Download Free Living In Problematicity Book in PDF and EPUB Free Download. You can read online Living In Problematicity and write the review.

Jan Patočka, perhaps more so than any other philosopher in the twentieth century, managed to combine intense philosophical insight with a farsighted analysis of the idea and challenges facing Europe as a historical, cultural and political signifier. As a political dissident in communist Czechoslovakia he also became a moral and political inspiration to a generation of Czechs, including Václav Havel. He accomplished this in a time of intense political repression when not even the hint of a unified Europe seemed visible by showing in exemplary fashion how concrete thought can be without renouncing in any way its depth. Europe as an idea and a political project is a central issue in contemporary political theory. Patočka’s political thought offers many original insights into questions surrounding the European project. Here, for the first time, a group of leading scholars from different disciplines gathers together to discuss the specific political impact of Patočka’s philosophy and its lasting significance.
The Risk of Freedom presents an in-depth analysis of the philosophy of Jan Patočka, one of the most influential Central European thinkers of the twentieth century, examining both the phenomenological and ethical-political aspects of his work. In particular, Francesco Tava takes an original approach to the problem of freedom, which represents a recurring theme in Patočka’s work, both in his early and later writings. Freedom is conceived of as a difficult and dangerous experience. In his deep analysis of this particular problem, Tava identifies the authentic ethical content of Patočka’s work and clarifies its connections with phenomenology, history of philosophy, politics and dissidence. The Risk of Freedom retraces Patočka’s philosophical journey and elucidates its more problematic and less evident traits, such as his original ethical conception, his political ideals and his direct commitment as a dissident.
Spanning his entire career, this selection of texts by influential philosopher Jan Patočka illustrates his thoughts on the appropriate manner of being and engagement in the world. The writings assembled in Living in Problematicity examine the role of the philosopher in the world, how the world constrains us through ideology, and how freedom is possible through the recognition of our human condition in the problems of the world. These views outline Patočka's political philosophy and how his later engagement in the political sphere with the human rights initiative Charter 77 corresponds with the ideas he maintained throughout his life. This short and engaging book--published in conjunction with the prestigious philosophy press OIKOYMENH--is an ideal English-language introduction to the most significant Czech philosopher in recent history.
Winner of the 2020 Emerging Scholar’s Theological Book Prize presented by the European Society for Catholic Theology This book examines the work of Czech philosopher Jan Patočka from the largely neglected perspective of religion. Patočka is known primarily for his work in phenomenology and ancient Greek philosophy, and also as a civil rights activist and critic of modernity. In this book, Martin Koci shows Patočka also maintained a persistent and increasing interest in Christianity. Thinking Faith after Christianity examines the theological motifs in Patočka's work and brings his thought into discussion with recent developments in phenomenology, making a case for Patočka as a forerunner to what has become known as the theological turn in continental philosophy. Koci systematically examines his thoughts on the relationship between theology and philosophy, and his perennial struggle with the idea of crisis. For Patočka, modernity, metaphysics, and Christianity were all in different kinds of crises, and Koci demonstrates how his work responded to those crises creatively, providing new insights on theology understood as the task of thinking and living transcendence in a problematic world. It perceives the un-thought element of Christianity—what Patočka identified as its greatest resource and potential—not as a weakness, but as a credible way to ponder Christian faith and the Christian mode of existence after the proclaimed death of God and the end of metaphysics.
​This edited collection discusses phenomenological critiques of formalism and their relevance to the problem of responsibility and the life-world. The book deals with themes of formalization of knowledge in connection to the life-world, the natural world, the history of science and our responsibility for both our epistemic claims and the world in which we live. Readers will discover critiques of formalization, the life-world and responsibility, and a collation and comparison of Patočka’s and Husserl’s work on these themes. Considerable literature on Husserl is presented here and the two themes of epistemic responsibility and the life-world are discussed together. This work specifically emphasizes the interrelatedness of these existential aspects of his work – self-responsibility and the crisis – as not only epistemological, but also related to human life. This volume also introduces Jan Patočka to English-speaking readers as a phenomenologist in his own right. Patočka shows us, in particular, the significance of the modern abyss between our thinking and the world. Readers will discover that this abyss is of concern for our everyday experience because it leads to a rupture in our understanding of the world: between the world of our living and its scientific construct. We see that Patočka continually emphasized the relevance of Husserl’s work to existential questions relating to human responsibility and the life-world, which he admits is left largely implicit in Husserl’s work. This edited collection will spark discussion on the question of responsibility against the backdrop of formalized knowledge which is increasingly inaccessible to human understanding. Despite the complexity of some of the analyzed ideas, this book discusses these themes in a clear and readable way. This work is scholarly, exact in its discussion and authoritative in its reading, but at the same time accessible to anyone motivated to understand these debates.
Whereas for the wider public Jan Patocka is known mainly as a defender of human rights and one of the first spokespersons of Charter 77, who died in Prague several days after long interrogations by secret police of the Communist regime, the international philosophical community sees in him an important and inspiring thinker, who in an original way elaborated the great impulses of European thought – mainly Husserl’s phenomenology and Heidegger’s philosophy of existence. Patocka also reflected on history and the future of humanity in a globalized world and laid the foundations of an original philosophy of history. His work is a subject of lively philosophical discussion especially in French and German-speaking countries, and recently also in Spanish-speaking, in U.S.A., and in the Far East. Scholars from around the world who are interested in the philosophy of Jan Patocka gathered in Prague to commemorate his centenary and the thirtieth anniversary of his death. The conference explored the significance of his work and its continuing influence on contemporary philosophy. The volume presents selected papers from the conference in English language.
Jan Patocka's contribution to phenomenology and the philosophy of history mean that he is considered one of the most important philosophers of the 20th century. Yet, his writing is not widely available in English and the Anglophone world remains rather unfamiliar with his work. In this new book of essential Patocka texts, of which the majority have been translated from the original Czech for the first time, readers will experience a general introduction to the key tenets of his philosophy. This includes his thoughts on the relationship between philosophy and political engagement which strike at the heart of contemporary debates about freedom, political participation and responsibility and a truly pressing issue for modern Europe, what exactly constitutes a European identity? In this important collection, Patocka provides an original vision of the relationship between self, world, and history that will benefit students, philosophers and those who are interested in the ideals that underpin our democracies.
The Czech philosopher Jan Patocka not only witnessed some of the most turbulent politics of twentieth-century Central Europe, but shaped his philosophy in response to that tumult. One of the last students of Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger, he inspired Václav Havel and other dissidents who confronted the Communist regime before 1989, as well as being actively involved in authoring and enacting Charter 77. He died in 1977 from medical complications resulting from interrogations of the secret police. Confronting Totalitarian Minds examines his legacy along with several contemporary applications of his ideas about dissidence, solidarity, and the human being’s existential confrontation with unjust politics. Expanding the current possibilities of comparative political theory, the author puts Patocka’s ideas about dissidence, citizen mobilization, and civic responsibility into conversation with notable world historical figures like Mahatma Gandhi, Vaclav Havel, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and other contemporary activists. In adding a fresh voice to contemporary conversations on transcending injustice, Confronting Totalitarian Minds seeks to educate a wider audience about this philosopher’s continued relevance to political dissidents across the world.
A COMPANION TO THE PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY AND HISTORIOGRAPHY The philosophy of historiography examines our representations and knowledge of the past, the relation between evidence, inference, explanation and narrative. Do we possess knowledge of the past? Do we just have probable beliefs about the past, or is historiography a piece of convincing fiction? The philosophy of history is the direct philosophical examination of history, whether it is necessary or contingent, whether it has a direction or whether it is coincidental, and if it has a direction, what it is, and how and why it is unfolding? The fifty entries in this Companion cover the main issues in the philosophies of historiography and history, including natural history and the practices of historians. Written by an international and multi-disciplinary group of experts, these clearly written entries present a cutting-edge updated picture of current research in the philosophies of historiography and history. This Companion will be of interest to philosophers, historians, natural historians, and social scientists.
In 1977 the sixty-nine-year-old Czech philosopher Jan Patočka died from a brain hemorrhage following a series of interrogations by the Czechoslovak secret police. A student of Husserl and Heidegger, he had been arrested, along with young playwright Václav Havel, for publicly opposing the hypocrisy of the Czechoslovak Communist regime. Patočka had dedicated himself as a philosopher to laying the groundwork of what he termed a "life in truth." This book analyzes Patočka's philosophy and political thought and illuminates the synthesis in his work of Socratic philosophy and its injunction to "care for the soul." In bridging the gap, not only between Husserl and Heidegger, but also between postmodern and ancient philosophy, Patočka presents a model of democratic politics that is ethical without being metaphysical, and transcendental without being foundational.