MACMILLAN Towards a Phenomenological Axiology: Discovering What Matters

About the Author Roberta De Monticelli is currently Full Professor for Philosophy of Personhood at San Raffaele University, Milan, Italy. She has been Full Professor of Modern and Contemporary Philosophy at the University of Geneva, Switzerland (1989-2004). She is Chief Editor of  “Phenomenology and Mind”. Among her books: L’avenir de la phénoménologie (1997) and L'ascèse philosophique - Phénoménologie et Platonisme (1995). Product Description This book attempts to open up a path towards a phenomenological theory of values (more technically, a phenomenological axiology). By drawing on everyday experience, and dissociating the notion of value from that of tradition, it shows how emotional sensibility can be integrated to practical reason. This project was prompted by the persuasion that the fragility of democracy, and the current public irrelevance of the ideal principles which support it, largely depend on the inability of modern philosophy to overcome the well-entrenched skepticism about the power of practical reason. The book begins with a phenomenology of cynical consciousness, continues with a survey of still influential theories of value rooted in 20th century philosophy, and finally offers an outline of a bottom-up axiology that revives the anti-skeptical legacy of phenomenology, without ignoring the standards set by contemporary metaethics. Review “Confronted with the confusions and urgencies inherited from the twentieth century, Roberta De Monticelli’s theoretical effort to reconsider the distinction between philosophy and sophistry and to defend the axiological foundations of moral responsibility and verification enlightens us as to the route to follow. A handbook of intellectual and moral survival for our times!”―Professor Emmanuel Faye, Université de Rouen Normandie, France“A case for values in a world of facts, a return to Socrates in the land of disenchantment, a plea for philosophy in a time of challenges: a passionate message for everyone to ponder, realists and antirealists alike.”― Achille Varzi, Professor of Logic and Metaphysics, Columbia University, New York, USA From the Back Cover This book attempts to open up a path towards a phenomenological theory of values (more technically, a phenomenological axiology). By drawing on everyday experience, and dissociating the notion of value from that of tradition, it shows how emotional sensibility can be integrated to practical reason. This project was prompted by the persuasion that the fragility of democracy, and the current public irrelevance of the ideal principles which support it, largely depend on the inability of modern philosophy to overcome the well-entrenched skepticism about the power of practical reason. The book begins with a phenomenology of cynical consciousness, continues with a survey of still influential theories of value rooted in 20th century philosophy, and finally offers an outline of a bottom-up axiology that revives the anti-skeptical legacy of phenomenology, without ignoring the standards set by contemporary metaethics.