Meaning and Porous Being

Abstract

In A Secular Age, Taylor introduces the idea of porous subjectivity by way of elucidating the mode of being typical of the enchanted pre-modern world, and juxtaposes it to the buffered self typical of the disenchanted modern world. The framing of the problem in this way, with the argument so clearly oriented as an attack on the latter position, risks a polarization that defaults to the former as the preferred option. These, though, are not our only choices. There is much to recommend Taylor’s notion of porous subjectivity as distinct from the buffered self of atomistic individualism. But Taylor associates the emergence of the disenchanted world with disengaged reason, and the existence of an enchanted world with a deeper mode of engagement in the world. If we instead focus upon modes of engagement with the world separate from the question of enchantment, we can perhaps further our understanding of human subjectivity and relations with others.