"The darkened world". After Auschwitz and Hiroshima catastrophes according to G. Anders and T. W. Adorno

«After Auschwitz and Hiroshima», it was said after the two greatest moral scandals of the 20th century, in the framework of a world by now darkened, in the context of moral’s and reason’s eclipses. «After Auschwitz and Hiroshima», it was affirmed thus coining an indissoluble pair, bound to be thought, to be interpreted in its entirety by many philosophers, or distinguishing the two disasters that bear the names of those places. There was someone, as T. W. Adorno, who dwelled on the first, on the «after Auschwitz» and on the new categorical imperative of «Auschwitz never again», without however neglecting to deal with the atomic bomb, and there was someone, as G. Anders, who instead devoted his whole speculation and even his whole life to thinking especially «after Hiroshima» and to warning, in practice as in theory, «Hiroshima never again», without however forgetting to meditate on Auschwitz. It is precisely on these two authors that this article wishes to dwell. Without investigating their personal and intellectual ties – seemingly not so friendly – we want to consider the essential points which they got, albeit in very different ways, about the catastrophes that have settled in the heart of 20th century Europe, and in particular how they evaluated the possibilities of assessing their causes and consequences in relation to ethics and to the possibility of a new ethics. In fact, not only there is a same shade of color in their writings, a same «darkness» in their thoughts, which however never gives in to resignation: but there is exactly a well-defined ethical call, addressed to all and to young people in particular, a call which passes also through the bodily and emotional domains, even those of «feeling», a call to moral resistance and to a «never more».