Johannes A. Niederhauser

Robert Musil’s The Man Without Qualities“Without doubt the greatest writing, ranking with the finest our epoch has to offer.” — Thomas MannUlrich, the protagonist of The Man Without Qualities, is a figure we are all familiar with. A man of means and extraordinary talent living in Vienna on the eve of the First World War, he has already been successful as a soldier, a mathematician and an engineer. Women find him irresistible. Society opens every door. Yet none of it seems like it adds up to anything. He decides to “take a year’s leave from his life” and step back from all the things he could become to figure out if there’s anything he actually wants to be.But he quickly discovers the problem is bigger than him. All around him sense of direction is dissolving. Something is ending — or has already ended. People still go to the opera, and raise toasts to progress, but a whole way of life is on the verge of collapse, and nobody seems to notice or to know what to do.Sound familiar? We’re not studying a quirky character from Vienna of 1913, but rather you in 2026. Gumbrecht is teaching a live online course on The Man Without Qualities this April! Very limited places remaining. You can apply here. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit halkyon.substack.com

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit halkyon.substack.com

I’m reading again from Onians’ excellent work “The Origins of European Thought.”Also, for a limited time Offer (pun intended!) you may use coupon KAIROS for 25% off all my philosophy courses here. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit halkyon.substack.com

Cultivate your attention this year This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit halkyon.substack.com

Here is a link to my Faust course. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit halkyon.substack.com

Analytic philosopher Peter Unger in 2014 declared that analytic philosophy is mostly if not entirely devoted to empty ideas that have no bearing on reality whatsoever. Not only are they empty in this regard however. They are also empty in themselves. This, in turn, makes them sort of monetary. Like money, analytic formal logic can randomly be applied to any given context (thereby destroying the context and content). Here is the piece by Ellie referred to in the video. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit halkyon.substack.com

Frictionless design is everywhere around us, drawing us into its interfaces, silently habituating us into relinquishing our attention for optimal user engagement. Not only the digital spaces we inhabit also the analogue is increasingly subjected to be frictionless. This denial of being, of the negativity inherent in being obliterates memory, history, time. How can we think and act to escape this?Philosophy of Health CoursePlato on Beauty Course This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit halkyon.substack.com

Houlgate’s scholarly approach to Hegel can be described as a “revised-metaphysical” interpretation of Hegel, which underscores the immanent, presuppositionless development of speculative thought in Hegel’s system. This reading challenges influential critiques by thinkers like Martin Heidegger, Jacques Derrida, and Gilles Deleuze, who accuse Hegel of adhering to a predetermined conception of being. Houlgate argues instead that Hegel’s logic unfolds dynamically, free from foundational assumptions, and he extends this analysis to connections between Hegel, Heidegger, and Derrida on the deconstruction of “essence” or “ground.”At his new online course at my Halkyon Academy across two lecture seminars Professor Stephen Houlgate will provide a profound introduction into the opening of Hegel’s Science of Logic. Where thought begins with pure being, passes through nothing, and unfolds into becoming. We shall see why this “presuppositionless” start matters, how the “dialectical method” really works, and what follows from this for ontology, logic, and metaphysics. Along the way, you’ll also be able to situate the passages within the legacies of Kant, Parmenides, and Heraclitus while practicing line-by-line interpretation.Follow this link to enrol in the course. Live seminar lectures will take place on November 25 & December 9. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit halkyon.substack.com

In a letter to his mother from October 1798 Friedrich Hölderlin explains his reasons for having left his position as a private tutor with a wealthy family in Frankfurt. According to the young poet the degradation of tutors to mere servants and the transactional relationship that results from this view diminishes severely the possibility of genuine Bildung. Learn more about Hölderlin’s Poetic Idealism and his idea of leisurely being at my German Idealism course. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit halkyon.substack.com

Aleksandr Dugin, a Russian political theorist known for the Fourth Political Theory, and Nick Land, a British philosopher linked to accelerationism, engage in a robust debate on modernity and philosophy. They touch on the implications of Dugin's anti-Western stance and Land's accelerationism. Topics such as Heidegger's ontological structures, the tensions between freedom and necessity, and the critique of liberalism are dissected. The discourse even delves into eschatology, concluding with a witty exchange on the moral weight of end-times narratives.