Drafts by Joshua Roe
This thesis explores Schelling’s shift from his Identitätsphilosophie to his Freiheitsphilosophie... more This thesis explores Schelling’s shift from his Identitätsphilosophie to his Freiheitsphilosophie, focusing on how he wrestles with reconciling the finite to the absolute. Darstellung meines Systems, often regarded as the seminal text of the Identitätsphilosophie, emphasizes the dominance of the absolute and dismisses the significance of the finite. However, in his later works, such as Philosophie und Religion and the Freiheitschrift, Schelling develops a more complex understanding of the finite as potentially independent of the absolute. This thesis argues that Schelling’s shift in thinking is marked by a stronger recognition of the independence and creativity of the finite, a new understanding of evil, the Ungrund as a primordial principle, and the unfolding of reason and non-reason in the fall and the possibility of reconciliation to indifference. The thesis also addresses the challenge of reconciling the changes in Schelling’s thought with his self-proclaimed status as a systematic thinker, and argues that Schelling’s later works demonstrate a recognition of the complexity of finite life and a departure from the possibility of comprehending the total order of the universe.
Both Lévinas and Harman claim that phenomenology, as it was conceived by Husserl and Heidegger, w... more Both Lévinas and Harman claim that phenomenology, as it was conceived by Husserl and Heidegger, was too restrictive in what it allowed to undergo phenomenological analysis. Lévinas's main claim against phenomenology is that it does not recognise the distinctiveness of the Other. The appeal to the Other is as something not sufficiently recognised by the phenomenological methods of Heidegger and Husserl. The structure of the relationship between Lévinas's alterity and phenomenology is similar to Harman's objection against phenomenology. This similarity will form the basis for this essay. Harman also claims that there are some cases which are not sufficiently addressed by phenomenology. The differences in kind of the cases that Lévinas and Harman consider capable of philosophical reflection will reveal the effectiveness of each approach. Underlying this analysis is the problem of ethics. Ethics lies at the root of Lévinas's objection to Husserl and Heidegger, but there is also an ethical objection lodged against Lévinas's appeal to the Other itself. It is at this point that Harman's work comes to the fore; his broader conception of objects is designed to match the Lévinasian encounter with the Other, and extend it. Since the ethical objection against Lévinas is that his view of the Other is too narrow, Harman's wider scope provides both a counterpoint and an indication of a possible alternative. Due to space restrictions, the problems with Harman's view will not be given extensive consideration, instead the essay will only indicate whether a better might be feasible.
Papers by Joshua Roe
This thesis addresses two questions: What ideas did Delors adopt from personalism? How did he app... more This thesis addresses two questions: What ideas did Delors adopt from personalism? How did he apply the ideas of personalism to European Integration? It identifies three main areas of influence: the problem of the bourgeois attitude, the problem of individualism, and the legitimacy of power. The notion of habitus, developed by Pierre Bourdieu using the ideas of phenomenology, shows how Delors used ideas from personalism in a different way than they were originally defined by the personalists. This adaptation is based on the nature of the relationship between ideas and politics, whereby ideas influence and affect politics but, faced with political demands, in a way that was not anticipated in its original formation. These are seen through the development of the three main ideas Delors takes from personalism. The bourgeois attitude, which Delors identifies with Emmanuel Mounier describes the lack of concern with the problems of predominantly the working class. In contrast Delors advocates greater sensitivity towards reality, which he develops through a combination of Mounier’s ideas and neo-realist cinema. Delors applies this binary to his own political experiences, which led to different practical implications that initially set out by Mounier. As for the problem of individualism, Delors identifies this from the 1960s onwards and is attached to the loss of communities in society. Whilst Delors credits Mounier with this idea, there is no specific quote or reference to Mounier. Therefore, the problem of individualism shows a more embedded interpretation of Mounier’s ideas.
In addition to the influence of Mounier, this paper also addresses other potential influences of personalism in Delors’ life and career. These include: Paul Vignaux, whom Delors met during his time in the Confédération française des travailleurs chrétiens (CFTC); Denis De Rougemont, against whom Delors defends the use of top-down power in European integration; and Jacques Maritain, whom Delors claimed to have read in a 2009 interview. The influence of these figures is more convoluted than that of Mounier but show important features about how philosophical discourses affect the political world. This is evident in Delors’ defence of top-down power: Delors’ conception of decentralisation (evident in the period of the 1970s) implicitly agreed with Rougemont’s critique of power but in the context of the project of European integration, Delors sees a more legitimate way of using power. Together the three ideas of the bourgeois attitude, excessive individualism and the legitimacy of power inform how Delors develops the principle of subsidiarity. The principle of subsidiarity can legitimately use top-down power because it is balanced with a bottom-up structure, which emphasises sensitivity towards reality and affirms communities. The way Delors incorporates the ideas he adopts from personalism into the project of European integration reflects Bourdieu’s notion of habitus; philosophical ideas are reshaped when they are incorporated into politics.
The aim of this study is to develop from Kristeva’s account of time and semiotics the conditions ... more The aim of this study is to develop from Kristeva’s account of time and semiotics the conditions of possibility for a new approach to interpreting the Bible. This will be set against the background of feminist biblical criticism, beginning from Esther Fuchs’s assessment of deception. She bases her comparison on the concept of deceptiveness but I will argue, using Lacan, that the aporia of desire undermines this comparison. Through Kristeva’s framework of the phases of feminism it will be shown that Fuchs’s argument weakness lies in her presupposition of the determinate identities of men and women. By examining passages in Genesis it will be shown that such determined identities are also not easily found in the Hebrew Bible. Then by considering another feminist scholar, Alice Bach, it will be shown that overcoming identity requires a more nuanced approach. In the first version of “Women’s Time” Kristeva suggests that identities could be overcome through moving towards the individual but this also operates in the same structure of identity. In fact Kristeva appears to recognize this problem as when she republishes the essay she considers a different way forward. It will be instead suggested that a type of feminism that recognizes its own weakness is needed. This will be used to interpret Proverbs 31 but in doing so it will become evident that this alone lacks the potency to overcome the diffuse nature of the symbolic.
The aim of this paper is to show that Jacques Derrida’s prayer is not disaffected by the loss of ... more The aim of this paper is to show that Jacques Derrida’s prayer is not disaffected by the loss of presence produced by différance. Further the relationship between negative theology and deconstruction will be shown to be consistent rather than opposed. Derrida’s prayer is influenced by his work on negative theology and the importance of performativity. This bears a resemblance to the conversion of Augustine and will provide the context for assessing Derrida’s prayer. The problem that binds both Derrida and Augustine is whether the name of God can be spoken without determining the other. Derrida’s prayer is distinguished to Augustine’s in that the latter knows the addressee whereas the former is cautious on making such a move. However this caution does not inhibit him to the extent that Caputo assumes in his interpretation of Derrida’s prayer.
MPhil Theology - Oxford University by Joshua Roe
This essay will argue that Reinhold’s development of the ‘first principle’ does not reconcile the... more This essay will argue that Reinhold’s development of the ‘first principle’ does not reconcile the dichotomy of faith and reason. He attempts to extend the scope of rational foundation within the Kantian project so that the place of religion comes under the scope of this foundation. However it will be argued that his re-conception of the rational foundation does not meet the strict criteria of rationality. Thus Reinhold does not firmly establish the foundation of religion.
Karl Leonhard Reinhold (1757-1823) was an Austrian philosopher, whose main concern was how faith could be reconciled with reason. In Kant’s ‘Critical Philosophy’ he thought he had found the basis for this reconciliation. Reinhold’s engagement of Kantian philosophy is divided into two parts. The first of these is his presentation of the Critical Project in Letters on the Kantian Philosophy. The purpose of this project was to popularise Kant’s critical philosophy. Kant’s work was largely inaccessible and so Reinhold attempted to take the main principles and explain it for a wider audience. This purpose gives a distinct tone to the Letters. They do not attempt to significantly develop the critical system in any significant way, which is the second part of Reinhold’s engagement with Kant’s philosophy. Instead Reinhold only attempts to do this in the later work ‘Contributions toward Correcting the Previous Misunderstandings of Philosophers’ [Beyträge zur Berichtigung bisheriger Missverständnisse der Philosophen (hereafter Contributions)]. Here, he sets out his project of the elementary philosophy [Elementarphilosophie].
Reinhold believed that the sceptic could reject Kant’s philosophy because it lacked a foundation that was indubitable. This rested upon the relationship between Darstellung and Vorstellung within Kant’s first Critique. The first of these, Vorstellung [usually translated as ‘representation’], describes cognitive representation as it correlates to reality. This type of representation is an idea that is intended to closely resemble the object as it really exists. Rather than converge with the real object Darstellung [usually translated as ‘presentation’ but could also be translated as ‘representation’] diverges from it. Darstellung is an indeterminate portrayal of the world, which refers to the object through metaphor and analogy. This lack of definition is extended through the romantic preference to the poetic into the more creative depiction of the absolute. The operation of Darstellung resonates with Paul Klee’s statement about visual art: ‘art does not reproduce the visible, rather it makes visible’. However, the issue that is of concern for Reinhold is that Kant uses Darstellung to explain Vorstellung. In fact, Kant himself seems to try to resist attaching significance to his application of Darstellung. Nevertheless the invocation of Darstellung in order to explain Vorstellung means that the latter concept lacks a substantial definition. Subsequently Reinhold develops the ‘first principle’ as the principle of consciousness to establish Kant’s Critical Project on a firm foundation. Manfred Frank summarises the impact this approach has on philosophy: ‘According to Reinhold, all other that can make a claim to truth can be developed from this “principle of consciousness”—either through logical or analytic derivation’. Accordingly Reinhold’s philosophy could be characterised as analytic in the sense that he attempted to derive all propositions from a basic principle. His argument for a self-evident basic principle influenced both German Idealism and Romanticism. Johann Fichte (1762-1814), the successor to Reinhold’s chair in Jena, responds to Reinhold’s attempted foundation by positing the foundation on Darstellung, which seemingly concedes the failure of the project. However within Fichte there is a further tension between the determinate and determinable that needs to be resolved. On the other hand ignoring this tension led to the Romantic reaction against Reinhold and in particular it will be seen that Schleiermacher reacts against the foundation and presents religion as posited. This would have an impact on the place of religion because it is considered as part of Darstellung in Kant, Fichte and Schleiermacher. Therefore religion can only problematically be understood through Vorstellung in Reinhold’s philosophy.
The accounts of revelation offered by Karl Barth and Jean-Luc Marion have ambiguous attitudes tow... more The accounts of revelation offered by Karl Barth and Jean-Luc Marion have ambiguous attitudes towards phenomenology. Phenomenology is examined directly by both, most notably, with the work of Martin Heidegger. However the extent their individual engagements with phenomenology differ. Barth is a theologian and only examines Heidegger as a clarification of his theology of revelation. However, this essay will also consider the phenomenological implications of his theory of revelation when he is not explicitly dealing with phenomenology. In particular, it will be argued that in his debate with Emil Brunner, he shows that he is actually closer to Heidegger’s account of the Nothing in ‘What is Metaphysics’ than Barth admits himself. Unlike Barth, Marion is has done several extensive studies on phenomenology and as such has wider recognition within the school of phenomenology.
Recently, John McNassor has compared Barth and Marion based on their theological method. He argues that Marion’s account of revelation is more complete than Barth’s because he presupposes the importance of the immediacy of experience, whereas he thinks that Barth’s resistance to the value of human experience means that he tends towards devaluing creation. Marion, like Barth, also advocates the development of theology that is not determined by human ideas, which leads him to develop the notion of saturated phenomena. Marion claims that phenomenology, as it was concieved by Husserl, did not grasp the richness of experience because he limited experience to what can be grasped through concepts. Against Husserl, Marion argues that there is a more basic form of experience which is unmediated by human concepts, which he describes as pure givenness. Pure givenness is the state of experience that is prior to our application of concepts to this experience and thus is pure content or intuition without being affected by human understanding (or intentionality). Marion argues that there are special cases of phenomena can reveal the pure givenness, which he labels saturated phenomena. These are cases where the experience exceeds our capacity to find concepts to understand it. The difference between pure givenness and saturated phenomena is that while pure givenness can only occur before conceptualisation, saturated phenomena can appear after conceptualisation. The limitation of conceptualisation in saturated phenomena is thus an account of revelation because it cannot be established by human reason (as in natural theology). Marion claims that the effect of saturated phenomena is that it negates conceptualisation so that its distinctive character is in pure givenness. However, it will be argued that Marion’s account of saturated phenomena displays ambiguity that on one side is restrictive about the accessibility of pure givenness but on the other side suggests that pure givenness is universally accessible. The former aspect is closer to Barth’s suspicion of natural theology and more distanced to phenomenology. Yet the more universal accessibility of givenness leans more towards phenomenology than revelation. Barth and Marion share in common an ambiguous relationship to phenomenology because they both dismiss phenomenology in the face of a theology of revelation they also display closer affinity to phenomenology than their sometimes admit.
Book Reviews by Joshua Roe
Conference Presentations by Joshua Roe
This paper has two main aims. Firstly, it will provide an overview of Mihaly Virág and the manusc... more This paper has two main aims. Firstly, it will provide an overview of Mihaly Virág and the manuscripts held in the Klimo library, and secondly it will show how the study of these manuscripts can contribute to scholarship on the history of religious tolerance and freedom and especially its history within Hungary. Mihaly Virág (1806-1867) was librarian of the Klimo library from 1835 to 1845. There are only two published works by him, the first is his doctoral dissertation (1829) and the second is an obituary for János Scitovszky (1867). Additionally there are the collection of unpublished manuscripts. These manuscripts focus on two main topics: history of the church and church law. Among the manuscripts there are several that are copied verbatim or almost verbatim from published works of other authors. These provide important clues to the sources Virág used and the dating of the manuscripts. There are also manuscripts that do not appear to be copied. Among these manuscripts there are several texts that deal with religious tolerance and freedom. This will be the focus of the second part of the paper. One of the most significant events in the development of religious tolerance in Hungary was the 1781 Patent of Toleration (Toleranzpatent) issued by Joseph II. It was one among many reforms of Joseph and these reforms were complicated and controversial. English and German scholarship has largely ignored the effects of the Patent in Hungary by focusing on Austria. Virág's manuscripts provide an important source for understanding the impact of the Patent in Hungary and shows that the attitude towards the Patent, while critical, was not entirely negative. The second contribution concerns the relationship between the clergy and laity and the understanding of anti-Christian tendencies. Ádám Hegyi (2015) argues that the deism which emerged from the Reformed church lacked the distinction between the philosophical conceptions of deisms and the practice of deism among the laity. Hegyi's study is based on the South East region of Hungary, where there are few sources available. In contrast, Virág's manuscripts demonstrate a more nuanced understanding of deism that distinguishes between its intellectual development and religious practices. Therefore this paper will suggest that the discussion of religious tolerance in Virág's manuscripts show that the attitude towards religious tolerance in Hungary was both positive and negative and demonstrate a nuanced understanding of deism that distinguishes between intellectual tradition and religious practice.
A tanulmány megírását két cél vezérelte. Elsősorban, áttekintést nyújtani Virág Mihálynak a Klimo Könyvtárban őrzött kéziratairól, másodsorban pedig bemutatni, hogy a kéziratok tanulmányozása hogyan járulhat hozzá a vallási tolerancia és szabadság történeti fejlődéséhez, különösen magyarországi vonatkozásban. Virág Mihály (1806-1867) a Klimo Könyvtár könyvtárosa volt 1835-tól 1845-ig. Két kiadott műve van csupán, az 1829-es doktori disszertációja és egy Scitovszky Jánoshoz írt 1867-es gyászjelentés. Létezik ezen felül, kiadatlan kéziratainak gyűjteménye is. Ezen művei két témára fókuszálnak: az egyházra és az egyházjogra. Kéziratai között számos olyat találni, melyet szó szerint, vagy majdnem szó szerint vett át más szerzők kiadott műveiből. Fontos utalásként szolgálnak ezek a Virág által használt forrásokhoz, illetve kéziratainak időbeni azonosításához. Bizonyos kéziratai azonban eredetinek tűnnek. Ezek között számosan vannak olyanok, melyek a vallási toleranciával és szabadsággal foglalkoznak. A tanulmány második része erre fókuszál. A vallási tolerancia történetének egyik legfontosabb eseménye a II. József által 1781-ben kiadott türelmi rendelet (Toleranzpatent) volt. Egyike József számos reformjának, melyek bonyolultak és ellentmondásosak voltak. Az angol és német nyelvű tudományos munkák nagymértékben figyelmen kívül hagyták a rendelet magyarországi hatásait, kizárólag Ausztriára koncentrálva. Virág kéziratai fontos forrást biztosítanak a rendelet magyarországi hatásának megértéséhez, illetve bemutatják a rendelettel szembeni kritikus, de nem teljesen elítélő hozzáállást. A kéziratok másik fontos eleme, hogy segít megérteni a papság és a laikusok közötti kapcsolatot és a kereszténység ellenes tendenciákat. Hegyi Ádám 2015-ös tanulmánya vitatja, hogy a Református Egyházból sarjadó deizmus különbséget tett a deizmus filozófiai elképzelései és a laikusok deista gyakorlata között. Hegyi műve Magyarország dél-keleti régióján alapul, ahol kevés forrás áll rendelkezésre. Virág kéziratai, ezzel szemben, a deizmusnak egy sokkal részletesebb megismerését mutatják be, mely megkülönbözteti a szellemi fejlődést és a vallási gyakorlatokat. Ebből adódóan, a tanulmány alátámasztja, hogy a Virág kézirataiban a vallási tolerancia körüli vita kapcsán egyszerre beszélhetünk pozitív és negatív magyarországi hozzáállásról, valamint árnyaltabb képet kaphatunk az intellektuális tradíció és a vallásgyakorlat között különbséget tevő deizmusról.
Arató Balázs magyar fordítása/Hungarian translation by Balázs Arató.
https://soundcloud.com/user-237248455/moller-and-roe-luther-demolished-the-roofs-calvin-the-walls-but-socinus-destroyed-the-foundations
In Religion within the Bounds of Mere Reason (1793) Kant distinguishes three types of predisposit... more In Religion within the Bounds of Mere Reason (1793) Kant distinguishes three types of predisposition that form the moral nature of human beings. These are: animality, which denotes the quality that human beings are living beings; humanity, which ascribes the rational nature of human beings; and personality, which is the predisposition of the human being as having responsibility. The inclusion of this third disposition, of personality, appears to add a new dimension that is not found in Kant’s earlier critical works. Indeed, one source for this disposition could be Karl Leonhard Reinhold, whose Letters on the Kantian Philosophy both popularised Kant’s works and opened new aspects for Kantian philosophy. Significantly, Reinhold tried to create a stronger distinction between human capacity and reason than found in Kant’s notion of practical reason. Hence Kant’s own inclusion of Reinhold’s notion suggests that the value of personality is detached from reason. This possibility runs against the predominant interpretation of Kant as an Enlightenment thinker who bases everything on reason. In this paper I will consider whether the predisposition of personality can be reconciled with a predominately rational interpretation of Kant or whether it reveals the importance of a non-rational basis in Kant’s philosophy.
Can power ever be rightfully used for political purposes? The personalist philosopher Denis De Ro... more Can power ever be rightfully used for political purposes? The personalist philosopher Denis De Rougemont seemed doubtful. Power was appropriate for personal actualisation but used against others it seems to undermine human dignity. For Jacques Delors the defence of human dignity was the overarching purpose he adopted from personalism. However he disagreed with De Rougemont over the use of power arguing that while power used for nationalistic purposes created problems, under the European umbrella, these could be overcome. I will argue, using Joanna Oksala's interpretation of Foucault, that Delors defence of power fails through the way he tries to justify it.
Talks by Joshua Roe
What can jokes tell us about human nature? Many philosophical works have a serious style and sugg... more What can jokes tell us about human nature? Many philosophical works have a serious style and suggest that clarity is the best way to philosophically understand something. The German philosopher, Johann Georg Hamann (1730-88), takes a very different view. For Hamann, wit and humour offer unique access to human nature because they allow us to recognise phenomena at the limit of our perception.
This approach is found in his own work; he often attacks his opponents through ridicule than rigorous philosophical argumentation. This style is by no means accidental but based on his belief that the so-called ‘rational’ approach of his contemporaries denied its own foundations. Likewise Hamann thought that language was by its nature indeterminable and it is this indeterminable quality of language that allows us to grasp reality even when it doesn’t fit within our clear understanding. This idea in turn reveals Hamann’s understanding of human nature as irreducible to rationality. He does not deny rationality but only the idiosyncratic definition of rationality employed by his contemporaries, such as Immanuel Kant and Christian Wolff, who see rationality as detached from tradition. Instead Hamann argues that reason is not ahistorical but develops out of a tradition. This tradition contains contradictions and complications that Kant and Wolff believe they have eliminated in the clarity of their approaches. The result is that Wolff, Kant and their fellows produce a narrow anthropology that over-emphasise rationality to the detriment of other factors in human nature.
Hamann tries to redress this problem by drawing attention to aspects of life that the ‘rationalist’ philosophers wanted to deny. This paper will focus on the role of humour, although Hamann also highlights other features of life that he thinks the rationalists deny, such as revelation, sexuality and tradition. The role of humour is interdependent with Hamann’s understanding of language, which is something that is not completely under our control.
This idea is evident in Hamann’s essay on the silent h in German words (Hamann is referring here mostly to archaic uses of German spelling, as in thun). The say concerns a debate at that time over whether unpronounced letters should be removed. One argument for the proposal is that the silent letter h corrupts the minds of children by leading them to believe in things that are superfluous to the principle of sufficient reason. This is an implicit attack against rationalist philosophy: primarily this is aimed against Leibniz and Wolff who most clearly espouse the ultimate principle of sufficient reason, but by extension it also serves as a retort to Kant. There is a clear irony in the way Hamann presents the argument. It is clearly not used by the proponents of spelling change but instead forms an argumentum absurdum. Rather than simply presenting phenomena that cannot be grasped by the principle of sufficient reason to defend the existence of things superfluous to our conscious knowledge, Hamann pushes the idea to the extreme. The result is farcical because even if the spelling reform were successful it would not bring about the true universal that is derived from the principle of reason because there simply remain too many phenomenon that are indeterminate beyond the superfluity of silent letters.
The effect of this argumentative approach is to highlight the absurdity of the argument. In the comedic, we see that there is something that we can recognise but not quite comprehend. The idea that all the world’s problems could be solved by spelling reform (or for that matter reading Origen!) is over-optimistic. The problem is that when we are immersed in rational argumentation we are not aware of the limits of the principles of reason. Within this system of argumentation there is an apparent circularity in which the reason justifies itself to the extent that considerations that do not fit this pattern are not considered because we would only ever consider arguments within the limits of reason. Hamann’s approach is to disrupt this circularity by making fun of it. By pushing the method to its limits, Hamann indicates its contradiction. There is something else that we didn’t consider in our style of reasoning that nevertheless defines our life. This is intended by Hamann to encourage the rationalist philosophers to look outside of their customary framework and consider reality as something more complicated than they could conceive by their use of the principle of sufficient reason.
In this way Hamann is not defending the irrational per se, an accusation he is often charged with (most notably by Isiah Berlin), but rather to point out that when someone thinks they have properly grasped rationality, in fact we only have an understanding that remains in part irrational. Hamann’s point is not to give up the idea of rationality and resign ourselves to irrationality. Instead Hamann wants us to reject the rationality of our reason because it is not rational enough. Humour is the tool that Hamann uses in order to provoke this response because it is external to the method of reasoning and it is only by recognising something external can we recognise the problem of a system that purports to have internal consistency (as the rationalist systems of Wolff and Leibniz did).
Hamann thinks that humour and language have indeterminacy because they reflect the indeterminacy in human nature. This is why humour can have an effect on us because it tells us something about the human condition that we can recognise in laughter even when we fail to understand it by relying on our own hubris of rationality.
https://soundcloud.com/user-237248455/joshua-roe-language-humour-and-human-nature-hamanns-challenge-to-enlightenment-philosophy
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Drafts by Joshua Roe
Papers by Joshua Roe
In addition to the influence of Mounier, this paper also addresses other potential influences of personalism in Delors’ life and career. These include: Paul Vignaux, whom Delors met during his time in the Confédération française des travailleurs chrétiens (CFTC); Denis De Rougemont, against whom Delors defends the use of top-down power in European integration; and Jacques Maritain, whom Delors claimed to have read in a 2009 interview. The influence of these figures is more convoluted than that of Mounier but show important features about how philosophical discourses affect the political world. This is evident in Delors’ defence of top-down power: Delors’ conception of decentralisation (evident in the period of the 1970s) implicitly agreed with Rougemont’s critique of power but in the context of the project of European integration, Delors sees a more legitimate way of using power. Together the three ideas of the bourgeois attitude, excessive individualism and the legitimacy of power inform how Delors develops the principle of subsidiarity. The principle of subsidiarity can legitimately use top-down power because it is balanced with a bottom-up structure, which emphasises sensitivity towards reality and affirms communities. The way Delors incorporates the ideas he adopts from personalism into the project of European integration reflects Bourdieu’s notion of habitus; philosophical ideas are reshaped when they are incorporated into politics.
MPhil Theology - Oxford University by Joshua Roe
Karl Leonhard Reinhold (1757-1823) was an Austrian philosopher, whose main concern was how faith could be reconciled with reason. In Kant’s ‘Critical Philosophy’ he thought he had found the basis for this reconciliation. Reinhold’s engagement of Kantian philosophy is divided into two parts. The first of these is his presentation of the Critical Project in Letters on the Kantian Philosophy. The purpose of this project was to popularise Kant’s critical philosophy. Kant’s work was largely inaccessible and so Reinhold attempted to take the main principles and explain it for a wider audience. This purpose gives a distinct tone to the Letters. They do not attempt to significantly develop the critical system in any significant way, which is the second part of Reinhold’s engagement with Kant’s philosophy. Instead Reinhold only attempts to do this in the later work ‘Contributions toward Correcting the Previous Misunderstandings of Philosophers’ [Beyträge zur Berichtigung bisheriger Missverständnisse der Philosophen (hereafter Contributions)]. Here, he sets out his project of the elementary philosophy [Elementarphilosophie].
Reinhold believed that the sceptic could reject Kant’s philosophy because it lacked a foundation that was indubitable. This rested upon the relationship between Darstellung and Vorstellung within Kant’s first Critique. The first of these, Vorstellung [usually translated as ‘representation’], describes cognitive representation as it correlates to reality. This type of representation is an idea that is intended to closely resemble the object as it really exists. Rather than converge with the real object Darstellung [usually translated as ‘presentation’ but could also be translated as ‘representation’] diverges from it. Darstellung is an indeterminate portrayal of the world, which refers to the object through metaphor and analogy. This lack of definition is extended through the romantic preference to the poetic into the more creative depiction of the absolute. The operation of Darstellung resonates with Paul Klee’s statement about visual art: ‘art does not reproduce the visible, rather it makes visible’. However, the issue that is of concern for Reinhold is that Kant uses Darstellung to explain Vorstellung. In fact, Kant himself seems to try to resist attaching significance to his application of Darstellung. Nevertheless the invocation of Darstellung in order to explain Vorstellung means that the latter concept lacks a substantial definition. Subsequently Reinhold develops the ‘first principle’ as the principle of consciousness to establish Kant’s Critical Project on a firm foundation. Manfred Frank summarises the impact this approach has on philosophy: ‘According to Reinhold, all other that can make a claim to truth can be developed from this “principle of consciousness”—either through logical or analytic derivation’. Accordingly Reinhold’s philosophy could be characterised as analytic in the sense that he attempted to derive all propositions from a basic principle. His argument for a self-evident basic principle influenced both German Idealism and Romanticism. Johann Fichte (1762-1814), the successor to Reinhold’s chair in Jena, responds to Reinhold’s attempted foundation by positing the foundation on Darstellung, which seemingly concedes the failure of the project. However within Fichte there is a further tension between the determinate and determinable that needs to be resolved. On the other hand ignoring this tension led to the Romantic reaction against Reinhold and in particular it will be seen that Schleiermacher reacts against the foundation and presents religion as posited. This would have an impact on the place of religion because it is considered as part of Darstellung in Kant, Fichte and Schleiermacher. Therefore religion can only problematically be understood through Vorstellung in Reinhold’s philosophy.
Recently, John McNassor has compared Barth and Marion based on their theological method. He argues that Marion’s account of revelation is more complete than Barth’s because he presupposes the importance of the immediacy of experience, whereas he thinks that Barth’s resistance to the value of human experience means that he tends towards devaluing creation. Marion, like Barth, also advocates the development of theology that is not determined by human ideas, which leads him to develop the notion of saturated phenomena. Marion claims that phenomenology, as it was concieved by Husserl, did not grasp the richness of experience because he limited experience to what can be grasped through concepts. Against Husserl, Marion argues that there is a more basic form of experience which is unmediated by human concepts, which he describes as pure givenness. Pure givenness is the state of experience that is prior to our application of concepts to this experience and thus is pure content or intuition without being affected by human understanding (or intentionality). Marion argues that there are special cases of phenomena can reveal the pure givenness, which he labels saturated phenomena. These are cases where the experience exceeds our capacity to find concepts to understand it. The difference between pure givenness and saturated phenomena is that while pure givenness can only occur before conceptualisation, saturated phenomena can appear after conceptualisation. The limitation of conceptualisation in saturated phenomena is thus an account of revelation because it cannot be established by human reason (as in natural theology). Marion claims that the effect of saturated phenomena is that it negates conceptualisation so that its distinctive character is in pure givenness. However, it will be argued that Marion’s account of saturated phenomena displays ambiguity that on one side is restrictive about the accessibility of pure givenness but on the other side suggests that pure givenness is universally accessible. The former aspect is closer to Barth’s suspicion of natural theology and more distanced to phenomenology. Yet the more universal accessibility of givenness leans more towards phenomenology than revelation. Barth and Marion share in common an ambiguous relationship to phenomenology because they both dismiss phenomenology in the face of a theology of revelation they also display closer affinity to phenomenology than their sometimes admit.
Book Reviews by Joshua Roe
Conference Presentations by Joshua Roe
A tanulmány megírását két cél vezérelte. Elsősorban, áttekintést nyújtani Virág Mihálynak a Klimo Könyvtárban őrzött kéziratairól, másodsorban pedig bemutatni, hogy a kéziratok tanulmányozása hogyan járulhat hozzá a vallási tolerancia és szabadság történeti fejlődéséhez, különösen magyarországi vonatkozásban. Virág Mihály (1806-1867) a Klimo Könyvtár könyvtárosa volt 1835-tól 1845-ig. Két kiadott műve van csupán, az 1829-es doktori disszertációja és egy Scitovszky Jánoshoz írt 1867-es gyászjelentés. Létezik ezen felül, kiadatlan kéziratainak gyűjteménye is. Ezen művei két témára fókuszálnak: az egyházra és az egyházjogra. Kéziratai között számos olyat találni, melyet szó szerint, vagy majdnem szó szerint vett át más szerzők kiadott műveiből. Fontos utalásként szolgálnak ezek a Virág által használt forrásokhoz, illetve kéziratainak időbeni azonosításához. Bizonyos kéziratai azonban eredetinek tűnnek. Ezek között számosan vannak olyanok, melyek a vallási toleranciával és szabadsággal foglalkoznak. A tanulmány második része erre fókuszál. A vallási tolerancia történetének egyik legfontosabb eseménye a II. József által 1781-ben kiadott türelmi rendelet (Toleranzpatent) volt. Egyike József számos reformjának, melyek bonyolultak és ellentmondásosak voltak. Az angol és német nyelvű tudományos munkák nagymértékben figyelmen kívül hagyták a rendelet magyarországi hatásait, kizárólag Ausztriára koncentrálva. Virág kéziratai fontos forrást biztosítanak a rendelet magyarországi hatásának megértéséhez, illetve bemutatják a rendelettel szembeni kritikus, de nem teljesen elítélő hozzáállást. A kéziratok másik fontos eleme, hogy segít megérteni a papság és a laikusok közötti kapcsolatot és a kereszténység ellenes tendenciákat. Hegyi Ádám 2015-ös tanulmánya vitatja, hogy a Református Egyházból sarjadó deizmus különbséget tett a deizmus filozófiai elképzelései és a laikusok deista gyakorlata között. Hegyi műve Magyarország dél-keleti régióján alapul, ahol kevés forrás áll rendelkezésre. Virág kéziratai, ezzel szemben, a deizmusnak egy sokkal részletesebb megismerését mutatják be, mely megkülönbözteti a szellemi fejlődést és a vallási gyakorlatokat. Ebből adódóan, a tanulmány alátámasztja, hogy a Virág kézirataiban a vallási tolerancia körüli vita kapcsán egyszerre beszélhetünk pozitív és negatív magyarországi hozzáállásról, valamint árnyaltabb képet kaphatunk az intellektuális tradíció és a vallásgyakorlat között különbséget tevő deizmusról.
Arató Balázs magyar fordítása/Hungarian translation by Balázs Arató.
https://soundcloud.com/user-237248455/moller-and-roe-luther-demolished-the-roofs-calvin-the-walls-but-socinus-destroyed-the-foundations
Talks by Joshua Roe
This approach is found in his own work; he often attacks his opponents through ridicule than rigorous philosophical argumentation. This style is by no means accidental but based on his belief that the so-called ‘rational’ approach of his contemporaries denied its own foundations. Likewise Hamann thought that language was by its nature indeterminable and it is this indeterminable quality of language that allows us to grasp reality even when it doesn’t fit within our clear understanding. This idea in turn reveals Hamann’s understanding of human nature as irreducible to rationality. He does not deny rationality but only the idiosyncratic definition of rationality employed by his contemporaries, such as Immanuel Kant and Christian Wolff, who see rationality as detached from tradition. Instead Hamann argues that reason is not ahistorical but develops out of a tradition. This tradition contains contradictions and complications that Kant and Wolff believe they have eliminated in the clarity of their approaches. The result is that Wolff, Kant and their fellows produce a narrow anthropology that over-emphasise rationality to the detriment of other factors in human nature.
Hamann tries to redress this problem by drawing attention to aspects of life that the ‘rationalist’ philosophers wanted to deny. This paper will focus on the role of humour, although Hamann also highlights other features of life that he thinks the rationalists deny, such as revelation, sexuality and tradition. The role of humour is interdependent with Hamann’s understanding of language, which is something that is not completely under our control.
This idea is evident in Hamann’s essay on the silent h in German words (Hamann is referring here mostly to archaic uses of German spelling, as in thun). The say concerns a debate at that time over whether unpronounced letters should be removed. One argument for the proposal is that the silent letter h corrupts the minds of children by leading them to believe in things that are superfluous to the principle of sufficient reason. This is an implicit attack against rationalist philosophy: primarily this is aimed against Leibniz and Wolff who most clearly espouse the ultimate principle of sufficient reason, but by extension it also serves as a retort to Kant. There is a clear irony in the way Hamann presents the argument. It is clearly not used by the proponents of spelling change but instead forms an argumentum absurdum. Rather than simply presenting phenomena that cannot be grasped by the principle of sufficient reason to defend the existence of things superfluous to our conscious knowledge, Hamann pushes the idea to the extreme. The result is farcical because even if the spelling reform were successful it would not bring about the true universal that is derived from the principle of reason because there simply remain too many phenomenon that are indeterminate beyond the superfluity of silent letters.
The effect of this argumentative approach is to highlight the absurdity of the argument. In the comedic, we see that there is something that we can recognise but not quite comprehend. The idea that all the world’s problems could be solved by spelling reform (or for that matter reading Origen!) is over-optimistic. The problem is that when we are immersed in rational argumentation we are not aware of the limits of the principles of reason. Within this system of argumentation there is an apparent circularity in which the reason justifies itself to the extent that considerations that do not fit this pattern are not considered because we would only ever consider arguments within the limits of reason. Hamann’s approach is to disrupt this circularity by making fun of it. By pushing the method to its limits, Hamann indicates its contradiction. There is something else that we didn’t consider in our style of reasoning that nevertheless defines our life. This is intended by Hamann to encourage the rationalist philosophers to look outside of their customary framework and consider reality as something more complicated than they could conceive by their use of the principle of sufficient reason.
In this way Hamann is not defending the irrational per se, an accusation he is often charged with (most notably by Isiah Berlin), but rather to point out that when someone thinks they have properly grasped rationality, in fact we only have an understanding that remains in part irrational. Hamann’s point is not to give up the idea of rationality and resign ourselves to irrationality. Instead Hamann wants us to reject the rationality of our reason because it is not rational enough. Humour is the tool that Hamann uses in order to provoke this response because it is external to the method of reasoning and it is only by recognising something external can we recognise the problem of a system that purports to have internal consistency (as the rationalist systems of Wolff and Leibniz did).
Hamann thinks that humour and language have indeterminacy because they reflect the indeterminacy in human nature. This is why humour can have an effect on us because it tells us something about the human condition that we can recognise in laughter even when we fail to understand it by relying on our own hubris of rationality.
https://soundcloud.com/user-237248455/joshua-roe-language-humour-and-human-nature-hamanns-challenge-to-enlightenment-philosophy
In addition to the influence of Mounier, this paper also addresses other potential influences of personalism in Delors’ life and career. These include: Paul Vignaux, whom Delors met during his time in the Confédération française des travailleurs chrétiens (CFTC); Denis De Rougemont, against whom Delors defends the use of top-down power in European integration; and Jacques Maritain, whom Delors claimed to have read in a 2009 interview. The influence of these figures is more convoluted than that of Mounier but show important features about how philosophical discourses affect the political world. This is evident in Delors’ defence of top-down power: Delors’ conception of decentralisation (evident in the period of the 1970s) implicitly agreed with Rougemont’s critique of power but in the context of the project of European integration, Delors sees a more legitimate way of using power. Together the three ideas of the bourgeois attitude, excessive individualism and the legitimacy of power inform how Delors develops the principle of subsidiarity. The principle of subsidiarity can legitimately use top-down power because it is balanced with a bottom-up structure, which emphasises sensitivity towards reality and affirms communities. The way Delors incorporates the ideas he adopts from personalism into the project of European integration reflects Bourdieu’s notion of habitus; philosophical ideas are reshaped when they are incorporated into politics.
Karl Leonhard Reinhold (1757-1823) was an Austrian philosopher, whose main concern was how faith could be reconciled with reason. In Kant’s ‘Critical Philosophy’ he thought he had found the basis for this reconciliation. Reinhold’s engagement of Kantian philosophy is divided into two parts. The first of these is his presentation of the Critical Project in Letters on the Kantian Philosophy. The purpose of this project was to popularise Kant’s critical philosophy. Kant’s work was largely inaccessible and so Reinhold attempted to take the main principles and explain it for a wider audience. This purpose gives a distinct tone to the Letters. They do not attempt to significantly develop the critical system in any significant way, which is the second part of Reinhold’s engagement with Kant’s philosophy. Instead Reinhold only attempts to do this in the later work ‘Contributions toward Correcting the Previous Misunderstandings of Philosophers’ [Beyträge zur Berichtigung bisheriger Missverständnisse der Philosophen (hereafter Contributions)]. Here, he sets out his project of the elementary philosophy [Elementarphilosophie].
Reinhold believed that the sceptic could reject Kant’s philosophy because it lacked a foundation that was indubitable. This rested upon the relationship between Darstellung and Vorstellung within Kant’s first Critique. The first of these, Vorstellung [usually translated as ‘representation’], describes cognitive representation as it correlates to reality. This type of representation is an idea that is intended to closely resemble the object as it really exists. Rather than converge with the real object Darstellung [usually translated as ‘presentation’ but could also be translated as ‘representation’] diverges from it. Darstellung is an indeterminate portrayal of the world, which refers to the object through metaphor and analogy. This lack of definition is extended through the romantic preference to the poetic into the more creative depiction of the absolute. The operation of Darstellung resonates with Paul Klee’s statement about visual art: ‘art does not reproduce the visible, rather it makes visible’. However, the issue that is of concern for Reinhold is that Kant uses Darstellung to explain Vorstellung. In fact, Kant himself seems to try to resist attaching significance to his application of Darstellung. Nevertheless the invocation of Darstellung in order to explain Vorstellung means that the latter concept lacks a substantial definition. Subsequently Reinhold develops the ‘first principle’ as the principle of consciousness to establish Kant’s Critical Project on a firm foundation. Manfred Frank summarises the impact this approach has on philosophy: ‘According to Reinhold, all other that can make a claim to truth can be developed from this “principle of consciousness”—either through logical or analytic derivation’. Accordingly Reinhold’s philosophy could be characterised as analytic in the sense that he attempted to derive all propositions from a basic principle. His argument for a self-evident basic principle influenced both German Idealism and Romanticism. Johann Fichte (1762-1814), the successor to Reinhold’s chair in Jena, responds to Reinhold’s attempted foundation by positing the foundation on Darstellung, which seemingly concedes the failure of the project. However within Fichte there is a further tension between the determinate and determinable that needs to be resolved. On the other hand ignoring this tension led to the Romantic reaction against Reinhold and in particular it will be seen that Schleiermacher reacts against the foundation and presents religion as posited. This would have an impact on the place of religion because it is considered as part of Darstellung in Kant, Fichte and Schleiermacher. Therefore religion can only problematically be understood through Vorstellung in Reinhold’s philosophy.
Recently, John McNassor has compared Barth and Marion based on their theological method. He argues that Marion’s account of revelation is more complete than Barth’s because he presupposes the importance of the immediacy of experience, whereas he thinks that Barth’s resistance to the value of human experience means that he tends towards devaluing creation. Marion, like Barth, also advocates the development of theology that is not determined by human ideas, which leads him to develop the notion of saturated phenomena. Marion claims that phenomenology, as it was concieved by Husserl, did not grasp the richness of experience because he limited experience to what can be grasped through concepts. Against Husserl, Marion argues that there is a more basic form of experience which is unmediated by human concepts, which he describes as pure givenness. Pure givenness is the state of experience that is prior to our application of concepts to this experience and thus is pure content or intuition without being affected by human understanding (or intentionality). Marion argues that there are special cases of phenomena can reveal the pure givenness, which he labels saturated phenomena. These are cases where the experience exceeds our capacity to find concepts to understand it. The difference between pure givenness and saturated phenomena is that while pure givenness can only occur before conceptualisation, saturated phenomena can appear after conceptualisation. The limitation of conceptualisation in saturated phenomena is thus an account of revelation because it cannot be established by human reason (as in natural theology). Marion claims that the effect of saturated phenomena is that it negates conceptualisation so that its distinctive character is in pure givenness. However, it will be argued that Marion’s account of saturated phenomena displays ambiguity that on one side is restrictive about the accessibility of pure givenness but on the other side suggests that pure givenness is universally accessible. The former aspect is closer to Barth’s suspicion of natural theology and more distanced to phenomenology. Yet the more universal accessibility of givenness leans more towards phenomenology than revelation. Barth and Marion share in common an ambiguous relationship to phenomenology because they both dismiss phenomenology in the face of a theology of revelation they also display closer affinity to phenomenology than their sometimes admit.
A tanulmány megírását két cél vezérelte. Elsősorban, áttekintést nyújtani Virág Mihálynak a Klimo Könyvtárban őrzött kéziratairól, másodsorban pedig bemutatni, hogy a kéziratok tanulmányozása hogyan járulhat hozzá a vallási tolerancia és szabadság történeti fejlődéséhez, különösen magyarországi vonatkozásban. Virág Mihály (1806-1867) a Klimo Könyvtár könyvtárosa volt 1835-tól 1845-ig. Két kiadott műve van csupán, az 1829-es doktori disszertációja és egy Scitovszky Jánoshoz írt 1867-es gyászjelentés. Létezik ezen felül, kiadatlan kéziratainak gyűjteménye is. Ezen művei két témára fókuszálnak: az egyházra és az egyházjogra. Kéziratai között számos olyat találni, melyet szó szerint, vagy majdnem szó szerint vett át más szerzők kiadott műveiből. Fontos utalásként szolgálnak ezek a Virág által használt forrásokhoz, illetve kéziratainak időbeni azonosításához. Bizonyos kéziratai azonban eredetinek tűnnek. Ezek között számosan vannak olyanok, melyek a vallási toleranciával és szabadsággal foglalkoznak. A tanulmány második része erre fókuszál. A vallási tolerancia történetének egyik legfontosabb eseménye a II. József által 1781-ben kiadott türelmi rendelet (Toleranzpatent) volt. Egyike József számos reformjának, melyek bonyolultak és ellentmondásosak voltak. Az angol és német nyelvű tudományos munkák nagymértékben figyelmen kívül hagyták a rendelet magyarországi hatásait, kizárólag Ausztriára koncentrálva. Virág kéziratai fontos forrást biztosítanak a rendelet magyarországi hatásának megértéséhez, illetve bemutatják a rendelettel szembeni kritikus, de nem teljesen elítélő hozzáállást. A kéziratok másik fontos eleme, hogy segít megérteni a papság és a laikusok közötti kapcsolatot és a kereszténység ellenes tendenciákat. Hegyi Ádám 2015-ös tanulmánya vitatja, hogy a Református Egyházból sarjadó deizmus különbséget tett a deizmus filozófiai elképzelései és a laikusok deista gyakorlata között. Hegyi műve Magyarország dél-keleti régióján alapul, ahol kevés forrás áll rendelkezésre. Virág kéziratai, ezzel szemben, a deizmusnak egy sokkal részletesebb megismerését mutatják be, mely megkülönbözteti a szellemi fejlődést és a vallási gyakorlatokat. Ebből adódóan, a tanulmány alátámasztja, hogy a Virág kézirataiban a vallási tolerancia körüli vita kapcsán egyszerre beszélhetünk pozitív és negatív magyarországi hozzáállásról, valamint árnyaltabb képet kaphatunk az intellektuális tradíció és a vallásgyakorlat között különbséget tevő deizmusról.
Arató Balázs magyar fordítása/Hungarian translation by Balázs Arató.
https://soundcloud.com/user-237248455/moller-and-roe-luther-demolished-the-roofs-calvin-the-walls-but-socinus-destroyed-the-foundations
This approach is found in his own work; he often attacks his opponents through ridicule than rigorous philosophical argumentation. This style is by no means accidental but based on his belief that the so-called ‘rational’ approach of his contemporaries denied its own foundations. Likewise Hamann thought that language was by its nature indeterminable and it is this indeterminable quality of language that allows us to grasp reality even when it doesn’t fit within our clear understanding. This idea in turn reveals Hamann’s understanding of human nature as irreducible to rationality. He does not deny rationality but only the idiosyncratic definition of rationality employed by his contemporaries, such as Immanuel Kant and Christian Wolff, who see rationality as detached from tradition. Instead Hamann argues that reason is not ahistorical but develops out of a tradition. This tradition contains contradictions and complications that Kant and Wolff believe they have eliminated in the clarity of their approaches. The result is that Wolff, Kant and their fellows produce a narrow anthropology that over-emphasise rationality to the detriment of other factors in human nature.
Hamann tries to redress this problem by drawing attention to aspects of life that the ‘rationalist’ philosophers wanted to deny. This paper will focus on the role of humour, although Hamann also highlights other features of life that he thinks the rationalists deny, such as revelation, sexuality and tradition. The role of humour is interdependent with Hamann’s understanding of language, which is something that is not completely under our control.
This idea is evident in Hamann’s essay on the silent h in German words (Hamann is referring here mostly to archaic uses of German spelling, as in thun). The say concerns a debate at that time over whether unpronounced letters should be removed. One argument for the proposal is that the silent letter h corrupts the minds of children by leading them to believe in things that are superfluous to the principle of sufficient reason. This is an implicit attack against rationalist philosophy: primarily this is aimed against Leibniz and Wolff who most clearly espouse the ultimate principle of sufficient reason, but by extension it also serves as a retort to Kant. There is a clear irony in the way Hamann presents the argument. It is clearly not used by the proponents of spelling change but instead forms an argumentum absurdum. Rather than simply presenting phenomena that cannot be grasped by the principle of sufficient reason to defend the existence of things superfluous to our conscious knowledge, Hamann pushes the idea to the extreme. The result is farcical because even if the spelling reform were successful it would not bring about the true universal that is derived from the principle of reason because there simply remain too many phenomenon that are indeterminate beyond the superfluity of silent letters.
The effect of this argumentative approach is to highlight the absurdity of the argument. In the comedic, we see that there is something that we can recognise but not quite comprehend. The idea that all the world’s problems could be solved by spelling reform (or for that matter reading Origen!) is over-optimistic. The problem is that when we are immersed in rational argumentation we are not aware of the limits of the principles of reason. Within this system of argumentation there is an apparent circularity in which the reason justifies itself to the extent that considerations that do not fit this pattern are not considered because we would only ever consider arguments within the limits of reason. Hamann’s approach is to disrupt this circularity by making fun of it. By pushing the method to its limits, Hamann indicates its contradiction. There is something else that we didn’t consider in our style of reasoning that nevertheless defines our life. This is intended by Hamann to encourage the rationalist philosophers to look outside of their customary framework and consider reality as something more complicated than they could conceive by their use of the principle of sufficient reason.
In this way Hamann is not defending the irrational per se, an accusation he is often charged with (most notably by Isiah Berlin), but rather to point out that when someone thinks they have properly grasped rationality, in fact we only have an understanding that remains in part irrational. Hamann’s point is not to give up the idea of rationality and resign ourselves to irrationality. Instead Hamann wants us to reject the rationality of our reason because it is not rational enough. Humour is the tool that Hamann uses in order to provoke this response because it is external to the method of reasoning and it is only by recognising something external can we recognise the problem of a system that purports to have internal consistency (as the rationalist systems of Wolff and Leibniz did).
Hamann thinks that humour and language have indeterminacy because they reflect the indeterminacy in human nature. This is why humour can have an effect on us because it tells us something about the human condition that we can recognise in laughter even when we fail to understand it by relying on our own hubris of rationality.
https://soundcloud.com/user-237248455/joshua-roe-language-humour-and-human-nature-hamanns-challenge-to-enlightenment-philosophy