Two imprisoning factors, rumination and loneliness, on the individual level, and two imprisoning factors, social isolation and over-positioning economy, at the collective level are extensively described. Several implications for the organization of the self in contemporary society are outlined: the increasing density and heterogeneity of I-positions, frequency of “visits” by unexpected positions, and larger “position leaps.” Then, the phenomenon of “over-positioning economy” as one of the main implications of neoliberalism is discussed in more depth. A sociological theory is introduced to account for the “asymmetrical penetration” of the economic value sphere into other value spheres (e.g., education, science, love). Also, on the level of the self, a one-sided penetration occurs as economic positions, such as consumer and entrepreneurial positions, are increasingly influencing other I-positions that, as a consequence, are at risk of losing their uniqueness. In all these cases, possible trajectories into the direction of self-liberation are sketched.

Anne Pollok discusses the role of history, historiography, and historicity in Cassirer’s philosophy in this chapter. In contrast to the “objectively teleological” approaches to history offered by Leibniz or Hegel, Cassirer, on the one hand, does not assume an inherent teleology that is merely reflected in culture, but interprets history as a dynamic and progressive movement of the self-liberation of spirit that must be expressed and manifested by cultural means. Hence, the historian must actively engage with our cultural past as a means to elucidate our current standing and inform our future development. Contrary to Heidegger, on the other hand, Cassirer sees this process of self-liberation not as an existential struggle, but assumes that a proper relation to our history offers a valid answer to the demands of the present. Pollok hereby demonstrates that historical reconstruction elucidates the basic communal and intersubjective structure of symbol formation, thus transcending the limits of the historian’s time and elucidating the complex system of human symbolic formation in culture.

This chapter explains the crucial role that science plays in the framework of the philosophy of symbolic forms. On the one hand, Cassirer’s functionalistic understanding of scientific knowledge is intimately tied with the history of self-liberation from the concept of substance that began with Galileo’s scientific revolution and that resulted in the focus of contemporary physics on purely mathematical symbols. On the other hand, for Cassirer science has broad cultural significance because it is at once the pivotal point of modern culture and remains influenced by other symbolic forms such as myth, language, and art, and ways of world understanding in general. In showing how science represents the 'theoretical self-awareness" of a new era of Western civilization, Ferrari emphasizes not only Cassirer's remaining commitment to Neo-Kantianism but also the continuity between his early epistemological view and broader philosophy of culture.