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Document Details : Title: Hermeneutics, Cognitivism and Nihilism Subtitle: Reply to Frank Chouraqui Author(s): VAN TONGEREN, Paul Journal: Tijdschrift voor Filosofie Volume: 84 Issue: 1 Date: 2022 Pages: 155-165 DOI: 10.2143/TVF.84.1.3290705 Abstract : In reply to Frank Chouraqui’s 'The Cognitivist Thesis of Nihilism: Paul van Tongeren’s Reflections on the Overcoming of Nihilism' (in this issue, Tijdschrift voor Filosofie 84 (2022): 127-154), I elaborate two points. First and in reaction to Chouraqui’s efforts (in line with most secondary literature) to describe Nietzsche’s thoughts on the overcoming of nihilism, I re-emphasize that Nietzsche never explicitly mentions this overcoming. Nietzsche makes all kinds of experiments to find out how to live under conditions of nihilism, while knowing that we cannot fully overcome it. Living under conditions of nihilism is not the same as 'overcoming nihilism', just like the awareness of being imprisoned is not the same as being liberated. Second, and more elaborately, I react to Chouraqui’s criticism of what he calls my a-priori-argument for the claim that Nietzsche (is aware that) his thesis that reveals truth as a misleading interpretation becomes inevitably entangled in a paradox. I explain that even a hermeneutical approach still makes a truth-claim, which, however, should be distinguished from any sort of objectivism or foundationalism. The 'truth-imperative' is not a truth that is imperative, but an imperative that forces to search for 'truth'. |
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