Philosophy’s only freedom is to project what reality prevents

Evidence

Philosophy approaches this goal to the degree to which it frees thought from its enslavement by the established universe of discourse and behavior, elucidates the negativity of the Establishment (its positive aspects are abundantly publicized anyway) and projects its alternatives. To be sure, philosophy contradicts and projects in thought only. It is ideology, and this ideological character is the very fate of philosophy which no scientism and positivism can overcome. Still, its ideological effort may be truly therapeutic—to show reality as that which it really is, and to show that which this reality prevents from being. — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 712

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the therapeutic function of philosophy as negative projection against the established universe.
• XREF: connects to: Philosophy’s task is resisting the status quo’s suggestive compulsion; Modern philosophy voluntarily shrinks itself to avoid touching established reality — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the…, 648; Empirical freedom is a secondary nihilation that presupposes an original nothingness — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 262 (+5 more)

Broader Connections

• The obstacles that limit freedom are constituted only by freedom’s own posited ends #contradicts (0.82) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 1152
• Modern philosophy voluntarily shrinks itself to avoid touching established reality #qualifies (0.80) — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 648
• Freedom’s only limit is itself; we cannot choose not to be free #contradicts (0.80) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 1075
• Freedom chooses its being but cannot choose not to be #contradicts (0.78) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 1146
• Freedom exists only by being conquered from original spontaneous existence #qualifies (0.75) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Ethics of Ambiguity, 22
• The given never conditions freedom because freedom is its internal negation #responds-to (0.75) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 1160
• Empirical freedom is a secondary nihilation that presupposes an original nothingness #complicates (0.72) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 262