#ernstcassirer — Public Fediverse posts on home.social

Jonathan Emmesedi @[email protected] · 2025-08-05 · 18:18 UTC

Ernst Cassirer -- 1874 - 1945

I've just finished this German philosopher's 1944 "An Essay on Man: An Introduction to a Philosophy of Human Culture". This reading was prompted in part by my thinking about the work of the American philosopher Susanne Langer , on whom Cassirer exercised a powerful influence, and partly by a more general interest in intellectual history and the history of philosophy.

The opening paragraph of Peter Gordon's introduction to the 2021 edition:

>> Can any meaning at all still be found in that old and often battered word humanism? Over the course of the twentieth century and well into the twenty-first, so many arrows have pierced this once heroic ideal that it now resembles Saint Sebastian, bound to a tree and always just about to die. But much like the martyr himself, humanism has shown a miraculous ability to survive its wounds, and a faith in humanity seems to persist even when the evidence against it may appear overwhelming. Perhaps no document of the recent past better exemplifies the improbable persistence of this ever-dying idealism than "An Essay on Man," a book that Ernst Cassirer completed in 1944, not long before his death the following year. Few works of philosophy have ever seemed as antiquated, and fewer still as necessary, since it may serve as a reminder of what we still might be. It is a hymn to humanity in an inhuman age. <<

I'm undecided about tackling the three volumes of his "The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms."

#Philosophy #ErnstCassirer #AnEssayOnMan #PhilosophyOfCulture #Humanism #IntellectaulHistory #HistoryOfIdeas

#philosophy #ernstcassirer #anessayonman #philosophyofculture #humanism #intellectaulhistory

Jonathan Emmesedi @[email protected] · 2025-08-05 · 18:18 UTC

Ernst Cassirer -- 1874 - 1945

I've just finished this German philosopher's 1944 "An Essay on Man: An Introduction to a Philosophy of Human Culture". This reading was prompted in part by my thinking about the work of the American philosopher Susanne Langer , on whom Cassirer exercised a powerful influence, and partly by a more general interest in intellectual history and the history of philosophy.

The opening paragraph of Peter Gordon's introduction to the 2021 edition:

>> Can any meaning at all still be found in that old and often battered word humanism? Over the course of the twentieth century and well into the twenty-first, so many arrows have pierced this once heroic ideal that it now resembles Saint Sebastian, bound to a tree and always just about to die. But much like the martyr himself, humanism has shown a miraculous ability to survive its wounds, and a faith in humanity seems to persist even when the evidence against it may appear overwhelming. Perhaps no document of the recent past better exemplifies the improbable persistence of this ever-dying idealism than "An Essay on Man," a book that Ernst Cassirer completed in 1944, not long before his death the following year. Few works of philosophy have ever seemed as antiquated, and fewer still as necessary, since it may serve as a reminder of what we still might be. It is a hymn to humanity in an inhuman age. <<

I'm undecided about tackling the three volumes of his "The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms."

#Philosophy #ErnstCassirer #AnEssayOnMan #PhilosophyOfCulture #Humanism #IntellectaulHistory #HistoryOfIdeas

#philosophy #ernstcassirer #anessayonman #philosophyofculture #humanism #intellectaulhistory

Jonathan Emmesedi @[email protected] · 2025-08-05 · 18:18 UTC

Ernst Cassirer -- 1874 - 1945

I've just finished this German philosopher's 1944 "An Essay on Man: An Introduction to a Philosophy of Human Culture". This reading was prompted in part by my thinking about the work of the American philosopher Susanne Langer , on whom Cassirer exercised a powerful influence, and partly by a more general interest in intellectual history and the history of philosophy.

The opening paragraph of Peter Gordon's introduction to the 2021 edition:

>> Can any meaning at all still be found in that old and often battered word humanism? Over the course of the twentieth century and well into the twenty-first, so many arrows have pierced this once heroic ideal that it now resembles Saint Sebastian, bound to a tree and always just about to die. But much like the martyr himself, humanism has shown a miraculous ability to survive its wounds, and a faith in humanity seems to persist even when the evidence against it may appear overwhelming. Perhaps no document of the recent past better exemplifies the improbable persistence of this ever-dying idealism than "An Essay on Man," a book that Ernst Cassirer completed in 1944, not long before his death the following year. Few works of philosophy have ever seemed as antiquated, and fewer still as necessary, since it may serve as a reminder of what we still might be. It is a hymn to humanity in an inhuman age. <<

I'm undecided about tackling the three volumes of his "The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms."

#Philosophy #ErnstCassirer #AnEssayOnMan #PhilosophyOfCulture #Humanism #IntellectaulHistory #HistoryOfIdeas

#philosophy #ernstcassirer #anessayonman #philosophyofculture #humanism #intellectaulhistory

Jonathan Emmesedi @[email protected] · 2025-08-05 · 18:18 UTC

Ernst Cassirer -- 1874 - 1945

I've just finished this German philosopher's 1944 "An Essay on Man: An Introduction to a Philosophy of Human Culture". This reading was prompted in part by my thinking about the work of the American philosopher Susanne Langer , on whom Cassirer exercised a powerful influence, and partly by a more general interest in intellectual history and the history of philosophy.

The opening paragraph of Peter Gordon's introduction to the 2021 edition:

>> Can any meaning at all still be found in that old and often battered word humanism? Over the course of the twentieth century and well into the twenty-first, so many arrows have pierced this once heroic ideal that it now resembles Saint Sebastian, bound to a tree and always just about to die. But much like the martyr himself, humanism has shown a miraculous ability to survive its wounds, and a faith in humanity seems to persist even when the evidence against it may appear overwhelming. Perhaps no document of the recent past better exemplifies the improbable persistence of this ever-dying idealism than "An Essay on Man," a book that Ernst Cassirer completed in 1944, not long before his death the following year. Few works of philosophy have ever seemed as antiquated, and fewer still as necessary, since it may serve as a reminder of what we still might be. It is a hymn to humanity in an inhuman age. <<

I'm undecided about tackling the three volumes of his "The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms."

#Philosophy #ErnstCassirer #AnEssayOnMan #PhilosophyOfCulture #Humanism #IntellectaulHistory #HistoryOfIdeas

#historyofideas #intellectaulhistory #humanism #philosophyofculture #anessayonman #ernstcassirer

Jonathan Emmesedi @[email protected] · 2025-08-05 · 18:18 UTC

Ernst Cassirer -- 1874 - 1945

I've just finished this German philosopher's 1944 "An Essay on Man: An Introduction to a Philosophy of Human Culture". This reading was prompted in part by my thinking about the work of the American philosopher Susanne Langer , on whom Cassirer exercised a powerful influence, and partly by a more general interest in intellectual history and the history of philosophy.

The opening paragraph of Peter Gordon's introduction to the 2021 edition:

>> Can any meaning at all still be found in that old and often battered word humanism? Over the course of the twentieth century and well into the twenty-first, so many arrows have pierced this once heroic ideal that it now resembles Saint Sebastian, bound to a tree and always just about to die. But much like the martyr himself, humanism has shown a miraculous ability to survive its wounds, and a faith in humanity seems to persist even when the evidence against it may appear overwhelming. Perhaps no document of the recent past better exemplifies the improbable persistence of this ever-dying idealism than "An Essay on Man," a book that Ernst Cassirer completed in 1944, not long before his death the following year. Few works of philosophy have ever seemed as antiquated, and fewer still as necessary, since it may serve as a reminder of what we still might be. It is a hymn to humanity in an inhuman age. <<

I'm undecided about tackling the three volumes of his "The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms."

#Philosophy #ErnstCassirer #AnEssayOnMan #PhilosophyOfCulture #Humanism #IntellectaulHistory #HistoryOfIdeas

#philosophy #ernstcassirer #anessayonman #philosophyofculture #humanism #intellectaulhistory

cob @[email protected] · 2025-06-15 · 11:52 UTC

"métamorphoses funestes" des croyances collectives avec "l'émergence des régimes fascistes".

"Héritage des Lumières, l'idéal démocratique impliquait les progrès de la #raison." [...] "grâce au développement de l' #education et l'avancée des sciences."

#livre Les argonautes du pacifique occidental de #BronislawMalinowski

#marmion #cerveau #connaissance #manipulation #psychanalyse #science #PierreDeSenarclens #metaphysique #year1945 #ErnstCassirer #fascisme

#livre #bronislawmalinowski #marmion #cerveau #connaissance #manipulation

cob @[email protected] · 2025-06-15 · 11:40 UTC

"Les sociétés ont besoin de mythes" -> cf #YuvalNoahHarari

interpréter les croyances humaines "comme des tentatives de réponse à la question insoluble de la mort." -> "expression de désirs collectifs" -> dont le nationalisme fait partie.

#livre Essai sur l'homme / #Rousseau, #Kant, #Goethe d' #ErnstCassirer

#marmion #cerveau #connaissance #manipulation #psychanalyse #science #PierreDeSenarclens #metaphysique #year1945