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hi this is dr gregory sadler
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i'm a professor of philosophy and the
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president and founder of an educational
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consulting company called reason i o
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where we put philosophy into practice
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i've studied and taught philosophy for
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over 20 years and i find that many
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people run into difficulties
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reading classic philosophical texts
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sometimes it's the way things are said
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or how the text is structured
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but the concepts themselves are not
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always that complicated and that's where
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i come in
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to help students and lifelong learners
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i've been producing longer lecture
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videos and posting them to youtube
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many viewers say they find them useful
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what you're currently watching is part
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of a new series of shorter videos
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each of them focused on one core concept
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from an important philosophical text
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i hope you find it useful as well
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unsurprisingly miguel de una muno is
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going to refer
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to the tragic sense of life at a number
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of points
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in his work tragic sense of life one
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would
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really expect him to and if you're going
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to look
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for a definition of what tragic sense of
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life
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means you're going to be a bit
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disappointed because he's not going to
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provide one to you as a matter of fact
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given his philosophy
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he would be inconsistent were he trying
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to provide some
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overarching fit everything into a box
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characterization of that sort instead
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he says that this entire work is a set
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of reflections and meditations upon
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the tragic sense of life so he's
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approaching
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this in a way that requires us to go at
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it from a number
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of different perspectives and bring in
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a number of different thinkers as we go
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through it
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we find some important characterizations
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that allow us to produce
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you might say something like a composite
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picture
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of what the tragic sense of life is
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supposed to be
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and i think the best way to do this is
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to look at
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chapter one and then go directly
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to the conclusion of the work and use
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those as endpoints and then work our way
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back inward so what does he say in in
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chapter one towards the end
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of the first chapter the man of flesh
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and bone where he's making the point
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that
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philosophizing is not something purely
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intellectual
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and it involves the entire person when
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it's authentic
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genuine philosophizing we could say
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this is a prime example of unamuno's
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existential
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position he tells us that there is
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something which for lack of a better
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name
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we will call the tragic sense of life so
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notice that
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he is saying well we don't have any
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better way of expressing this any more
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precise way
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we're going to use these terms that are
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rather evocative and that people should
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be able to relate to and i will say this
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that tragedy had somewhat of a different
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sense for the educated reader of the
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early 1900s
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than it necessarily does for us today
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where we've cheapened the word
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and used it to mean any sort of
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situation where
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somebody suffers something or where some
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injustice has been done
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tragedy is a bit deeper than that and so
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we want to keep that in mind so he goes
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on and he says
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it carries with itself a whole
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conception
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of life itself and of
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the universe so the tragic sense of life
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is including ourselves it's including
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the universe in which we find ourselves
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often
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not one that we've chosen in large part
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but in which we
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are you know fallen or thrown or however
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we want to put it
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using whatever terminology and of life
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something that we experience something
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that we
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bear within us but we cannot completely
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cognize we can approach through
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rationality but also through willing
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through
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sentiment through relationships through
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all of these things
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and he goes on and he calls this a whole
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philosophy more or less formulated
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more or less conscious and that's
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important there
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it's it's not saying that this is always
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well
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worked out it's sometimes more or less
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conscious that means that sometimes it
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won't be
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very conscious at all it'll be operating
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almost by instinct
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and sometimes it will be quite
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reflective and conscious but it may not
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be
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conscious of everything there will still
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be some parts that are
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irrational some parts that are
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subconscious some parts that
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are yet to be discovered in how one
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works these things out
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then we can also say that
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not only more or less conscious he says
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more or less formulated we may not
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always have the full articulation as a
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matter of fact we can probably say
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we won't have the entire articulation
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finished philosophical systems or
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anything like them
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whether they're political or social
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scientific or
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you know other sorts of things are
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probably going to
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leave something important out
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so this is quite important he also says
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that
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this is the sense may be possessed and
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is possessed not only by individual
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human beings
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but by whole peoples and he's going to
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talk about his fellow
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spaniards uh the iberian you you might
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say
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consciousness because he's also going to
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talk about portuguese
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in here and he's he's also going to talk
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about the basques
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as well at certain points so this this
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may be possessed by whole peoples and he
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says
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this does not so much flow from ideas
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as determine them even though afterwards
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it is manifest these ideas react upon it
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and
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confirm it so this tragic sense of life
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uses ideas you could say it's in a
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dialectical
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relationship with ideas ideas allow it
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to articulate itself
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but there's something more than just the
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ideas
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and he also goes on and he says you know
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sometimes it may originate in a chance
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illness other times it's constitutional
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and it's useless to speak of people who
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are healthy and people who are not
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healthy
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apart from the fact that there's no
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normal standard of health nobody has
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proved that human beings are necessarily
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cheerful by nature and further human
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beings by the fact of being humans with
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possession consciousness
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is in comparison with the ass or the
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crab
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a diseased animal consciousness is a
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disease so being conscious
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and not hiding one's head in the sand or
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in escapism of various sorts or
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throwing oneself into some sort of you
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know solve it all
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movement or or you know set of ideas
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is going to provoke this tragic sense of
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life within us and he gives us
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a listing of his own people that he
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thinks
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exhibit this some of whom you know
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i'll admit i haven't read all of these
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people myself and you probably haven't
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heard
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of some of them but you'll certainly
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have heard of the first
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several he says i recall now
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these are these these are men of flesh
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and bone who are typical examples of
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those who possess this tragic sense of
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life
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he says marcus aurelius saint augustine
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pascal rousseau renee
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obermann thompson leopardy
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vigney lanao christ amiel kental
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kierkegaard and it says that these are
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people who are
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burdened with wisdom rather than
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knowledge and so that's kind of an
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interesting
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list if you think about it some of these
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are people that
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when we talk about existentialism get
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called proto-existentialists
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particularly
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saint augustine and uh pascal
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um but all of them are are concerned
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with making sense out of this this
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you could call it general human
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condition
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in in their own way that we all have to
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deal with
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when we go to the conclusion which has
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this very
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interesting and provocative title
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don quixote in the contemporary european
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tragic comedy there
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is a sort of philosophy within the
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quixote
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una muno says that one can
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can sort of dig out and europe
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itself your the european consciousness
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has got itself away from this tragic
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sense of life
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and so he's got these interesting
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ruminations upon
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the possibility of a spanish philosophy
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so he tells us this is a bit
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deep in it he's he's talking about
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somebody who really nobody reads anymore
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but was a very
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popular german author uh of the
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you know doing a lot of things
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particularly the history of philosophy
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wendell bond and he tells us that that
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vindal bond
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thinks that you know uh philosophy in
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the systematic sense is the critical
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knowledge of values of universal
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validity
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and unimogo goes on and says what values
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are there more universal validity than
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that of the human will
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seeking before all the personal
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individual and concrete immortality of
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the soul or in other words the human
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finality
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of the universe what values are there
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more universal validity
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than the rational mathematical value and
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the volitional or teleological value
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of the universe in conflict with each
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other and here we're getting to
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something
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that is really key to this tragic sense
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of life
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we have as human beings these various
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modes of using our
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consciousness to understand things to
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understand
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vital domains of life and rationality
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and the sciences are one way in which we
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do that but the person who confines
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himself to just those
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is in a certain sense not even a tragic
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being but rather a comic being
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a truncated being somebody who is not
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grasping
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at least the available totality of
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existence i won't say the entire
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totality of existence but there is so
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much more
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than just what can be made rational and
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so he goes on and he says um
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here we go um
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we will be told yet again there's never
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been any spanish philosophy in the
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technical sense of the word
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i will answer by asking what is this
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sense what does
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philosophy mean
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and vindle bond and people like him say
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that it's really just philosophy
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as science and he goes and he says
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doesn't philosophy have any other office
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to perform
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may not its office be to reflect upon
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the tragic sense of life itself
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such as we've been studying it in this
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book to formulate this conflict between
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reason and faith between science and
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religion
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and deliberately here's the key right
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here to perpetuate
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this conflict now that is a really
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good formulation of what philosophy
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could be doing
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and what existentialist philosophy in
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fact in some cases does
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it realizes that we have these different
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domains and they don't all have to
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actually end up
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on the same page we don't have to turn
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everything into science
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we don't have to turn everything into
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some brand of philosophy
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we don't have to accept these sorts of
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claims we also don't have to allow
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religion to dominate everything we can
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realize the conflict between these
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and philosophy doesn't have to say ah
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well i'm either going to be the handmaid
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of theology or the handmaid of the
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sciences
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that's that's not the only option
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available for us
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philosophy can look at this tragic
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conflict that we have within ourselves
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and instead of simply trying to resolve
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this conflict
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it can perpetuate it as unamuno says
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that is not going to be
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something that philosophers like
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vindlebond or really many people
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in philosophy departments are going to
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be particularly
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happy to do although you know it's kind
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of funny because it would provide you at
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least
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some job security would it not right
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so if you're thinking in purely economic
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motives which are not tragic motives
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that might have some some play he goes
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on a little bit later in the chapter
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and he says that um
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philosophy is the science
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of the tragedy of life a reflection on
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the tragic
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sense of it an essay in this philosophy
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with
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its inevitable internal contradictions
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and antinomies is what i have attempted
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in these essays again
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una muno is not trying to harmonize
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everything he's not trying to explain
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contradictions away
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he wants these contradictions to come to
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the fore and to provoke their
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emotional or affective responses on our
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part
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so that we're really aware of the
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problems that are that are posed
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before us and we can cultivate this
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in terms of this overarching tragic
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sense of life so i think
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chapter one in the conclusion gave you
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some good ideas about what's going on
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here
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there are a couple places where he talks
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about the
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basis or the source of the
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tragic sense of life but it might be
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good to focus
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on something that's happening in the
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middle of the book in chapter six
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where he talks about this religious
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despair
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and he talks about suffering
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and dealing with all of these sorts of
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matters so
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he tells us that
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here we go i have brought the reader
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who's had the patience to follow me
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halfway through the book endeavoring
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always to do equal justice to the claims
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of reason and feeling i don't want to
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keep silence on matters about which
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others are silence
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i have sought to strip naked not only my
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own soul but the human soul
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be its nature what it is its destiny to
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disappear or not to disappear
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and we have arrived at the bottom of the
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abyss at the irreconcilable
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conflict between reason and vital
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feeling and he goes on and he says that
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he who looks for reasons strictly
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so-called scientific arguments
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technically logical reflections may
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refuse to follow me further anybody's
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free to read whatever they want anybody
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can follow along
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you there's there's no like absolute
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internal necessity
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to go along with una muno in this
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discussion of the tragic sense of life
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but he says that i hope to gather
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everything together and to show that
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this religious despair
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which i have been talking about which is
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nothing other
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than the tragic sense of life itself is
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though more or less hidden the very
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foundation of the consciousness
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of civilized individuals and peoples
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today so he's saying there's something
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going on
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we can hide ourselves from it and we can
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find a million ways to distract
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ourselves
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but if we're sufficiently attentive and
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sufficiently bold
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to follow out what's really going on
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we will discover this tragic sense of
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life
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at the bottom and the tragic sense of
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life is a sense
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for this interminable conflict between
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these
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you might say polarities of the human
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being
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he goes on and he says of those
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individuals and those peoples who do not
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suffer from stupidity of intellect or
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stupidity of feeling
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notice that isn't that an interesting
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parallel there
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stupidity of intellect an inability to
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use your intellect
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well to follow things through to their
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very ends
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but we can also have a stupidity of
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feeling he's not just talking about
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emotional intelligence by the way here
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he is talking about something that goes
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deeper than that recent psychological
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movement
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which is useful itself in its own right
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and
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often best when it's drawing upon
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classic philosophy as it does a little
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bit of a digression
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there so he he says that this
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tragic sense is the spring
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of heroic achievements
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now isn't that an interesting way to
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describe it
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it's the spring of heroic achievements
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why
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because in order to do anything
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genuinely
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heroic you don't have the whole thing
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laid out for you in advance with a nice
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checklist
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and everything in its place and a set of
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procedures that you just follow
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from point to point to point you
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actually have to
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stake your own life you actually have to
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commit yourself you actually have to
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take
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choices that you'll take responsibility
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for and say yes i could be wrong about
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this but i am going to go
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slay the hydra or you know tackle
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whatever else has to be tackled it's
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good to remember that one of
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hercules jobs if we're talking about
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heroic was cleaning out a terrible
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uh you know area full of manure
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now of course he found a way to do that
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was kind of crazy that
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isn't available for all of us but the
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this tragic sense of life leads us to be
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able to take on
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things that are in some degree
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beyond what we think we're capable of
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it doesn't have to be heroism in the
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sense of saving entire peoples of
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nations it could be
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heroism in terms of loving somebody
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who is largely unlovable and
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sticking with that and not doing so just
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out of a sense of resignation
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right but doing so out of a
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vast adventure that you're on it could
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be all sorts of things
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don quixote who he talks about in the
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end
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may be an emblem of this as well
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now we should talk about this this basis
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or
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source as well in chapter
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2 early on in the work he is going to
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tell us
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that the basis of the tragic sense of
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life lies in the realization
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of a certain conflict he says
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living is one thing knowing is another
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as we shall see perhaps there is such an
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opposition between the two we may say
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that everything vital is anti-rational
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not merely irrational
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and that everything rational is
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anti-vital and this
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is the basis of the tragic sense of
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life this awareness of the conflict the
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things that cannot be
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completely assimilated to each other but
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which which attempt to
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and then in chapter 9 he talks about
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this eternal
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anguish and he's it's in the the context
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of a discussion
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of suffering which is
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quite important
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here we go he he tells us that
00:19:48
this is in the chapter on faith hope and
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charity
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he says suffering is the substance of
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life and the root of personality
00:19:56
it is only suffering that makes us
00:19:58
persons and suffering is universal
00:20:00
suffering is that which unites all us
00:20:02
living beings together
00:20:04
that which we call will what is it but
00:20:06
suffering and then he says and suffering
00:20:07
has degrees
00:20:09
according to the depth of its
00:20:10
penetration from the suffering that
00:20:12
floats on the sea of appearances
00:20:14
to the eternal anguish the source
00:20:17
of the tragic sense of life which seeks
00:20:20
a habitation in the depths of the
00:20:22
eternal
00:20:23
and there awakens consolation from the
00:20:25
physical suffering that contorts our
00:20:27
bodies to
00:20:28
religious anguish so then he says
00:20:30
anguish is something far deeper
00:20:32
more intimate and more spiritual than
00:20:34
just
00:20:35
suffering and what is he talking about
00:20:38
there well
00:20:39
our response to this conflict between
00:20:43
we could say reason and life or between
00:20:46
uh the objects of religion and the
00:20:48
objects of science or the activities
00:20:51
this conflict within us is is not just
00:20:55
purely individual it's not about you
00:20:57
know taking the
00:20:58
the person who's suffering and then
00:21:00
adjusting them to society
00:21:02
the way that ego psychology wanted to do
00:21:04
in early in the
00:21:06
last century no it's about realizing
00:21:09
that this
00:21:09
is the human condition and we can hide
00:21:13
this from ourselves
00:21:14
or we can actually do justice to it
00:21:18
within ourselves and that is the source
00:21:20
of this thing that he calls the
00:21:22
tragic sense of life this entire book
00:21:27
is devoted to providing insights
00:21:30
into this tragic sense of life and
00:21:32
leading us to be able to
00:21:34
more clearly cognize it as i mentioned
00:21:38
before he doesn't provide definitions
00:21:39
but i think that these
00:21:41
characterizations might be quite helpful
00:21:44
as you're approaching bunamuno's great
00:21:56
work
00:22:15
you
