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1. Philosophy / H. Continental Philosophy / 1. Continental Philosophy

[key shared characteristics of continental modern philosophy]

19 ideas
We must break up the rigidity that our understanding has imposed [Hegel]
     Full Idea: The battle of reason is the struggle to break up the rigidity to which the understanding has reduced everything.
     From: Georg W.F.Hegel (Logic (Encyclopedia I) [1817], I §80Z p.115), quoted by A.W. Moore - The Evolution of Modern Metaphysics 07.7
     A reaction: This sounds like a combination of Nietzsche and later Wittgenstein, and may be one of the ideas that launches 'continental' philosophy. Recent French thinkers talk continually of 'liberation'.
Truth does not appear by asserting reasons and then counter-reasons [Hegel]
     Full Idea: It is not difficult to see that the way of asserting a proposition, adducing reasons for it, and in the same way refuting its opposite by reasons, is not the form in which truth can appear.
     From: Georg W.F.Hegel (Phenomenology of Spirit [1807], p.28), quoted by Stephen Houlgate - Hegel p.100
     A reaction: This is a pretty good description of the way Plato and Aristotle do philosophy, so this idea, which must be a founding idea for the 'continental school', is extremely radical. Personally I identify rationality with believing things for good reasons.
Modern philosophy begins with Descartes' abstraction from sensation and matter [Feuerbach]
     Full Idea: The beginning of Descartes' philosophy, namely, the abstraction from sensation and matter, is the beginning of modern speculative philosophy.
     From: Ludwig Feuerbach (Principles of Philosophy of the Future [1843], §10)
     A reaction: In Britain it might be said that modern philosophy begins with a rebellion against Descartes' move. Feuerbach is charting the movement towards idealism.
Empiricism is right about ideas, but forgets man himself as one of our objects [Feuerbach]
     Full Idea: Empiricism rightly derives the origin of our ideas from the senses; only it forgets that the most important and essential object of man is man himself.
     From: Ludwig Feuerbach (Principles of Philosophy of the Future [1843], §41)
     A reaction: This seems to nicely pinpoint the objection of most 'continental' philosophy to British empiricism and analytic philosophy. It seems to point towards Husserl's phenomenology as the next step. It is true that empiricists divided person from world.
We must create new words, and treat them as normal, and as if designating real things. [Deleuze]
     Full Idea: Let us create extraordinary words, on condition that they be put to the most ordinary use and that the entity they designate be made to exist in the same way as the most common object.
     From: Gilles Deleuze (A Conversation: what is it? What is it for? [1977], I)
     A reaction: This sounds like the attitude of someone creating a computer game. A language game! The idea is to create concepts with which to 'palpitate' our conceptual scheme, in order to reveal it, and thus put it within our power.
'Difference' refers to that which eludes capture [Deleuze, by May]
     Full Idea: 'Difference' is a term which Deleuze uses to refer to that which eludes capture.
     From: report of Gilles Deleuze (Difference and Repetition [1968]) by Todd May - Gilles Deleuze 3.03
     A reaction: Presumably its ancestor is Kant's noumenon. This is one of his concepts used to 'palpate' our ossified conceptual scheme.
Philosophy and politics are fundamentally linked [Foucault]
     Full Idea: The relationship between philosophy and politics is permanent and fundamental.
     From: Michel Foucault (Ethics of the Concern for Self as Freedom [1984], p.293)
     A reaction: This idea is one of the biggest gulfs between continental and analytical philosophy. Many aspects of philosophy are turning out to be much more social than analytical philosophers might have thought - epistemology, for example.
Some continental philosophers are relativists - Baudrillard, for example [Baudrillard, by Critchley]
     Full Idea: There are philosophers in the continental tradition who are relativists - Baudrillard, for example.
     From: report of Jean Baudrillard (works [1976]) by Simon Critchley - Interview with Baggini and Stangroom p.192
     A reaction: This remark is in the context of Critchley denying that most continental philosophers are relativists.
The plague of philosophy is those who criticise without creating, and defend dead concepts [Deleuze/Guattari]
     Full Idea: Those who criticise without creating, those who are content to defend the vanished concept without being able to give it the forces it needs to return to life, are the plague of philosophy.
     From: G Deleuze / F Guattari (What is Philosophy? [1991], 1.1)
     A reaction: This seems to be the continental view of analytical philosophy, that it is pathetically conservative. I would offer MacIntyre as a response, who gives a beautiful analysis of why the super-modern view is dead. The French are hopelessly romantic.
Two marxist ideas have dominated in France: base and superstructure, and ideology [Scruton]
     Full Idea: Two tenets of classical Marxism have played a decisive role in French culture during our century: the theory of base and superstructure, and the concept of ideology.
     From: Roger Scruton (Upon Nothing: Swansea lecture [1993], p.7)
     A reaction: It is striking how marxist attitudes permeate even the least political of French philosophical writings, to the point where you wonder if they are even aware of it any more. They largely have marxism and reaction, with liberalism passing them by.
To meet the division in our life, try the Subject, Nature, Spirit, Will, Power, Praxis, Unconscious, or Being [Critchley]
     Full Idea: Against the Kantian division of a priori and empirical, Fichte offered activity of the subject, Schelling offered natural force, Hegel offered Spirit, Schopenhauer the Will, Nietzsche power, Marx praxis, Freud the unconscious, and Heidegger offered Being.
     From: Simon Critchley (Continental Philosophy - V. Short Intro [2001])
     A reaction: The whole of Continental Philosophy summarised in a sentence. Fichte and Schopenhauer seem to point to existentialism, Schelling gives evolutionary teleology, Marx abandons philosophy, the others are up the creek.
The French keep returning, to Hegel or Nietzsche or Marx [Critchley]
     Full Idea: French philosophy since the 1930s might be described as a series of returns: to Hegel (in Kojève and early Sartre), to Nietzsche (in Foucault and Deleuze), or to Marx (in Althusser).
     From: Simon Critchley (Continental Philosophy - V. Short Intro [2001], Ch.2)
     A reaction: An interesting map. The question might be why they return to those three, rather than (say) Hume or Leibniz. If the choice of which one you return to a matter of 'taste' (as Nietzsche would have it)?
German idealism aimed to find a unifying principle for Kant's various dualisms [Critchley]
     Full Idea: In his Third Critique Kant established a series of dualisms (pure/practical reason, nature/freedom, epistemology/ethics) but failed to provide a unifying principle; German idealism can be seen as an attempt to provide this principle.
     From: Simon Critchley (Interview with Baggini and Stangroom [2001], p.187)
     A reaction: He cites 'subject', 'spirit', 'art', 'will to power', 'praxis' and 'being' as candidates. This is a helpful overview for someone struggling to get to grips with that tradition.
Since Hegel, continental philosophy has been linked with social and historical enquiry. [Critchley]
     Full Idea: In continental philosophy from Hegel onwards, systematic philosophical questions have to be linked to socio-historical enquiry, and the distinctions between philosophy, history and society begin to fall apart.
     From: Simon Critchley (Interview with Baggini and Stangroom [2001], p.188)
     A reaction: I have a strong sales resistance to this view of philosophy, just as I would if it was said about mathematics. It seems to imply a bogus view that history exhibits direction and purpose (the 'Whig' view). There are pure reasons among the prejudices.
Continental philosophy fights the threatened nihilism in the critique of reason [Critchley]
     Full Idea: If reason must criticise itself (in Kant) how does one avoid total scepticism? In my view, the problem that has animated the continental tradition since Jacobi (early 19th cent) is the threat of nihilism.
     From: Simon Critchley (Interview with Baggini and Stangroom [2001], p.188)
     A reaction: As an outsider to 'continental' philosophy, this is the most illuminating remark I have read about it. It is not only a plausible account of the movement, but also a very worth aim, which should be taken seriously by analytical philosophers.
Continental philosophy is based on critique, praxis and emancipation [Critchley]
     Full Idea: The basic map of the continental tradition can be summarised in three terms: critique, praxis and emancipation.
     From: Simon Critchley (Interview with Baggini and Stangroom [2001], p.189)
     A reaction: I wince at 'emancipation', which seems to take freedom as of unquestionably high value, instead of being one of the principles up for question in social philosophy. There are more presuppositions in Marxist than in analytical philosophy.
Continental philosophy has a bad tendency to offer 'one big thing' to explain everything [Critchley]
     Full Idea: In continental philosophy there is a pernicious tendency to explain everything in terms of 'one big thing', such as the 'death drive' (Freud), 'being' (Heidegger), 'the real' (Lacan), 'power' (Foucault), 'the other' (Levinas), or 'différance' (Derrida).
     From: Simon Critchley (Interview with Baggini and Stangroom [2001], p.197)
     A reaction: From a fan of this type of philosophy, this is a refreshing remark, because if pinpoints a very off-putting feature. Each of these 'big things' should be up for question, not offered as axiomatic assumptions that explain everything else.
Analytic philosophy has much higher standards of thinking than continental philosophy [Williamson]
     Full Idea: Certain advances in philosophical standards have been made within analytic philosophy, and there would be a serious loss of integrity involved in abandoning them in the way required to participate in current continental philosophy.
     From: Timothy Williamson (Interview with Baggini and Stangroom [2001], p.151)
     A reaction: The reply might be to concede the point, but say that the precision and rigour achieved are precisely what debar analytical philosophy from thinking about the really interesting problems. One might as well switch to maths and have done with it.
Deleuze relies on Spinoza (immanence), Bergson (duration), and difference (Nietzsche) [May]
     Full Idea: The three tripods on which the philosophy of Deleuze stands are immanence (Spinoza), duration (Bergson), and the affirmation of difference (Nietzsche).
     From: Todd May (Gilles Deleuze [2006], 2.12)
     A reaction: [Just to begin sketching how continental philosophy sees its tradition].