Martedì 22 marzo e mercoledì 30 marzo 2016 si terranno due incontri nell’ambito del ciclo di seminari intitolato Temi e problemi della filosofia classica tedesca: pensare la vita. Il concetto di vita tra filosofia classica tedesca e pensiero contemporaneo. Il seminario è parte delle attività del Corso di Dottorato in Filosofia del Dipartimento di Filosofia, Sociologia, Pedagogia e Psicologia Applicata (FISPPA) dell’Università degli Studi di Padova ed è coordinato dai professori Luca Illetterati, Francesca Menegoni, Antonio Nunziante e Gabriele Tomasi.

Gli incontri saranno tenuti dal dott. Johannes-Georg Schülein (Ruhr-Universität Bochum) che presenterà due contributi intitolati:

1. The Language of Metaphysics: Hegel and Derrida (22 marzo)

2. Identity, Difference and the Critique of Metaphysics: Hegel and Derrida (30 marzo)

Gli incontri si terranno alle ore 16.30 in Sala Stefanini (Piazza Capitaniato 3, Padova).

Seguono gli abstract dei contributi:

Abstract I

For many, Hegel still counts among the most prominent examples of occidental metaphysics, a kind of philosophical reasoning that thinkers like Derrida allegedly tried to overcome. – My aim in this paper is to examine how precisely Derrida conceives of Hegel’s philosophy as a metaphysics. I want to show that, in Derrida’s view, metaphysics is closely linked to a certain understanding of language as a means of representation. Put bluntly: Whoever defends such a representational understanding of language qualifies for Derrida as a proponent of (representational) metaphysics. My second aim is to defend Hegel’s philosophy against Derrida’s interpretation. I am going to develop the following argument: As Hegel already sets out to overcome the representational features of language, his philosophy does not depend on the understanding of language that Derrida ascribes to it – and therefore, Hegel’s philosophy cannot be regarded as a metaphysics in the Derridean sense. In fact, Hegel seems to have already overcome the kind of metaphysics Derrida sets out to criticize.

Abstract II

The relation between difference and identity is widely perceived to be the crucial issue that separates Hegel’s alleged metaphysics and Derrida’s critique of metaphysics on a fundamental level. With a strong emphasis on unity in his all-encompassing system, Hegel seems to take the side of identity; on the other hand, Derrida seems to affirm a manifold of differences that cannot be grasped within such unitary forms of philosophizing. – My aim here is to examine this view by putting together some of Derrida’s decisive statements about Hegel’s conception of identity and difference and compare them to what Hegel actually says in the Logic of Essence. I want to make the point that Hegel and Derrida come much closer to each other than it initially may appear. The key issue between Hegel and Derrida is not the alternative “difference or identity.” Rather, the key issue is that both take identity and difference to be inseparable concepts. More precisely, both affirm a difference that is at work within identity. They disagree in that, for Hegel, difference does never put identity entirely into question, whereas Derrida thinks of difference as a fundamentally threatening force to identity. Nevertheless, their conceptions of difference within identity remain so close that Derrida himself speaks of an “almost absolute proximity” between his own and Hegel’s position.

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