R. Tallis

Enemies of Hope

A Critique of Contemporary Pessimism

• Broschiertes Buch

Produktbeschreibung

Over the last few years, Raymond Tallis has published widely acclaimed critiques of influential trends in contemporary thought: for example, Not Saussure - described as 'one of the most brilliant and effective of all rebuttals of post-Saussurean theory' - In Defence of Realism and The Explicit Animal, which demonstrated the baselessness of contemporary accounts of consciousness.Enemies of Hope takes the story further, identifying the themes common to anti-humanist twentieth-century thought and challenging the cult of pessimism that pervades our age. Tallis teases out the many strands of the comfortable, self-congratulatory cynicism of modernist and postmodernist cultural critics, exposing their self-contradictions and their wilful blindness to the distinctive mystery of human nature. The 'pathologisers of culture' and 'the marginalisers of consciousness' are shown to be the enemies of hope - the hope of progress based upon the rational, conscious endeavours of humankind.Perceptive, passionate and often controversial, Raymond Tallis's latest debunking of Kulturkritik explores a host of ethical and philosophical issues central to contemporary thought, raising questions we cannot afford to ignore. After reading Enemies of Hope, those minded to misrepresent mankind in ways that are almost routine amongst humanist intellectuals may be inclined to think twice. By clearing away the hysterical anti-humanism of the twentieth century Enemies of Hope frees us to start thinking constructively about the way forward for humanity in the twenty-first.

Produktdetails

• Verlag: Palgrave Macmillan / Palgrave Macmillan UK / Springer Palgrave Macmillan
• Artikelnr. des Verlages: 978-0-312-22417-2
• 1997
• Seitenzahl: 516
• Erscheinungstermin: 12. Juni 1997
• Englisch
• Abmessung: 216mm x 140mm x 28mm
• Gewicht: 643g
• ISBN-13: 9780312224172
• ISBN-10: 0312224176
• Artikelnr.: 21767140

Autorenporträt

Raymond Tallis is Professor of Geriatric Medicine at the University of Manchester.

Inhaltsangabe

Preface to the 1999 Reprint Acknowledgements Prologue: Isaiah Berlin's 'Yes-But to the Enlightenment' Introduction: Elements of Enlightenment Thought PART I: PATHOLOGISING CULTURE Introduction: Man as a Sick Animal From Apes to Plato Falling into the Ha-Ha The Wisdom of Myths and the Myths of Wisdom A Critique of Cultural Criticism PART II: MARGINALISING CONSCIOUSNESS Introduction: Rational Consciousness as an Embarrassment Marx and the Historical Unconscious Durkheim and the Social Unconscious Freud and the Instinctual Unconscious The Linguistic Unconscious: Saussure and the Post Saussureans, The Absent Author, The Absent Speaker, The Absent Self Unconscious Consciousness: From Behaviourism to Cognitive Psychology Recovering the Conscious Agent Appendix Epilogue Notes and References Index