Schelling's Ontology of Powers

Brings Schelling's ontology into conversation with contemporary analytic metaphysics of powers Charlotte Alderwick presents Schelling's ontology as fundamentally power-based and demonstrates that this ontology enables his unique conception of human freedom outlined in the Freedom essay, thereby providing a novel interpretation of his metaphysics and conception of freedom. This distinctive reading demonstrates that Schelling's power-based ontology can usefully problematise and supplement contemporary work on power-based ontologies. Firstly, where current work focuses on powers in relation to specific areas of metaphysics, Schelling provides a holistic picture, encompassing these areas into a single ontological story. Secondly, engagement with Schelling's work points to problems (though also to possible solutions) that will arise for any power-based metaphysics, but are currently unexamined in the literature. Charlotte Alderwick is Associate Head of Department and a Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of the West of England, Bristol