Towards a New Conception of the Human Condition‪.‬

Existential Thought and the Postmodern Condition I want to begin my talk by letting you know how grateful I am for this opportunity to visit St. Petersburg University and to be invited to speak about matters that are of great interest to me. My presence here today is the first step in a series of visits to professional organizations across Europe as part of my academic sabbatical. I hope it will also be a significant step in the forging of new research links and ongoing dialogues about the relevance of existential thought for our times and the possibility of a new existentialism. The question that I would like to raise is as follows: to what extent does existential thought contribute to our understanding of our postmodern condition? Perhaps it is necessary at this point to clarify that when I use the term 'postmodern' I am not referring to theory but to situation: the condition of living in a technological world dominated by visual media; a world that has given up on the concept of truth and the possibility of eternal values; a world with a diminished sense of historicity and that appears to be resigned to the proliferation of capitalist values.