La logica antropobiologica della storia: una rilettura di ‘Urmensch und Spätkultur’

Abstract

Highlighting the link that connects the philosophy of history and institutions developed by Urmensch with the biological categories set out in Der Mensch, this work attempts to reconstruct the main social, cultural and institutional stages of human history in the light of two interconnected principles: the biological principle of exaptation, and the principle, derived from the idealistic tradition, of indirect self-consciousness [indirektes Selbstbewusstsein]. The result is a materialist conception of human history in which, however, the main social and cultural institutions – from the rituals of hunting to totemism, from the great monotheistic religions to the experimental practice of modern science – do not appear as mere superstructural effects of different «socio-economic formations», but as «transcendental schemes» that interconnect action and perception, reality and need, necessity and convention, norm and emotion. This conception allows to throw new light on post-histoire, on the postmodern era in which the techno-scientific institution dominate any other form of institutional mediation, transforming the metainstitution of language into an instrument of manipulation of internal and external reality. Neutralizing any means to satisfy the most essential needs, which is communication, humanity is thus exposed to the greatest danger: an era where social autism seems no longer possible to be cured.