation for Marxist dialectical materialism. Derrida gives two specific (...) criticisms of Althusser that we discuss: (1) Althusser commits himself to a tautology, by arguing that Theory only makes explicit what is implicit already in Marxist practice; (2) Althusser ultimately establishes the priority of practice over theory. We refute both of these charges before concluding that, prior to the distinction between theory and practice, is the world itself; and presenting itself to us as unthinkable, the world places the demands upon us that it be engaged with, in theory and in practice. (shrink)

In his 2010 work, The Grand Design, Stephen Hawking, argues that ‘… philosophy is dead’. While not a Philosopher, Hawking provides strong argument for his thesis, principally that philosophers have not taken science sufficiently seriously and so Philosophy is no longer relevant to knowledge claims. In this paper, Hawking’s claim is appraised and critiqued, becoming a meta-philosophical discussion. It is argued that Philosophy is dead, in some sense, due to particular philosophers having embarked on an intellectual path (...) no longer in keeping with the ancient definition of Philosophy. Philosophy as the seeking of wisdom necessarily includes the consideration of findings of other intellectual pursuits, including physical and natural science. While Philosophy has justifiably evolved through its long history, is it unrecognisable in the terms by which it historically defined itself? Seeking consistency, Hawking is critiqued for appearing to practise ‘dead’ Philosophy. Indeed, Hawking’s appeal to multiverse theory and his core discussion of the metaphysical problem of being are philosophical. The question of the death of Philosophy has contemporary relevance for the discipline which is particularly under threat for its survival in the academy, oftentimes assumed to be irrelevant. (shrink)

This dissertation traces the themes of madness and death from Plato to twentieth century European philosophy. By focusing on the writings of Plato, Hegel, Heidegger and Foucault, this work tries to articulate the way in which philosophy relies on the themes of madness and death to define itself. Madness and death are not simply topics within philosophy, but they are the "other" of philosophical discourse. In this respect madness and death are instances of (...) negativity. Negativity plays a significant role in the constitution of philosophical discourse. Thus far from being marginal topics within philosophy, madness and death prove to be related to many contemporary philosophical problems, such as subjectivity, the metaphysics of presence, the relationship between the body and language, and finally the question of ethics. ;The first chapter concentrates on Plato's Phaedo and Phaedrus. For Plato, philosophy is defined as a preparation of death and as a kind of madness. Through a close reading of these texts, this chapter establishes the constitutive roles of madness and death for philosophy. ;The second chapter concentrates on Hegel's notion of madness in the Encyclpaedia, and his understanding of death in the Phenomenology of Spirit. This chapter establishes that Hegel's approach to negativity ultimately remains a cognitive one, and incapable of thinking the question of negativity in a radical fashion. ;The third and fourth chapters focus on Heidegger in order to articulate a more radical thinking of negativity. The notion of death in Being and Time, and that of madness in Heidegger's later writings characterize Heidegger's non-cognitive understanding of negativity that cannot be reduced to a content of thought. ;The final chapter focuses on the debate between Foucault and Derrida on madness and ultimately attempts to question the radicality of both Hegel's and Heidegger's notions of negativity. ;The conclusion tries to connect the questions of madness and death to that of ethics. The radicalization of the question of ethics in twentieth century continental philosophy presupposes and requires a rethinking of the question of alterity. This work gestures towards such a rethinking. (shrink)

1 1 Ulrich de Balbian Meta-Philosophy Research Center (Meta-Philosophy) Death of Philosophy Part 2 PART 2 Philosophy subject-matter page2 Different approaches to doing philosophy (Methods) page 164 Metaphysics, Ontology, Epistemology page.

Shows that the dialogue in Plato's Phaedo is primarily devoted to presenting Socrates' final defense of the philosophical life against the theoretical and political challenge of religion.

Although declarations of the death of God seem to be provocations announcing the end of the era of theology, this announcement is actually central to the Christian revelation in its most classic forms, as well as to its reworkings in contemporary religious thought. Indeed provocative new possibilities for thinking theologically open up precisely in the wake of the death of God. Already Hegel envisaged a revolutionary new realization of divinity emerging in and with the secular world through its (...) establishment of a total order of immanence. However, in postmodern times this comprehensive order aspired to by modern secularism implodes or cracks open towards the wholly Other. A hitherto repressed demand for the absolute difference of the religious, or for “transcendence”, returns with a vengeance. This difference is what could not be stated in terms of the Hegelian System, for reasons that poststructuralist writers particularly have insisted on: all representations of God are indeed dead. Yet this does not mean that they cannot still be powerful, but only that they cannot assign God any stable identity. Nietzsche’s sense of foreboding concerning the death of God is coupled with his intimations of the demise of representation and “grammar” as epistemologically bankrupt, but also with his vision of a positive potential for creating value in the wake of this collapse of all linguistically articulated culture. He points the way towards the emergence of a post-secular religious thinking of what exceeds thought and representation. (shrink)

While moral perfectionists rank conscious beings according to their cognitive abilities, Paola Cavalieri launches a more inclusive defense of all forms of subjectivity. In concert with Peter Singer, J. M. Coetzee, Harlan B. Miller, and other leading animal studies scholars, she expands our understanding of the nonhuman in such a way that the derogatory category of "the animal" becomes meaningless. In so doing, she presents a nonhierachical approach to ethics that better respects the value of the conscious self. Cavalieri opens (...) with a dialogue between two imagined philosophers, laying out her challenge to moral perfectionism and tracing its influence on our attitudes toward the "unworthy." She then follows with a roundtable "multilogue" which takes on the role of reason in ethics and the boundaries of moral status. Coetzee, Nobel Prize winner for Literature and author of _The Lives of Animals_, emphasizes the animality of human beings; Miller, a prominent analytic philosopher at Virginia Polytechnic Institute, dismantles the rationalizations of human bias; Cary Wolfe, professor of English at Rice University, advocates an active exposure to other worlds and beings; and Matthew Calarco, author of _Zoographies: The Question of the Animal from Heidegger to Derrida_, extends ethical consideration to entities that traditionally have little or no moral status, such as plants and ecosystems. As Peter Singer writes in his foreword, the implications of this conversation extend far beyond the issue of the moral status of animals. They "get to the heart of some important differences about how we should do philosophy, and how philosophy can relate to our everyday life." From the divergences between analytical and continental approaches to the relevance of posthumanist thinking in contemporary ethics, the psychology of speciesism, and the practical consequences of an antiperfectionist stance, _The Death of the Animal_ confronts issues that will concern anyone interested in a serious study of morality. (shrink)

Death has long been a pre-occupation of philosophers, and this is especially so today. The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Death collects 21 newly commissioned essays that cover current philosophical thinking of death-related topics across the entire range of the discipline. These include metaphysical topics--such as the nature of death, the possibility of an afterlife, the nature of persons, and how our thinking about time affects what we think about death--as well as axiological topics, (...) such as whether death is bad for its victim, what makes it bad to die, what attitude it is fitting to take towards death, the possibility of posthumous harm, and the desirability of immortality. The contributors also explore the views of ancient philosophers such as Aristotle, Plato and Epicurus on topics related to the philosophy of death, and questions in normative ethics, such as what makes killing wrong when it is wrong, and whether it is wrong to kill fetuses, non-human animals, combatants in war, and convicted murderers. With chapters written by a wide range of experts in metaphysics, ethics, and conceptual analysis, and designed to give the reader a comprehensive view of recent developments in the philosophical study of death, this Handbook will appeal to a broad audience in philosophy, particularly in ethics and metaphysics. (shrink)

True enough, not many of the human lot we know, not least of all thosewe may chance upon in life in an intricate tangle of modern socialformations where individuals get to interface rather unreflectively mostof the time, would be so generous as to bestow a casual interest in philosophy. Two thousand years ago, this kind of antipathy toward philosophy made its point well when a man named Socrates was condemned to death, proof rather of the unchanging isometrics (...) of equivocation in the face of the compelling demands of justice and truth that Socrates exposed to be the skeleton in the cupboard of power, hiding under the façade of indestructibility. This pervasive practice would have by now covered an entire époque of Western intellectualtradition from the death of Socrates to the contemporary, disguised asunwavering love of everything that abounds in beauty and vitality, adetermined search for the fundament that holds everything together under the condition that Man is free and that Life is precious as too rich and valuable for the taking. (shrink)

What is the meaning of life? In today's secular, post-religious scientific world, this question has become a serious preoccupation. But it also has a long history: many major philosophers have thought deeply about it, as Julian Young so vividly illustrates in this thought-provoking second edition of _The Death of God and the Meaning of Life_. Three new chapters explore Søren Kierkegaard’s attempts to preserve a Christian answer to the question of the meaning of life, Karl Marx's attempt to translate (...) this answer into naturalistic and atheistic terms, and Sigmund Freud’s deep pessimism about the possibility of any version of such an answer. Part 1 presents an historical overview of philosophers from Plato to Marx who have believed in a meaning of life, either in some supposed ‘other’ world or in the future of this world. Part 2 assesses what happened when the traditional structures that give life meaning began to erode. With nothing to take their place, these structures gave way to the threat of nihilism, to the appearance that life is meaningless. Young looks at the responses to this threat in chapters on Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre, Camus, Foucault and Derrida. Fully revised and updated throughout, this highly engaging exploration of fundamental issues will captivate anyone who’s ever asked themselves where life’s meaning really lies. It also makes a perfect historical introduction to philosophy, particularly to the continental tradition. (shrink)

Death and Philosophy presents a wide ranging and fascinating variety of different philosophical, aesthetic and literary perspectives on death. Death raises key questions such as whether life has meaning of life in the face of death, what the meaning of "life after death" might be and whether death is part of a narrative that can be retold in different ways, and considers the various types of death, such as brain death, that (...) challenge mind-body dualism. The essays also include explorations of Chinese, Japanese and Tibetan perspectives on death and why death in some cultures, such as in Mexico's day of the dead, is celebrated. (shrink)

This paper explores the death of God narrative through the lens of kenosis, drawing insights from thinkers such as Marcel, Heidegger, Vattimo, and Girard. It investigates the implications of kenotic thought for contemporary religious and philosophical discourse, exploring various interpretations of kenosis, ranging from Altizer and Žižek’s apocalyptic views to Vattimo’s more hopeful perspective. Through critical engagement with these viewpoints, this paper advocates for a nuanced understanding of kenosis inspired by Hegel, one that bypasses both radical theology and excessive (...) optimism. Methodologically, this study adopts a hermeneutic approach, analyzing key texts and engaging in philosophical dialogue. This paper concludes that rethinking kenotic thought could provide a robust framework for grappling with the death of God in the contemporary context, offering avenues for ethical reflection, social critique, and speculative renewal. (shrink)

This dissertation is based on four backgrounds: (1) the diversity of definitions of philosophy, (2) statements by several thingkers about the death/ending of philosophy, (3) the existence of Hassan Hanafi's writings about the definition, life and death of philosophy, and (4) the limitations of specific studies on philosophy according to Hanafi. On that basis, this dissertation examines philosophy according to Hanafi, by revealing and reviewing his definition of philosophy and his views on (...) when philosophy lives and when philosophy dies. In general, this is metaphilosophical study of Hanafi's philosophy by disclosuring it descriptively and analytically on the one side, and by reviewing it falsificatively, interpretatively and axiologically on the other side. This metaphilosophical study of Hanafi philosophy found several things. First, Hanafi's definition of philosophy is still diverse and needs to be reanalyzed, so it cannot overcome the problem of the diversity of definitions of philosophy. Second, Hanafi's statement about those who kill philosophy and turn on it is inconsistent and falsifiable. Third, philosophy can still live in conditions that are considered to kill it. Fourth, although it has several weaknesses, Hanafi's philosophy is useful in particular for Muslims and researchers about Islam, Arab nations and researchers about Arab, and societies that face internal and external traditions; and also worthwhile in general for philosophy and practitioners of philosophy. Fifth, Hanafi's philosophy can overcome the problem of ongoing discourse about the death/ending of philosophy, because his philosophy can actually bring philosophy to life. (shrink)

Demonstrates the significance of the concepts of madness and death for the history of philosophy.

This paper reflects on an article that appeared after the death of A.J. Ayer, which complains about what British philosophers focus on. I propose that the content of the philosophy curriculum can be predicted from a rational actor model.

What is the meaning of life? In the post-modern, post-religious scientific world, this question is becoming a preoccupation. But it also has a long history: many major figures in philosophy had something to say on the subject, as Julian Young so vividly illustrates in this thought-provoking book. Part One of the book presents an historical overview of philosophers from Plato to Hegel and Marx who have believed in some sort of meaning of life, either in some supposed 'other' world (...) or in the future of this world. Part Two looks at what happened when the traditional structures that provided life with meaning ceased to be believed. With nothing to take their place, these structures gave way to the threat of nihilism, to the appearance that life is meaningless. Julian Young looks at the responses to this threat in the work of Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre, Camus, Foucault and Derrida. This compelling and highly engaging exploration of fundamental values will captivate anyone who's ever asked themselves where life's meaning really lies. It also makes a perfect historical introduction to philosophy. (shrink)

This article reflects on the successes and failures of a new Philosophy and Ethics course in a low socioeconomic context in Perth, Western Australia, with the eventual demise of the subject in the school at the end of 2010. We frame this reflection within Deleuzian notions of geophilosophy to advocate for a Philosophy and Ethics that is informed by nomadic thought, as this offers a critical freedom for students to transform themselves and their society and suggests practical ways (...) both of overcoming the prejudices which led to its demise and of student reluctance to engage in open discussion in class. We consider the demise of the course a ‘missed opportunity’ because it had so much potential to be transformative of student subjectivities in schools. (shrink)

The heart of the book is a long chapter and appendix expounding the brilliance of Aristotle on language, the soul, and mind. This updating of him, much broader than the conventional, stereotyped, view, can be incorporated into modern science." "The Death and Life of Philosophy not only presents the great thinkers of the past in a new light, but also satirizes the philosophy professors of today, putting their work and even their aims into perspective in a readable (...) and engaging manner."--BOOK JACKET. (shrink)

This book is the first comprehensive study of Schopenhauer's philosophy of religion. It develops a contextual account of Schopenhauer's relation to the religions of India by placing his interpretation of their main doctrines within the perspective of his diagnosis of the religious situation in nineteenth-century Europe, and his revised conception of the proper content and methods of metaphysical philosophy in the wake of Kant. It shows that Schopenhauer's encounter with the religions of India was the stimulus for his (...) formulation of a novel theory of a revitalised modern Christianity. The possibility of an oriental renaissance prompted Schopenhauer to argue that Christianity's immanent or ethical teachings needed to be severed from its supernatural or metaphysical doctrines, so that European culture could continue to satisfy the human need for a metaphysical interpretation of the world and life. This book will be of interest to philosophers, theologians, students of religion and modern intellectual history. (shrink)

Robert R. Williams offers a bold new account of divergences and convergences in the work of Hegel and Nietzsche. He explores four themes - the philosophy of tragedy; recognition and community; critique of Kant; and the death of God - and explicates both thinkers' critiques of traditional theology and metaphysics.

An examination of the Scientific Revolution that shows how the mechanistic world view of modern science has sanctioned the exploitation of nature, unrestrained commercial expansion, and a new socioeconomic order that subordinates women.

The first decisive steps of medicine towards becoming a science in its present shape happen to coincide with “the rise of the novel” in the eighteenth century. Before this well known and in our days still growing scientific specialization of medicine, the connections between literature and medicine were both many and close. By reading and analyzing a contemporary novel, The Death of a Beekeeper by the Swedish author Lars Gustafsson (1978), this article is an attempt to explore to which (...) extent a fictional narrative about a unique case of cancer may illuminate challenges associated with the experience of serious illness. Our claim is that medicine might draw wisdom from literature, its ability to create connections through narrative, to illuminate the complexity of ethical dilemmas, and to intertwine symptoms, life stories, and contexts. We argue that by being in the company of literary narratives and philosophical questions, physicians as well as other health care professionals may acquire clinically relevant skills which help them reach the ethically defined goals of their profession. (shrink)

Many subscribe to an Ethic of Life, an ethical perspective on which all living things are deserving of some level of moral concern. Within philosophy, the Ethic of Life has been clarified, developed, and rigorously defended; it has also found its strongest critics. Currently, the debate is at a standstill. This book ends this stalemate by proving that the Ethic of Life must be abandoned.

With a preface by Gianni Vattimo, this book offers both an overview of contemporary Italian philosophy and a new interpretation of Nietzsche’s ‘God is Dead’ in connection with the notion of freedom as the original dynamic of the will to power.

Ahrensdorf’s interpretation of the Phaedo leaves few stones unturned. While other scholars have pointed to the fallibility of Socrates’ “proofs” for the immortality of the soul, or have sought to distinguish the primary interlocutors, Simmias and Cebes, or have examined this dialogue’s vindication of the philosophical life, Ahrensdorf manages to pull all these issues together in a coherent, holistic reading of the Phaedo. The dialogue, he argues, presents Socrates’ views that the individual soul is not immortal and that our embodied (...) human existence is the place where the philosophical life is lived out, not some transcendent reality in which perfect wisdom exists. “In the Phaedo, then, Socrates indicates, albeit quietly, that, in his view, the philosophical life is the best way of life, not because of the rewards the divine soul of the philosopher will enjoy in Hades, but rather because of the happiness the philosopher enjoys, as a human being, in this life”. (shrink)

With a preface by Gianni Vattimo, this book offers both an overview of contemporary Italian philosophy and a new interpretation of Nietzsche’s ‘God is Dead’ in connection with the notion of freedom as the original dynamic of the will to power.

In this essay, I will look closer at the death of the French philosopher Gilles Deleuze, who committed suicide in 1995. I will scrutinize his death in concordance with his philosophical thoughts, but frame my gaze within Albert Camus’ well-known opening- question from The Myth of Sisyphus: “Judging whether life is worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy” (Camus, 2005:1).

Grzegorz Musiał’s late work is exemplary of the Modernist coupling of desire and death, which German Ritz linked to the way that homosexual sensibility has been encoded in Polish literary Modernism. This reading of Musiał is paradoxical at heart, as the writer’s literary output must also be ridden with tensions, because his clinging to a bygone aesthetic in order to render homosexual desire seems quaint in an era in which the idea of gay emancipation is widespread. Musiał’s literary alter (...) ego, who is realized as a fictional character and as the speaker in his poems, is a hybrid of an erudite homosexual male equipped with the classical sensibility and a devout Catholic, whose appreciation and outright enjoyment of church ritual is almost camp. Musiał attempts to pit this literary dummy against the usually younger homosexual men who, like a mob of the living dead, populate the underground world of night clubs and anonymous sex. (shrink)

Grzegorz Musiał’s late work is exemplary of the Modernist coupling of desire and death, which German Ritz linked to the way that homosexual sensibility has been encoded in Polish literary Modernism. This reading of Musiał is paradoxical at heart, as the writer’s literary output must also be ridden with tensions, because his clinging to a bygone aesthetic in order to render homosexual desire seems quaint in an era in which the idea of gay emancipation is widespread. Musiał’s literary alter (...) ego, who is realized as a fictional character and as the speaker in his poems, is a hybrid of an erudite homosexual male equipped with the classical sensibility and a devout Catholic, whose appreciation and outright enjoyment of church ritual is almost camp. Musiał attempts to pit this literary dummy against the usually younger homosexual men who, like a mob of the living dead, populate the underground world of night clubs and anonymous sex. (shrink)

This paper covers the theme of the death of God considered from a Hegelian standpoint. For Aristotle, the image of God as ‘thought thinking itself’ was an image of the knowledge aspired to in philosophy. With the notion of God becoming man and his insistence on the icon of the Cross, Hegel challenged the Aristotelian goal of philosophy as immutable knowledge of an ‘ultimate’ reality. Hegel viewed the crisis of normativity as strictly linked to the conception of (...) the self. It is Nietzsche who is best known for alluding to the full significance of this image for modern life, but Hegel’s thought on the complex relations of philosophy and religion in the modern world can be regarded as an attempt to think through this same historical phenomenon. In this paper, I focus on the philosophical relevance of Hegel’s notion of the death of God. I argue that unpacking the significance of the ‘truths’ presented symbolically in modern Christianity is crucial in unders.. (shrink)