AbstractsPhilosophy & Theology

This project seeks to demonstrate human value beyond the modern will in the form of an Ur-will, a residue of the will that cannot be attributed to the historic age. By utilizing the seemingly diverse ideas of Heidegger?s Gelassenheit, an attentive releasement towards death, and Kant?s Lebensgef?hl, a feeling of life engendered by aesthetic and reflective experience, this work shows how a more primordial relation to both the sensible and the supersensible reveals an underlying harmony between humanity and nature. This harmony opens the space for a dual reorientation, between humanity and the thing, and between humanity and our rational ideas that allows for both Gelassenheit and the ability to reflect on nature in terms of human value. Establishing the Ur-will as an indeterminate tie between the embodied, and sensuous, human and supersensible ideas provides the basis for the possibility of human value existing beyond the modern age and into the ?new beginning? prescribed by Heidegger through Gelassenheit. Advisors/Committee Members: Sweet, Kristi (advisor), George, Theodore (committee member), Vasilakis, Apostolos (committee member).