Markus Gabriel
Markus Gabriel is a German philosopher and author at the University of Bonn. In addition to his more specialized work, he has also written popular books about philosophical issues.
Career
Gabriel was educated in philosophy and Ancient Greek in Germany. After completing his doctorate and habilitation at Heidelberg University, he held a faculty position at New School for Social Research. He then came to the University of Bonn, where he holds the chair for Epistemology, Modern and Contemporary Philosophy, and is Director of the International Centre for Philosophy. Gabriel has also been a visiting professor at University of California, Berkeley. From 2022 to 2024, he worked as academic director at The New Institute in Hamburg.Work
Gabriel argues against Physicalism, Moral nihilism, and Neurocentrism.Physicalism
In 2013, Gabriel wrote Transcendental Ontology: Essays in German Idealism. In the Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews Sebastian Gardner wrote that the work is "Gabriel's most comprehensive presentation to date, in English, of his reading of German Idealism" and notes that "due to its compression of a wealth of ideas into such a short space, the book demands quite a lot from its readers."In a 2018 interview, Gabriel complained that "most contemporary metaphysicians are when it comes to characterizing their subject matter," using words like "the world" and "reality" "often...interchangeably and without further clarifications. In my view, those totality of words do not refer to anything which is capable of having the property of existence." He goes on to explain:
Opinion about COVID-19
In an April 2020 interview he called European measures against COVID-19 unjustified and a step towards cyber dictatorship, saying the use of health apps was a Chinese or North Korean strategy. He said the coronavirus crisis called into question the idea that only scientific and technical progress could lead to human and moral progress. He said there was a paradox of virocracy, to save lives one replaced democracy by virocracy.Publications
Monographs
- Neo-Existentialism, Polity, 2018, ISBN 978-15095-3247-6 / ISBN 978-15095-3248-3
- The Meaning of Thought, Polity, 2020, ISBN 978-1509538362
- With Graham Priest: Everything and Nothing, Polity, 2022, ISBN 978-1-5095-3747-1