Author Archives: Josh

How is man a problem for himself in Philosophical Anthropology? While all philosophical anthropologists are committed to the notion that man is (goshdarn it!) a problem for himself, we can detect a few models of the problem we are for … Continue reading →

The famous debate between Carl Schmitt and Hans Blumenberg has been ably dispatched in a recent dissertation by Joe Kroll, A Human End to History? Hans Blumenberg, Karl Loewith and Carl Schmitt on secularization and modernity.  Much documentary evidence has … Continue reading →

The status of theory in Jewish mysticism remains to be parsed out. While others have teased the proto theoretical attitude from other mystical texts, the relationship of the Kabbalah to the nascent scientific method remains to be seen. Without offering … Continue reading →

Contrasting the agreeable and the beautiful, Kant takes special issue with the gustatory. The agreeable “pleases the senses in sensation.” We want to get to a good sensation and those who do not share our tastes can be accused of … Continue reading →

The Polish Hassidic genius, Yosef Engel, devoted a penetrating treatise of pilpul to a question of indeterminacy and subjectivity. The legendary ordeal of the Sotah involves a sacrifice– a prerequisite for the efficacy of the entire ceremony. The problem lies in the intentionality behind the sacrifice. … Continue reading →