Abstract: Hedwig Conrad-Martius (1888-1966) is gaining recognition as an important representative of early phenomenological realism, but her philosophy transcends that designation. Conrad-Martius’ realism is housed in a reformed classical philosophical universalism, and this becomes especially evident in her late project of universal ontology. Universal ontology is an ontological account of everything—“absolutely everything”—that there is: “[Not only] material, formal and categorical objects, not only real and ideal… not only purely fictitious objects, but… also purely conceptual objects, that is, objects to which nothing actually objective corresponds” (Das Sein, 40). To better appreciate her contribution, I will describe this late project, and contextualize it in terms of her spirituality, her cosmology, and her influences and resonances.

Link to the talk.