The Link #23 - Letters to the Editor

I am nearing the end of my studies, with only a thesis left to write. After several different ideas, ranging from economic and environmental problems to issues arising out of my undergraduate thesis on mysticism, I am once again drawn to working with K. For the moment I seem to be pursuing the notion of freedom as talked and written about by K. I want to compare his views with those of several philosophers, mainly Heidegger, Wittgenstein and possibly Sartre.

The past few months have been spent academically reading philosophy, mainly Kant, Schopenhauer, Hegel, Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Heidegger, Wittgenstein, and Sartre. To my great surprise, I find myself in disagreement with Raymond Martin’s opinion that there is no real point of intersection between K and the philosophical world because K does not suggest theories. If I remember correctly, according to Martin fruitful comparisons between K and philosophy end with Hume (who also questions the notion of a self). In my opinion, they start with Hume.

The reason for my disagreement with Martin may be due to the fact that he has been trained in the analytic, Anglophone tradition of philosophy (which tends to skip anything between Hume and Frege), while my readings are mainly in the continental, French and German, tradition. I find that most of the writings of these philosophers relate directly to matters raised by K, from Kant’s and Schopenhauer’s Transcendental Idealism limiting what we can know and how we can know it, to Heidegger’s and Sartre’s explorations of being and choice. Surprisingly, Wittgenstein’s insights into language and psychology shed new light on K’s own insights in these areas. K’s main concern was of course transformation, and interestingly enough, this is also the main concern of the existential philosophers, as well as of Wittgenstein — though admittedly in a different manner.

This is not to say that these philosophers agree with K,or among themselves. Not at all. But what is interesting to me is that they all have things to say to one another. They offer solutions to the problems of life, solutions in one’s way of being. They are definitely not merely concerned with proposing theories. They are talking about a shift in one’s way of being, even if they disagree exactly as to what that shift is. These areas of disagreement fascinate me; out of them emerge challenges to the philosophers, to K, and to myself in the pursuit of this life path.

Willem Zwart
July 2003