Daniel Hoyer
Thesis: Seinsbegriff und Einheitsproblematik bei Platon und Plotin
In Plotinus’ discussion of being in Enn. VI 1 and 2 the questions What is being? and Of what number is being? are intimately connected. Especially in the first chapters of Enn. VI 2 the conception of being as a structured and limited plurality is achieved by arguing against monist views of what being is. Plotinus thereby highlights the notion of primary being as the structured whole of the five greatest kinds known from Plato’s Sophist. This discussion provides the grounds for identifying this complex plurality of primary being with an analysis of the primary constituents of intellect or nous. The primary focus of my work lies on these three topics: 1) Why is being, or at least primary being, in Plotinus not one but rather a structured plurality? 2) How does this conception of primary being relate to Plotinus’ exegetical starting point, the unity of being in Plato? 3) Why does an analysis of primary being amount to an analysis of intellect and especially the unity of intellect?
Areas of Specialization: Ancient Philosophy (Plato and the Platonic Tradition).
Areas of Competence: Ancient Philosophy (Plato and the Platonic Tradition), Kant's critical philosophy, Hegel's dialectic (Encyclopaedia Logic), Literary Theory (Narratology, Structuralism).