Ortega y Gasset's Philosophy Flashcards final exam.

Flashcards on Ortega y Gasset's Philosophy

Vital Reason

A fusion of life and reason, emphasizing the lived experience of individuals, where reason must be rooted in life.

Phrase suggesting that human beings cannot be understood apart from their historical and environmental context; the self is a dynamic reality shaped by decisions.

I am I and my circumstance

The understanding that human existence is intelligible only as biography, a narrative with temporal depth; contrasts with static views of human nature.

Historical Reason

Rejection of Abstract Rationalism

Critique of the Enlightenment's reliance on universal, disembodied reason, arguing that rational systems divorced from life produce dehumanizing ideologies.

The concept that life is not just reality but radical reality, demanding subjectivity and action; emphasizes human freedom and self-responsibility.

Radical Reality

Mass-Man

Ortega's term for the conformist, anti-intellectual individual who is entitled but ungrateful for civilization's achievements, rejecting self-overcoming.

Reality as a Project

The idea that life is not given but constructed, symbolizing the creative engagement with life and a refusal to accept the world as merely given.

Illusion vs. Reality

The exploration of subjectivity through the Quixotic lens, where interpretations shape our world, and what we 'see' is colored by our ideals and imagination.

Perspective

The understanding that no single, objective view defines truth; reality must be interpreted from within life, not from abstract detachment.

Vital Reason integrates life + reason

Standing against both irrationalism and pure rationalism.

Historical Reason

Truth is always temporal and contextual.

Mass-man

The person who refuses to assume responsibility for self-direction.

Philosophy begins in wonder

continues in life.

Symbol of man’s ability to live by ideals

Don Quixote is not a fool

Radical reality

life is the root of all meaning and must be affirmed existentially.

Individual autonomy

arises not from escaping the world but by engaging with it consciously.

Historical reason

rejects timeless, abstract views of human nature. For Ortega, a person is a biographical project, inseparable from their era, culture, and unfolding experience.

Vital reason

reason must be grounded in life—it cannot be abstracted from experience.

Subjectivity

is dynamic, historical, and embodied—not solipsistic, but rooted in life.

Cogito

Descartes famously posited the cogito (“I think, therefore I am”) as the foundation of knowledge, prioritizing abstract, universal reason.