Introducing Eidorexia

Aristotle declared “All men by nature desire to know.” This was the first sentence to his work on “first philosophy”, the Being of beings, of what became known as his Metaphysics. Over two thousand years later, we are still unpacking the complexities of this statement.

All men / by nature / desire / to know.

Does everyone?

Is it natural?

Where does this desire come from?

What does it mean to know?

Philosophy has circled around this sentence since.

Nietzsche on the will to truth as a concealed will to power, the Übermensch.

Heidegger on “Being as intelligibility” versus the question of the meaning of Being, poetic thinking, Being-in-the-world.

Girard on the logos of Heraclitus versus Paul, the scapegoat mechanism, the origin of meaning.

Jonas on gnosis and pistis.

Kierkegaard on existentialism and the leap of faith.

Bloom on the aesthetic sublime and misinterpretation.

Emerson on the individual.

Nishitani on nihilism, nothingness, and Buddhism.

Bataille on sacrifice.

Kant and Hegel on reason, intelligibility, normativity, and freedom.

…

French theory and the meaninglessness of meaning

Liberalism and democracy, fascism and paganism.

Technology, modernity, meaning, and language.

Analytic and interpretive philosophy.

Philosophia might just be ideology, the masking of eidorexia, the appetite for knowledge. Metaphysics - the desire to know - a neurosis, born of a trauma, a wound in our being. Modernity, a sickness. The cure? Unreason. Poetry. Nothing. The leap of faith. Resoluteness. The negative. The unintelligible. Sacrifice. Self-sacrifice. Existence. Wisdom. The sublime. Power.

Subscribe to be notified of new posts.