Resumen: El artículo pretende realizar una confrontación entre el modelo fenomenológico de Merleau-Ponty y la propuesta deconstructiva de Derrida acerca del tema del lenguaje y de la problemática genética. En Merleau-Ponty, la cuestión genética se vincula a la noción de cuerpo y a la expresividad precategorial de los gestos, en los que el silencio describe una dimensión opaca e inalcanzable temáticamente, pero originaria y decisiva para la mirada fenomenológica. Por otra parte, Derrida es un crítico muy radical de todo uso (...) filosófico de un origen pleno, y por lo tanto también de la proyección de un silencio primitivo pretendida por Merleau-Ponty. Sin embargo, la noción de silencio de Merleau-Ponty no cumple cabalmente la función que Derrida le asigna, siendo siempre para Merleau-Ponty un espacio diacrónico y diferencial. El texto que sigue pretende mostrar los puntos de contactos y de distancias entre Merleau-Ponty y Derrida con respecto al tema del lenguaje en general, haciendo también hincapié sobre la cuestión de la literatura, a la que ambos filósofos se dedican ampliamente y a la que ambos pretenden extender las cuestiones evocadas, con el objeto de demostrar que en este ámbito los motivos de oposición entre los dos planteamientos se hacen efímeros.: This article aims to realize a confrontation between Merleau-Ponty's phenomenological model and Derrida's deconstructive proposal, with regard to the subject of language and the genetic problematic. In Merleau-Ponty, the genetic question is linked to the notion of the body and the pre-categorial expressiveness of gestures, in which silence describes a dimension that is opaque and thematically unattainable, but original and decisive for the phenomenological viewpoint. Derrida, in contrast, is a radical critic of the philosophical use of such origin, and therefore also of the projection to a primitive silence sought by Merleau-Ponty. However, the notion of silence in Merleau-Ponty does not fully meet fully the role assigned to it by Derrida, silence being always for Merleau-Ponty a diachronic and differential space. This article aims to show the points in common and the differences between Merleau-Ponty and Derrida on the issue of language in general. Also discussed is the topic of literature, with which both philosophers are widely engaged and to which both try to extend the issues under consideration in this paper. It is argued that in this area the motives behind the opposition between the two approaches become ephemeral. (shrink)

Theodor Adorno's concept of 'natural history' [Naturgeschichte] was central for a number of Adorno's theoretical projects, but remains elusive. In this essay, I analyse different dimensions of the concept of natural history, distinguishing amongst (a) a reflection on the normative and methodological bases of philosophical anthropology and critical social science; (b) a conception of critical memory oriented toward the preservation of the memory of historical suffering; and (c) the notion of 'mindfulness of nature in the subject' provocatively asserted in Max (...) Horkheimer and Adorno's Dialectic of Enlightenment. These strands are united by the notion of transience and goal of developing a critical theory sensitive to the transient in history. The essay concludes by suggesting some implications of an expanded concept of natural history for issues in the discourse theory of Jürgen Habermas. (shrink)

These are questions that have lost none of their relevance.... Horkheimer remains a figure to be reckoned with.

Over the past thirty years much has been written about the critical theory of society that was produced by a small group of left-wing Hegelians in the Institute of Social Research in Frankfurt am Main, Germany and in the United States. This book seeks to make a contribution to the continued development of the critical theory of society and religion as it offers a corrective to the one-sided, positivistic development of the modern social sciences as well as to the increasing (...) social irrelevancy of the contemporary Christian church. (shrink)

Introduction Max Horkheimer was born on February in Stuttgart. By the time he died, on 7 July in Nuremberg, he had played a decisive role in launching and ...

This book provides an intellectual biography of Max Horkheimer during the early and middle phases of his life and analyzes his model of early Critical Theory.

Max Horkheimer: Outsider des Bürgertums und Unternehmer in Sachen Kritischer Theorie. Niemand steht so wie Max Horkheimer für das, was in den 1960er Jahren die Bezeichnung ”Frankfurter Schule“ erhielt. Der Sohn eines Textilfabrikanten übernahm 1930 die Leitung des marxistischen ”Instituts für Sozialforschung“ mit dem Ziel, der von Konkurrenz und Gewinnstreben bestimmten Welt seines Vaters die Alternative eines der Erkenntnis gewidmeten und von Solidarität geprägten Lebens gegenüberzustellen. Durch die Nazis ins Exil gezwungen, wurde das Institut zu einem Ort der Zusammenarbeit von (...) Intellektuellen verschiedener Disziplinen und prägte auch nach der Rückkehr nach Deutschland die geistige Entwicklung der Bundesrepublik. Die neue, aktuelle Darstellung von Horkheimers Leben und Werk bietet eine Einführung und eine Gesamtschau dieses zentralen Denkers des 20. Jahrhunderts. (shrink)

In 1930, in Anfänge der bürgerlichen Geschichtsphilosophie, Horkheimer analyzes utopia in bourgeois philosophy of history and identifies two aspects: the criticism of what is, and the representation of what should be. Utopia therefore plays a revolutionary role in history. In 1937, in Traditionelle und kritische Theorie, Horkheimer changes opinion. Utopia is criticized as misleading, acquiescent to reality. In later writings, in a pessimistic view, the Director of the Frankfurt School describes contemporary society as a dystopia.

The author advances the thesis that Max Horkheimer’s philosophy is a social one, the constitutive element of which is historiosophy. Contrary to the interpretative stereotype, dominating the philosophical literature, the Author strives to prove that Max Horkheimer’s philosophical point of view—that he calls the critical theory—is distinguished by its uniformity, because albeit the critical theory evaluated under the influence of the 20th-century Europe turbulent history, left its identity intact. The Author thinks that the identity of the critical theory has two (...) major indicators: 1. a visible criticism of the founding father of the Frankfurt philosophical school throughout his intellectual development towards the socio-historical circumstances that deprives the intellectual unity of autonomy and suppresses an independent thought and 2. the inconsolable thirst of changing things into better ones. Three stages of the development of Horkheimer’s philosophical conception have been depicted and briefly characterized in the article: prewar (the forming of the evidence of the critical theory), wartime (thehistoriosophical conception depicting the auto destruction of enlightenment) and postwar (the prediction of “an administered world”). (shrink)

Horkheimer/Adornos im kalifornischen Exil verfasste Dialektik der Aufklärung untersucht das Scheitern menschlicher Befreiung und die Errichtung neuer Herrschaftsformen. Obgleich ein Schlüsseltext der philosophischen Zeitdiagnose, gab es bislang keinen Kommentar zu ihr. Der hier vorgelegte kooperative Kommentar geht der Dialektik der Aufklärung in zwei Durchgängen nach. Ein erster Durchgang kommentiert die einzelnen Abschnitte des Buches; ein zweiter Durchgang verfolgt Koordinaten seines theoretischen Horizonts. Abschließend gelangt die Wirkungsgeschichte des Textes zur Darstellung. Ein Gravitationstext der kritischen Theorie unserer Zeit findet damit erstmals eine (...) kommentierende Auslegung. (shrink)

Horkheimer's work contains many passages concerning moral and morally relevant problems, but one searches in vain for a completely elaborated moral philosophy. The rudiments thereof may be found primarily in “Materialism and Ethics” (1933) and in various passages of the “Juliette” portion of the Dialectic of Enlightenment. These would be quickly summarized, but could not thereby be adequately elucidated. If the matter were to remain with the mere reproduction of these thoughts, one would have to reach the regrettable conclusion — (...) given the paucity of texts — that early critical theory had an ethics deficit. The attempt to read Horkheimer in such a way that the relevant passages open one's vision to an implicit moral philosophy — that is, one amenable to reconstruction—must rely upon other approaches. (shrink)

Max Horkheimer does not generally receive the scholarly attention given to other ‘Frankfurt School’ figures. This is in part because his early work seems contradictory, or unphilosophical. For example, Horkheimer seems, at various points (to use contemporary metaethical terms), like a constructivist, a moral realist, or a moral skeptic, and it is not clear how these views cohere. The goal of this article is to show that the contradictions regarding moral theory exist largely on the surface, and that one can (...) go below the surface to reconstruct a coherent position. Part I will examine Horkheimer’s skeptical critique of morality, and show that it leads to the realist position discussed in part II. Part III then shows that such realism can only be understood within a larger constructivist project, which elaborates on a minimal normativity present in human experience. This reconstruction should make sense of Horkheimer’s work, and show its contemporary relevance. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Naharaim Jahrgang: 11 Heft: 1-2 Seiten: 25-46.

Abstract“What we call meaning is bound to vanish”: Under this heading, an interview with Max Horkheimer was published in Der Spiegel (Jan 5, 1970). Revisiting this interview, the article focuses on Horkheimer’s thesis that human beings share the “longing that the injustice which characterizes the world must not be the final word”. It examines the extent to which Horkheimer’s notion of the “desire for the totally other” may be inspired by Kant’s claim that religion is grounded in the “need of (...) practical reason”. A further topic of discussion is Horkheimer’s critical assessment concerning current tendencies toward a “total administration of the world” that may ultimately “reduce thinking to the level of industrial processes”. Relating this critique to Kant’s reflections on the “unbelief of reason (Vernunftunglaube)”, which is based on “the maxim of reason’s independence of its own need”, the article raises the question of Horkheimer’s significance today: What relevance does Horkheimer’s method of casting doubt on any “politics that is not based on theology, metaphysics and, of course, morality” have for today’s discourse on such matters? In this context a brief glance is cast at Jürgen Habermas’s post-metaphysical reading of Horkheimer’s “negative theology”. Die Forschung zu diesem Beitrag wurde durch das Russian Academic Excellence Project at the Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University (Aleksandra Nevskogo Street 14, 236016 Kaliningrad, Russische Föderation) unterstützt. (shrink)

Subject of numerous interpretations and studies, the vicissitudes of the famous Frankfurt Institute for Social Research nevertheless still reserve some little-known pages, such as the human and scientific relationship that bound philosopher Max Horkheimer and economist Friedrich Pollock for over fifty years. Based on texts and letters translated here into English for the first time as well as some previously unpublished documents, the book reconstructs the crucial moments in the friendship between the two scholars with a narrative style and philological (...) accuracy. Nicola Emery accompanies us through the two friends and intellectuals' "nonconformism" and search for an alternative life-form that led to the birth of the Frankfurt critical theory. (shrink)

The paper analyses today partly forgotten Max Horkheimer’s conception of instrumental reason which presents this reason differently from the definition widespread today (claiming that it consists in adopting suitable means to set ends). Horkheimer relates instrumental reason to subjective one, seeing the former as a degenerate form of the latter. His theory is far more philosophical than the dominating today conceptions which do not consider the problem of instrumental reason philosophical any longer and instead move it step by step to (...) the domain of a nonphilosophical decision theory. The paper analyses in particular Horkheimer’s beliefs claiming that 1) it is science which founds instrumental reason, and therefore 2) it is science which is the main source of oppressiveness and degradation of the contemporary civilization. It is shown among other things that Horkheimer misunderstands some properties of science and its operations and this leads to his incorrect presentation of the role of instrumental reason. (shrink)

El presente trabajo aborda la relación entre la noción de razón y la de impulsos en Max Horkheimer. Nos centraremos principalmente en el análisis de dos de sus artículos de la década de 1930 para señalar que el filósofo rechaza la idea -propia de la concepción burguesa de razón- según la cual razón e impulsos son radicalmente opuestos entre sí, ya que mediante ella se suele fundamentar la represión de lo impulsivo en nombre de una optimización del pensamiento. Horkheimer entiende (...) que mientras tal represión pretende emancipar a la razón respecto de lo otro de ella, en realidad no hace más que producir una atrofia del pensamiento. Nos proponemos demostrar que Horkheimer concibe a esa oposición radical como falsa por dos motivos: por un lado, por el hecho de que la razón misma adquiere un comportamiento impulsivo cuando se identifica con el pensamiento y busca reprimir todo lo que considera distinto de él. Por otro lado, porque sin un vínculo consciente de la razón con lo impulsivo, ella queda presa de la irracionalidad. Sostenemos que hay en Horkheimer una concepción materialista de la relación entre las nociones de impulsos y razón, según la cual sólo el establecimiento de una relación consciente entre ambos, que no descuide la satisfacción de las demandas impulsivas, puede evitar que el pensamiento se torne irracional. (shrink)

Tradução de Die Aktualität Schopenhauers, de Max Horkheimer, artigo publicado em 1961 no Schopenhauer-Jahrbuch da Schopenhauer-Gesellschaft.

In diesem Aufsatz wird die bislang kaum beachtete frühe Moralphilosophie von Max Horkheimer aus den 1930er Jahren in ein produktives Spannungsverhältnis zu den Grundannahmen des ethischen Naturalismus gesetzt. Horkheimer versteht die Moral als ein normatives Instrument, mit dem die menschliche Gattung ihr gesellschaftliches Leben zu organisieren versucht. Die natürliche Normativität der menschlichen Lebensform ist für Horkheimer selbst historisch bestimmt, als die menschliche Lebensform sich notwendig nur historisch realisieren kann. In der bürgerlichen Gesellschaft ist diese Normativität nach Horkheimer widersprüchlich verfasst: Einerseits (...) sollen die Menschen moralischen Normen und nicht allein ihren eigenen Interessen folgen, andererseits erfordert die bürgerliche Gesellschaft gerade das rücksichtslose Verfolgen eigener Interessen, da sonst die Selbsterhaltung der Menschen gefährdet würde. Die Auswirkungen dieser Widersprüchlichkeit werden hier anhand von drei Aspekten untersucht: die Opazität und Naturhaftigkeit der bürgerlichen Gesellschaft, das Leiden der menschlichen Natur, Geschichte als Anpassungsprozess der menschlichen Natur. Abschließend wird Horkheimers Ansatz hinsichtlich seiner theoretischen Reichweite in den moralphilosophischen Diskussionen der gegenwärtigen Kritischen Theorie verortet. (shrink)