Work Classification Layer
Compare Works
Pick two or more works to set their attribute fingerprints, dimension-by-dimension passages, and shared school embodiments side by side. Especially useful for author-stage comparisons (Wittgenstein early vs late) and for setting a single tradition's foundational texts against each other.
Critique of Dialectical Reason
Existentialism integrated with Marxism — Sartre's major late philosophical attempt to ground historical-materialist analysis in existentialist phenomenology
Attribute Fingerprint
Rows where works disagree are highlighted in gold. The full ontology grid is shown.
| Attribute | Critique of Dialectical Reason (Late (Sartre's major late philosophical work)) |
|---|---|
| Time · Extent | Infinite |
| Time · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Time · Grain | Continuous |
| Time · Freedom | Non-Deterministic |
| Time · Traversability | Linear |
| Time · Dimensionality | One |
| Time · Direction | Uni-directional |
| Space · Extent | Infinite |
| Space · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Space · Curvature | Flat |
| Space · Dimensionality | Three |
| Space · Locality | Local |
| Matter · Extent | Infinite |
| Matter · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Matter · Conservation | Conserved |
| Matter · Dimensionality | Three |
| Matter · Locality | Local |
| Observer · Time Instance | Single |
| Observer · Space Instance | Single |
| Observer · Knowledge Extent | Partial |
| Observer · Knowledge Retainment | Total |
| Observer · Physicality | Embodied |
| Observer · Agency | Active |
| Observer · Number | Plural |
| Observer · Metaphysical Agency | None |
| Observer · Moral Authority | Reason |
| Observer · Theological Method | — |
| Energy · Extent | Infinite |
| Energy · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Energy · Conservation | Conserved |
| Energy · Dispersibility | Irreversible |
| Information · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Information · Cosmic Conservation | Conserved |
| Information · Personal Conservation | Non-conserved |
| Information · Granularity | Continuous |
Dimension-by-Dimension Evidence
What each work's passages reveal about its stance on each of the six dimensions.
Time
Critique of Dialectical Reason
Historical time as the medium of dialectical development; the rhythm of group-formation and institutional routinisation.
Space
Critique of Dialectical Reason
The social-political space of inherited material-structural conditions and collective action.
Matter
Critique of Dialectical Reason
The practico-inert as the material-historical substrate; embodied human praxis as the active principle.
Observer
Critique of Dialectical Reason
The praxis-engaged subject — embodied, plural, active in collective transformation within structural conditions.
Energy
Critique of Dialectical Reason
The energies of free praxis taking up and transforming the practico-inert.
Information
Critique of Dialectical Reason
Historical-structural conditions preserved as practico-inert; collective action preserved through its institutional outcomes.
Internal Tensions
Where each work's argument pulls against itself.
Volume II's unfinished state has been a continuing scholarly question. The Critique's relation to Being and Nothingness — does it modify or preserve the early framework? — is contested. The structuralist criticism (Lévi-Strauss's famous response in The Savage Mind) charged Sartre with insufficient attention to deep structural patterns. The Critique has been less widely read than Being and Nothingness but is often regarded as Sartre's most philosophically mature work.