History does not merely touch on language, but takes place in it. Theodor Adorno More Quotes by Theodor Adorno More Quotes From Theodor Adorno If philosophy is still necessary, it is so only in the way it has been from time immemorial: as critique, as resistance to the expanding heteronomy, even if only as thought's powerless attempt to remain its own master and to convict of untruth, by their own criteria, both a fabricated mythology and a conniving, resigned acquiescence. Theodor Adorno acquiescencephilosophyway Tenderness between people is nothing other than awareness of the possibility of relations without purpose. Theodor Adorno awarenesspurposepeople Proletarian language is dictated by hunger. The poor chew words to fill their bellies. Theodor Adorno hungerpoorlanguage Quality is decided by the depth at which the work incorporates the alternatives within itself, and so masters them. Theodor Adorno alternativesqualitydepth A thinking that approaches it objects openly, rigorously ... is also free toward its objects in the sense that it refuses to have rules prescribed to it by organized knowledge. It ... rends the veil with which society conceals them, and perceives them anew. Theodor Adorno veilsapproachthinking The error in positivism is that it takes as its standard of truth the contingently given division of labor, that between the science and social praxis as well as that within science itself, and allows no theory that could reveal the division of labor to be itself derivative and mediated and thus strip it of its false authority. Theodor Adorno derivativesdivision-of-laborerrors In the general tendency toward specialization, philosophy too has established itself as a specialized discipline, one purified of all specific content. In so doing, philosophy has denied its own constitutive concept: the intellectual freedom that does not obey the dictates of specialized knowledge. Theodor Adorno disciplineintellectualphilosophy In the products of the culture industry human beings get into trouble only so that they can be rescued unharmed, usually by representatives of a benevolent collective; and then, in illusory harmony, they are reconciled with the general interest whose demands they had initially experienced as irreconcilable with their own. Theodor Adorno demandtroubleculture The specific is not exclusive: it lacks the aspiration to totality. Theodor Adorno exclusiveaspirationtotality If across the Atlantic the ideology was pride, here it is delivering the goods. Theodor Adorno goodsprideideology Because thought has by now been perverted into the solving of assigned problems, even what is not assigned is processed like a problem. Theodor Adorno problem The metaphysical apologia at least betrayed the injustice of the established order through the incongruence of concept and reality. The impartiality of scientific language deprived what was powerless of the strength to make itself heard and merely provided the existing order with a neutral sign for itself. Such neutrality is more metaphysical than metaphysics. Theodor Adorno betrayedorderreality In the age of the individual's liquidation, the question of individuality must be raised anew. Theodor Adorno being-yourselfbirthdayinspire In his state of complete powerlessness the individual perceives the time he has left to live as a brief reprieve. Theodor Adorno perceiveindividualstates Kitsch evokes a future utopia looking back at a past that is selectively (mis)remembered, thereby helping to stabilize the present toward which kitsch is otherwise deeply anatagonistic. Theodor Adorno kitschhelpingpast The man for whom time stretches out painfully is one waiting in vain, disappointed at not finding tomorrow already continuing yesterday. Theodor Adorno yesterdaytimemen The darkening of the world makes the irrationality of art rational: radically darkened art. Theodor Adorno rationalworldart Even the loveliest dream bears like a blemish its difference from reality, the awareness that what it grants is mere illusion. Theodor Adorno differencesdreamreality The lie has long since lost its honest function of misrepresenting reality. Nobody believes anybody, everyone is in the know. Lies are told only to convey to someone that one has no need either of him or his good opinion. Theodor Adorno believelyingreality The gods look in pleasure on penitent sinners. Theodor Adorno sinnerpleasurelooks
