Body, Mind, and Conditions of Novelty: Some Remarks on Leonard C. Feldstein’s Luminosity

Abstract

Philosophy, as the love of wisdom, may also be described as the art of failing. One may fail in this endeavor by loving either too little, or too much. From the former spring neatly reasoned papers, at best: carefully defended and prudently restricted to manageable insights, yet not overly inspiring. The latter gives rise to monstrous designs of a daring imagination, ideally conceived, yet somewhat cloudy and hard to make out. It is customary to excuse the first as publishable samples of scholarly craftmanship and to deride the second as nonsense. But one may wonder whether wisdom, should it ever yield to a wooer, would not prefer the ardent — even though imprudent — lover to the sober-hearted candidate.