UID:
almahu_9949203540202882
Format:
1 online resource (xii, 236 pages).
ISBN:
9781350102415
,
1350102415
,
9781350102422
,
1350102423
,
9781350102408
,
1350102407
Content:
"Hans Jonas (1903-1993) was one of the most important German-Jewish philosophers of the 20th century. A student of Martin Heidegger and close friend of Hannah Arendt, Jonas advanced the fields of phenomenology and practical ethics in ways that are just beginning to be fully appreciated in the English-speaking world. Drawing on unpublished and newly translated material, Lewis Coyne brings together, in a English-language volume, Jonas's philosophy of life, ethic of responsibility, political theory, philosophy of technology and bioethics. Coyne argues that the aim of Jonas's philosophy is to confront three problems inherent to modernity: nihilism, the ecological crisis and the transhumanist drive to biotechnologically modify human beings. While these might at first appear disparate, Jonas demonstrates that all in fact follow from the materialist turn taken by Western thought in the seventeenth century. Coyne then shows how Jonas tackles these issues at their collective point of origin. On the basis of an ontology that does justice to the purposefulness and dignity of life, Jonas develops a new categorical imperative of responsibility: to act in a way that does not compromise the future of humanity on Earth. The book concludes with a reflection on two possible futures: one of ecological and societal collapse, following from our present course of action, and another in which the biosphere and all that depends upon it is saved - humanity having accepted its newfound responsibilities as the 'shepherd of beings'"--
Note:
Preface -- Acknowledgements -- Introduction -- I. Jonas's Philosophical Project -- II. The Man and His Work -- 1. The Gnosticism of Modernity -- I. The Gnostic Principle -- II. Nihilism, Ancient and Modern -- III. The Scientific Revolution -- IV. The Age of Technology V. The Baconian Ideal -- 2. The Philosophy of Life I: The Organism -- I. Dualism, Materialism, Integral Monism -- II. The Phenomenological Approach to Organismic Being -- III. Self-Organization -- IV. Behaviour -- V. The Nisus of Being -- 3. The Philosophy of Life II: The Scala Naturae I. Aristotle After Darwin II. Plants III. Animals IV. Humans V. Being is One -- 4. Values and the Good -- I. The Axiological Dimension of Teleology -- II. Species and the Biosphere -- III. The Good of Being -- IV. Moral Traditions -- 5. New Dimensions of Responsibility -- I. Ethics, Old and New -- II. The Temporal Horizon -- III. Responsibility for the 'Idea of Man' -- IV. Global and Intergenerational Ethics -- V. Duties to Non-Human Life -- 6. The Politics of Nature -- I. The Nature of Politics -- II. New Rules for Collective Action -- III. Farewell to Utopia? IV. Rival Interpretations of Jonas's Politics -- V. Freedom and the Republic -- 7. Toward a Richer Bioethics -- I. The Dignity of the Person -- II. Human Beings as Means -- III. The Threshold of Life and Death -- IV. The Future of the Human Condition -- Conclusion I. Humanity: The Shepherd of Beings II. Carrying the Fire -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index.
,
Also published in print.
,
Mode of access: World Wide Web.
Additional Edition:
Print version: Coyne, Lewis. Hans Jonas London ; New York : Bloomsbury Academic, 2020. ISBN 9781350102392
Language:
English
Keywords:
Electronic books.
;
Electronic books
DOI:
10.5040/9781350102422
URL:
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