Werner W. Ernst

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Werner W. Ernst in an interview with the Tiroler Tageszeitung (2015)

Werner W. Ernst (born August 25, 1947 in Salzburg ) is an Austrian political scientist. He was a professor at the Institute for Political Science at the University of Innsbruck . His main research interests lay primarily in the areas of political theory and the history of ideas , epistemology , general social theory and psychoanalytic development theory . He paid particular attention to the criticism of law and morality , research on violence and negativity, and the theories of evil . His research on these topics was in his major work The Evil, Separation and Death. A theory of evil (Passagen Verlag, 2014) published.

As part of his research activities at the University of Innsbruck, Ernst co-founded the inter-faculty working group and the later research platform World Order - Religion - Violence , later Politics - Religion - Art , which was characterized by its interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary approach. As a trained psychotherapist and psychoanalyst , he was deputy chairman of the Society for Psychoanalysis (Innsbruck). Today he works as a psychoanalyst in private practice.

Life

Ernst grew up in Mattsee (Salzburg). The first move took place as early as 1949 after his father accepted a professional position in Vienna . In 1952 the father moved with his family to Lenzing (Upper Austria). After primary school education, he attended the secondary school in Vöcklabruck (1957 to 1960) and in Gmunden (1961). In the fall of 1962, for reasons of poor school performance, he switched to the Textile HTL in Vienna, which Ernst again completed with moderate results. He completed the subsequent nine-month military service at the military sports and hand-to-hand combat school of the Austrian Armed Forces (competitive sport judo).

In the autumn of 1968 Ernst began studying economics and philosophy at the University of Vienna and took part in the political resistance ( 1968 movement ). In 1972 he completed his studies in social and economic sciences with a master's degree , in order to study political science as a postgraduate course at the Institute for Advanced Studies from 1972 to 1974. At the same time, he took a doctorate in economics at the University of Vienna and studied music with a major in piano at the Prayner Conservatory (Dr. rer. Soc. Oec. 1974, state matriculation examination in piano 1974; both with distinction).

On November 1, 1974, he was appointed university assistant at the Senate Institute for Peace Research at the theological faculty of the University of Vienna. In 1978 Ernst completed his resumed studies in philosophy and political science (Dr. phil .; with distinction) at the University of Vienna with a dissertation on social democracy . In 1982 he moved to the Institute for Economics at the University of Vienna and completed his habilitation in political science at the University of Innsbruck in 1983 with the habilitation thesis Legitimationswandel und Revolution. Studies on the modern development and justification of political violence . In 1985 he moved to the Institute for Political Science at the University of Innsbruck , where he worked as a university professor for political theory and the history of ideas from March 1987 to September 2012 . Against the subject-specific narrowness, Ernst trained as a psychoanalyst (1993 to 1997). Study trips took place in the USA: 1989 and 1990 ( Harvard University ), 1990 ( New York University ), 1992 and 1993 ( Arizona State University ) and 1994 ( Tulane University ).

Werner W. Ernst lives in Telfs (Tyrol) and is married to the art historian Sybille Moser-Ernst . Since the turn of the millennium he has devoted himself increasingly to Bible study . In-depth knowledge of the Bible appears to him to be indispensable in a “Euro-American culture” which has Judeo-Christian roots.

Settlement analysis

"Rags" at the prevailing positivism in science and everyday life moving Werner W. Ernst in the 1990s to an analysis of the assumed assumptions ( settlement ) of exclusionary and restrictive view of the world . For him, positivism (Latin positivus, set, PPP from ponere, set) is subject to the characteristic trait of accepting the world as set by man . Settlements are owed to an arbitrary approach by people ( arbitrariness ), while knowledge refers to what has gone before, what already exists, which in itself leads to development and thus also to knowledge. The term reduction and related composites allowed him a succinct description of this widespread belief, which reigns as reducing violence and from him to the pleonasm " anthropo centric decimation was marked -Positivismus". Ernst published a summary of the analysis of the settlement in the article Scientific positivism and psychoanalysis, in: Psychoanalysis at the University, 2004 .

As an initial position, Ernst explains the I-position . This ego-positing means that the human being raises the ego as the sole reason for all further deductions in advance, without looking for other preceding determining reasons. What is at the bottom is called subject in Latin (Latin subiectum, PPP from subicere, inferior, subordinate). The positing of the ego therefore corresponds to the positing of the subject ( ego- logical subject ). The subject status for and through people is taken for granted and is deeply embedded in thought and language. Furthermore, the human being can negate everything that he is not himself or does not want to be through the object-positing ( not-I ) and imagine the objects as being thrown against him (Latin obiectum, PPP from obicere, something against himself) -throw). For Ernst, the subject thus forms the basis for the object status ( subject-object split ), in short: “Man creates the world” or in everyday language: “Man is the focus” (see humanism ).

According to Ernst, the ego-positing is continued in logical thinking through the laws of thought ( axioms ). These laws of thought come about through equation ( proposition of identity , Latin principium identitatis) and as a counter-principle through opposition ( proposition of contradiction , Latin principium contradictionis). Either something belongs to the same ( identity ) or it does not belong to it and is therefore in opposition to it ( contradiction , difference ). There is nothing third ( sentence about the excluded third , Latin tertium non datur). Ernst sees differences, transitions, deviations, interspaces, connections, mixtures of things, people, conditions or events exposed to the judgment of equation, and if this does not succeed, is at the mercy of a condemnation through opposition ( separation / delimitation ). Petrified each other identity and difference from, and think the relationship, fails because of the schizo -related initial position. For him it turns out to be even worse: The split ( setting apart ) pushes for an ( idealistic ) idea of wholeness , which is established through an act of putting together . According to Ernst, these so-called laws of thought rule as power of thought (power of separation) over otherness or foreignness.

I-positing (subject) and equating (identity) entail a series of further positing acts for Ernst , which he analyzes in more detail in his writings. In excerpts, these are positions such as: initial setting, cause setting, presupposing (setting in advance, assumption), fixing-setting, implementation-setting, enforcement, translation-setting, means-setting, purpose-setting, goal -Setting, law-setting (law), foundation-setting (principle), norm-setting, measures-setting, degradation-setting, setting-setting, decomposition, exposure-setting, dis-setting.

For Ernst, stepping out of the positional world means that no act of positing may predetermine knowledge and thereby cloud it. As an alternative to the settlement form, he assumes the preceding context . This connection is not composed of parts (composition), but consists of differences in themselves. These differences form evolutionarily, in that development or production differentiates something that is then developed, produced. According to Ernst, this difference should never be interpreted as so different as if it had nothing to do with the creation. The connection between production and that which is produced has to be considered greater than their difference. Even if that which has been produced, such as man, opposes his own production, the connection is therefore not broken for him.

Quotes

“What can help us are precisely those foreign people and foreign cultures that we don't understand. Likewise, everything so-called negative and irrational that has already been repressed in human history and is tried again and again, namely in terms of individual history, to be repressed. It is our descent from the preceding context, our body and our soul, not the I, but the id that can help. And of course it is the preliminary context itself that can help. (1994) "

“By contrast, we want to take a different path. The beginning should not be made arbitrarily with any new or different object-setting and also no subject-setting. Rather, these positive acts of positing are to be discovered as the rule of positing (positivism), and consequently as negative. The starting point is the negativity that has yet to be passed through and expressed. No one is exempt from this walk, path, discharge. (2003) "

“In view of the current situation, today's conditions in this world, to be so super one with yourself, you have to say: For God's sake, what is wrong with you, are you sick? You have to be hardy and not see the disgusting, violent conditions! (2007) "

Fonts

Monographs

  • Social democracy. Attempt at a reconstruction. With a foreword by Bruno Kreisky. Böhlau Verlag, Vienna-Cologne 1979, ISBN 978-3-205-07146-4 .
  • Change of legitimation and revolution. Studies on the modern development and justification of political violence. Duncker & Humblot Verlag, Berlin 1986, ISBN 978-3-428-06056-6 .
  • Evil, separation and death. A theory of evil. Passagen Verlag, Vienna 2014, ISBN 978-3-7092-0127-5 .

Editorships

  • Theory and Practice of the Revolution. Böhlau Verlag, Vienna-Cologne-Graz 1980, ISBN 978-3-205-07154-9 .
  • Science and Accountability. WUV-Universitätsverlag, Vienna 1994 (together with H. Barta and H. Moser), ISBN 978-3-85114-149-8 .
  • Rationality and feeling in the gender relationship. Centaurus Verlag, Pfaffenweiler 1995 (together with Ch. Annerl and U. Ernst), ISBN 978-3-8255-0071-9 .
  • Gentlemen lot. Dominion - knowledge - form of life. Peter Lang Verlag, Frankfurt-Berlin-Bern-New York-Paris-Vienna 1996 (together with A. Schweighofer and C. von Werlhof), ISBN 978-3-631-48801-0 .
  • Public opinion and European security policy. Nomos Verlag, Baden-Baden 2002 (together with F. Kernic), ISBN 978-3-7890-7857-6 .
  • Splitting and Destruction by Disciplinary Science. StudienVerlag, Innsbruck-Vienna-Munich-Bozen 2003, ISBN 978-3-7065-1823-9 .
  • Psychoanalysis at the university. LIT Verlag, Münster-Hamburg-London 2004 (together with Hans Jörg Walter), ISBN 978-3-8258-8202-0 .
  • Love in the name of your favorite literature. IUP Verlag, Innsbruck 2009, ISBN 978-3-902719-08-9 . (on-line)

Articles (selection)

  • Idionomy and Domination. Is alternative (not: alternative) politics even possible? , in: Texts, Journal 1/90, Innsbruck Working Group for Psychoanalysis, Innsbruck 1990
  • Truth and love. A discussion with Werner W. Ernst , in: R. Jochum / Ch. Stark (ed.), Theology for burned children, contributions to a new political theology, Vienna-Freiburg 1991
  • On the psychoanalysis of the power of thought , in: Texte, Zeitschrift 3/91, Innsbruck working group for psychoanalysis, Innsbruck 1991
  • Form of rule and ethics , in: No man's land, magazine between cultures 4, 10/11, Berlin 1992
  • Formal form as legal authority , in: Ethica. Science and Responsibility, Issue 2/1993
  • On a phenomenology of “fixation” and “object” status , in: H. Reinalter (ed.), Networked Thinking - Common Action. Interdisciplinarity in theory and practice, Thaur-Wien-Munich 1993
  • For the analysis of the moral way of thinking , in: Sapientia Papers 3/93, Sapientia - series of publications of the Institute for Political Philosophy and Culture, Vienna 1993
  • Therapeutic considerations in the case of TBI patients , acc. with B. Linder, in: Physiotherapy, magazine for physiotherapists, central organ of physiotherapists in Germany (Munich), December 1998
  • The "values" and their enemy , in: The Innsbruck Theological Reading Room, Innsbruck November 23, 2001 (online)
  • To transcendence. In memoriam Raymund Schwager , in: R. Siebenrock / W. Sandler (ed.), Church as a universal sign. In memoriam R. Schwager, Vienna-Münster 2005
  • Education and violence , in: H. Hierdeis / HJ Walter (ed.), Education, Relationship, Psychoanalysis, Contributions to a Psychoanalytic Understanding of Education, Bad Heilbrunn 2007
  • European thinking, positional form and “truth” , in: A. Pelinka / F. Plasser (ed.), Thinking and Teaching European, Festschrift for Heinrich Neisser, Innsbruck 2007
  • Religious thinking and evil , in: W. Palaver / R. Siebenrock / D. Regensburg (ed.), Western Modernism, Christianity and Islam. Violence as a request to monotheistic religions, World Order Edition - Religion - Violence Volume 2, Innsbruck 2008 (online)
  • Gone away. Report on my last controversy with Egon Matzner , in: W. Schönbäck / W. Blaas / J. Bröthaler (ed.), Socioeconomics as a multidisciplinary research approach, A memorial for Egon Matzner, Vienna 2008
  • Truth, Faith and Many Religious Communities , in: W. Guggenberger / W. Palaver (ed.), In the Contest for Good. Approaching Islam from the Perspective of Mimetic Theory, Contributions to Mimetic Theory Volume 25, Münster 2009
  • Comments on a theory of the power of thought , in: IDPRK - Innsbruck Discussion Papers on Politics, Religion and Art, Number 39 (December 2010), Innsbruck 2010 (online)
  • René Girard and Freud's psychoanalysis , in: N. Wandinger / P. Steinmair-Pösel (ed.), Encountering God in the Drama of Life. Insights into the theology of Józef Niewiadomski, Münster 2011
  • Secularization , in: W. Palaver / A. Oberprantacher / D. Regensburger (ed.), Political Philosophy versus Political Theology ?, Innsbruck 2011
  • “Negativity”, “Separation” and “Leading Connection” , in: M. Behmann / Th. Frick / U. Scheiber / S. Wörer (ed.), Responsibility - Sympathy - Dissidenz, Frankfurt am Main 2013
  • Are counter-worlds an alternative to the worlds of today? , in: Chr. Bertsch / V. Vahrson (ed.), Gegenwelten, Innsbruck-Vienna 2014
  • God and his creation , in: R. Siebenrock / Chr. Amor (ed.), Acting God, Freiburg im Breisgau-Vienna 2014
  • Sexuality, imperatives of inclination and form of satisfaction , in: H.-J. Niedenzu / H. Staubmann (Ed.), Critical Theory and Social Analysis, Innsbruck 2016 (online)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Werner W. Ernst: Comments on a theory of the power of thought , in: IDPRK - Innsbruck Discussion Papers on Politics, Religion and Art, Number 39 (December 2010), Innsbruck 2010, accessed on April 30, 2017, p. 10
  2. ↑ Werner W. Ernst: European Thinking, Settlement Form and "Truth" , in: A. Pelinka / F. Plasser (ed.), Thinking and Teaching European, Festschrift for Heinrich Neisser, Innsbruck 2007, p. 95
  3. ↑ Werner W. Ernst: Moral and Pedagogy , in: Werner W. Ernst (ed.), Splitting and Destruction through Disciplinary Sciences, StudienVerlag, Innsbruck-Wien-Munich-Bozen 2003, p. 71
  4. ↑ Werner W. Ernst: The contribution of 'disciplinary' sciences to the destruction of the world , in: Science and responsibility. WUV-Universitätsverlag, Vienna 1994 (together with H. Barta and H. Moser), p. 370
  5. ↑ Werner W. Ernst: The responsibility of science for society , in: Splitting and destruction through disciplinary sciences. StudienVerlag, Innsbruck-Vienna-Munich-Bozen 2003, p. 29
  6. ↑ Werner W. Ernst: Lecture at the University of Innsbruck on April 17, 2007 , audio recording of Some.1 , 27:20 minutes
personal data
SURNAME Ernst, Werner W.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian political scientist
DATE OF BIRTH August 25, 1947
PLACE OF BIRTH Salzburg