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Markus Gabriel
Markus Gabriel
Markus Gabriel
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Markus Gabriel (German: [ˈɡaːbʁiˌeːl]; born 6 April 1980) is a German philosopher and author at the University of Bonn. In addition to his more specialized work, he has also written popular books about philosophical issues.

Key Information

Career

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Gabriel was educated in philosophy and Ancient Greek in Germany. After completing his doctorate and habilitation at Heidelberg University, he held a faculty position at New School for Social Research. He then came to the University of Bonn, where he holds the chair for Epistemology, Modern and Contemporary Philosophy, and is Director of the International Centre for Philosophy.[1] Gabriel has also been a visiting professor at University of California, Berkeley.[2] From 2022 to 2024, he worked (together with Anna Katsman) as academic director at The New Institute in Hamburg.[3]

Work

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Gabriel in 2013

Gabriel argues against Physicalism, Moral nihilism, and Neurocentrism.[4]

Physicalism

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In 2013, Gabriel wrote Transcendental Ontology: Essays in German Idealism. In the Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews Sebastian Gardner wrote that the work is "Gabriel's most comprehensive presentation to date, in English, of his reading of German Idealism"[5] and notes that "due to its compression of a wealth of ideas into such a short space, the book demands quite a lot from its readers."[5]

In a 2018 interview, Gabriel complained that "most contemporary metaphysicians are [sloppy] when it comes to characterizing their subject matter," using words like "the world" and "reality" "often...interchangeably and without further clarifications. In my view, those totality of words do not refer to anything which is capable of having the property of existence."[6] He goes on to explain:

I try to revive the tradition of metaontology and metametaphysics that departs from Kant. As has been noticed, Heidegger introduced the term metaontology and he also clearly states that Kant’s philosophy is a “metaphysics about metaphysics.” I call metametaphysical nihilism the view that there is no such thing as the world such that questions regarding its ultimate nature, essence, structure, composition, categorical outlines etc. are devoid of the intended conceptual content. The idea that there is a big thing comprising absolutely everything is an illusion, albeit neither a natural one nor an inevitable feature of reason as such. Of course, there is an influential Neo-Carnapian strand in the contemporary debate which comes to similar conclusions. I agree with a lot of what is going on in this area of research and I try to combine it with the metaontological/metametaphysical tradition of Kantian and Post-Kantian philosophy.[6]

Opinion about COVID-19

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In an April 2020 interview he called European measures against COVID-19 unjustified and a step towards cyber dictatorship, saying the use of health apps was a Chinese or North Korean strategy. He said the coronavirus crisis called into question the idea that only scientific and technical progress could lead to human and moral progress. He said there was a paradox of virocracy, to save lives one replaced democracy by virocracy.[7]

Publications

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Monographs

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  • Gabriel, Markus (2006). Der Mensch im Mythos: Untersuchungen über Ontotheologie, Anthropologie und Selbstbewußtseinsgeschichte in Schellings "Philosophie der Mythologie" [Man in Myth: Studies on Ontotheology, Anthropology, and the History of Self-Consciousness in Schelling's "Philosophy of Mythology".] (in German) (Quellen und Studien zur Philosophie ed.). Berlin/New York City: Walter de Gruyter. p. 513. ISBN 978-3110190366.
  • Gabriel, Markus (2008). Antike und moderne Skepsis zur Einführung [Ancient and modern skepticism for introduction] (in German). Hamburg: Junius. p. 183. ISBN 978-3-88506-649-1.
  • Gabriel, Markus; Žižek, Slavoj (2009). Mythology, Madness, and Laughter: Subjectivity in German Idealism. New York/London: Continuum. p. 202. ISBN 978-1-4411-9105-2.
  • Gabriel, Markus (2014). An den Grenzen der Erkenntnistheorie. Die notwendige Endlichkeit des objektiven Wissens als Lektion des Skeptizismus [At the Limits of Epistemology. The necessary finiteness of objective knowledge as a lesson of skepticism.] (in German) (Quellen und Studien zur Philosophie ed.). Freiburg i.Br./München: Verlag Karl Alber. p. 454. ISBN 978-3495486580.
  • Gabriel, Markus (2016). Sinn und Existenz - Eine realistische Ontologie [Meaning and Existence - A Realistic Ontology] (in German). Berlin: Suhrkamp Verlag. p. 507. ISBN 978-3-518-29716-2.
  • Gabriel, Markus (2017). Buchheim, Thomas (ed.). Neutraler Realismus (in German) (Jahrbuch-Kontroversen 2 ed.). Verlag Karl Alber.
  • Gabriel, Markus (2017). Gaitsch, Peter; Lehmann, Sandra; Schmidt, Philipp (eds.). Eine Diskussion mit Markus Gabriel. Phänomenologische Positionen zum Neuen Realismus [A discussion with Markus Gabriel. Phenomenological Positions on New Realism.] (in German). Wien/Berlin: Turia + Kant. p. 260. ISBN 978-3-85132-858-5.
  • Gabriel, Markus (2017). Eckoldt, Matthias (ed.). Der Geist untersteht nicht den Naturgesetzen, sondern seinen eigenen Gesetzen [The spirit is not subject to the laws of nature, but to its own laws.] (in German) (Kann sich das Bewusstsein bewusst sein? ed.). Heidelberg: Carl-Auer Verlag GmbH. p. 247. ISBN 978-3-8497-0202-1.
  • Gabriel, Markus; Krüger, Malte (2018). Was ist Wirklichkeit? Neuer Realismus und Hermeneutische Theologie [What is Reality? New Realism and Hermeneutic Theology.] (in German). Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. p. 124. ISBN 978-3-16-156598-4.
  • Gabriel, Markus; Olay, Csaba (2018). Ostritsch, Sebastian (ed.). Welt und Unendlichkeit. Ein deutsch-ungarischer Dialog in memoriam László Tengelyi [World and Infinity. A German-Hungarian Dialogue in Memoriam of László Tengelyi] (in German). Freiburg: Verlag Karl Alber. p. 2014. ISBN 978-3-495-48853-9.
  • Gabriel, Markus (2018). Der Sinn des Denkens [The sense of thinking] (in German). Berlin: Ullstein Buchverlage GmbH. p. 366. ISBN 978-3-550-08193-4.
  • (en) Neo-Existentialism, Polity, 2018, ISBN 978-15095-3247-6 / ISBN 978-15095-3248-3 (pb)
  • (en) The Meaning of Thought, Polity, 2020, ISBN 978-1509538362
  • Gabriel, Markus; Eckoldt, Matthias (2019). Die ewige Wahrheit und der Neue Realismus : Gespräche über (fast) alles, was der Fall ist [The eternal truth and the New Realism : conversations about (almost) everything that is the case.] (in German). Heidelberg: Carl-Auer Verlag GmbH. p. 262. ISBN 978-3-8497-0312-7.
  • (en) The Power of Art. Polity. 2020. ISBN 978-1509540976.
  • Gabriel, Markus (2020). Neo-Existentialismus [Neo-Existentialism] (in German). Freiburg/München: Verlag Karl Alber. p. 171. ISBN 978-3-495-49047-1.
  • Gabriel, Markus (2020). Fiktionen [Fictions] (in German). Berlin: Suhrkamp Verlag. p. 636. ISBN 978-3-518-58748-5.
  • Gabriel, Markus (2020). Moralischer Fortschritt in dunklen Zeiten : universale Werte für das 21. Jahrhundert [Moral progress in dark times : universal values for the 21st century.] (in German). Berlin: Ullstein Buchverlage GmbH. p. 368. ISBN 978-3-550-08194-1.
  • Gabriel, Markus (2020). Redliches Denken: Grundlagen der Ethik aus philosophischer Sicht : ein Essay [Thinking honestly : foundations of ethics from a philosophical point of view : an essay.] (in German). Würzburg: West-Östliche Weisheit Willigis Jäger Stiftung. p. 44. ISBN 978-3-9819150-5-1.
  • Gabriel, Markus; Scobel, Gert (2021). Zwischen Gut und Böse: Philosophie der radikalen Mitte [Between Good and Evil: Philosophy of the Radical Center] (in German). Hamburg: Edition Körber. p. 320. ISBN 978-3-89684-287-9.
  • (en) With Graham Priest: Everything and Nothing, Polity, 2022, ISBN 978-1-5095-3747-1
  • Gabriel, Markus (2024). Sense, Nonsense, and Subjectivity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. p. 296. ISBN 978-0-6742-6028-3.
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  • Warum es die Welt nicht gibt, Ullstein Buchverlage GmbH, 2013, ISBN 978-3-548-37568-7
  • Ich ist nicht Gehirn: Philosophie des Geistes für das 21. Jahrhundert, Ullstein, 2015, ISBN 978-3-548-37680-6

Editions (publisher, co-editor or co-worker)

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  • Halfwassen, Jens; Gabriel, Markus; Zimmermann, Stephan, eds. (2011). Philosophie und Religion [Philosophy and religion] (in German). Conference paper, 2008. Heidelberg: Winter. p. 329. ISBN 978-3-8253-5863-1.
  • Gabriel, Markus, ed. (2011). Skeptizismus und Metaphysik [Skepticism and Metaphysics] (in German). Berlin: Akad.-Verl. p. 356. ISBN 978-3-05-005171-0.
  • Gabriel, Markus; Heyne, Stefan (2014). Porstmann, Gisbert (ed.). Stefan Heyne - Naked light : die Belichtung des Unendlichen [Stefan Heyne - Naked light : the exposure of the infinite] (in German). on the occasion of the exhibition Stefan Heyne - Naked Light. The Exposure of the Infinite, Städtische Galerie Dresden - Kunstsammlung, June 14 to September 14, 2014. Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz. p. 128. ISBN 978-3-7757-3841-5.
  • Gabriel, Markus, ed. (2014). Der Neue Realismus [The New Realism] (in German). Conference paper, 2013. Berlin: Suhrkamp. p. 422. ISBN 978-3-518-29699-8.
  • Gabriel, Markus; Egging, Björn; Wurm, Erwin (2015). Beil, Ralf (ed.). Erwin Wurm - Fichte [Erwin Wurm - spruce] (in German). Baden-Baden: Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg. p. 109. ISBN 978-3-945364-04-8.
  • Gabriel, Markus; Hogrebe, Wolfram; Speer, Andreas, eds. (2015). Das neue Bedürfnis nach Metaphysik [he new desire for metaphysics] (in German). Berlin, Boston: Walter de Gruyter. p. 292. ISBN 978-3-11-044129-1.
  • Freytag, Philip (2019). Gabriel, Markus (ed.). Die Rahmung des Hintergrunds : eine Untersuchung über die Voraussetzungen von Sprachtheorien am Leitfaden der Debatten Derrida – Searle und Derrida – Habermas [Framing the background : an investigation into the presuppositions of theories of language guided by the Derrida – Searle and Derrida – Habermas debates.] (in German). Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann. p. 542. ISBN 978-3-465-04358-4.

References

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Markus Gabriel

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Markus Gabriel (born 1980) is a German philosopher and academic specializing in , , metaphysics, and the . He holds the Chair of , Modern and Contemporary Philosophy at the , where he was appointed Germany's youngest full professor in the field at age 29 in 2009. Gabriel earned his doctorate and at and has held visiting positions in and New York. Gabriel is a prominent advocate and co-founder of New Realism, a philosophical stance that rejects constructivist, correlationist, and postmodernist reductions of reality to human interpretation or social constructs, emphasizing instead the existence of mind-independent fields of sense that constitute the world's plurality. His major works, such as Why the World Does Not Exist (2013), argue against the notion of "the world" as a totalizing whole, proposing that reality comprises innumerable, overlapping domains of meaning inaccessible to exhaustive unification. Other key texts include Fields of Sense (2015), which develops his ontology of senses, and I Am Not a Brain (2015), critiquing neurocentric views of consciousness. These contributions have positioned him as a critic of deflationary epistemologies prevalent in late 20th-century thought. Beyond academia, Gabriel directs the International Center for Philosophy and the Center for and Thought at , fostering interdisciplinary dialogue on topics from to the . In 2025, he founded the deep-IN Academy for Deep Innovation to integrate ethical philosophy into economic and technological decision-making. His popular writings and public engagements challenge dominant narratives in media and culture, prioritizing empirical and logical scrutiny over ideological conformity.

Early Life and Education

Childhood and Formative Influences

Markus Gabriel was born on April 6, 1980, in , , , and raised in the adjacent town of Sinzig. His family provided a modest, working-class environment: his mother worked as a nurse, and his father as a , occupations rooted in practical, hands-on labor rather than pursuits. This background, devoid of academic privilege, marked Gabriel's path as one of social ascent through personal determination. As a teenager, Gabriel exhibited an unusually focused interest in , declaring to his mother around age fifteen his intent to become a —a he pursued with singular resolve from . This early ambition reflected self-initiated intellectual engagement, prioritizing rigorous inquiry amid a non-elite upbringing that emphasized tangible realities over theoretical abstraction. Such formative sparks, drawn from personal curiosity rather than familial or institutional guidance, laid the groundwork for his rejection of overly detached philosophical trends in favor of empirically anchored reasoning.

Academic Studies and Degrees

Gabriel began his undergraduate studies in , ancient , , and at the FernUniversität in , followed by the and the University of . He earned his Magister Artium (MA) degree in from the . His curriculum emphasized and Ancient , with additional coursework conducted in , , and New York, , providing exposure to both continental European and Anglo-American philosophical approaches. Gabriel completed his doctoral studies at , receiving his Dr. phil. degree in 2005 for a in theoretical . He then pursued his at the same institution, qualifying as a university lecturer in 2008 with a work examining and in . These qualifications marked the culmination of his formal academic training in , building on interdisciplinary foundations in classical texts and .

Academic Career

Early Appointments and Habilitation

Following his doctoral studies, Gabriel served as a guest researcher at the from March to June 2005, marking his initial international post-doctoral engagement. This brief role facilitated early exposure to global philosophical networks beyond . In May 2006, he joined the Philosophical Seminar at Ruprecht-Karls-Universität as a scientific employee, transitioning to temporary academic councilor by 2008; these positions involved research and teaching duties focused on historical and systematic , including elements of through analyses of . During this period, Gabriel contributed to seminars on ancient and modern philosophical traditions, building a foundation in critical examination of knowledge claims that aligned with his emerging interests in contemporary epistemological debates. Gabriel completed his at in July 2008 with a thesis titled Skeptizismus und Idealismus in der Antike, addressing and in as a qualification for full professorship in the German academic system. The work's rigorous historical and analytical approach underscored his merit-based progression, enabling swift transitions to advanced roles without reliance on extended institutional . Immediately following habilitation, from July 2008 to June 2009, Gabriel held a tenure-track assistant professorship in the Department of at for in , where he taught and researched contemporary philosophy, including epistemological topics amid the institution's emphasis on continental traditions. He received and declined a tenure offer as , reflecting confidence in competing opportunities and highlighting his rapid international recognition at age 28. This U.S. appointment demonstrated the appeal of his expertise in and to leading programs outside .

Professorship at Bonn and Institutional Leadership

Markus Gabriel was appointed to the Chair for , Modern and Contemporary Philosophy at the in 2009, becoming Germany's youngest philosophy professor at age 29. In this position, he has advanced research and education in and the philosophies of and contemporaneity through teaching and supervision of academic projects. Since 2012, Gabriel has served as director of the International Center for Philosophy (IZPH) at the , managing programs such as international courses, a doctoral , exchanges, guest lectures, symposiums, and visiting professorships to promote global and interdisciplinary philosophical engagement. Under his leadership, the IZPH has organized recurring events including the International in —addressing topics like in 2025—and conferences such as "Auf den Punkt," which encourage precise conceptual analysis among emerging scholars. In 2017, Gabriel co-founded and assumed directorship of for Science and Thought (CST) at , establishing an interdisciplinary platform to explore interfaces between and natural sciences via clusters on certified AI and desirable digitalization. The CST, under Gabriel's guidance, hosts conferences like "Technological Futures Now" in 2025 and "Irrationality and the Age of AI" in 2026, alongside mentoring networks such as Feminist AI for female researchers, thereby facilitating debates on foundational philosophical issues including realism in scientific contexts. Through these roles, Gabriel has exerted institutional influence by curating events that challenge relativist tendencies, exemplified by IZPH-hosted book launches such as "Towards a New Scientific Realism" in 2025, which feature discussions advancing realist ontologies against prevailing .

Philosophical Foundations

Development of New Realism

New Realism, as developed by Markus Gabriel, originated as part of a broader philosophical movement initiated in 2011 by Gabriel and Maurizio Ferraris at the . Gabriel's contributions crystallized in his 2013 publication Warum die Welt nicht existiert, translated as Why the World Does Not Exist, which laid the groundwork for his by challenging the presupposition of a singular, all-encompassing . This work argued that the concept of "the " functions as an unfounded myth in , positing instead that manifests through discrete domains without unification into a total explanatory framework. Central to New Realism's tenets is the of fields of (Sinnfelder), introduced and elaborated in Gabriel's 2015 book Fields of Sense: A New Realist . These fields represent contexts in which entities exist and acquire meaning, such as scientific, artistic, or everyday perceptual domains, where objects appear as they do without reference to a hidden underlying or global totality. Gabriel maintains that is not mind-independent in a naive nor correlated solely to , but occurs wherever something makes within its field, allowing for a pluralistic realism grounded in the observable multiplicity of appearances. This framework derives from empirical observation of experience, where phenomena are encountered in specific, bounded senses rather than through abstract mediation between subject and object. Gabriel emphasizes that denying the world does not negate the reality of things but rejects ontotheological commitments to a self-sufficient whole that purportedly accounts for all facts. By prioritizing the of fields, New Realism upholds truth as tied to verifiable senses within domains, countering reductions to either or without invoking overarching narratives.

Ontology of Fields of Sense

In Markus Gabriel's , fields of sense constitute the fundamental domains of , defined as unconstructed structures in which objects appear and are individuated through objective descriptions or modes of . These fields operate as self-contained arenas where meaning emerges causally from the relations among objects, without reliance on or subjective projection; objects "radiate senses" by causally interacting and appearing as they do within the field's governing conditions. Existence itself is field-relative: an entity exists insofar as it appears meaningfully in at least one such field, affirming ontological realism where appearances are not illusory but constitutive of real, mind-independent relations. This framework rejects reductionist ontologies by positing an infinite plurality of fields, each equally valid and irreducible to others, with no overarching field capable of encompassing all reality. Gabriel's "no-world-view" denies the existence of a totalizing "world" as a metaphysical totality, arguing that attempts to quantify over all fields lead to paradox and fail to capture the dispersed nature of existence; instead, reality manifests as a non-monistic mosaic of co-dependent fields and objects. Meaning-making occurs causally within each field through exclusive rules that differentiate appearances—such as physical laws in one domain versus perceptual relations in another—preventing any singular perspective from dominating or reducing the multiplicity. Illustrative examples highlight this structure: Mount Etna exists as a mountain in the human perceptual field of sense, determined by terrestrial causal relations like elevation and visibility, yet appears as a in a hypothetical Martian field governed by inverted gravitational metrics, demonstrating how the same object participates in multiple, non-reducible senses without contradiction. In scientific contexts, particles manifest in quantum fields of sense under probabilistic rules, distinct from macroscopic fields where everyday objects adhere to , underscoring the causal autonomy of each domain without implying hierarchy or convergence into a unified . These instances reveal fields as dynamic sites of appearance, where causal mechanisms generate objective facts tailored to the field's parameters, preserving the ontological pluralism central to Gabriel's realism.

Rejection of the Fact-World Dichotomy

Gabriel rejects the traditional between facts as constituents of a mind-independent "world" and subjective human interpretations, arguing that this divide artificially separates verifiable appearances from itself. In his , facts are not brute, world-encompassing truths independent of context but relational occurrences within specific fields of sense—domains where objects and events manifest meaningfully. This view dismantles the assumption that facts must aggregate into a singular, totalizing "world" to be objective, as such a totality would presuppose an overarching domain that excludes alternative senses in which the same facts appear differently, such as Mount Etna as both a and a valley depending on perspective. By privileging appearances as ontologically primary, Gabriel maintains that what is verifiable through direct engagement with these fields constitutes , without recourse to a speculative underlying that facts supposedly mirror. Truth, for Gabriel, resides immanently within these fields rather than in correspondence to an external world, providing objective anchors against relativist claims that all interpretations are equally ungrounded. Descriptions hold true insofar as they accurately capture how objects present themselves in a given field, yielding intersubjectively stable knowledge without denying the plurality of senses. This counters the relativist denial of objective truth by affirming that facts gain traction through their consistency and verifiability across engagements in the field, not through reduction to a purported mind-independent substrate. For instance, scientific facts about physical laws operate within empirical fields of sense, where they are tested and confirmed, but they do not exhaust by subsuming non-physical senses like ethical or aesthetic ones. The implications extend to causal realism, where events exert genuine effects across intersecting fields without invoking postmodern about causality's objectivity. Gabriel's framework upholds that causal relations are real insofar as they manifest verifiably in senses—such as a volcanic eruption altering both geological and historical fields—affirming without positing a unified that causally totalizes all domains. This avoids the dichotomy's pitfalls by treating causation as embedded in the openness of appearances, where effects propagate realistically yet pluralistically, grounded in empirical traceability rather than abstract speculation.

Critiques of Dominant Philosophies

Against and

Gabriel critiques for reducing truth to expressions of power, as articulated by influences such as Nietzsche and Foucault, where knowledge claims are dismissed as socially constructed assertions lacking objective grounding beyond communal or dominant recognition. This relativistic stance, he argues, equates all perspectives as potentially equivalent, ignoring that existence does not confer normative validity—evident in cases like authoritarian regimes whose claims persist despite factual falsehoods. In Why the World Does Not Exist (2013), Gabriel contrasts this with his assertion of direct access to facts across diverse domains, rejecting the postmodern construction of reality through discourse as incompatible with verifiable causal structures. New Realism, which Gabriel co-initiated in 2012, positions itself explicitly against such by upholding objective truths that hold independently of interpretive frameworks or power relations, thereby restoring the possibility of rational argumentation grounded in rather than narrative dominance. He contends that postmodernism's erosion of factual discourse manifests empirically in failures to engage causal realities, such as prioritizing ideological constructs over scientific data, which he deems a "crazy view" that trivializes achievements like Nobel Prizes by recasting them as mere power plays. In Moral Progress in Dark Times (2022), Gabriel applies this to ethical domains, defending against relativistic denials of universal values; he posits self-evident categories of good, neutral, and evil as knowable facts, not reducible to contextual or evolutionary contingencies. Postmodern , per Gabriel, fosters societal decay by enabling to override evidence-based debate, relying on illusory group stereotypes (e.g., racial essentialism) that fragment shared human experiences and impede progress on tangible issues like or . He advocates instead for "difference politics" rooted in individual realities and color-blind , arguing that relativist prioritization of power narratives empirically correlates with stalled advancements, as distorted perceptions prevent confrontation with objective and causal truths.

Opposition to Correlationism and Idealism

Correlationism, as articulated in post-Kantian , posits that being is inextricably correlated with thought, such that entities exist only insofar as they relate to a thinking subject or human access, rendering absolute inaccessible. Markus Gabriel rejects this framework in his development of New Realism, arguing that it conflates with and unduly privileges human cognition. Instead, he maintains that comprises a plurality of fields of sense—autonomous domains in which objects appear and acquire meaning without dependence on a transcendental subject. These fields are unconstructed and objective, allowing objects to exist and exert influence independently of any particular observer, thereby breaking the correlationist circle. Gabriel's counters 's variants, including subjective and transcendental forms, by denying that thought constructs or asymmetrically determines existence. , in his view, subordinates empirical reality to mental structures, overlooking mind-independent facts verifiable through intersubjective appearances across fields. For instance, objects manifest in diverse senses—such as physical, mathematical, or social—governed by field-specific rules (e.g., causal laws in physical fields or axiomatic consistency in numerical ones), none of which reduce to human ideation. This pluralism precludes a singular "" as an all-encompassing totality, a notion Gabriel deems illusory and correlationist in origin, as no entity or perspective can unify all fields exhaustively. By emphasizing the of appearances in fields, incorporates a commitment to causal efficacy beyond thought: unthought objects, such as subatomic particles or distant astronomical phenomena, produce effects within their respective senses, accessible via empirical investigation and intersubjective validation. This approach privileges from scientific and everyday encounters over speculative denials of independent being, refuting idealism's insulation from such evidence. 's thus restores ontological priority to the plural manifestations of , verifiable without deference to anthropocentric limits.

Challenges to Physicalism and Scientism

Gabriel critiques , which he defines as the view that all existing entities are located within the physical universe and thus amenable to scientific investigation through matter and energy. In his of fields of sense, he argues that consists of a plurality of such fields—domains of meaning where objects appear relationally—none reducible to a single physical domain, thereby rejecting physicalism's monistic reduction of existence to spacetime-bound entities. This framework posits that fields like or operate independently, with no overarching "world" unifying them under physics, as physicalism assumes; instead, all fields are equally real, challenging hierarchical materialist ontologies that privilege physics. While acknowledging science's empirical triumphs, such as elucidating cosmic structures like nebulae or subatomic particles since the , Gabriel contends that overextends by claiming explanatory completeness over non-empirical phenomena like and meaning. For instance, cannot account for evaluative judgments, such as why Vincent van Gogh's paintings surpass others in artistic merit, as these pertain to distinct fields of sense rather than neural correlates alone. , he maintains, involves objective perspectival appearances within multiple senses, not subjective reducible to brain states, evading physicalist closure. Gabriel extends this to scientism, portraying it as an ideological overreach that dogmatically elevates as the exclusive path to truth, often echoed uncritically in public discourse. He targets figures like and for exemplifying this hubris, assuming physics encompasses all reality despite its confinement to sensory , while ignoring infinite domains of beyond empirical verification. Though excels in predictive modeling of physical laws—evident in technologies from to —scientism falters by projecting a false totality, failing to address existential meaning or the irreducibility of human experience to causal mechanisms. This critique underscores a meta-metaphysical : no single field, including physics, captures the whole of being, preserving ontology's pluralism against reductive dogmas.

Engagement with Contemporary Issues

Skepticism Toward COVID-19 Measures

In early 2020, Markus Gabriel expressed skepticism toward stringent European COVID-19 lockdowns, arguing on March 26 that measures such as confining children and closing schools created a "medical state of emergency" driven by fear, transitioning society rapidly from individualism to collectivist obedience akin to a "science-obeying North Korea." He questioned the proportionality of these restrictions in an April 8 interview, stating "we are not at war" and warning that they imposed excessive economic and social damages without equivalent wartime justification, potentially paving the way for surveillance via proposed mobile tracking apps that threatened privacy and democratic norms. Gabriel advocated for a "metaphysical " as an intellectual counter-movement, described as a global unification of peoples beyond national fears to foster awareness of shared human realities, contrasting the viral with neglected annual deaths from other viruses, such as over 200,000 children from due to contaminated . This concept critiqued fear-driven collectivism, emphasizing that responses ignored longstanding global inequities while prioritizing viral containment over holistic human needs. He further challenged the "virological imperative" dominating policy, arguing it reduced individuals to mere "virus carriers" devoid of , with isolation measures overlooking causal harms like increased , , , and economic disruption, particularly for those without safe homes. Gabriel contended that virological models represented simplifications of incomplete data, not infallible guides for shutdowns, and urged incorporating ethicists, psychologists, and sociologists alongside scientists to assess low transmission risks for many against broad societal costs, deeming the global handling a failure for sidelining these trade-offs. In May 2020, he debated tracking apps explicitly as potential gateways to cyber-dictatorship, reinforcing concerns over permanent overreach.

Broader Social and Political Commentary

Gabriel's ethical and political interventions stem from his commitment to , positing the existence of universal moral facts discernible through reason and experience, independent of relativistic ideologies or cultural constructs. In Moral Progress in Dark Times (2022), he contends that such facts enable genuine moral advancement amid societal fragmentation, critiquing distortions like for elevating group-based grievances over individual and universal norms. This approach challenges narratives that normalize differential treatment based on identity categories, arguing instead for a "politics of difference" that affirms each person's unique relational otherness without subordinating individuals to collective ideologies. Crises, Gabriel observes, often unmask underlying nationalistic and prejudicial attitudes, yet he rejects both uncritical and state-driven collectivism as inadequate responses, prioritizing individual agency in ethical decision-making over paternalistic interventions that presume collective solutions to personal moral failings. His realist underscores human capacity for autonomous sense-making across diverse "fields of sense," cautioning against ideologies—whether nationalist or egalitarian—that impose a singular interpretive framework, thereby eroding personal responsibility and causal accountability in social relations. In discussions of technology and democracy, Gabriel warns that unchecked digitalization blurs public and private spheres, fostering a potential "new " through pervasive and data-driven control that mimics democratic forms while centralizing power. He advocates decentralized mechanisms for truth discernment, rooted in pluralistic realism, to safeguard democratic vitality against algorithmic manipulations or cybernetic that distort individual and collective . This stance positions his commentary as a counter to techno-optimistic or ideologically conformist views, emphasizing empirical vigilance over utopian promises of tech-mediated harmony. Gabriel's public engagements have advanced realist critiques of dominant social narratives, including those embedding moral norms in politically charged dominance hierarchies with both constructive and corrosive effects, thereby fostering discourse on amid institutional biases toward or coercion.

Public Presence and Reception

Markus Gabriel has actively participated in media interviews and podcasts to communicate to non-academic audiences. In September 2025, he featured in several episodes of the Closer to Truth series, including discussions on realism versus aired on September 18 and explorations of truth on September 5. These appearances, hosted by a platform dedicated to fundamental questions, reached viewers through and public television. Gabriel has delivered public lectures internationally, enhancing accessibility of his ideas. On October 14, 2025, he spoke at the 391st Yomiuri International Economic Society Lecture Meeting in on navigating nested crises. Earlier, in June 2025, he provided a keynote at the Business Forum for Global Peace, addressing escalating world divisions. Such events, spanning , , and beyond, leverage his proficiency in nine languages to engage diverse global audiences. His television and TEDx engagements further extend outreach. In a NHK World-Japan Direct Talk interview, Gabriel discussed his philosophical perspectives as the youngest professor at the . At TEDxBerlinSalon in August 2017, he presented on the nature of values, amassing views on . These formats have facilitated broader participation in debates on and , countering specialized academic barriers.

Academic and Public Critiques

Academic philosophers have praised Markus Gabriel's for revitalizing metaphysical inquiry through his "new realism," which posits the existence of objects and facts without reliance on a totalizing "" framework, thereby challenging dominant anti-realist trends in 20th-century . Tom Sparrow, in his review of Fields of Sense (2015), describes the work as a "formidable installment" in the resurgence of realism, appreciating its affirmation of unconstructed domains where objects appear as equally real perspectives. This approach is seen as providing a "vibrant, invigorating tonic" by emphasizing ontological pluralism over reductive or . Critics within academia, however, have highlighted ambiguities in Gabriel's core concept of "fields of sense," arguing that the indefinite or infinite multiplicity of these domains introduces nonfatal but persistent vagueness, as the precise boundaries and interconnections remain underspecified. Sparrow notes occasional reliance on tangential discussions that dilute the central no-world thesis, potentially mistaking argumentative complexity for substantive simplicity. Sheldon Richmond, in a 2021 review of Gabriel's later works, questions the practical detachment of this ontology, suggesting it fails to adequately address Kantian limits on or Heideggerian critiques of thought's inherent weakness, rendering fields of sense more abstract than empirically grounded in social or ecological contexts. Public intellectual discourse has engaged Gabriel's anti-relativist stance positively for countering postmodern fragmentation and scientistic overreach, with reviewers like commending his accessible critique of figures such as and , arguing that reality exceeds scientific silos through diverse s of . Yet detractors point to drawbacks, including logical tensions from relativizing to fields—allowing contradictory claims (e.g., witches existing in one but not another)—which risks undermining coherence without resolving into a unified realism. This has fueled debates where his rejection of totality is lauded for avoiding dogmatic prevalent in continental traditions but criticized for potentially enabling unresolved pluralism akin to the he opposes. Tensions persist with idealist-leaning continental philosophers, who view Gabriel's fields of sense as insufficiently transcendental, prioritizing empirical appearances over constructive subjectivity, though no major academic scandals have arisen from these exchanges. Richmond further contends that Gabriel's emphasis on pure thought overlooks its subordination to practical, situation-bound reasoning, limiting its causal efficacy in addressing real-world pluralism. Overall, while validated for ontological , Gabriel's framework faces scrutiny for conceptual imprecision and incomplete integration with empirical causal structures.

Major Publications

Key Monographs

Warum es die Welt nicht gibt (2013), Gabriel's foundational monograph on New Realism, contends that there is no singular "world" encompassing all existence but rather a multiplicity of "fields of sense" where meaning and facts appear, thereby rejecting holistic ontologies prevalent in . This work establishes his critique of correlationism, emphasizing that objects exist independently of human access yet manifest through contextual senses without reducing to . Der Sinn des Denkens (2018), translated as The Meaning of Thought (2020), extends this framework to , positing thought as an irreducibly meaningful sense akin to , not a computational or neural process confined to the . Gabriel argues here for a non-physicalist account where thinking engages the world's fields directly, innovating against eliminativist and functionalist views by grounding mentality in ontological plurality rather than reductive mechanisms.

Edited Volumes and Collaborations

Gabriel co-founded the New Realism philosophical movement alongside Maurizio Ferraris, articulating a critique of postmodern constructivism and correlationism through shared manifestos and joint advocacy starting around 2012, with key developments by 2014 emphasizing ontology's independence from human . This collaboration positioned New Realism as a realist alternative, rejecting the notion that is reducible to interpretive frameworks, and influenced subsequent edited works advancing . In 2009, Gabriel collaborated with Slavoj Žižek on Mythology, Madness, and Laughter: Subjectivity in German Idealism, contributing an essay and co-authoring the introduction to examine subjectivity's non-reductive dimensions in idealist thought, challenging reductive interpretations of German philosophy. Gabriel co-edited German Idealism Today (2017) with Anders Moe Rasmussen, compiling essays that reassess classical German idealism's contributions to contemporary debates on metaphysics and epistemology, underscoring its ongoing relevance against scientistic reductions. More recently, he served as co-editor of Beyond Neoliberalism and Neo-illiberalism: Economic Policies and Performance for Sustainable Growth (2024) with Anna Katsman, Thomas Liess, and William Milberg, integrating philosophical analysis with economic policy discussions to critique dominant paradigms and propose realist alternatives informed by fields of sense. These efforts highlight Gabriel's emphasis on interdisciplinary collaboration to propagate New Realist critiques, prioritizing empirical and ontological rigor over ideological constructs.

References

  1. https://www.cst.uni-bonn.de/en/persons/markus-gabriel
  2. https://www.amazon.com/Markus-Gabriel/e/B001JOLZ8W
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  4. https://www.phil.arts.cuhk.edu.hk/web/tcivp/markus-gabriel/
  5. https://philosophynow.org/issues/113/Markus_Gabriel
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  10. https://www.sueddeutsche.de/projekte/artikel/gesellschaft/markus-gabriel-kinderwahlrecht-kinderrechte-e917267/
  11. https://www.bwstiftung.de/de/jahresbericht2023/warum-braucht-es-utopien
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  33. https://ndpr.nd.edu/reviews/fields-of-sense-a-new-realist-ontology/
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  36. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-71899-2
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  40. https://theconversation.com/do-universal-values-exist-a-philosopher-says-yes-and-takes-aim-at-identity-politics-but-not-all-of-his-arguments-are-convincing-208014
  41. https://www.the-tls.com/philosophy/contemporary-philosophy/moral-progress-in-dark-times-markus-gabriel-book-review-lucy-mcdonald
  42. http://blog.christilling.de/2016/03/blogging-through-markus-gabriels-why.html
  43. https://www.uni-bonn.de/en/news/we-need-a-metaphysical-pandemic
  44. https://www.handelsblatt.com/arts_und_style/literatur/wirtschaft-und-gesellschaft-philosophieprofessor-zu-corona-massnahmen-wir-sind-nicht-im-krieg/25724140.html
  45. https://www.nzz.ch/feuilleton/coronavirus-warum-der-virologische-imperativ-auch-gefaehrlich-ist-ld.1548594
  46. https://www.abc.net.au/religion/lessons-from-coronavirus-shutdown-for-the-environmental-movement/12176256
  47. https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/markus-gabriel-vs-jan-wetzel-fuehrt-corona-in-eine-cyber-100.html
  48. https://thenew.institute/en/media/values-for-tomorrow-markus-gabriel-will-become-a-fellow-at-the-new-institute
  49. https://www.icmica-miic.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Gabriel_Philosopher-says-digitalization-leading-to-new-totalitarianism-_-The-Asahi-Shimbun.pdf
  50. https://thenew.institute/en/media
  51. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iz-26FTZIeI
  52. https://closertotruth.com/video/gabma-005/
  53. https://closertotruth.com/contributor/markus-gabriel/
  54. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42KGdjfMYEw
  55. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYKBcow9dvM
  56. https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/shows/2058983/
  57. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZ07GkLGoEE
  58. https://www.a-speakers.com/speakers/dr-markus-gabriel/
  59. https://social-epistemology.com/2021/08/30/open-letter-to-markus-gabriel-a-review-of-the-power-of-art-and-the-meaning-of-thought-sheldon-richmond/
  60. https://brill.com/view/journals/vfp/89/4/article-p649_11.xml
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  63. https://iris.unito.it/retrieve/handle/2318/1533508/76874/Speculations_VI_Ferraris.pdf
  64. https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/author/markus-gabriel/
  65. https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/hegel-bulletin/article/markus-gabriel-and-slavoj-zizek-mythology-madness-and-laughter-subjectivity-in-german-idealism-continuum-2009-isbn-139781441191052-hbk-pp-202-1799/86BDAD0861E7D2C883C819217F69B8B1
  66. https://isdistribution.com/BookDetail.aspx?aId=174535
  67. https://cup.columbia.edu/book/beyond-neoliberalism-and-neo-illiberalism/9783837674873/
  68. https://markus-gabriel.com/beyond-neoliberalism-and-neo-illiberalism-2024
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