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Von der Medicina mentis zu den Pädagogischen Briefen über ein Register des moralischen Lebens. Zur Geschichte eines therapeutischen Philosophieverständnisses der Neuzeit von Spinoza bis Cavell

Applicant Hampe Michael
Number 115930
Funding scheme Project funding
Research institution Professur für Philosophie GESS/Institut für Philosophie ETH Zürich
Institution of higher education ETH Zurich - ETHZ
Main discipline Philosophy
Start/End 01.04.2007 - 31.10.2011
Approved amount 288'350.00
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Keywords (9)

Therapie; Selbstkenntnis; Spinoza; Therapeutical conceptions of; philosophy in modernity; Tschirnhaus; Freud; Wittgenstein; Cavell.

Lay Summary (English)

Lead
Lay summary
Philosophy as therapy is an ancient idea. We will investigate what happened to this idea in modern times since 1600 up to the present in a series of studies. We start from Spinoza's Ethics and its therapy of emotions. From there we consider ideas of medicina mentis as they can be found in Tschirnhaus and other philosophers of the enlightenment. In this context we will compare the development of academic philosophy in relation to so called “popular” philosophy and the theories of education (like Zimmermann, Garve, and Knigge). One of our hypotheses is that the therapeutic idea was not academically accepted anymore after Spinoza. Both Cartesianism and Kantianism criticize it as methodologically naive.
We believe that the rise of psychotherapy at the end of the 19th century is a reaction to the tension between the public want for philosophical therapies and the academic refusal to work on them. The conflicts between psychoanalysis and philosophy mirror the old quarrels between academically established and non-academic philosophy. Parallel to psychotherapy therapeutical conceptions of philosophy become influential at the end of the 19th century: in the thought of Schopenhauer, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Emerson, and Thoreau.
These philosophers are the starting-point for different therapeutical enterprises in contemporary thought. Here we will especially look at Stanley Cavell and his relation to the late Wittgenstein. Cavell, following Emerson and Thoreau, considers philosophy as a kind of (re-)education for grown-ups. This leads to special problems: In what sense is it possible to educate a grown-up person for life, what are the standards for this education and what are its needs?
The first two studies will cover the two ends of our temporal scale: Spinoza and Cavell. One study will investigate Spinoza’s conception of subjectivity. Who is it who suffers from disturbing emotions in Spinoza? What is the result of the Spinozistic therapy for the individual? Will it be “freed” from its particular perspective onto the world? We believe not. Spinoza has been misunderstood as a philosopher who considers the therapy of the individual as dissolution of its individuality.
The second study will reconstruct Cavell’s view that philosophy has lost its connection to ordinary life and has therefore become unable to be therapeutical. Austin and Wittgenstein have tried to find a philosophical way back to ordinary life. The study will investigate what a therapeutical philosophy of the ordinary in Cavell’s sense could mean.
In the long run we hope to come to a new understanding of the relation between modern philosophy, psychotherapy and religion.
Direct link to Lay Summary Last update: 21.02.2013

Responsible applicant and co-applicants

Employees

Publications

Publication
Spinoza's Ethics
Michael Hampe, Ursula Renz, Robert Schnepf (2011), Spinoza's Ethics, Brill Academic Pub, Leiden.
Cities of Words
Cities of Words, (2010), Cities of Words, Chronos Verlag, Zürich.
Das vollkommene Leben
Michael Hampe (2009), Das vollkommene Leben, Carl Hanser Verlag, München.
Klassische Emotionstheorien
Hilge Landweer, Ursula Renz (2008), Klassische Emotionstheorien, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York.
Die Erklärbarkeit von Erfahrung
Ursula Renz, Die Erklärbarkeit von Erfahrung, Vittorio Klostermann, Frankfurt am Main.

Scientific events

Active participation

Title Type of contribution Title of article or contribution Date Place Persons involved
Rhetorics and Therapy: How emotions modify beliefs, and how beliefs modify emotions 14.04.2011 Zürich, Schweiz
Philosophy as Therapeia: Perspectives from India and Europe 20.06.2008 Liverpool, United Kingdom


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