Abstract:

Hannah Arendt, a well-known political philosopher in the world for her reflections on a series of political problems in the twentieth century, turned to philosophy in her late years from the political realm with which she had been always concerned. In her unfinished writing, The Life of Mind, she tried to bridge the traditional gap between life of mind and life of action, formulating the intellectual basis of political activities. Moreover, she sought to give a theoretical explanation of the phenomenon: the banality of evil, illustrating why thinking had a power to refuse evils. Arendt's idea of the political significance of thinking was indebted to the two great masters of Western philosophy: Kant and Socrates. From Kant she learned what was thinking, and from Socrates she learned how to think.

Key words: life of mind, banality of evil, reason, intellect, conscience