Project Aims: To investigate the evolution of apathy and the changing attitudes toward it over time – from the Stoics to modern culture. Has an era ended? Was the era of positivity towards apathy correct, or modernity’s negative opinion? What does it mean to be individual today?
Object: Apathy
Concepts: Politics, Social development, the Culture Industry, the Last Man, the Other.
Change/contrast: historical contrast between the Stoics, the Christian theologians and modern society
Thinkers: Adorno, Nietzsche, Levinas
Adorno – the Culture Industry as a cause
Nietzsche – overcoming the Last Man
Levinas – Do we need to focus upon something ‘Other’ than ourselves to overcome our apathetic age?