The Philosopher's Gaze: Modernity in the Shadows of EnlightenmentDavid Michael Levin's ongoing exploration of the moral character and enlightenment-potential of vision takes a new direction in The Philosopher's Gaze. Levin examines texts by Descartes, Husserl, Wittgenstein, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Benjamin, Merleau-Ponty, and Lévinas, using our culturally dominant mode of perception and the philosophical discourse it has generated as the site for his critical reflections on the moral culture in which we are living. In Levin's view, all these philosophers attempted to understand, one way or another, the distinctive pathologies of the modern age. But every one also attempted to envision—if only through the faintest of traces, traces of mutual recognition, traces of another way of looking and seeing—the prospects for a radically different lifeworld. The world, after all, inevitably reflects back to us the character, the reach and range, of our vision. In these provocative essays, the author draws on the language of hermeneutical phenomenology and at the same time refines phenomenology itself as a method of working with our experience and thinking critically about the culture in which we live. |
Contents
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4 | |
7 | |
9 | |
17 | |
25 | |
Descartess Window | 27 |
Husserls Transcendental Gaze Controlling Unruly Metaphors | 58 |
Gestalt Gestell Geviert The Way of the Lighting | 114 |
The Field of Vision Intersections of the Visible and the Invisible in Heidegger and MerleauPonty | 168 |
Outside the Subject MerleauPontys Chiasmic Vision | 214 |
The Invisible Face of Humanity Levinas on the Justice of the Gaze | 232 |
Justice in the Seers Eyes Benjamin and Heidegger on a Vision out of Time and Memory | 334 |
Shadows Reflections on the Enlightenment and Modernity | 406 |
Where the Beauty of Truth Lies | 417 |
The Glasses on Our Nose Wittgensteins Optics and the Illusions of Philosophy | 92 |
Other editions - View all
The Philosopher's Gaze: Modernity in the Shadows of Enlightenment David Michael Levin Limited preview - 2023 |
The Philosopher's Gaze: Modernity in the Shadows of Enlightenment David Michael Levin Limited preview - 2023 |
The Philosopher's Gaze: Modernity in the Shadows of Enlightenment David Michael Levin No preview available - 2003 |
Common terms and phrases
Adorno already Anaximander Anaximander Fragment appearance argues articulate beauty become Benjamin calls claim concealment conception consciousness critique cultural Descartes dialectical dimension discourse ego-logical ence enframing Epistemology essence ethical relation experience eyes face face-to-face field figure-ground flesh Frankfurt am Main gathering gaze German Gestalt Greek ground Heidegger's Heraclitus hermeneutical human Husserl Ibid intentionality invisible Italics added justice Levinas Levinas's light logic looking Martin Heidegger meaning Merleau-Ponty metaphorical metaphysics Minima Moralia modern moral nature object ontological Parmenides perhaps Phenomenology of Perception philosophical Plato possible prepersonal presence present-at-hand primordial question radically rational reading realm recollection reflection reifying René Char representation responsibility Robert Bernasconi Schriften seer sense sensuous shadows sight social speak structure Theodor Adorno things thought tion totality trace transcendental truth unconcealment understand University Press Verlag violence visible vision visual Wallace Stevens Walter Benjamin Wittgenstein words York