Madness and Authority in Jacobi and Ferraris: Why New Realism Is Not New
Keywords:
Speculative realism, new realism, M. Ferraris, F.H. Jacobi, I. Kant
Abstract
New Realism is not new. Instead of a new response to a novel philosophical problem, New Realism is an unacknowledged resurrection of Jacobi’s criticism of philosophical rationality that ignited what is now known as the “pantheism controversy.” Both Jacobi and Ferraris argue that the antirealist epistemologies of their contemporaries displace our relation to the world to which thought is supposed to be beholden. Further, both Jacobi and Ferraris claim that the antidote to these delusional philosophical ideations is realism. Finally, both take a reactionary stance toward the renegotiation of authority that stands at the core of the Enlightenment project. If this is indeed the case, then New Realism is a repetition and not an advance. More significantly, despite its own aspirations, New Realism is a reactionary, anti- Enlightenment philosophical proposal. In short, Ferraris says “Goodbye Kant!” too quickly and for old reasons.
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Grier, Michelle (2001). Kant’s Doctrine of Transcendental Illusion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Foucault, Michel (1984). “What is Enlightenment?” In The Foucault Reader, ed. Paul Rabinow, trans. Catherine Porter, 32–50. New York: Pantheon Books.
Jacobi, Friedrich Heinrich (1994). The Main Philosophical Writings and the Novel Allwill. Trans. George Di Giovanni. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.
Jacobi, Friedrich Heinrich (1994). “Concerning the Doctrine of Spinoza in Letters to Herr Moses Mendelssohn” [1785]. In The Main Philosophical Writings and the Novel Allwill. Trans. George Di Giovanni, 173–252. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.
Jacobi, Friedrich Heinrich (1994). “David Hume on Faith, or Idealism and Realism, A Dialouge” [1787] In The Main Philosophical Writings and the Novel Allwill. Trans. George Di Giovanni, 253–338. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.
Jacobi, Friedrich Heinrich (1994). “Concerning the Doctrine of Spinoza in Letters to Moses Mendelssohn” [1789]. In The Main Philosophical Writings and the Novel Allwill. Trans. George Di Giovanni, 339–78. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.
Jacobi, Friedrich Heinrich (1994). “Jacobi to Fichte.” [1799] In The Main Philosophical Writings and the Novel Allwill. Trans. George Di Giovanni, 497–536. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.
Janssens, David (2003). “The Problem of Enlightenment: Strauss, Jacobi, and the Pantheism Controversy.” The Review of Metaphysics 56.3: 605–31.
Johnston, Adrian (2008). Žižek’s Ontology: A Transcendental Materialist Theory of Subjectivity. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press.
Johnston, Adrian (2019). Prolegomena to Any Future Materialism: Volume Two, A Weak Nature Alone. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press.
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich (1977). The Difference Between Fichte’s and Schelling’s System of Philosophy [1801]. Trans. H.S. Harris and Walter Cerf. Albany, NY: State
University of New York Press.
Kant, Immanuel (2003). Critique of Pure Reason [1787]. Trans. Norman Kemp Smith. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
McDowell, John (1996). Mind and World. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Meillassoux, Quentin (2008). After Finitude: An Essay on the Necessity of Contingency [2006]. Trans. Ray Brassier. London: Continuum.
Milbank, John (1999). “The Theological Critique of Philosophy in Hamann and Jacobi.” In Radical Orthodoxy: A New Theology, ed. John Milbank, Catherine Pickstock, and Graham Ward, 21–37. London: Routledge.
Mullarkey, John (2006). Post-Continental Philosophy: An Outline. London: Continuum. Norris, Benjamin (2015). “Review of Markus Gabriel’s Fields of Sense: A New Realist Ontology.” The Graduate Faculty Philosophy Journal 36.2: 493–96.
Norris, Benjamin (2019). “The Education of Kanzi and the Notion of Progress: Reza Negarestani’s Intelligence and Spirit.” Pli 30: 164–90.
Negarestani, Reza (2019). Intelligence and Spirit. Falmouth: Urbanomic.
Sellars, Wilfrid (1968). Science and Metaphysics: Variations on Kantian Themes. London: Routledge.
Žižek, Slavoj (1993). Tarrying with the Negative: Kant, Hegel, and the Critique of Ideology. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Published
2020-07-25
How to Cite
Norris, B. (2020). Madness and Authority in Jacobi and Ferraris: Why New Realism Is Not New. Stasis, 9(1). https://doi.org/10.33280/2310-3817-2020-9-1-76-104
Section
Articles
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