Religion and Toleration from the Enlightenment to the Post-Secular Era

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rainer Forst
Keyword(s):  
Immanuel Kant ◽  
Recent Work ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Fundamental Question ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Human Reason ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Pierre Bayle ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter addresses the classical question of the relationship between enlightenment and religion. In doing so, the chapter compares Jürgen Habermas's thought to that of Pierre Bayle and Immanuel Kant. For, although Habermas undoubtedly stands in a tradition founded by Bayle and Kant, he develops a number of important orientations within this tradition and has changed his position in his recent work. The chapter studies this change to understand Habermas's position better. It also draws attention to a fundamental question raised by the modern world: what common ground can human reason establish in the practical and theoretical domain between human beings who are divided by profoundly different religious (including antireligious) views?

Music Transcendent and Sublime

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip V. Bohlman
Keyword(s):  
Immanuel Kant ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Universal History ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
The Sublime ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Masses ◽  
Form Of Expression

The translations in Song Loves the Masses close with Herder’s final large-scale essay on music, published in 1800 as a chapter in Kalligone, the culmination of his aesthetic work. With this late essay Herder, a polemic against his former teacher, Immanuel Kant (1724–1804), reveals the extent to which he has moved into a fully aesthetic domain in his concern for the universal history of humanity. Embodying the subjectivity of song and singing, music acquires the force of transcendence, and it therefore aspires to the Enlightenment ideals of the sublime. In Herder’s “On Music,” human beings are endowed with a degree of understanding that allows them to perceive the traits that make music unlike any other form of expression.

Edwards the Mentor

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rhys S. Bezzant
Keyword(s):  
Jonathan Edwards ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Face To Face ◽  
Cultural Engagement ◽  
Mentoring Relationship ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Metropolitan Cities ◽  
The One

Among his many accolades, Jonathan Edwards was an effective mentor who trained many leaders for the church. Though his pastoral work is often overlooked, this book investigates the background, method, theological rationale, and legacy of his mentoring ministry. He does what mentors normally do—meeting with individuals to discuss ideas and grow in skills—but undertakes these activities in a distinctly modern or affective key. His correspondence is composed in an informal style, his understanding of friendship and conversation takes up the conventions of the great metropolitan cities of Europe of his day, his pedagogical commitments are surprisingly progressive, and his aspirations for those he mentors are bold and subversive. The practice of mentoring is presented in this book as the exchange between authority and agency, in which the more experienced person in the mentoring relationship empowers the one in the position of a learner, whose own character and competencies are nurtured. When Edwards explains his mentoring practice theologically, he expounds the theme of seeing God face to face, which recognizes that human beings learn through the example of friends as well as the exposition of propositions. The book is a case study in cultural engagement, for Edwards deliberately takes up certain features of the modern world in his mentoring and yet resists other pressures that the Enlightenment generated. If his world witnessed the philosophical evacuation of God from the created order, Edwards’s mentoring is designed to draw God back into an intimate connection with human experience.

scholarly journals Documentary and ecosemiotics: Frames and faces in the work of Johan van der Keuken

2016 ◽  
Vol 44 (1/2) ◽  
pp. 186-208
Author(s):  
Hing Tsang
Keyword(s):  
Recent Work ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Coastal Area ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Urban Environments ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Physical Processes ◽  
Natural Habitats ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
The Relationship

This article argues that the work of the late Johan van der Keuken offers a contribution to ecological semiotics, and that it also defines the relationship between the semiotic animal and nature in ways that avoid glottocentricism. Taking from the recent work of Kalevi Kull, Jesper Hoffmeyer, and John Deely amongst others, I will argue that van der Keuken’s documentaries offer a view of ecology that is broader than a study of bio-physical processes that might reduce ecology to a narrow political issue.In order to support this argument, I will be looking at two contrasting films from van der Keuken – Flat Jungle (1978) and Face Value (1991). The first film examines natural habitats within a confined coastal area in Western Europe, while the second film looks at human beings in the different urban environments of late-20th-century Europe. I will then argue that van der Keuken does not collapse the vital distinctions between umwelt and Lebenswelt, yet his films also succeed at reminding us of their constant interdependence.

scholarly journals The modern age and a sense of presence

2021 ◽  
Vol 64 (2) ◽  
pp. 69-78
Author(s):  
Jelena Djuric
Keyword(s):  
External World ◽  
The State ◽  
Human Existence ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Modern Age ◽  
Sense Of Presence ◽  
Qualitative Nature ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Relationship

In this paper, the idea of human existence is related to current issues of identities within a complex, technologically globalized modern world. Kierkegaard?s discourse seems very useful in this regard, because of its vivid narrative about obstacles arrising from the superficial offerings of freedom and knowledge that essentially supress the individual?s inner development. By conceptualizing existence and reason as polarities of human experience, it is not possible to implement the existential immediacy of the relationship between knowable structure of Being and the living issues of human beings. That is why, I sugest, their relating, which emerges from the qualitative nature of the state of presence - simultaneously belonging to individual?s interiority and to the external world - is of great importance.

Kantian ethics

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Onora O’Neill
Keyword(s):  
Immanuel Kant ◽  
Kantian Ethics ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Moral Agents ◽  
Universal Principles ◽  
Reasoning About Action ◽  
Contemporary Work ◽  
Conception Of The Good ◽  
Kant's Ethics ◽  
The Relationship

Kantian ethics originates in the ethical writings of Immanuel Kant (1724–1804), which remain the most influential attempt to vindicate universal ethical principles that respect the dignity and equality of human beings without presupposing theological claims or a metaphysical conception of the good. Kant’s systematic, critical philosophy centres on an account of reasoning about action, which he uses to justify principles of duty and virtue, a liberal and republican conception of justice with cosmopolitan scope, and an account of the relationship between morality and hope. Numerous contemporary writers also advance views of ethics which they, and their critics, think of as Kantian. However, some contemporary work is remote from Kant’s philosophy on fundamental matters such as human freedom and reasoning about action. It converges with Kant’s ethics in claiming that we lack a substantive account of the good (so that teleological or consequentialist ethics are impossible), in taking a strong view of the equality of moral agents and the importance of universal principles of duty which spell out what it is to respect them, and in stressing an account of justice and rights with cosmopolitan scope. Both Kant’s ethics and contemporary Kantian ethics have been widely criticized for preoccupation with rules and duties, and for lack of concern with virtues, happiness or personal relationships. However, these criticisms may apply more to recent Kantian ethics than to Kant’s own ethics.

Balibar, citizenship, and the return of right populism

2019 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 323-341
Author(s):  
Geoff Pfeifer
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Immanuel Kant ◽  
Recent Work ◽  
State System ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Nation State ◽  
Philosophical Thought ◽  
The Third ◽  
Full Benefit ◽  
The Right

Arendt famously pointed out that only citizenship actually confers rights in the modern world. To be a citizen is to be one who has the ‘right to have rights’. Arendt’s analysis emerges out of her recognition that there is a contradiction between this way of conferring rights as tied to the nation-state system and the more philosophical and ethical conceptions of the ‘rights of man’ and notions of ‘human rights’ like those championed by thinkers such as Immanuel Kant who understands rights belonging universally to all humans as a result of facts having to do with what it means to be human. Étienne Balibar, in his recent work, adds to this by pointing out that there is a contradictory movement between this universalizing tendency in philosophical thought and the production of the citizen-subject out of the exclusionary acts of law and force. In this article, I put Balibar’s work in dialogue with the contemporary moment where we are witnessing the re-emergence of a nativist right populism. I use Balibar to help distinguish between three modes of political existence that we find today. Two of these three are more or less well understood. They are the non-citizen, who has no – or almost no – rights in a given nation-state and the citizen who enjoys the full benefit of the rights a given nation-state has to give. The third category is what I term the ‘nominal citizen’. This last category is somewhere in between full citizenship and non-citizenship. Individuals in this last category have rights in name but are largely unable to exercise them. Understanding this last category can, among other things, help us at least partially make sense of the return of right populism and also help us see the ways in which the modern category of citizenship, with its contradictions as elaborated by Balibar, can provide a means for resistance.

scholarly journals A Secular Interpretation of God in Christianity under Holographic Theory

2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. p129
Author(s):  
Yu Fu ◽  
Xi Kang
Keyword(s):  
Fundamental Question ◽  
Christian Faith ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Religious Philosophy ◽  
The Core ◽  
Christian Religion ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Universe

God is the core of Christian religion, where the whole Christian faith and creed rest upon. While the relationship between the mortal and God is the fundamental question that makes Christianity distinguish from other religions. This paper aims to discover the secular meaning of God, such as in China, with the perspective of relationship between God and mortal and the theory of holographic theory, which brings atheists a better comprehension of human beings and the universe through a religious philosophy.

Imagination and Education

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Moira von Wright
Keyword(s):  
Common Ground ◽  
Central Element ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Social Imagination ◽  
Meaning Creation ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Self Formation ◽  
Specific Definition

The concept of imagination, with its potential to contribute to education, is attracting increasing interest as humanity faces major challenges such as migration and climate change. Imagination is expected to enlarge the mentality of human beings and help to find new solutions to global problems. However, educational thinkers have different understandings of what imagination and imaginative thought can actually contribute to. Imagination is the mental ability to visualize what may lie beyond the immediate situation and to “see” things that are not present. It is a central element of meaning creation in education—in the relationship between mental pictures and reality, between humans and the outside world, and between the past and the future. Imagination is a way of seeing, a happening in the here and now. No single specific definition of imagination exists, and this term is used in a variety of ways. Because it is so evasive, the idea of imagination has been contested and questioned, so its meaning depends on the theory and context with which it is associated. Many educational theories simply neglect the concept of imagination, or limit its meaning to common fantasizing and playfulness, whereas others give imagination a central role in the processes of understanding and learning. The socially and politically emancipating dimension of imagination has been emphasized, as has its moral significance and relation to self-formation and education. Some thinkers argue that education should not be satisfied with developing students’ ability to think imaginatively, create a narrative and develop social imagination; rather, it needs to intentionally raise young people to “live imaginatively”—that is, to live a rich life with an open mind, being ready to think in new ways and change their habits when former ways of thinking prove untenable for moral and ethical reasons. Despite these differences of opinion, the value of imagination in education is undeniable. Yet questions remain: How does “bad fantasy” differ from “good imagination,” and what are the educational consequences of such a distinction? How can imagination be a common ground in education, and how can it be a liminal space or topos for the different perspectives of children and adults in that area? How can imagination be part of a greater social responsibility and a way of life?

Kantian ethics

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Onora O’Neill ◽  
Jens Timmermann
Keyword(s):  
Immanuel Kant ◽  
Practical Reasoning ◽  
Kantian Ethics ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Moral Agents ◽  
Reasoning About Action ◽  
Contemporary Work ◽  
Conception Of The Good ◽  
Kant's Ethics ◽  
The Relationship

Kantian ethics originates in the ethical writings of Immanuel Kant (1724–1804), which remain the most influential attempt to vindicate universal ethical principles that respect the dignity and equality of human beings without relying on theological claims or a metaphysical conception of the good. Kant’s systematic, critical philosophy centres on an account of reasoning about action, that is practical reasoning, which he uses to derive principles of duty and virtue, a liberal and republican conception of justice with cosmopolitan scope, and an account of the relationship between morality and hope. Numerous contemporary writers also advance views of ethics which they, and their critics, think of as Kantian. However, some contemporary work is remote from Kant’s philosophy on fundamental matters such as human freedom and practical reason. It converges with Kant’s ethics in claiming that we lack a substantive account of the good (so that teleological or consequentialist ethics are impossible), in taking a strong view of the fundamental equality of moral agents and the importance of universal principles of duty which spell out what it is to respect them, and in stressing an account of justice and rights with cosmopolitan scope. Both Kant’s ethics and contemporary Kantian ethics have been widely criticized for preoccupation with rules and duties, and for lack of concern with virtues, happiness or personal relationships. However, these criticisms may apply more to certain strands within modern Kantian ethics than to Kant’s own ethics.

scholarly journals Can matter and spirit be mediated through language? Some insights from Johann Georg Hamann

2012 ◽  
Vol 68 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Detlev Tönsing
Keyword(s):  
Immanuel Kant ◽  
Complex Adaptive Systems ◽  
Adaptive Systems ◽  
Charles Darwin ◽  
Evolutionary Process ◽  
Self Awareness ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Theory Of Evolution ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
European Philosophy

The Enlightenment introduced to European philosophy and thought-patterns the strict dichotomy between res extensa and res cogitans; that is, matter and spirit. How to overcome the dichotomy and conceive of the interactions between these planes of reality has since become an overarching issue for philosophers. The theory of evolution, as founded by Charles Darwin, understands human beings, with their ability to think, to have arisen in the evolutionary process. Neuroscience utilises insights from the theory of complex systems to attempt to understand how perception, thought and self-awareness can arise as a consequence of the complex system that is the brain. However, already at the height of the Enlightenment, a contemporary and critic of Immanuel Kant, Johann Georg Hamann, suggested a metaphor for understanding the interrelationship of matter and thought. This metaphor is language. The appropriateness of this metaphor can be seen both in the importance that language abilities play in the evolutionary transition to the human species and in the characteristics of complex adaptive systems.

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