Abstract: In this essay, I defend philosophical wandering not only as an approach to doing philosophy, but also as an important force to incite critical reflection in cultural life. I argue that philosophical wanderers have an embodied, errant praxis, supporting wisdom whenever they engage with others. For these philosophers reflection is not given in a series of systematic assertions, nor…
Abstract: The symbolic imaginary of counterculture was fostered by dissent towards the cultural roots of the Western world, by a challenge to traditional norms, values and symbols, and by the rejection of historical identity and national sovereignty. This article aims to discuss some of the aftermaths of the counterculture of the 1960s as resulting from the transformations…
Abstract: The aim of this paper is to compare the approaches of Ernst Cassirer and Aurel Kolnai on the idea of the nation state in its most radical form, which consists of identifying national sovereignty with an unrestricted right of the nation to political, external, and internal self-determination. What the comparison attempted here focuses…
Abstract: The various efforts to put the idea of humanity on a secure ethical, political, and social base have not succeeded. The various post-humanist and transhumanist programs are inadequate. Our deep-seated suspicion of our deepest selves and motives is understandable in light of the barbarity of the twentieth century, but humanism is not to blame….
Abstract: After offering a brief outline of Cassirer’s fundamental ideas on symbolization, the article looks at its application to psychopathology, e.g. psychosis, a theme not introduced by Cassirer himself. Psychosis is conceived of as a distortion of a fundamental symbolization, a radical metaphor, thus elaborating a version of Cassirer’s own line of thought. Cassirer’s concept of basis phenomena appears to provide a fruitful…
Abstract: The aim of the article is to discuss the specifics of human actions and decision-making processes from the psychopathological perspective. The concepts of action and decision making are reported in the context of human experience and the experiential structure of self-determination. The starting point is provided by considerations related to the notion of…
Abstract: This paper argues in favor of two related theses. First, due to a fundamental, biologically grounded world-openness, human culture is a biological imperative. As both biology and culture evolve historically, cultures rise and fall and the diversity of the human species develops. Second, in this historical process of rise and fall, abnormality plays a crucial role….
Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to analyze silence as a specific experience that is formed on the border between that what is psychotic and that what is creative. Trying to deepen the reflection on the area of silence in our experience I will recall two conceptions: Merleau-Ponty’s and Lacan’s. Both of these authors attempted to go beyond the…
Abstract: The phenomenology of trauma is a historical, epistemological, and methodic inquiry that wishes to test the validity of an already settled dynamic model of surprise as shock-rupture based on its correlated inner structures of attention (as an open awaiting) and emotion (as a perduring resonance). Thanks to an integrative approach, crossing (micro)phenomenological subjective experiences and empirical (neuro…
Abstract: The term “anti-psychiatry” was coined in 1912 by Dr. Bernhard Beyer, but only popularized by Dr. David Copper (and his critics) in the midst of a widespread cultural revolt against involuntary hospitalization and in-patient psychiatry during the 1960s and 1970s. However, with the demise of the old-fashioned mental hospital, and the rise of Big…