The Existentialist Prolegomena to a Future Metaphysics by Frederick Sontag (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 485 step that speculation on history in the philosophical vein had to take on its own premises appeared. The selection of the individual authors for direct consideration is perhaps too narrow; but the treatment of each, in his own right, is unexceptionable. The concluding chapter is simply too rich; it deserves to be expanded, even at the cost of increasing the book by a third. But if this were done the manner of treatment would have to be altered considerably. Thus the notion of historicity in the existential vein is only brushed over lightly; based as it is on a very profound treatment of the underlying concepts such as time, it merits much more. The exceptions taken in the above paragraphs serve not to denigrate but rather to place in greater relief, the solid qualities of this book. Within its compass it accomplishes more than one would have the right to expect. It is well planned, simply and lucidly written, reasonably wellinformed , and carefully documented. It must with facility accomplish with any motivated reader what the subtitle declares to be its intention: to introduce him to a region of philosophy which has held Western man fascinated for many thousands of years. University of N otr~ Dame Notre Dame, Indiana A. RoBERT CAPONIGRI The Existentialist Prolegomena to a Future Metaphysics. By FREDERICK SoNTAG. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1969. Pp. 231. In this book Professor Sontag seeks to reconstruct a ground or prolegomena for metaphysics in the personal and internal experiences of decision described in existential literature. After Kant's destructive analysis the only acceptable method for metaphysics is to investigate the source of metaphysical questioning concerning being and nonbeing. The precise area chosen is man's direct knowledge of nonbeing in anxiety and dread, or more succinctly, in the psychological immediacy of experienced uncertainty. Metaphysics cannot be scientific, abstract, certain, and necessary anymore, but it results in concrete, individual, confused and unresolved knowledge. Such an approach is not purely subjective nor is the data independent of common experience. Existential literature describes the most basic experiences of moral decision which force a man to raise questions concerning the meaning and structure of his existence. The attempt to meet the problems of human existence is, for Sontag, the fountainhead of metaphysics . For, if one can describe what in man's existential experience forces him to raise such questions, the validity, meaning, and application of metaphysics would be vindicated as a matter of course. Metaphysics IS defined from its origin in the inner psychological experience of man. 486 BOOK REVIEWS However, not just any psychological experience is sufficient. A distinction must be drawn between introspective psychology, which simply attempts to describe and characterize man's inner states phenomenologically, and philosophical psychology, which uses these descriptions as a prolegomena upon which to reopen and examine traditional metaphysical and theological questions. But the philosophical psychology which serves as the prolegomena must be pure, that is, it must eliminate reference to any particular individual and treat the experience as a general condition applicable to all men. Insights of this type of psychology are either analytical, that is, explicative, resulting in no addition of knowledge, or synthetical, that is, expansive, which increase knowledge beyond a simple description. One single intense experience can provide such revelatory, synthetical insights provided it possess impact of depth penetration. Since existential literature incontestably has given proof of such experiences, the task is merely to show how these synthetical insights, certain personal and crucial psychological , boundary limit situations, can have metaphysical validity. This task is accomplished first by establishing that individual insights have relevatory significance if something of the essential structure of being is exposed. Two such insights are basic, anxiety and dread. By providing insights into being and nonbeing anxiety and dread prove that they must be fundamental to all human experience of existence. They present the fundamental insecurity of man and the possibility of nonbeing and, as such, force man to raise metaphysical questions regarding the irrevocable limits and precariousness of his existence. These insights do not require a complete uniformity of overt behavior but simply a universally applicable inner experience. The universality, the second part of the task...