Work · Phenomenology & Hermeneutics
Weak Thought
A collection edited with Pier Aldo Rovatti that gave its name to a programme: philosophy after the end of metaphysics without claims to ultimate foundations.
Introduction
“Weak Thought” appeared in 1983 as a collection of essays edited by Vattimo and Pier Aldo Rovatti, with contributions by Umberto Eco, Maurizio Ferraris and others. The editors’ introduction gave a name to a mood shared after the decline of Marxism and of the great systems: philosophy should no longer seek strong foundations, a final truth or a dialectic that resolves history, but should accept that Being, after Nietzsche and Heidegger, is given only in weakened forms – as tradition, interpretation and memory. Vattimo’s own essay, “Dialectic, Difference, Weak Thought”, outlines this programme. The contributions differ widely; Eco’s essay on the encyclopedia as an alternative to Porphyry’s tree stands at some distance from Vattimo’s Heideggerian line. The book made “pensiero debole” a slogan of Italian philosophical postmodernism and set off a long debate about relativism.
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