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Introduction INTRODUCTION The overarching aim of this thesis is the articulation of a philosophical notion of an “ethics of thinking,” a kind of thinking that is receptive to the non‑identical character of the world of human and non‑human objects. The task of explicating an ethical way of thinking requires the gesture of stepping out of the common conception of ethics inasmuch as I would like to construe the ethical life as not necessarily constituting a moral system, but something that has real ethical efficacy despite the absence of a transcendental moral system. In this sense, to think about ethics, as “philosophical praxis,” is to think outside ethics, as a system of moral code. The political philosopher Raymond Geuss distinguishes two senses of the word ethics. First is the more common usage as a set of “rules that contain restrictions on the ways in which it is permissible to act toward other people,” and the second refers to a “whole way of seeing the world and thinking about it.”1 The second sense has a broader signification, yet one which has less common usage. In attempting to make sense of what I call the “ethics of thinking,” I would like to follow Geuss’ second description of ethics. Philosophical thinking has always been a way of looking at or thinking about the world and the objects within it. It is in this very rough context that I want the idea of ethics to be construed, that is to say, that philosophy is inextricably related to ethical thinking. This obviously entails a reconfiguration of the practice of 1 Raymond Geuss, Outside Ethics (Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 2005), 6. Introduction 2 philosophical thinking. The ethics of thinking is critical of the reifying and rigidifying tendency of the human conceptual apparatus, a tendency of human rationality to dominate, control, and instrumentalize the world of human and non‑human objects. Thinking is ethical if it seeks to circumvent conceptual reification via a reorientation to the deeply mimetic and emphatically somatic character of human experience. Moreover, thinking is ethical if its concepts are able to maintain their mimetic distance from their objects, thereby opening up each encounter with objects to new possibilities, as opposed to the rigid subsumption of objects under formalized and fixated categories. In order to conceptualize such notion of ethical thinking, I turn to the works of two important German thinkers, Friedrich Nietzsche (1844‑ 1900) and Theodor W. Adorno (1903‑1969). The thesis, however, will not present a conventional comparative study of the two philosophers. I would rather figuratively call my approach an experimentation with Nietzsche and Adorno—an experimental account of the ethics of thinking, which is to be done by emphasizing and activating the strong theoretical links between the two philosophers: 1) language, 2) critique, and 3) the non‑identical. The Nietzsche‑Adorno relation might appear to be an odd combination to many, especially to those who are predisposed to read Adorno’s works in terms of Hegelian‑Marxism. The influence of Hegelian‑ Marxism on Adorno’s thought is indeed proverbial. The strong socio‑ political dimension of his writings—for instance, his critique of reification, Introduction 3 disdain towards the culture industry, and poignant descriptions of human suffering in a damaged life—is testament to his indebtedness to Hegelian‑ Marxism, particularly to the ideas of Georg Lukács.2 The socio‑political or materialist dimension of Adorno’s thought has been proven to be a stronghold against idealist philosophy. But there is another angle to Adorno’s oeuvre which is noticeably in contrast to its Hegelian‑Marxist heritage; yet it is a tension that is not necessarily inimical to Hegelian‑ Marxism. This tension in Adorno’s thinking is partly the reason why he resists, even without really trying, any form of convenient categorization. Beyond Hegelian‑Marxism, the insights of Walter Benjamin were profoundly influential for Adorno. It was in the former’s The Origin of German Tragic Drama that Adorno would discover the critical and interpretative power of conceptual constellations; it is also through this where we find an indirect link to Nietzsche. Adorno writes in his “A Portrait of Walter Benjamin”: “The later Nietzsche’s critical insight that truth is not identical with a timeless universal, but rather that it is solely the historical which yields the figure of the absolute . became the canon of his practice” (P 231). I consider this statement from Adorno to be the fulcrum upon which we could 2 For a comprehensive discussion of Lukács’ influence on Adorno, see Martin Jay, “Theodor W. Adorno and the Collapse of the Lukácsian Concept of Totality,” in Marxism and Totality: The Adventures of a Concept from Lukács to Habermas (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1984), 241‑275. On Adorno’s relation to Hegelian‑Marxism, see Nigel Gibson, “Rethinking an Old Saw: dialectical Negativity, Utopia, and Negative Dialectic in Adorno’s Hegelian Marxism,” in Adorno: A Critical Reader (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers Ltd., 2002), 257‑291. Introduction 4 make sense of his relation to Nietzsche; we could say that, in a broad sense, they share this emphatic view of the “historical”—which they restate as “mimetic” or “somatic”—basis of truth or that what we understand as “totality” is not an ethereal transcendent, but, rather, a reflection of individual moments, the particularity of our sensuous experiences. Here, epistemology and ethics converge, as Nietzsche and Adorno converge. Adorno sees in Nietzsche’s critical outlook on universal truth an image of an ethics of thinking. In a lecture Adorno gave in 1963 where he confessed the truth about his reception of Nietzsche, namely that “of all the so‑called great philosophers” he owes Nietzsche “by far the greatest debt – more even than to Hegel” (PMP 172)—could it be that Adorno was referring exactly to the emphatic notion of an ethics of thinking? It is not at all farfetched to say, yes and more besides. This image of Nietzsche as a forerunner of critical theory is not something that orthodox Marxists would readily welcome. According to Peter Pütz, after 1945, Nietzsche’s . fragmentary work seemed unsuited for clearing the rubble . He was judged guilty through the actions of those who had appropriated him. The harshest condemnation of Nietzsche has come from the orthodox Marxists’ tribunal: they regard him as nothing less than the pre‑fascist assassin of reason. Even Lukács has been unable to provide a better judgment.3 3 Peter Pütz, “Nietzsche and Critical Theory,” in Telos, 50 (1981‑82)., 103. Introduction 5 However, Pütz is quick to add that the evaluation of Nietzsche of the immediate members of the Frankfurt School was significantly different and affirmative.4 This can indeed be corroborated by Rolf Wiggershaus who relates to us an occasion in 1942 in Los Angeles where the self‑exiled members of the Frankfurt School (among them were Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Friedrich Pollock, Herbert Marcuse, Ludwig Marcuse, Günther Anders, and Rolf Nürnberg) debated Nietzsche’s significance in social critique, in particular to a Nietzschean account of the relation between need and culture. Wiggershaus points out that it was Adorno (who was supported by Horkheimer) who dominated the intellectual exchange and who sought “to correct or supplement Marx through the use of Nietzsche as a thinker concerned with the ‘totality of happiness (Glück) incarnate.’”5 4 Ibid. William Outhwaite extends Pütz’s observations by discussing, in more detail than Pütz, the resemblances between the works of Benjamin, Horkheimer, and Habermas, on the one hand, and Nietzsche, on the other. See “Nietzsche and Critical Theory,” in Nietzsche: A Critical Reader (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1995), 203‑221. Other essays discussing the relation to Nietzsche to critical theory are the following: Vincent P. Pecora, “Nietzsche, Genealogy, Critical Theory,” in New German Critique, 53 (1991), 104‑130 and Yianna Liastos, “An Artist’s Choice, an Artist’s Commitment: Reconciling Myth and Modern History in Nietzsche and Adorno,” in Dialectical Anthropology, 26 (2001), 137‑158. Pecora is skeptical of Nietzsche’s contribution to critical theory, while Liastos attempts at a synthesis between Nietzsche and Adorno. Meanwhile, there are only a couple of book length studies dealing specifically with the Nietzsche‑Adorno relation worth mentioning here: Karin Bauer, Adorno’s Nietzschean Narratives: Critiques of Ideology, Readings of Wagner (New York: State University of New York Press, 1999) and Rüdiger Sünner, Ästhetische Szientismuskritik: Zum Verhältnis von Kunst und Wissenschaft bei Nietzsche und Adorno (Frankfurt am Main: Verlag Peter Lang, 1986). Bauer’s book has significantly contributed to the initial conception of this thesis. 5 Rolf Wiggershaus, “The Frankfurt School’s Nietzschean Moment’,” trans. by Gerd Appelhans, in Constellations, 8:1 (2001), 144. Introduction 6 Allow me to cite here Wiggershaus’ recount of Adorno’s thoughts on Nietzsche: Adorno says expressly that he does not want to adopt as positive correctives Nietzschean concepts like “love” and “longing.” Indeed, he and Horkheimer valued Nietzsche above all for his frankness concerning the instinctual nature of cruelty, for his attentiveness to the stirring of repressed instincts without minimizing rationalization. No philosopher had brought such anti‑Christian, antihumanistic furor to his age as the pastor’s son Nietzsche, who interacted almost exclusively with the educated, patricians, and petty nobility. Almost no philosopher had attempted so resolutely, without regard for socio‑historical trends, to negate and destroy his own origins and training. Almost no philosopher so uncompromisingly and aggressively placed self‑unfolding and enhanced life above considerations of personal gain and social success.6 Nietzsche’s influence on Adorno’s thought is perhaps the most subtle of all that inform the latter’s complex and difficult work. Nietzsche’s influence is also the least explored. Adorno’s relation to Nietzsche is itself complex, often drawing inspiration not from any specific Nietzschean idea, but, rather, broadly from the latter’s critical spirit.
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