mething like a pre-subjective modality of the I,” which,white and blue striped toms, in turn, betrays a certain mind/body dualism — for it is only after an intangible, invisible “certitude” assures the I of its own existence that the I can then become a subject and view the world as an object. In the end, modern thought tends to minimize the role the body plays in forming the self, insisting instead on a subjectivity based on consciousness,beautiful toms.Brague prefers the medieval account, rejecting this modern tendency to ignore the body as an integral part of the self, and he thinks that “the rediscovery of the flesh is perhaps a philosophical task decisive for our own age” — not least because modernity has become “the age without angels,cheap gray toms.” For medieval thinkers, angels held an important position in the hierarchy of being because they are rational, non-corporeal beings — intermediaries between rational, corporeal human beings and God, who is pure being. Modernity, however, has lost its angels, and this poses an anthropological problem: If humans can be properly defined only when their carnal nature is distinguished from the non-carnal nature of angels, what happens when angels disappear? In effect, man himself becomes an angel. And this is precisely what one finds in the modern approach to subjectivity. Man is defined, not by his rationality and carnality, but by his rationality alone.Much is lost, however, when our carnal nature is overlooked. For one, carnality gives us our sense of touch — a sense that in medieval thought seemed central to knowledge of self and world. In the Middle Ages, “all knowledge is necessarily based in sense knowledge” and the fundamental sense is touch. Brague notes: “We cannot help but possess [touch]: To lose it would be to lose life.” Moreover, touch is the fundamental sense because “we touch our flesh at the very moment we touch an object.” “We do not see our eye when it sees,” nor do we “hear our eardrums when they hear.” In touch, however, “the I knows itself,” and not “in the same manner as does the modern subject — or at least not if we follow Heidegger’s analysis. The subject does not make sure of itself before knowing things.” Instead, “we awaken to conscious life and we discover ourselves already inhabiting a body we have not created.”Our carnality, then, can be a source of humility, because it reminds us that we do not create ourselves. In fact, Brague argues that this is precisely the reason modern subjectivity excludes the body: “It symbolizes what consciousness must receive from the outside and cannot construct out of itself.” From this, Brague concludes that medieval authors — far from being irrelevant to current thought — “ought to be considered as partners who are quite deserving of being heard.” Pages12Next ›Last »[标签:标题]
Just in time for the New New Deal, a show of Depression-era art is depressing indeed. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 — the supposed smelling salts offered to the swooning U.S. economy — contains more than a few controversial allocations of taxpayer dollars. Chief among these were $50 million worth of stimulus to the National Endowment for the Arts. The arts and artists suffer at least as much as any other industry in an economic downturn, defenders of this particular provision asserted.No argument there. But governments, past or present, do not exactly have a stellar record when it comes to patronizing the arts. Those who believe otherwise would do well to look at the painting, sculpture, and architecture of Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, or Communist China. Alternatively, take a trip to the Smithsonian American Art Museum for an inspection of “1934: A New Deal for Artists.”The exhibition, which opened in February and will run until January 2010, spotlights the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP): the New Deal’s original unemployment plan for out-of-work artists and America’s first large-scale foray into government-sponsored art. Advertisement The PWAP was the brainchild of George BidRelated articles:

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