Abstract

It is now a commonplace that premodern reflection, whether mythical, philosophical, or theological, was terminally “anthropomorphic,” given to the erroneous supposition that the human shape offers genuine insight into the shape of everything else.1 It is also commonly assumed that modern philosophy distinguishes itself from its precursors by placing the human being at the center of its concerns. Thus Kant, for example, claimed that the question “what is man?” recapitulates the whole of systematic philosophical inquiry.2 First impressions notwithstanding, these two convictions are not really at odds. For it is precisely through their “turn to the subject” that modern thinkers…