on Antiphilosophy

Please note: this talk has been cancelled to help contain the spread of the new coronavirus. 

Under the title Hyperpresent, five contemporary thinkers will give a talk on a new idea that they introduced themselves. Afterwards, they will engage in a conversation with philosopher Laurent De Sutter – who curated this series.

Philosophy is traditionally understood as the search for universal truths, and philosophers are supposed to transmit these truths beyond the limits of their own culture. But today, we have become sceptical about the ability of an individual philosopher to engage in ‘universal thinking’, so philosophy seems to capitulate in the face of cultural relativism. Boris Groys will argue that modern ‘antiphilosophy’ does not pursue the universality of thought as its goal but proposes in its place the universality of life, material forces, social practices, passions, and experiences – angst, vitality, ecstasy, the gift, revolution, laughter or ‘profane illumination’ – that he will discuss with thinkers from Kierkegaard to Derrida, from Nietzsche to Benjamin.

• Boris Groys is an art critic, media theorist and philosopher. He is professor at New York University. His work is dedicated to the exploration of the link between socialism, modernism, contemporary art and media and technology. His last book is In the Flow.