Hello, everyone, I'm looking for a reading guide to get into continental philosophy, does anyone knows any good guide or reading list?

Unfortunately many secondary sources on Blanchot are equally ambiguous and would appreciate any advice!

Hi all,

I remember a while while back watching philosphy tube's videos speaking about the comparisson between Fanon's experience of being black in white france and trans folks experience being trans in a cis world. i.e that the proposed philosophical relationship that Fanon suggests between black and white is the same relationship between trans and cis.

Im searching for academic papers that suggest this comparison and cant find any. Does anyone here know of such papers, and can send a link to them in the comments? it would be of immense help.

Thanks :)

my boyfriend wrote this substack article about Kant and i thought it might be enjoyed here, would love to hear thoughts/feedback on it, check it out if you want to!!

https://open.substack.com/pub/atmidnightalltheagents/p/whatever-happened-to-future-metaphysics?r=2eypst&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

Hi there,

I am a folk singer/musician and PhD student (writing my dissertation on philosophy and esotericism) who has taken on the endeavor to transform philosophy into music, aestheticize knowledge. Enclosed is my musical exposition of the mystical aspects of Platonic philosophy, especially the aspects which the Neoplatonists would reinterpret in their understanding of the mystical ascent. The song primarily follows the trajectory of the Phaedrus and the Symposium, but also references the Republic, Meno, Phaedo, Critias, and the Timaeus.

I created a lot of hand drawn animations for it, and included a lot of alchemical imagery, as many alchemists did indeed interpret Plato alchemically. I also created a number of animations of the images from the great Neo/Platonist Renaissance magi Robert Fludd, my own artwork, one of Athanasius Kircher’s illustrations, an image from the alchemical treatise the Rosarium Philosophorum, and images from ancient Greek art (the sirens and Eros) that I adapted. Yes, sirens in the ancient Greek context were envisioned as avian rather than aquatic humanoids! The chariot animation was created using the still frames of a film of a horse running (it took awhile to make!).

Some nuances: the line “drinking from the lake of memory” is an allusion to Orphism, as Plato’s theory of anamnesis derives from the Orphic cult. I am also dressed in Egyptian-style attire at one point, a subtle reference to Plato’s debt to the ancient Egyptian religion.

I have been studying and writing about Plato in an academic context for more than 12 years now, I’ve read and written about these texts a lot over the years, and I feel a very deep philosophical affinity with Plato’s philosophy. Though a rationalized mysticism, Plato preserves the knowledge of mythic traditions and mystery cults. In addition to my own knowledge and experience working with this philosophical material, I took inspiration from the books of the late Algis Uzdavinys, one of my favorite scholars, in the construction of the narrative, specifically his texts The Golden Chain and Orpheus and the Roots of Platonism. I also include citations at the end, citing the sources for these lyrics to give it a bit more scholarly weight. I just finished writing about eleven thousand words on Plato for my PhD thesis concomitantly as I constructed this creative artifact, so sharing this feels like a personal culmination. I hope you enjoy this experimental didactic production! As Socrates relates, philosophy is the best music (Phaedo 61a).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1_DeeQ3YLE

Lyrics and citations:

I ascend and remember again

Drinking from the lake of memory (Phaedo 76a; Meno 85d)

I will regain my philosopher’s wings

I can see them growing (Phaedrus 251c)

And as the sirens sing

In celestial harmony (Republic 617b)

Meeting the gaze of beauty (Symposium 211a-212a)

Unifying with it

Returning to my native star (Timaeus 41d-42c)

In my flying chariot (Timaeus 41e)

I’m regrowing my philosopher’s wings

I grew up in a cave

Prisoners in it enchained

Shadows on the wall

Mistaken for true reality (Republic 514a-515b)

But just outside, the true light shines

Beyond the fleeting illusion of becoming

beyond the simulacrum of materiality

To go there, one must practice philosophy

As preparation for death (Phaedo 67cd)

To overcome the body  (Phaedo 66a-67d; Phaedrus 82c)

So the soul can ascend to the stellar tier

Aiming for immortality (Phaedrus 247b; Symposium 212a)

Imitating the forms,

I merge with them

The eros of wisdom

Through anamnesis, purification and askesis

I attain my divinity

Ascending the heavenly ladder

Perceiving the vision of the soul of beauty

Initiated into its mystery

Never again will I be beguiled

By superficial charms and wiles (Symposium 210d-212a)

Remembering true beauty, my wings begin to grow (Phaedrus 251c)

Returning to my divine abode

Harmony bringing order to the orbits of my soul (Timaeus 47d)

And rhythm my lost sense of measure (Timaeus 46e)

My soul is eternal (Phaedrus 245c)

The seat of understanding

I gain peace and understanding

By gleaning eternal wisdom

Only momentarily forgotten

The sun bestows the ability to see  (Republic 508b)

The highest knowledge is noesis (Republic 511b)

The good is what it stems from (Republic 508e)

So I make my return to the divine kingdom

I ascend and remember again

Drinking from the lake of memory

I have regrown my philosopher’s wings

In the noetic realm I’m soaring

And as the sirens sing

In celestial harmony

Meeting the gaze of beauty

Unifying with it

I’ve returned to my native star

In my flying chariot

I’ve regrown my philosopher’s wings

 The human was once an androgyny,

Says Aristophanes (Symposium 189d)

Round sphere (Symposium 189e-190a)

Torn asunder by Zeus (Symposium 190d)

And left to wander

Seeking wholeness (Symposium 191b-d)

I learned about Atlantis from an Egyptian priest (Critias 108d-110b)

Love is a mighty daimon (Symposium 203a)

And divine madness (Phaedrus 256d)

Love joins one’s soul with the gods and intelligible beauty

Time a moving image of eternity (Timaeus 37d)

Article my bf wrote abt absurdism and Camus, would love to hear thoughts/feedback on it, check it out if you want to!

https://open.substack.com/pub/atmidnightalltheagents/p/absurdism-isnt-absurd?r=2eypst&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

Follow us here:
https://www.reddit.com/r/InstitutionalCritique/

In art, institutional critique is the systematic inquiry into the workings of art institutions, such as galleries and museums, and is most associated with the work of artists like Michael Asher, Marcel Broodthaers, Daniel Buren, Andrea Fraser, John Knight (artist), Adrian Piper, Fred Wilson, and Hans Haacke and the scholarship of Alexander Alberro, Benjamin H. D. Buchloh, Birgit Pelzer, and Anne Rorimer.

Institutional critique takes the form of temporary or nontransferable approaches to painting and sculpture, architectural alterations and interventions, and performative gestures and language intended to disrupt the otherwise transparent operations of galleries and museums and the professionals who administer them.

A lot of more recent theorists have been been using french/continental thought to create new theories of power, militancy and action. Virno, Guatarri, Negri, Deleuze, Foucault, Bourdieu, Bifo, are all used in contemporary art criticism.

I'm looking for non fiction books where the author wasn't aware of Deleuze or Foucault or Baudrillard but their works ended up revealing insights that have a nature similar to the works of either of the three philosopher I mentioned

Hi there,

I am a PhD student, also a folk-singer/musician endeavoring to transform philosophy and esotericism into music. I have for you an alchemical poem by the great German Romantic poet-philosopher-mage Novalis that I have rendered into musical form; I also provide a commentary at the end of the video, illuminating the alchemical and magical references within it.

The effect that Novalis sought to achieve with his poem "Astralis" was nothing less than the completion of the alchemical work, the hieros gamos conjunctio, the unification of the realms of life and death, personal and transcendent, past and future. At the time that Novalis wrote it, he knew he was dying. His true love, Sophie Kuhn, had died a few years previously. While in outward life he had moved on, even becoming engaged to Julie Charpentier, in his inner life, he had not, composing extensive poetry about Sophie. To him, Sophie had been a personal instantiation of Sophia, and had become a mediatrix to the beyond. Privately, he confessed to friends in letters that whilst he felt with Julie more loved than ever before, he would prefer death, in the company of his true beloved. Not much later, his wish would be granted, death ushering him to an early grave.

In the "Astralis" poem, Astralis is the alchemical progeny born from the kiss of the characters of Heinrich and Matilde, who are literary representations of Novalis and Sophie. Like Sophie, in Heinrich von Ofterdingen, Matilde has also met an early death; the unfinished novel has Heinrich undertaking an Orphic and alchemical journey. She is his soul, also the soul of the world. A love that overcomes death, Astralis presents a creation myth of the new world engendered by love.

Featuring images from alchemical manuscripts animated by me and a slew of stop motion sequences created by yours truly, including of a collection of bones that I found in a lake.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=soaVmA-dh8k

https://open.substack.com/pub/atmidnightalltheagents/p/utopia-as-a-predicament?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=23h2fr Would love to hear feedback/thoughts on it, check it out if you want to!

A paper that explores the relation of the Yoneda Lemma in Category Theory to the structure of Existence and Being (Plato's Theory of Forms) has been posted https://www.academia.edu/115745588/Existence_Mathematics_Being with its companion piece https://www.academia.edu/116150118/Binary_Expression_of_Existence. For those interested in Ontology and the nature of Existence thought about in terms of mathematics these papers might be worth a look.

Hi there,

I am a PhD student, also a folk-singer/musician endeavoring to transform philosophy into music. Novalis’s unfinished masterwork Heinrich von Ofterdingen was originally envisioned by Novalis as a musical—so I had to turn it into music! The song I present to you is a folk-style rendition on a ukulele that draws from some of my favorite parts in the novel. It opens with Fable singing a celebration of the founding of the kingdom of eternity, Sophia as priestess of hearts. It also portrays Fable's encounter with the Sphinx in a scene that was inspired by Goethe's fairy tale The Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily. In the final section of the song, the son of the naturalist finds the mysterious red carbuncle of the Princess in the forest; it is sparkling red with mysterious ciphers on the converse side-- the stone of the heart. Novalis’s poetry is filled with alchemical, mythic and esoteric references to the trained eye; this song is a homage to Novalis's genius—in my own personal estimation, Heinrich von Ofterdingen is the greatest poetic work ever penned. You have to experience it to understand! Hope you enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FO2HSbK7BSE