Kompleks Odyseusza - Z Paulem Majkutem rozmawia Monika Bakke
Odysseus’s Complex - Monika Bakke Talks To Paul Majkut

Summary/Abstract: Husserl’s phenomenology was the starting point for Paul Majkut to create his own philosophy called Odysseus’s complex. Reflections on the question posed in Cartesian Meditations concerning the illusory character of the transcendental subject in relation to itself inspired an interest in illusory perception and the role of seduction. Odysseus’s complex describes elementary human behaviour based on “the ability to reconstitute one’s own self, i.e. one’s identity into something which one is not in order to delude one’s surroundings and conceal what by mistake is perceived as Different”. Seduction has both a negative meaning, such as the impact of mass advertising in modern culture, which leads to manipulating the consumer’s awareness (ethical implication), as well as a positive one which among the intelligentsia and petty bourgeois is reduced to fashion (aesthetic implication). Most importantly, seduction is an element of nature: for animals the objective of seduction is the survival of a species. With people this may differ, but it cannot be denied that love is also related to seduction. “As far as this question is concerned, I agree with Shakespeare’s concept that love is a form of mutual delusion and is a positive thing as such,” said Paul Majkut.

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