Laziness and the Cunning of Nature: Kant on Boredom
Аннотация
The paper argues that boredom is a modern phenomenon and should be considered as the inalienable property or proprium of the modern lonely, universal, and tragic subject. As a token of radical inconstancy, imperfection, and fortuitousness, boredom, then, underlies our entire existence. In his Anthropology, Kant undertakes an original attempt to rethink boredom as our propensity toward laziness, that is, the avoidance of tiresome and tedious activity, and thus toward rest. And yet, since absolute rest is tantamount to death, which causes aversion and fear, nature has put an opposite tendency in us, a kind of suffering and pain that becomes the incentive to life-saving activity. Boredom, therefore, has to be considered a painful gift of nature that allows us both to live on and live productively. In this respect, boredom is not only inevitable but also indispensable for our well-being, which, however, is understood from a perspective of the modern autonomous subject.
Литература
Aristotle (1995). Poetics. Trans. Stephen Halliwell. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Balibar, Étienne (1997). Spinoza: From Individuality to Transindividuality. Delft: Eburon.
Boethius (1973). The Consolation of Philosophy. Trans. H. F. Stewart, E. K. Rand, and S. J. Tester. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Cicero (1914). On Ends. Trans. H. Rackham. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
de Mandeville, Bernard (1989). The Fable of Bees, or Private Vices, Publick Benefits. London: Penguin.
Dio Chrysostom (1946). Discourses 37–60. Trans. H. Lamar Crosby. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Diogenes Laertius (1925). Lives of Eminent Philosophers Vol. 2. Trans. R. D. Hicks. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Epictetus (1925). Discourses: Book I and II. Trans. W. A. Oldfather. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Goodstein, Elizabeth S. (2005). Experience without Qualities: Boredom and Modernity. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Healy, Seán Desmond (1984). Boredom, Self, and Culture. Rutherford, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press.
Kant, Immanuel (1914a). “Die Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der blossen Vernunft,” ed. Georg Wobbermin. In Gesammelte Schriften, Vol. 6, ed. Prussian Academy of Sciences, 3–202. Berlin: De Gruyter.
Kant, Immanuel (1914b). “Die Metaphysik der Sitten,” ed. Paul Natorp. In Gesammelte Schriften, Vol 6, ed. Prussian Academy of the Sciences, 205–493. Berlin: De Gruyter.
Kant, Immanuel (1917). “Anthropologie in pramatischer Hinsicht,” ed. Oswald Külpe. In Gesammelte Schriften, Vol. 7, ed. Prussian Academy of the Sciences, 117–334. Berlin: De Gruyter.
Kant, Immanuel (1923). “Idee zu einer allgemeinen Geschichte in weltbürgerlicher Absicht,” ed. Heinrich Maier. In Gesammelte Schriften, Vol. 8, ed. Prussian Academy of Sciences, 15–31. Berlin: De Gruyter.
Kant, Immanuel (1923). “Verkündigung des nahen Abschlusses eines Traktats zum ewigen Frieden in der Philosophie,” ed. Heinrich Maier. In Gesammelte Schriften Vol. 8, ed. Prussian Academy of the Sciences, 413–22. Berlin: De Gruyter.
Kant, Immanuel (1991). “Idea for Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose,” trans. H. B. Nisbet. In Political Writings, ed. Hans Reiss, 41–53. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kant, Immanuel (1996). “Religion within the Bounds of Mere Reason,” trans. George di Giovanni. In Religion and Rational Theology, ed. Allen W. Wood and George di Giovanni, 39–216. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kant, Immanuel (1998). “Anthropologie Mrongovius.” In Gesammelte Schriften, Vol. 25, ed. Academy of the Sciences of Göttingen, 1209–429. Berlin: De Gruyter.
Kant, Immanuel (2007). “Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View,” trans. Robert B. Louden. In Anthropology, History and Education, ed. Günther Zöller and Robert B. Louden, 227–429. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kant, Immanuel (2012). “Anthropology Mrongovius,” trans. Robert R. Clewis. In Lec- tures on Anthropology, ed. Allen W. Wood and Robert B. Louden, 335–510. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Klein, Lawrence Eliot (1994). Shaftesbury and the Culture of Politeness: Moral Discourse and Cultural Politics in Early Eighteenth-Century Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
La Rochefoucauld, François de (1964). “Maximes.” In Oeuvres complètes de La Roche- foucauld, ed. Louis Martin-Chauffier, 293–498. Paris: Gallimard.
Nietzsche, Friedrich (1974). The Gay Science. Trans. Walter Kaufmann. New York: Vintage.
Nikulin, Dmitri (2010). Dialectic and Dialogue. Stanford: Stanford University Press. O’Connor, Brian (2018). Idleness: A Philosophical Essay. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Seneca (1925). Epistles Vol. 3. Trans. Richard M. Gummere. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Stendhal (1947). Love. Trans. H. B. V. New York: Liveright.
Sulzer, Johann Georg (1773). “Untersuchungen über gen Ursprung der angenehmen und unangenehmen Empfindungen.” In Vermischte philosophische Schriften, Vol. 1, 1–98. Leipzig: Weidmann.
Svendsen, Lars (2005). A Philosophy of Boredom. Trans. John Irons. London: Reaktion Books.
Toohey, Peter (2011). Boredom: A Lively History. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
Weisel, Ori, and Shaul Shalvi (2016). “The Cooperative Roots of Corruption.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. http://www.pnas.org/content/112/34/10651.full
Whitehead, Alfred North (1974). Process and Reality. Ed. David Ray Griffin and Donald W. Sherburne. New York: Free Press.
Copyright (c) 2019 European University at Saint-Petersburg
Это произведение доступно по лицензии Creative Commons «Attribution» («Атрибуция») 4.0 Всемирная.
