Philosophy as a Transformative Practice: A Review of Leah Kalmanson's Cross-Cultural Existentialism
- Philosophy as a Transformative Practice:A Review of Leah Kalmanson's Cross-Cultural Existentialism
Leah Kalmanson's Cross-Cultural Existentialism: On the Meaning of Life in Asian and Western Thought develops what the author calls 'speculative existentialism' by challenging the metaphysical assumptions behind the existential inquiry in the West. The author turns to East Asian thought—Ruism (also known as Confucianism) in particular—questioning the "problematic understanding of subjective interiority" that remains in European existentialism despite its efforts to subvert subject-object dualism. The author writes, "my book is ultimately about the radical existential vision of Ruism, a tradition that has, in general, received less attention than Buddhism in comparative existential work."1 A revised existentialism via Ruist thinking is sought not only theoretically but also through practical techniques for mental cultivation, self-transformation, and existential realization. This journey pushes the existential inquiry not only beyond dualist assumptions but also beyond the human condition in its engagement with a qi 氣 cosmology that emphasizes the continuity between humans and environments.
The author uses the term 'speculative' in a specific sense: "a mode of speculation that grants us access to reality beyond the constraints of the ordinary subjective experience."2 The term comes from Quentin Meillassoux's "speculative realism," a call for a renewed realism that reclaims access to mind-independent reality, renounced by post-Kantian philosophy (including phenomenology) that accepts the distinction between phenomena and noumena. Meillassoux critiques the tendency prevalent in post-Kantian philosophy to understand a reality limited to our own perceptual and cognitive abilities—what he calls a 'species solipsism.' In her invention of 'speculative existentialism', Kalmanson redefines speculation itself, "not as the interior rumination of a subject looking out on the world but rather as a dynamic activity that transforms both selves and their environments."3 By putting the key concepts of European existentialism—anxiety, absurdity, [End Page 258] alienation, authenticity, and freedom—in conversation with Ruist virtues, the author shows that key existential concerns are rooted in a limited, solipsistic view of the world that underlies Western thought, and that they could be better addressed through the practical techniques and strategies of Ruists' that ground us in the world.
I have appreciated the author's inventive ideas, not as an expert in classical Asian philosophy, but as a social/political philosopher trained in what is known to be the 'Continental tradition' with an interest in decolonial thought and early twentieth-century East Asian philosophy. I believe the creativity of this book lies in (1) its 'cross-cultural' method, (2) its radical reframing of our existential condition, and (3) its reflection on philosophy as a transformative practice. In what follows, I discuss these three aspects in detail after presenting a brief overview of the book.
Overview
The first chapter begins with the Wolf-Cahn debate on whether the idea of a meaningful life is based on an objective value or a subjective reality, which the author views as a version of the idealism-realism debate in the history of philosophy. Showing how both positions are unsatisfactory, the author claims that the premise that generates the opposition between objectivity and subjectivity itself, namely subject-object dualism, should be questioned. After reviewing the philosophical lineage of attempts to overcome the dualistic assumption—Nietzsche's condemnation of the metaphysical subject, Beauvoir's take on the human condition, and the recent critique of phenomenology—Kalmanson concludes that Western philosophy keeps returning to the anxiety of Cartesian solipsism. This is due not to the lack of theoretical tools for a non-dualistic existential investigation but to the lack of practices to reframe and re-habituate existential questions.
The following two chapters explore ways for "The Creation of New Values" in the Buddhist karmic economy and the qi-based Ruist cosmology. In the second chapter, Kalmanson first turns to the karmic economy and examines the proliferation of karmic merit as a mode of existential meaningmaking. Here we meet the Korean Buddhist nun Kim Iryŏp, whose existential thought is informed by Mahāyāna...
