Hans Blumenberg 1920 – 1996
Hans Blumenberg was a German philosopher whose work ranged across the history of ideas, philosophy of science, rhetoric, and the theory of myth. His Legitimacy of the Modern Age argued, against Karl Lowith, that modernity is not a secularized Christianity but a genuine self-assertion that reoccupies the questions left open by the late medieval crisis of theology. Work on the Concept of Myth and Paradigms for a Metaphorology developed his thesis that human beings live by metaphor and myth as much as by concept. He held chairs at Hamburg, Giessen, Bochum, and Munster.
Key facts
- Nationality
- German
- Era
- Contemporary
- Movements
- Continental
Selected quotes
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Attributed to Hans Blumenberg:
“The modern age is the reoccupation of positions left vacant by the medieval system.”
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Attributed to Hans Blumenberg:
“Myth is what is repeated.”
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Attributed to Hans Blumenberg:
“Curiosity is the great human motor.”
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Attributed to Hans Blumenberg:
“We can never speak directly about ourselves; only through metaphor.”
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Attributed to Hans Blumenberg:
“Distance from the absolute is the condition of being human.”