Rethinking Georg Simmel's Social Philosophy

Ferdinand Fellmann (d. 2019) was a noted German philosopher. He studied at the University of Münster and the University of Giessen (Germany), where he trained under his most influential professor, Hans Blumenberg. Fellmann was appointed Professor of Philosophy at the University of Münster in 1980. Later, he moved away from historicism and towards systematic themes. In 1994, he was appointed “Gründungsprofessor” of philosophy at the Chemnitz University of Technology, where he worked on synthesizing idealistic and materialistic forms of thought. After becoming Professor Emeritus in 2005, Fellmann served as Visiting Professor in Vienna (Austria) and Trento (Italy). In opposition to the dominance of analytic philosophy at German universities, Fellmann remained devoted to the continental philosophical tradition. His concept of the philosophy of life covers a wide spectrum of cultural anthropology, and is especially focused on evolutionary psychology. Following modern psychoanalysis, he emphasized the role of eroticism in the making of the human mind. In doing so, he was similar to Georg Simmel, about whom he published several groundbreaking articles in German. Being an unconventional thinker like Simmel, Fellmann did not belong to any particular philosophical community. He ironically referred to himself as the “Academic of no Academy”.

• Introduction.- Chapter 1. Sociology Reconsidered.- Chapter 2. Forms of Sociability.- Chapter 3. Forms of Culturalization.- Chapter 4. Intimate Relations.- Chapter 5. Personality and Individual Differences.- Chapter 6. Individual Ethics.- Chapter 7. Human Nature.- Epilogue.