Projects / Programmes
Philosophical Investigations
January 1, 2015
- December 31, 2021
| Code |
Science |
Field |
Subfield |
| 6.10.00 |
Humanities |
Philosophy |
|
| Code |
Science |
Field |
| H001 |
Humanities |
Philosophy |
| Code |
Science |
Field |
| 6.03 |
Humanities |
Philosophy, Ethics and Religion |
Žižek, philosophy, psychoanalysis, diagnosis of the time, ecology, bioethics, social justice, economy, neuroscience, religion, sport
Researchers (32)
Organisations (1)
Abstract
The research programme proposed is a fruitful and meaningful continuation of the programme Philosophical Investigations, financed and carried out in the years 2009-2014. In the field of philosophy, the programme excels in the value of a number of vital indicators: the number of researchers and bibliographic units (published research work), international reputation of its researchers as well as the impact on the scientific, social and public space. The specificity and decisive advantage of the research group is the scope of topics covering all major periods from the history of philosophy, its chief virtue being the multifariousness as well as the balanced character of its approaches and impacts: the researchers publish their work in the Slovenian and in foreign languages, writing strict scientific as well as more popular works, evincing topical flexibility between pure philosophy and interdisciplinary approach, reflecting both on world events and national identity, addressing both European and Non-European philosophies, upholding academic tradition as well as entering the public space with their philosophical insights, and lastly, evincing intense activity in education, editorship and translation.
In the last five-year period of financing, the programme has set its specific research goal to reflect emphatically on contemporaneity. Undoubtedly, the comprehensive bibliography of the researchers proves that the goal has been more than successfully achieved. The topic at the same time provides the guideline for further research work, which will in the next period concentrate on the continuous deepening of and responding to globally most prominent achievements in philosophy and its history, while at the same time, in witnessing the paradoxes of recent social and technological developments, developing the necessary conceptual tools for explicating the ground structure of the contemporary world. Slavoj Žižek has rightfully gained world-wide reputation for being theoretically one of the most acute, charismatic, influential as well as concrete diagnostician of contemporaneity. In his book Living in the End Times, he identifies four basic issues of contemporaneity, naming them the four riders of the apocalypse: global ecological crisis, effects of bio-genetic revolution, disproportionality of the economy system (including intellectual property, struggle for natural resources, water and food) and global expansion of social divisions and exclusions. On the basis of this diagnosis, Žižek thinks towards the possibilities of a new beginning. The four coordinates and solution proposals articulated will provide the theoretical as well as factual and socially engaged starting point of the research work for the next period of research. More than obviously, the programme group displays special aptitude for the research, not least because it includes researchers who specialize in the topics of ecology, bioethics, World Ethos, the idea of social justice, economy, neuroscience, religion and sport.
Significance for science
The scientific importance of the investigations of the proposed programme is double in its nature: the research work is obliged to simultaneously draw attention to the development of the world philosophy as well as to strive for its own independent production and creativity on the global level. The programme “Philosophical Investigations” thus on the one hand serves to encourage the transfer of foreign compendia of knowledge, theoretical achievements of the global knowledge society into the Slovenian space, and on the other hand to affirm and consolidate Slovenian philosophy in its global recognition. So far, both tasks have been more than successfully fulfilled, since the Department of Philosophy of the Faculty of Arts of the Ljubljana University proves to be one of the largest and most recognizable humanistic study programmes in Slovenia, with a long and well-nourished tradition of excellence and a high level of scientific research; most importantly, however, among various sciences in the Slovenian university and research sphere, Slovenian philosophy is quite probably a science which has gained most prominent global recognition; particularly bearing in mind the interdisciplinary fruitful relationship between philosophy and psychoanalysis, an original Slovenian project as the innovation of the Ljubljana Lacanian School (S. Žižek, M. Dolar).
Despite the broad variety of methodological approaches, present in every strand, all research approaches nevertheless betray a high level of scientific competence, quite comparable to the present conditions of philosophical research in specific fields, be it the currently highly popular speculative realism (Meillassoux, Grant, Brassier, Toscano, Harman), the younger generations of the Frankfurt School (Habermas, Honneth), theory of subjectivity and event, the philosophy emphatically reflecting on contemporaneity (Badiou) or the phenomenological horizons of meaning (Waldenfels, Held). As the bibliography of the researchers patently shows, certain researchers of the programme group belong among the very top of world philosophy, which in itself makes the research programme most legitimately part of the global development of philosophy.
The main emphasis of the research remains the Ljubljana Lacanian School, because its two most prominent representatives, the programme director Slavoj Žižek and Mladen Dolar, with their research hours, remain the main proponents of the research group. The interrelationship between philosophy and psychoanalysis gives the philosophical horizon a new edge, at the same time providing a clear starting point for other researchers. The research group offers the strongest combination of scientific excellence and its fruitful relationship with various non-philosophical fields of knowledge and social life: the relationship between philosophy and sport being tackled by Lev Kreft, between philosophy and economy by Zdravko Kobe, between philosophy and Non-European spiritual traditions by Maja Milčinski, between philosophy and materialism Enlightenment and atheism by Miran Božovič, between human and animal mind by Borut Cerkovnik, between philosophy and ecology and bioethics by Igor Pribac and Luka Omladič, between philosophy and neuroscience by Andrej Ule and Olga Markič, between philosophy and cosmology and modern physics by Marko Uršič, between philosophy and music by Franci Zore, between philosophy and literature and the deep psychology by Janko Lozar Mrevlje, between philosophy and women studies by Eva Dolar Bahovec, and between philosophy and scientific realism by as well as the status of science by Jure Simoniti.
Due to the limited space of the application form, only some of the numerous scientific goals of the proposed research programme can be listed:
1. PHILOSOPHY OF UTOPISTICS IN THE AFTER-METAPHYSICAL ERA. The research of Cvetka Hedžet Toth starts from the basic differentiation between two key concepts of »culture« and »society«, which have clearly m
Significance for the country
The programme “Philosophical Investigations” is one of the most successful research programme teams in Slovenia. In view of its publications in leading academic journals and publishing houses, Slovenian philosophy has become one of the highest recognition factors for Slovenia in the world. The internationally recognized Ljubljana Lacanian School, which is of high importance to the cultural development of Slovenia, has unbendingly put Slovenia on the map of world philosophy.
Because of their close relatedness to pedagogical work, the research results will be directly involved in the educational process, which offers an additional value of the programme for sustainable development. The research programme group members have also actively taken part in the reformation of educational programmes in accordance with the Bologna Reform at the Department of Philosophy, Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana. They established new programs from all university study levels. Among other things, research programme group members also cooperate in the additional and permanent education of high-school philosophy teachers.
In order to avoid unnecessary overgeneralizations, we would like to direct the attention to five problem fields, quite concretely explicated by the programme group members, bearing witness to the importance of the research for the development of society, and betraying acute topicality for contemporary and socially relevant topics:
1. THE STATUS OF POSTMODERN ART IN CONTEMPORARY SOCIETY. The research work done by Lev Kreft shall investigate the issue of the social and institutional role of art after modernism. The issue is actually highly relevant for the history of art as well as for the future framework of philosophy of art. The issue itself is clearly definable from the institutional viewpoint: there exist museums of modern art, and museums of contemporary art are increasingly growing in numbers, yet postmodern art, which proved of utmost importance for the late 70s and 80s of the previous century, has failed to gain an institutional status, falling into an awkward in-between position between modern and contemporary art.
2. SPORT BETWEEN ETHICS AND AESTHETICS. The research work of Lev Kreft in the field of philosophy of sport shall concentrate on the development of a theory that relates aesthetics and ethics already in philosophy in general (Epicurus, Gassendi, Diderot, Jean-Marie Guyau etc.) or the so-called hedonistic ethics/aesthetics, which conceive of ethics on the ground of following one's own feeling of pleasure rather than as a set of doctrinarian set of prescriptions and rules. The sport (as claimed by the aesthetician Wolfgang Welsch) has replaced its ethical function for the aesthetical one, and the arts, on the other hand, have moved from the realm of aesthetics to the realm of ethics. From the perspective of philosophy, therefore, the key question can be formulated in the following manner: can both ethics and aesthetics have a common groundwork (in this case a hedonistic one)? The question is relevant for aesthetics and philosophy of art as well, especially in relation to contemporary art, which is, all its ethical engagement notwithstanding, being criticized for no longer being able to produce aesthetic pleasure.
3. ETHICS OF ECOLOGY. The researcher Luka Omladič shall investigate the ethical dimension of climate changes, the practical goal of the research being a proposal of universal ethical starting points on climate changes to be adopted by the UNESCO, where the research group is actively involved in The World Commission on the Ethics of Scientific Knowledge and Technology (COMEST).
4. THE ROLE OF ANIMALS IN THE HUMAN WORLD; AN ATTEMPT AT PROVIDING A PHILOSOPHICAL THEORY OF ANIMAL KNOWING, LANGUAGE AND THINKING. On the basis of Wittgenstein's theory of language, Borut Cerkovnik shall endeavour to explain the behaviour of animals as a following of rules, although not as a behaviour implying rules, whic
Most important scientific results
Annual report
2015,
interim report
Most important socioeconomically and culturally relevant results
Annual report
2015,
interim report
