«Could “National Philosophy” Be Strictly Defined Research Object?» Ebb and Flow Between the Unit (Common) and Multiple (Differential)

Authors

  • Pierre Caussat Paris West University Nanterre La Défense

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.22240/sent30.01.062

Keywords:

universal/peculiar, identity/difference, sacred/secular, vertical/horizontal, Babel/Pentecost, philosophia perennis, lingua universalis/natural idioms, perspectivism

Abstract

The word and idea of a «national philosophy» come up against a seemingly insurmountable aporia between the demand for a universal wisdom (philosophia perennis) and the need to incarnate this pursuit in the manifold and varied cultures.
This aporia is mythically revealed in the conflict between the unified, solid, senseless language of Babel and its redemption in the shared understanding by different peoples and idioms (Pentecost).
This myth finds its effective incarnation in the multiplicity of human cultures along human history. But this history is marked by a double conflict:
- a symbolic one in the competition between a «vertical» order (the rule of languages considered to be sacred) and a «horizontal» order challenged by the outcome of new secular idioms (Volgare in Italy of Renaissance);
- a polemical one in the recurrence of the tension between the building of a «lingua universalis» (a logical one) and the fertility of «natural» idioms. (at the epicenter of this tension radiates thought of Leibniz).
What emerges from these oppositions is the part played by language, in the diversity of its expressions. This diversity enables the emergence of a «nationalization» of philosophy. From then on, it seeks and coins itself in the midst of fundamentally peculiar cultures (nations) competing in an inventive, contrasting and vulnerable quest for meaning.

Author Biography

Pierre Caussat, Paris West University Nanterre La Défense

famous French philosopher, linguist, translator, former professor of philosophy

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Published

2014-06-16

How to Cite

Caussat, P. (2014). «Could “National Philosophy” Be Strictly Defined Research Object?» Ebb and Flow Between the Unit (Common) and Multiple (Differential). Sententiae, 30(1), 62–79. https://doi.org/10.22240/sent30.01.062

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