Habermas poses the idea of the ”post-metaphysical”. (For later)
The teacher decided that it could be pedagogical to learn about post-metaphysical philosophy before metaphysical.
Post-post-metaphysics.
Parmenides called the founder of metaphysics, though so is Aristotle.
Parmenides is however the first to talk about ”Being”.
”Parmenides however seems to speak with rather more insight. For holding as he does, that Not-being, as constrasted with being, is nothing, he necessarily supposes that being is one and that there is nothing else.; but being compelled to accord with phenomena, and assuming that Being is one in definition many in respect of sensation, he posits in his turn two causes, ie. Two first principles, Hot and Cold.”
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Aristotle on Parmenides.
Aristotle touches on the paradox between the one and the many, an important problem in metaphysics.
Metaphysics as ”identity-thinking”
”Many a heart drifts away in generality,
But the noblest devotes itself to the One”
-Goethe.
Metaphysicians try to think about the ”One”.
Philosophy originally ties to chase away the initial mythical depictions with something that is somehow ”more general”, the notion of the One, the Good or the Idea – Logos
Not one among the many, but one which is transcendent from the many.
→ thus we instead later get God.
First there is Unity or Identity, then there is Transcendence.
Habermas talks of different layers of abstractness, using Greek, and/or, christian thought who stands above the world, or then there are also a group of gods, less abstract. At the most abstract there is Being.
The postmetaphysical scene
Depicts a change seen in 20:th century philosophy wherein people no longer think about ”the One”, but rather as he says;
”The order of things that is found in the world itself no longer counts as rational; instead, what counts as rational is solving prolems successfully through procedurally suitable dealing with reality.”
→ rather than God, we have grounded problems which we see ourselves and can ”deal with”.
20:th century thought saw a turn to or return of ”procedure”
Inspired by the scientific methodology, specifically Francis Bacon’s Novum Organum
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(new) Organon (aristoteles)
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early theories about how the scientific method works.
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no clear end to the science
An absence of a pre-ordained order, eg. the sort of stuff seen in MacBeth,
relates to the same idea as Nietzsche’s Death of God.
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The loss of the absolute values
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The development of secularisation from the enlightenment onward
”The madman jumped into their midst and pierced them with his eyes. ”Where is god?” He cried. ”I’ll tell you! We have killed – you and I! We are his murderers.’”
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The Gay Science, Nietzsche.
Habermas still believes in ”the One” but a ”weak” version of it.
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He does not think we should be going back to classical positivistic science.
Habermas’ Context:
Leading figure in post-war German thought
Considered to be second-generation Frankfurt school
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A self-aware historian of philosophy.
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Postmetaphysical thinking from 1992
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”Also a History of Philosophy” 2019
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Forwarded the idea of the ”post-secular” society → ie. We live in a secular society but one that recognises that religion won’t go away. Further promotes dialogue between religous and secular communities.
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Main contribution: ”Communicative Reason”
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”Rational beings need to actually talk things out.”
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Communication is something linguistic that involves understanding and some kind of agreement, the effective use of language.
Furthermore, it relies on the use of reason, that requires reasoning subjects.”
→ Habermas tries to bridge the linguistic turn with the philosophies of life and consciousness.
The task of the presenters:
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Before: read the assigned texts, do extra research if necessary, discuss with other group members.
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During: Answer the questions in your own language, make your delivers is clear. (Visual aids are encouraged.)
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After: Prepare topics for discussions, takes questions from the audience.
The Linguistic Turn
It could be
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”A mere medium for the speaker’s intention.” or it could be
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”Something solid and independent, with its own logic.”
The linguistic turn takes the second of the two positions.
Language is a fundamental method for doing philosophical thinking, because it is the very one procedural method that is necessarily involved in all modes of philsophical thought.
”I shall mean by ’linguistic philosophy’ the view that philosophical problems are problems which may be solved (or dissolved) either by reforming language or by understanding more about the language we presently use.”
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Rorty.
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Holds that language is the only problem that really matters.
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Logical positivism (logical atomism) vs. Ordinary language philosophy.
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Eg. Frege, who wanted to formalise language as something that can be understood like math, and can thus be standardised (logical atomism).
”Another example is thr word ”God” in its mythological use of the word has a clearer meaning, used to denote physical beings which are enthroned on mount Olympos. In its metaphysical use, on the other hand, the word God refers to something beyond experience. The word is deliberately divested of its reference to a physical being to a spiritual being that is immanent in the physical. And as it is not given a new meaning, it becomes meaningless.”
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Rudolf Carnap
Philosophy of Consciousness
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Largely speaking, language is not really a problem that matters.
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The problem of (self-)consciousness
It is rather talking about intentionality, subjectivity and human experience. Language is rather a tool.
”A rough division of epochs in the history of philosophy in therms of ”being”, ”consciousness” and ”language” the corresponding modes of thought as ontology, the philosophy of consciousness and then linguistic analysis.”
-Habermas
Here, ”subject” is rather seen as the method, rather than language.
This begins quite early, being attested by the professor to see beginnings as early as Descartes.
Doing philosophy must be grounded in the subject that is doing it.
According to descartes step-by-step method, which is meant to purify:
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ruling out false opinions: ”I had long before remarked that, in relation to practice, it is sometimes necessary to adopt, as if above doubt, opinions which we discern to be highly uncertain, as has been already said.”
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Ruling out our senses: ”seeing that our senses sometimes deceive us, I was willing to suppose that there existed nothing really.”
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Ruling out demonstrations: ”And because some men err in reasoning and fall into paralogisms, even on the simplest matters of geometry, I, convinced that I was as open to error as any other, rejected as false all the reasonings I had hitherto taken for demonstrations.”
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Ruling out presentations: ”I supposed that all the objects that had ever entered into mymind when awake, had in them no more truth than the illusions of my dreams.”
→ leads to the cogito.
- Descartes achievment is the beginning of the philosophy of consciousness.
→ leading later to Kant, as well as later Husserl.
Kant, The Transcendental Subject:
Something that both stands outside of the world but also holds it together.
”The I-think must be able to accompany all my representations; for otherwise something would be represented in me that could not be thought at all. I also call its unity the trascendental unity of self-consciousness in order to designate the possibillity of a priori cognition from it.”
The common link that convinces you of things that really aren’t the same are the same, is you.
The subject constitutes the identical being of the world, or the sameness of the world.
The world however, isn’t something we see, but rather something we constitute through the transcendetal subject holding the world together.
”The world-constituting synthesis of reason (or of subjectivity)” – Habermas.
Consciousness is responsible for the creating of the world.
Husserl: An ego (the I) holds things together and constitutes them.