Philosophical anthropology
Philosophical anthropology, sometimes called anthropological philosophy,[1][2] is a discipline dealing with questions of metaphysics and phenomenology of the human person.[3]
Philosophical anthropology is distinct from Philosophy of Anthropology, the study of the philosophical conceptions underlying anthropological work.[4]
History
Aristotle defined the man as the union of two substances, the body and the soul, within the socalled theory of hylomorphism. Man is a type of animal with a specific characteristic that makes him superior than any other living entity: it is the rational soul. The soul is not something of extraneous to the body, but it is the principle that organizes, structures, gives life and form to the body's matter. The Aristotelian soul's conception is described in the threaty On the Soul from a theoretical point of view, and in the Politics and Nicomachean Ethics from a practical one.[3]
The Christian thought developed the concept of creatio ex nihilo according to which all what exists is a contingent creature of God, including matter. The Platonic khôra ended to be a region out of the Logos' power.
Time started to be conceived within a linear and not yet a cyclic
Christianity also developed the notion of person in order to explain the Most Holy Trinity and the co-existence of the human and divine nature (essence) in the unique person of Christ.
Ancient Christian writers: Augustine of Hippo
Augustine saw the human being as a perfect unity of two substances: soul and body.[7] He was much closer in this anthropological view to Aristotle than to Plato.[8][9] In his late treatise On Care to Be Had for the Dead sec. 5 (420 AD) he insisted that the body is essential part of the human person:
In no wise are the bodies themselves to be spurned. (...) For these pertain not to ornament or aid which is applied from without, but to the very nature of man.[10]
Augustine's favourite figure to describe body-soul unity is marriage: caro tua, coniux tua – your body is your wife.[11] Initially, the two elements were in perfect harmony. After the fall of humanity they are now experiencing dramatic combat between one another.
They are two categorically different things: the body is a three-dimensional object composed of the four elements, whereas the soul has no spatial dimensions.
According to N. Blasquez, Augustine's dualism of substances of the body and soul doesn't stop him from seeing the unity of body and soul as a substance itself.
Modern period
Philosophical anthropology as a kind of thought, before it was founded as a distinct philosophical discipline in the 1920s, emerged as post-
Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) taught the first lectures on anthropology in the European academic world. He specifically developed a conception of pragmatic anthropology, according to which the human being is studied as a free agent. At the same time, he conceived of his anthropology as an empirical, not a strictly philosophical discipline.[20] Both his philosophical and his anthropological work has been one of the influences in the field during the 19th and 20th century.[21][22] After Kant, Ludwig Feuerbach is sometimes considered the next most important influence and founder of anthropological philosophy.[23][24]
During the 19th century, an important contribution came from
Philosophical anthropology as independent discipline
Since its development in the 1920s, in the milieu of Germany
1920s Germany
Scheler defined the human being not so much as a "
Helmuth Plessner and Arnold Gehlen have been influenced by Scheler, and they are the three major representatives of philosophical anthropology as a movement.
From the 1940s
In 1953, future pope
In the 20th century, other important contributors and influences to philosophical anthropology were
Anthropology of interpersonal relationships
A large focus of philosophical anthropology is also interpersonal relationships, as an attempt to unify disparate ways of understanding the behaviour of humans as both creatures of their social environments and creators of their own values.[3] It analyses also the ontology that is in play in human relationships – of which intersubjectivity is a major theme. Intersubjectivity is the study of how two individuals, subjects, whose experiences and interpretations of the world are radically different understand and relate to each other.[citation needed]
Recently anthropology has begun to shift towards studies of intersubjectivity and other existential/phenomenological themes. Studies of language have also gained new prominence in philosophy and sociology due to language's close ties with the question of intersubjectivity.[citation needed]
Michael D. Jackson's study of intersubjectivity
The academic
In his latest book, Existential Anthropology, he explores the notion of control, stating that humans anthropomorphize inanimate objects around them in order to enter into an interpersonal relationship with them. In this way humans are able to feel as if they have control over situations that they cannot control because rather than treating the object as an object, they treat it as if it is a rational being capable of understanding their feelings and language. Good examples are prayer to gods to alleviate drought or to help a sick person or cursing at a computer that has ceased to function.
P. M. S. Hacker's Tetraology on Human Nature
A foremost Wittgensteinian,
See also
- List of important publications in anthropology
- Antihumanism (opposite)
- Ernst Tugendhat (2007) Anthropologie statt Metaphysik
- Introduction to Kant's Anthropology
- Martin Buber
- Philosophical Anthropology Info – names, books
Notes
- ISBN 90-277-0969-6.
References
- ^ Fikentscher (2004) pp.74, 89
- ^ Cassirer (1944)
- ^ OCLC 1117709579. Archived from the original (PDF) on 28 January 2023. Retrieved 15 December 2022.)
{{cite journal}}
: CS1 maint: date and year (link - ^ "Anthropology, the Philosophy of | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy".
- ^ Husserl, Edmund. Phenomenology of Internal Time-Consciousness. Tr. James S. Churchill. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1964, 21.
- ^ Heidegger, Being and Time Trs. Macquarrie & Robinson. New York: Harpers, 1964. 171. Articulating on how "Being-in-the-world" is described through thinking about seeing: "The remarkable priority of 'seeing' was noticed particularly by Augustine, in connection with his Interpretation of concupiscentia." Heidegger, quoting the Confessions: "Seeing belongs properly to the eyes. But we even use this word 'seeing' for the other senses when we devote them to cognizing... We not only say, 'See how that shines', ... 'but we even say, 'See how that sounds'".
- ^ Gianni (1965), pp. 148–49.
- ^ Hendrics (1954), p. 291.
- ^ a b Massuti, p.98.
- ^ Augustine of Hippo, De cura pro mortuis gerenda CSEL 41, 627 [13–22]; PL 40, 595: Nullo modo ipsa spernenda sunt corpora. (...) Haec enim non-ad ornamentum vel adiutorium, quod adhibetur extrinsecus, sed ad ipsam naturam hominis pertinent; Contra Faustum, 22.27; PL 44,418.
- ^ Augustine of Hippo, Enarrationes in psalmos, 143, 6; CCL 40, 2077 [46] – 2078 [74]); De utilitate ieiunii, 4, 4–5; CCL 46, 234–35.
- ^ Augustine of Hippo, De quantitate animae 1.2; 5.9
- ^ Augustine of Hippo, De quantitate animae 13.12: Substantia quaedam rationis particeps, regendo corpori accomodata.
- On the free will(De libero arbitrio) 2.3.7–6.13
- ^ Mann, p. 141–142
- ^ El concepto del substantia segun san Agustin, pp. 305–350.
- ^ De ordine, II, 11.31; CCL 29, 124 [18]; PL 32,1009; De quantitate animae, 25, 47–49; CSEL 89, 190–194; PL 32, 1062–1063
- ^ Couturier (1954), p. 543
- ^ Apostolopoulou, Georgia The Problem of Religion in Helmuth Plessner's Philosophical Anthropology, in Reimer, A. James and Siebert, Rudolf J. (1992) The Influence of the Frankfurt school on contemporary theology: critical theory and the future of religion, pp.42–66. Quotation from p.49:
Philosophical anthropology is a kind of thought arising in times of crisis. The main anthropologists, Max Scheler and Helmuth Plessner, share the same opinion [that it] has appeared as a consequence of the shaking of the Middle Age's order, the roots of which were Greek tradition and Christian religion.
- ^ Thomas Sturm, Kant und die Wissenschaften vom Menschen (Paderborn: Mentis, 2009).
- ^ a b Grolier (1981) The Encyclopedia Americana, Volume 21 p. 768
- ^ a b Buber, Martin (1943), Das Problem des Menschen [The Problem of Man] (in German).
- ^ Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, Poolla Tirupati Raju (1966) The concept of man: a study in comparative philosophy p. 490
Feuerbach interpreted philosophical anthropologism as the summary of the entire previous development of philosophical thought. Feuerbach was thus the father of the comprehensive system of anthropological philosophy.
- ^ Judith Deutsch Kornblatt, Richard F. Gustafson (1996) Russian religious thought p. 140 quotation:
In modern thought, according to Buber, Feuerbach was the most important contributor to philosophical anthropology, next to Kant, because he posited Man as the exclusive object of philosophy...
- ^ TURNBULL, Jamie. Kierkegaard and the Limits of Philosophical Anthropology. A Companion to Kierkegaard, p. 468-479, 2015.
- ^ Fischer (2006) p.64, quotation:
Ende der 1920er Jahre prominent geworden, weil damals aus verschiedenen Denkrich- tungen und Motiven die Frage nach dem Menschen in die Mitte der philosophischen Problematik rückte. Die philosophische Anthropologie wurde so zu einer neuen Disziplin in der Philosophie neben den eingeführten Subdisziplinen der Erkenntnistheorie, der Ethik, der Metaphysik, der Ästhetik
- ^ a b Wilkoszewska, Krystyna (2004) Deconstruction and reconstruction: the Central European Pragmatist Forum, Volume 2, p.129
- ^ a b Schilpp, ed. (1967), The philosophy of Martin Buber, p. 73,
It was a neo-Kantian philosopher, Ernst Cassirer, who perhaps more than anyone else contributed to the definition and development of philosophical anthropology in recent decades. Particularly relevant here is Cassirer's conception of man as a symbolizing and mythologizing animal.
- ISBN 9781402000669.
- JSTOR 2107489.
Bibliography
- Agaësse, Paul SJ (2004). L'anthropologie chrétienne selon saint Augustin : image, liberté, péché et grâce. Paris: Médiasèvres. p. 197. ISBN 2-900388-68-6.
- ISBN 84-922537-4-6.
- Blasquez, N, El concepto del substantia segun san Agustin, "Augustinus" 14 (1969), pp. 305–350; 15 (1970), pp. 369–383; 16 (1971), pp. 69–79.
- Cassirer, Ernst (1944) An Essay on Man
- Couturier Charles SJ, (1954) La structure métaphysique de l'homme d'après saint Augustin, in: Augustinus Magister, Congrès International Augustinien. Communications, Paris, vol. 1, pp. 543–550
- Donceel, Joseph F., Philosophical Anthropology, New York: Sheed&Ward 1967.
- ISBN 0-7220-4114-4.
- Fischer, Joachim (2006) Der Identitätskern der Philosophischen Anthropologie (Scheler, Plessner, Gehlen) in Krüger, Hans-Peter and Lindemann, Gesa (2006) Philosophische Anthropologie im 21. Jahrhundert
- Fikentscher, Wolfgang (2004) Modes of thought: a study in the anthropology of law and religion
- Gianni, A., (1965) Il problema antropologico, Roma .
- Hendrics, E. (1954) Platonisches und Biblisches Denken bei Augustinus, in: Augustinus Magister, Congrès International Augustinien. Communications, Paris, vol. 1.
- Karpp, Heinrich (1950). Probleme altchristlicher Anthropologie. Biblische Anthropologie und philosophische Psychologie bei den Kirchen-vatern des dritten Jahrhunderts. Gütersloh: G. Bertelsmann Verlag.
- Lucas Lucas, Ramon, Man Incarnate Spirit, a Philosophy of Man Compendium, USA: Circle Press, 2005.
- Mann, W.E., Inner-Life Ethics, in:The Augustinian Tradition. Philosophical Traditions. G. B. Matthews (ed.). Berkeley-Los Angeles-London: University of California Press. 1999. pp. 138–152. ISBN 0-520-20999-0.)
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- Mondin, Battista, Philosophical Anthropology, Man: an Impossible Project?, Rome: Urbaniana University Press, 1991.
- Pulina Giuseppe, Dizionario di antropologia filosofica, Diogene Multimedia, Bologna 2022.
- Thomas Sturm, Kant und die Wissenschaften vom Menschen. Paderborn: Mentis, 2009. ISBN 3897856085, 9783897856080
Further reading
- Joseph Agassi, Towards a Rational Philosophical Anthropology. The Hague, 1977.
- Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy, Chicago: The Great Books foundation 1959.
- Martin Buber, I and Thou, New York: Scribners 1970.
- Martin Buber, The Knowledge of Man: A Philosophy of the Interhuman, New York: Harper&Row 1965.
- Martin Buber, Between Man and Man, New York: Macmillan 1965.
- Albert Camus, The Rebel: An Essay on Man in Revolt, New York: Vintage Books 1956.
- Charles Darwin, The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, Chicago – London: Encyclopædia Britannica 1952.
- Teilhard de Chardin, The Phenomenon of Man, New York: Harper&Row 1965
- Jacques Derrida, l'Ecriture et la Difference
- Joachim Fischer, Philosophische Anthropologie. Eine Denkrichtung des 20. Jahrhunderts. Freiburg, 2008.
- Sigmund Freud, Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality, New York: Basic Books 1975.
- Erich Fromm, To Have or To Be, New York: Harper&Row 1976.
- David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature
- Hans Jonas, The Phenomenon of Life. Chicago, 1966.
- Søren Kierkegaard, The Sickness unto Death. 1848.
- Hans Köchler, Der innere Bezug von Anthropologie und Ontologie. Das Problem der Anthropologie im Denken Martin Heideggers. Hain: Meisenheim a.G., 1974.
- Hans Köchler, "The Relation between Man and World. A Transcendental-anthropological Problem," in: Analecta Husserliana, Vol. 14 (1983), pp. 181–186.
- Stanislaw Kowalczyk, An Outline of the Philosophical Anthropology. Frankfurt a.M. etc., 1991.
- Michael Jackson, Minima Ethnographica and Existential Anthropology
- Michael Landmann, Philosophische Anthropologie. Menschliche Selbstdeutung in Geschichte und Gegenwart. Berlin, 3rd ed., 1969.
- Claude Lévi-Strauss, Anthropologie structurale. Paris, 1958.
- John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, New York: Dover Publication 1959 (vol. I-II).
- Bernard Lonergan, Insight: A Study on Human Understanding, New York-London: Philosophical Library-Longmans 1958.
- Alasdair MacIntyre, Dependent Rational Animals. 1999.
- Gabriel Marcel, Homo Viator: Introduction to a Metaphysics of Hope, London: Harper&Row, 1962.
- Gabriel Marcel, Problematic Man, New York: Herder and Herder 1967.
- Maurice Merleau-Ponty, La Phenomenologie de la Perception
- Herbert Marcuse, One Dimensional Man, Boston: Beacon Press 1966.
- Jacques Maritain, Existence and Existent: An Essay on Christian Existentialism, Garden City: Image Books 1957.
- Gerhard Medicus, Being Human – Bridging the Gap between the Sciences of Body and Mind. Berlin: VWB 2015, ISBN 978-3-86135-584-7.
- Maurice Nédoncelle, Love and the Person, New York: Sheed & Ward 1966.
- Josef Pieper, Happiness and Contemplation. New York:Pantheon, 1958.
- Josef Pieper, "Josef Pieper: An Anthology. San Francisco:Ignatius Press, 1989.
- Josef Pieper, Death and Immortality. New York:Herder & Herder, 1969.
- Josef Pieper, "Faith, Hope, Love". Ignatius Press; New edition, 1997.
- Josef Pieper, The Four Cardinal Virtues: Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, Temperance. Notre Dame, Ind., 1966.
- Leonardo Polo, Antropología Trascendental: la persona humana. 1999.
- Leonardo Polo, Antropología Trascendental: la esencia de la persona humana. 2003.
- Karl Rahner, Spirit in the World, New York: Herder and Herder, 1968.
- Karl Rahner, Hearer of the Word
- Karl Rahner, Hominisation: The Evolutionary Origin of Man as a Theological Problem, New York: Herder and Herder 1965.
- Marc Rölli, Anthropologie dekolonisieren, Frankfurt, New York: Campus 2021.
- Paul Ricoeur, Soi-meme comme un autre
- Paul Ricoeur, Fallible Man: Philosophy of Will, Chicago: Henry Regnery Company 1967.
- Paul Ricoeur, Freedom and Nature: The Voluntary and Involuntary, Evanston: Northwestern University Press 1966.
- Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay in Phenomenological Ontology, New York: The Citadel Press 1956.
- Jean-Paul Sartre, Existentialism and Humanism, New York: Haskell House Publisher 1948.
- Jean-Paul Sartre, Nausea, New York: New Directions 1959.
- Martti Olavi Siirala, Medicine in Metamorphosis Routledge 2003.
- Baruch Spinoza, Ethics, Indianapolis: Hackett 1998.
- Eric Voegelin, Anamnesis.
- Karol Wojtyla, The Acting Person, Dordrecht-Boston: Reidel Publishing Company 1979.
- Karol Wojtyla, Love and Responsibility, London-Glasgow: Collins, 1981.