Research

[Last updated: 11/2022].

My research is result-oriented. This list contains some of my research results and the corresponding research domains.

Meta-Metaphilosophy (What is metaphilosophy? How should we practice metaphilosophy?)

• (1) I have examined the disciplinary structure of metaphilosophical research and explored the problem of bias, demarcation, dissent, and unity in metaphilosophy: see “Metaphilosophie als einheitliche Disziplin” (forthcoming, Springer/Metzler), and “Dissent and Unity in Metaphilosophy” (forthcoming).
• (2) The underlying epistemology is “perspectivism”.

Metaphilosophy (What is philosophy? How should we understand and practice philosophy?)

• (1) An updated version of Lakatosian methodology of research programs can do better at reconstructing the logic of philosophical research than the Kuhnian category “paradigm”. See the second part of “Das System der Ideen” and “Transcendental Philosophy as a Scientific Research Program”.
• (2) The comparative analysis of philosophical approaches must consider the category “demands”. See ibid. and “Hegel’s Critique of Kant’s Concept of Reason. The Problem of Different Demands”.
• (3) For a systematic reconstruction of the Kantian concept and “imperfect definition” of philosophy see “Kant’s Metaphilosophy”.

Perspectivism (Epistemology) (How should we understand epistemic acts and do epistemology?)

• (1) Analysis of perspectivist concepts and their structure that constitutes the matrix of any possible epistemic situation (“epistemic”, “epistemic situation”, “perspective”, “standpoint”, “horizon”, “view”, “picture”, “direction”, “context”, “aspect”, “relation” etc.). See “Relativism, Perspectivism, and the Universal Epistemic Language” (forthcoming), “Metaphilosophie als einheitliche Disziplin”, “The Conceptual Basis of Perspectivism”, “History of Perspectivism and the Status of Perspectivist Concepts”.
• (2) Development of a perspectivist methodology to reconstruct and re-assess epistemic situations (e.g., in metaphilosophy). See “Metaphilosophie als einheitliche Disziplin”, “Relativism, Perspectivism, and the Universal Epistemic Language” (forthcoming), “Das System der Ideen” (second part).
• (3) Clarification of the relationship between relativism and perspectivism in “Relativism, Perspectivism, and the Universal Epistemic Language” (forthcoming). The conceptual analysis shows that there is and can be only one epistemology and that one should differentiate between analytic doctrinal elements and unnecessary synthetic doctrinal additions.
• (4) History of perspectivism: Completeness of Fichte’s theory of standpoints and world views (see “Der Stachel der Selbsttätigkeit und das Ausschöpfen der Freiheit. Zur Vollständigkeit der fünf Weltansichten beim späten Fichte“), compatibility of Nietzsche’s perspectivism with the mission to resolve misunderstandings of Kant, Fichte, and Hegel: “Psychologischer Skeptizismus. Nietzsche’s Kritik am Deutschen Idealismus”.

Conceptual Analysis (What are concepts? How should we analyze concepts?)

• (1) Conceptual originalism: knowledge of old (and new) languages and etymological dictionaries give clues to retrieve the original meanings and logical functions of concepts. Originalism about concepts can withstand a confused use of words and the linguistic oblivion. See “Metaphilosophie als einheitliche Disziplin” and “Relativism, Perspectivism, and the Universal Epistemic Language” (forthcoming).
• (2) “Universal epistemic language” theory (UEL-theory). See “Relativism, Perspectivism, and the Universal Epistemic Language” (forthcoming).
• (3) History of conceptual analysis: For Kant’s understanding of analysis see “The Faculty of Ideas. Kant’s Concept of Reason in the Narrower Sense” and “Kant’s Metaphilosophy”.

Reason and Rationality (What is reason? Are there different concepts of reason?)

• (1) Theory of reason as intellectual capacity to develop idealizing presuppositions (ideas) and guide the rational agent in thinking and acting. My book “Das System der Ideen” presents systematically seven kinds of ideas, which, according to Kant, constitute the nature of reason as the categories constitute the nature of the understanding. It also examines how Fichte derives different ideas and spheres of uses of reason and how one can understand reason as a research program that can be further developed and defended against several objections in recent contexts. My article “The Faculty of Ideas. Kant’s Concept of Reason in the Narrower Sense” offers a Kantian conceptual analysis of basic interconnected marks of the concept of reason qua the faculty of ideas. See also: “The Universe of Science. The Architectonic Ideas of Science, Sciences and Their Parts in Kant”, “Ist die theoretische Vernunft selbst eine Idee? Fichtes Umgang mit Kantischen Ideen um 1810“, and „Reason, Ideas and Their Functions in Classical German Philosophy“.
• (2) Three guises of reason: reason-reasonability-rationality: see “Das System der Ideen” (second part).

Skepticism (How should we understand and confront skepticism?)

• (1) Münchhausen trilemma is Aggripan pentalemma minus the tropes “relativity” and “dissent”. It is wrong to dismiss these powerful tropes. See “Das System der Ideen” (second part).
• (2) Many skeptic objections are based on a shift in demands. See ibid.

Philosophical Exegesis (How should we read philosophical texts and understand/interpret theories? What is the correct reading?)

• (1) The right reading of the dialectic of lordship and bondage in Hegel’s “Phenomenology of Spirit” is the “intersubjective” one (that in the next passages turns into an “intrasubjective” relationship). The “intrasubjective reading” imports elements from anthropology into phenomenology committing a category error and causing a precarious problem shift. See: „Der Erfolg der Seele und der Misserfolg des Herren. Ein Beitrag zur intersubjektiven Interpretation der Herr-Knecht-Dialektik”.
• (2) Kant’s theory of reason is spread throughout his works—one must consider as many different passages as possible to receive a more complete picture of his concept of the faculty of ideas, otherwise there will be no progress on the understanding of this concept. Kant calls this method “archeology of reason”, the corresponding method of conceptual analysis is “exposition”. The same applies to his concept of philosophy. See “Das System der Ideen”, “The Faculty of Ideas. Kant’s Concept of Reason in the Narrower Sense”, and “Kant’s Metaphilosophy”.
• (3) Fichte’s first principle both in the Jena and Berlin period is the “self-positing reason” (in the Kantian sense, as the faculty of ideas, and with the Fichtean addition: the positing of the idea of reason (real act) and knowledge of this act (ideal act) itself must be the starting point of deduction of the structure of acts of consciousness). See “Das System der Ideen” and “The First Principle in the Later Fichte: The (not) “surprising insight” in the 15th Lecture 1804/II”.