The "esprit prophetique"
brief remarks on the phenomenology of genius in Diderot
pp. 141-148
in: Dana Riesenfeld, Giovanni Scarafile (eds), Perspectives on theory of controversies and the ethics of communication, Berlin, Springer, 2014Abstract
In this chapter, my intention is to highlight some aspects of the idea of genius formulated in Diderot's thought. The approach is not merely philological or historiographical. Instead, I am interested in studying the actuality of a notion that tantalizes us because of the multiplicity of its aspects, starting from the so-called prophetic spirit.According to Diderot, this form adopted by an unidentified quality of the human soul does not coincide with imagination, judgment, wit, warmth and vivacity, and sensibility or taste, although it shares some features with each of these faculties.This research, carried out with reference to the main categories of the Husserlian phenomenology, permits individuation of the core of the prophetic spirit in a special form of intuition, the intuition of essences.
