<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>Experiences of absence are common in everyday life, but have received little philosophical attention until recently, when two positions regarding the nature of such experiences surfaced in the literature. According to the Perceptual View, experiences of absence are perceptual in nature. This is denied by the Surprise-Based View, according to which experiences of absence belong together with cases of surprise. In this paper, I show that there is a kind of experience of absence—which I call <italic>frustrating absences</italic>—that has been overlooked by the Perceptual View and by the Surprise Based-View and that cannot be adequately explained by them. I offer an alternative account to deal with frustrating absences, one according to which experiencing frustrating absences is a matter of subjects having desires for something to be present frustrated by the world. Finally, I argue that there may well be different kinds of experiences of absence.</p></abstract>

Experiences of absence are common in everyday life, but have received little philosophical attention until recently, when two positions regarding the nature of such experiences surfaced in the literature. According to the Perceptual View, experiences of absence are perceptual in nature. This is denied by the Surprise-Based View, according to which experiences of absence belong together with cases of surprise. In this paper, I show that there is a kind of experience of absence—which I call frustrating absences—that has been overlooked by the Perceptual View and by the Surprise Based-View and that cannot be adequately explained by them. I offer an alternative account to deal with frustrating absences, one according to which experiencing frustrating absences is a matter of subjects having desires for something to be present frustrated by the world. Finally, I argue that there may well be different kinds of experiences of absence.

Frustrating Absences

Disputatio

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{"article-title":"Frustrating Absences"}

Experiences of absence are common in everyday life, but have received little philosophical attention until recently, when two positions regarding the nature of...

Frustrating Absences

Published Online: Nov 21, 2019

Page range: 45 - 62

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/disp-2019-0011

Keywords
Absences, frustration, perception, desires, phenomenology

© 2019 André J. Abath, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Frustrating Absences

Published Online: Nov 21, 2019

Page range: 45 - 62

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/disp-2019-0011

KeywordsAbsences, frustration, perception, desires, phenomenology

© 2019 André J. Abath, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Keywords
Absences, frustration, perception, desires, phenomenology