Metaphysics

This volume makes available in English for the first time Adorno'slectures on metaphysics. It provides a unique introduction not onlyto metaphysics but also to Adorno's own intellectual standpoint, asdeveloped in his major work Negative Dialectics. Metaphysics for Adorno is defined by a central tension betweenconcepts and immediate facts. Adorno traces this dualism back toAristotle, whom he sees as the founder of metaphysics. In Aristotleit appears as an unresolved tension between form and matter. Thisbasic split, in Adorno's interpretation, runs right through thehistory of metaphysics. Perhaps not surprisingly, Adorno finds thistension resolved in the Hegelian dialectic. Underlying this dualism is a further dichotomy, which Adornosees as essential to metaphysics: while it dissolves belief intranscendental worlds by thought, at the same time it seeks torescue belief in a reality beyond the empirical, again by thought.It is to this profound ambiguity, for Adorno, that the metaphysicaltradition owes its greatness. The major part of these lectures, given by Adorno late in hislife, is devoted to a critical exposition of Aristotle's thought,focusing on its central ambiguities. In the last lectures, Adorno'sattention switches to the question of the relevance of metaphysicstoday, particularly after the Holocaust. He finds in 'metaphysicalexperiences', which transcend rational discourse without lapsinginto irrationalism, a last precarious refuge of the humane truth towhich his own thought always aspired. This volume will be essential reading for anyone interested inAdorno's work and will be a valuable text for students and scholarsof philosophy and social theory.