The Belief in Intuition: A Politico- Philosophical Reading of Henri Bergson and Max Scheler The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Alfaro Altamirano, Adriana. 2017. The Belief in Intuition: A Politico- Philosophical Reading of Henri Bergson and Max Scheler. Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University, Graduate School of Arts & Sciences. Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:41140232 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA THE BELIEF IN INTUITION: A Politico-philosophical Reading of Henri Bergson and Max Scheler A dissertation presented by ADRIANA ALFARO ALTAMIRANO to THE DEPARTMENT OF GOVERNMENT in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in the subject of POLITICAL SCIENCE Harvard University Cambridge, Massachusetts April 2017 © 2017 Adriana Alfaro Altamirano. All rights reserved. Advisor: Richard Tuck Adriana Alfaro Altamirano The Belief in Intuition: A Political-philosophical Reading of Henri Bergson and Max Scheler Abstract This dissertation examines the ethico-political implications of Henri Bergson and Max Scheler’s belief in intuition. Unlike many later philosophers, and against various predecessors and contemporaries—from idealists (ancient and early-modern), to neo-Kantians, Freudians, Marxists, pragmatists, and positivists—they believed that there is a human faculty, beyond reason and sensibility, that gives us access to a privileged kind of knowledge, namely “intuition.” The latter provides knowledge about something that is both deeper and more complex than matter, but still empirical; something given in experience, but not only through the senses. Their appeal to intuition in that sense—our capacity to turn to “the things themselves” as they are given in experience—accounts for their belonging to what in philosophy is normally known as phenomenology. Through a close reading of their texts, this dissertation shows, in the first place, that the belief in intuition led, in each case, to a conception of individuality—or, more specifically, of personal uniqueness—as the acknowledgement of inner diversity, which nonetheless does not negate the reality of the person as an agent; hence, their so-called “personalism.” In Bergson, this means the articulation of a notion of the “inner life” as something that exists in time, always in flux, changing, and heterogeneous. It is further shown how this conception of individuality relates, in turn, to Bergson’s phenomenology of agency, which—against Kant’s rationalist conception of practical reason—constitutes what I have called a “phenomenology of hesitation.” According to iii it, the oscillations of action in time and space are duly accepted as a constitutive trait of moral character. Moreover, it is argued that his conception of agency—founded on a non-sovereign will, and aided by habit and improvisation—is better endowed to deal with chance, contingency, and with our lack of control over the future. In Scheler, for his part, our faculty of intuition is exercised through a hierarchy of emotions, which gives us access to a corresponding hierarchy of values. The dissertation shows how, for him, individuality is realized through our ability to discriminate between different nuances of emotions and values, without reducing any one of them to each other. Further, it explains that such a conception of individuality leads to distinctive notions of both autonomy and sympathy. The former presents a challenge to Kant’s principle of publicity, since it maintains that being responsible does not mean begin able to publicly justify the maxim of our actions, but depends rather on our capacity to listen and respond to the singularity of the voice of conscience. The latter presents a challenge to the Enlightenment sentimentalists, since it maintains that “true sympathy” consists in the capacity to understand the feelings of others, without however feeling as they do. Thus, Schelerian sympathy offers, or so the dissertation argues, distinctive protections for individuality against the socio-political threats proper to mass society. Finally, this work examines the model of authority that corresponds to their respective notions of exemplarity; that is, the kind of authority that lies in a person, whose example has some moral claim on other people. Bergsonian and Schelerian exemplarity is similar in important respects to Max Weber’s conception of charismatic authority. However, Weber’s relativism about values, and his Kantian-inspired skeptical approach in social science, yield a notion of personality that is iv “minimalistic,” or—as people would normally say today in political theory—“unencumbered.” In contrast, Bergson and Scheler’s ideas on personal authority hold the promise of accounting for an encumbered or complex self, without therefore renouncing the aspiration to individuality and freedom contained in Weber’s examination of charisma. More specifically, it is argued, their insights suggest a way in which authority can be consistent with freedom—or perhaps can even contribute to our freedom and to the development of our personality. v Acknowledgments I want to thank my dissertation committee, Richard Tuck, Michael Rosen, and Danielle Allen. Richard Tuck read multiple versions of every chapter of this dissertation, and in our discussions throughout these years, he oriented me with his critical eye and knowledgeable mind, and encouraged me with his warmth, humor, trust, patience, and curiosity. Michael Rosen’s advice and support were key to this project: his reading suggestions provided critical orientation, and the European Philosophy Workshop, which he hosts every year, constituted a welcoming and stimulating venue to present my work, both at the beginning and towards the end of the process. Danielle Allen gave me very helpful and timely advice on how to structure and present my ideas. My work, both formally and substantially, has benefited greatly from her rigorous reading and her wide-ranging approach. I also thank Michael Frazer, whose advice helped me to orient and sharpen the project, especially in its early stages, and Eric Beerbohm, for his support and feedback, especially during my year as a fellow at the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics. I am indebted to the late Patrick Riley, whose example was like fresh air to the academic life in the department. The Political Theory Workshop, the graduate seminar at the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics, and the CES Dissertation Workshop provided helpful and friendly atmospheres to present many of the ideas contained in this dissertation. Special thanks to Charlie Lesch, Tim Beaumont, Ignat Kalinov, Lowry Pressly, Aleksy Tarasenko-Struc, Beth Truesdale, Jacob Abolafia, and Avishay Ben Sasson-Gordis for providing comments to my work at these venues. Two of the chapters of the dissertation were the happy victims to Frances Kamm’s careful and always sharp analysis. I thank Luz Noguez, Jess Miner, Mark W. Westmoreland, and Les Harris for their help editing different parts of the dissertation. My research was supported by the Mexican Government through CONACYT and by the Fundación México en Harvard. I thank Rodrigo Chacón, on the one hand, and Noam Gidron, on the other, for their friendship and intellectual company throughout these years. My experience as a dissertation writer and my life in Cambridge would not have been the same without them. As my writing partner, Tae- Yeoun Keum has shared with me the joys and sorrows of the process for more than three years. Jaime del Palacio has given me important emotional and intellectual support, without which the doctorate would have been a less profound experience. I thank my professors, colleagues, and friends at ITAM, where I first knew about in my interest in political philosophy, and will now continue to pursue it. I take this moment to acknowledge Cecilia Zenteno, Roberto Ponce, Azucena Rojas, Chiara Superti, and Natalia Gutkowski for being like an extended family in Cambridge; Marcela Talamás, Adriana Ortega, Mónica Maccise, and Sandra López for being both a personal and a professional community for the last nine years; Francisco Cantú, for sweetening my graduate- student years with music, phone calls, books, and travels; Gema Santamaría for (among many other things) taking care of me the day I landed in the U.S. to start the Ph.D., and for making her apartment in New York a home for me during my first five years here; José Cruz for being with me as my oldest, indispensable, friend; and Daniel Aguirre for having greatly raised my standards of neighborliness, and for his company during the past year. vi Finally, I thank my family, which is big and comprises multiple sources of affection and good wishes. However, most of all, I am grateful to my mother and father, Cecilia Altamirano and José Luis Alfaro, and my sister and brother, Mónica and José Luis. Their love and support allowed me to start and finish the dissertation. I dedicate my work to them. vii Table of Contents Abbreviations ................................................................................................................................ x Introduction ..................................................................................................................................