Christian Lotz

To be sure, Hans-Georg Gadamer's philosophy has received increased attention in recent philosophical debates. For although older confrontations, such as Gadamer's debate with Habermas, have receded in the background, scholars such as John McDowell, Cristina Lafont, Ruth Sonderegger, Albrecht Wellmer, and Günther Figal have revitalized some of Gadamer's main philosophical insights and demonstrated the importance of hermeneutics for contemporary philosophy. In addition, the newly-founded Society for Philosophical Hermeneutics has helped to give this recent attention a new academic forum for fresh and vibrant work on Gadamer.Kristin Gjesdal's book fits neatly into this newly-discovered interest in Gadamer's philosophy, especially since it focuses on important, but less frequently discussed, historical sources of Gadamer's philosophy and their systematic impact on both hermeneutics in general and a theory of interpretation in particular. Gjesdal's book is lucidly written, paying much attention to the underlying arguments that are implied in Gadamer's critical and often reductive accounts of philosophers who belong to the tradition of "German Idealism." However, having said this, the title of her book is misleading: though the reader might expect an extensive discussion of Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel, the author focuses mainly on the sources of

In this paper, I will present an argument against Husserl’s analysis of picture consciousness. Husserl’s analysis of picture consciousness (as it can be found primarily in the recently translated volume Husserliana 23) moves from a theory of depiction in general to a theory of perceptual imagination. Though, I think that Husserl’s thesis that picture consciousness is different from depictive and linguistic consciousness is legitimate, and that Husserl’s phenomenology avoids the errors of linguistic theories, such as Goodman’s, I submit that his overall theory is unacceptable, especially when it is applied to works of art. Regarding art, the main problem of Husserl’s theory is the assumption that pictures are constituted primarily as a conflict between perception/physical picture thing and imagination/picture object. Against this mentalist claim, I maintain, from a hermeneutic point of view, that pictures are the result of perceptual formations [Bildungen]. I then claim that Husserl’s theory fails, since it does not take into account what I call “plastic perception” [Bildliches Sehen], which plays a prominent role not only within the German tradition of art education but also within German art itself. In this connection, “plastic thinking” [Bildliches Denken] was prominent especially in Klee, in Kandinsky, and in Beuys, as well as in the overall doctrine of the Bauhaus. Ultimately, I argue that Husserl’s notion of picture consciousness and general perceptive imaginary consciousness must be replaced with a more dynamic model of the perception of pictures and art work that takes into account (a) the constructive and plastic moment, (b) the social dimension and (c) the genetic dimension of what it means to see something in something (Wollheim).

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 39.1 (2001) 160-161 [Access article in PDF] Sonja Rinofner-Kreidl. Edmund Husserl. Zeitlichkeit und Intentionalität. Freiburg: Alber Verlag, 2000. Pp. 828. DM 178.00. Husserl himself understood the principle of a further development in phenomenology as a process of "critique of critique." One can find a realization of this principle in this impressive study by Sonja Rinofner-Kreidl (University of Graz, Austria). Through the title Edmund Husserl.Zeitlichkeit und Intentionalität the author announces her project to be an immanent analysis of central themes in transcendental phenomenology. The study concerns not only an interpretation of the whole published corpus, but also methodological problems and problems of the theory of subjectivity. Phenomenological topics like the lived body or psychology are exlcluded, which is a great advantage of the study. The themes are presented by critical analysis, and with systematic perspicacity in order to give new insights into traditional problems of research in Husserlian phenomenology. The author introduces her main points in three steps. In part one she deals with the "basis of phenomenology" and the "model of intentionality," which are presented in the first chapter through a commentary on the doctrine of intentionality in the Logical Investigations and the Noesis-Noema-correlation in Ideas I. Questions of method such as eidetic intuition and reduction are discussed in the second chapter. Overall, the study tries to understand Husserl's theory as an "intentional neutralism" (684) in which problems of a theory of knowledge are "bracketed." In the two chapters of the second part, the author connects Husserl's theory of subjectivity, the I-problematic and the problem of self-awareness, with his phenomenology of time consciousness. The I-problematic and the different concepts of consciousness in transcendental phenomenology are not only presented through an analysis of the Logical Investigations and Ideas I, but also an explanation of Husserl's later monadology. Rinofner-Kreidl shows convincingly that Husserl's position has to be understood as a non-egological theory of self-awareness.In the third part, the author demonstrates the limits of transcendental phenomenology within metaphysics by critisizing Husserl's thesis of a thinkable "world annihilation" [Weltvernichtung]. The investigation is finished by a chapter on the connection between phenomenology and science.Against the background of such questions, Rinofner-Kreidl develops her main argument against Husserl's phenomenology, namely, that it is able to solve neither the problem of the original temporal constitution of consciousness nor that of the pure I, because of certain methodological preconditions, e.g., intuition and the pure givenness of the phenomena to be described. Both threads are linked together in an impressive discussion of the often discussed reflective problematic. According to Rinofner-Kreidl, the heart of the matter is the question whether acts of reflection have to be understood as inner perception or as re-presentification [Vergegenwärtigung]. By preferring the first option one encounters difficulties by considering the act of reflection as occurring at the same time as the retentional constitution of the lived present. However, on the basis of Husserl's time phenomenology, the latter seems to be impossible. Non-intentional original constitution of time and intentional acts cannot be together at the same "objective" time. Thus, the author speaks about the "neuralgic problem" (511) of Husserl's phenomenology. Further, by preferring the second case one must give up the Cartesian [End Page 160] thread of phenomenology, because a representing reflection must "thematize" its objects, namely the experiences [Erlebnisse] themselves, as an object like any other object. However, this means that phenomenology, which is itself constituted by reflection, is unable "to refer to past objects without errors" (377). Consequently, The Cartesian ideal of an absolute apodicticity has to be given up.The author argues for the second option. She writes: "If a phenomenological philosophy is to keep itself clear of all constitution and speculation by strictly confining itself to the given, then precisely the time analysis comes into conflict with the basic principle, since it wants to describe what never can be an object" (499). Not only the analysis of time consciousness...

Es ist bekannt, daß Husserl Fichtes theoretischer Philosophie keine gute Seite abgewinnen konnte. In den 1917 vor Kriegsheimkehrern gehaltenen und 1918 wiederholten Vorträgen über Fichte spricht Husserl von »abstrusen Konstruktionen«, die in der Wissenschaftslehre Fichtes zu finden seien. Nichtsdestotrotz kann man sehen, daß beide Ansätze mehr als bloße Strukturanalogien aufweisen. Es wurde - wenn auch nicht häufig - darauf hingewiesen, daß sachliche Verweise beider Ansätze aufeinander möglich sind. Die Berührungspunkte in der praktischen Philosophie dagegen fallen eher ins Auge. In seinen Vorträgen orientiert sich Husserl insbesondere an Fichtes populären und religionsphilosophischen Schriften und es ist inzwischen bekannt, daß sich Husserl in den 20er Jahren vermehrt der praktischen Philosophie im Sinne Fichtes zuwendet, über deren Verhältnis zu der seinen er in einem Brief an Adolf Grimme meint, »daß die religions-philosophischen Perspektiven, die mir die Phänomenologie eröffnete, überraschend nahe Beziehung zu Fichtes späterer Gotteslehre zeigen«. Ich möchte mich an dieser Stelle auf den theoretischen Zugang konzentrieren und dabei speziell den Begriff der Affektion bei Fichte und Husserl näher untersuchen.

In den Cartesianischen Meditationen von Edmund Husserl heißt es: "Der Andere ist Spiegelung meiner selbst und doch nicht eigentlich Spiegelung." . Man kann den Satz nicht nur als einen Reflex der Leibniz-Lektüre Husserls auslegen, sondern ihn auch als sachlichen Hinweis auf die Erfahrung der Spiegelung verstehen. Meine Überlegungen beschränken sich auf eine Grundskizze einer Phänomenologie der Spiegelerfahrung, die die konkrete Fremderfahrung, also abgesehen von ihrer Grundlegungsdimension, genauer beleuchten hilft. Man kann die ursprüngliche Assoziation, die Husserl unter dem Titel "Paarung" anführt, im Sinne einer leiblichen Spiegelung interpretieren. Mit der Bestimmung einer solchen unmittelbaren leiblichen "Übereinkunft" wäre ein erster rudimentärer Begriff des Mitmachens gewonnen, bei dessen Bestimmung kognitive Muster vermieden werden können. Die passive Fremderfahrung läßt sich verstehen als eine passive Einigung der Leiber und Bewegungssysteme, die spiegelverkehrt verläuft. Dieser Aufweis kann nicht nur helfen kann, den psychologischen Begriff der Nachahmung phänomenologisch zur reinterpretieren, sondern auch als Voraussetzung jeder intersubjektiven Erfahrung angesehen werden

In this essay, I shall attempt to shed light on central practical concepts, such as action and decision, in Heidegger’s existentialism and in Fichte’s idealism. BothFichte and Heidegger, though from different philosophical frameworks and with different results, address the practical moment by developing [1] a non-epistemic concept of certainty, in connection with [2] a temporal analysis of the conditions of action, which leads to the primacy of future in their analyses. Both [1] and [2] shed light on their concept of the self, and on the concept of freedom. In addition, my paper offers a further clarification of what was called before Fichte’s “proto-existentialism” (G. Zöller, D. Henrich). The ontological framework of both philosophies and their concept of the practical self, finally, leads to the proposal to merge both perspectives into what I would like to call “existential idealism.” Fichte’s and Heidegger’s practical philosophies can be taken as two sides of the same coin.

Hubert L. Dreyfus has worked out a critique of what he calls “representationalism” and “cognitivism,” one proponent of which, according to Dreyfus, is Husserl. But I think that Dreyfus misunderstands the Husserlian conception of practical intentionality and that his characterization of Husserl as a “representationalist” or as a “cognitivist” is thereby wrongheaded. In this paper I examine Dreyfus’s interpretation by offering a Husserlian critique of Dreyfus’s objections to Husserl, and then by outlining Husserl’s account of practical intentionality and the practical lived Body. I sketch the critique and the approach of Dreyfus in three steps. First, I deal with his objections against Husserl’s theory by arguing that Dreyfus understands neither the role of the reduction nor the function of background-awareness in Husserl’s phenomenology. Second, I elucidate the central role that the “practical lived Body” plays in practical intentionality for Husserl, and, third, I highlight the consequences that follow from the analyses offered in the previous sections.

In this paper, I will perform a "step back" by showing how Derrida's analysis of forgiveness is rooted in Kantian moral philosophy and in Derrida's interpretation of Kierkegaard's concept of decision. This will require a discussion of the distinction that Kant draws in his Groundwork between price (the economic) and dignity (the incomparable), as well as a discussion of the underlying notion of singularity in Kant's text. In addition, Derrida universalizes Kierkegaard's concept of the agent so that, with this perspective in view, the interpretation of Kantian morality as something that must be described in a paradoxical way, becomes fully transparent. Whereas the interpretation of Kantian morality will provide us with a concept of morality that remains a "blind spot" for the agent, with the help of Derrida's Kierkegaard interpretation we can see that the concept of decision remains ultimately ambivalent. In conclusion, both (a) the deconstructed concept of morality and (b) the concept of decision will finally (c) let us understand Derrida's radical concept of forgiveness, which is both a non-economic act of morality in the sense explained and an unpredictable, uncontrollable decision and event.

Die 4. Auflage bringt zunächst die Kommentierung der Präambel und der Art. 1 bis 19 auf den aktuellen Stand von Judikatur und Literatur. Die grundlegende Struktur des Kommentares wurde beibehalten und um neuere Entwicklungen wie die Implikationen der Europäisierung und Digitalisierung sowie der Corona-Pandemie ergänzt.Die Herausgeberschaft des Kommentares hat ab der 4. Auflage Frauke Brosius-Gersdorf übernommen. Auch im Autorenkreis sind personelle Veränderungen zu verzeichnen: Mit Ausnahme von Frauke Brosius-Gersdorf, Alexander Thiele und Ferdinand Wollenschläger, die bereits an der 3. Auflage mitgewirkt haben, liegen die Kommentierungen in den Händen neuer Autorinnen und Autoren.Der Kommentar erscheint in drei Bänden und wird nur geschlossen abgegeben.Der Grundgesetz-Kommentar ist Bestandteil des Moduls Verfassungsrecht PREMIUM, das bei beck-online.de erhältlich ist.

In this essay, I offer thoughts on the constitution of images in art, especially as they are constituted in painting and in photography. Utilizing ideas from Gadamer, Derrida and Adorno, I shall argue that representation should be conceived as a performative concept and as an act of formation; i.e., as a process rather thanas something "fixed." My reflections will be carried out in connection with a careful analysis of Gerhard Richter's painting Reader, which is a painting of a photograph that depicts a female who is reading. I demonstrate how a close analysis of this fascinating painting leads us deeper into the problem of painted images, insofar as it enacts what it is about, namely, the constitution of itself as an innige by means of a complex and enigmatic relationship between seeing, reading, memory, inner, outer, gaze and blindness.

In this essay I critically examine David Graeber’s concept of “everyday communism.” Graeber claims that that all societies are ultimately based and founded upon what he calls the “communism of the senses.” This “two-level” version of social reality, as I intend to show in what follows from a Marxian standpoint, should be rejected, as it operates with a descriptive concept of society that posits as the center or “essence” of society its universal and ahistorical “human” base, on top of which hierarchical and economic relations are posited as “superstructures.” Graeber favors a theory that posits an ahistorical base underneath the historical. As a consequence, society disappears underneath an empty and abstract concept of the ethical. This image of society, I will argue with Marx and Engels, overlooks the categorical form of social relations, which cannot be reduced to an empty and abstract concept of sociality as “human” ethical relations. This is especially visible in the case of capitalist socialization.

Scholarship in Heideggerian philosophy can be broadly differentiated into three groups, which evolved in the European and Anglo-American discourses after WWII, namely, first a transcendental (idealist Kantian) approach; second, an Aristotelian approach; and third, a Christian approach to Heidegger’s analytic of Dasein and his fundamental ontology. All of these basic positions are a result of Heidegger’s philosophy on his way to Being and Time (1927) which he developed both in his broad ranging and fascinating lecture courses in Freiburg, where he taught as Husserl’s assistant between 1917 and 1923, and in Marburg, where he taught between 1923 and 1927 (before he returned to Freiburg in 1928 as Husserl’s successor). Interestingly, the analytic reception of Heidegger focuses on Heidegger’s main work Being and Time, whereas the European and “Continental” discourse is oriented towards larger issues, which include philosophical anthropology, theology, hermeneutics, and the history of philosophy. McGrath’s study belongs to the theologically motivated studies on Heidegger’s phenomenology and ontology and thereby contributes to the recent renewed interest in Heidegger’s early philosophy, which arose after his early lecture courses were published in his Collected Works and after it became clear that Heidegger’s way to Being and Time (and his later thinking) not only was heavily influenced by Scholasticism, especially by Duns Scotus, but also by Augustine, Eckhart, and Luther, all of which took effect before Heidegger encountered Husserl’s phenomenology, Neo-Kantianism or Aristotle’s philosophy. The greatness of Being and Time is indeed a result of the ingenious transformation of all these sources into something new.

Christian Lotz shows in this book that Husserl's Phenomenology and its key concept--subjectivity--is based on a concrete anthropological structure, such as self-affection and the bodily experience of the other. The analysis of the sensual sphere and the lived Body forces Husserl to an ongoing correction of his strong methodological assumptions. Subjectivity turns out to be an ambivalent phenomenon, as the subject is unable to fully present itself to itself, and therefore is forced to allow for a fundamental non-transparency in itself

I argue from a hermeneutic point of view that formal elements of poetry can only be identified because poetry is based on both the phenomenon and the conception of poetry, both of which precede the attempt to identify formal elements as the defining moment of poetry. Furthermore, I argue with Gadamer that poetry is based on a rupture with and an epoche of our non-poetic use of language in such a way that it liberates “fixed” universal aspects of everyday language, and that through establishing itself in a new, self-referential and monologue unity, it individualizes speech . From the hermeneutic position, poetry is a form of speaking rather than a “fixed” object. As such, I will try to make sense of what Paul Celan said in his famous “Meridian” speech: namely, that the poem is “actualized language, set free under the sign of a radical individuation, which at the same time stays mindful of the limits drawn by language, the possibilities opened by language.”