Iain Hamilton Grant

Last updated

Iain Hamilton Grant
NationalityBritish
Alma mater University of Reading
Warwick University
Era Contemporary philosophy
Region Western philosophy
School Continental philosophy
Speculative realism (transcendental materialism)
Main interests
Naturphilosophie , German Idealism, Ontology [1]
Notable ideas
Transcendental materialism

Iain Hamilton Grant (born 21 November 1963, in Bristol[ citation needed ]) is a British philosopher. He is a senior lecturer at the University of the West of England in Bristol, United Kingdom. His research interests include ontology, European philosophy, German Idealism (especially Schelling), and both contemporary and historical philosophy of nature. [1] He is often associated with the recent philosophical current known as Speculative Realism. [2]

Contents

Work

Grant was initially known as a translator of the prominent French philosophers Jean Baudrillard and Jean-François Lyotard. His reputation as an independent philosopher comes primarily from his book On an Artificial Earth. [3] In this book, Grant heavily criticizes the repeated attempts of philosophers to "reverse Platonism," and argues that they should try to reverse Immanuel Kant instead. He is highly critical of the recent prominence of ethics and the philosophy of life in continental philosophy, which in his view merely reinforce the undue privilege of human being. Against these trends, Grant calls for a renewed treatment of the inorganic realm. [4]

Grant views Plato and Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling as his major allies among classic philosophical figures, and generally opposes both Aristotle and Kant for what he sees as their tendency to reduce reality to its expressibility for humans. Grant is also influenced by the French philosopher Gilles Deleuze.

Grant wrote his PhD thesis on Kant and Lyotard in the Department of Philosophy at Warwick University. Whilst at Warwick he was part of the Cybernetic Culture Research Unit.

He states "I am a philosopher working on ontology and post-Kantian philosophy and German Idealism, especially Schelling, and on the philosophy of nature both historically and in the contemporary context. I have published widely in these areas, and am writing a monograph on the problem of nature in later Idealism to follow my Philosophies of Nature after Schelling (Continuum, 2006). I maintain an interest in the philosophy of technology and in art." [5]

Bibliography

Original works

English translations

Related Research Articles

Idealism in philosophy, also known as philosophical idealism or metaphysical idealism, is the set of metaphysical perspectives asserting that, most fundamentally, reality is equivalent to mind, spirit, or consciousness; that reality is entirely a mental construct; or that ideas are the highest type of reality or have the greatest claim to being considered "real". Because there are different types of idealism, it is difficult to define the term uniformly.

Postmodern philosophy is a philosophical movement that arose in the second half of the 20th century as a critical response to assumptions allegedly present in modernist philosophical ideas regarding culture, identity, history, or language that were developed during the 18th-century Age of Enlightenment. Postmodernist thinkers developed concepts like différance, repetition, trace, and hyperreality to subvert "grand narratives", univocity of being, and epistemic certainty. Postmodern philosophy questions the importance of power relationships, personalization, and discourse in the "construction" of truth and world views. Many postmodernists appear to deny that an objective reality exists, and appear to deny that there are objective moral values.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">German philosophy</span> Specialty in philosophy, focused on German language origin

German philosophy, meaning philosophy in the German language or philosophy by German people, in its diversity, is fundamental for both the analytic and continental traditions. It covers figures such as Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Immanuel Kant, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Karl Marx, Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, Ludwig Wittgenstein, the Vienna Circle, and the Frankfurt School, who now count among the most famous and studied philosophers of all time. They are central to major philosophical movements such as rationalism, German idealism, Romanticism, dialectical materialism, existentialism, phenomenology, hermeneutics, logical positivism, and critical theory. The Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard is often also included in surveys of German philosophy due to his extensive engagement with German thinkers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling</span> German philosopher (1775–1854)

Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling, later von Schelling, was a German philosopher. Standard histories of philosophy make him the midpoint in the development of German idealism, situating him between Johann Gottlieb Fichte, his mentor in his early years, and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, his one-time university roommate, early friend, and later rival. Interpreting Schelling's philosophy is regarded as difficult because of its evolving nature.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">German idealism</span> Philosophical movement

German idealism is a philosophical movement that emerged in Germany in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. It developed out of the work of Immanuel Kant in the 1780s and 1790s, and was closely linked both with Romanticism and the revolutionary politics of the Enlightenment. The period of German idealism after Kant is also known as post-Kantian idealism or simply post-Kantianism. One scheme divides German idealists into transcendental idealists, associated with Kant and Fichte, and absolute idealists, associated with Schelling and Hegel.

Continental philosophy is an umbrella term for philosophies prominent in continental Europe. Michael E. Rosen has ventured to identify common themes that typically characterize continental philosophy. These themes proposed by Rosen derive from a broadly Kantian thesis that knowledge, experience, and reality are bound and shaped by conditions best understood through philosophical reflection rather than exclusively empirical inquiry.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">British idealism</span> Philosophical movement

A subset of absolute idealism, British idealism was a philosophical movement that was influential in Britain from the mid-nineteenth century to the early twentieth century. The leading figures in the movement were T. H. Green (1836–1882), F. H. Bradley (1846–1924), and Bernard Bosanquet (1848–1923). They were succeeded by the second generation of J. H. Muirhead (1855–1940), J. M. E. McTaggart (1866–1925), H. H. Joachim (1868–1938), A. E. Taylor (1869–1945), and R. G. Collingwood (1889–1943). The last major figure in the tradition was G. R. G. Mure (1893–1979). Doctrines of early British idealism so provoked the young Cambridge philosophers G. E. Moore and Bertrand Russell that they began a new philosophical tradition, analytic philosophy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Transcendental idealism</span> Philosophical system founded by Immanuel Kant

Transcendental idealism is a philosophical system founded by German philosopher Immanuel Kant in the 18th century. Kant's epistemological program is found throughout his Critique of Pure Reason (1781). By transcendental Kant means that his philosophical approach to knowledge transcends mere consideration of sensory evidence and requires an understanding of the mind's innate modes of processing that sensory evidence.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Absolute idealism</span> Type of idealism in metaphysics

Absolute idealism is chiefly associated with Friedrich Schelling and G. W. F. Hegel, both of whom were German idealist philosophers in the 19th century. The label has also been attached to others such as Josiah Royce, an American philosopher who was greatly influenced by Hegel's work, and the British idealists.

<i>Naturphilosophie</i> Current in 19th-century German idealism

Naturphilosophie is a term used in English-language philosophy to identify a current in the philosophical tradition of German idealism, as applied to the study of nature in the earlier 19th century. German speakers use the clearer term Romantische Naturphilosophie, the philosophy of nature developed at the time of the founding of German Romanticism. It is particularly associated with the philosophical work of Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel—though it has some clear precursors also. More particularly it is identified with some of the initial works of Schelling during the period 1797–9, in reaction to the views of Fichte, and subsequent developments from Schelling's position. Always controversial, some of Schelling's ideas in this direction are still considered of philosophical interest, even if the subsequent development of experimental natural science had a destructive impact on the credibility of the theories of his followers in Naturphilosophie.

Espen Hammer is Professor of Philosophy at Temple University. Focusing on modern European thought from Kant and Hegel to Adorno and Heidegger, Hammer’s research includes critical theory, Wittgenstein and ordinary language philosophy, phenomenology, German idealism, social and political theory, and aesthetics. He has also written widely on the philosophy of literature and taken a special interest in the question of temporality.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ray Brassier</span> British philosopher

Raymond Brassier is a British philosopher. He is member of the philosophy faculty at the American University of Beirut, Lebanon, known for his work in philosophical realism. He was formerly Research Fellow at the Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy at Middlesex University, London, England.

Speculative realism is a movement in contemporary Continental-inspired philosophy that defines itself loosely in its stance of metaphysical realism against its interpretation of the dominant forms of post-Kantian philosophy.

Dermot Moran is an Irish philosopher specialising in phenomenology and in medieval philosophy, and he is also active in the dialogue between analytic and continental philosophy. He is currently the inaugural holder of the Joseph Chair in Catholic Philosophy at Boston College. He is a member of the Royal Irish Academy and a founding editor of the International Journal of Philosophical Studies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul W. Franks</span>

Paul Walter Franks is the Robert F. and Patricia Ross Weis Professor of Philosophy and Judaic Studies at Yale University. He graduated with his PhD from Harvard University in 1993. Franks' dissertation, entitled "Kant and Hegel on the Esotericism of Philosophy", was supervised by Stanley Cavell and won the Emily and Charles Carrier Prize for a Dissertation in Moral Philosophy at Harvard University. He completed his B.A and M.A, in Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Balliol College, Oxford. Prior to this, Franks received his general education at the Royal Grammar School, Newcastle, and studied classical rabbinic texts at Gateshead Talmudical College.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Watson (philosopher)</span> Canadian philosopher (1847–1939)

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<i>Libidinal Economy</i> 1974 book by Jean-François Lyotard

Libidinal Economy is a 1974 book by French philosopher Jean-François Lyotard. The book was composed following the ideological shift of the May 68 protests in France, whereupon Lyotard distanced himself from conventional critical theory and Marxism because he felt that they were still too structuralist and imposed a rigid "systematization of desires". Drastically changing his writing style and turning his attention to semiotics, theories of libido, economic history and erotica, he repurposed Freud's idea of libidinal economy as a more complex and fluid concept that he linked to political economy, and proposed multiple ideas in conjunction with it. Alongside Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari's Anti-Oedipus, Libidinal Economy has been seen as an essential post-May 68 work in a time when theorists in France were radically reinterpreting psychoanalysis, and critics have argued that the book is free of moral or political orientation. Lyotard subsequently abandoned its ideas and views, later describing it as his "evil book".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vittorio Hösle</span> German philosopher (born 1960)

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Alison Stone is a British philosopher. She is a Professor of European Philosophy in the Department of Politics, Philosophy and Religion at Lancaster University, UK.

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References

  1. 1 2 "Dr. Iain Grant". University of West England Staff Profiles. Archived from the original on 27 February 2018. Retrieved 3 May 2016.
  2. Speculative Realism in Collapse: Journal of Philosophical Research and Development (Falmouth: Urbanomic, 2007), pp. 306-449.
  3. On an Artificial Earth: Philosophies of Nature After Schelling. London, New York 2006.
  4. ENR // AgencyND // University of Notre Dame (10 May 2007). "On an Artificial Earth: Philosophies of Nature after Schelling // Reviews // Philosophical Reviews // University of Notre Dame". Ndpr.nd.edu. Archived from the original on 24 July 2011. Retrieved 21 September 2011.{{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  5. "Dr Iain Grant - UWE Bristol".
  6. Lister, Martin; et al. (2003). New media : a critical introduction (Reprinted. ed.). London: Routledge. ISBN   978-0415223782.
  7. "A review of the book in the Notre Dame Philosophical Review". Archived from the original on 24 July 2011. Retrieved 21 January 2008.
  8. Dunham, Jeremy; Grant, Iain Hamilton; Watson, Sean (2010). Idealism: A History of a Philosophy. Durham: Acumen Publishing Ltd. ISBN   9781844652419.
  9. "Dr Iain Grant - UWE Bristol".