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Hans Blumenberg's Anthropology of Instrumental Reason Culture 1 Hans Blumenberg’s Anthropology of Instrumental Reason Culture, Modernity, and Self-Preservation Francis Plagne ORCID ID: 0000-0002-9600-4609 Submitted in total fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Melbourne June 2017 1 2 Abstract: This thesis argues that a notion of biological self-preservation is central to the philosophical anthropology of Hans Blumenberg. It shows how Blumenberg adopts an understanding of the human being developed in early 20th century German Philosophical Anthropology, particularly in the naturalistic variant proposed by Arnold Gehlen. This theory of the human argues that the unique biological make-up of the human being should be the central consideration in the interpretation of human life and its production (culture). Against the backdrop of an archaic experience of the power of nature that he calls ‘the absolutism of reality’, Blumenberg adopts this ‘anthropobiological’ paradigm and uses it as the basis for a functional interpretation of culture centred on human self-preservation. The thesis demonstrates that this philosophical anthropology is not only descriptive, but also has normative and critical aspects. Blumenberg proposes an unsurpassable limit in the possible transformations of the human relationship to nature, denying the possibility of a receptive opening to nature that would break with instrumental mastery. This anthropological limit is formulated in critical dialogue with Martin Heidegger’s work and Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno’s Dialectic of Enlightenment, both of which look forward to a reconciled relationship between the human and non-human. It then argues that Blumenberg’s interpretation and defence of modernity is also grounded in his philosophical anthropology. His account of modernity through the category of ‘self-assertion’ functions as a complete reversal of the critique of instrumental reason in Heidegger and Critical Theory. Blumenberg celebrates the modern intensification of the instrumental relationship to nature as the moment in which humanity first properly recognised and accepted its true relation to nature. Only by reading Blumenberg in dialogue with the critique of instrumental reason can these implications of his anthropological position and account of modernity be brought to the surface. 2 3 Declaration: This is to certify that: (i) The thesis comprises only my original work toward the PhD. (ii) Due acknowledgement has been made in the text to all other material used. (iii) The thesis is fewer than 100, 000 words in length, exclusive of tables, maps, bibliographies, and appendices. Francis Plagne 3 4 Acknowledgments I would like to extend my gratitude to my supervisors, John Rundell and Gerhard Wiesenfeldt, for the expertise, support, enthusiasm, and critical feedback that enabled the successful completion of this thesis. I am extremely grateful to Lauren Bliss for insightfully and attentively reading and commenting on the whole manuscript. I thank Michael Ascroft, James Field, and Simone Gustafsson for reading and responding to unfinished versions of some of the chapters. For many hours of conversation and help with some translations, my thanks go out to Giles Fielke. 4 5 Table of Contents List of Abbreviations.................................................................................................................7 Note on Translations..................................................................................................................8 Introduction..............................................................................................................................9 Chapter 1: Central Themes of Philosophical Anthropology..............................................19 1.1. Max Scheler: Human World-Openness.............................................................................21 1.2. Arnold Gehlen’s Anthropobiology....................................................................................27 Chapter 2: Wresting Significance from the Status Naturalis.............................................37 2.1. Blumenberg’s Anthropogenetic Scenario.........................................................................37 2.2. The Work of Myth.............................................................................................................44 2.3. Significance.......................................................................................................................52 2.4. Mythical and Scientific Logos...........................................................................................59 2.5. The Status of Blumenberg’s Anthropology......................................................................71 Chapter 3: Constructive and Receptive Anthropologies....................................................79 3.1. Against Heidegger.............................................................................................................79 3.2. Contrasting Images of the Human Being..........................................................................90 3.3. Shaping Reality Through Metaphor..................................................................................92 Chapter 4: Dogma and Utopia............................................................................................101 4.1. Jacob Taubes’ Critique of Blumenberg...........................................................................102 4.2. Romanticism and Idealism..............................................................................................117 4.3. Dogma and Utopia..........................................................................................................124 4.4. Blumenberg’s Defence of Existing Institutions..............................................................137 4.5. Concluding Remarks.......................................................................................................144 Chapter 5: ‘Other Possibilities’..........................................................................................149 5.1. Two Naturalistic Anthropologies ...................................................................................153 5 6 5.2. The Rational Function of Myth in Blumenberg..............................................................155 5.3. The Rational Function of Myth in Horkheimer and Adorno...........................................162 5.4. The Ambivalence of Myth..............................................................................................165 5.5. Instrumental and Mimetic Magic....................................................................................171 5.6. Instrumental and Mimetic Language...............................................................................184 5.7. Contrasting Horizons.......................................................................................................187 Chapter 6: Modernity as Self-Assertion.............................................................................193 6.1. Modernity as the Epoch of Instrumental Reason............................................................196 6.2. What is the ‘Legitimacy’ of the Modern Age? Blumenberg Against the Secularisation Thesis......................................................................207 6.3. Blumenberg’s Interpretation of Modernity as Human Self-Assertion............................223 6.4. Aspects of Self-Assertion................................................................................................238 6.5. Late Modernity: Science’s Autonomy from Life............................................................258 Chapter 7: Outcomes and Limitations of Blumenberg’s Anthropology.........................263 7.1. The Human Self-Image in Modernity.............................................................................263 7.2. Self-Assertion and Self-Preservation..............................................................................270 7.3. The Anthropological Defence of Instrumental Reason...................................................276 7.4. Limitations of Blumenberg’s Philosophical Anthropology............................................283 Bibliography.........................................................................................................................293 6 7 List of abbreviations Works by Hans Blumenberg: AAR: ‘An Anthropological Approach to the Contemporary Significance of Rhetoric’. Translated by Robert M. Wallace. In After Philosophy: End or Transformation, edited by Kenneth Baynes, James Bohman, and Thomas McCarthy, 429-58. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1987. AM: Arbeit am Mythos. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1979. ÄMS: Ästhetische und metaphorologische Schriften. Edited by Anselm Haverkamp. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 2001. BM: Beschreibung des Menschen. Edited by Manfred Sommer. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 2006. BTB: Hans Blumenberg and Jacob Taubes. Briefwechsel 1961-1981. Edited by Herbert Kopp-Oberstebrink and Martin Treml. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 2013. GCW: The Genesis of the Copernican World. Translated by Robert M. Wallace. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1987. LMA: The Legitimacy of the Modern Age. Translated by Robert M. Wallace. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 1983. PM: Paradigms for a Metaphorology. Translated by Robert Savage. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2010. PNC: ‘Prospect for a Theory of Non-Conceptuality,’ in Shipwreck With Spectator: Paradigm of a Metaphor for Existence. Translated by Steven Rendall, 81-102.
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