Theological Roots of Modernity. Nominalist Tradition from William Ockham to Quentin Meillassoux 3800-TKN25-S-OG

The goal of the seminar will be an investigation into the genealogy of modern philosophy as arising from the nominalist crisis. The nominalist crisis, which took place in late-medieval scholastics, marks the end of the era of conceptual realism, by having brought down the notion of the universals as the eternal forms responsible for the maintanance of the metaphysically stable cosmos. God – before a rational foundation of the cosmis order – now emerges as “Deus fallax,” a voluntarist “Devious God,” whose main attribute is infinite will, standing above all law. Early-modern thought is formed under this challenge, by attempting to stabilize the chaotic world facing an arbitrary Creator whose capricious will may any moment end the “experimentum mundi” (the experiment of the world). According to Hans Blumenberg, whose “Legitimacy of the Modern Age” will be the guiding text of the seminar, the new modern thought is characterised by a departure from metaphysics and critical focus on epistemology as the “first philosophy”: while nominalist metaphysics renders God and his relation to the world “extra-logical,” Cartesianism proceeds according to the “provisionary logic” and carefully defines the limits of possible cognition. The theme of the seminar, therefore, will be nominalist philosophical theology as present in the thought of the following modern thinkers: William Ockham, Giordano Bruno, Descartes, Baruch Spinoza, Nicolas Malebranche, Soren Kierkegaard, Arthur Schopenhauer, Friedrich Nietzsche, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Theodor Adorno, Hans Jonas, Jean Laplanche, Jacques Derrida, and Quentin Meillassoux.

This is also how, according to Blumenberg, modern scientific paradigm is born: by refusal to deal with metaphysical questions and limiting itself solely to empirical knowledge. These developments, however, do not indicate a total disappearance of the nominalist “Deus fallax”: the nominalist spectre of the arbitrary God does not vanish, it is merely displaced within what Blumenberg designates as “metaphysics in abeyance”. The nominalist spectre, therefore, is bound to return, taking various forms within modern philosophy, which the seminar purports to identify and interpret: from the first nominalists, here most of all William Ockham who coined the concept of “Deus fallax,” to the last, including Quentin Meillassoux for whom the Ockhamian “deviousness” is an ontological feature of the cosmo-chaos, existing “without reason and purpose.” In between these poles, which mark the evolution of the modern nominalist spectrum, there also emerge other thinkers, crucial to the formation of modern philosophical theology: Giordano Bruno, Descartes, Baruch Spinoza, Nicolas Malebranche, Soren Kierkegaard, Arthur Schopenhauer, Friedrich Nietzsche, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Theodor Adorno, Hans Jonas, Jean Laplanche, and Jacques Derrida.

Type of course

elective seminars
general courses

Course coordinators

Agata Bielik-Michalska

Learning outcomes

Participants are expected to acquire: (1) a basic orientation in the philosophical theories of the nominalist tradition; (2) a knowledge of arguments used in favour and against the nominalist concepts (like God, world, human being, etc.).

Knowledge: The participant
- knows and understands at an advanced level, functional revision of paradigms - global achievements, theoretical foundations and general issues and general issues detailed – appropriate for scientific or artistic disciplines;
- knows and understands the main scientific or artistic trends in which they occur.

Skills: The participant
- knows and understands the fundamental dilemmas of contemporary civilization;
- can perform critical analysis and evaluation of the results of scientific research and activities, expert and other creative work and their contribution to the development of knowledge.

Social Competences: The participant
- can communicate on specialist topics to the extent that allows active participation in the international scientific community;
- can disseminate the results of scientific activities, also in popular forms;
- can initiate a debate;
- can participate in scientific discourse;
- can use a foreign language at level B2 of the Common European Framework of Reference Language Education the extent enabling participation in international scientific and professional environment;
- is prepared critically to assess the achievements within a given scientific or artistic discipline;
- is prepared critically to assess one’s own contribution to the development of a given scientific or artistic discipline;
- is prepared to recognize the importance of knowledge in solving cognitive and practical problems.

Assessment criteria

Active participation during classes (50%) plus one essay (50%).

Number of absences: 2 in a semester

Bibliography

The Nominalist Crisis or the Decline of the Great Chain of Being. Reading: Arthur Lovejoy, The Great Chain of Being (Harvard University Press, 2011), Etienne Gilson, God and Philosophy (Yale Universty Press, 2020) (fragments)
Nominalism or the Return of Gnosticism. Reading: Hans Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Age (MIT: 1986) (fragments).
New Age or the Birth of Modernity. Reading: Michael Allen Gillespie, The Theological Origins of Modernity (The University of Chicago Press, 2008) (fragments)
Duns Scotus or the “Individual Form”: Mystical Nominalism. Reading: Martin Jay, Magical Nominalism. The Historical Event, Aesthetic Reenchantment, and the Photograph (The University of Chicago Press, 2025) (fragments)
Malicious Demon or “Deus fallax” in Philosophical Disguise: Descartes with Ockham. Reading: Hans Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Age (MIT: 1986) (chapter on Descartes)
Giordano Bruno or the “Living Matter”: Vitalist Nominalism. Reading: Ernst Bloch, Avicenna and the Aristotelian Left (Columbia University Press, 2019) (fragments)
Spinoza or the “modi individua”: Expressionist Nominalism. Reading: Gilles Deleuze, Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza (Zone Books, 1990) (fragments)
Malebranche or the „Occidental Asharitism”: Occasionalist Nominalism. Reading: Nicolas Malebranche, The Search after Truth (Cambridge University Press, 1999) (fragments)
Kierkegaard or the “Repetition Principle”: Existential Nominalism. Reading: Repetition (Princeton University Press, 1976).
Kierkegaard or the „Fear and Trembling”: Fideist Nominalism. Reading: Fear and Trembling (Princeton University Press, 1975).
Schopenhaer or „Ill Will”: Gnostic Nominalism. Reading: Arthur Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation (Cambridge University Press, 1998) (fragments).
Nietzsche or „God as an Artist”: Aesthetic Nominalism. Reading: excerpts from “Thus Spake Zarathustra” and “On Genealogy of Morals.”
Wittgenstein or the „End of Explanation”: Logical Nominalism. Reading: Tractatus logico-philosophicus (Cambridge University Press, 1964), Theses 5-7.
Adorno or the „Honour of the Name”: Jewish Nominalism, Part 1. Reading: Theodor W. Adorno, Negative Dialectics (Routledge 2000) (fragments).
Jonas or the “Adventure of History”: Jewish Nominalism, Part 2. Reading: Hans Jonas, Mortality and Morality. A Search for the Good after Auschwitz (Nortwestern University Press, 1996) (fragments).
Derrida or the “Marvelous Singularity”: Jewish Nominalism, Part 3. Reading: Jacques Derrida, On the Name (Stanford University Press, 1995).
Laplanche or the “Copernican Revolution”: Nominalism in Psychoanalysis. Reading: Jean Laplanche, Essays on Otherness (Routledge, 1999).
The Nominalist Syndrome or the “Dependence on the Alien Will”: Theology Read with Laplanche. Reading: John of the Cross, Dark Night of the Soul (Doubleday, 2019).
Meillassoux or “Mundus Fallax”: Ontological Nominalism. Reading: Quentin Meillassoux, After Finitude (Zone Books, 2018).
Nominalist Legacy and Its Future: Conclusion (concluding lecture by the convenor plus selected presentations of the participants).

Additional information

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