How Do Thinking Be Possible-Hannah Arendt’s “the Life Of The Mind”

Through the Chinese and foreign scholars study of Arendt’s political philosophy, it is an immense number of books and the research angle is varied. As an important work of Arendt in her later years, the Life of Mind expresses its important ideas from the perspectives of “thinking”, “willing” and “judging”, and based on the three aspects of the perspective. It can also be of great help for us to has an overall concise and more thorough understanding of Arendt’s thought. As a matter of fact, there are many ideas of the Life of the Mind which are from her early and middle works and related arguments. Thinking, which is the core part of the Life of Mind, has framing effect of Willing and Judging. According to Thinking, Arendt, through in-depth investigation of the two sources—ancient Greek and Rome, pointed out that thought is the only activity that only needs to be able to practice. In this part, Arendt introduced the will into the range of thinking. Then She talked about the dilemma of modern top-down thinking, and called the return of thinking. In her opinion, Arendt thought that everyone should use the ability of “thinking”. Afterwards,she turned to the thinking of totalitarianism to mediocrity, gave “thought” back to life, and let the spirit of life to thinking, which makes the practical way of life to the contemplative life style. At last, by returning to Socrates, she gave the original answers of “thinking”, which are purification, the liberation of judgment, and obtained the conclusion—Thought is action.She thinks that thinking from its source run parallel of action. On the whole structure of the Life of Mind, Philosophy and Politics;“thinking”and action;“thinking”, “willing”, “judging”etc.The subtle relationship among them is not only through the Life of Mind, but also very critical in the overall grasp of Ahrendt thought, and a subtle perspective of its important links as well.