2. Philosophy - Stefano Franchi

B ORDERING PHILOSOPHY
ditions that must be in place in order for that place to be reached? Both alternatives, in fact,
might be true, since they are not mutually exclusive: it might be that the only example ex-
hibiting the structural constraints that Spiel identifies is, in fact, Spiel itself. To say it a bit
more formally, it might true that Spiel is the only member of a one-element set, a unicum
that exemplifies only itself. Nonetheless, since the second alternative is less stringent, noth-
ing is lost if, at least for now, we decide to follow it and, consequently, we adopt the view
that Spiel has to be provisionally interpreted as a set of conditions to be fulfilled in order to
warrant the existence of an endpoint to the Hegelian path that originates with the reflection
upon the end of philosophy.
However, the distinction between the “proper” and “metonymical” interpretations of
Spiel can also be considered from a different point of view. In fact, it is certainly not granted
that the mapping between Spiel and the constraints outlined above in the context of Hegel’s
discussion is complete and one to one. In other words, there might exist a certain discrep-
ancy between the two, either because what we know, or pretend to know, under the label of
Spiel presents a richer set of features or, conversely, because some of the features required
to either close or terminate philosophy are not quite consistent with Spiel as we “know” it.
We do not have real answers to this point, at this level of the analysis, because we do not
enjoy the comfortable position of someone sitting on the fence and glancing down to both
antagonists in order to dispassionately assess their intrinsic qualities. Nor can we find any
help in empirical investigations or pre-theoretical understandings of play and game, other
than as bare clues toward further progress. The issue is how to think philosophy, or rather
its end, together with play, and how to think both together with their relationship, if any.
Regardless of whether the end of philosophy brings to a Spiel or to a Spiel-like location, are
we sure that what we know about Spiel and Spielen in general is consistent with the fea-
tures—or constraints, as I have I called them—that such a place should and would exhibit?
Unfortunately, there is no readily available touchstone, i.e. a body of knowledge about Spiel
firmly in place and onto- logically independent from philosophy that we may use to settle
the issue. Thus, the only possible way to gain more clarity on it is to conduct the investiga-
tion, as it were, from both sides. That is, on the one hand we are forced to proceed from the
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