Skepticism, sublimity and transcendence

Abstract

Stanley Cavell has suggested that the deepest roots of skepticism lie in a sense of alienation between the subject and the world, and this has led him to reassess the philosophical importance of the Romantic project of “re-enchanting” the world. One way to pursue this project is by starting from Kant’s reflections on the sublime. I consider Julian Young’s recent discussion of this topic and the Heideggeran pantheism to which it leads him. I conclude that, while there is much insight in Young’s reflections, there are crucial weaknesses in his position that point towards the plausibility of re-configuring it in more theistic and / or Platonic terms