European Journal of Philosophy, Volume 30, Issue 1, Page 182-204, March 2022.

Abstract That current ideals of cognition impoverish experience is a classical observation, and complaint, of the early Frankfurt School. Adorno reacts to this phenomenon in several ways, among them his conception of metaphysical experiences. Metaphysical experiences are conventionally understood as promissory notes, as metaphors for rich experiences. This article takes a different view of metaphysical experiences. It discusses them in light of Adorno's notion that objects have priority in experience and of his further remark that metaphysical experiences are constituted by (...) error. It argues that rather than promissory notes or metaphors for rich experiences, metaphysical experiences are attempts at taking things literally. (shrink)

We ordinarily think that self and other coexist as subjects with mutually exclusive mental lives. The conceptual problem of other minds challenges this common thought by raising doubts that coexistence and mutual exclusivity come together in a coherent idea of others. Existential phenomenology is usually taken to be exempt from skeptical worries of this sort because it conceives of subjects as situated or embodied, offering an inclusive account of coexistence. I submit that this well-entrenched view faces a serious dilemma: either (...) the ordinary distinction between self and other has to be given up, or accounts of situated and embodied coexistence presuppose a non-phenomenological solution to (a close relative of) the conceptual problem of other minds. I then propose a way out for existential phenomenology by sketching a Sartre-inspired phenomenological response to the problem. (shrink)

Grotius ist ein Klassiker der Theorie internationaler Beziehungen. In der politischen Philosophie hingegen wird er eher selten diskutiert. In meinem Beitrag greife ich seine Kritik an der verbreiteten Vorstellung eines unbedingt geltenden Widerstandsrechts auf. Grotius bestreitet insbesondere, dass aktiver Widerstand gegen Zwänge unter allen Umständen gerechtfertigt ist. Seiner Auffassung nach sind gewisse Zwangsverhältnisse – freiwillige Abhängigkeitsverhältnisse – durchaus mit dem Naturrecht vereinbar. Um diese Kritik plausibel zu machen, bringe ich sie zunächst gegen eine aktuelle Variante der für die Diskussion von (...) Widerstandsrechten immer noch einschlägigen Locke’schen These vom Selbsteigentum in Stellung, aus deren Sicht freiwillige Abhängigkeitsverhältnisse zwanglose Verhältnisse sind. Dann entwickele ich in Grundzügen einen alternativen Widerstandsbegriff, der an Grotius‘ Idee eines natürlichen Privilegs der Selbstverteidigung anknüpft. Dieser Idee zufolge stützt sich Widerstand nicht etwa auf einen einzufordernden Rechtstitel wie das Selbsteigentum, sondern beruht auf menschlicher Schwäche. (shrink)

This paper argues that Tugendhat's critique of Heidegger's existential conception of truth as disclosedness is usually misunderstood. The main claim of this paper is that Tugendhat insists against Heidegger on certain conventional features of truth such as conformity of the law of non-contradiction, not because he adheres to an ideal of truth as correctness; rather, he proposes an alternative existential conception of truth in terms of an active, critical or self-critical, engagement with untruth. Various recent objections to Tugendhat's critique of (...) Heidegger are discussed against the background of his alternative and are rejected. The paper concludes by outlining several challenges to Tugendhat's alternative existential conception of truth. (shrink)

Adorno's moral philosophy has often been accused of making aporetic prescriptions that are too taxing for moral agents. In this article, I defend his approach in terms of a theory of moral dilemmas. My guideline is Adorno's famous sentence that wrong life cannot be lived rightly. I argue that this claim is not distinctly prescriptive, as most of Adorno's critics believe, but is a claim about moral reality. Emphasizing realist aspects of his moral theory, I suggest that wrong life is (...) neither inconceivable nor an amoral or skeptical trope. Instead, Adorno's sentence about wrong life can be interpreted as a claim about the salience of particular moral facts. This, I conclude, allows Adorno to envisage moral reasons that motivate moral conduct case by case, although they are blocked overall. (shrink)

The phrase after Auschwitz plays a central role in Adorno's oeuvre. To him, the industrialized genocide of Jews, Sinti and Roma, and Slavic people at death camps like Auschwitz, the systematic mass killing of human beings labeled “life unworthy of life” by their murderers and the ideologues behind them, the ruthlessness and utter contempt for humanity of the Nazi German perpetrators of these unimaginable crimes, give those who live after Auschwitz certainties about the extent of human cruelty as well as (...) human torment that undermine any trust in civilization and social progress, in traditional appeals to meaning, beauty, truth, or goodness. The clearest theoretical expression of these certainties can be found in Adorno's impossibility claims about poetry and art, about the good life, about metaphysical fundamentals. This contribution will examine these impossibility claims in order to clarify the philosophical role of Adorno's phrase after Auschwitz in his own works, but also in order to place Adorno's reflections on life and thought after Auschwitz with respect to our contemporary situation. (shrink)