Metanoia and the Reinvention of Thinking: A Speculative Odyssey on Language, Thought, and the Brain
How many times has language changed who we are and the world we inhabit?
The Metamorphosis of Consciousness: The Enigma of Metanoia
What does it mean that reading a book, writing a word, or engaging in a conversation can radically transform the structure of our thinking? In Metanoia: A Speculative Ontology of Language, Thinking, and the Brain, Armen Avanessian and Anke Hennig explore the possibility that the act of thinking is an endless process of transformation, in which both subject and world are transfigured. This book is not merely a philosophical exploration of change but also a bold proposal to consider how new subjectivities, languages, and realities emerge.
Can thinking truly reshape our perception of the past, or are we prisoners of the perspective we hold today of who we once were?
Language as Alchemy: Poiesis and Contingency
The book’s core thesis rejects a linear and static view of language. Rather than conceiving language as a neutral tool for naming the world, Avanessian and Hennig propose it as an ontological laboratory, in which the world is created each time we speak, write, or read. Thus, the governing principle of language does not lie in the arbitrariness of signs (as Saussure maintains), but in its contingency and plasticity: every word has the potential to inaugurate new modes of being, thought, and perception.
Does language reflect the world, or does it shape it in every act of speech?
This poietic approach—from the Greek poiesis, the act of creation—means that language is not merely a mirror but a creative force: each linguistic act can transform the system as a whole and with it our relationship to the world.
The Hermeneutic Circle: Beyond Interpretation and Deconstruction
Avanessian and Hennig examine and reformulate the historical debate between hermeneutics and deconstruction—between Gadamer’s quest for unified meaning and Derrida’s endless “differance”—to show that the production of meaning is always circular, twisted, and unexpected. What is traditionally understood as a hermeneutic circle, here becomes a creative spiral: every insertion of a “part” into the “whole” of meaning changes the entire system’s configuration. Meaning never stabilizes; instead, it recursively rewrites the past and the future of our concepts.
When we understand a text, do we change the text, or do we transform ourselves as readers?
Metanoia and the Challenge of Otherness: Beyond the Self and the World
The book argues that authentic metanoia—radical change of mind—does not occur solely on the individual plane. It is a triadic phenomenon, where subject, object, and “other” mutually transform each other. In this sense, thinking metanoia requires surpassing the binary oppositions of structuralism (subject/object, langue/parole) and orienting towards models where otherness and difference are conditions of possibility for philosophical and existential change.
This perspective connects with contemporary debates on brain plasticity and the co-evolution of language and mind: conceiving thought as mutable and the brain as a plastic entity transforms even the biological basis of the self.
Can we imagine a world where thought does not oppose nor simply reflect reality, but changes it with every linguistic turn?
Against the Myth of Arbitrariness: Reality as a Linguistic Product
One of Avanessian and Hennig’s targets is the “arbitrariness” of the sign, seen as a dogma of modern linguistics. They replace it with the idea of contingency: language is not arbitrary because every word and grammatical relation arises and develops within a constantly changing system in ongoing interplay with the world. In this sense, language possesses even more reality-content than perception itself, since its recursive capacity and systemic organization allow it to generate referentiality and fiction, to open new horizons of meaning, and to perform the miracle of metanoia.
What would be lost if language were truly arbitrary, with no power to shape our comprehension of being?
Metanoia, Abduction, and the Speculative Poetics of Conceptual Invention
The book highlights the importance of abduction—the creative inference proposed by Peirce—as a logical and poetic process through which new rules and realities emerge from imagination. Instead of secure deduction or passive induction, abduction is the radical act of proposing possible worlds and investigating if they can become real. Thus, metanoia is the extreme experience of abduction: the conceptual and vital leap that recomposes both subject and object in a single movement.
Can the act of concept-creation be considered a philosophical and political emancipation?
Language, Brain, and History: The Contemporary Relevance of Metanoia
In the twenty-first century, where the acceleration of social, technological, and political changes constantly redefines who we are, Avanessian and Hennig’s speculative ontology emerges as an urgent resource for thinking about the present. Their work—at the crossroads of neuroscience, philosophy of language, and critical theory—relates directly to contemporary debates on posthumanism, artificial intelligence, and the transformation of modes of subjectivation. Metanoia is not only a philosophical phenomenon but also a survival strategy: the capacity to continually reinvent our mode of being in the world.
Are we prepared to turn every crisis of meaning into the occasion for a new beginning?
Epilogue: Towards a Poetics of Transformative Thinking
In Metanoia, reflection becomes a tool of emancipation, a lightning rod of possibility against the inertia of thought and the rigidity of language. Avanessian and Hennig invite us to be poietic subjects, to accept the risk of losing meaning in order to invent a new one, and to understand that truth—far from being a unified, eternal reflection—turns out to be the contingent product of a history of ruptures, reinventions, and alterities.
Would you dare to forget everything you know, just to open up the possibility of a new world and a new self?