On the advantages and disadvantages of ethics and politics /

Scott (Pennsylvania State Univ.), a leading author in the field of American Continental philosophy, writes from a vantage point beyond ethics, though the essence of "beyond" here is neither hostile to ethics nor standing above the ethical domain. He claims that Nietzsche and such contemporary philosophers as Heidegger, Levinas, Foucault, and Derrida argue persuasively that we no longer can think and justify our acts within the traditional framework of transcendence. Nevertheless, this does not imply an absence of ethics or renunciation of the legitimacy of ethical concerns. In fact Scott celebrates this apparent loss of transcendence as what frees ethics from its excess. This remarkable account of the impact of postmodern philosophy on the question of ethics and politics is particularly insightful in discussing the genealogical approach to practical philosophy that characterizes the work of Nietzsche and Foucault. The work is commendable also for its balanced view of Heidegger's relationship to politics and ethics. Scott offers an excellent account of Heidegger's philosophical understanding of technology, seeing evidence there of both of a lingering moral asceticism and a mode of temporally rooted questioning that overcomes ethical subjectivity and its notion of responsibility. Upper-division undergraduate; graduate; faculty. W. A. Brogan Villanova University