The Problem of the Questions “Who am I ˮ and “What am I ˮ in Arendt's Human Condition and Patočka's Heretical Essays in the Philosophy of History

Alžbeta Hájková

Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium

Abstract

This article explores Arendt’s and Patočka’s accounts of the questions “who am I” and “what am I.” For Arendt, we need to abandon the given meaning of life and pursue excellence through means of action and speech in order to find our “who am I.” When it comes to “what am I,” Arendt is convinced that this is a question one should not ask, since it can lead to dangerous attempts to master the human nature. I argue that not all attempts to understand human nature are dangerous, as some of them aim not at mastering the human nature from within, but creating the political framework that would fit human nature the best. Furthermore, while the totalitarian regimes, through their violent attempts to master the “what am I,” i.e. the human nature, obscured the way to our “who”  both Arendt and Patočka suggest that in the modern age, we have abandoned this question – who am I – voluntarily. While Arendt does not offer an explicit way out of the state in which there is no true space for action and speech, Patočka thinks that the way out of such nihilisim lies in readoption of the Socratic way of life, which can come about only if one faces the senselessness in its strongest form - the senselessness of war.

Key words: Arendt, Patočka, human nature, “who am I,” action, nihilism