Abstract

This volume contains the Cassirer Lectures delivered by Professor Beck at Yale University in 1974. The strategy of the four lectures is to examine the categorical structures of two competing images of man, the humanistic and the scientific. Alternative descriptions of simple actions are given by Spectator I, a commonsense humanist, and Spectator II who is "a fool, a physiologist". Another guiding motif is provided by the differences between understanding ourselves as active agents and the perspective we have of ourselves and others in the role of spectators. We also hear, from time to time, from an angelic point of view, i.e., one based on actual knowledge of what is in fact going on "backstage and onstage" as opposed to beliefs which reflect our limited perspectives.