Ortega y Gasset: Life, Philosophy, and the Spanish Crisis
Coxto Hist. Ort: The Birth
From 1883 until his death in 1955, Spain experienced many political forms: the Monarchy of Alfonso XII and XIII, the Republic in 1923, the dictatorship of Primo de Rivera, and Franco’s dictatorship after the Civil War. Period of conflict: Spain lost its remaining colonies in 1898 (Cuba and the Philippines) and faced confrontation with the U.S., worker revolts in Catalonia and Andalusia, and peasant uprisings. Internationally, events such as two world wars and the Russian Revolution occurred. The socio-economic situation in 20th-century Spain was marked by political ineffectiveness: a life expectancy of 34 years, high infant mortality, and 64% illiteracy. Little industry was concentrated in the Basque Country and Catalonia, with 70% of the population living in miserable conditions in the countryside. Emigration was the only way out. The second decade was critical: the Great War (1914-1918) traumatized Europe. Although Spain did not participate, the conflict benefited businesses and landowners due to increased European demand for products, while hurting workers and peasants. Social unrest, general strikes, and anarchist bombings increased. Totalitarianism began to emerge in Europe and Spain. Ortega expressed this fear in “The Issue of Our Time.” However, this period of socio-political crisis coincided with the “Silver Age” of Spanish culture: Picasso, Sorolla, Gaudí, Falla, Ortega himself, Ramón y Cajal, etc. Ortega was obsessed with the problems of Spain. He shared the Generation of ’98’s concerns about Spain’s backwardness. It was a time when Spain needed to rebuild culturally and politically. Ortega believed that Spain would find its destiny in Europe by adapting to European thought. In “The Issue of Our Time,” he asserts that little is well in Spain and much is wrong. “Our generation is witnessing the crisis.” Ortega wrote this work to respond to this situation.
Conto Fil. Ort
Ortega y Gasset graduated from the University of Madrid and furthered his studies at various German universities, where he received training in neo-Kantianism. Ortega soon abandoned neo-Kantian idealism, considering it part of the crisis of modernity. Overcoming idealism, which is the “issue of our time,” was, for Ortega, a philosophical question and the solution to the problems of Spain and Europe. Back in Madrid, from 1911 to 1936, he held the chair of Metaphysics at the Central University, creating a school with disciples like Julián Marías and María Zambrano. In 1923, he founded the Revista de Occidente. In addition to teaching, he published many books and articles in the press and magazines and gave numerous lectures. He was clearly influenced by vitalist and historicist currents. In the mid-19th century, Vitalism emerged in Europe, with Nietzsche as a prominent representative. It defended life, instincts, the unconscious, passions, and desires. It did not deny reason but challenged its exclusivity in defining humanity. There are ways of knowing and acting that go beyond reason (intuition, poetic inspiration, instinct, etc.). Nietzsche assumed a perspectival conception of truth and defended life’s values, but Ortega avoided his nihilism and irrationalism, creating a Nietzschean raciovitalismo. Ortega’s historicism, influenced by Dilthey, was decisive in his concept of historical reason. Historicism emerged in Germany and argues that history is the most important element for humans. Humans are dynamic and historical. Husserl’s phenomenology was also decisive for Ortega and the philosophy of Heidegger and Sartre, authors who were part of Ortega’s generation, the Generation of ’14.
Val. Ort
The philosophical school Ortega created has a significant impact today, with followers like García Morente, Zubiri, Julián Marías, and María Zambrano. His commitment to an integrated Europe, a “vertebrate” Spain that did not sacrifice its Hispanic identity and sensibility, remains highly relevant. Ortega’s philosophy is proposed as a solution to the crisis of modernity. His criticism of the political life of his time, a politics detached from real life, remains valid. According to Ortega, the whole truth will only emerge from the union of partial truths provided by all sides. This offers a framework for understanding relations between ethnicities and races, something critical in an intolerant and ethnocentric world. It emphasizes that there is no single truth but rather multiple perspectives. Perspectivism is effective in increasingly multicultural societies.
Intro. Ort
This is an excerpt from “The Issue of Our Time” by the Spanish philosopher José Ortega y Gasset. The theme of this text is perspectivism and the construction of truth as the author sees it. Ortega’s ratiovitalism critiques both realism and idealism. Objectivist realism posits that true reality lies in things. Subjective idealism posits that true reality is the self. But for Ortega, the radical reality is life. Reality is radically perspective. The sum of different perspectives makes up the truth. For Ortega, the self is not an immutable subject; it is constructed in relation to things, in relation to its circumstances. In turn, a fact is nothing without the ego that experiences it. The basic reality is life: I am myself and my circumstances. Ortega is against rationalism because it understands reason as pure, detached from life. Against this, Ortega proposes ratiovitalism or vital reason, because reason acts from within life, never uprooted from it. Ortega would say that “the issue of our time” is the substitution of pure reason for vital reason. Perspectivism in Ortega is an attempt to solve one of the classic problems of philosophy: the problem of truth. Most philosophers have tried to find the truth. Ortega also addresses this issue but based on the concept of life: individual life and the circumstances surrounding it, distinct from other lives. Hence, Ortega says, “I am myself and my circumstances.” If every human being is constituted in relation to a unique set of circumstances, each has a particular perspective of reality. Therefore, reality has no single point of view but many, and all are necessary and equally true. There is no privileged being who can capture absolute truth; that truth could only be achieved as the sum of all partial truths. Each individual is an indispensable organ for the conquest of truth. Ortega also rejects the realist position. Thus, neither is the subject independent of reality nor is reality independent of the subject. Truth takes on a critical dimension; it is linked to our circumstances, and our perspective changes as our life changes. Truth is vital and historical, not universal and absolute. Life and history are not impediments to truth but the only means to make it knowable. Every life is a view of the universe. Only from this vital and historical perspective is the concept of truth admissible.