Abstract
This article discusses Gadamer’s conception of friendship as a part of his draft of a conception of practical philosophy. His starting point is Greek philosophy, specifically Plato’s and Aristotle’s views on friendship. He adds significant nuances to the understanding of friendship that were first laid down in his doctrine of philosophical hermeneutics. It allows him to place the notion of friendship in the context of modern philosophical debate and social criticism, and thus to make an original contribution to the discussion. Gadamer understands friendship as a necessarily reciprocal struc-ture. He emphasizes the fact that only reciprocity or a kind of relation to someone other than “me” can serve as a suffi-cient basis for the explanation of the possibility of a community, as opposed to neo-Kantian and a phenomenological adherence to self-consciousness. The notion of friendship is closely connected to the notion of solidarity. The first one is considered as a more universal and thus grounding type of interpersonal communication, whereas natural solidarity is a specific kind of bond that can grow into the true friendship. Furthermore, friendship is seen as an accession of being (Zuwachs an Sein) from a teleological point of view, i.e., the true friendship is a contribution to and the realization of life. The outcome of this practice cannot be differentiated from its process.
Highlights
The issue of friendship cannot be considered as entirely new for social philosophy, since it was a subject of interest in Ancient Greece, and discussed in the poetic treaties of Hesiod and Homer
Gadamer wrote about some politically relevant topics and suggested an original interpretation of friendship, solidarity, and ethics on the whole, it would still be inconsistent to label him as a political thinker
Hofer tries to elaborate a notion of friendship that would be in accordance with the basic ideas of philosophical hermeneutics (Hofer, 1998: 119–198)
Summary
This article discusses Gadamer’s conception of friendship as a part of his draft of a conception of practical philosophy. Hofer tries to elaborate a notion of friendship that would be in accordance with the basic ideas of philosophical hermeneutics (Hofer, 1998: 119–198) He completely ignores Gadamer’s views about ethics, practical philosophy, and friendship, and limits the consideration mainly to the ideas expressed in Truth and Method. The second, titled “Friendship and Solidarity” (1999), aims at discussing the role of friendship and solidarity in modern society under the conditions of a new social order and habits of coexistence Both texts treat the topic in various ways, from the point of view of the history of philosophy, from the current perspective, and from a theoretical angle. The features to regard are the structure of friendship, its meaning in the context of communal human life, and its essence
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