Abstract

The project of speculative thinking cannot ignore the post-speculative intellectual situation. Rather, it must react to it and constitute itself within it. To this end, it must come to terms with the double meaning of speculation - elevation (specula) and mirror (speculum). In a dialogue with Plato, Kant, and Hegel on the one hand, and Dieter Henrich and Hans Heinz Holz on the other, the essay argues in favour of taking the precariousness of speculation seriously and transforming it from a philosophia prima into a philosophia ultima.