Nuno Ribeiro

NOVA University of Lisbon

Pluralismo Filosófico e Drama Heteronímico em Fernando Pessoa

25 February 2025, 17h00 (Lisbon Time — GMT+0)

Sala Mattos Romão (Room C201.J – Department of Philosophy)

School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

A apresentação visa explorar as relações entre a constituição de um drama heteronímico e a criação de uma filosofia da pluralidade na obra de Fernando Pessoa, tendo por base a análise dos escritos filosóficos do espólio pessoano. Para esse efeito, dividirei a apresentação em duas partes: numa primeira, analisarei a relação entre o processo de dramatização e a constituição de um esboço de filosofia plural no período pré-heteronímico; numa segunda, explicitarei as relações entre o conceito de “drama em gente” e a construção de uma filosofia pluralista no período heteronímico.

Ankica Čakardić

University of Zagreb

Family Abolition and Dead Labour: Hegel and Marxist-Feminism

18 February 2025, 17h00 (Lisbon Time — GMT+0)

Sala Mattos Romão (Room C201.J – Department of Philosophy)

School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

The Croatian philosopher and Marxist-humanist associated with the Yugoslav Praxis School, Blaženka Despot, wrote in one of her essays: “With Hegel’s philosophy, with his intervention on freedom, he becomes a necessary starting point for the foundation of a certain Marxist-feminism”. In this lecture, I will attempt to develop a Marxist-feminist reading of Hegel through the lens of social reproduction theory by tracing some of Despot’s Marxist-feminist ideas. Social Reproduction Theory (SRT) is all about life-making. Its core tenet is the fact that the accumulation of surplus value under capitalism is not possible without informal, dead and unpaid domestic labour that generates healthy labour power. SRT traces the “hidden” processes that enable production possible, looks closely “behind the scenes”, at family relations and marriage, and attempts to examine the phenomena of life-making and the produced gender reality. In Hegelian sense, it focuses on Ethical life in its totality, taking into account both the capitalist system of needs and the state as well as the backstage of these visible social relations, i.e. the nuclear family. In Hegel’s writings we are confronted not only simply and naturally with the problem of the family and patriarchy, but also with the presentation of the fact that they constitute the very basis of the reproduction of capitalist society. In order to solve this Hegelian problem in Marxist-feminist terms and to stake out the terrain for the actualised freedom and emancipation of women, we must tackle this goal in its totality, on the long term. In this context, the anti-capitalist solutions include not only the abolition of private property, but also the abolition of the monogamous nuclear family.

This activity is funded by Portuguese national funds through FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, I.P., within the project UID/00310/2025, Centro de Filosofia da Universidade de Lisboa
(https://doi.org/10.54499/UID/00310/2025)

Julie Saada

Sciences Po Paris

Human Rights, Freedom, and Socioeconomic Rights

11 February 2025, 17h00 (Lisbon Time — GMT+0)

Sala Mattos Romão (Room C201.J – Department of Philosophy)

School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

I will analyze human rights from both historical and normative perspectives, focusing on three dialectical movements that characterize them. I will emphasize the interdependence of civil-political and socio-economic rights. The dialectic of the original productivity of human rights refers to the historical and intellectual movement that culminated in the French Revolution’s Rights of Man and of the Citizen. While individual rights were proclaimed as opposable to the sovereign, it was also through the absolutization of the sovereign’s authority that collective medieval legal forms were dissolved in favor of the individualization of rights. Subjective rights were thus constituted by a transformation of the legal subject, whose rights became opposable to power, and by a transformation of power, which granted rights to subjects. This movement led to what I term a ‘right to life beyond life,’ meaning a life transcending mere biological existence as it embodies the equal freedom of legal subjects. The right to life beyond life thus denotes the right to a particular political condition. However, this initial dialectic gives rise to two contradictions: Firstly, freedom is conceptualized as negative and individualistic, while the Declaration formulates economic and social rights that have been extensively developed in international Declarations and Conventions on human rights. Conceived as a right to a particular social condition, these rights focus on the material conditions necessary to realize freedom, emphasizing a collective dimension that presupposes social redistribution and solidarity mechanisms that states must ensure. This contradiction produces what I term a dialectic of the continuous production of human rights. Overcoming the contradiction between the two forms of freedom and the types of rights that constitute them can be achieved by establishing an interdependent relationship between rights. As expressed in civil and political rights, individual freedom can only be realized by promoting collective forms of freedom and rights. Thus, the right to life beyond life becomes not only a right to a particular political condition but also a right to a specific social condition, understood as a means of attaining freedom. Secondly, even when rights to a social condition are acknowledged, human rights remain abstract. Their general and indeterminate formulation is a prerequisite for their potential universalization. The contradiction lies in the fact that rights, which establish a right to life as a right to a specific political and social condition, are detached from what individuals and communities can actually do with them. They only become concrete rights when specified to particular agents in specific contexts, facilitated by specific implementation processes. Paradoxically, the universal formulation aims to render these rights locally interpretable and adaptable, creating a dialectic between the universal and the particular. The capabilities approach to human rights provides a means to verify that specific rights correspond to abstract rights and fulfill them, which is an essential condition of human dignity.

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This work/event is funded by Portuguese national funds through FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, I.P., within the project UID/00310/2025, Centro de Filosofia da Universidade de Lisboa
(https://doi.org/10.54499/UID/00310/2025)

Fabrizio Boscaglia

Universidade Lusófona/CFUL

Fernando Pessoa e a Filosofia Islâmica: Questões de Receção, Representação e Interpretação

4 February 2025, 17h00 (Lisbon Time — GMT+0)

Sala Mattos Romão (Room C201.J – Department of Philosophy)

School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

Nesta sessão, são abordados aspetos do pensamento e da obra de Fernando Pessoa (1888-1935) relacionados com autores e questões da Filosofia e da Teologia Islâmicas. Ao considerar criticamente Pessoa enquanto poeta animado pela filosofia, e mais precisamente poeta e pensador, tal como ele se definiu em 1910 e 1933, esta abordagem baseia-se sobretudo (mas não só) no corpus de escritos filosóficos do autor. A partir da investigação no espólio e na biblioteca particular de Pessoa, tenta-se atender às seguintes questões: existem, na reflexão e na escrita filosófica de Pessoa, referências ao pensamento islâmico? Que autores e questões da filosofia islâmica foram abordados por Pessoa e de que forma? A partir de quais fontes, línguas e contextos culturais? Por que caminhos e para quais finalidades inerentes ao pensamento e à obra pessoana? Como ler estas referências no âmbito do pensamento filosófico contemporâneo em Portugal? Ao tentar responder, levantam-se uma série de questões específicas, relativas, tanto à receção do pensamento islâmico em Pessoa e na Europa, inclusivamente no que respeita à representação orientalista do mesmo, como inerentes à interpretação filosofante que Pessoa faz, em particular, das questões filosófico-religiosas de Deus, dos atributos divinos, do destino e do pluralismo religioso, entre outras.

Francisco Felizol

Praxis-CFUL

Entre rei sagrado e vítima microcósmica, bobo judicial e carrasco executivo: Os vértices antropológicos da soberania ante a ameaça populista

3 December 2024, 17h00 (Lisbon Time — GMT+0)

Sala Mattos Romão (Room C201.J – Department of Philosophy)

School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

Em 1975, Foucault entronizava o soberano grotesco como um dos motores do poder. Esta ideia poderá ser melhor compreendida e fundamentada com o auxílio de uma antropologia que detecte as máscaras, sombras e misturas com que, nas sociedades humanas, o poder se costuma revestir. Nesta perspetiva, se, na esteira de Frazer, Hocart e Girard, as origens do poder político parecem remeter ao rei sagrado, também este é imediatamente remetível a outras figuras ou tipos. Sendo rei sagrado já de si potencial vítima (ou vítima adiada, e aí a sua proximidade com o homo sacer e o deuotus) com cariz microcósmico (o que acontece ao seu corpo acontece ao cosmos, ao reino), encontra-se na vizinhança antropológica do que tentaremos perceber como o bobo judicial (no âmbito do riso fertilizante e assassino, apontado, com a criança e o louco, à verdade tão violenta quão inocente) e o carrasco executivo (a também fertilizante execução mortal da de-cisão que o pode assegurar como soberano). Os tabus imobilizadores, a gravitas do rei (ou, hoje, do líder) fazem mais do que moderar os seus movimentos e decisões, sempre perigosos, mais do que conter nele o ambíguo sagrado antropológico (tão salvífico quanto violento): mantêm com ele, aquilo que tentaremos perceber como os outros três vértices da soberania, a vítima microcósmica, o bobo judicial e o carrasco executivo, a distância segura. Contudo, o progressivo colapso destas distâncias e interdições, liberta o sagrado que o rei, em sim deve conter; transborda-se para o palco, senão já para a rua, o trono, o altar, o circo e o patíbulo. Que tudo se acelera e precipita, mais as quatro figuras se aproximam esboçando a figura do soberano grotesco. Quando, desde os fundamentos do poder soberano, este caos sagrado emerge, assistimos a uma perigosa degradação do poder. À medida que, no lugar do poder, ante o avançar do espectáculo igualizado em que se torna a política, se assiste à queda de barreiras e limites, o soberano grotesco e os seus perigos parecem regressar, à direita e à esquerda, na forma do que usamos chamar de populismo. Talvez por esta via, se possa compreender melhor a atracção, aparentemente contemporânea, deste e do líder que lhe dá rosto.

Sjoerd van Tuinen

Erasmus University Rotterdam

Frogs in the Swamp: A Critique of Menno ter Braak and other Liberal Discourses on Ressentiment

5 November 2024, 17h00 (Lisbon Time — GMT+0)

Sala Mattos Romão (Room C201.J – Department of Philosophy)

School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

As the post-2016 boom in the self-diagnostics of toxic liberalism shows, the concept of ressentiment is still one of today’s main ‘ideologemes’ (Jameson). It is an ideologeme because, while having a strong morally disqualifying power, it offers no way out of the political impasse it describes. Here I propose a critique of the 1937 essay by the Dutch writer Menno ter Braak, ‘National Socialism as a Doctrine of Rancor’ (translated and published for the first time in English in Theory, Culture & Society in 2019) as the basis for a wider critique of ‘pastoral’ discourses on ressentiment. First, I argue that ressentiment initially and primarily names a bourgeois phenomenon and problem, and as such is an articulation of what Rancière has aptly called a ‘hatred of democracy’: liberal democracy is held responsible for all social problems as it inherently summons forth a bad infinity of emancipatory struggle (‘fanaticism’, ‘utopism’) that must be disqualified. Second, I show how ressentiment functions as a label for bourgeois self-legitimation: in discerning ressentiment everywhere, a claim is made to good conscience on the basis of either a more rational or a more authentic relation to one’s own ressentiment. It is this esprit de sérieux that culminates in Ter Braak’s hypocritical statement that ‘one will have to begin, for example, by speaking less disparagingly about the “bunch of losers”, because one cannot overestimate the extent of the reservoir of latent rancour.’ Third, I will briefly touch upon ways in which other discourses on ressentiment – those of Nietzsche and of the diplomat as invoked by ter Braak at the outset of his essay – seek to overcome this seriousness and contrast these other discourses with a discourse that is at risk of deepening it – in particular that of Améry.

Gonçalo Marcelo

University of Coimbra

Hermeneutics as Critical Social Theory

29 October 2024, 17h00 (Lisbon Time — GMT+0)

Sala Mattos Romão (Room C201.J – Department of Philosophy)

School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

In this talk I will briefly present the fertile intersection between the tradition of philosophical hermeneutics and the task of critical social theory, exploring the possibility of using hermeneutics as a method for social theory. Coming back to Paul Ricœur’s definition of “critical hermeneutics” (in “Hermeneutics and the Critique of Ideology”, 1973) as reconciling a reinterpretation of cultural heritages with an interest in emancipation, I will attempt to demonstrate how it is precisely in a hermeneutical vein that much of the most fertile and philosophically informed critical social theory of the last decades has been put forward, drawing on examples from Ricœur, Michael Walzer, Charles Taylor, Axel Honneth and Hartmut Rosa. Through its emphasis on traits such as: 1) the first-person perspective; 2) interpretation and the symbolic fabric of social imaginaries; and 3) its connection with selfhood through self-interpretation hermeneutics will thus appear, or so I will argue, as a way to both make sense of the social and push for meaningful social transformation.

Adrian Razvan Sandru

MainenLab – Champalimaud Foundation

Re-presenting the Familiar – The Cognitive and Moral Role of Art in Kant’s Aesthetic Theory

22 October 2024, 17h00 (Lisbon Summer Time — GMT+1)

Sala Mattos Romão (Room C201.J – Department of Philosophy)

School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

Starting from Kant’s statement from his anthropology lectures that “the role of the artist is to present the familiar (das Gewöhnliche) in such a way that it stands out” I will try to reconstruct the role of art in Kantian aesthetic philosophy. I will argue in 4 steps: 1) to present the familiar as standing out means for Kant to present the familiar in such a way that the habitual application of concepts is questioned; 2) the experience of an uncertainty in the application of concepts is treated in the first instance by the subject as displeasure which leads the subject to enter into a reflective process aimed at resolving the cognitive conflict; 3) if the reflective process indicates a possible integration of the new perspective on the familiar it will lead to the experience of pleasure; 4) pleasure will finally open the space for two possible experiences: a) awe at the aesthetic ideas presented by the artwork in question and experienced as a feeling of the possibility of the supersensible and b) reflective awareness of the habitual nature of the subject as well as the possibility of reconstructing this nature into a second moral nature.

Francesco Biagi

CIAUD-ULisboa

Henri Lefebvre: “Teoria” e “Praxis” para a Renovação do Marxismo

11 June 2024, 17h00 (Lisbon Summer Time — GMT+1)

Sala Mattos Romão (Room C201.J – Department of Philosophy)

School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

Henri Lefebvre (Hagetmau 1901 – Navarrenx 1991) foi um filósofo e sociólogo marxista que viveu intensamente todo o “breve século XX”. A Revolução Russa irrompeu quando o autor tinha quase dezoito anos, e ele morreu aos 90 anos, dois anos após a queda do Muro de Berlim e alguns meses antes da implosão da União Soviética. A receção portuguesa e internacional de Lefebvre tem sido inadequada e parcial, esquecendo-se frequentemente que o autor é um dos expoentes mais brilhantes, ainda que periféricos, do marxismo francês do século XX. De facto, Lefebvre inaugurou um novo tipo de filosofia, seguindo os passos de Marx e Engels, capaz de se desenvolver simultaneamente no plano teórico e prático: o marxismo deve ser uma “teoria” que ajude a compreender e a transformar a “práxis”. Esta é a perspetiva que lhe permite compreender e analisar as transformações da sociedade, desde a questão espacial, passando pela vida quotidiana, até uma teoria geral da política que abarca toda a análise da modernidade capitalista. A questão rural e a questão urbana tornam-se o “laboratório social” privilegiado para observar as evoluções do capitalismo e dar um novo impulso à tradição marxista, contra a ortodoxia dogmática propagada pelo estalinismo. Se, por um lado, Lefebvre contribuiu para revitalizar os instrumentos de investigação da crítica marxiana, por outro lado, a amplitude dos seus interesses não permitiu um reconhecimento adequado da sua contribuição original em comparação com outras figuras como Jean-Paul Sartre, Louis Althusser ou Guy Debord. A minha intervenção, após apresentar a biografia intelectual do autor, centrar-se-á em explicar como os estudos rurais e urbanos de Lefebvre são o instrumento através do qual o autor revitaliza e dá um novo significado ao pensamento marxista.

Arvi Särkelä

ETH Zürich

Life behind a Glass: Alienation and Disclosure in Wittgenstein and Pessoa

4 June 2023, 17h00 (Lisbon Summer Time — GMT+1)

Sala Mattos Romão (Room C201.J – Department of Philosophy)

School of Arts and Humanities – University of Lisbon

Abstract

Wittgenstein once quipped that philosophy should be written like poetry. Does he himself follow this imperative? Given that he describes his aim in philosophy as “show[ing] the fly a way out of the fly-bottle” (PI, §309), that is, as a method of “showing” rather than “saying” (TLP, 4.1212), one may hypothesize that he perhaps did. When Wittgenstein in the Philosophical Investigations recounts the experience of captivity in the fly-bottle, he sometimes dissociates by writing about “the author of the Tractatus-Logico Philosophicus.” Now, the author of TLP is obviously the same empirical and juridical person as the author of PI, Ludwig Wittgenstein, born on 26 April 1889, in Vienna, Austro-Hungarian Empire. But if we, at least for the sake of experiment, take this person’s quip about writing philosophy like poetry seriously, then the author writing the PI and “the author of the Tractatus-Logico Philosophicus” can be read as different characters. The Portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa, who was born only one year before Wittgenstein, explored intensely this poetic method of self-othering. During his brief life, he produced more than seventy such poetic characters. To emphasize the authorial status of these characters, their independent intellectual life and unique perspective, he did not call them pseudonyms but heteronyms. One of the most famous of these heteronyms is Álvaro de Campos. He was born one year after Wittgenstein. Like Wittgenstein, he studied engineering in Great Britain and wanted to become a philosopher. Unlike Wittgenstein he failed, and instead, mirroring Wittgenstein’s quip, tried to write poetry like philosophy.

In the poem “Tabacaria” (The Tobacconist’s Shop, 1928), Pessoa stages Campos behind a window looking across a Lisbon street at the Tobacconist’s on the opposite side. Like “the author of the Tractatus-Logico Philosophicus,” Campos experiences an existential captivity behind a glass: a state of seeing everything with “absolute clarity” yet unable to get at life, to touch, smell, manipulate the things. Towards the end of the poem, he says to himself, in a language reminiscent of the turn Wittgenstein would take one year after Tabacaria, that “metaphysics is a consequence of feeling sick.” This talk will be devoted to a comparative reading of the poetic method of heteronym and the poetic topos of a life behind a glass in Pessoa’s Tabacaria and Wittgenstein’s PI. The hypothesis is that Wittgenstein and Pessoa use similar yet different poetic methods that, however, appear as philosophically significant. And they do this in an attempt to alienate themselves in order to alienate the reader from an alienating form of life.