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Topic: October 10: Löwith, "The Fate of Progress" and Adorno, "Progress"

yale.instructure.com · 171 words · saved by 1 readers

These lectures of Löwith and Adorno were keynotes at the German philosophy society congress in Münster in October 1962. Löwith spoke on the first evening of the conference and Adorno on the second. To the extent that the two texts have been read side by side, the tendency has been to see Löwith as a critic of the idea of progress, whereas Adorno is (surprisingly) the "defender." To me this seems somewhat oversimplified and informed by prior knowledge of the two thinkers' other writings. As a starting point, I would rather say that both speakers seem to want to convince their listeners that the commonplace idea of progress is unexpectedly complicated and paradoxical - and thus worthy of a philosophical consideration. This is the role of the keynote speakers: to frame the endeavor of the conference itself. The English translation of Löwith's text is much easier to read than the Adorno translation. This is partly a reflection of the German texts, but to my mind the translation of Adorno,

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