Alessandro De De Cesaris

The paper proposes the notion of “Two-Worlds Model” (TWM) as a theoretical framework in order to analyse some currents in the contemporary debate on technologically mediated experience. According to this model, technologically mediated experience—especially immersive experience—can be described as a form of “digital metempsychosis”—a feeling of being elsewhere. The paper argues that this model is not new in the history of philosophy, and that it is a very common theoretical and cultural strategy, often used to reduce medial differences—differences in the way of being or of experiencing something—as objectual difference. By analysing some specific topics—the most common accounts of immersive experience, the relation between immersivity and presence, and the notion of “cyberspace”—the paper aims at showing the limits of the TWM, in particular when it is used in order to describe technologically mediated experience.

Der Beitrag bietet eine Analyse von Ernst Kapps Philosophie der Technik und insbesondere seiner berühmtesten These, der Organprojektion. Die Forschungshypothese ist, dass das Denken Ernst Kapps sich nicht mit einer Anthropologie des Mangels in Verbindung bringen lässt und dass seine Ähnlichkeit mit anderen Theorien der technischen Erweiterung des Körpers (z. B. Marshall McLuhans berühmte These über Medien als Erweiterungen der Sinnesorgane) nur oberflächlich ist. Stattdessen wird Kapps Denken als eine dynamische Ökologie der Medien interpretiert, in der die Beziehung zwischen Medialität und Raum eine grundlegende Rolle spielt. Außerdem lassen sich in Kapps Denken zwei Ebenen der Technizität ausmachen: eine horizontale und eine vertikale Dimension, die als Diatechnik bzw. Metatechnik bezeichnet werden. Diese Unterscheidung eröffnet die Möglichkeit, Kapps Philosophie des Technischen als eine potenzielle Grundlage für eine Philosophie des Designs zu betrachten.

Aim of this article is to analyse the relationship between creativity, freedom and future in contemporary society. The main focus is on the notion of creativity in our digital era. Common sense understands creativity as a concept implying something new, something original that did not exist before. And yet in our society the constant overflow of news, products and contents doesn’t surprise anymore, is no longer connected to a truly creative act. The complete lack of limits seems to be our society’s own limit, since newness is not experienced anymore as something really new. The solution to this situation is a new ethic of self-limitation that reshapes our idea of creativity and bases it on different criteria. The first part of the article is an analysis of hypermodern society. Hypermodernity is defined through three features: quantity as a qualitative element, override of distance, sublation of perspective. Unlike postmodern society, hypermodernity defines itself positively on the basis of some technological and social results that are experienced as improvements. In the second part of the article the paradox of hypermodern society is discussed: despite its obsession for newness, despite the huge spread of creative jobs and the passion for future, newness seems to be something given an usual, being creative means conforming to given standards, and future is almost completely implemented into present. In the last part of the article I argue that a solution to this situation is an ethic of selflimitation, in which a rediscovery of limit leads to a new concept of creativity no longer based on quantitative increment, but rather on the ideas of qualitative selection, objective distance, personal perspective. According to this view, being creative is no longer a matter of content, but rather of form. I will also argue that the aesthetics of Oulipo, a French literary movement of the Sixties, already expressed this stance in a very similar situation.

The paper proposes the notion of “Two-Worlds Model” (TWM) as a theoretical framework in order to analyse some currents in the contemporary debate on technologically mediated experience. According to this model, technologically mediated experience—especially immersive experience—can be described as a form of “digital metempsychosis”—a feeling of being elsewhere. The paper argues that this model is not new in the history of philosophy, and that it is a very common theoretical and cultural strategy, often used to reduce medial differences—differences in the way of being or of experiencing something—as objectual difference. By analysing some specific topics—the most common accounts of immersive experience, the relation between immersivity and presence, and the notion of “cyberspace”—the paper aims at showing the limits of the TWM, in particular when it is used in order to describe technologically mediated experience.

This book offers new critical perspectives on the relationship between the notions of speculation, logic and reality in Hegel's thought as basis for his philosophical account of nature, history, spirit and human experience. The systematic functions of logic and pure thought are explored in their concrete forms and processual progression from subjective spirit to philosophy of right, society, the notion of habit, the idea of work, art, religion and science. Engaging the relation between the Logic and its realisations, this book shows the internal tension that inhabits Hegel's philosophy at the intersection of logical speculation and concrete analysis. The investigation of this tension allows for a hermeneutical approach that demystifies the common view of Hegel's idealism as a form of abstract thought, while allowing for a new assessment of the importance of speculation for a concrete understanding of the world.

Aim of this paper is to analyze Hegel’s notion of “singularity” as it is presented in the third part of the Science of Logic. It is argued that Hegel’s philosophy not only offers a definition of singularity, but also develops a very specific and original account of it. The first part of the paper deals with the Doctrines of Being and of Essence, in order to prove the relationship between objective and subjective Logic and to show how the genesis of Hegel’s notion of Singularity starts from the categories of “Something” and of “Thing”. The second part of the paper deals with Hegel’s account of Concept, of Judgement and of Syllogism and shows how Hegel’s notion of Singularity is the core notion of the whole Begriffslogik. Finally, in the third part is argued that the distinction between singularity and individuality is pivotal in order to understand Hegel’s standpoint on the matter. Hegel does in fact differentiate the two notions and his Logic shows the passage from singularity to individuality and finally to personality. It is also argued, after a thorough analysis, that the holistic-inferentialist approach to Hegel’s notion of individual being is insufficient, since it basically obliterates the originality of Hegel’s contribution to the topic and often doesn’t allow to recognize the specificity of his theory with respect to the tradition.