- Kierkegaard, Friedrich Nietzsche, René Girard, Anthropology, Philosophy Of Language, Wittgenstein, and 11 moreContinental Philosophy of Religion (Theology), Mimesis, Aesthetics, Paul Ricoeur, Emotional Contagion, Affect Theory, Moral Psychology, Moral Development, Well-Being, Gabriel Tarde, and Emile Durkheimedit
- I am currently a Postdoctoral Fellow and Communications Associate at the Human Flourishing Program at Harvard Univers... moreI am currently a Postdoctoral Fellow and Communications Associate at the Human Flourishing Program at Harvard University. I am a former Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Husserl-Archives: Centre for Phenomenology and Continental Philosophy, Institute of Philosophy at KU Leuven. I was affiliated with an ERC project Homo-Mimeticus. I lectured for a few years in philosophy at the Australian Catholic University, Melbourne, Australia. I graduated from that school with a PhD: "The Problem and the Cure: 'Mimesis' in Kierkegaard’s Second Authorship." I was a Visiting Scholar at the Søren Kierkegaard Research Centre, University of Copenhagen in Autumn 2015; I am a former House Foundation Fellow at Hong Kierkegaard Library, St. Olaf College, Northfield, MN, USA in 2011.
My philosophical interests are in affectivity, imitation (mimesis), imagination, morality (especially moral psychology and moral education, virtues, exemplarity), eudaimonic well-being, selfhood (authenticity, individuality and identity) aesthetics. My work is informed by recent developments in social and natural sciences on imitation in humans especially in evolutionary biology, experimental psychology, and studies of human cognition and learning.edit - Dr Jeffrey Hanson, Harvard University, Prof. George Pattison, Glasgow University, Dr Richard Colledge, Australian Catholic University, KU Leuven Project Advisor Dr Nidesh Lawtooedit
This paper defines the nature of collective irrationality that flourished during the COVID-19 pandemic and lays out specific individual and shared traits and dispositions that facilitate it. Drawing on the example of globally experienced... more
This paper defines the nature of collective irrationality that flourished during the COVID-19 pandemic and lays out specific individual and shared traits and dispositions that facilitate it. Drawing on the example of globally experienced phenomenon of panicked toilet paper buying and hoarding during the COVID-19 pandemic and resources from philosophy, psychology, sociology, and economics this paper identifies four essential features of collective irrationality: weak shared mentality; non-cognitive and immediate mimicry; affective contagion; and psychosocial adaptivity. After (I) initially pointing out conceptual problems around benchmarking collectivity and irrationality, this paper (II) identifies weak mentality as serving the goals of "group" recognition internally and externally. It is argued that (III) the non-cognitive and immediate mimicry and emotional contagion are shared and individual dispositional conditions that facilitate collective irrationality in environments affected by uncertainty (IV). The human mimetic faculty and susceptibility to emotional contagion are presented as enabling and augmenting conditions under which collective irrationality flourishes. Finally, (IV) presenting collective irrationality in the context of psychosocial adaptivity, the paper provides evolutionary reasons for engaging in irrational behaviors, rendering collective irrationality as an adaptive strategy.
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Most conceptions of well-being either ignore suffering or assume an ideal version of human life in which suffering would be eliminated. This trend is especially emblematic of positive psychology. Recent research on well-being indicates a... more
Most conceptions of well-being either ignore suffering or assume an ideal version of human life in which suffering would be eliminated. This trend is especially emblematic of positive psychology. Recent research on well-being indicates a mediating function of meaning in life between suffering and wellbeing demonstrating that making sense of past experiences is significantly correlated with high presence of meaning in life. Hence, meaning-making serves the role of an active coping mechanism that alleviates suffering. This and related strategies of defining, measuring, and augmenting well-being however overlook a form of suffering that is ineliminable and in fact essential to personal growth. In this paper the insights of the existentialist philosopher Søren Kierkegaard are developed to formulate an integrated conceptualization of well-being that regards "negative" aspects as crucial for a rich and complete life. The complexity of the relationship between meaning in life, suffering, and authenticity concerning well-being are discussed. A synthetic perspective on the subjective dimension of the experience of suffering and on the objective nature of human limitations that often cause suffering is discussed in relation to the notions of meaning in life and authenticity. Finally, an integrated conceptualization of well-being is posited. It entails suffering as constitutive of meaning in life and authenticity, which are key components of a well-lived life.
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This article engages the considerations of imagination in Kierkegaard and Ricoeur to argue for a moral dimension of the imagination and its objects. Imaginary objects are taken to be mental representations in images and narratives of... more
This article engages the considerations of imagination in Kierkegaard and Ricoeur to argue for a moral dimension of the imagination and its objects. Imaginary objects are taken to be mental representations in images and narratives of people or courses of action that are not real in the sense that they are not actual, or have not yet happened. Three claims are made in the article. First, by drawing on the category of possibility, a conceptual distinction is established between imagination and fantasy, (1) I claim that imagination has a moral dimension because it is engaged in considering real-life possibilities. Second, (2) drawing on Kierkegaard and Ricoeur, it is argued that mental representations of selfhood in imagination have a moral dimension because they essentially allow people to understand the development of agency in human selfhood by means of representations of would-be selves and narrative figurations of the self. Third (3) mental representations of would be selves have a moral dimension because they form important points of reference for moral orientation in the field of human praxis.
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https://rdcu.be/cODvV
Access to full article under this link:
https://rdcu.be/cODvV
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By spelling out the affective dimension of admiration, this paper challenges the view of admiration as a trustworthy means of detecting morally desirable qualities in exemplars. Such a view of admiration, foundational for the current... more
By spelling out the affective dimension of admiration, this paper challenges the view of admiration as a trustworthy means of detecting morally desirable qualities in exemplars. Such a view of admiration, foundational for the current debate on exemplars in moral education, holds that admiration is a self-motivating emotion essentially oriented toward the good and the excellent. I demonstrate that this view ignores the affective aspects of admiration explored widely in the history of philosophy on which the debate on moral exemplars substantially draws. Focusing on Spinoza, Smith, Kierkegaard, and Nietzsche, I bring to light their largely skeptical views of the moral value of admiration. These thinkers indicate that admiration can be influenced by, and is often conflated with, other emotions, and can arise in us through behavioral mimicry; moreover, admiration is often oriented toward the mediocre and corrupt, is contagious, self-referential, collective, and has limited motivational power. Their remarks on the affective dimension of admiration call into question admiration’s applicability and usefulness in moral exemplarity.
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“Chapter 6” systematizes and analyzes Kierkegaard’s insightful remarks on human affectivity in relation to moral emotions, body, contagion, and collectivity. Following a brief outline of the conceptualization of affects and human... more
“Chapter 6” systematizes and analyzes Kierkegaard’s insightful remarks on human affectivity in relation to moral emotions, body, contagion, and collectivity. Following a brief outline of the conceptualization of affects and human affectivity from Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Spinoza, Tomkins, and Massumi, the first part zooms in on empathy and sympathy in two important precursors of Kierkegaard, namely David Hume and Adam Smith. The second part argues for Kierkegaard’s distinctively affective reading of admiration, which I locate in its being fundamentally linked with other emotions such as envy, but also in its being oriented toward the mediocre and base, having a limited motivational capacity, and being highly contagious. Affective admiration is then related to the contemporary discussion on moral exemplars, posing a challenge to the view of the epistemological and moral trustworthiness of admiration in moral exemplarity espoused primarily by Linda Zagzebski. The third part centers on the affective character of Kierkegaard’s crowd psychology. Therein I examine his critical remarks on human collectivity, focusing on such key concepts from his social and political philosophy as “crowd” and “the public.” Reading his philosophy alongside two French theorists of mass society, Gabriel Tarde and René Girard, I draw out Kierkegaard’s great interest in such mimetic terms as magnetism, fascination, somnambulism, scapegoating, and violence.
Research Interests: Philosophy, Moral Psychology, Violence, Mimesis, Social Cognition, and 15 moreEnvy (Psychology), Ethical Theory, Gabriel Tarde, Kierkegaard, Affect Theory, Social emotions, Adam Smith, David Hume, Affect/Emotion, Emotional Contagion, René Girard, Affect (Cultural Theory), Crowd Behaviour and Psychology, Imitation, and Herding/Contagion
This essay demonstrates the prominence of imitation in Kierkegaard’s ethics. I move beyond his idea of authentic existence modeled on Christ and explore the secular dimension of Kierkegaard’s insights about human nature and imitation. I... more
This essay demonstrates the prominence of imitation in Kierkegaard’s ethics. I move beyond his idea of authentic existence modeled on Christ and explore the secular dimension of Kierkegaard’s insights about human nature and imitation. I start with presenting imitation as key to understanding the ethical dimension of the relationship between the universal and individual aspects of the human self in Kierkegaard. I then show that Kierkegaard’s moral concepts of “primitivity” and “comparison” are a response to his sociological and psychological observations about imitation from an ethical point of view. In the final section of this paper, I briefly engage Friedrich Schleiermacher’s “ethics of individuality” and Gabriel Tarde’s “laws of imitation” to explore Kierkegaard’s consideration of ethics and imitation as situated within the context of a broader conversation on imitation.
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My aim in this chapter is to introduce the reader to the complexity of mimesis in Kierkegaard by both emphasizing important features of the discussion present in the literature and contributing my own position on a particular aspect of... more
My aim in this chapter is to introduce the reader to the complexity of mimesis in Kierkegaard by both emphasizing important features of the discussion present in the literature and contributing my own position on a particular aspect of the problem. After offering general technical insights into mimesis as a concept, I will present three interpretive lenses that have been used to analyze the phenomenon in question in Kierkegaard’s work. I then argue for a particular conceptualization of mimesis I find in Kierkegaard that I term ‘existential’ and characterize it as indirect, intention-oriented, ‘non-comparing,’ and concerned with ends rather than means.
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Unconscious imitative mechanisms are at work when we laugh at the craziness of toilet paper brawls, heap condemnation on the people involved for being irrational or simply greedy, or reward ourselves for not giving in to the whole... more
Unconscious imitative mechanisms are at work when we laugh at the craziness of toilet paper brawls, heap condemnation on the people involved for being irrational or simply greedy, or reward ourselves for not giving in to the whole business of bulk buying.
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The advice that Cervantes got from his imaginary friend when it came to writing Don Quixote, once voted the best book of all times, was imitate. The unknown character from the Prologue advises, "In what you are writing you only have to... more
The advice that Cervantes got from his imaginary friend when it came to writing Don Quixote, once voted the best book of all times, was imitate. The unknown character from the Prologue advises, "In what you are writing you only have to make use of imitation, and the more perfect the imitation the better your writing will be." This rule of imitation sinks deep and defines Don Quixote in terms of its literary structure and intellectual substance. Indeed, this recommendation is repeated in the book by its eponymous protagonist and ultimately transposed beyond writing, to other aspects of life. Whatever it is you seek to do, imitate best in that respective field. This whatever, which Don Quixote has in mind, has a profoundly existential dimension as it covers our very lifestyles, values and morality. That rule of the imitation of models, so characteristic of the intellectual, moral and religious discourses from Antiquity to Renaissance, is no less influential today. Or maybe more so today than ever. Our world is saturated with role models of some kind. With the most advanced technology at our fingertips, we can choose from scientists to Instagram influencers; from politicians to athletes. They are figures as different from each other as Marie Curie-Sklodowska, Kim Kardashian, Nelson Mandela, or Nick Cummins. Although they seem to convince us about such different things as what clothes are in vogue, which political party we should vote for, and what kind of diet is right for us, they actually tell us what sort of life is worth living ― even if they think they don't. We admire, listen to and imitate them. We desire what they desire. We want to become like them at least on some level. Their lives are our models for life.
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This article reevaluates the origins of Kierkegaard’s concept of imitation. It challenges the general approach to the genealogy of the phenomenon in question, which privileges the influence of various religious traditions on the thinker... more
This article reevaluates the origins of Kierkegaard’s concept of imitation. It challenges the general approach to the genealogy of the phenomenon in question, which privileges the influence of various religious traditions on the thinker and ignores his exposure to the non-Christian literature. I contend that a close reading of the Apology, the Sophist, the Republic, and the Phaedo alongside Kierkegaard’s texts from the so-called second authorship reveals in the dialogues of Plato the three crucial aspects of Kierkegaard’s concept of imitation, namely the phenomenon of following after, the existential, and the non-imitative character of imitation. Lastly, I show that, apart from striving to be a follower/an imitator of Christ, Kierkegaard perceives himself as a follower/an imitator of Socrates. This means that the life of the imitator of Christ is the examined life in the Socratic sense.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/heyj.12330
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/heyj.12330
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In this essay I attempt an analysis of Kierkegaard’s authorial strategies of polynomity and pseudonymity, and the multifarious construction of the veronymous texts, in the context of his multifaceted textual production. I argue that the... more
In this essay I attempt an analysis of Kierkegaard’s authorial strategies of polynomity and pseudonymity, and the multifarious construction of the veronymous texts, in the context of his multifaceted textual production. I argue that the proliferation of authorial voices, but also the revocation of the authorial voice and multilayered editing process, redefine the relationship between the author and the reader. I show that these authorial tactics and measures aim at changing the reader’s scope from reading texts as related to a particular author, and to directing the reader from the author towards the text. Moreover, considering the Dane as the primary reader of his own texts, I read his pseudonymous “Does a Human Being Have the Right to Let Himself Be Put to Death for the Truth?” as offering a radical split-up between Kierkegaard qua reader and qua author, undertaken by putting the fictional author of that work to death.
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Through an analysis of Kierkegaard’s and Dostoevsky’s approaches to the theme of the death of Christ – one of the major leitmotifs in the debate of their contemporaries conveyed through theological and philosophical considerations, but... more
Through an analysis of Kierkegaard’s and Dostoevsky’s approaches to the theme of the death of Christ – one of the major leitmotifs in the debate of their contemporaries conveyed through theological and philosophical considerations, but also expressed in novels and in art – I show how the thinkers comprehended and articulated in their works the religious challenges awaiting the modern man.
Research Interests: Aesthetics, Mimesis, Christology, Ekphrasis, Kierkegaard, and 7 moreReligion and Modernity, The Theology of Søren Kierkegaard, Dostoevsky, Soren Kierkegaard, Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoyevsky, Hans Holbein the Younger, and Interdisciplinarity in the Arts (experimental poetry, ekphrasis, contemporary art)
The figure of Job is a fundamental point of departure for the thought of both Søren Kierkegaard and René Girard. Job, for Kierkegaard, exemplifies the 'teacher of the humankind’ who embodies the model of a believer who accepts God’s... more
The figure of Job is a fundamental point of departure for the thought of both Søren Kierkegaard and René Girard. Job, for Kierkegaard, exemplifies the 'teacher of the humankind’ who embodies the model of a believer who accepts God’s intervention in the famous: “The Lord gives; the Lord takes; Blessed be the name of the Lord.” Girard’s Job, mainly considered in Job, the Victim of His People, is a model that represents a recipient of the suffering inflicted upon him by his fellowmen. The article offers an analysis of Job as the one who suffers at the hands of both God and his fellow men, and suggests that Kierkegaard anticipates Girard’s description of victimization.
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The notion of an exclusive relationship between Kierkegaard and Socrates has been well established among scholars to the point where the Dane has been named “Socrates of Copenhagen.” However, when appealing to this insightful title... more
The notion of an exclusive relationship between Kierkegaard and Socrates has been well established among scholars to the point where the Dane has been named “Socrates of Copenhagen.” However, when appealing to this insightful title academics often fall short of the real depth and the true meaning it offers. Following a particular intuition expressed by Karol Toeplitz illuminating the relation between the thinkers, I contribute a systematic approach to the subject. Analysing Kierkegaard’s numerous references to Socrates I show that Kierkegaard perceived the Greek thinker as a model of the true philosopher and his literary endeavour as a Socratic task. Examining the correlation between the socio-political-historical-religious contexts of Socrates and Kierkegaard I show that the latter thinker saw himself in a similar position to the Greek thinker. Consequently Kierkegaard adopted the standpoint of Socrates, which was dying for the truth. Lastly, I show that Kierkegaard’s concept of “Efterfølgelse” is modeled on his comprehension of the death of Socrates.
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This paper challenges the general approach to Kierkegaard’s s engagement with imitation, which privileges a strictly religious reading. Heretofore imitation has been apprehended as a coherent concept shaped within the context of imitatio... more
This paper challenges the general approach to Kierkegaard’s s engagement with imitation, which privileges a strictly religious reading. Heretofore imitation has been apprehended as a coherent concept shaped within the context of imitatio Christi in the devotio moderna. I locate Kierkegaard ’ s writings in the broader context of mimesis. Analyzing particular mimetic structures woven into the text, I show that a plurality of imitative models that are different from Christ occurs therein. Addressing the distinction between the religious and the aesthetic in Kierkegaard, I inquire into the status of these imitative models. Referring to the term “ Mellembestemmelserne ” and “ ekphrasis ”— the rhetorical device of aesthetics — I show that the other models of imitation exhibit supportive roles to the highest type of prototype (Christ) and therefore question the solely religious rendering of mimesis and the aesthetic confines of Kierkegaard ’ s concept of aesthetics.
Research Interests: Aesthetics, Ethics, Mimesis, Modernist Literature (Literary Modernism), Ekphrasis, and 9 moreKierkegaard, The Theology of Søren Kierkegaard, Philosophy of Human Suffering, Representation Theory, Theology of Suffering and Evil, Religious Studies, Imitation, Self Representation, and Religious Aesthetics
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Kierkegaard and Tischner: On the Concept of Human Existence.
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This essay discusses becoming and awakening as fundamental categories for Kierkegaard’s self. I argue in the paper that the existential categories of despair and anxiety play an important part in the awakening and challenging for the... more
This essay discusses becoming and awakening as fundamental categories for Kierkegaard’s self. I argue in the paper that the existential categories of despair and anxiety play an important part in the awakening and challenging for the existing self, and in that very sense make the self existential. I focus on the ethical-religious stages.
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In this paper, I present Kierkegaard not as someone who indifferently investigates mimesis as a concept from a distance (I wonder how fruitful this type of conceptual examination is when it comes to mimesis anyway). To the contrary, I... more
In this paper, I present Kierkegaard not as someone who indifferently investigates mimesis as a concept from a distance (I wonder how fruitful this type of conceptual examination is when it comes to mimesis anyway). To the contrary, I present Kierkegaard as someone who is deeply affected by mimesis and substantially changes it. I do so in three steps.
(1) First, I briefly present Kierkegaard as a thinker who observes the intensification of the role of mimesis in modern society; I focus on the phenomena of fashion and repetition as qualifying the lives of both the bourgeois and the working class in the emerging urban environment. (2)Second, I present Kierkegaard as a “transitional” thinker who traces a conceptual shift in an understanding of mimesis from representation (understood as occupying a limited and privileged position in the domains of aesthetics and religion) to performance (the domain of everyday life). I read Kierkegaard as someone who reclaims the original performative dimension of mimesis from the Platonic (pre-Platonic) tradition, which was lost in and after the Renaissance. (3)Lastly, after briefly outlining the classic takes on affective mimesis in Durkheim and Tarde, I indicate that Kierkegaard especially takes issue with affective mimesis, because he sees it as compromising the authenticity of the modern self; then I present Kierkegaard’s indirect and performative-interpretative mimesis as a counterbalance, or a solution to the affective mimesis.
(1) First, I briefly present Kierkegaard as a thinker who observes the intensification of the role of mimesis in modern society; I focus on the phenomena of fashion and repetition as qualifying the lives of both the bourgeois and the working class in the emerging urban environment. (2)Second, I present Kierkegaard as a “transitional” thinker who traces a conceptual shift in an understanding of mimesis from representation (understood as occupying a limited and privileged position in the domains of aesthetics and religion) to performance (the domain of everyday life). I read Kierkegaard as someone who reclaims the original performative dimension of mimesis from the Platonic (pre-Platonic) tradition, which was lost in and after the Renaissance. (3)Lastly, after briefly outlining the classic takes on affective mimesis in Durkheim and Tarde, I indicate that Kierkegaard especially takes issue with affective mimesis, because he sees it as compromising the authenticity of the modern self; then I present Kierkegaard’s indirect and performative-interpretative mimesis as a counterbalance, or a solution to the affective mimesis.
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This book challenges the widespread view of Kierkegaard's idiosyncratic and predominantly religious position on mimesis. Taking mimesis as a crucial conceptual point of reference in reading Kierkegaard, this book offers a nuanced... more
This book challenges the widespread view of Kierkegaard's idiosyncratic and predominantly religious position on mimesis. Taking mimesis as a crucial conceptual point of reference in reading Kierkegaard, this book offers a nuanced understanding of the relation between aesthetics and religion in his thought. Kaftanski shows how Kierkegaard's dialectical-existential reading of mimesis interlaces aesthetic and religious themes, including the familiar core concepts of imitation, repetition, and admiration as well as the newly arisen notions of affectivity, contagion, and crowd behavior. Kierkegaard's enduring relevance to the malaises of our own day is rmly established by his classic concern for the meaning of human life informed by re ective meditation on the mimetic origins of the contemporary age. Kierkegaard, Mimesis, and Modernity will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working on Kierkegaard, Continental philosophy, the history of aesthetics, and critical and religious studies.