Justifying Our Existence : : An Essay in Applied Phenomenology / / Graeme Nicholson.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter UTP eBook-Package Backlist 2000-2015
• VerfasserIn: Nicholson, Graeme,
• Place / Publishing House: Toronto : : University of Toronto Press, , [2016]; ©2009
• Year of Publication: 2016
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource

In his magnum opus Being in Time (1927), Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) argued that individuals have assumed that their existence is "a given," when in actual fact they simply have the ability to be. Justifying Our Existence examines the ways in which human beings attempt to calm their existential concerns by magnifying and proving their existence through phenomena such as self-righteousness, careerism, nationalism, and religion. Using remarkably accessible and concise writing, Graeme Nicholson provides a close reading of Heidegger's methods to indicate how his work has a practical application for existential concerns. Justifying Our Existence shows how phenomenology can be used to foreground existence, while also providing startling insights into human behaviour, the motivation behind many of our social systems, as well as one of the twentieth century's most important philosophers.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- 1. INTRODUCTION -- 2. THE ABILITY TO BE -- 3. MAGNIFYING THE SELF -- 4. JUSTIFYING THE SELF -- 5. MAGNIFYING THE COMMUNITY -- 6. JUSTIFYING THE COMMUNITY -- 7. A SPIRITUAL EXISTENCE -- 8. CONCLUSION -- Notes -- Index