Ernst Cassirer

Ernst Alfred Cassirer (

After Cohen's death in 1918, Cassirer developed a theory of symbolism and used it to expand phenomenology of knowledge into a more general philosophy of culture. Cassirer was one of the leading 20th-century advocates of philosophical idealism. His most famous work is the Philosophy of Symbolic Forms (1923–1929).

Though his work received a mixed reception shortly after his death, more recent scholarship has remarked upon Cassirer's role as a strident defender of the

Politically, Cassirer supported the liberal German Democratic Party (DDP).^[6] After working for many years as a Privatdozent at the Friedrich Wilhelm University in Berlin, Cassirer was elected in 1919 to the philosophy chair at the newly founded University of Hamburg, where he lectured until 1933, supervising amongst others the doctoral theses of Joachim Ritter and Leo Strauss. On 30 January 1933, the

Cassirer died of a heart attack in April 1945 in New York City. The young rabbi Arthur Hertzberg, who was a student of Cassirer's at Columbia University, conducted the funeral service.^[8] His grave is located in Westwood, New Jersey, on the Cedar Park Beth-El Cemeteries in the graves of the Congregation Habonim. His son, Heinz Cassirer, was also a Kantian scholar.

Other members of his prominent family included the neurologist Richard Cassirer, the publisher and gallery owner Bruno Cassirer and the art dealer and editor Paul Cassirer.

Influences

Donald Phillip Verene, who published some of Cassirer's papers kept at Yale University, gave this overview of his ideas:

"Cassirer as a thinker became an embodiment of Kantian principles, but also of much more, of an overall movement of spirit stretching from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment, and on to Herder’s conception of history, Goethe’s poetry, Wilhelm von Humboldt’s study of the Kavi language, Schelling’s Philosophie Der Mythologie, Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit, and Vischer’s conception of the aesthetic symbol, among many others. Cassirer’s own position is born through a mastery of the whole development of this world of the humanistic understanding, which included the rise of the scientific world view — a mastery evident both in his historical works and in his systematic philosophy."^[9]

Work

History of science

Cassirer's first major published writings were a

In 1929 Cassirer took part in a historically significant encounter with

Cassirer believed that reason's self-realization leads to human liberation. Mazlish (2000)^{[citation needed]}, however, notes that Cassirer in his The Philosophy of the Enlightenment (1932) focuses exclusively on ideas, ignoring the political and social context in which they were produced.

The Logic of the Cultural Sciences

In The Logic of the Cultural Sciences (1942) Cassirer argues that objective and universal validity can be achieved not only in the sciences, but also in practical, cultural, moral, and aesthetic phenomena. Although inter-subjective objective validity in the natural sciences derives from universal laws of nature, Cassirer asserts that an analogous type of inter-subjective objective validity takes place in the cultural sciences.

The Myth of the State

Cassirer's last work, The Myth of the State (1946), was published posthumously; at one level it is an attempt to understand the intellectual origins of

• Leibniz' System in seinem wissenschaftlichen Grundlagen (1902)
• The Problem of Knowledge: Philosophy, Science, and History since Hegel [Das Erkenntnisproblem in der Philosophie und Wissenschaft der neueren Zeit] (1906–1920), English translation 1950 (online edition Archived 2011-06-05 at the Wayback Machine)
• "Kant und die moderne Mathematik." Kant-Studien (1907)
• Substance and Function [Substanzbegriff und Funktionsbegriff] (1910) and Einstein's Theory of Relativity [Einsteinschen Relativitätstheorie ] (1921), English translation 1923 (online edition)
• Freedom and Form [Freiheit und Form] (1916)
• Kant's Life and Thought [Kants Leben und Lehre] (1918), English translation 1981
• Philosophy of Symbolic Forms [Philosophie der symbolischen Formen] (1923–29), English translation 1953–1957
  • Volume One: Language [Erster Teil: Die Sprache] (1923), English translation 1955
  • Volume Two: Mythical Thought [Zweiter Teil: Das mythische Denken] (1925), English translation 1955
  • Volume Three: The Phenomenology of Knowledge [Dritter Teil: Phänomenologie der Erkenntnis] (1929), English translation 1957
• Language and Myth [Sprache und Mythos] (1925), English translation 1946 by Susanne K. Langer
• The Individual and the Cosmos in Renaissance Philosophy [Individuum und Kosmos in der Philosophie der Renaissance] (1927), English translation 1963 by Mario Domandi
• "Erkenntnistheorie nebst den Grenzfragen der Logik und Denkpsychologie." Jahrbücher der Philosophie 3, 31-92 (1927)
• Die Idee der republikanischen Verfassung (1929)
• "Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik. Bemerkungen zu Martin Heideggers Kantinterpretation." Kant-Studien 26, 1-16 (1931)
• Philosophy of the Enlightenment [Die Philosophie der Aufklärung] (1932), English translation 1951
• Determinism and Indeterminism in Modern Physics: Historical and Systematic Studies of the Problem of Causality [Determinismus und Indeterminismus in der modernen Physik] (1936), English translation 1956
• The Logic of the Cultural Sciences [Zur Logik der Kulturwissenschaften] (1942), English translation 2000 by Steve G. Lofts (previously translated in 1961 as The Logic of the Humanities)
• An Essay on Man (written and published in English) (1944) (books.google.com)
• The Myth of the State (written and published in English) (posthumous) (1946) (books.google.com)
• Symbol, Myth, and Culture: Essays and Lectures of Ernst Cassirer, 1935-1945, ed. by Donald Phillip Verene (March 11, 1981)
• Ernst Cassirer: Gesammelte Werke. Hamburger Ausgabe. Electronic Edition. (2016) – The electronic version of the definitive edition of Cassirer's works, published in print by Felix Meiner Verlag, and electronically in the Past Masters series.
• The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms, Vol. 4, The Metaphysics of Symbolic Forms. Edited and translated by John Michael Krois and Donald Philip Verene from manuscripts left after Cassirer's death. Published 1996, New Haven & London: Yale University Press.
• The Warburg Years (1919-1933): Essays on Language, Art, Myth, and Technology. Translated and with an Introduction by S. G. Lofts with A. Calcagno. New Haven & London: Yale University Press.

References

Further reading

• Aubenque, Pierre, et al. "Philosophie und Politik: Die Davoser Disputation zwischen Ernst Cassirer und Martin Heidgger in der Retrospektive." Internationale Zeitschrift für Philosophie, 2: 290-312
• Barash, Jeffrey Andrew. The Symbolic Construction of Reality: The Legacy of Ernst Cassirer (2008) (excerpt and text search)
• Burtt, Edwin Arthur. The Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Physical Science, London: Paul Trencher (2000)
• Eilenberger, Wolfram. Time of the Magicians: The invention of modern thought, 1919–29, Allen Lane (2020)
• Folkvord Ingvild & Hoel Aud Sissel (eds.), Ernst Cassirer on Form and Technology: Contemporary Readings, (2012), Basingstoke, Palgrave MacMillan (
  ISBN 978-0-230-36547-6
  ).
• Friedman, Michael. A Parting of the Ways: Carnap, Cassirer, and Heidegger (2000) (excerpt and text search)
• Gordon, Peter Eli. Continental Divide: Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos (2010)
• Krois, John Michael. Cassirer: Symbolic Forms and History (Yale University Press 1987)
• Lassègue, Jean. Cassirer’s Transformation: From a Transcendental to a Semiotic Philosophy of Forms. Springer, 2020. (Studies in Applied Philosophy, Epistemology and Rational Ethics book series. volume 55) Online
  ISBN 978-3-030-42905-8
• Lipton, David R. Ernst Cassirer: The Dilemma of a Liberal Intellectual in Germany, 1914-1933 (1978)
• Lofts. Steve G. Ernst Cassirer: A "Repetition" of Modernity (2000)
  ISBN 978-0-791-44495-5: at Google Books
• Magerski, Christine. "Reaching Beyond the Supra-Historical Sphere: from Cassirer's Philosophy of Symbolic Forms to Bourdieu's Sociology of Symbolic Forms." ´´Pierre Bourdieu and the Field of Cultural Production.´´ Ed. J. Browitt. University of Delaware Press (2004): 21-29.
• Schilpp, Paul Arthur (ed.). The Philosophy of Ernst Cassirer (1949) archive.org
• Schultz, William. Cassirer & Langer on Myth (2nd ed. 2000) (excerpt and text search)
• Skidelsky, Edward. Ernst Cassirer: The Last Philosopher of Culture (Princeton University Press, 2008), 288 pp. 
  ISBN 978-0-691-13134-4
  .
• Hardy, Anton G. "Symbol Philosophy and the Opening into Consciousness and Creativity" (2014)

External links

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Library resources about
Ernst Cassirer

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• Resources in your library
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• Friedman, Michael. "Ernst Cassirer". In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
• History of the Cassirer Family
• Ernst Cassirer in family context
• Centre for Intercultural Studies
• Works by Ernst Cassirer at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about Ernst Cassirer at Internet Archive
• Newspaper clippings about Ernst Cassirer in the 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBW
• Ernst Cassirer Papers. General Collection, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Yale University.
• Ernst Cassirer Papers - Addition. General Collection, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.