This study considers the origins and characteristics of Karl Jaspers’ biographical approach. Specifically, we analyse how this approach manifests itself in Jaspers’ work, namely, in his understanding of psychology, his psychology of worldviews, his views on the history of philosophy and his philosophical method. The biographical approach was a central strategy in Jaspers’ work as an appeal to life and was closely linked with how Jaspers understood both philosophy and his thought. For Jaspers, biography could restore mental unity and reveal (...) the existence behind creativity. (shrink)

The discourse on nihilism in the German-speaking world continues to take its orientation primarily from Friedrich Nietzsche’s understanding of nihilism as a historical movement of the decline of values. This means that the aspects of nihilism that are not tied to specific epochs and cultures are not accorded due importance (I). In order to make a reappraisal of nihilism that does justice to these objective contents, I will present a classification of types of nihilism and of arguments that support it. (...) The discussion of the typology of the principal meanings of nihilism points to a loss in relevance of conceptions that take their orientation from Nietzsche (II). The discussion of the arguments testifies to the importance of objective knowledge in the justification of nihilism (III). (shrink)

Persons are not just mechanical systems of instinctual animalistic proclivities, but also language-producing, existentially aware creatures, whose experiences and actions are drenched in subjective meaning. To understand a human being as a person is to understand him or her as a rational system that wants, fears, hopes, believes, and in other ways imbues the world with meaning, rather than just a mechanical system that is subject to the same chains of cause and effect as other animals. But contemporary personality psychology (...) has, to a great extent, focused on the behavioral side of personality, while neglecting its meaning side, failing to realize that subjective meanings are part of the very constitution rather than just causes of personality. My overarching purpose with this dissertation is, consequently, to contribute to the establishment of a genuinely non-reductive science of personality that systematically studies the systems of meaning that comprise a person’s worldview in their own right, as sources of meaning in personality. I both establish conceptual and theoretical foundations for the psychology of worldviews and present empirical research on worldviews. The conceptual and theoretical issues are addressed in the introductory chapters and the first paper. I begin by explicating a non-reductive realist philosophy of personality that steers between reductionism and social constructionism, and by suggesting that we need a more coherent understanding of personality and a richer study of it, rather than a radically new methodology. I continue by discussing the limitations of, and conceptual issues with, previous approaches to personality, and by outlining the conceptual foundations for a psychology of worldviews to remediate their weaknesses, demarcating worldview constructs as referring to presuppositions, concepts, and narrative scripts that, by working as the substrata, or background, for intentional thought, feeling, and action, form the most central sources of meaning. I continue by discussing the structure and dynamics of worldviews in terms of the relationship between innate meaning-making mechanisms and the universal features of the existential condition that they address. I conclude the introductory chapters by describing the background of the empirical research and by discussing limitations with the present thesis and directions for future theory and research. I continue, in the first paper, to argue that the study of traits and the study of worldviews form mutually irreducible parts of personality psychology and that worldviews are not inherently less universal in terms of structure, or in other ways less basic, than traits. I conclude this paper by emphasizing the need to address coherence not just in behavior, but also within worldviews and between traits and worldviews, and to complement traditional individual differences research with personalistic methodology. The empirical research is presented in the second and third papers included in this thesis. This research addresses Humanism and Normativism, which are arguably the two broadest and potentially most important worldview constructs in the research literature today, representing whether human beings are thought of as intrinsically valuable and ontologically important or as acquiring value and reality only through the attainment of external norms and ideals . Although originally thought to be opposites, previous research has suggested that they are uncorrelated. In the first empirical paper, I introduce a hierarchical model of their structure, develop scales to measure their facets, and demonstrate through confirmatory factor analysis that they are, contrary to previous wisdom, negatively related in terms of view of human nature, attitude to affect, and interpersonal attitude, but unrelated in terms of epistemology and political values. I present evidence also of discriminant and predictive validity in relation to other worldview variables, life goals, educational field, political and religious orientation, and the Big Five aspects. In the second empirical paper, I use humanism and normativism to explain the broad systems of meaning that potentially underlie, and intersect with, variables from the most important models of the underpinnings of political ideology today, through path modeling. The results suggest that humanism is related to political ideology through preference for equality, as mediated by moral concern with fairness and the avoidance of harm, emotionality, and honesty-humility, and that normativism is related to political ideology through conservative attitudes in general, as mediated by system justification, moral concern with authority, loyalty, and purity, and low openness. Both of the empirical articles provide ample evidence of broad systems of meaning cutting across different aspects of the worldview and of their explanatory power with regards to other psychological phenomena. These studies thereby help to substantiate the viability of the psychology of worldviews. (shrink)

Reevaluates Western and Chinese philosophical traditions to question the boundaries of entrenched conceptual frameworks.

Purpose. The purpose of the study is to outline the links between individual and collective dimensions of the human worldview. This purpose requires solving two tasks: to update philosophical ideas formed by reflection on human and community worldview; to identify and generalize the relationship of singular and general in the context of the problem of human worldview. Theoretical basis. The study is based on philosophical reflections about manifestations of singular and general worldviews. Such reflections appeared in European philosophy quite a (...) long time ago. Ukrainian and foreign philosophical discourse considers both measures of the worldview. And a role of the carrier of worldview plays either human or society. We can see that in researches of S. Krymskyi, I. Nadolniy, V. Popov, N. Rozhanska, V. Tabachkovskyi, V. Shynkaruk, V. Poythress, D. Rousseau, D. Billingham, C. Gianolla and others. However the links between individual and collective dimensions of worldview are not clearly outlined. It is possible to note the research of V. Popov who focuses on the problem of socio-collective and individual dimensions of worldview. But the scientist focuses more on the use of the concept of worldview in these two meanings. Human as a social being interacts with worldviews of other individuals. That is why we can speak of two dimensions of the worldview function: individual and collective. This problem became topical due to acuteness of the links between human and society in modern life. Originality. The author outlined key links between individual and collective dimensions of human worldview functioning. The study identified a role of human as a carrier of the worldview in formation of collective worldview. Conclusions. Human as a worldview carrier plays a key role in formation of collective worldview. In philosophical discourse thoughts about links between individual and collective worldviews are different and sometimes conflicting. We have a discussion problem of uniformity and diversity of collective worldview. Collective worldview is showed as a circulation of different ideas and views of individuals. But collective worldview is showed as a whole system of individual views too. Collective worldview manifests as integrated phenomenon because it is based on common worldviews of individuals. At the same time the human is influenced by collective worldview in particularly as a past generation heritage. (shrink)

Naturalism is the current orthodoxy in analytic philosophy. Naturalism is the conjunction of the (ontological) claim that all that truly exists are the entities countenanced by the natural sciences and the (epistemological) claim that the only true knowledge is natural-scientific knowledge. Drawing on some recent work in Critical Theory, this article argues that naturalism qualifies as an ideology. This is the case because naturalism meets three key aspects shared by paradigmatic cases of ideology: (i) naturalism has practical consequences and implications (...) of a specific kind, (ii) those endorsing naturalism fall prey to a dual deception: having false meta-level beliefs about naturalism as being without alternative, and (iii) naturalism has a tendency towards self-immunisation. The article ends by suggesting we pull naturalism out of our collective cognitive backgrounds onto the main stage of critical discourse, making it a proper topic for philosophical critique again. (shrink)

Ludwik Fleck is a pioneer of the contemporary social constructionist trend in scientific theory, where his central concept of thinking style has become standard fare. Yet the concept is too often misunderstood and simplified with serious consequences not only for Fleck studies. My essay situates Fleck’s concept of thinking style in the historical context of the 1920s and ‘30s, when the notion of style was first applied to the natural sciences, in order to illustrate the uniqueness of Fleck’s concept among (...) the uses of style by his contemporaries and, finally, to examine the epistemological, methodological, and political consequences of this distinction. (shrink)

Varying forms of ontological and methodological naturalism are among the most popular theses in contemporary philosophy. However, each of these theses faces a different dilemma: ontological naturalism is famously challenged by Hempel’s dilemma, while methodological naturalism faces issues regarding its coherence. Some prominent naturalists (Elpidorou and Dove 2018, Ney 2009, Rea 2002) have suggested to circumvent these respective dilemmas by reconceiving naturalism as an attitude (rather than a thesis). This paper argues that such attitude accounts are unsuccessful: naturalism as an (...) attitude either collapses into a thesis again or is rationally unjustifiable. This paper closes by suggesting two options a naturalist has remaining. Either a naturalist can reasonably choose to revert to defending naturalism as a thesis; given that naturalism receives substantial support, it is not unlikely that a solution to the problems encountered by naturalism qua thesis is forthcoming. Or a naturalist might simply want to embrace an a-rational form of naturalism as a worldview, as suggested by Kim (2003) and Stoljar (2010) (and earlier by thinkers like Dilthey 1960 and Jaspers1925). (shrink)

Most accounts of Weber’s notion of charisma follow his own explicit comments and seek its origins in the writings of Rudolf Sohm. While I acknowledge the validity of this, I follow Weber’s suggestions and locate the charismatic forces in the political and ethical conduct and beliefs of certain Old Testament prophets, specifically Amos, Jeremiah and Isaiah. Their emphasis on political justice and ethical fairness, coupled with their unwavering belief in the power of prophecy, infuse Weber’s conception of charisma and in (...) crucial ways contribute to the formation of his notion of the modern political leader. (shrink)

Max Weber famously diagnosed both an excess and a subordination of meaning in modernity when he coined the term disenchantment next to the fragmentation and irreconcilability of value spheres. Unlike Weber, however, who sought to keep the ideological and the rationalist sides of the modern divide together, his immediate followers capitalized either on his decisionism (i.e. Carl Schmitt) or on his universalism (i.e. Jürgen Habermas). In an attempt to develop a constructive perspective on the question of how we can conceive (...) of irreconcilable values within a larger normative horizon, this article introduces Karl Jaspers’s interpretation and refinement of Weber’s work. Most fundamentally, Jaspers’s existentialist philosophy of communication sought to turn Weber’s warring gods into a source of solidarity rather than divisiveness. I argue that Jaspers did so in rooting human freedom not in the decision or the law but in an experiential uncertainty and the knowledge not to know. The article closes with a discussion of some practical and theoretical implications of Jaspers’s thought for our understanding of diversity in unity in post-truth times. (shrink)

Immer mehr Menschen verbringen ihren Lebensabend in Einrichtungen der Altenpflege. Zusätzlich zur Sorge um physische, psychische und soziale Belange gilt es, deren spirituelle Bedürfnisse zu berücksichtigen. Ziel dieser Arbeit war es, die spirituellen Bedürfnisse von alten Menschen in Langzeitpflegeeinrichtungen zu erfassen. Gleichzeitig wurde untersucht, welche spirituellen Bedürfnisse Pflegende bei den ihnen anvertrauten Bewohner/-innen wahrnehmen. Dabei wurden Übereinstimmungen bzw. Unterschiede identifiziert. Daten aus 28 Einzelinterviews mit Bewohnerinnen und Bewohnern und 9 Fokusgruppeninterviews mit Mitarbeitenden wurden mittels Qualitativer Inhaltsanalyse ausgewertet und unter die (...) Kernkategorien „Sinn“, „Verbundenheit“, „Transzendenz“ kategorisiert. Die Kategorien beider Befragtengruppen wurden einem Vergleich unterzogen. Trotz zahlreicher Übereinstimmungen in den Aussagen beider Gruppen bleiben Defizite in der Wahrnehmung von Pflegenden. Aus den Ergebnissen der Arbeit werden Schlussfolgerungen für die Einbeziehung der spirituellen Dimension der alten Menschen in die pflegerische Arbeit im Seniorenheim gezogen und Empfehlungen ausgesprochen. (shrink)

Different forms of methodological and ontological naturalism constitute the current near-orthodoxy in analytic philosophy. Many prominent figures have called naturalism a image, a Weltanschauung, or even a “philosophical ideology”. This suggests that naturalism is indeed something over-and-above an ordinary philosophical thesis. However, these thinkers fail to tease out the host of implications this idea – naturalism being a worldview – presents. This paper draws on remarks of Dilthey and Jaspers on the concept of worldviews in order to demonstrate that naturalism (...) as a worldview is a presuppositional background assumption which is left untouched by arguments against naturalism as a thesis. The concluding plea is to re-organize the existing debate on naturalism in a way that treats naturalism not as a first-order philosophical claim, but rather shifts its focus on naturalism’s status as a worldview. (shrink)

Based on an analysis of the theory of the movement of existence, this paper answers the following question: Where can one see the most important connections of philosophical and religious language in the most re-thought part of Jan Patočkaʼs thinking? The third movement of life is seen as a form of the true philosophical life, but also as a form with metaphysical responsibility. The movement of breakthrough, or actual self-comprehension, is the most important, because it leads to care for the (...) soul—and, according to Patočkaʼs analyses of inter­pretations of the Faust legend, it leads to care for the true immortality of soul. In the third movement of life, one lives an unsheltered life in openness to all which is not given and cannot be given, which is beyond all objective identification, and yet determines this world. In response to the mission in time (kairos), on the way to “asubjective” openness of the soul, in a dialogue which searches for truth and resists temptation, one can still find metaphysical responsibility and freedom. (shrink)

Cieszkowski’s philosophy embodies the most influential trends in philosophy and culture of the nineteenth century. This does not mean, however, that Cieszkowski’s philosophy has today only historical character and it is good topic for some historians of philosophy. On the contrary. Although Cieszkowski used Post-Hegelian language and concepts, at the core his philosophy is an experience which has got a fundamental complexion. It is an experience of the dialectic of history. It underlies not only the history of philosophy of the (...) nineteenth century, but also lies at the root of modern consciousness, as determined by hermeneutics and postmodernism. The ancestor of the transversal reason is a cunning reason of history. Postmodernism, which focuses on pluralism and diversity, is closely related to the era of the "end of history" and post-history. The last term, just as the "post-modernism" is a historiosophical concept. The present of Cieszkowski’s philosophy of history allows us better understanding the philosophical foundation of contemporary culture. (shrink)

Este artículo se centra en la interpretación del concepto de facticidad en los cursos impartidos por Heidegger entre 1921 y 1923. La facticidad será allí entendida en términos de cierto dinamismo, al tiempo que vacilantemente asimilada al “sentido del ser” del ente que somos. En relación a ello, trataremos de mostrar cómo en el problema al que esta noción apunta cabe ya reconocer la cuestión por el sentido del ser en general planteada en Ser y tiempo.

Recently, I have introduced the notion of a miniature of a boundary situation. It views the process of creativity as a miniature of a boundary situation, in which the ideas of Karl Jaspers and Sigmund Freud are combined. Thus, the miniature represents a problem-solving situation via the means of a regression in the name of the ego or a third thought process. In such situations of creativity, one is forging a new worldview or a Weltanschauung by discovering new knowledge. The (...) third thought process, as well as the miniature of the boundary situation, can be experienced only inward and subjectively by personal immersion in the situation, they lie outside the scope of objectification and they receive meaning only from a concrete personality and a concrete miniature situation, but their product is objective, it is a creative product. In this sense, heuristic methods do fail in boundary situations. Moderate stress is inherent to the boundary situation, the phenomenon of flow and its miniature, in which quantitative accumulations lead to qualitative changes, laying on a single continuum. Such a continuum is constructed nowadays in phenomenological psychiatry. In conclusion, the creative process viewed as moderate stress represents an intellectualizing of the miniature of a boundary situation or a sublimation. (shrink)