Ascent to “Natural Humanness”: Immanuel Kant in the Philosophical Anthropology of Gustav Shpet

DOI: 10.5922/0207-6918-2024-3-6
Pages: 104-121

Gustav Shpet Kant philosophical anthropology humanness reasonable grounds freedom nature

Abstract

The archive of Gustav Shpet contains scattered preparatory materials for his works. Some of these handwritten rough drafts are devoted to Immanuel Kant. These jottings enable us to take a new look at possible trajectories of philosophical anthropology. The main goal of this article is to show, on the one hand, the modern relevance of Kant’s reflections on the essence of the human being and, on the other hand, the productiveness of their critical reinterpretation by Shpet. In effect, Kant’s reflections give us an insight into the sources of the current anthropological crisis when “the free man”, capable of creating himself, has finally detached himself from his nature (i.e. accomplished what Kant believed to be the foundation of anthropology). Shpet’s critique enables us to outline the contours of a positive way out of today’s critical situation. To implement this task, the authors carry out a historical-philosophical analysis of Shpet’s treatment of the question of philosophical anthropology. This is a new approach both for Shpet scholarship and for the Russian philosophical tradition, an approach that opens up a new path to overcome the crisis and, what is more, a path that is ecologically significant. This gives us all the more reason to try to find the critical points of anthropologism (easy enough if we turn to Shpet’s article “The Anthropologism of Lavrov in Light of the History of Philosophy”). It also encourages us to reinterpret in an anthropological context Shpet’s reflections on the human being and humanness (see the article “Wisdom or Reason?”). The Supplement contains the first ever publication of a historical document, a letter Shpet received from the German embassy in 1924, inviting him to Königsberg for the celebration of the 200th anniversary of Kant’s birth and a programm of the event with the names of speakers and the topics of their presentations.

Reference

Akhutin, A. V., 1990. Sophia and the Devil (Kant in the Face of Russian Religious Metaphysics). Voprosy filosofii, 1, pp. 51-69. (In Rus.)

Anonym, 1924. Die Feier des 200 Geburtstags Immanuel Kants in seiner Vaterstadt: die Königsberger Kant-Tage 19. bis 24. April 1924 nach den Berichten der Königsberger Hartungschen Zeitung. Königsberg: Hartungsche Verlagsdruckerei.

Anuchin, D. N., 1900. Beglyy vzglyad na proshloye antropologii i na yeye zadachi v Rossii [A Brief Look at the History of Anthropology and Its Tasks in Russia]. Russkiy antropologicheskiy zhurnal [Russian Anthropological Journal], 1, pp. 25-42. (In Rus.)

Avtonomova, N. S, 1994. Michel Foucault and His Book The Order of Things. In: M. Foucault, 1994. Slova i veshchi [The Order of Things]. Translated [into Russian] by V. P. Vizgin and N. S. Avtonomova. St. Petersburg: A-cad, pp. 7-37. (In Rus.)

Chesnov, Y. V., 2007. Telесnost’ cheloveka: filosofsko-antropologicheskoe ponimanie [The Corporeality of Man: Philosophical-Anthropological Understanding]. Moscow: IPh RAS. (In Rus.)

Foucault, M., 2008. Introduction à l’Antropologie de Kant. In: E. Kant, 2008. Antropologie d’un point de vue pragmatique. Paris: Librairie Philosophique, J. Vrin, pp. 11-79.

German Embassy, 1924. Letter to G. G. Shpet from the German Embassy with an Invitation to Königsberg to Participate in the Celebration of the 200th Anniversary of the Birth of I. Kant. 1924. Manuscript Department of the Russian State Library. F. 718. Box 25. Unit 11.

Kant, I., 2007. Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View. Translated by R. B. Louden. In: I. Kant, 2007. Anthropology, History, and Education. Edited by G. Zöller and R. B. Louden. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 227-429.

Kühnemann, E., 1904. Herder und Kant. In: Zu Kants Gedachtniss. Zwolf Festgaben zu seinem 100-jahrigen Todestage. Berlin: Reuther & Reichard, 1904, pp. 246-260.

Kühnemann, E., 1924. Kant und Herder. In: Die Feier des 200 Geburtstags Immanuel Kants in seiner Vaterstadt: die Königsberger Kant-Tage 19. bis 24. April 1924 nach den Berichten der Königsberger Hartungschen Zeitung. Königsberg: Hartungsche Verlagsdruckerei, pp. 17-19.

Shchedrina, T. G., and Shchedrina, I. O., 2022. Immanuel Kant in the Historical Philosophy of Gustav Shpet. Kantian Journal, 41(3), pp. 124-151. http://dx.doi.org/10.5922/0207-6918-2022-3-5

Shpet, G. G., 2006. Introduction to Ethnic Psychology. In: G. G. Shpet, 2006. Philosophia Natalis. Izbrannye psihologo-pedagogicheskie trudy [Philosophy of Natalis. Selected Psychological and Pedagogical Works]. Edited by T. G. Shchedrina. Moscow: ROSSPEN, pp. 417-500. (In Rus.)

Shpet, G. G., 2009. Ocherk razvitija russkoj filosofii. II. Materialy [Essay on the Development of Russian Philosophy. II. Materials]. Reconstruction by T. G. Shchedrina. Moscow: ROSSPEN. (In Rus.)

Shpet, G. G., 2010. [Book Review] Zu Kants Gedachtnis. Zwölf Festgaben zu seinem 100-jährigen Todestage. Berlin, 1904. In: G. G. Shpet, 2010. Filosofskaja kritika: otzyvy, recenzii, obzory [Philosophical Criticism: Comments, Reviews, Summaries]. Edited and comp. by T. G. Shchedrina. Moscow: ROSSPEN, pp. 52-61. (In Rus.)

Shpet, G. G., 2014. Istorija kak problema logiki: Kriticheskie i metodologicheskie issledovanija. Chast’ pervaja. Materialy [History as a Problem of Logic: Critical and Methodological Studies. Part One: Materials]. Edited and commented by T. G. Shchedrina. Moscow & St. Petersburg: Universitetskaja kniga. (In Rus.)

Shpet, G., 2019a. Wisdom or Reason? In: G. Shpet, 2019. Hermeneutics and Its Problems. With Selected Essays in Phenomenology. Edited and translated by T. Nemeth. Cham: Springer, pp. 212-265.

Shpet, G., 2019b. Philosophy and History. In: G. Shpet, 2019. Hermeneutics and Its Problems. With Selected Essays in Phenomenology. Edited and translated by T. Nemeth. Cham: Springer, pp. 269-277.

Login:
Password:
	Remember Me

Register Forgot your password?

2024 Vol. 43. №3