Ernst Cassirer (review)

Abstract

626 JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 34:4 OCTOBER 1996 and on the particular topic at hand. All in all, I find this study a major contribution to Machadiana, valuable for both those familiar with his work and for those who will be goaded into familiarity by this book. My only regret is that Mr. Maia Neto did not relax his criterion a bit and include a detailed analysis of Quincas Borba along with the other novels. Even though it does not fit his limitation to protagonist-narrator, I think that there is a great deal of material in the novel that falls within the purview of his study. GREGORY RABASSA Queens Collegeand the Graduate School, CUNY Andreas Graeser. Ernst Cassirer. Beck'sche Reihe: Denker. Mtinchen: Verlag C. H. Beck, 1994. Pp. ~34. Paper, DM 94.oo. This book is the first full-length critical study of Ernst Cassirer's philosophy to appear in his native language of German not to have originated as a doctoral thesis or to aim at "introducing" Cassirer's thought. Graeser, a professor of philosophy in Bern, Switzerland , was trained in ancient philosophy and has published numerous studies dealing with Hegel and different fields of contemporary philosophy. His book does not concentrate on summarizing or reformulating Cassirer's position but rather seeks to assess it in the light of contemporary philosophical debate. Graeser does not treat Cassirer as the member of a philosophical school but rather looks at his thought in reference to the analytic and hermeneutic streams of contemporary philosophy. Frege and Heidegger play as large a role in this study as do Kant and Hegel. By comparing problems discussed in Cassirer's writings with Frege's or Heidegger's views and incorporating them into his argument, Graeser shows how the different levels of Cassirer's theory of symbolic forms address the questions of thinkers whose thought at first glance seems fundamentally different from his. It is this integrative nature of Cassirer's philosophy which Graeser seeks to apply in his book. It is typical of his approach that he draws repeated attention to the parallel between Cassirer's general conception and the present-day discussion of realism/antirealism associated with the names of Putnam and Rorty. Graeser examines a variety of aspects of Cassirer's philosophy in chapters on concrete and theoretical topics such as language, myth, and ethics or the nature of concepts , symbolism, and truth. Two concluding chapters, "Riickblick" (review) and "Ausblick" (prospect4), show how unfinished matters in Cassirer's philosophy pose problems for further research. In Graeser's view Cassirer's theses have the character of hypotheses and should be evaluated as such. Graeser avoids referring to Cassirer's philosophy as a form of Neo-Kantianism, but he does say that Cassirer's "approach" (Ansatz) is led by a transcendental question: what are the conditions of the possibility of meaning (Bedeutung)? (~8). In order to answer this question, we must have recourse to something more fundamental. Graeser criticizes Karl-Otto Apel's view that Cassirer assumed a theory of transcendental "subjectivity " in order to support his theory of meaning, finding no clear basis for Apers criticism in Cassirer's writings. Nonetheless, Graeser concludes that Apel raises the key BOOK REVIEWS 627 question of how strong a recourse to transcendental structures must be in order to "explain" semiotic functions and how weak they can be and still be explicative. Graeser does not answer this question, but it is to his credit to have formulated it clearly. To what extent is Cassirer's philosophy really transcendental? In a rare display of hyperbole Graeser terms Cassirer's rejection of the notion of immediately present content in perception "spectacular and provocative" (138). In Cassirer's radical theory of symbolism, there is no presence or, rather, the only presence is representation. But if Cassirer has broken with the subjectivism of transcendental philosophy, as Graeser seems to think, the question arises of where his philosophy then stands in regard to the proponents of philosophies of signs and symbols for whom signs only refer to other signs. This question is all the more pressing given Graeser's view that for Cassirer truth was a form of...