A B S T R A C T
Arendt’s
Conception of the Sense of Realness
Julia Honkasalo
M.A., Ph. D. student, Department of Philosophy
University of Helsinki (webpage under construction)
Epistemological foundationalism has for centuries attempted
to unify all scientific inquiry into the context of one
grand science, the first philosophy. One of the most
important tasks of this tradition has been to ground all
knowledge on absolutely certain foundations. Hannah Arendt
is best known for her writings in political theory and for
her reflections on the nature of moral judgment and the
banality of evil. Most of Arendt’s major works
concern questions and problems of political theory and the
possibility of political praxis. However, an important
exception is the first book of her last, unfinished
trilogy, The Life of the Mind. In this book Arendt develops
her philosophical notion of the sense of realness. Drawing
from works by both Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Ludwig
Wittgenstein, Arendt engages herself in a philosophical
reflection on the nature of philosophical knowledge and
certainty.
In this paper I discuss Arendt’s critical
interpretation of first philosophy. I show how Arendt
claims that the philosophical accomplishment of absolute
knowledge rests on the implicit presupposition of an
epistemologically prior form of faith in the world and
trust in other conscious beings. I show that Arendt’s
central thesis in volume one of The Life of the Mind is
that knowledge is possible only within the context of a
common world that is inhabited by several conscious beings
that share a common linguistic system. This threefold
element is the bedrock condition and starting point for any
kind of philosophical inquiry. For this reason Arendt
claims that thinking can never transcend or withdraw
completely from the phenomenal world of appearance and
change.
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