Factitious Diarrhea
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In
philosophy Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...
, facticity (, ) has multiple meanings — from "factuality" and " contingency" to the intractable conditions of human existence.


Early usage

The term was first used by German philosopher
Johann Gottlieb Fichte Johann Gottlieb Fichte (; ; 19 May 1762 – 29 January 1814) was a German philosopher who became a founding figure of the philosophical movement known as German idealism, which developed from the theoretical and ethical writings of Immanuel Ka ...
(17621814) and has a variety of meanings. It can refer to facts and factuality, as in nineteenth-century
positivism Positivism is a philosophical school that holds that all genuine knowledge is either true by definition or positivemeaning '' a posteriori'' facts derived by reason and logic from sensory experience.John J. Macionis, Linda M. Gerber, ''Soci ...
, but comes to mean that which resists explanation and interpretation in
Wilhelm Dilthey Wilhelm Dilthey (; ; 19 November 1833 – 1 October 1911) was a German historian, psychologist, sociologist, and hermeneutic philosopher, who held Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel's Chair in Philosophy at the University of Berlin. As a polymathi ...
and
Neo-Kantianism In late modern philosophy, neo-Kantianism () was a revival of the 18th-century philosophy of Immanuel Kant. The neo-Kantians sought to develop and clarify Kant's theories, particularly his concept of the thing-in-itself and his moral philosophy ...
. The Neo-Kantians contrasted facticity with ideality, as does
Jürgen Habermas Jürgen Habermas ( , ; ; born 18 June 1929) is a German philosopher and social theorist in the tradition of critical theory and pragmatism. His work addresses communicative rationality and the public sphere. Associated with the Frankfurt S ...
in ''
Between Facts and Norms ''Between Facts and Norms'' () is a 1992 book on deliberative politics by the German political philosopher Jürgen Habermas. The culmination of the project that Habermas began with ''The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere'' in 1962, ...
'' (''Faktizität und Geltung'').


Heidegger

German philosopher
Martin Heidegger Martin Heidegger (; 26 September 1889 – 26 May 1976) was a German philosopher known for contributions to Phenomenology (philosophy), phenomenology, hermeneutics, and existentialism. His work covers a range of topics including metaphysics, art ...
(1889–1976) discusses "facticity" as the "
thrownness Thrownness () is a concept introduced by German philosopher Martin Heidegger (1889–1976) to describe humans' individual existences as being 'thrown' (''geworfen'') into the world. Overview ''Geworfen'' denotes the arbitrary character of ''Dasei ...
" (''Geworfenheit'') of individual existence, which is to say individuals are "thrown into the world." By this, he does not only refer to a brute fact, or the factuality of a concrete historical situation, e.g. "born in the '80s." Facticity is something that already informs and has been taken up in existence, even if it is unnoticed or left unattended. As such, facticity is not something individuals come across and directly behold. In moods, for example, facticity has an enigmatic appearance, which involves both turning toward and away from it. For Heidegger, moods are conditions of thinking and willing to which they must in some way respond. The ''thrownness'' of human existence (or ''
Dasein "Dasein" (; ) is a term in the philosophy of Martin Heidegger. Adopted from the ordinary German word meaning "existence", Heidegger used it to refer to the mode of being that he believed is particular to human beings. A being that is aware of an ...
'') is accordingly disclosed through moods.


Sartre and de Beauvoir

In the mid-20th century works of French existentialists
Jean-Paul Sartre Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre (, ; ; 21 June 1905 – 15 April 1980) was a French philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary criticism, literary critic, considered a leading figure in 20th ...
and
Simone de Beauvoir Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir (, ; ; 9 January 1908 – 14 April 1986) was a French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist, and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, nor was she ...
, facticity signifies all of the concrete details against the background of which human freedom exists and is limited. For example, these may include the time and place of birth, a language, an environment, an individual's previous choices, as well as the inevitable prospect of their death. For example: currently, the situation of a person who is born without legs precludes their freedom to walk on the beach; if future medicine were to develop a method of growing new legs for that person, their facticity might no longer exclude this activity.


Recent usage

Facticity is a term that takes on a more specialized meaning in 20th century
continental philosophy Continental philosophy is a group of philosophies prominent in 20th-century continental Europe that derive from a broadly Kantianism, Kantian tradition.Continental philosophers usually identify such conditions with the transcendental subject or ...
, especially in
phenomenology Phenomenology may refer to: Art * Phenomenology (architecture), based on the experience of building materials and their sensory properties Philosophy * Phenomenology (Peirce), a branch of philosophy according to Charles Sanders Peirce (1839â ...
and
existentialism Existentialism is a family of philosophical views and inquiry that explore the human individual's struggle to lead an authentic life despite the apparent absurdity or incomprehensibility of existence. In examining meaning, purpose, and valu ...
, including
Edmund Husserl Edmund Gustav Albrecht Husserl (; 8 April 1859 – 27 April 1938) was an Austrian-German philosopher and mathematician who established the school of Phenomenology (philosophy), phenomenology. In his early work, he elaborated critiques of histori ...
,
Martin Heidegger Martin Heidegger (; 26 September 1889 – 26 May 1976) was a German philosopher known for contributions to Phenomenology (philosophy), phenomenology, hermeneutics, and existentialism. His work covers a range of topics including metaphysics, art ...
,
Jean-Paul Sartre Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre (, ; ; 21 June 1905 – 15 April 1980) was a French philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary criticism, literary critic, considered a leading figure in 20th ...
,
Maurice Merleau-Ponty Maurice Jean Jacques Merleau-Ponty. ( ; ; 14 March 1908 – 3 May 1961) was a French phenomenological philosopher, strongly influenced by Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. The constitution of meaning in human experience was his main interes ...
and
Theodor Adorno Theodor is a masculine given name. It is a German form of Theodore. It is also a variant of Teodor. List of people with the given name Theodor * Theodor Adorno, (1903–1969), German philosopher * Theodor Aman, Romanian painter * Theodor Blue ...
. Recent philosophers such as
Giorgio Agamben Giorgio Agamben ( ; ; born 22 April 1942) is an Italian philosopher best known for his work investigating the concepts of the state of exception, form-of-life (borrowed from Ludwig Wittgenstein) and '' homo sacer''. The concept of biopolitic ...
,
Jean-Luc Nancy Jean-Luc Nancy ( ; ; 26 July 1940 – 23 August 2021) was a French philosopher. Nancy's first book, published in 1973, was ''Le titre de la lettre'' (''The Title of the Letter'', 1992), a reading of the work of French psychoanalyst Jacques Laca ...
,
Byung-Chul Han Byung-Chul Han (born 1959) is a South Korean-born philosopher and culture theory, cultural theorist living in Germany. He was a professor at the Berlin University of the Arts and still occasionally gives courses there. His work largely centers a ...
and
François Raffoul François Raffoul (born 1960) is an American philosopher and Professor of Philosophy and Retired Professor of Philosophy and French Studies at Louisiana State University Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College, ...
have taken up the notion of facticity in new ways. Facticity plays a key part in
Quentin Meillassoux Quentin Meillassoux (; ; born 26 October 1967) is a French philosopher. He teaches at the Pantheon-Sorbonne University, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne. Biography Quentin Meillassoux is the son of the anthropologist Claude Meillassoux. He ...
's philosophical project to challenge the thought-world relationship of
correlationism In metaphysics, object-oriented ontology (OOO) is a 21st-century Heidegger-influenced school of thought that rejects the privileging of human existence over the existence of nonhuman objects. This is in contrast to post-Kantian philosophy's tenden ...
. Meillassoux defines it as "the absence of reason for any reality; in other words, the impossibility of providing an ultimate ground for the existence of any being."


See also

*
Being for itself Being-in-itself is the self-contained and fully realized being of objects. It is a term used in early 20th century continental philosophy, especially in the works of Martin Heidegger, Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, and the existentialists. ...


References


Further reading

* * * * * * * {{Existentialism Existentialist concepts Hermeneutics Jean-Paul Sartre Philosophy of Martin Heidegger Ontology Phenomenology Simone de Beauvoir