At the Origin of the Ontological Primacy of Befindlichkeit

This paper provides an exposition and critical assessment of a fundamental disagreement between Løgstrup’s and Levinas’s otherwise closely aligned ethical phenomenologies. The disagreement concerns the putative (in)compatibility of ethics and ontology, where in stark contrast to Levinas’s ethics, which proceeds from a critique of the ‘primacy of ontology’ in Western thought, Løgstrup brands his own ethical project as ‘ontological ethics’. First, I provide an interpretation of Løgstrup’s ontological ethics, clarifying in particular the influence of hermeneutic and existential analysis on Løgstrup’s methodology. Second, I bring Løgstrup’s ontological ethics into critical dialogue with Levinas’s thought. Here, I home in on two Levinas-style worries that appear to have traction against Løgstrup’s ontological ethics. However, ultimately, I argue that both can be defused.

The aim of this study was to delineate the existential ranking of human beings within the perspective of Ibn Arabi’s existence theory. The analysis illustrated some philosophical and practical positions that emerged due to this ranking as seen by Ibn Arabi. The study concludes that for Ibn Arabi, the origin of humanity is the purpose of the universe and that humans have an ontological primacy and this reflects the Universal Reality or the Muhammadan Reality of the universe. Consequent to this, the origin of humans encompasses all the facts about divine names and therefore all cosmic facts. Accordingly, humanity rose with the existence of humans. Since the origin of humanity is all encompassing, it warrants that the universe should be organized by succession and that all the elements in the universe serve this purpose. This ranking presents the most perfect forms/ spheres of existence. The study concludes that Ibn Arabi’s position entails some practical results that assume the preclusion of violations against humanity, which extols and honors human beings.

This article discusses the importance of and challenges in analyzing and contex- tualizing the ways of bodily participation in participatory performance practices. The writer suggests that the crucial ideological assumptions, as well as the processes of exclusion and inclusion of any participatory project, are not to be seen solely in their “goals” or “themes”, but, even more distinctly, in the modes of bodily participation that they employ. The writer presents a novel performance analytical framework that takes the bodily dimension – what is actually done to and expected from the bodies of the participants during the performance event – as the starting point for critical analysis. Drawing especially from Jacques Rancière’s and Marcel Mauss’s views of human perception and experience, the main concepts of this framework are ‘sensory fields’ and ‘collective body tech- niques’. The writer also shows how these concepts have informed his research on Lois Weaver’s performance What Tammy Needs to Know About Getting Old and Having Sex (2008).

This paper offers a reading of Maupassant’s Le Horla by focusing on the questions of human body and bodily existence. After pointing to several aspects of the narrator’s narcissism at the beginning of the novella, the text will follow the dissolution of that narcissistic position. If to begin with the narrator, despising the body, is detached from any bodily dimension and is seemingly a pure mind and gaze, with the help of his double, the Horla, he gradually discovers bodily existence. This breaking up from the fascination of the image constitutes an advance towards experiencing himself. The full passage is therefore from the narcissism of the image, of the exterior, from empty representation, to a true feeling of oneself, of one’s existence, through one’s vital bodily essence: from the emptiness of the image and the privileging of sight to the fullness of dynamic experience. Through the transparent presence of the other the narrator finds himself.

Insistence of Material: Literature in Age of Biopolitics, by Christopher Breu. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2014. 264 pages. The material world has been garnering a lot of critical attention recently, and for good reason. In waning decades of twentieth century, all that was solid seemed to melt into air as scholars emphasized linguistic play, discursive construction, and/or ideological encoding of texts both literary and cultural. But as thinkers such as Lawrence Buell, Bill Brown, Eve Sedgwick, Bruno Latour, Wai Chee Dimock, Cary Wolfe, Franco Moretti, Elisabeth Grosz, and Graham Harman have all observed over past two decades, those critical moves left a lot of stuff out: ecology, things, affect, science, animals, bodies, technology, geology, and so on. Of course, one corner of humanities, occupied by committed Marxists like Fredric Jameson and David Harvey whose work reliably attended to contemporary political economy, never lost sight of material at all. And yet, materialism in today's new veers away from that long-standing tradition of dialectical materialism, emphasizing instead excesses of matter that surpass human subjectivity. (1) That's what makes these materialisms new. (2) Clearly committed to both kinds of materialism, Christopher Breu's Insistence of Material: Literature in Age of Biopolitics stages a provocative encounter between two. He celebrates vibrancy of matter, volatility of bodies, and primacy of ontology while at same time seeking out the material underpinnings of contemporary capitalism's avatar fetishism--that is, our fetishization of immaterial transcendence (21, 22). To do so, Breu turns to a corpus of twentieth-century that he describes as the late-capitalist of materiality--William Burroughs's Naked Lunch (1959), Thomas Pynchon's V. (1963), J. G. Ballard's Crash (1973), Dodie Bellamy's The Letters of Mina Marker (1998), and Leslie Marmon Silko's Almanac of Dead (1991)--that he reads as a counterpractice of writing in postmodern era (23). Insistence thus makes two interconnected claims: first, we should not be seduced by immateriality of a capitalism gone virtual but must instead appreciate how contemporary commodity culture relies on biopolitical management of material bodies, offshoring of material production, and real-life immiseration of marginalized populations across global north and south; second, we should not reduce later twentieth-century to postmodern metafictions linguistic turn and must instead appreciate counter-tradition of authors who foreground materiality of contemporary existence. Connecting these two claims, Breu hopes that his investigation into materialist of mid- to late twentieth century will make us more clear-eyed and political in our thinking about status of material world here in twenty-first. After deftly clarifying and constellating his key terms--new materialism, biopolitics, political economy, and postmodernism--in book's introduction, Breu turns in his opening chapter to Burroughs's Naked Lunch as the founding text in tradition of materialist literature that Insistence chronicles (38). One is not surprised to find Burroughs here, championing graphic muck and physical intractability of human condition. But even as Burroughs affords Breu an initial fleshy foray into irreducible materiality of self, writing in Naked Lunch also introduces a complication that Breu will be at pains to parse throughout Insistence: difference--in terms of political utility--between materiality of language and materiality of physical world. Because Breu juxtaposes insistent materiality that he valorizes to what he tends to caricature as the primarily linguistic concerns of much metafiction, texts that highlight materiality of language (e. …

This article has two main goals. Firstly, the author gives a brief outline of the development of both liturgical theology and pastoral liturgical studies. Both of these disciplines are important in the field of liturgical studies and both have their roots in the Liturgical Movement, an important source for contemporary liturgical reflection. One of the main themes of the Liturgical Movement was the relation between theological reflection and pastoral praxis within the framework of the liturgy. Until this day, this proves to be a difficult issue. Therefore, a second goal of this article is to develop new perspectives on the relation between theology, liturgy and Christian life. The author starts from the definition of pastoral liturgy used by C. Vagaggini. He perceives pastoral liturgy as ‘the general way of conceiving and putting the pastoral into practice by consciously centering it in the liturgy’. The author tries to combine this insight with the liturgical theological propositions of the relation between liturgy and theology. Using a threefold liturgical lens, a concept of liturgical theologian D. Fagerberg, the author develops his reflections on pastoral and Christian praxis. Subsequently, he discusses the meaning of the bodily, relational and self-giving dimension of the liturgy. It is his conviction that these three liturgical lenses show some necessary and basic attitudes for both pastoral activity as well as Christian life in general. In the end, the liturgy, perceived as the human self-giving answer to Gods Trinitarian gift of self, brings us to the core of human existence itself. As such, this article explores living a Christian life as living a liturgical life.

This paper aims to interpret the role of the soul as ontological, intellectual or cognitive and as the moral principle within the frame of the holistic conception of human psychosomatic health that emerges from the context of Zalmoxian medicine in the proemium of Plato’s Charmides. It examines what the ontological status of the soul is in relation to the body and the body–soul complex of man considered as a psychosomatic whole. By comparing the presentation of the soul as principle in the Charmides and the Phaedrus, the paper defends the thesis that in the former dialogue, Plato develops his own anthropological ontology, which paves the way for the salvation of human existence and health. The soul is bestowed with an ontological primacy that determines the philosophical and medical presuppositions for treating human illness under a holistic view. The interpretation of the ontological relation of the soul to the body and the entire human being in the context of Zalmoxian holistic medicine is based on Hermias Alexandrinus’ exegesis of the conception of the soul as principle in the Phaedrus. This paper demonstrates that, from both the medical holistic viewpoint and the anthropological philosophical perspective, the soul is the principle and πρῶτον with regard to the body and the body–soul complex without being the whole that the corresponding medical epistemology must apprehend.

The article is devoted to the phenomenon of ressentiment, which has aroused interest in a number of humanities in connection with new interpretations of the crisis state of society. The socio-philosophical analysis of the strategy of ressentiment as an existential modus actualized in the era of ontological uncertainty is carried out. The subject of the study is the strategy of ressentiment, as a form of unexpressed feelings of hostility, vindictiveness, latent hatred and impotent envy that can reconcile an individual with the existing reality. The aim of the article is the philosophical analysis of this phenomenon and the definition of new facets, including the existential experience of the subject, aimed at accumulating destructive emotions that form the victim complex. The methodological basis of the study was the elements of historical and philosophical reconstruction, as well as the methods of hermeneutical and psychoanalytic analysis. Such a synthesis of approaches allows us to consider ressentiment from the perspective of its ontological and existential characteristics, and not only as a “fatal” strategy in the period of ontological crisis. Uncertainty in human existence becomes an increasingly relevant component of existential dread and, as a consequence, manifests itself in various forms of marginality. Thus, ressentiment, as an unhealthy form of aggression that generates impotence, becomes an urgent topic of philosophical reflection again. The authors conclude that overcoming the strategy of ressentiment is a worldview problem, where the revision of modern values is the most important step towards its solution.

The purpose is to identify common and distinctive features of concepts and methodology of the problem of subject within different discourses, implicitly or explicitly relevant to the definition of mode of human existence. The research methodology combines techniques of discourse analysis and basic principles of historical and philosophical studies. Scientific novelty of the research lies in definition of the clinical philosophical discourse as a special communicative process, where utterances not only focus on disease syndromes, and reveal phenomenology of inner experience of a pathological self, but also structure a certain type of sociality. Clinical discourse represents the space where the patient is treated not as a subject but as an object of disease. Ontology of clinical discourse prevails over ontology of disease, since its structures determine the notion of disease as such. Categorization of the disease, the idea of disease as a phenomenon subdued to professional authority leads to the idea of the need for patient's isolation from the natural environment and removing him to special social institutions. A great while authenticity of the individual had been determined through the testimony of others and manifestation of one's connection to others; then authenticity begun to establish trough the discourse, which individual was able or obliged to deliver about himself/herself. The clinicist doctrines share the intention to reduce the patient's self to its bodily dimension, while ignoring social determinants of psychological deviations. Conclusions of the study are summarized in the following positions: the current clinical discourse is based on the positivist-biological trend in humanitarian knowledge and it is the basis for the production and reproduction of medical and pharmaceutical repressive ideology; philosophical clinical discourse opens the possibility of overcoming the dominance of purely clinicist discourse; such a transformation is possible only after a paradigm shift in understanding the category of subject.

Introduction. The challenges of the posthuman- istic phase transition lead to a critical response from representatives of the anthropological trend in philosophy. Going into the sphere of determin- ism of digital discourse overcomes a person in all his previous discourses, since what was constantly perceived as ontic and ontological in being loses its meaning and value in the coordinates of digital relations. It is important to define the term “digital”, which in the study is represented in numbers and following the logic of an algorithm that eliminates anthropological reality, understood as the subjec- tivity of human existence. The purpose of the paper is to represent the con- cepts of the new materialists, who propose to overcome the man not only in his spiritual, but also in bodily dimensions in comparison with the com- plexity paradigm and the concept of M. Heidegger. Methods. The author uses methods of analyzing philosophical concepts of the new materialists, M. Heidegger and representatives of complexity theory. Scientific novelty of the research lies in discovery- ing the connection between M. Heidegger’s concept of quaternary and the concepts of complexity theory, including the new materialists’ theories. The transition of the ontological model of Heidegger’s concept into the ontic construct of the latest ma- terialistic thought is traced. The author reveals the difference between authentic and non-authentic modes of virtuality. Results. According to D. Haraway, an alterna- tive is a form of interspecific mixing, in which the monstrous, which was previously a marker of the boundaries of the human, breaks into the anthro- pological topic, reshaping it according to the digital patterns of the posthuman world. This inversion of the Heideggerian world project of quaternary makes it possible to eliminate the ontological plane of being, solving the problem of man’s exclusivity in the direction of its elimination from the discourse of modern philosophy. Conclusions. Comparison of the approaches of M. Heidegger, accelerationists and Russian philoso- phy provides an opportunity to clarify important aspects of digital deanthropologization.

The purpose is to identify common and distinctive features of concepts and methodology of the problem of subject within different discourses, implicitly or explicitly relevant to the definition of "clinical" mode of human existence. The research methodology combines techniques of discourse analysis and basic principles of historical and philosophical studies. Originality of the research lies in definition of the clinical philosophical discourse as a special communicative process, where utterances not only focus on disease syndromes, and reveal phenomenology of inner experience of a pathological self, but also structure a certain type of sociality. Clinical discourse represents the space where the patient is treated not as a subject but as an object of disease. Ontology of clinical discourse prevails over ontology of disease, since its structures determine the notion of disease as such. Categorization of the disease, the idea of disease as a phenomenon subdued to professional authority leads to the idea of the need for patient’s isolation from the natural environment and removing him to special social institutions. The clinicist doctrines share the intention to reduce the patient’s self to its bodily dimension, while ignoring social determinants of psychological deviations. Conclusions of the study are summarized in the following positions: the current clinical discourse is based on the positivist-biological trend in humanitarian knowledge and it is the basis for the production and reproduction of medical and pharmaceutical repressive ideology; criticism of philosophical clinical discourse opens the possibility of overcoming the dominance of purely clinicist discourse; such a transformation is possible only after a paradigm shift in understanding the category of subject.

The author of this article presents, and examines the expression of, iconicity in the poetry of Antanas A. Jonynas. Drawing on the American semiotician Charles S. Peirce’s sign theory and hermeneutic analysis she reveals how, in Jonynas’s poetry, reality is contextualized through language – its characteristics, expression, and meaning. Unusually for Lithuanian literary studies, the article dicsusses iconicity in terms of cognitive poetics.The article relates poetic expression with both iconicity in language and the function of metaphor within the literary text. These reflect the complex phenomenon of literary visualization and convey the fundamental human ability to think in terms of analogy.As is characteristic for modern poets, Jonynas stresses the importance of language: it is a means, a separate motive, and a problematized aesthetic effect – it is the power to both create a world and to decipher human experience through language. The image of reality within the text is based on the logic of spectacle (the analysis reveals the latter’s metatextual status), and for this reason the drama of the poem can appear to be both real and theatrical. But Jonynas’s texts are characterized by the ability to simultaneously talk about and describe states, and to convince and engage the perceiver: the texts combine sensations and draw on the transmission function (speaking and listening). The author of the article offers a detailed analysis of the nature of the poet’s language and the motif of memory in his writing. Images and the entire texts’s metaphoric level reveal the discontinuity between conscious speaking and nondiscursive experience in Jonynas’s poetry. The poetic text combines elements of reality; existential categories merely create the misleading impression that the status of emotion in the text is equivalent to the represented object or landscape.

This study explores the nature of clinical practice of eight expert nurses working in an intensive care unit. It is ontological and epistemologically grounded in Heideggerian phenomenological hermeneutics. This paper provides a description of the relevant Heideggerian concepts, in particular worldliness, understanding and care. The hermeneutic analysis revealed four themes: being busy, comforting, focusing and balancing. The paper concludes by discussing some ontological qualities, from a Heideggerian perspective, that underpin critical care nursing practice. This study contributes to the endeavour of exploring alternative ways of investigating human experience and also attempts to provide insight into the lifeworld of expert nurses working in an intensive care unit. The specific purpose of the study was to provide a phenomenological hermeneutic analysis of the aesthetics of nursing practice in an intensive care unit. Consistent with the epistemology of phenomenological hermeneutic philosophy, I have chosen to use the first person in reporting these research findings (see Webb 1992 for further discussion).

Worry is a common feeling that nearly every individual has faced throughout human history. Psychological research has generally shown that worry has a negative impact on both the mental and physical well-being of individuals. There is an implicit call in the belief that humans should not excessively worry about their lives, as found in the text of Matthew 6:25-34. This research seeks to reexamine worry through an interdisciplinary approach, involving its psychological aspects. The Gospel of Matthew is approached through hermeneutic analysis while simultaneously considering its psychological facets, which is referred to as 'interdisciplinary interpretation.' The culmination of this interdisciplinary meeting results in the thesis statement that the text of Matthew 6:25-34, when interpreted through an interdisciplinary lens, teaches that worry, though common to human experience, can be managed and overcome. This interpretive finding subsequently provides a proposal for the development of a Christian pastoral counseling approach to assist individuals in managing their worries.Â

Aim. To conduct a historical and philosophical analysis of the main conceptual ideas about the problem of time and reveal the specific features of its sacred and profane manifestations as the key principles of self-actualization of human existence as the Other.Methodology. This study was carried out using the methods of historical-philosophical, dialectical, and hermeneutic analysis, which made it possible to comprehend the non-classical concept of time as a fundamental form of a bifurcated human perception of the world.Results. The analysis made it possible to substantiate the problem of time as an ambivalent form of borderline perception and experience of reality by a person through events disintegrated and fragmented in it, in which its ambiguous essence, open to the sacred and profane dimension, is imprinted and formed in a contradictory way. The sacred explication of time presupposes a non-identical dimension of a person, in his extremely hypostatized and impersonal form of events, and the profane explication of time presupposes his primordial nature, identified in an animated form, closed on itself.Research implications. This study sheds light on the conceptual rethinking of the phenomenon of time as a universal mirror of human existence, in which its inferior value is acquired in an authentic way.