The Structure of Significant Lives

Datos Bibliográficos

ID3969912
AutoresNorman Fiering (John Carter Brown Library, Brown University, Providence, USA, autor de correspondencia)
Año2017
Volumen22
Número4
Páginas406-426
Fecha de publicación2017-05-19
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaThe European Legacy (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1084-8770 • E-ISSN: 1470-1316
EditorialInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/10848770.2017.1291885
OpenAlexW2606574499
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas1
Referencias citadas11

A human life is not made up of measurable equal increments. There are crises, setbacks and advances, obstacles and pathways, highs and lows. The prevailing methods for the study of significant lives, insofar as there is any interest at all in the subject, are hampered by scientism and materialism. The means for understanding how we progress as individuals in relation to society and to the future of humankind cannot be found in the standard disciplines of psychology or sociology, which are looking for measurable results and are dominated by the quest for objectivity. Guided primarily by the thought of Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy, we observe here the patterns in the life of two pioneering physicians, centuries apart, Theophrastus von Hohenheim, known as Paracelsus, and Sigmund Freud. Inspiration, revelation, conversion, orientation, grace are at the center, but none of these terms is reducible to material measurement. A new approach is suggested that better informs us about what makes the world go ‘round, the grammatical imperative, which subsumes even love

Environmental ethics · Epistemology · Materialism · Psychoanalysis · Revelation · Scientism · Sociology · Theology · Philosophy · Psychoanalysis and Social Critique · Psychology