Prolegomena to Any Future Historicizing: The Dilthey-Husserl Debate and Why It Matters for Critical Phenomenology

For more than a century, phenomenology’s relation to history has remained a problem for phenomenological analysis. This can in part be attributed to the circumstances surrounding the beginnings of phenomenology. As Europe moved increasingly toward world war at the turn of the 20th century, a growing consciousness of the historical relativity of all values and knowledge spread throughout the continent, leading Ernst Troeltsch to speak of the “crisis of historicism” (Rand 1964, 504-5). In this same context, Edmund Husserl framed phenomenological analysis in opposition to history. While Husserl recognized the “tremendous value” that history has to offer philosophical thinking, he believed that a purely historical reduction of consciousness necessarily results in the relativity of historical understanding itself, like a serpent that bites its own tail (Husserl 2002, 280). If phenomenology was to be a genuine science, it had to attempt a phenomenological reduction which would seize upon the essence of our historical being, i.e., our essence as beings that exist within history and are inseparable from it. What was required over and beyond a historical understanding of lived experience was an analysis of the structure of historicity itself (293-4).

Достоевский, Аполлон Григорьев, Бахтин

Аполлон Григорьев и Бахтин затрагивали достаточно разные вопросы творчества Достоевского, но корреляция между их работами очевидна на уровне их металогики, их философии, их культур-философских оснований. Григорьев, вместе с Достоевским, находился у истоков почвенничества, хотя отзывы Григорьева о творчестве Достоевского эпизодичны и довольно инвективны. Григорьев, в основном, отказывал Достоевскому в том, что его искусство соответствует «правде жизни». Но и первый вариант книги Бахтина о Достоевском не был апологетическим. Григорьев и Бахтин реализуют свою философию через эстетику (философию искусства). Искус-ство, согласно Григорьеву, имеет истоки в самой жизни, а жизнь через искусство реализует себя и сама себя понимает; поэтому критик – также «художник». Бахтин также исходит из принципа корреляции искусства и жизни, выводя отсюда свое понятие «творческий хронотоп». У Григорьева, Бахтина, Достоевского дело идет об онтологии искусства, как и об искусстве онтологии. Искусство онтологии подразумевает самую широкую эстетизацию жизни: ее вдвижение в горизонт искусства. Данная установка – предмодернистская и модернистская. В генезисе понятия «органическая критика» отозвались уроки Канта как автора трех философ-ских «Критик». Идеи Канта были значимы также для Достоевского и Бахтина. Григорьева могло за-интересовать философское измерение, приданное Кантом понятию «критика». Поэтому «органиче-ская критика» относится преимущественно к философии, поднимая объемный перечень вопросов, превышающих собственно эстетические. Согласно Бахтину, полифония Достоевского заключается в том, что автор выступает «медиумом», «пропускающим» через себя различные идеи («голоса» персонажей, различные «точки зрения» и т. п.) Автор-медиум «проводит» «через себя» и «из себя» массу различных идей без сущностного отвержения какой-либо из них. «Автор-медиум» пытается говорить от лица жизни, но также и даже «вместо жизни», что ведет к логической и смысловой подмене «мира» – «картиной мира». Отвер-жение сущностное вовсе не означает отсутствия у автора отвержения формального, т. е. просто констатированного. Однако сущностное неотвержение означает гораздо больше, чем то или иное формальное отвержение. Жизнь, историческое бытие в таком случае оказывается для Достоевского практически «хаосом». В развитие идей Бахтина следует, что при внедрении в свой художественный мир карнавального начала Достоевский утверждает «связку» чувствительность / физиологизм. Ее истоки – в сентимен-тализме XVIII в. Данная «связка» находит религиозную проекцию в феномене юродства. Поэтому итоговой бахтинской трактовкой Достоевского (1963) движет пафос «оправдания» писателя, полно-та художественного мира которого в главном реализована через религиозно трактованную Досто-евским «картину мира» (все-таки «картину мира», но не сам «мир»). Apollon Grigoriev and Bakhtin touched upon quite different issues of Dostoevsky’s work but the correlation between their works is obvious at the level of their metalogic, their philosophy, and their cultural-philosophical foundations. Grigoriev, together with Dostoevsky, was at the origins of “pochvennichestvo” (a grassroots movement), although Grigoriev’s comments on Dostoevsky’s work are episodic and rather injective. Grigoriev basically denied Dostoevsky that his art corresponded to the “truth of life”. But even the first version of Bakhtin’s book about Dostoevsky was not apologetic. Grigoriev and Bakhtin realize their philosophy through aesthetics (philosophy of art). Art, according to Grigoriev, has its origins in life itself, and life through art realizes itself and understands itself; therefore the critic is also an “artist”. Bakhtin also proceeds from the principle of correlation between art and life, deriving from this his concept of “creative chronotope”. Grigoriev, Bakhtin, and Dostoevsky deal with the ontology of art as well as the art of ontology. The art of ontology implies the broadest aestheticization of life: its movement into the horizon of art. This attitude is pre-modern and modern. In the genesis of the concept of “organic criticism”, the lessons of Kant as the author of three philosophical “Critics” could be echoed. Kant’s ideas were also significant for Dostoevsky and Bakhtin. Grigoriev might have been interested in the philosophical dimension that Kant gave to the concept of “criticism”. Therefore, “organic criticism” refers primarily to philosophy, raising a voluminous list of issues that exceed the aesthetic ones themselves. According to Bakhtin, Dostoevsky’s polyphony consists in the fact that the author acts as a “medium”, “passing” various ideas through himself (“voices” of characters, different “points of view”, etc.). The author- medium “conducts” “through himself” and “out of myself” a lot of different ideas without the essential rejection of any of them. The “author-medium” tries to speak on behalf of life but also even “instead of life”, which leads to a logical and semantic substitution of “the world” – “an image of the world”. Essential rejection does not at all mean that the author has no formal rejection, i.e. just stated. Essential non-rejection, however, means much more than any formal rejection. Life, historical being in this case turns out to be practically “chaos” for Dostoevsky. In the development of Bakhtin’s ideas, it follows that, when introducing carnivalization into his artistic world, Dostoevsky affirms a “link” of sensitivity / physiology. The origins of this “link” are in the sentimentalism of the 18th century. This “link” finds a religious projection in the phenomenon of “yurodstvo” (foolishness). Therefore, Bakhtin’s final interpretation of Dostoevsky (1963) is driven by the pathos of the “justification” of the writer, whose integrity of the artistic world is mainly realized through the religious “image of the world” (aft er all, the “image of the world” and not the “world” itself).

What Is Man? Interpreting the Philosophical-Anthropological Ideas of Karl Marx Part 1: Generic Essence and Praxis

This article uses the key concepts available in Karl Marx’s texts and attempts to answer the question, “What is man?” The author explores such constitutive aspects of man’s generic essence (Gattungswesen des Menschen) and of man’s worldly being as corporeality and relationship with nature; suffering as a product of desire; praxis (Praxis) as productive creative activity (produktive Tätigkeit, Selbstbetätigung) that is carried out in the dialectical processes of objectification (Vergegenständlichung, Äußerung) and de-objectification (Entgegenständlichung, Aneignung); man’s universality; objectivity (Gegenständlichkeit) of the man-made human world; intersubjectivity and sociality/sociability (Gesellschaftlichkeit); interplay of social relations (das Ensemble der gesellschaftlichen Verhältnisse); the existential and emotional relations of man (menschlichen Verhältnisse zur Welt) to the world of nature, to human activity, to the results of one’s labor, to other people, and to oneself. We demonstrate that the generic essence of man is not granted by nature but evolves in the course of historical development. Moreover, in Capital, Marx distinguishes between the invariant essence (Praxis) and historical modifications of praxis. Therefore, history is understood as “continuous change of human nature,” and man himself as a historical being. In spite of later reductionist interpretations, Marx conceptualizes man as a living, uniquely generic (socially individual), integral being, whose essential mode of existence is praxis (social conscious purposeful transforming objectal-instrumental material and spiritual activity). Man is an integral bodily-spiritual being, transforming the natural world (Welt) and creating “worlds” of his own, those of material, social, and spiritual culture (Umwelt), society and its relations (Mitwelt), which are interiorized and form an inner world (Innerlichkeit, Eigenwelt) in the process of practical activity. The article concludes that, following Marx’s philosophical anthropology, man should be considered not only as a “practical being” but also a suffering one, experiencing his worldly existence in the form of partial, existential relations to the world and to himself.

Engels, humanism and revolutionary praxis: The centrality of the dynamic analysis of historical materialism and its inherent relation to overcoming capitalist alienation

At the end of the 19th century, a debate emerged among academics of historical materialism on the apparent divergence between Engels’ and Marx’s theoretical developments. During the 20th century, those who wanted to argue that there was a dichotomy between the two authors identified Engels as responsible for historical materialism’s crises. This paper aims to demonstrate that Engels, far from distancing himself from Marx’s central positions, contributed to the formation of historical materialism as a revolutionary praxis that seeks a more rational regulation of the human metabolism with nature through overcoming the alienating conditions of the capitalist system. For this reason, the paper analyses Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy, one of Engels’ most controversial texts, and exposes the correlation with the historical development of the revolutionary praxis in the Engels’ and Marx’s work. The article will be drawing on Adolfo Sánchez Vázquez’s Philosophy of Praxis, understood as a ‘revolutionary’ activity, and his analysis of Marx’s and Engels’ work. It is argued that one of Engels’ primary purposes, in Ludwig Feuerbach, was to show the demystification process of the Hegelian dialectical method, resulting in the formation of historical materialism as a dynamic epistemic model, that seeks to transform social reality through revolutionary praxis. The Feuerbachian ontological categories and Feuerbach’s perception of nature were the objects of the same process of demystification and critique, resulting in the characterisation of the human being in Marxism as a generic, social and historical being. Finally, it is shown that Engels demonstrates the possibilities for transformation of the human subject; for that reason, Engels’ argument is associated with the revolutionary praxis.

Manual of Practices in Physical Education in Professional and Technological Education Using the Free Application Efe – Eptfis

The application, EFE-EduFisEPT, acts as a support for physical education school activities, using historical-critical pedagogy occurs the confrontation of the scientific knowledge of the teacher with the empirical knowledge of the students, causing the development of a new vision and action in society. The purpose of this manual is to guide the physical education teacher about the content and practices for physical education classes in EPT and about the functionality of the free Application EFE – EPTFis. With its simple interface, the use of the application becomes easy and with intuitive functionality. This educational product exists as a support for the teacher to develop a more critical physical education, which understands the student beyond the biological being, that is, a social, political, cultural and historical being. In which each class, the student can understand that the content presented is linking to various dimensions of reality, contributing to a society vision based on values and attitudes towards the common goal: knowledge to generate fewer exclusions and discriminations.

The revenge of the words: On language’s historical and autonomous being and its effects on ‘secularisation’

What if language was an autonomous historical being? What if language’s use was not solely dependent on the intentions of the one who speaks? In this text I will test these provocative statements. Specifically, I will investigate whether language’s proclaimed historical independence can be traced in the usage of the concept of ‘secularisation’, and I will try to unveil the consequences of this operation.Contribution: Has Christianity abandoned the public stage in the ‘secularised’ and industrialised world? In this article I intend to demonstrate that this is not the case. The continuous operative presence of Christianity in our socio-political language is used as the model to prove this argument.

Historicity and Religiosity in Heidegger’s Interpretation of the Reality: With an Outlook to Adolf Reinach’s Contribution to Heidegger’s Phenomenological Conception

The question of whether Heidegger’s phenomenological contribution to the philosophy of being originates from his pre-philosophical attitude to theology or rather, it is the methodological question of phenomenology which influenced his thinking, is one of the most essential questions in Heidegger-research. Though, this has already been elaborated on in a broader sense, the publication of the Black Notes has opened new dimensions for discussion. It is not the aim of this paper to represent Heidegger’s concept of the history of being in the light of the new debates, but rather to confirm the thesis, that, in spite of the ‘turn’; in Heidegger’s thinking, his phenomenological hermeneutics was inspired, above all, by his reflection on Christianity. Moreover, the paper will question whether the linearity of Heidegger’s thinking about the historical being remains on the horizon of the religious phenomenon, as it is thematized in his early papers and lectures. While Heidegger’s early phenomenological approaches to religion and theology have been sufficiently elaborated on by several authors, and the phenomenological–hermeneutical relevance has been proven in his thinking, the linkage between the early philosophical approaches to the problem of religiosity and of historical being arising newly in Heidegger’s thinking from the 1930s is missing. The present paper will not just refer to the thesis that Heidegger’s theological background contributed to his questioning of being, and that it was influenced in different ways, but makes an attempt to reveal the internal dynamics of Heidegger’s early thinking prior to the publication of Being and Time and the time of composing the Contributions to Philosophy of those of Heidegger’s lectures which remain in the parallel analysis of religiosity and historicity.

A Senior as an Individual in the Situation of Dementia. Tom Kitwood's Person-Centred Care Model and the Philosophy of Dialogue

Seniors suffering from dementia are always exposed to a reductive approach and depersonalization due to the specificity of that disease. The subjectivity of a senior is neglected or even completely negated. What remains unnoticed is the fact that, despite their disease, a senior is still a person – with the rights and needs of a person – and not just a helpless patient. The paper presents a break that has been made in the understanding and care of seniors with dementia thanks to the work of Tom Kitwood, a British psychologist. In Kitwood’s Person-Centred Care model, a person is defined as a relational, feeling, and historical being. At the same time, being a person is only possible in the interpersonal context. Hence the author's suggestion to read Kitwood’s concept from the angle of the philosophy of dialogue, which is always an affirmation of subjectivity and an opposition to tendencies that reify human beings. In the author’s opinion, Kitwood translated the main postulates of the philosophy of dialogue into the language of psychology, gerontology and senior care by operationalizing the indicators of the well-being of a patient with dementia.

Early Manifestation of Historical Thinking in Primary School Pupils and its Diagnostics

This article outlines the early manifestation of historical thinking in primary school pupils and its diagnosis. Historical thinking is a concept that expresses the essence of man and his world as a historical being. Development of pupils’ historical thinking is determined by an integrated characteristics of interconnected historical consciousness, historical knowledge, historical memory and historical worldview. In the development of pupils’ historical thinking, the main didactic parameter is paying particular attention to strengthening cooperation between the “teacher - pupil”, “pupil - pupil”, “pupil - historical object”, as well as integration of possibilities of courses like “Reading”, “The ABC of Ethics” and additional courses like “The ABC of History” and “Journey to the World of History”. It is advisable to organize pupils’ independent learning activities as the main criterion for developing primary school pupils’ historical thinking, assessing its results, identifying possible difficulties and ways to eliminate them, developing the ability to realize the sphere of their interests and associating them with achievements in learning activities and personal qualities

JOSE ORTEGA Y GASSET: PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORICAL BEING OF MAN

The article provides reconstruction of philosophical and historical ideas of Jose Ortega y Gasset, the greatest European philosopher of the 20th century. Ortega considers the historical existence of man in the context of different paradigms: phenomenology, existentialism, philosophy of life. The philosopher’s views on the content and structure of the historical process are shown. The fundamental role of beliefs and ideas in the historical existence of man is emphasized. Beliefs are the reality a person lives in. They constitute the latent layer of the man’s «logos». Ideas are generated by human intellectual activity. The true primary reality is mysterious and problematic. Man is only able to create imaginary worlds, construct interpretations, comparing them with the mysterious reality. Such modes of historical human existence as self-immersion and self-alienation are considered. The most important structural element of the historical process is generation. Ortega proposes to regard generation as a fundamental historical category that allows one to understand the dynamics and nature of historical changes. The generation is the trajectory history moves along. Ortega considered historical crisis to be another important category related to the historical existence of man. The historical crisis is a fundamental form that the structure of human life can take. History is a linear system of human experiences extended in time. Forms of human life in history are not infinite, each historical stage «sprouts» from the previous one. The historical crisis is a transition to a new era, a kind of bifurcation point. Ortega considered the concept of historical reason to be one of the important achievements in his philosophy of history. Life has a much more radical nature than all the worlds constructed by intelligence. The historical crisis of modernity led humanity to the point which can be defined as «cartesianism of life», not «cartesianism of thought». There is a moment in history when collapse of the physical reason frees the way for the vital and historical reason. The historical reason finds itself in history as a dialectical experience of man.