• bloodninja
    272
    Unfortunately this will only make sense to those already interested in Heidegger... There is no "Heidegger" category, so I chose to put it in the general section.

    What is the relevance of death in Heidegger's Being and Time? It seems to be a concept that is open to endless interpretation. But what is its function within the text itself? Throughout the death chapter he constantly refers to dasein's 'wholeness'. So this obviously key to any interpretation of death, and I think it's also a key to what he means by originary temporality. Here is a quotation:

    "Underlying this biological-ontical exploration of death is a problematic that is ontological. We still have to ask how the ontological essence of death is defined in terms of that of life. In a certain way, this has always been decided already in the ontical investigation of death. Such investigations operate with preliminary conceptions of life and death, which have been more or less clarified. These preliminary conceptions need to be sketched out by the ontology of Dasein. Within the ontology of Dasein,
    which is superordinate to an ontology of life, the existential analysis of death is, in turn, subordinate to a characterization of Dasein's basic state. The ending of that which lives we have called 'perishing'. Dasein too 'has' its death, of the kind appropriate to anything that lives ; and it has it, not in ontical isolation, but as codetermined by its primordial kind of Being. In so far as this is the case, Dasein too can end without authentically dying, though on the other hand, qua Dasein, it does not simply perish.
    We designate this intermediate phenomenon as its "demise". Let the term "dying" stand for that way of Being in which Dasein is towards its death. Accordingly we must say that Dasein never perishes. Dasein, however, can demise only as long as it is dying. Medical and biological investigation into "demising" can obtain results which may even become significant ontologically if the basic orientation for an existential Interpretation of death has been made secure. Or must sickness and death in general even from a medical point of view-be primarily conceived as existential phenomena ?" (pg. 291)
  • t0m
    319
    It was Innwood or Carmen or both that I got this idea from: Death is the closing down of possibilities as other possibilities are chosen. Death is also the closing down of possibilities as we age. That's one take on death that I found meaningful. This is also in Kojeve, which is where I first saw the idea. I hadn't read Heidegger then.

    This general idea also happens to be in Feuerbach's criticism of Hegel and The Essence of Christianity as well. God shines as the image of the realization of all human possibilities. But a mortal man can only develop some of his godlike potential, neglecting the rest. He is therefore comforted by the infinite image of God -- which is "just" (in all its glory) the essence of humanity as a whole.
  • TimeLine
    2.7k
    The concept of death or inexistence is closely linked to his views on authenticity and self-awareness; we are capable of knowledge, the conscious experience of ourselves, which inevitably means an awareness of inexistence or death, the futility of our efforts. Modernity has provided the landscape that enables us to escape this awareness of our mortality and what that means is that we conversely are not conscious of 'being' or existence either, somewhat moulded to the material world and lack authenticity. Heidegger thus questioned ‘being’ from an ontological angle; what is ‘being’ and is it an awareness of our own existence? Who we are is determined by this examination of ourselves and thus Dasein is an ‘essence’ rather than a property. An inauthentic Dasein, what most are like today where they assume they are conscious of death and have an individuality, when really they are not but are merely mindlessly following, is caused by a subjective state of Furcht or fear.

    Authenticity is somewhat temporal, that we can anticipate death, we can recollect or envision, whereas inauthenticity is making things present and forgetting and this fear is the causal roots for the latter' subjective attitude (as in, why the inauthentic do not actually confront death); Dasein is basically a person who is able to recognise themselves as a subject authentically, to genuinely distinguish themselves as separate from the material world of modernity where they are thus able to distinguish the difference between their feelings or attitudes directed to the material world as being fundamentally flawed.
  • TimeLine
    2.7k
    What are you on about?
  • t0m
    319


    What are you on about?
  • t0m
    319
    Not sure how you intended your entry into the conversation in terms of tone, but I'll assume and hope it was friendly.

    That said, I googled and found on the first page Dreyfus criticizing Taylor Carmen's view of death or dying as the closing down of Dasein's possibilities. If memory serves, I just saw that idea in Innwood's Heidegger dictionary last night, too. As you may know, Kojeve fused Marx and Heidegger in his famous lectures. And of course Feuerbach, a German philosopher, may have influenced Heidegger, especially as a critic of Hegel and of metaphysics generally.
  • Agustino
    11.2k
    I don't think this is a faithful reading of Heidegger at all. Heidegger would be quite appalled by the humanism and anthropocentrism that emanates from that. Like for example:

    Dasein is basically a person who is able to recognise themselves as a subject authenticallyTimeLine
    That's not what Heidegger meant. Dasein is more fundamental than merely human or person or any such a designation.
  • TimeLine
    2.7k
    Not sure how you intended your entry into the conversation in terms of tone, but I'll assume and hope it was friendly.t0m

    It was meant to be nothing but a statement of fact.

    That said, I googled and found on the first page Dreyfus criticizing Taylor Carmen's view of death or dying as the closing down of Dasein's possibilities. If memory serves, I just saw that idea in Innwood's Heidegger dictionary last night, too. As you may know, Kojeve fused Marx and Heidegger in his famous lectures. And of course Feuerbach, a German philosopher, may have influenced Heidegger, especially as a critic of Hegel and metaphysics generally.t0m

    Ok, kind of sounds interesting but you do need to actually hone in on Carmen, methinks.
  • TimeLine
    2.7k
    I don't think this is a faithful reading of Heidegger at all. Heidegger would be quite appalled by the humanism and anthropocentrism that emanates from that. Like for example:Agustino

    I think the only thing appaling at this point is the assumption that you know what Heidegger would be feeling. Anthropocentrism? Are you saying that Heidegger is not talking about being?

    That's not what Heidegger meant. Dasein is more fundamental than merely human or person or any such a designation.Agustino

    So, Dasein is not existence? Yeah, this is getting a bit awkward.
  • t0m
    319
    It was meant to be nothing but a statement of fact.TimeLine

    I was referring to "what are you on about?" I suppose that was your second post in the thread.

    Here's Dreyfus' quote of Carman, since I'm such a nice fellow.
    And Carman, therefore suggests that death is 'the constant closing down of possibilities, which is an essential structural feature of all projection into a future. He adds:
    Such things die by dying to us, or rather by our dying to them as possibilities. Our possibilities are constantly dropping away into nullity, then, and this is what Heidegger means when he says — what might sound otherwise hyperbolic or simply false — that 'Dasein is factically dying as long as it exists' (295). To say that we are always dying is to say that our possibilities are constantly closing down around us.
    — D
    http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~hdreyfus/189_s08/pdf/Carol%20White%20forward.pdf
  • Agustino
    11.2k
    Anthropocentrism? Are you saying that Heidegger is not talking about being?TimeLine
    Yes, he problematized the question of the meaning of being. That's prior to the possibility of any sort of anthropocentrism, and by reducing it to anthropocentrism and humanism you destroy that priority.

    So, Dasein is not existence? Yeah, this is getting a bit awkward.TimeLine
    Yes, but it doesn't refer to the humanness of existence. It is true that only the human can be Dasein, as far as we know, but that doesn't mean that the phenomenon of Dasein is tied to the humanity of man.
  • TimeLine
    2.7k
    Yes, he problematized the question of the meaning of being. That's prior to the possibility of any sort of anthropocentrism, and by reducing it to anthropocentrism and humanism you destroy that priority.Agustino

    I get what you are saying, but this is the dilemma that people face, the unique position we are in and this collision enables us to respond or react, making us different to any other species. That anthropocentrism only becomes displaced the moment we recognise authentically Dasein.

    Yes, but it doesn't refer to the humanness of existence. It is true that only the human can be Dasein, as far as we know, but that doesn't mean that the phenomenon of Dasein is tied to the humanity of man.Agustino

    Ok, that makes sense.
  • TimeLine
    2.7k
    Yes, but it doesn't refer to the humanness of existence. It is true that only the human can be Dasein, as far as we know, but that doesn't mean that the phenomenon of Dasein is tied to the humanity of man.Agustino

    On another angle, though, there is this unavoidable humanism left in Dasein, this 'essence' despite what Heidegger imagines. What is left is 'man' or 'woman' or a kind of reappropriation. I fear there really is no escape.
  • Agustino
    11.2k
    On another angle, though, there is this unavoidable humanism left in Dasein, this 'essence' despite what Heidegger imagines. What is left is 'man' or 'woman' or a kind of reappropriation. I fear there really is no escape.TimeLine
    :-|
  • TimeLine
    2.7k
    Oh sorry, that's what Derrida said. But of course, you know better.
  • Agustino
    11.2k
    Oh sorry, that's what Derrida said. But of course, you know better.TimeLine
    :-|
  • t0m
    319
    This past, as that to which I run ahead, here makes a discovery in my running ahead to it: it is my past. As this past it uncovers my Dasein as suddenly no longer there; suddenly I am no longer there along such and such things, alongside such and such people, alongside these vanities, these tricks, this chattering. The past scatters all secretiveness and busyness, the past takes everything into the Nothing. The past is not some occurence, not some incident in my Dasein. It is its past, not some 'what' about Dasein, some event that happens to Dasein and alters it. This past is not a 'what' but a 'how', indeed the authentic 'how' of my Dasein. This past, to which I can run ahead as mine, is not some 'what', but the 'how' of my Dasein pure and simple. — Heidegger
    That's from the lecture (not the book) The Concept of Time. Someone (can't remember who) called it the Ur-B&T, just as the ~100 page book of the same name is sold (I bought one) as the "first draft."

    This is probably the most beautiful single work of philosophy I possess at the moment.
  • TimeLine
    2.7k
    Thanks, so as I said about authenticity and temporality, which is why Carmen' position inevitably destroys the possibilities that follow.
  • t0m
    319
    Dasein is authentically alongside itself, it is truly existent, whenever it maintains itself in this running ahead. This running ahead is nothing other than the authentic and singular future of one's own Dasein. In running ahead, Dasein is its future, in such a way that in this being futural it comes back to its past and present. Dasein, conceived in its most basic extreme possiblity of being, is time itself, not in time. — H

    Kojeve, blending Hegel and Heidegger, had it : Man is the Concept is Time.
  • t0m
    319

    My pleasure. I didn't understand that last post. Care to clarify?
  • TimeLine
    2.7k
    Charming. Unfortunately, you're not actually being funny, but that is the problem with people who have no sense of humour.

    For the sake of brevity, there is a temporal link between Dasein and this anthropocentrism that he seeks to avoid, which is where Carmen' position is somewhat interesting. Derrida said this in The Ends of Man. "We see that Dasein, though not man, is nevertheless nothing other than man... a repetition of the essence of man permitting a return to what it was before [on this side of] the metaphysical concepts of Humanitas."
  • t0m
    319

    Thanks. I definitely read Dasein as a more holistic notion of human being. But still man. I don't mind, though. I really don't see how anthropocentrism can ever be avoided. On the other hand, I agree with Feuerbach that man is the god of man, so I don't think it needs to be. For me it's a question of shaping our self-image in a good or successful way. More accurately, I think this is done (ultimately or most authentically) on a personal level. We each shape our own notion of who we are, though admittedly in the context of or from within interpretations that preceded our own. We never get a blank canvas.
  • TimeLine
    2.7k
    I really don't see how anthropocentrism can ever be avoided.t0m

    (Y)
  • t0m
    319
    Found some stuff in Kojeve that may help illuminate this issue. The last part is what I especially had in mind.

    Therefore, [man] is
    the empirical existence in the World of a Future that will never
    become present. Now, this Future, for Man, is his death, that
    Future of his which will never become his Present; and the only
    reality or real presence of this Future is the knowledge that Man
    has in the present of his future death. Therefore, if Man is Concept
    and if the Concept is Time (that is, if Man is an essentially tem-
    poral being), Man is essentially mortal; and he is Concept, that is,
    absolute Knowledge or Wisdom incarnate, only if he knows this.
    Logos becomes flesh, becomes Man, only on the condition of being
    willing and able to die.

    ...
    For History to exist, there must be not only a given reality, but
    also a negation of that reality and at the same time a ("sublimated")
    preservation of what has been negated. For only then is evolution
    creative; only then do a true continuity and a real progress exist in
    it. And this is precisely what distinguishes human History from a
    simple biological or "natural" evolution. Now, to preserve oneself
    as negated is to remember what one has been even while one is
    becoming radically other. It is by historical memory that Man's
    identity preserves itself throughout History, in spite of the auto-
    negations which are accomplished in it, so that he can realize him-
    self by means of History as the integration of his contradictory
    past or as totality, or, better, as dialectical entity. Hence history is
    always a conscious and willed tradition, and all real history also
    manifests itself as a historiography: there is no History without
    conscious, lived historical memory.

    ...
    Man's Freedom is the actual negation
    by him of his own given "nature" — that is, of the "possibilities"
    which he has already realized, which determine his "impossibili-
    ties" — i.e., everything incompatible with his "possibilities." And
    his Individuality is a synthesis of his particularity with a uni-
    versality that is equally his. Therefore Man can be individual and
    free only to the extent that he implies in his being all the possi-
    bilities of Being but does not have the time to realize and manifest
    them all. Freedom is the realization of a possibility incompatible
    (as realized) with the entirety of possibilities realized previously
    (which consequently must be negated); hence there is freedom
    only where that entirety does not embrace all possibilities in gen-
    eral, and where what is outside of that entirety is not an absolute
    impossibility. And man is an individual only to the extent that the
    universality of the possibilities of his being is associated in him
    with the unique particularity (the only one of its kind) of their
    temporal realizations and manifestations. It is solely because he is
    potentially infinite and always limited in deed by his death that
    Man is a free Individual who has a history and who can freely
    create a place for himself in History, instead of being content, like
    animals and things, passively to occupy a natural place in the given
    Cosmos, determined by the structure of the latter.

    Therefore, Man is a (free) Individual only to the extent that
    he is mortal, and he can realize and manifest himself as such an
    Individual only by realizing and manifesting Death as well.
    — Kojeve
    https://archive.org/stream/pdfy-xPoejl7ruL9jyW3_/KOJEVE%20introduction%20to%20the%20reading%20of%20hegel_djvu.txt
  • Rich
    3.2k
    I think you can pretty much ignore all of the academic interpretations, because no one really gets it because no one studies Bergson anymore so they are grasping in the air. The Dasein is a kind of reworking of Bergson's la durée. In some ways it augments but in most ways it just obscures for no reason other than to create something different.

    Just consider Dasein as ongoing Time/Duration (in Bergson's sense) which is taking on the possibilities of Life and Death. Each is a manifestation of the possibilities of Duration. So what we call death is just a transition (demise) into another state of possibilities of the Duration. We c make of each state as we do.

    Hamlet's famous soliloquy touches upon this. Philosophers tend to be unnecessarily verbose.
  • tim wood
    9.3k
    What is death in Heidegger's Being and Time?

    On my reading of Heidegger, what is important, what matters, about death is not so much death itself, but the awareness of what death (my death) means. As in, for example, the "many" don't die; and only I can die my death.

    Or, much more generally, not so much what something "is," so much as what it means for it to be. Of course he wrote a whole book or two about this....

    That is, if you're thinking about death itself, then maybe you're not within the horizon of any of Heidegger's thinking.
  • bloodninja
    272
    That Carol White forward written by Dreyfus that you linked above is brilliant and extremely comprehensive! I would HIGHLY recommend that everyone who is interested in this discussion's topic read it! Here it is again:

    http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~hdreyfus/189_s08/pdf/Carol%20White%20forward.pdf

    I was quietly thinking to myself that the gradual closing down of possibilities cannot be what Heidegger meant by death. Dreyfus's criticism of Carman's interpretation is spot on and devastating in my opinion.
  • t0m
    319


    I found it interesting, somewhat convincing, but not conclusive or exhaustive.

    That one dies one's own death seems at least as central. The "they" can talk their talk, but I swim that last lap radically and beautifully alone. Death "individualizes Dasein down to itself." It opens up Dasein's absolute groundlessness. We exist against a background of the nothingness from which we emerged and to which we must return. From when to when is the how. The life given to us in its radical specificity is the unique ground of our finite possibilities, finite because we know that they are always already closing down.

    Of course this is such a deep issue that it can't be just theoretical. But I would like to know how Heidegger understood himself --if we can assume that his thinking was ever fixed or exact on this issue.
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