Horkheimer held that irrationalism correctly diagnosed rationalism’s collapse but drew the wrong conclusions.
Evidence
Horkheimer had repeatedly stressed that irrationalism and metaphysics had correctly recognized the bankruptcy of rationalism, but had drawn the wrong conclusions from it. For him, the problem was how to sketch out the correct conclusions more clearly, and in closer relation to more recent events, than was possible with a programme that aimed to carry forward Marx’s critique of political economy through a materialist transcendence of Hegelian dialectics. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 349
Categorization
- DEEPTHINKING: A compressed statement of the Frankfurt School’s central diagnostic move — granting irrationalism its diagnosis while refusing its politics — that rewards sustained reflection.
- XREF: connects to: Irrationalism correctly diagnoses rationalism’s crisis but serves power’s interests. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 548; For Horkheimer, irrationalism serves economic power by masking it as larger interest; Horkheimer attacked positivism and Lebensphilosophie as twin failures of reason.
- yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: Irrationalism correctly diagnoses rationalism’s crisis but serves power’s interests. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 548; For Horkheimer, irrationalism serves economic power by masking it as larger interest; Horkheimer attacked positivism and Lebensphilosophie as twin failures of reason.
Broader Connections
- Irrationalism correctly diagnoses rationalism’s crisis but serves power’s interests.
#corroborates(0.93) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 548