Discipline of Philosophy Speakers Series

Discipline of Philosophy Speakers Series presents "Dōgen’s Negative Ocularcentrism" by Adam Loughnane (University College Cork) 

Time:  Thursday 27th November @ 1:00-2:30 pm (Lunch will be provided) 

Location:  The River Room (AS203) 

Abstract: Scholars have long identified a tendency within the Western intellectual tradition known as ocularcentrism—the overdetermination of philosophy by the metaphysics of vision. While critics have warned of the “hegemony of the visual” (Jay, McMahan, Levin), I argue that the real danger lies not in the privileging of sight over other senses, but in the latent positivism that visual metaphor entails. The problem, I propose, is not ocularcentrism per se, but positivist ocularcentrism. As a counterpoint, I turn to the Buddhist philosopher Dōgen, who also privileges vision, yet in a radically different key—what I call “negative ocularcentrism”. Dōgen subverts the representational model of vision by embracing blindness, opacity, invisibility, and darkness as constitutive dimensions of the visual. His thought thus transforms seeing into a complex site of negation and depth rather than simple clarity and presence. I conclude by tracing how this form of negative ocularcentrism resonates in phenomenology and modern science.