Historical Development of Continental Philosophy’s Existentialism Essay

Absolute Idealism left distinct marks on many facets of Western culture. True, science was indifferent to it, and common sense was mayhap stupefied by it, further the greatest political movement of the 19th and twentieth centuries Marxismwas to a significant degree an outgrowth of Absolute Idealism. (Bertrand Russell remarked somewhere that Marx was nothing more than Hegel mixed with British economic theory. ) Nineteenth- and twentieth-century literature, theology, and level off nontextual matter felt an influence.The Romantic composers of the nineteenth century, for example, with their fondness for expanded form, colossal orchestras, coordination compound scores and soaring melodies, searched for the all-encompassing musical statement. In doing so, they mirrored the efforts of the metaphysicians whose vast and imposing systems were sources of inspiration to many artists and composers. As we form said, much of what happened in philosophy after Hegel was in response to Hegel. This response took different forms in English-speaking countries and on the European continentso different that philosophy in the twentieth century was split into cardinal usages or, as we efficacy say nowadays, two conversations. So-called analytic philosophy and its offshoots became the predominant tradition of philosophy in England and eventually in the united States. The response to Hegelian idealism on the European continent was quite different but and is known (at least in English-speaking countries) as Continental philosophy. signify while, the United States developed its own brand of philosophycalled pragmatismbut ultimately analytic philosophy became firmly entrenched in the United States as well. Within Continental philosophy may be put various identifiable schools of philosophical thought existentialism, phenomenology, hermeneutics, deconstruction, and critical theory. Two weighty schools were existentialism and phenomenology, and we will begin this chapter with them.Both existentialism and phenomenology have their grow in the nineteenth century, and many of their themes can be traced back to Socrates and even to the pre- Socratics. Each school of thought has influenced the other to such an extent that two of the most famous and prestigious Continental philosophers of this century, Martin Heidegger (18891976) and Jean-Paul Sartre (1905 1980), are important figures in both movements, although Heidegger is primarily a phenomenologist and Sartre primarily an existentialist.Some of the main themes of existentialism are traditional and academic philosophy is sterile and remote from the concerns of existing life. Philosophy must focus on the individual in her or his confrontation with the institution. The world is irrational (or, in any event, beyond arrive comprehending or accurate conceptualizing through philosophy). The world is absurd, in the sense that no ultimate explanation can be given for why it is the instruction it is. Senselessn ess, emptiness, triviality, separation, and inability to communicate pervade valet de chambre existence.Giving birth to anxiety, dread, self-doubt, and hopelessness as well as the individual confronts as the most important fact of human existence, the necessity to choose how he or she is to constitute within this absurd and irrational world. Now, many of these themes had already been introduced by those musing thinkers of the nineteenth century, Arthur Schopenhauer (see previous chapter), Soren Kierkegaard, and Friedrich Nietzsche. All three had a strong opposition for the optimistic idealism of Hegeland for metaphysical systems in general. Such philosophy, they thought, ignored the human predicament.For all three the universe, including its human inhabitants, is seldom rational, and philosophical systems that seek to trace everything seem rational are just futile attempts to overcome pessimism and despair. This impressive-sounding article denotes the philosophy that grew out of the work of Edmund Husserl (18591938). In brief, phenomenology interests itself in the essential structures plunge within the stream of conscious experiencethe stream of phenomenaas these structures unequivocal themselves independently of the assumptions and presuppositions of science.Phenomenology, much more than existentialism, has been a product of philosophers rather than of artists and writers. just like existentialism, phenomenology has had enormous impact outside philosophical circles. It has been especially influential in theology, the social and political sciences, and psychology and psychoanalysis. Phenomenology is a movement of thinkers who have a variety of interests and points of view phenomenology itself finds its antecedents in Kant and Hegel (though the movement regarded itself as anything but Hegelian).Kant, in the Critique of Pure Reason, argued that all objective knowledge is found on phenomena, the data received in sensory experience. In Hegels Phenomenol ogy of Mind, beings are treated as phenomena or objects for a consciousness. The world beyond experience, the real world assumed by natural science, is a world concerning which much is unknown and doubtful. But the world-in-experience, the world of pure phenomena, can be explored without the same limitations or uncertainties.