Martin Black

The beneficence of Enlightenment thought derives from its subordination of theory to practice, but precisely this re-orientation of philosophy rendered the ends of life invisible to theory, precipitating the various practical and philosophical crises of modernity. When Nietzsche and Heidegger locate the origin of contemporary nihilism in classical thought they appear not to have taken sufficient account of this change, making possible or urgent an open re-examination of the founding of classical philosophy by Socrates in the works of Plato and others.