This English translation of Gebser’s major work, Ursprung und Gegenwart (Stuttgart, Deutsche Verlag, 1966), offers certain fundamental insights which should be beneficial to any sensitive scientist and makes it available to the English-speaking world for the recognition it deserves. “The path which led Gebser to his new and universal perception of the world is, briefly, as follows. In the wake of materialism and social change, man had been described in the early years of our century as the “dead end” of (...) nature. Freud had redefined culture as illness—a result of drive sublimation; Klages had called the spirit (and he was surely speaking of the hypertrophied intellect) the “adversary of the soul,” propounding a return to a life like that of the Pelasgi, the aboriginal inhabitants of Greece; and Spengler had declared the “Demise of the West” during the years following World War I. The consequences of such pessimism continued to proliferate long after its foundations had been superseded. It was with these foundations—the natural sciences—that Gebser began. As early as Planck it was known that matter was not at all what materialists had believed it to be, and since 1943 Gebser has repeatedly emphasized that the so-called crisis of Western culture was in fact an essential restructuration.… Gebser has noted two results that are of particular significance: first, the abandonment of materialistic determinism, of a one-sided mechanistic-causal mode of thought; and second, a manifest “urgency of attempts to discover a universal way of observing things, and to overcome the inner division of contemporary man who, as a result of his one-sided rational orientation, thinks only in dualisms.” Against this background of recent discoveries and conclusions in the natural sciences Gebser discerned the outlines of a potential human universality. He also sensed the necessity to go beyond the confines of this first treatise so as to include the humanities (such as political economics and sociology) as well as the arts in a discussion along similar lines. This was the point of departure of The Ever-Present Origin. From In memoriam Jean Gebser by Jean Keckeis. (shrink)

The essay discloses dimensions of communicative awareness, which are both local and general in the sense that they are recognised in all civilisations and pervade the researches of anthropologists, archeologists and historians. These dimensions are bodily activities composed of six practical orientations: up-down, left-right and forward-backward. Our social architecture, our systems of practical implements, our spaces and times of orientations are inscribed by both, the specific bodily situations and their silent background in all communicative awareness. Even languages are variations on (...) these silent dimensions of activities: we face the future – a forward orientation; we leave the past behind – pertaining to our backward dimension; there are upper and lower social classes, left and right political movements. These silent dimensions are both universal and contingent. (shrink)

The main theses of the article show the ways that various groups, whether ethnic, racial, religious or even ideological fall prey to monological positions without recognizing their own limitations. Thus they assume a “universal” position as all inclusive and true to reality itself. Those who hold such a position are not cognizant that without dialogical engagement there would not be a position. In this sense, the dialogical encounter allows one to have a position and its limitation. Moreover, monological positions tend (...) to define others in such a way, that the others accept such definitions and become part of a specific monologue. The article is designed to show the ways of extricating oneself from monological posturing. (shrink)

The discussion follows the logic of Western modern metaphysics (mathematical) and ontology (atomistic materialism) in order to demonstrate how scientific discourses assumed a power to construct the environment. A discourse of any discipline is constructed on the basis of its value to be applied on the material, homogeneous environment, to yield desired technical products, including genetic, chemical, electronic, physiological, etc. Thus, each discourse contains the ‘power’ to remake the environment in accordance with its rules. The result is the following: environment (...) is a discursive construct. Such constructivism is accepted by post-modern writers who claim that all discourses are a power which determines how we understand and treat the environment. (shrink)

Born in Posen in 1905, Jean Gebser came from an old Franconian family domiciled in Thuringia since 1236. A nephew of German chancellor von Bethmann-Hollweg, he was a descendant on his mother's side of Luther's friend Melanchthon. He was educated in Breslau, Konigsberg, Rossleben, and at the University of Berlin. In 1929 Gebser emigrated to Italy and subsequently lived in Spain where he was attached to the Ministry of Education of the Spanish Republic. From 1937-1939 he lived in Paris in (...) the circle which included Picasso, Andre Malraux, Paul Eluard, and Louis Aragon. In 1939 he made his permanent home in Switzerland where he became a citizen in 1951. For many years Gebser was Lecturer at the Institute of Applied Psychology in Zurich and was later appointed honorary Professor of Comparative Studies of Civilization at the University of Salzburg, Austria. For his many publications, including books on Rilke, his friend Federico Garcia Lorca, recent developments in the sciences, East-West relations, evolution, and twentieth century civilization and its antecedents, Gebser received several prizes, including a share of the German Schiller prize, the literary award of the Esslingen Artist's Guild, the Koggen prize of the City of Minden, and the literary award of the City of Berne. He died in Berne on May 14, 1973.". (shrink)

The chapter exposes a history of the “Husserl Circle”.

_The New Yearbook for Phenomenology and Phenomenological Philosophy_ provides an annual international forum for phenomenological research in the spirit of Husserl's groundbreaking work and the extension of this work by such figures as Scheler, Heidegger, Sartre, Levinas, Merleau-Ponty and Gadamer.

The essay provides arguments and the disclosure of principles which are at the base of the modern Western understanding of the world and the human role in it. The principles are ontological, i.e., the conception of nature as a sum of material, atomic parts, and metaphysical, i.e., mathematics as a basis of scientific theories and methods. The conjunction of these principles constitutes what is known as “instrumental reason,” resulting in the universal technological globalization and nomadic civilization. The latter is composed (...) of detached, technical experts, capable of residing anywhere without any cultural or ethnic commitments. The results of their activities are a global network of technical means both for global nomadic tourism and anonymous associations without personal involvement. (shrink)

The scientific modern Western pronouncement that everything has to be treated with objective impartiality requires the positing of our own culture as one among others, having no value claim to be privileged in its various pronouncements. The claim to scientific objectivity is an aspect of Western modern culture and belongs only to its interpretive context. Hence, the very claim to Western scientific superiority as having methods to access all phenomena objectively is a culture bound position that cannot be universal. After (...) all, “objectively speaking” other cultures, as equal, have very different understandings that do not include such tandems as “objectivity” or for that matter “subjectivity.” Culturally objectively speaking, we cannot deny them their different reading of cultural, and indeed all other, phenomena. To say that the others are wrong would be tantamount to saying that we have a criterion of the “right culture” which belongs only to our culture. But in this sense, one abolishes the treatment of other cultures as given objectively and equivalently. We then would posit our scientific culture as universal and require that all others interpret themselves in terms of our own requirements. If social theory is part of modern western culture, then it is limited by that culture and cannot claim universality. (shrink)

The article explicates one significant, although usually overlooked, aspect of all arts: cosmos. Numerous ontological, metaphysical, epistemological, psychological, sociological, and even moralistic factors were discussed throughout the entire history of philosophy, each offering its own version as to the nature and meaning of art. Yet it constantly appeared that something is missing from all these analyses and claims, although it was involved in any art - space, time and movement - cosmic composition. As Kant had sharply demonstrated, this composition is (...) a necessary, a priori condition of all experience, all philosophical and scientific explanations. Given this demonstration, the article shows the ways that space-time-movement is articulated at various levels of awareness and how such an articulation is initiated by art. In this sense, arts are the leading edge of all advancements in philosophy, sciences, and even transformations of daily awareness. (shrink)

In this book, the authors present current research in the study of Cosmic Passion for the Aesthetic. It engages arts from different tradition, showing their cultural contexts and discloses dimensions of awareness that transgress the characteristics of art works. This book delves into the deeper meaning of art, and shows how various cultures attempt to suppress other cultures and their arts, and how the suppressed reappear and reassert themselves in new contexts. It travels through different conceptions, speculations, definitions and portrays (...) how the aesthetic, the expressive, that is not identical with the characteristics of an art work, is what all art works attempt to capture. The aesthetic encompasses the passionate dimension which is not limited or reducible to anything -- it is cosmic. The latter is disclosed by the aesthetic passion that is most apparent in comparative studies of arts, above all through examining the art of India, the text visually captures the aesthetic, cosmic passion. In addition, it questions what is aesthetic value, judgements on art, the authors draw on how the depictions of the cosmic in art can assume a way of understanding specific interpretation of space, time and movement prior to any theological, mythical, theoretical or even scientific explanations and portray a flow of sensuous envelopment which resonates with cosmic passion. This book would interest not only artists, but students of cultures and comparative civilisations, and indeed for those who are interested in the ways that cosmic awareness has been and is being explicated in civilisations. (shrink)

Contemporary European theories have focused attention on corporeity, its surface excitations and passions, and even on politically constructed bodies – how do men and women “carry their bodies”. The great variety of such claims suggests transformations in theoretical thinking, yet such changes were already articulated at another level by phenomenological studies: kinesthetic body. It is obvious that to speak of corporeity is possible only on the basis of analyses of corporeal movements. Thus, the aim of this essay is to disclose (...) the structures of bodily movements, constituting the basis of primordial awareness – not “I think” but “I can”. In the essay there are presented a number of theses of post modernists who have not developed adequate analyses of corporeal movements. (shrink)

Algis Mickiinas savo straipsnyje svarsto moder- niojo mokslo ir filosofijos ivykdytq tikroves "su- skliaudimo" judesi, leidusi semiotikams ir dekonst- rukcininkarns teigti kalbq arba diskursq esant pirmi- ne ir svarbiausia galios forma, pasirei3banEia visose 2mogiSkojo patyrimo ir praktikos srityse. Autoriaus tikslas - analizuojant 3i "suskliaudimq" atverti ypa- tingas struktiiras, "kurios niekam nepriklauso ir yra niekur neaptinkamos, ta&au yra esmingiausiy miisy modemiojo hojimo modalumy pamatas". Autorius teigia, jog wenamasis pasaulis - morfologiSkai kon- stituoty ir intuityviai suvokiarny ivykiy ir objekty pa- saulis - (...) yra suskliaudiiamas mokslinio skepsio, o pa- grindu laikoma transcendentine ir homogeniika tik- rove neatsiveria pojiiEiams. Teorinio-metodologinio formalizmo konstitucija, stokojanti intuityvaus as- pekto, neturi vertikalaus matmens ir tegali biiti arti- kuliuota horizontaliai, nuosekliavienalaypte progre-sija, remiantis savo paEios vidinemis taisyklemis. Ji neturi jokio biitino rySio su transcendentine homo- geni3ka tikrove; Sis rySys - arbitralus ir lemia tai, jog tikrovei primetami atsitiktinai parinkti forrnaliai kon- stituoti metodai. Sitoks arbitralus teorinio-metodo- loginio formalizmo ir w e n a m o pasaulio rySys Mic- kiinui leidiia interpretuoti modernyji progresq kaip autoreferentiSkq, subjekto n e t u ~ t j reiskini, kaip ar- bitraly riby nepaisymq, ir moderniqjq galiq kaip de- centralizuotq atsakomybq, kaip "galiq be priehties", kuriq palaiko ir maitina beribes formaliy ir materia- liy konstrukcijy galimybb. 'Ibks visur i3plitqs bet kobo veiksmo arbitralumo ir riby nebuvimo pojiitis ir yra, anot autoriaus, niidienos humanizmo krizes esme. Raktiniai ZodZiai: fenomenologija, swkliaudi- mas, gyvenamasis pasaulis, teorinis-metodologinis f o m l ~. (shrink)

The interest in television programming, its content, even its semiotics and at times the various levels of rhetoric, economic context and controlling interests, have been thoroughly analyzed. This is even the case with the analyses of the phenomenon of reruns, although one could surmise that the analyses are somewhat artificial. What has been left out of these important contributions are some of the most fundamental compositions of media in general and television in particular. These compositions will be called ontological, i.e. (...) explicating the presumed nature of media, all the way to its very substance. The latter can only be intimated, since the more comprehensible aspects will be offered first. (shrink)

Japan and Zen -- Zen and the West -- India and Zen -- Zazen -- Awareness and self -- Upsurging awarenesss.

The article analyses the relation between globalization and the responsibility of the intellectual. Inthe context of globalization the question of the responsibility of the intellectual is problematic. Thatis why we have to ponder on intellectual modesty and human measure of Socrates trying to analysethe phenomenon of globalization. The author discusses the dualism of the act and potency by Aristotle, that of mind and body by Descartes, the concept of the thing-in-itself by Kant and the radicalprinciple by Hegel, and the utopias (...) of Marxism and Capitalism at the end. The discussion is focused onthe following question: does the logic of globalization has metaphysical roots, or it is just untenableclaim to reduce all the cultures to the worldwide one without the possibility of the responsibility ofthe intellectual?Key words: homogeneity, metaphysical foundations of globalization, ontological debate, reflection, identity, universality. (shrink)

The essay is designed to disclose one aspect of modern Western civilization that has become theground for what is known as “globalization.” The argument is presented that this civilization is premisedon formal systems that are not derivable either from physical or from empirical grounds. Such systemsare constructs and their connection with the environment is technical and productive. Thus the selectionamong the systems to be applied depends on social valuations with respect to their usefulness. Thecurrent global systems of internet communication have (...) no physical presence; they are purely “signitive”in the sense that they have no specific space-time location, although can be embodied at any time andany place. Such systems provide an invisible net that can be utilized to access and communicate messagesabout all events around the globe. The argument that such communication although very fast, takessome time, since the logic of this communication is signitive, a net of meanings that by themselves, asa matter of course define even space and time. It can be stated without a contradiction that theinvisible signitive world is a variant of traditional metaphysics, such as Plato’s understanding ofmathematics, or the world of ideas.Keywords: global, science, logic, signification, value, technology, space-time. (shrink)

Fenomenologinė refleksija gali parodyti kiek „Aš esu ten“ kaip faktiškumas yra esmiškai koreliuotas su pasaulio horizontu ir šis „Aš esu ten“ nėra jokia esybė pasaulyje. Tai reiškia, kad savastis kaip pastovumas kisme nėra esybės tęstinumas laike ir jos tikslas nėra laikiška determinacija. Tačiau kaip temporalizacija ji gali suponuoti laikišką determinaciją. Lingvistiniai įpročiai gali mus versti ieškoti laikiškų apibrėžčių. Kaip pastebėjo Husserlis, lingvistinė artikuliacija veda prie ontifikacijos ir todėl reikalauja atnaujinto epoche atlikimo. Epoche naudojama siekiant parodyti, jog savastis nėra kažkas, kas (...) egzistuoja kaip esybė pasaulyje. Tokia fenomenologija gali atskleisti refleksijos ir jos konstituotos dialektikos ribas. Kalba absoliutina refleksiją veikiančią su ontifikuotų konceptų pagalba. Tai negali panaikinti transcendentalios iliuzijos apie prieštaringas apibrėžtis, nes įtraukta į kalbą reflektyvi mintis yra dialektikos šaltinis. Šiame lygmenyje sprendimai negalimi. Genetinės fenomenologijos analizė skirta pirminiam transcendentalaus gyvenimo funkcionavimui yra retrogresija į dialektikos pagrindus ir į iki-dialektinio gyvenimo pasireiškimą. Esminiai žodžiai: fenomenologija, dialektika, epoche, Husserlis, Kantas.Phenomenological reflection can show to what extent the “I am there” as a facticity is an irrevocable correlation to the world horizon and thus the “I am there” is not a being in the world as an entity. This means that the self, as an inactor of functions, as a continuity in changes, is not a continuity of an entity in time, and that its aim orientation is not a temporal determination. As temporalization, it cannot presuppose temporal determinations. Of course linguistic habits may compel us to assume temporal determinations. But as Husserl had noted, linguistic articulations lead to ontification and thus require the renewed use of the epoche. The epoche here is used to show that what the self is not something, an entity in the world. Thus phenomenology can reveal the limits of reflection and its constituted dialectics. Language absolutizes reflection which deals with ontified concepts. It cannot abolish the transcendental illusion of contradictory determinations, since reflective thought imbedded in language is the source of dialectics. At this level no solutions are possible. The genetic phenomenology analysis of the primordial functioning of the transcendental life is a retrogression into the ground of dialectics and the manifestation of the pre-dialectical life.Key words: phenomenology, dialectics, epoche, Husserl, Kant. (shrink)

The essay explicates the formation of inter-subjective awareness which is a necessary ground of any lifeworld. It discloses the temporally and spatially non-positional awareness which comprises the continuously extensioning and deepening polycentric field of perceptions. The field is accessible to anyone and anytime and thus provides an ahistorical background for any historical time and location of events in such a time. This non-positional awareness is transcendental and is inadequate for the understanding of the presence of individual differentiations. As universal, it (...) consists of eidetic structures that are common to everyone. Hence the essay shows that while history is accessible at this level, it also shows another dimension of awareness – the corporeal – at which history is made, built in concrete projects. The making is premised on the awareness of the primacy of “I can” which consists of acquired abilities, in distinction to those of others providing the differentiation among individuals engaged in concrete tasks. The analyses, at this level, show the ways the engaged activities comprise “inter-corporeal” commonalities and individuating differentiations. (shrink)

The essay explicates the phenomenological problematic of intersubjectivity on the level of bodily interaction with the world and with others. On this level, the concept of visibility is transformed in terms of the primacy of bodily “I can” and the kinaesthetic awareness that pervades all perceptual fields. In addition, the investigations into kinaesthetic awareness lead to the understanding that one’s own bodily action is extended as well as varied by the kinaesthetic activities of others and thus form an inter-corporeal field (...) wherein visibility is located. Such an extended awareness is the bodily counterpart of transcendental domain. (shrink)

The essay is designed to investigate the foundations of the conjunction of modern/postmodern premises that the world is a construct of discourses and their power. Such premises require the exclusion of the world of perception, including the lived world, and the appearance of the modern subject and its specific interpretation of reality. The question is as follows: how must the modern subject access such reality when it is assumed that such reality is not accessible to direct, perceptual intuition? Here we (...) encounter the way how the subject must construct methodological and theoretical discourses which do not represent, but ‘make’ modern reality. (shrink)

Straipsnyje tyrinėjamas kompleksinis fenomenologinių patyrimo struktūrų ir empirinės plotmės sąryšis. Siekiama apibrėžti dviejų objektyvumo plotmių koreliaciją: eidetinių patirties struktūrų ir empirinės plotmės. Ši koreliacija yra labai sudėtinga. Netgi atskiri empiriniai fenomenai turi būti apibrėžiami per patirties struktūras, su kuriomis jie yra koreliuoti. Empiriniai komunikacijos tyrimai turi atsižvelgti į patirties struktūras, kurios užtikrina Santraukaempirinę duotį. Tuo pat metu jie turi empirinius faktus susieti su kalbiniais kontekstais. Dar daugiau, komunikacijos tyrinėjimai kultūrinių objektyvybių lygmenyje turi analizuoti ne tik empirijos koreliaciją su ženklų sistemomis, (...) bet ir ženklų tarpusavio sąry-šius bei tarp pačių ženklų atsirandančią prasmę. Esminiai žodžiai: fenomenologija, patirties struktūros, empiriniai duomenys, kalba, išraiška, komunikacija, ženklai.This paper has hardly hinted at the complexity of the relationship between phenomenological-experiential structures and the empirical domain; it attempted to sketch a simple correlation, or lack thereof, between the two domains of objectivity: the eidetic-experiential structures and the empirical domain. The correlations are extremely complex. Even the singular empirical phenomenon has to be delimited in terms of experiential structures which are correlated to it. Empirical researches in communication must respect the experiential structures as parameters within which the empirical data are present. At the same time it must contextualize the empirical factors within linguistic fields. Moreover, communication researches at the level of cultural objectivity must forego the search of empirical correlates to the sign systems and deal with the relationships among the signs and the meaning which emerges between the signs. Key words: phenomenology, experiential structures, empirical data, language, expression, communication, signs. (shrink)

Cultural and historical variability is completely overwhelming and within its context it is almostimpossible to decipher something “essential”, some “invariant variable” which would comprise a clueto what the human is, – this idea is presented as the main presupposition of Eugen Fink’s philosophicalanthropology. A major direction of Fink’s works is a fundamental critique of traditional ontology anda search for a worldly thinking that would be more appropriate or implicit in human “worldly” existence.While following Husserl’s transcendental philosophy, Fink opened up a (...) new philosophical domainthat is implicit in transcendental mode of awareness. His effort consisted in “revealing” what is alreadyamidst us, what we have silently guessed and lived but dared not speak. This “revelation” is at thebasis of Fink’s conception of education. Education is a movement from authority to autonomy, fromsubmission to “pregiven” and ready-made answers toward the creative, the free activity which is itsown source.Keywords: being human, temporality, freedom, productivity, creativity, political self-understanding. (shrink)

Neįmanoma aprėpti visą temų ir kontroversijų, sutelktų aplink dialoginį ir eventualiai poli-loginį mąstymą įvairovę. Šis tematinis horizontas skleidžiasi nuo nekvestionuotinų racionalaus diskurso pagrindų paieškų iki socialinių struktūrų steigties anapus kalbinio tarpininko galimybių tyrinėjimų. Šis straipsnis nėra sumanytas kaip lakoniška begalės darbų apžvalga. Jo paskirtis veikiau yra atskleisti pagrindinių debatų tarp Vokiečių teoretikų plėtotę, reflektuojant pamatines komunikatyvinės praktikos problemas. Pirmiausia straipsnyje pristatomos su įvairiais bandymais pagrįsti poli-logines praktikas susijusios kontraversijos. Tačiau tai nėra prieštara tarp fundacionistų ir įvairių jiems oponuojančių antifundacionistų. Veikiau (...) taip stengiamasi užaštrinti poziciją ir nužymėti jos lūžio tašką. Antra, straipsnyje bus atidengtos kai kurios normatyvioje sferoje iškylančios kontraversijos, kuriose susikerta įvairūs politiniai, socialiniai ir techniniai klausimai. Dėmesio centras bus sutelktas ties problemomis, susijusiomis su tam tikrų principų, numatomų poli-loginės praktikos konteksto teisių ir pareigų, adekvatumu arba neadekvatumu.Esminiai žodžiai: dialogas, kalba, poli-loginė praktika, komunikacinė praktika.The diversity of themes and controversies focusing on the dialogical and by extension on poli-logical thought can be hardly surveyed. Topics range from ultimate founding of poli-logical to investigations in the way the social fabric might appear without the mediation of language. This essay is not designed to offer one paragraph surveys of numerous works, but to unfold some of the main debates among German theorists focusing on some crucial issues in communicative praxis. First, the essay will present the controversies concerned with the efforts at founding of poli-logical praxis. This is not to be seen as a controversy between foundationalists and their various antifoundationalist opponents. Rather, it is more like an effort to push a thesis to a limit and to note its breaking point. Second, the essay will present some of the controversies in the normative area which is criss-crossed by various political, social, and technical concerns. The emphasis will be placed on the problems concerning the adequacies or inadequacies of some of the principles involved in the rights and duties in the context of poli-logical praxis.Key words: dialog, language, poli-logical praxis, communicative praxis. (shrink)

The essay is designed to present the phenomena of popular culture, its difference from pop culture, both products of modern West, and their impact on film and advertisement media in India. First, the discussion focuses on the Critical School which proposed the initial thesis of commodification of culture with a resultant “lowering” of standards to appeal to “the masses”, and an appeal to the “average” tastes. In the essay an argument is presented that pop culture is a “critique” of popular (...) culture and is an elitist position attempting to shock popular mores and media content. Given this setting, it is argued that while India has followed both the globalizing popular and pop cultures, neither are adequate to encompass Indian media, specifically their film content. (shrink)

Events in the contemporary world are available through a great variety of media and most of them consist of images, seemingly reflecting some "reality". Yet there is no clear understanding what constitutes reflection, image, cultural symbolic designs and who is the reflecting Self. The text investigates the difference between visuality, images, vision and the different concepts of reality which are at the base of our understanding of the great varieties of means for reflection - from theological to technical.

There are various accounts for the war in Ukraine; this essay is not contesting such accounts but, taking the classical understanding of the war between Sparta and Athens, elucidated by Thucydides, there seems to be a “hidden reason”. The latter is the declining political significance of Sparta and the expanding importance of Athens. The brief analysis of the war by Thucydides is used to establish a framework for clear understanding of behavior of nations and their leaders when, despite an absense (...) of military threat, they opt for war. Given this context, the question arises why Russia, not being threatened militarily, opts for war against its harmless neighbor. The Soviet Union was a global power equivalent to NATO alliance, and this power was inherited by Russia. The latter could not be afraid of military invasion by the West and yet it opted for war aiming to demonstrate that it is as significant as the West. The difference between Traditional Russian autocracy and modern Western democracy is such that the latter “crosses borders” by attraction and not by military power. (shrink)

The article draws a comparison between the Peloponnesian War between ancient Sparta and Athens, on the one hand, and Russia and the West, on the other. Rather than economic and utilitarian ethics, the author proposes that aggression on the part of oppressive as opposed to democratic regimes is driven by the fear of future insignificance. Democracies represent a threat to autocracies not so much by their military power and expansionist politics, but by their very existence, openness, and the freedoms they (...) grant their citizens. This framework is used to explain Russia’s imperialist aggression and oppression of its neighbors and its fear of democracy. (shrink)

The essay explicates the essence and the limits of the life world of enlightenment in terms of its basic notion of primacy of the will and constructed values to be realized in and through instrumental reason. It shows that at the level of values, all events, including humans, are equivalent to the extent that they can be treated as means for the sake of better life, security, greed, production, technical progress, genetic manipulation, and even social functioning. This leveling leads to (...) a question of criteria among the world of values: which values are “worth” having, and such a criterion cannot be one more value among others. Resultantly, the “background” awareness that led to enlightenment comes to the fore to raise the question of legitimation of the entire life world of values: the criterion is “self-worth” with its specific characteristics of action: honor, self-other respect, dignity, truthfulness. Can the life world of all values allow self-worth to be enacted? (shrink)

The essay is a phenomenological study of Russian literature as a point of critique of two lifeworlds: the traditional Russian Feudalism with its “decadent” aristocracy, and the modern Western Enlightenment with its values, specifically the “subjective” construction of val-uations of all environment and human activities. Russian writers, from Turgenev all the way to Gogol found themselves between those two worlds and sought an answer which of them answers the existential question of human self-worth as an “eidetic” criterion of all values (...) and life worlds, given in direct awareness. Self-worth does not belong to the world of categories, but is apparent in active commitments, such as being truthful, honorable, other and self respect‒dimensions absent among modern values.El ensayo es un estudio fenomenológico de la literatura rusa como un punto de crítica de dos mundos: el Feudalismo ruso tradicional con su aristocracia "decadente" y la Ilustración occidental moderna con sus valores —concretamente, la construcción "subjetiva" de evaluaciones de todo tipo de ambiente y actividades humanas. Los escritores rusos, desde Turgenev hasta Gogol, se encontraron entre esos dos mundos y buscaron una respuesta que respondiera a la cuestión existencial de la auto-estima humana como un criterio "eidético" de todos los valores y mundos de la vida, dado en conciencia directa. La autoestima no pertenece al mundo de las categorías, sino que se manifiesta en los compromisos activos, tales como ser veraz, ser honorable, respeto propio y ajeno —dimensiones ausentes entre los valores modernos. (shrink)