Features essays on ethics, politics, and law. This book re-evaluates the meaning, values, and the idea of freedom in Western culture. A daring marriage of philosophical theory and practical politics, this collection is the first of Gianni Vattimo's many books to combine his intellectual pursuits with his public and political life. Vattimo is a paradoxical figure, at once a believing Christian and a vociferous critic of the Catholic Church, an outspoken liberal but not a former communist, and a recognized authority on Nietzsche and Heidegger as well as a prominent public intellectual and member of the European parliament.

In Ontological Terror Calvin L. Warren intervenes in Afro-pessimism, Heideggerian metaphysics, and black humanist philosophy by positing that the "Negro question" is intimately imbricated with questions of Being. Warren uses the figure of the antebellum free black as a philosophical paradigm for thinking through the tensions between blackness and Being. He illustrates how blacks embody a metaphysical nothing. This nothingness serves as a destabilizing presence and force as well as that which whiteness defines itself against. Thus, the function of blackness as giving form to nothing presents a terrifying problem for whites: they need blacks to affirm their existence, even as they despise the nothingness they represent. By pointing out how all humanism is based on investing blackness with nonbeing—a logic which reproduces antiblack violence and precludes any realization of equality, justice, and recognition for blacks—Warren urges the removal of the human from its metaphysical pedestal and the exploration of ways of existing that are not predicated on a grounding in being.

Frequently related to the negative thought all of lifestyle is useless, nihilism, as a philosophical concept, is far less sensational. it is the ethical doctrine that there are no ethical absolutes or foolproof natural rules, that "truth" is inescapably very subjective. Because the circumstances for equal rights and independence are not "naturally" given, community must definitely create these principles or it will certainly be taken in by irrationality, tendency, and oppression. Rhodes suggests that the infighting, timidity, and misunderstandings that have overtaken modern generous thought and state policies are the products an extended and indulgent grieving over the loss of the transcendental dad figure any organization or power framework that describes fact, knowledge, and truth. Until humankind triumphs over its need for exterior authority whether it be structured religious beliefs, the nation-state, or free-market capitalism emancipation will stay unachievable. Gathering 14 of Rhodes' most significant articles on principles, state policies, and law, Nihilism and Emancipation is a revealing reevaluation of significance, principles, and the idea of independence in European lifestyle.

Could there have been nothing? is the first book-length study of metaphysical nihilism – the claim that there could have been no concrete objects. It critically analyses the debate around nihilism and related questions about the metaphysics of possible worlds, concrete objects and ontological dependence.

Essays describe Italian philosopher Gianni Vattimo’s unique and radical hermeneutic philosophy.

This book examines the relationship between nihilism and postmodernism in relation to the sublime, and is divided into three parts: history, theory, and praxis. Arguing against the simplistic division in literary criticism between nihilism and the sublime, the book demonstrates that both are clearly implicated with the Enlightenment. Postmodernism, as a product of the Enlightenment, is therefore implicitly related to both nihilism and the sublime, despite the fact that it is often characterised as either nihilistic or sublime. Whereas prior forms of nihilism are 'modernist' because they seek to codify reality, postmodernism creates a new formulation of nihilism - 'postmodern nihilism' - that is itself sublime. This is explored in relation to a broad survey of postmodern literature in two chapters, the first on aesthetics and the second on ethics. It offers a coherent thesis for reappraising the relationship between nihilism and the sublime, and grounds this argument with frequent references to postmodern literature, making it a book suitable for both researchers and those more generally interested in postmodern literature.

Within this text James Theodore Stillwell III extracts thought strands from profound thinkers such as Hume, Nietzsche, Kant A.J. Ayer, C.L. Stevenson, J. L. Mackie, Ragnar RedBeard, Peter Sjöstedt-H and interweaves them into a meta ethical tapestry that is a liberating-brutally honest red pill. Mixing non cognitivism, error theory, with projectivism, Stillwell puts forth a kind of moral nihilism (Power-Nihilism) that dispenses with both secular and theistic forms of moral realism. In the final chapter James articulates his qualified form of political nihilism and critiques such concepts as ""Natural law"" and ""Natural Rights"" along with a few other pivotal concepts within political theory. This book also covers such topics as the will to power, slave morality, bad conscience, the on going destruction of Western civilization, radical individualism, collectivism, egalitarianism, hierarchy and much more...

An introduction to Nietzsche's political thinking, which traces the development of his thinking on politics from his early writings to the mature work where he advocates aristocratic radicalism as opposed to petty European nationalism. Key ideas - the will

The debate over the place of religion in secular, democratic societies dominates philosophical and intellectual discourse. These arguments often polarize around simplistic reductions, making efforts at reconciliation impossible. Yet more rational stances do exist, positions that broker a peace between relativism and religion in people's public, private, and ethical lives. Christianity, Truth, and Weakening Faith advances just such a dialogue, featuring the collaboration of two major philosophers known for their progressive approach to this issue. Seeking unity over difference, Gianni Vattimo and René Girard turn to Max Weber, Eric Auerbach, and Marcel Gauchet, among others, in their exploration of truth and liberty, relativism and faith, and the tensions of a world filled with new forms of religiously inspired violence. Vattimo and Girard ultimately conclude that secularism and the involvement (or lack thereof) of religion in governance are, in essence, produced by Christianity. In other words, Christianity is "the religion of the exit from religion," and democracy, civil rights, the free market, and individual freedoms are all facilitated by Christian culture. Through an exchange that is both intimate and enlightening, Vattimo and Girard share their unparalleled insight into the relationships among religion, modernity, and the role of Christianity, especially as it exists in our multicultural world.

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