Work · Science & Human Sciences
An Essay on Man
The human being as “animal symbolicum” – a summary of the philosophy of culture written in exile.
Introduction
Cassirer wrote the book in English at Yale, at the request of readers who wanted a short account of his philosophy; it appeared in 1944, the year before his death. The first part asks what a human being is and draws on the biologist Jakob von Uexküll: every animal has a circle of receptors and effectors, but humans have added a third link, the symbolic system, and live in a symbolic universe rather than a merely physical one. The second part surveys myth and religion, language, art, history and science as symbolic forms. The book became Cassirer’s most widely read work and a standard introduction to the philosophy of culture.
Connections
Builds on
- The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms1923 · Ernst Cassirer
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