Gabriel Marcel | On the Ontological Mystery (part 1) | Existentialist Philosophy & Literature

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10 жыл бұрын

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In this video, we start examining a particularly important essay by Gabriel Marcel, "On the Ontological Mystery," originally given as a talk by Marcel in 1933 to the Societe d'Etudes Philosophiques, then published in the volume, The Philosophy of Existentialism.
I also refer at points to an outline of this essay, "On the Position of the Ontological Mystery and the Concrete Approaches to it", which can be found in Marcel's book, Being and Having.
Marcel begins with reflections on the "sense of the ontological", i.e. the sense for being, and why it is lacking or underdeveloped in many in modern society, in which people tend to become identified with their functions. He then moves into discussion of the "ontological need" and what reflection upon it in light of everyday examples can yield us. In following out questions about being, we find that we ourselves are not simply outside observers of the questions, but end up involved in the questions, which bear upon our very being and modes of being.
This leads Marcel to the distinction between Mystery and Problem. A problem can be resolved and articulated by some definite technique, and it does not involve the person examining it in the problem itself, which is why the realm of problems is the realm of objectivity. But, deeper than this, and concerning much more momentous matters, is the domain of mystery, where the "problem encroaches on its own data," rendering it no longer a problem, but something more complex, requiring commitment and engagement by the human person.
In fleshing out this distinction between problem and mystery, Marcel briefly discusses four examples: the relation between body and soul; the "problem" of evil; love; and chance but fateful encounters
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Пікірлер: 57

@Tshirat_ 4 ай бұрын

For me, this really hard to grasp. What a unpredicated feeling of philosophizing. And, thank you, pakde 🙏

@GregoryBSadler 4 ай бұрын

You're welcome

@tuomasansio 5 жыл бұрын

The Problem-Mystery opposition reminds me of Kierkegaard's Subjective-Objective/abstract dichotomy, where in the subjective sphere the existing subject is always tied to his/her own self, (s)he always participates as Marcel would put it. The objective or the abstract thinking on the other hand tries to get as far from the existing subject as possible, although one can already see the paradox in to which this kind of attitude leads.

@GregoryBSadler 5 жыл бұрын

Yes, there are likely connections there

@BarrySchoedel76 10 жыл бұрын

Easter is a good day to remember Marcel. Thanks for brining him back to my attention.

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

new video in the Existentialist Philosophy and Literature series

@UnslavedPodcast 5 жыл бұрын

superb breakdown of an exceptionally important thinker.

@vansalzburg4666 7 жыл бұрын

Thank you for this video, Gregory. This helps me to refresh my studies in existentialism specifically on Gabriel Marcel.

@GregoryBSadler 7 жыл бұрын

You're very welcome

@TODR34M 10 жыл бұрын

Thanks again for your videos. You do a great job at expressing these concepts.

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

You're very welcome!

@BarrySchoedel76 10 жыл бұрын

I know this video is about philosophy but it made me think of how even theology as it became primarily scholastic in some ways was operating at the level of abstraction about problems rather than the mystery of being as such. Especially as it has become a "career" and is so easily reduced to one among many other ways of making a buck. The divorce between monastic and scholastic theology is an example of this. Not that many monks aren't scholastics, but the modern temptation is to be a theologian who operates upon, writes about problems - what is interesting about this, is that it doesn't resolve the potential for being to be love, or gratitude, or surrender as a creature. In the Rule of St. Benedict it says that monks seek God, that is they seek the necessary Being. With Augustine, as we are lost in problems, we have the same nagging sense, "late have I loved thee." If a theologian must first be a person who meditates and prays with and upon the Word - being transfigured into a type of Christ, it seems a philosopher must first be someone who be someone who seeks the truth of the mystery of being, and not lose sight of this, that the truth of being, which is a mystery, can, paradoxically, be intentionally participated in and realized.

@giocaballero4766 5 жыл бұрын

thank you for all your work!!!!!!

@existentialexplorations4900 8 жыл бұрын

I've done some close and thorough reading of some of Marcel's work, I never go out without taking a copy of "The Mystery of Being" part 1 with me, and appreciate your clear exposition of "On The Ontological Mystery". I particularly found useful the implication you highlighted that Marcel's notion of mystery obligates each philosopher to include it in their philosophizing and move away from their tendency to treat philosophical questions as objective problems. It have thought this should be obvious to philosophers but it's just as obvious that it's been overlooked. A good video. I'm looking forward to watching part 2. Thanks.

@GregoryBSadler 8 жыл бұрын

+Soren BFG Yes -- there's various ways of framing that issue, e.g. philosophy as practical, or as a way of life (as you see Aristotle, Cicero, Epictetus, etc. talking about it) -- but, you're right, it's quite easy for philosophers or for other theorists to lose sight of that.

@existentialexplorations4900 8 жыл бұрын

Hi, Thanks for your reply, I appreciate your comments. I have tended to focus on the more modern writers such as Marcel, whose philosophical approach is very appealing to me, especially with his use of delineating from particular examples taken from concretely lived experience, but also Kierkegaard , and Josef Pieper. I've always had a bit of a bent for writers like Kafka and Camus as well but resist the bleak outlook of their main characters. I find the faith and hope offered by Marcel and Kierkegaard to be more rounded. I would actually love to find a way of presenting the issue which would speak to our times. I so often regret that great minds like Marcel are no longer with us to explore this issue as it relates to our current circumstances. Marcel had great foresight but I would still like to hear from him now as the information revolution swamps over us. The formal logic and analytic and linguistic philosophies which dominates some of the university's, and much of public life, just doesn't cut it.

@sammondroz6 4 жыл бұрын

Incredibly helpful. Thank you!

@GregoryBSadler 4 жыл бұрын

Glad it was useful for you!

@matthewmaw8418 4 жыл бұрын

Started looking into Personalism recently after reading Kreeft’s The Platonic Tradition. As always, searched your videos and wasn’t left wanting. Thank you for your work!

@GregoryBSadler 4 жыл бұрын

Yes, I definitely need to do more on Marcel

@SeekersofUnity 4 жыл бұрын

Fabulous work

@GregoryBSadler 4 жыл бұрын

Thanks!

@jamescollins609 10 жыл бұрын

Thanks for posting this video. I have thoroughly enjoyed all your videos. I'm new to Marcel's thought, and am currently reading his "Man Against Mass Society" where he dwells on the issue of man being stripped of his being, and forcefully conformed to mass--and thoughtless--society. After watching your video I feel quite compelled to read his "Philosophy of Existentialism".

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

Man Against Mass Society is an excellent work. Philosophy of Existentialism is a set of essays from various times, given you an idea about what Marcel's version of it looks like -- and his criticisms of Sartre's version in particular

@kristinaamelong1429 3 жыл бұрын

Wow, well done

@GregoryBSadler 3 жыл бұрын

Thanks

@objectiveirony 10 жыл бұрын

Good analysis of Marcel's work

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

Thanks! I've been looking forward to getting to film some videos on Marcel -- one of my favorite thinkers

@ZiemniakZKosmosu 10 жыл бұрын

Gregory B. Sadler I've been looking forward to looking that video :). Thank you dr Sadler!

@JamesParus 10 жыл бұрын

Is it a good way to start a Sunday morning by watching philosophy videos. (8am). Hmmm... good vid.

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

Thanks! Nice to be part on one's day

@dmitryandreyev8579 10 жыл бұрын

thank you so much for this. I'd had a deep fall from grace and this video now has me hanging onto grace by a thread.

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

You're welcome. I'm honored that it could be what was needed at the time, existentially, rather than just yet another lecture. But, that's because Marcel is so good. I'll level with you as well: My own spiritual life is often pretty arid, and I've spent enough time falling and through grace getting back up that I've made quite little time for any real growth in grace myself -- something I'm unhappy about. So. . . Marcel, and other people like him who both live the life of the mind and a life of grace in a world which they look at very realistically (i.e. as a broken world) do offer us all -- if we allow ourselves even a bit of openness to it -- the chance to realize our need for, and the chance to actually accept when offered, the grace that it is available to us. There's a lot more to be said about this, but I'll just say this: Saint Anselm, who for me has been one of those people, gives us a model for understanding this in his De Concordia -- God provides the grace in every case, but. . . in most cases, the grace offered to person A is offered through the cooperative action of person B, who used the grace they received to choose that action. And, the chain can go on and on, very far back. We human beings get to make our distinctive contributions in the process, but God is involved throughout the process. You might say that not only is there not an incompatability between human choice and action and the working of divine grace, it's actually (at least for Anselm) how human action and choice is most fully human.

@dmitryandreyev8579 10 жыл бұрын

I am curious if you ever take offense from some of the atheistic thinkers you teach. For me, ironically, I have experienced the most openness from atheists. It actually challenged some of my spiritual views.

@dmitryandreyev8579 10 жыл бұрын

I think that my view of God is closest to Rilke. I suppose that breaking with idolatry can bring one closer to a superior intelligence if it exists. This was very liberating and refreshing but I think that the lectures on Rilke and Camus will probably stick with me more. Did Camus criticise Marcel, by the way? I could imagine him doing so.

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

I don't know that Camus actually engaged Marcel in any substantive way. I do know that Sartre did.

@dmitryandreyev8579 10 жыл бұрын

I don't know if you saw my prior comment. If it's too personal to answer, I understand.

@euroroomer 10 жыл бұрын

I've watched the lecture and reviewed pieces here and there a few times. It's great! My main question is regarding 16:03 to 17:18 . You say that we can in some sense "choose" being and that we can "have more of it within our selves in our relation to other beings." It seems weird to me how one can have more or less being. I've taken to heart Heidegger's notion that being is that on the basis of which things are already understood and I can't see how any phenomena could "have more" being than any other phenomena. You later say that being is that which can not be distilled away no matter how much you break something up. This I see and I feel falls in line with being as being that on the basis of which... But this notion of more or less being let alone choosing being assails me. Any clarification? Thank You Stevie

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

There's multiple senses of being -- and Heidegger himself uses "being in multiple senses - precisely why we capitalize it sometimes and othertimes not. There are a number of philosophical perspectives from which it makes sense to speak of having more or less being -- Plato and Aristotle actually speak this was, as do Augustine, Anselm, Aquinas. . . even Descartes. So, although it may feel weird to you, it's not a novel or even unusual conception in the history of ideas. Now, it's good that you say "in some sense choose" -- it's not the same sort of "choice" (which also has multiple senses) as when, say you sit down and choose from a menu at a restaurant. Again, Marcel is not on his own in seeing that there re different types or levels of choice, freedom, determining things -- there, he actually is saying something like Heidegger (or Sartre, or Maritain), and that the fundamental, determinative choice has to do with how we orient ourselves (as a kind of being) in relation to being -- and that this is inherent in the kinds of beings we are, like it or not. You probably would want to read the Marcel essay, which I'm summarizing parts of and explaining -- as I noted, he himself points out that the "that which remains," etc. is not meant to be something like an exact definition, but a stab at explaining what being is, which he points out, is rather tough to do.

@BLaCkKsHeEp 6 жыл бұрын

Prison scene "im not locked in here with you, you locked in here with me!!" - Rorschach. The Watchmen movie

@LegendOfTheIceKing 10 жыл бұрын

This is gonna be a tad funny & ridiculous, but i have a essay but we've only been talking about Gabriel Marcel. However, we have to contrast it (at least partially) to Heidegger. "How does an ontology rooted in Intersubjectivity, change everything?" ^thats literally what the Q. says. But the prof. is basically asking, whats so critical about it in contrast to Heideggers view or def. of ontology. I'm just asking cause we barely covered Heidegger. Only once in class but it didn't go too in depth as to help (me at least). Thanks again for you video & yeah, I'm not asking you to write the paper. lol which I'm sure you're too busy to do but i guess give me a jist of Heideggers view in regards to the question.

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

Well, that's a really vaguely put question. No idea what it would actually mean. You've got my sympathy. . . . . I guess that the thing to think about with Heidegger, on this set of topics (intersubjectivity, other people, etc) is that Dasein -- human existence in its ontological basis -- is by its very nature connected with other people. Heidegger calls it Mit-Dasein -- "being (there) with." Other people can be connected to us through many of the various modes of Dasein that Heidegger sketches in Being and Time. . . . but that probably doesn't help an awful lot, since likely, you guys just hit B&T (which is a tough work) a bit. . . .

@jasonaus3551 5 жыл бұрын

What do you think of Luijpen? I have just stumbled across a copy of his "Existential Phenomenology" I have only read about 10 pages but it is very interesting

@GregoryBSadler 5 жыл бұрын

Haven't read him

@dmitryandreyev8579 10 жыл бұрын

"fragmented and compartmentalised": Is that from the film Waking Life?

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

No. It's just ways of describing a life cut up into portions

@dmitryandreyev8579 10 жыл бұрын

Who said it, again?

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

No idea who first used those terms. They're pretty commonplace for describing that

@MrBstrang 10 жыл бұрын

problem and mystery seem to me not to be differentiated by an objective definition but by a subjects choice, reflection, and understanding. The subject could believe everything is objective problem is this subjective mystery? Maybe I am not thinking within his loose system.

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

You'll definitely want to read Marcel's text, so that you can work with the conception of problem and mystery he's articulating in it. He's not offering an "objective definition" of the distinction between problem and mystery, nor am I saying that he is. It's certainly possible for a human being to think everything is in the realm of objectivity and problems -- that's precisely what Marcel is examining and showing to be insufficient in parts of this essay and throughout his works

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

***** Perhaps you might read his texts before permitting yourself (since that's a choice) to feel he's "insulting and patronizing". . . .

@GregoryBSadler 10 жыл бұрын

Well... like I've made clear, the lecture IS based on Marcel's text. So, the thing to do, if you find you don't like what's being said, would be to actually read Marcel. It probably won't take you all that long. . . . so, why not go there?

@dmitryandreyev8579 9 жыл бұрын

If you ever wanted to post a personal talk on these Encounters, I would love to watch it. Dm.

@GregoryBSadler 9 жыл бұрын

Interesting idea