DOCSLIB.ORG

Beyond Exclusive Humanism

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Beyond Exclusive Humanism BEYOND EXCLUSIVE HUMANISM A Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of Georgetown University in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Government By Paula Louise Olearnik, M.A. Washington, DC November 4, 2010 Copyright by Paula Louise Olearnik All Rights Reserved ii BEYOND EXCLUSIVE HUMANISM Paula Louise Olearnik Thesis Advisor: Robert B. Douglass, Ph. D. ABSTRACT Contemporary liberal theory and the theoretical justification thereof are intimately related to the pre-political worldview of exclusive humanism. This form of humanism maintains the primacy of human life and flourishing to the exclusion of any transcendent values. The veracity of this form of humanism has recently been questioned by a number of political theorists including John Gray, Charles Taylor and Václav Havel. This dissertation investigates the merits of their critiques, pitting them against self-avowed humanist partisan Richard Rorty. It evaluates the merits of the alternatives to exclusive humanism offered by the aforementioned authors. What consequences for liberal theory and culture would going beyond exclusive humanism entail? iii Whenever I came to a difficult point in the dissertation or was simply exhausted, I would pull out a piece of paper and begin to write my acknowledgements. I would think of all the people who had educated, motivated and sustained me throughout the years of my doctoral study, and those who did so well before. I now own reams of handwritten acknowledgements in notebooks, on the backs of articles and scribbled on pieces of scrap paper, so many in fact that it would be impossible for me to reproduce them all here. I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to very many friends and loved ones and although I do not list all your names here, please know that you are precious to me. In a special way, of course, I recognise the mentorship of my advisor Prof. Bruce Douglass. In his musings on education, the Polish philosopher Józef Tischner wrote that upbringing and education are work with and upon a person who is in the process of maturing. It therefore creates between teacher and pupil bonds analogous to fatherhood - not as the passing on of life, but as the passing on of hope. The teacher is a confidant of the pupil’s hope; he is its support and strength. Prof. Douglass, you have been a true teacher in this sense; the bearer of my hope. I also sincerely thank professors Patrick Deneen, Colin Bird and Richard Boyd for their help and guidance along the way. I further acknowledge my fellow political theorists at Georgetown for their solidarity in the ordeal, especially: Hamutal Bernstein, Craig French, Kristine Miranda and Briana McGinnis. Finally, I thank my parents Henryk and Irena Olearnik and my brother Gabriel. This journey has taken me far from home but your love and support has always been close beside me. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction …..…………………………...………………………………………..1 Chapter 1: A Defence of Humanism …..…….……………….…………………16 Chapter 2: An Anti-humanist Challenge …..….……..…………………………52 Chapter 3: A Transcendent Perspective ………..……………………………....91 Chapter 4: Politics beyond Exclusive Humanism ….…………..……………..129 Conclusion ………………………………………………...……………………..169 Bibliography ……………………………………………...………………….......176 v Introduction Liberalism needs to move beyond exclusive humanism? Sounds suspiciously like metaphysics… Ever since John Rawls attempted to free liberalism from metaphysical claims, political theorists have been embroiled in debates over neutrality concerning the good, the reasonableness of comprehensive doctrines and the continual reliance on substantive truth claims in politics. A lively public debate – especially, though not exclusively in the United States - has also ensued about the role of religious discourse in the public square. The present investigation however does not engage in those well-rehearsed and, frankly, tired debates. In drawing attention to the problematic nature of the exclusive humanist worldview, which in many ways lies beneath many of those debates of the 80’s and 90’s, neither does it aim at getting at the same issues in a peculiar and oblique way. Rather it is interested in answering the following question: what, if anything, do contemporary critiques of humanism entail for liberal theory and liberal culture? This enquiry is prompted by a number of recent critiques of humanism - a fact made all the more intriguing by the diversity of their provenance. Its primary task is to examine the validity and persuasiveness of these critiques, both on their own merits but also by considering responses to them. A secondary, though no less important task, is to determine what the results of this investigation entail for liberal theory; a finally, to examine the alternatives to the humanist worldview. 1 Before embarking on any of these endeavours however, several preliminary tasks must be carried out. The first is to define the kind of humanism under consideration; that is, to clarify the term ‘exclusive humanism’. The second is to establish the relationship between exclusive humanism and procedural liberalism. What is exclusive humanism? Humanism is best thought of as a worldview or life-stance which identifies and promotes the value of human beings and carries with it a series of obligations about how we ought to live and treat others. 1 This succinct description is largely accurate, if not exhaustive, of all forms of humanism despite significant differences in terms of their specific content. The humanist worldview has a long and complex history, one which has seen Renaissance, Enlightenment and Modern iterations – to name but a few examples. None of these are of immediate concern, however, since the humanism under consideration here is supplied by Charles Taylor’s term ‘exclusive humanism’. Exclusive humanism, Taylor specifies, consists in the combination of two elements – one practical; the other theoretical. The practical element avows the primacy of human life, largely understood in material terms as the valuing of physical life and its necessary corollaries – food, shelter, alleviation of sickness and pain, education, employment, opportunity for a personal life and so forth. The second-order element supplies the additional claim that there is nothing beyond the primacy of human life as outlined in the terms above. 2 This characterization acts as a good working 1 Paul Kurtz, Toward a New Enlightenment (New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1994), 277. 2 Charles Taylor, A Catholic Modernity: Charles Taylor’s Marianist Award Lecture with responses, ed. James L. Heft, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 19. 2 definition of the prevailing form of contemporary humanism. However it requires a further precision which Taylor himself does not supply. Exclusive humanism, like every other kind of worldview, can function in a variety of ways. It is important to disambiguate. The present investigation will be primarily concerned with exclusive humanism which functions as a pre-political foundation; that is to say, which functions as a minimal conception affirming the moral claim that human beings have intrinsic worth (‘The First Anthropocentric Principle’) and the epistemological claim that reality can only be judged from a human perspective (‘The Second Anthropocentric Principle’). It is important to differentiate between a pre-political foundation and a comprehensive doctrine, the latter of which would articulate a complete conception of the good covering all recognized values and virtues within one rather precise system. Humanism has, of course, functioned as a comprehensive doctrine. Historically, humanist notions of the ‘autonomous individual’ became central to our modern self-understanding and helped to supply the substantive underpinnings of liberal politics. Even today exclusive humanism continues to function as a complete moral conception in some quarters, as the manifestos of various humanist associations attest, issuing a robust set of first-order political, social and ethical commitments. 3 For reasons that will shortly be articulated it will be necessary to limit the present inquiry to a form of exclusive humanism that functions as a pre-political foundation or minimal conception. It will become clear however that the authors under 3 See for example The British Humanist Association http://www.humanism.org.uk/ 3 consideration will be rather less disciplined in keeping to these functional distinctions; therefore where exclusive humanism functions as a comprehensive doctrine, or as will more often be the case, as well-defined set of practical commitments that eschews a metaphysical conception of the good, this will be duly brought to the reader’s attention. What is the relationship between exclusive humanism and procedural liberalism? The second preliminary task is to explain the relationship between exclusive humanism and contemporary liberalism. It is undertaken in order to pre-empt what would otherwise be the first objection to the entire project. Whether the critiques of humanism are valid or not - so the objection would go - is irrelevant to most forms of contemporary liberalism which, following the Rawlsian model, do not commit themselves to any single worldview or set of beliefs. Granted – the objection will continue – a convincing case could be made that early modern liberalism derived normative principles such as individual autonomy, freedom and equality from enlightenment humanism and as such any critiques of
Load more

Recommended publications
  • The Cynicism of Diogenes
    DON‟T SHOOT THE MESSENGER! RETHINKING CYNICISM AND THE VALUE OF POLITICAL CRITIQUE by Suvi Maaria Irvine A dissertation submitted to Johns Hopkins University in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Baltimore, Maryland December 2014 ©2014 Suvi Irvine All Rights Reserved Abstract: That Americans have become cynical about politics is often taken for granted in both popular and scholarly discourse. But what does it mean to be cynical? The answer to this question is far from simple and requires an investigation into the concept‟s origins, which reside in the ancient Greek philosophy known as classical Cynicism. Diogenes of Sinope, who remains the paradigmatic Cynic, was an abrasive figure in ancient Athens whose sneers and sarcasm where essential to his commitment to „living according to nature.‟ And for Diogenes, this meant living in accordance with the truth. He distrusted the social and political motivations of his fellow Athenians, and he called them out on their hypocrisy in ways that both amused and aggravated them. But what Diogenes did, above all, was demand room for honesty and the truth in the public sphere. I propose that his example is valuable in the context of contemporary American political culture, where honesty is rare and the truth is regularly disregarded. This dissertation presents an analysis of what cynicism can do for American political culture. I first address the question of what it means to be cynical and assess how much cynicism has changed since the days of Diogenes. While it may not mirror the original in all of its aspects, I argue that at root what it means to be cynical has not changed significantly, and that we can still identify cynics in our midst through their commitment to seeking and sarcastically speaking the truth.
    [Show full text]
  • Citizen Cyborg.” Citizen a Groundbreaking Work of Social Commentary, Citizen Cyborg Artificial Intelligence, Nanotechnology, and Genetic Engineering —DR
    hughes (continued from front flap) $26.95 US ADVANCE PRAISE FOR ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE NANOTECHNOLOGY GENETIC ENGINEERING MEDICAL ETHICS INVITRO FERTILIZATION STEM-CELL RESEARCH $37.95 CAN citizen LIFE EXTENSION GENETIC PATENTS HUMAN GENETIC ENGINEERING CLONING SEX SELECTION ASSISTED SUICIDE UNIVERSAL HEALTHCARE human genetic engineering, sex selection, drugs, and assisted In the next fifty years, life spans will extend well beyond a century. suicide—and concludes with a concrete political agenda for pro- cyborg Our senses and cognition will be enhanced. We will have greater technology progressives, including expanding and deepening control over our emotions and memory. Our bodies and brains “A challenging and provocative look at the intersection of human self-modification and human rights, reforming genetic patent laws, and providing SOCIETIES MUST RESPOND TO THE REDESIGNED HUMAN OF FUTURE WHY DEMOCRATIC will be surrounded by and merged with computer power. The limits political governance. Everyone wondering how society will be able to handle the coming citizen everyone with healthcare and a basic guaranteed income. of the human body will be transcended, as technologies such as possibilities of A.I. and genomics should read Citizen Cyborg.” citizen A groundbreaking work of social commentary, Citizen Cyborg artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, and genetic engineering —DR. GREGORY STOCK, author of Redesigning Humans illuminates the technologies that are pushing the boundaries of converge and accelerate. With them, we will redesign ourselves and humanness—and the debate that may determine the future of the our children into varieties of posthumanity. “A powerful indictment of the anti-rationalist attitudes that are dominating our national human race itself.
    [Show full text]
  • Aristotle and Plato on Friendship by John Von Heyking
    Digital Commons @ Assumption University Philosophy Department Faculty Works Philosophy Department 2017 The Form of Politics: Aristotle and Plato on Friendship by John Von Heyking Nalin Ranasinghe Assumption College, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.assumption.edu/philosophy-faculty Part of the Philosophy Commons Recommended Citation Ranasinghe, N. (2017). The Form of Politics: Aristotle and Plato on Friendship by John Von Heyking. International Political Anthropology 10(1): 39-55. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Philosophy Department at Digital Commons @ Assumption University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Philosophy Department Faculty Works by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ Assumption University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Form of Politics: Aristotle and Plato on Friendship by John Von Heyking Nalin Ranasinghe Abstract Heyking’s ascent from Aristotle to Plato implies that something Platonic was lost in Aristotle’s accounts of friendship and politics. Plato’s views on love and soul turn out to have more in common with early Christianity. Stressing differences between eros and thumos, using Voegelin’s categories to discuss the Platonic Good, and expanding on Heyking’s use of Hermes, I show how tragic culture and true politics can be further enhanced by refining erotic friendship, repudiating Augustinian misanthropy, positing minimum doctrines about soul and city, and basing reason on Hermes rather than Apollo. Keywords: Plato, Aristotle, Voegelin, Eros, Thumos, friendship, soul, Von Heyking Introduction John von Heyking’s book on friendship is as easy to read as it is hard to review.
    [Show full text]
  • An Antihumanist Reinterpretation of the Philosophy of Singularity 2016/27 245
    An Antihumanist Reinterpretation of the Philosophy of Singularity 2016/27 245 Kaygı Uludağ Üniversitesi Fen-Edebiyat Fakültesi Felsefe Dergisi Uludağ University Faculty of Arts and Sciences Journal of Philosophy Sayı 27 / Issue 27│Güz 2016 / Fall 2016 ISSN: 1303-4251 Research Article Araştırma Makalesi Dilara BİLGİSEL İstanbul Bilgi Üniversitesi, Sosyal ve Beşeri Bilimler Fakültesi, İstanbul-Türkiye Istanbul Bilgi University, Faculty of Social Sciences, Philosophy and Social Thought, Istanbul-Turkey [email protected] An Antihumanist Reinterpretation of the Philosophy of Singularity Abstract This article takes a close look at the discussion of singularity in Jean-Luc Nancy’s The Inoperative Community and Being Singular Plural as an attempt to negate the subject/object dichotomy and create a new context for a re-evaluation of resistance. With its aim of refuting individualistic subjectivity, the philosophy of singularity puts forward that the humanist point of view unnecessarily polarizes individuality and community. By placing a challenging scenario of antihumanism against the humanist sense of responsibility, the philosophy of singularity questions whether it is possible to do philosophy without saying ‘I’. This antihumanist stance, which replaces the ‘I’/‘other’ differentiation with Nancy’s ‘the other of another,’ chooses to strengthen the link between ontology and resistance in the notion of coexistence, beyond traditional hypotheses on immanence or transcendence. In order to discover the manifestation of coexistence within the frame of an antihumanist philosophy of singularity, this article begins with digging deep under the notion of individualistic subjectivity to show that it embodies a hollow and plastic category. Following this, Nancy’s stress on the term ‘ecstasy’ will be grounded upon the Freudian theory of drives and the concept of coexistence will be situated in a dark realm that the humanist worldview would expect in the least.
    [Show full text]
  • Adopting a Posthumanist Ethics to Inform Value Sensitive Design
    philosophies Article The Ecological Turn in Design: Adopting a Posthumanist Ethics to Inform Value Sensitive Design Steven Umbrello Institute of Ethics and Emerging Technologies (IEET), University of Turin, 10124 Turin, Italy; [email protected] Abstract: Design for Values (DfV) philosophies are a series of design approaches that aim to incorpo- rate human values into the early phases of technological design to direct innovation into beneficial outcomes. The difficulty and necessity of directing advantageous futures for transformative technolo- gies through the application and adoption of value-based design approaches are apparent. However, questions of whose values to design are of critical importance. DfV philosophies typically aim to enrol the stakeholders who may be affected by the emergence of such a technology. However, regardless of which design approach is adopted, all enrolled stakeholders are human ones who propose human values. Contemporary scholarship on metahumanisms, particularly those on posthumanism, have decentred the human from its traditionally privileged position among other forms of life. Arguments that the humanist position is not (and has never been) tenable are persuasive. As such, scholarship has begun to provide a more encompassing ontology for the investigation of nonhuman values. Given the potentially transformative nature of future technologies as relates to the earth and its many assemblages, it is clear that the value investigations of these design approaches fail to account for all relevant stakeholders (i.e., nonhuman animals). This paper has two primary objectives: (1) to argue for the cogency of a posthuman ethics in the design of technologies; and (2) to describe how existing DfV approaches can begin to envision principled and methodological ways of incorporating Citation: Umbrello, S.
    [Show full text]
  • Inhuman Power: Infrastructural Modernism and the Fiction of Social Form
    University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations 2019 Inhuman Power: Infrastructural Modernism And The Fiction Of Social Form Natalie Amleshi University of Pennsylvania, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations Part of the Modern Literature Commons, and the Other History Commons Recommended Citation Amleshi, Natalie, "Inhuman Power: Infrastructural Modernism And The Fiction Of Social Form" (2019). Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations. 3442. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/3442 This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/3442 For more information, please contact [email protected]. Inhuman Power: Infrastructural Modernism And The Fiction Of Social Form Abstract E.M. Forster’s imperative to “only connect” has long been read as modernist slogan for the rarefied depth of authentic interpersonal intimacy. Reframing the historical co-emergence of literary modernism and modern social science, this project tells a different story—not of connections between exceptional humans, but of connections between persons and environments. The prevailing canons of modernism have not yet grasped the internal complexity of early-twentieth-century debates regarding the interdependence of human and nonhuman agency. Early-twentieth-century sociologists like Émile Durkheim grounded both the autonomy of human culture and the disciplinary authority of sociology on the premise of species exceptionalism—the independence
    [Show full text]
  • 1 Joseph Blankholm Department of Religious Studies University of California, Santa
    Joseph Blankholm Department of Religious Studies University of California, Santa Barbara Secularism, Humanism, and Secular Humanism: Terms and Institutions Abstract: This chapter considers recent American attempts to recognize secular humanism as a religion in light of more than a century of debates over the religiosity of secularism and humanism. It offers a history of these terms’ codependent evolution in the United States by focusing on the individuals, groups, and institutions that have adopted them and shaped their meanings. The chapter also argues that those who use these terms today bear forth a fraught and sometimes self-contradicting inheritance. In order to recognize the stakes of contemporary struggles over the meaning and purpose of secularism, one needs a deeper understanding of how the term has come to bear its traces and how it fits within a shifting constellation of labels and concepts. Keywords: Secularism, Humanism, Secular Humanism, Organized Nonbelievers, Secular Activism, Separation of Church and State In October of 2014, a federal district judge in the state of Oregon ruled that secular humanism is a religion, at least for legal purposes involving the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment. The judge sided with the lawsuits’ plaintiffs, who argued that a humanist inmate at a federal prison should receive certain rights reserved solely for religious groups. The decision arrived a year after the U.S. Army began recognizing humanism as a religious preference, and in the lawsuit’s wake, the Federal Bureau of Prisons granted the same formal recognition. This was not the first time that federal courts have called secular humanism a religion, nor does it settle the question of its religiosity for humanists and their opponents.
    [Show full text]
  • HUMANISM for IDEAL SOCIETY Original Research Paper Mathematics
    IF : 4.547 | IC Value 80.26 Volume-6, IssueV-9,olum Speciale : 3 | IssueIssue :September-2017 11 | November 2014 • ISSN • ISSN No N 2277o 2277 - 8160- 8179 Original Research Paper Mathematics HUMANISM FOR IDEAL SOCIETY Smt. Sunkara. Lalitha Senior Lecturer, Department of Mathematics The Hindu College, Machilipatnam ABSTRACT Humanism is a philosophy, world view, or life stance based on naturalism-the conviction that the universe or nature is all that exists or is real. Humanism serves, for many humanists, some of the psychological and social functions of a religion, but without belief in deities, transcendental entities, miracles, life after death, and the supernatural. Humanists seek to understand the universe by using science and its methods of critical inquiry-logical reasoning, empirical evidence, and skeptical evaluation of conjectures and conclusions-to obtain reliable knowledge. Humanists affirm that humans have the freedom to give meaning, value, and purpose to their lives by their own independent thought, free inquiry, and responsible, creative activity. Humanists stand for the building of a more humane, just, compassionate, and democratic society using a pragmatic ethics based on human reason, experience, and reliable knowledge-an ethics that judges the consequences of human actions by the well-being of all life on Earth. KEYWORDS : INTRODUCTION values imparted by bonae litterae or humane learning. Those who Humanism is a progressive life stance that, without have spoken Latin and have used the language correctly do not give supernaturalism, affirms our ability and responsibility to lead to the word humanitas the meaning which it is commonly thought meaningful, ethical lives capable of adding to the greater good of to have, namely, what the Greeks call φιλανθρωπία (philanthropy), humanity.
    [Show full text]
  • Resaying the Human: Levinas Beyond Humanism and Antihumanism, 2010
    Resaying the Human Resaying the Human In this reading of the French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas a notion of the human is developed through an engagement with his philosophy. The argument is that, with the help of Levinas, it is possible for the idea of the human to be understood anew, for the notion to be ‘resaid’. This resaying of the human is performed in a self-critical way: Levinas’s work is shown not to be a new variation of the complacent ideology of humanism; the idea of the human is instead interpreted to be the bearer of the very movement of critique. Here Levinas is offered as a modern thinker of particular relevance for contemporary discussions surrounding the nature both of the political and of Human Rights. In addition one finds a systematic analysis of the major works of Levinas, unraveling how a notion of the human develops from within his philosophy. Levinas’s thought is placed alongside the philosophical figures of his time, such as Heidegger, Sartre, Bataille, Lévi-Strauss, Althusser, Foucault and Derrida, as well as with more recent political thinkers, for example, Alain Badiou, Giorgio Agamben and Jacques Rancière. Levinas Beyond Humanism and Antihumanism Carl Cederberg Carl Cederberg Södertörns högskola Södertörn Doctoral Dissertations 52 Biblioteket [email protected] S-141 89 Huddinge www.sh.se/publications Resaying the Human Levinas Beyond Humanism and Antihumanism Carl Cederberg Södertörns högskola Södertörns högskola S-141 89 Huddinge 2010 www.sh.se/publications Cover & Cover Image: Rafael B. Garrida Graphic
    [Show full text]
  • History of Structuralism. Vol. 2
    DJFHKJSD History of Structuralism Volume 2 This page intentionally left blank History of Structuralism Volume 2: The Sign Sets, 1967-Present Francois Dosse Translated by Deborah Glassman University of Minnesota Press Minneapolis London The University of Minnesota Press gratefully acknowledges financial assistance provided by the French Ministry of Culture for the translation of this book. Copyright 1997 by the Regents of the University of Minnesota Originally published as Histoire du structuralisme, 11. Le chant du cygne, de 1967 anos jour«; Copyright Editions La Decouverte, Paris, 1992. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Published by the University of Minnesota Press III Third Avenue South, Suite 290, Minneapolis, MN 554°1-2520 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper http://www.upress.umn.edu First paperback edition, 1998 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Dosse, Francois, 1950- [Histoire du structuralisme. English] History of structuralism I Francois Dosse ; translated by Deborah Glassman. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. Contents: v. 1. The rising sign, 1945-1966-v. 2. The sign sets, 1967-present. ISBN 0-8166-2239-6 (v. I: he: alk. paper}.-ISBN 0-8166-2241-8 (v. I: pbk. : alk. paper}.-ISBN 0-8166-2370-8 (v. 2: hc: alk. paper}.-ISBN 0-8166-2371-6 (v. 2: pbk. : alk. paper}.-ISBN 0-8166-2240-X (set: hc: alk. paper}.-ISBN 0-8166-2254-X (set: pbk.
    [Show full text]
  • Misanthropy and Misanthropes
    Pre-publication draft; please cite published version in Journal of Philosophical Research (forthcoming in 2021). MISANTHROPY AND MISANTHROPES Kathryn J. Norlock Trent University kathrynnorlock at trentu dot ca Norlock (2021) prepublication draft Page 2 of 20 In this paper, I argue that it is conceptually and ethically good to broaden the conception of misanthropy beyond that of hatred of humans, as philosophers such as David Cooper do. I concur with Cooper that misanthropy in the form of a negative critical verdict of humanity is apt and does not reduce to blame of individual humans. After all, as Claudia Card argues, evil institutions and practices are ubiquitous and systemic. They are both very bad and not simply imputable to individuals. So the judgment that evils are human-caused is not reducible to a judgment of particular individuals. However, I hope to persuade readers that not everyone with misanthropic thoughts is a misanthrope. Just as philosophers like Card and Kate Manne broaden the conception of misogyny but hold that most who contribute to environments hostile to women are not misogynists, I argue that many of us who hold misanthropic thoughts are not misanthropes; further, we should consider whether we want to be and we should consider when we find it ethically important to attribute the identity of a misanthrope to others. I propose holding the descriptive concept of a misanthrope to characterize anyone who appraises or expresses the moral perception — the negative critical verdict of humanity — to be appropriate, weighty, and governing of other aspects of one’s moral outlook or one’s character.
    [Show full text]
  • Leopold Mozart, the Rationalist? Humanism and Good Taste in Eighteenth-Century Musical Thought Katherine H
    Yale Journal of Music & Religion Volume 3 | Number 2 Article 4 2017 Leopold Mozart, the Rationalist? Humanism and Good Taste in Eighteenth-Century Musical Thought Katherine H. Walker Hobart and William Smith Colleges Follow this and additional works at: http://elischolar.library.yale.edu/yjmr Part of the Arts and Humanities Commons Recommended Citation Walker, Katherine H. (2017) "Leopold Mozart, the Rationalist? Humanism and Good Taste in Eighteenth-Century Musical Thought," Yale Journal of Music & Religion: Vol. 3: No. 2, Article 4. DOI: https://doi.org/10.17132/2377-231X.1084 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by EliScholar – A Digital Platform for Scholarly Publishing at Yale. It has been accepted for inclusion in Yale Journal of Music & Religion by an authorized editor of EliScholar – A Digital Platform for Scholarly Publishing at Yale. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Leopold Mozart the prolific voices of the pre-Kantian rationalistic Enlightenment, provides undeniable evidence Rationalist? of secularization. Nonetheless, as recent his- Humanism and Good Taste in toriographies have shown, the assumption that the Philosophes’ writings reflect the broader Eighteenth-Century Musical intellectual climate of the Enlightenment is Thought simply not supported by evidence.3 Notwith- Katherine Walker standing the tenor of those writings, the Enlightenment was, it turns out, deeply and Twenty years after Dale Van Kley’s The broadly informed by religion. Religious Origins of the French Revolution, which The religious turn in eighteenth-century situated Catholic theology, in general, and studies has created opportunities to revisit and Jansenist-related controversies, in specific, at refine some of our most entrenched narratives the heart of French Revolutionary politics, it is about this period in history.
    [Show full text]