Thanks for this - so I didn't have to. — 180 Proof
H is a "priestly-type" of human, all too human — 180 Proof
He [Heidegger] does not think on the stage but rather in the background, at best on the side stage, or in a Catholic context, not before the high altar bur rather in the sacristy. Because of influences that are older than his thought, he came to the conviction that what is visible and prominent, what is right in the middle, lives from the inconspicuous preparation of assistants backstage and in the wings. He too is such an assistant, and that is what he wants to be: a pioneer, a second, someone who blends into a greater event - in no case, or at least only momentarily and awkwardly, is he the hero standing center stage. Heidegger is never actually a protagonist who exposes himself in exemplary battles to the heroic risk of being seen on all sides. Moments of apparent deep emotion cannot change anything in this regard. A hidden power was at work in him, which was neither exhibited nor explained, let alone admitted or apologized for. When distressed or embarrassed, he tended to fall silent, and no god gave him the words to say how he suffered.
It seems important to me, in everything having to do with Heidegger’s spiritual physiognomy, to take into consideration his father’s occupation as a sexton. If, in his biographical studies, Hugo Ott has plausibly argued that much in Heidegger’s thought is only understandable as a metastasis of southwestern German Old Catholicism circa 1900, then we should add that it was not so much a priestly Catholicism, thus a catholicism of the high altar and the nave, that formed Heidegger’s dispositions; it was rather a Catholicism of the side aisle, a Catholicism of the sexton and altar boy, a religiosity of the quiet assistant on the periphery, desperate for acceptance.
Given that S was an excommunicated Jew, the first openly secular philosopher in Christendom in the last half or so millennium and the father of biblical (Tanahk & Xtian NT) criticism, he certainly wasn't "struggling with Christianity" (Judaism, Islam or any 'religious faith'). — 180 Proof
based on H's 1976 revisions of SuZ instead of the 1927 manuscript on which Macquarrie's & Robinson's translation was based, I'll stand by Stambaugh's as more authoritative (pace Dreyfus et al). — 180 Proof
If you say so. Clearly, neither of us is convinced of the other's bona fides. — 180 Proof
For me, sir, H is not worth my time delving any deeper than I have - e.g citing chapter & verse - in order to more thoroughly critique his work ( — 180 Proof
A philosophy which is either of no consequence to or concerned even tangentally with its own implications for "politics, ethics, social issues, etc" is not worth bothering with — 180 Proof
If one is serious, one doesn't choose philosophers a la cart or from a buffet table; rather serious study includes running down significant sources wherever and whomever they are. If you are serious, Xtrix, then you know that, and that your question is disingenuous. — 180 Proof
as Freddy Zarathustra might say, H is a "priestly-type" of human, all too human "underhanded (onto)theologian" decadent one must overcome in oneself in order to affirm the whole of life - amor fati! — 180 Proof
:up:You are quite welcome! I'm thinking you know though that I chose that infamous gem precisely as an easy target in order to rescue it somewhat. — path
Thanks. Neither do I.FWIW, I like your criticisms of Heidegger. I still don't see a problem in raiding his texts for spare parts.
N was a piñata of "uncharitable readings" by Anglo-American analytical/positivists for the first half of the last century, as I recall, until Walter Kaufmann translated his dionysian music into lyrical english in the 50s and R.J. Hollingdale brought Zarathustra back down to old "Motley Cow" in the 60s-70s, both of which helped make N accessible, even hypnotic, to postwar students and bohemians - though, as you know, never quite respectable (fortunately) - on both sides of the Atlantic.I think we both love Nietzsche, and to me it's not clear why Nietzsche is any less of a target for a certain uncharitable reading than Heidegger, Hegel, or Derrida.
Every decade since the late 80s it seems rereading Spinoza's oeuvre has "re-contextualized" "things" for me. As I once had learned by example to read N against N, I read S against S (always mindful that S had read Descartes Maimonides & Aristotle against themselves!) "Beware lest a statue slay you" indeed!But when is the story finished? Who knows ahead of time how things might be re-contextualized?
:cool:In any case, I think it's great that you elaborated on Heidegger. I always enjoy your posts, ...
Yeah, well, some of my favorites are sophists too ......even if you call some of my favorite thinkers sophists.
Again, read Spinoza. What you "think" is clearly uninformed and/or not thought through.Given that S was [1] an excommunicated Jew, [2] the first openly secular philosopher in Christendom in the last half or so millennium and [3] the father of biblical (Tanakh & Xtian NT) criticism, he certainly wasn't "struggling with Christianity" (Judaism, Islam or any 'religious faith').
— 180 Proof
I don't think that's true. ... but within the context of a Christian worldview- otherwise why mention "God" at all, even if meant in a quasi-pantheistic way? — Xtrix
If we're all operating with an understanding of being, then this effects everything - our politics and our culture and our future. If Heidegger is right, and our current understanding is a "technological-nihilistic" one, then we're in bad shape indeed. You can see the results all around you.
So it's not that the questioning of "being" has no relevance to the current political or social world; it does.
Worth pointing out. — Xtrix
Thanks. Sloterdijk and I are old acquaintances (since his masterful Critique of Cynical Reason days, which that 'Heidegger quote' could be from(?)). — 180 Proof
This helps me relate to Heidegger trying to awaken the question of being. I am still trying to figure out how the question of meaning and the question of being relate, beyond the straightforward way (what does it mean to say something is?) — path
Yanked out of context like that, the passage is far from conclusive. Surely I am reading into it also. But if the beetle in the box plays no role, then that's revolutionary. Hegel made a similar point in his first book. A crude empiricism wants to point 'here' and 'now.' 'Look! Reality is right there.'
Some kind of ineffable direct access is vaguely taken for granted and yet plays no role. This is why the question of being is related to the question of meaning and the question of consciousness for me.
I have a strong sense that I'm always still finding words to say in new ways that we human beings don't know what we are talking about. Now obviously we get along practically. So I'm exaggerating as a rhetorical device in order to make something visible. This helps me relate to Heidegger trying to awaken the question of being. I am still trying to figure out how the question of meaning and the question of being relate, beyond the straightforward way (what does it mean to say something is?)
Is it the same-enough question? I think AI connects to this, not because (at all) I project some mystical capacity on AI. Rather because AI is a kind of a mirror for us. Whatever we think that AI can never be is related to whatever meaning is or being is. Just to emphasize, I don't have answers. With Heidegger, I just want to light up a question, drag our 'ignorance' or hazy preinterpretation into the light.
It's basically a thrust against complacent chatter that has no choice but to work within that chatter. — path
but I'd like to bury the hatchet, if you would also like to. — csalisbury
I've long thought the beginning of Hegel's Phenomenology (say what you mean) has the flavor of a kind of bullying. You point to the thing, it's this. The responding voice: but what is this? This is just "this", it has nothing to do with what you're pointing to. And so forth through Sense-Certainty- 'now'? But now it's not when you said 'now'! You can see the bullied kid thinking: no, I'll show and tell them what I mean! — csalisbury
One is almost tempted to say that the language itself is a mythology deprived of its vitality, a bloodless mythology so to speak, which has only preserved in a formal and abstract form what mythology contains in living and concrete form.
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Nothing upsets the philosophical mind more than when he hears that from now on all philosophy is supposed to lie caught in the shackles of one system. Never has he felt greater than when he sees before him the infinitude of knowledge. The entire dignity of his science consists in the fact that it will never be completed.
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This is the incomprehensible basis of reality in things, the irreducible remainder which cannot be resolved into reason by the greatest exertion but always remains in the depths. Out of this which is unreasonable, reason in the true sense is born. Without this preceding gloom, creation would have no reality; darkness is its necessary heritage.
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All rules for study are summed up in this one: learn only in order to create. — Schelling
Reality is right there, but you can't see it unless you can process the objections to it that have gotten to you. Reason, in this mode, is a bully. The meaning of reality, and of being, is just what it was before something snuck into your head and scrambled everything, like the sound of a coin in a washing machine. — csalisbury
There have always been beetles in boxes, before the bully showed up, only what you did was play with one another to express or articulate the beetles, thereby creating something new (and the beetles themselves were shaved off from a common space, they were both outside and inside, which is what allows the play) Convention - which is important and has its place- develops from this sort of thing, but then afterwards turns back and says : 'there is nothing important to say that we haven't all already decided upon - consider the language of laying slabs.' — csalisbury
What you have to do is figure out how to handle both aspects - if there's bullies, there's bullies and you have to meet them on their level. But meeting them on their level is not the whole point - it's the very beginning.
The questions: does life has a meaning? What is meaning? etc only make sense if you have some backdrop sense of what 'meaning' is in order to show that it doesn't. In other words: you can only think life has no meaning, if you already know what meaning is, but you've lost it. The question of meaning is more like: can you remember? Can you play again? — csalisbury
I have it on a pile somewhere but I haven't gotten around to reading it yet.a newer collection Not Saved: Essays After Heidegger — csalisbury
Regarding AI, I think we should think of it less as a potential 'also-dasein' and more in the sense we relate animals to cells (or, more precisely, whatever facilitates the organization of cells into animals) ...But we tend to think of AI as a potential 'agent' or 'consciousness' on the same level as us. It seems to me that AI, for better or for worse (I'm terribly torn on this) is less 'another dasein or non-dasein entity' than a potential skeleton, or fusing spirit. — csalisbury
Was the state good or bad? It's hard to say. I can imagine AI being used for something like population control for allocating immigrants, for sentencing, for distribution etc, until we don't know how to live without it. At each crisis, we cede more power to it, until, a few generations down the road, it just, in-your-bone-feels, like a universal force (like god, or the market) that you don't question. And then how it progresses from there? — csalisbury
Because of influences that are older than his thought, he came to the conviction that what is visible and prominent, what is right in the middle, lives from the inconspicuous preparation of assistants backstage and in the wings.
If Heidegger is right, and our current understanding is a "technological-nihilistic" one, then we're in bad shape indeed. You can see the results all around you.
So it's not that the questioning of "being" has no relevance to the current political or social world; it does.
Worth pointing out. — Xtrix
I think they're intimately connected through "disclosure," through aletheia. Being is only vaguely understood in a pre-theoretical way and then interpreted in some fashion. Interpretation certainly involves meaning. So the human being is a "clearing," "unconcealing" beings while giving them meaning. — Xtrix
What is “familiarly known” is not properly known, just for the reason that it is “familiar”. When engaged in the process of knowing, it is the commonest form of self-deception, and a deception of other people as well, to assume something to be familiar, and give assent to it on that very account. Knowledge of that sort, with all its talk, never gets from the spot, but has no idea that this is the case. Subject and object, and so on, God, nature, understanding, sensibility, etc., are uncritically presupposed as familiar and something valid, and become fixed points from which to start and to which to return. The process of knowing flits between these secure points, and in consequence goes on merely along the surface. Apprehending and proving consist similarly in seeing whether every one finds what is said corresponding to his idea too, whether it is familiar and seems to him so and so or not. — Hegel
The questions: does life has a meaning? What is meaning? etc only make sense if you have some backdrop sense of what 'meaning' is in order to show that it doesn't. In other words: you can only think life has no meaning, if you already know what meaning is, but you've lost it. — csalisbury
It's a good point. I think Heidegger is insightful on our current situation. It sucks that he acted on his insights then the way that he did, but we can still raid him for parts (like Caputo does.) — path
One way I can approach this (which is maybe Braver's way) is to think of being as reality. Philosophers obsess over what is real. What do they mean? Some people say the physical, which is one beetle in the box. And some say the mental, which is another. If we try to determine the physical, we end up mentioning all kinds of mentalistic stuff. If we try to determine the mental, we end up talking about the worldly stuff. The whole game of reducing the whole to some X....seems doomed and confused. — path
Basically we get scientism or theology, which is maybe better expressed as scientism-theology, given that the essence of each is a forgetfulness of the question of being-meaning (taken it as a dead question that has been answered well enough, so please stop wasting everyone's time.) — path
Just in case you haven't seen this quote (you probably have), it seems relevant: — path
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