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The paper deals with the meeting of Catherine ii and Denis Diderot in 1773–1774, which is interpreted as an archetypal event of the clash of Western Enlightenment with a country on the periphery of Western civilisation. Diderot was one of the few Enlightenment thinkers who saw the problems associated with the globalisation of Enlightenment ideas and practices. The problem of “enlightened despotism” is discussed; the suggestion is that it foreshadows the 20th century dictatorial regimes pursuing modernisation.
Abstract
The article argues that Hegel’s dialectical logic is much more dependent on historical circumstances than has generally been assumed. Hegel endeavored to conceptualize his own time, that of the dawning modern age. But from Hegel’s conviction that philosophy “grasps its time in thought”, it then follows that only modernity can be “dialectical” – in the sense, namely, that only modern times succeed in mediating the contradictions of society, culture, and thought and raising them into a higher synthesis. The antiquity was not able to solve its inner tensions in this way, and so it perished because of them. Ancient thought still lacked the idea of self-referential subjectivity that is constitutive of modernity. Thus, a fully developed dialectic became possible only in modern times.
Contributors include: Evald Ilyenkov, Tarja Knuuttila, Alex Levant, Andrey Maidansky, Vesa Oittinen, Paula Rauhala, and Birger Siebert.
Contributors include: Evald Ilyenkov, Tarja Knuuttila, Alex Levant, Andrey Maidansky, Vesa Oittinen, Paula Rauhala, and Birger Siebert.
Contributors are: David Bakhurst, Aleksandr Khamidov, Vladislav Lektorsky, Alex Levant, Pentti Määttänen, Andrey Maidansky, Sergei Mareyev, Elena Mareyeva, Vesa Oittinen, Edward Swiderski, and Inna Titarenko.
Contributors are: David Bakhurst, Aleksandr Khamidov, Vladislav Lektorsky, Alex Levant, Pentti Määttänen, Andrey Maidansky, Sergei Mareyev, Elena Mareyeva, Vesa Oittinen, Edward Swiderski, and Inna Titarenko.