-
Many have argued that existentialist
ideals such as passion (Kierkegaard), the will to power (Nietzsche),
authenticity (Heidegger), radical freedom (Sartre), and once-ocurrent
being (Bakhtin) are inimical to moral equality and ethical reciprocity.
By closely analyzing one of these existentialist ideals of human thriving,
critically examine the argument that such ideals are incompatible
with normative concerns.
-
What is Existentialism, and how might we understand
its legacy in regard to ethical and moral concerns?
-
Choose a classic Existentialist thinker–
e.g. Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre, de Beauvoir, (early)
Bakhtin, etc. – and show he/she understands the role of the
will in a human life in contrast to traditional accounts.
-
Choose a classic Existentialist thinker–
e.g. Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre, de Beauvoir, (early)
Bakhtin, etc. – and show he/she understands the role of emotions
in a human life in contrast to traditional accounts.
-
How should we understand Johannes de Silentio’s
call for a “teleological suspension of the ethical” in
connection with traditional Eudaimonistic and Deontological ethical
theories? What in your estimation is gained by this critique of desire
and/or duty as our basic orientation to the world and other human
beings?
-
What is Anti-Climacus’ definition of
the self in The Sickness Unto Death, and how do you assess his radical
emphasis upon “resting transparently in another”? In other
words, assess the liabilities and assets moving beyond aesthetic and
ethical modes of existence.
-
Does it make sense to think that there are
absolute individuating duties?
-
In ”The Present Age,” Kierkegaard
marshals a powerful attack upon modernity. What is this critique of
modernity, and how do you assess it strength as a critical examination
of contemporary circumstances?
-
What is the difference between Husserl’s
and Heidegger’s understanding of phenomenology?
-
Carefully explain why Heidegger views his
analysis of human being (existence) – the Daseinanalytik –
as a necessary preliminary to his analysis of being (presence) –
that is, the Seinsfrage.
-
Compare and contrast Heidegger’s and
Sartre’s conceptions of emotions. What are the liabilities and
assets of linking emotion to, respectively, world-disclosure and volition?
-
Compare and contrast Heidegger’s and
Judith Butler’s accounts of social recognition. Which, in your
estimation, is better suited to address social and cultural oppression?
-
What type of inquiry does Nietzsche propose
in his Genealogy of Morals and Beyond Good and Evil, and how does
it address the quintessential modernist concern with freedom?
-
How does Nietzsche understand “values”
and their role in orienting agents to the world? What repercussions
might his views have on traditional accounts of moral psychology?
-
Charles Taylor argues that Sartre account
of freedom is untenable. Do you find this Taylor’s critique
of radical freedom convincing?
-
What is Bakhtin’s argument against Kantian
accounts of the moral act? How do you assess this critique?
-
What, according to Bakhtin, is “fatal
theoreticism” and the equally dangerous way of acting he calls
“aestheticism”? What repercussions might his views have
on how we understand education, moral reciprocity, interpersonal relations,
or autobiography? [choose only one]
