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Hans-georg gadamer Biography

Hans-Georg Gadamer

(Marburg, Germany, 1900-Heidelberg, 2002) German philosopher.Hans-Georg Gadamer graduated with a doctoral thesis in philosophy directed by Martin Heidegger in Freiburg (1922).He then taught aesthetics and ethics in his hometown (1933), in Kiel (1934-1935) and again in Marburg, where he was appointed extraordinary professor (1937).Two years later he obtained a chair at the University of Leipzig, to later move to the universities of Frankfurt on the Main (1947-1949) and Heidelberg (1949), where he took over from Karl Jaspers as professor of philosophy.He became a professor emeritus in 1968.

Hans-Georg Gadamer

His most important work, Truth and method.Elements of a philosophical hermeneutic (1960), established the presuppositions and objectives of the hermeneutic current, according to which the world does not exist, but rather different historical meanings of world .Despite the relativism that this conception entails, Gadamer always refers in his writings to an ultimate convergence in which communication and the expression of a meaning is possible.

Truth and method is, at the same time, the most systematic exposition of hermeneutical philosophy and the most significant work of Gadamer; This essay shows his adherence to Heidegger's hermeneutics of being and to Wilhelm Dilthey's philosophy in his analysis of the problem of truth.The history of truth that Gadamer reconstructs is marked, starting from Descartes, by the concept of "adaequatio": the notion of truth is explained, in reality, as a method to achieve the "adequate" correspondence between facts and propositions.Gadamer's task consists, in sharp contrast to this position, in an attempt to describe the real possibilities of the human experience of truth.

The hermeneutical principles that the author elaborates are not limited to the strict philosophical field, but are capable of being applied to disciplines as diverse as sociology or literary criticism.The search for truth requires a redefinition of hermeneutics (interpretation of texts), understanding by such not a mere comprehension technique, even if it is thorough, but a fundamental reflection on the conditions in which all understanding in general is reached.

In this area, the problems that develop around the aesthetic experience acquire particular relevance.According to Gadamer, in this type of experience a circumstance of truth is glimpsed in which the subject of the experience itself is modified.The opposition to philosophical theories in which the notion of truth is identified with the knowledge of the positive sciences is therefore accompanied by a claim for the contribution of truth to those experiences of the subject in contact with the work of art, with the history or personal dialogue.

In the analysis of the legitimacy of such truth, Gadamer's reflection is directed to the process of understanding.Gadamer's thesis, which at this point is explicitly reminiscent of Heidegger, supports the circularity that constitutes understanding.Circularity that is based on the essentially historical character of existence: knowledge, which must then abandon all pretense of objectivity, is carried out within the framework of a certain historical situation in which the influence of tradition is present.This is developed as an interpretive process in which the interpreter and tradition, past and present, have always been in a constant relationship of tension.

With the notion of "fusion of horizons", Gadamer describes this process especially in what has to do with historical understanding: interpreting the past, or even a work or a statement of the interlocutor himself, means understand it on the horizon of the present situation, allowing the present itself to intervene with its own horizon of truth.Gadamer's analysis then turns to the "medium" of such a relationship, language, which instead of being a simple instrument of thought, constitutes the dimension within which man's existence is found and is realized; in it thought itself and the existence of the subject are made concrete: it is, therefore, the supreme horizon of hermeneutical ontology.

Hans-Georg Gadamer He also wrote, among other works, The problem of historical consciousness (1963), Small writings (1967) and Dialogue and dialectic (1980) , a compendium of essays on Plato's dialogues.Throughout his life he polemicized with thinkers such as Jacques Derrida and Jürgen Habermas, among others.The Italian philosopher Riccardo Dottori published his conversations with Gadamer in 2000 under the title L'ultimo dio.Lezioni sul XX Secolo, whose German edition appeared in 2002, weeks before the death of the German philosopher.

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