Metaphysics and genealogy: World War One in the assessment of philosophers and literators

The author analyzes conceptualizations of causes, objectives and actors of the World War One in the polemical texts written by different philosophers and novelists. The author argues that certain schemes of conceptualizing war logically determine the attitude to war. Scheler and Mann, who ignore the hideous realities of war and depoliticize its causes and goals, build metaphysical interpretations, which vindicate atrocities. On the one hand, they postulate that fighting is about unique ways of life, incommensurable ideals; on the other hand, they essentialize the combating sides as unified entities. This schematization presents war as a battle for the very existence and makes any future peace impossible. In contrast to the “metaphysical” and “apolitical” interpretation of war, Bergson and Muirhead, despite their bitter criticism of German militarism, trace its genealogy and see Germany as a complex cultural phenomenon, which is irreducible to the rapacious policy of the present government. Yet, they both recognize that big abstract principles are coming that in fact guide and direct the conflicting parties. Bergson attacks mechanicism, while Muirhead places all blame on the German elites’ materialism. However, the sensitivity to internal complexity and historical dynamics of social development in the opposing state opens to them the opportunity to find common ground, to establish points of rapprochement, and thereby to dispel the illusion of the “dark force” induced by the war-time propaganda; overall, it opens the path to peace.