Papers by Rick Anthony Furtak
Kierkegaard Studies Yearbook, 2013
According to Kierkegaard, love plays a foundational role in human existence. In Works of Love, he... more According to Kierkegaard, love plays a foundational role in human existence. In Works of Love, he identifies love as "the deepest ground" of existence and as "the source of everything," a "passion of the emotions" that exerts its influence like a "hidden spring," flowing from a single source "along many paths" and "forming the heart" of each human being. In this paper, I explain how love can provide grounding and orientation in the ways that Kierkegaard claims it can. Love is manifested in different forms, all of which are subject to the imperative of loving thy neighbor as thyself: it permits us to realize our own individuality and to appreciate the distinct existence of other persons, thus enabling us to inhabit a meaningful world. Thus, at the same time, love enables us to be and also to know. It is a commonplace observation that love is not exactly based on reasons-i. e., that I don't love a person because of X, Y, and Z, where these are justifying reasons. Indeed, as one philosopher has recently written, "love in general is not thought to require reasons," adding: "the citation of particular reasons" may "seem like the bringing in of ulterior motives," which "cast doubt on" whether one is accurately describing "the…state [in question] as love."¹ In other words, although "the beloved invariably is…valuable to the lover," nevertheless "perceiving that value is not at all an indispensable formative or grounding condition of the love."² Even if this is true, it does not follow that love is utterly irrational, nor does the fact that love for a person is not based upon reasons rule out the Allow me to express a debt of gratitude to Karin Nisenbaum, the first audience for this paper, from whom I have learned more than I can say. Also helpful and encouraging in her response was my second reader, Sharon Krishek, to whom I am profoundly thankful as well. I have also benefited from numerous conversations with David Young and with James D. Reid, and from the comments and questions that I received from
Discipline Filosofiche, 2024
My review of one of Kierkegaard's "psychological" (as he called them) texts argues for this inter... more My review of one of Kierkegaard's "psychological" (as he called them) texts argues for this interpretation: the forms of despair are simultaneously a kind of phenomenology of moods – including boredom, but most importantly the extremes of (hypo)mania and depression.
Philosophical Investigations, 2024
Socrates is a man of faith whose love and pursuit of the truth is grounded in religious convictio... more Socrates is a man of faith whose love and pursuit of the truth is grounded in religious conviction. Faith, whatever else it may be, involves guiding one's life in terms of a transcendent dimension, recognizing a reality lying behind any particular experience. In Plato's Phaedo, a literary and philosophical masterpiece, we enter the narrative of Socrates' trial and execution on the day of his death, examining arguments for the immortality of the psyche. The dialogue combines logical argument and mythological speculation, and presents Socrates simultaneously as an abstract theorist and an unforgettably singular person. Distinct persons, such as Socrates, have an interest in continuing to exist as the individuals that they are. When we cease to exist, we lose the opportunity to engage in any activity that is worth doing, such as-emphatically, for some of us-doing philosophy. What Socrates is presented as having discovered in the Phaedo-with the ostensibly absent Plato lurking behind every line in this literary gem of a text-is a way of transforming oneself with an eye on immortality. That Socrates dies utterly without fear is the supreme vindication of the philosophical life. Do not go gentle into that good night.
Routledge Handbook of Contemporary Existentialism, 2024
Transactions of The Charles S Peirce Society, Oct 30, 2007
The dispute between those who believe that the world was created by God and those who think it ca... more The dispute between those who believe that the world was created by God and those who think it came into being of its own accord deals with phenomena that go beyond our reason and experience. Much more real is the line separating those who doubt being as it is granted to man (no matter how or by whom) from those who accept it without reservation.-Milan Kundera 1 And how is skepticism to be overcome here? By love.
Review of Metaphysics, Dec 1, 2021
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this p... more The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
International Journal for Philosophy of Religion, Oct 30, 2011
Your article is protected by copyright and all rights are held exclusively by Springer Science+Bu... more Your article is protected by copyright and all rights are held exclusively by Springer Science+Business Media B.V.. This e-offprint is for personal use only and shall not be selfarchived in electronic repositories. If you wish to self-archive your work, please use the accepted author's version for posting to your own website or your institution's repository. You may further deposit the accepted author's version on a funder's repository at a funder's request, provided it is not made publicly available until 12 months after publication.
Philosophia, Dec 16, 2017
The emotions play a crucial role in our apprehension of meaning, value, or significanceand their ... more The emotions play a crucial role in our apprehension of meaning, value, or significanceand their felt quality is intimately related to the sort of awareness they provide. This is exemplified most clearly by cases in which dispassionate cognition is cognitively insufficient, because we need to be emotionally agitated in order to grasp that something is true. In this type of affective experience, it is through a feeling of being moved that we recognize or apprehend that something is the case. And that is why our emotions are epistemically indispensable: namely, because they give us access to significant truths. In this essay, I explain how the phenomenally felt character of an emotion is intimately linked with its intentionality. Intellectual activity divorced from affective feeling is profoundly lackingnot only in its qualitative feel, but also in its epistemic import, or its ability to inform us about matters of significance. A better appreciation of how the living body is involved in affective experience should help us to understand the distinctive kind of embodied cognition that emotional responses involve. It also ought to resolve confusions about phobic responses and other Brecalcitrant^emotions, which are not divorced from cognition as many have claimed.
Philosophical Explorations, Mar 1, 2010
In both psychology and philosophy, cognitive theories of emotion have met with increasing opposit... more In both psychology and philosophy, cognitive theories of emotion have met with increasing opposition in recent years. However, this apparent controversy is not so much a gridlock between antithetical stances as a critical debate in which each side is being forced to qualify its position in order to accommodate the other side of the story. Here, I attempt to sort out some of the disagreements between cognitivism and its rivals, adjudicating some disputes while showing that others are merely superficial. Looking at evidence from neuroscience and social psychology, as well as thought experiments and theoretical arguments, I conclude that it is necessary to acknowledge both that emotions have intentional content and that they involve somatic agitation. I also point out some of the more promising directions for future research in this area.
Oxford University Press eBooks, Feb 15, 2018
Emotions are not merely physiological disturbances: they are experiences through which we apprehe... more Emotions are not merely physiological disturbances: they are experiences through which we apprehend truths about ourselves and the world. Emotions embody an understanding that is accessible to us only by means of affective experience. Only through emotions can we perceive meaning in life, and only by feeling emotions are we capable of recognizing the value or significance of anything whatsoever. Our affective responses and dispositions therefore play a critical role in our apprehension of meaningful truth—furthermore, their felt quality is intimately related to the awareness that they provide. Truthfulness is at issue in episodes of such emotions as anger, fear, and grief. Even apparently irrational emotions can show us what distinguishes emotion from other modes of cognitive activity: the turbulent feeling of being afraid is our way of recognizing a potential threat as such. What is disclosed to us when we experience fear can be either a misconstrual of something harmless as a danger or an axiologically salient fact about the world. Yet only a being able to perceive itself as threatened is susceptible to becoming afraid. So the later chapters of Knowing Emotions turn to the background conditions of affective experience: for instance, why it is only if we care about the life and well-being of a person that we are disposed to react with fear when that person is threatened? Our emotional dispositions of love, care, and concern serve as conditions of possibility for the discovery of significance or value, enabling us to perceive what is meaningful.
Journal of philosophy of emotion, Jan 30, 2019
Axioms in philosophy are not axioms until they are proved upon our pulses.
Journal of philosophy of emotion, Jan 30, 2019
RESPONSE TO DE SOUSA Ronald de Sousa, whose work I quote throughout Knowing Emotions, has called ... more RESPONSE TO DE SOUSA Ronald de Sousa, whose work I quote throughout Knowing Emotions, has called emotions "Janus-faced," 2 because they face both inward and outward, revealing truths about oneself and about one's world of concern at the same time. I appreciate that he agrees for the most part with my major line of argument. And he gives me a chance to say more about a few things: first of all, why I don't identify my approach as an "enactive" one. 3 Although I acknowledge that there is an affinity between enactivism and my emphasis on "unified" embodied experience (and upon what might be called "operative intentionality"), it seems to me that in order to accept this term one must do it quite religiously-that is, judging from the spirit in which others embrace it. de Sousa mentions, for instance, the "enactivist activist" Giovanna
Oxford University Press eBooks, Jun 22, 2023
Rainer Maria Rilke's Sonnets to Orpheus
Rilke claims that the poet’s task is to reveal the qualitative valences of existence, thus enabli... more Rilke claims that the poet’s task is to reveal the qualitative valences of existence, thus enabling his readers to become emotionally aware of its meaning—in spite of all that might threaten our sense that life is significant and worth living. Insofar as Rilke’s Sonnets to Orpheus enact this mode of vision, they embody an antinihilistic way of seeing. One who does not view the world in this manner must remain unaware of its axiologically rich features, because poetic vision brings tangible value to light for both poet and reader. This chapter discusses how this outlook is articulated in the musical aspects of the Sonnets—which heighten the affective impact of Rilke’s words, and often register powerfully felt shocks of recognition. The formal patterns of Rilke’s sonnets bring intense feeling and insight to voice: furthermore, the poet’s formal techniques contribute to his way of articulating a poetic vision of the world.
NY: Fordham University Press, 2012
A set of essays on the significance of Thoreau's writings for contemporary thought.
University of Notre Dame Press, 2005
See back cover for information about the book.
Cambridge Critical Guide to "Either/Or", 2023
An interpretation of the first section in Kierkegaard's first major work, and of the temperament ... more An interpretation of the first section in Kierkegaard's first major work, and of the temperament and personality behind it.
Kierkegaard and Possibility, edited by Erin Plunkett, 2023
A discussion of Kierkegaardian themes in conversation with Marcel Proust.
Partial Answers: Journal of Literature and the History of Ideas, 2023
This paper interprets what Proust's novel has to say about the following theme, reading "In Searc... more This paper interprets what Proust's novel has to say about the following theme, reading "In Search of Lost Time" somewhat against the grain to see how it might endorse a less cynical vision of love than is often thought.
As we are reminded by the title of a well-known poem, love calls us to the things of this world. Turning to existential phenomenology, we find that point being made in similar terms. It is, as Max Scheler explains, the "movement of my heart" as a loving or caring being that establishes my "many-sided interest in the things of this world" (1973a: 98). The realm of "things which count and exist for me," in other words, those of Merleau-Ponty (2002: 333), is defined by my ability to love. Our entire life is experienced as meaningful only because we are fundamentally loving beings: this affective capacity determines what has reality and value, as far as each of us is concerned-which is why, if we understand how love reveals the significance of things to us, "we shall thereby come to understand better how things and beings can exist in general" (ibid. 178). Elsewhere, I introduce the notion of the emotional a priori-love, care, and concern-as grounding our whole affective life, giving rise to an axiologically charged world by opening our eyes to the meaning of what exists (Furtak 103-21). The important distinction here is between underlying attitudes of love, care, and concern (terms whose connotations allow them to signify aspects of the same continuum) and, on the other hand, episodes of such emotions (or affects) as fear, jealousy, and worry. Love, therefore, serves as "the foundation for every sort of knowing" (Scheler 2008: 391-92), just as the sun illuminates visible things for those of us with eyes to see. Someone who had never known love's influence would be like a blind person in relation to colors (Scheler 1973a: 117). Through this mode of vision, we discern much that we would otherwise overlook.
Kierkegaard's "The Sickness unto Death: A Critical Guide," ed. by Hanson & Krishek, 2022
A fruitful line of inquiry in recent philosophical analyses of depression has focused upon the co... more A fruitful line of inquiry in recent philosophical analyses of depression has focused upon the concept of possibility and has argued that possibilities are typically a feature of the world as we experience it – but not for a depressed person, who experiences the world as bereft of possibility. Kierkegaard's pseudonymous "The Sickness unto Death" offers resources for interpreting depression *and* mania from a phenomenological perspective. Here, I show what this text has to say that is relevant to cyclothymic or bipolar conditions.
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Papers by Rick Anthony Furtak
As we are reminded by the title of a well-known poem, love calls us to the things of this world. Turning to existential phenomenology, we find that point being made in similar terms. It is, as Max Scheler explains, the "movement of my heart" as a loving or caring being that establishes my "many-sided interest in the things of this world" (1973a: 98). The realm of "things which count and exist for me," in other words, those of Merleau-Ponty (2002: 333), is defined by my ability to love. Our entire life is experienced as meaningful only because we are fundamentally loving beings: this affective capacity determines what has reality and value, as far as each of us is concerned-which is why, if we understand how love reveals the significance of things to us, "we shall thereby come to understand better how things and beings can exist in general" (ibid. 178). Elsewhere, I introduce the notion of the emotional a priori-love, care, and concern-as grounding our whole affective life, giving rise to an axiologically charged world by opening our eyes to the meaning of what exists (Furtak 103-21). The important distinction here is between underlying attitudes of love, care, and concern (terms whose connotations allow them to signify aspects of the same continuum) and, on the other hand, episodes of such emotions (or affects) as fear, jealousy, and worry. Love, therefore, serves as "the foundation for every sort of knowing" (Scheler 2008: 391-92), just as the sun illuminates visible things for those of us with eyes to see. Someone who had never known love's influence would be like a blind person in relation to colors (Scheler 1973a: 117). Through this mode of vision, we discern much that we would otherwise overlook.
As we are reminded by the title of a well-known poem, love calls us to the things of this world. Turning to existential phenomenology, we find that point being made in similar terms. It is, as Max Scheler explains, the "movement of my heart" as a loving or caring being that establishes my "many-sided interest in the things of this world" (1973a: 98). The realm of "things which count and exist for me," in other words, those of Merleau-Ponty (2002: 333), is defined by my ability to love. Our entire life is experienced as meaningful only because we are fundamentally loving beings: this affective capacity determines what has reality and value, as far as each of us is concerned-which is why, if we understand how love reveals the significance of things to us, "we shall thereby come to understand better how things and beings can exist in general" (ibid. 178). Elsewhere, I introduce the notion of the emotional a priori-love, care, and concern-as grounding our whole affective life, giving rise to an axiologically charged world by opening our eyes to the meaning of what exists (Furtak 103-21). The important distinction here is between underlying attitudes of love, care, and concern (terms whose connotations allow them to signify aspects of the same continuum) and, on the other hand, episodes of such emotions (or affects) as fear, jealousy, and worry. Love, therefore, serves as "the foundation for every sort of knowing" (Scheler 2008: 391-92), just as the sun illuminates visible things for those of us with eyes to see. Someone who had never known love's influence would be like a blind person in relation to colors (Scheler 1973a: 117). Through this mode of vision, we discern much that we would otherwise overlook.
Non se oye estremecerse el cocotero
ni en la ribera sollozar los sauces;
solos están la vega y el otero,
desierto el robledal, seco los cauces
y, tendito a la orilla de un estero,
abre el lagarto sus enormes fauces.
The trembling of the coconut palm goes
unheard, as does the weeping of the willow
on the river; meadow and hill are alone.
The oak groves is deserted, the creeks are dry,
and stretched out on the banks of the estuary
the alligator opens his enormous jaws.
(This is by no means incompetent, but it is non-rhythmic, unmusical, and in English somehow no longer a sonnet. Maybe if you dislike rhyme you ought not to translate formal poems.)