The author thinks that Heidi himself believed such scribblings to be part of his oeuvre, and that his previously published work was "sanitized" in some cases by fans — Ciceronianus

Richard Wolin is not considered by most Heidegger scholars to be an authority on Heidegger’s philosophy. This has less to do with ‘fandom’ than with rigorous scholarship. Even if Heidegger was a bigger Nazi than Hitler, this doesn't change the fact that Wolin is out of his depth philosophically.

As I see it, at least some of Heidegger's work is as good as philosophy gets. I won't burn Pound's Cantos for his political stupidity, and I won't burn Heidegger's The Concept of Time. I can and do think antisemitism is stupid. Perhaps I ought to understand how otherwise smart people found it alluring.

I suspect that antisemites project repressed parts of themselves on a scapegoat. They are rootless mandarins who are therefore afflicted by an impossible nostalgia. 'If only if only that alien corrosive modern egoistic 'worldless' moneygrabbing subject would go away, all could be Pure again, and I could truly appropriate the soil again like a tree with roots as deep as a grave.

There is a direct connection between his concept of time and his acceptance of Nazism and its atrocities. He called it "hearkening to Being".

There is a direct connection between his concept of time and his acceptance of Nazism and its atrocities. He called it "hearkening to Being". — Fooloso4

Oh all kinds of interpretations are possible of course. To some people there's a nazi in every crevice, and not just at the library. But I try to tell people to go back and read the earlier stuff. Find me some Hitler in the Dilthey draft.

Is there a connection between temporality and the Nazisms? Is it not what the future brought forth? Is it not something es gibt?

Is there a connection between temporality and the Nazisms? — Fooloso4

I think this was located in Arbeit macht frei.

I think this was located in Arbeit macht frei. — Tom Storm

This charming slogan, which also graced the gate into Auschwitz (part of what Heidi called the "self-annihilation of the Jews" when referring to the Holocaust), is mentioned in the book.

Is there a connection between temporality and the Nazisms? Is it not what the future brought forth? Is it not something es gibt? — Fooloso4

Frankly, I find this kind of thing childish. I don't mind it personally, but it's weirdly just the kind of evasive gossip that Heidegger wrote about.

'Don't nazis suck' is just too easy to say. Of course they suck. It's the most banal self-flattery that I can think of. If you think even Heidegger's early work is contaminated, make a case. Or just air a petty prejudice as if you are paying alms. The world is running low on reasons not to read, not to think. Let's burn some books for Jesus and Apple Pie, boys !

:100:

There is a direct connection between his concept of time and his acceptance of Nazism and its atrocities. He called it "hearkening to Being". — Fooloso4

:fire:

Being and Time should be read by all serious students of philosophy and is worthy of being course subject matter. — Arne

Agreed, as I advocated on an old thread ...

I've been grateful to Heidegger, nonetheless, since my earliest philosophical studies in the late '70s for his monumental oeuvre as a/the paragon of how NOT to philosophize - or think-live philosophically (as Arendt points out) - as manifest by the generations of heideggerian obscurant sophists (i.e. p0m0s e.g. Derrida, Baudrillard, Lyotard, Rorty et al) who've come and gone in and out of academic & litcrit fashion since the 1950s ... — 180 Proof

Certainly in Freddy Zarathustra's sense, "serious students of philosophy" ought to study intellectual diseases (e.g. Heidi, p0m0, woo-woo, etc) in order to learn how to, like surgeons (Rosset), incisively diagnose and excise cultural illness (e.g. decadence, resentment, nationalism, antisemitism, historicism / utopianism / eschatology, etc). :mask:

'Don't nazis suck' is just too easy to say. Of course they suck. It's the most banal self-flattery that I can think of. If you think even Heidegger's early work is contaminated, make a case. Or just air a petty prejudice as if you are paying alms. The world is running low on reasons not to read, not to think. Let's burn some books for Jesus and Apple Pie, boys ! — plaque flag

I think a case was made, which goes something like this:

‘It’s not really Heidegger I’m all hot under the collar about. The Nazi connection is just a convenient post-hoc justification. The truth is he’s just a symbol for an entire culture of thinkers in philosophy, the arts and social sciences whose ideas are alien to the way I look at the world.’

The Nazi connection is just a convenient post-hoc justification. — Joshs

In some cases that seems to be it. Nietzsche is often on that list too, and he's every bit as indulgent, it seems to me, a veritable mystic buffoon at times. But I fucking love Nietzsche...and my crazy boy Heidegger before he went rotten. And that windbag Hegel. And...

Could be. I personally don't have anything against Heidegger as a thinker (how could I?) and what I have read does sound intriguing. I simply don't have the time, capacity and background experience to acquire a useful reading of him. But I would say the same about Kant or Derrida and many more in my case. I am here mostly to understand to the best of my ability what the key concerns and themes are.

Frankly, I find this kind of thing childish. — plaque flag

An evasive response. All this was discussed earlier. I won't repeat it. Heidegger sings a siren song, the dark side of Doris Day, Que sera, sera, whatever will be will be. It is the acceptance of a future that was ours to see.

:up:

An evasive response. All this was discussed earlier. I won't repeat it. Heidegger sings a siren song, the dark side of Doris Day, Que sera, sera, whatever will be will be. It is the acceptance of a future that was ours to see. — Fooloso4

Dude was an actual strong poet, same way Cantor was, inspiring the same crankish resistance to his offensive originality. To me you sound on this issue like an old maid at a church picnic gossiping about the hot young thing that got herself knocked up. The work doesn't need me to defend it though, so have at it. I think it'll outlast you.

The work doesn't need me to defend it though — plaque flag

And that is fortunate. If it did it would not outlast us.

A critical reading of Heidegger is not a rejection of Heidegger. It is not an argument to not read Heidegger. Just the opposite, to read him and read him closely and carefully. It is not to sweep under the rug what is not understood as metaphor.

I think a case was made, which goes something like this: — Joshs

It was not made here. Let's put aside the problem of Nazism for a moment. The issue is his treatment of history, of es gibt, of an uncritical acceptance of "what is given to thought", and his identification of Dasein with the Volk, the Blut und Boden, the blood and soil, as well as the special place of the language of the German people.

A critical reading of Heidegger is not a rejection of Heidegger. It is not an argument to not read Heidegger. — Fooloso4

Exactly. Even his greatest critics have read him.

The world is running low on reasons not to read, not to think. Let's burn some books for Jesus and Apple Pie, boys ! — plaque flag

When I taught Introduction to Philosophy I would sometimes use Time and Being. What did not change from semester to semester was the use of primary texts and a degree of close reading appropriate to introductory level courses. I did not bring up his Nazi affiliation.

I did not bring up his Nazi affiliation. — Fooloso4

Do you have to be a good person to be a good philosopher?

Do you have to be a good person to be a good Doctor, lawyer, teacher, mathematician, writer, president, scientist. . ., etc.

Do you have to be a good person to be a good philosopher? — Arne

That depends on what you take the practice of philosophy to be about.

We need to look not only as what is said but at what isn't said, that is, what is neglected.

The Socratic philosopher's concern is first and foremost the human things, the inquiry into the just, the beautiful or noble, and the good.

Heidegger's concern is first and foremost Being.

The Socratic philosopher's concern is first and foremost the human things, the inquiry into the just, the beautiful or noble, and the good.

Heidegger's concern is first and foremost Being. — Fooloso4

Heidegger’s concern is to uncover the presuppositions underlying concepts like ‘human’, ‘beautiful’ and ‘good’, and to ground them in a more originary thinking.

Is there a concern for the human things in this more originary thinking? Where do we see it?

That depends on what you take the practice of philosophy to be about. — Fooloso4

Are you suggesting that there are definitions of philosophy the practice of which would require one to be a good person? And is a focus upon being somehow outside the realm of the "Socratics?" Certainly Plato had his ontology.

Would one have to be just in order to inquire in to "justice?" I suspect many who condemned Socrates to death sincerely considered themselves just and were considered by many fellow Athenians to be so.

Are you suggesting that there are definitions of philosophy ... — Arne

I try to avoid definitions of philosophy.

...the practice of which would require one to be a good person? — Arne

Rather than a requirement, a practice that aims at being good and living well.

And is a focus upon being somehow outside the realm of the "Socratics?" Certainly Plato had his ontology. — Arne

I am not sure I understand the question. As I see it, Plato was a Socratic philosopher. A concern for the human things does not preclude ontology. Concerns for knowledge are not separate from concerns for the knower. The centrality of the question of the good is not about claims such as this is the best possible world, but rather about how the mind, in accord with the hypothesis of the Forms, orders and makes sense of things.

Would one have to be just in order to inquire in to "justice?" — Arne

No. Sophists then and now do this.

I suspect many who condemned Socrates to death sincerely considered themselves just and were considered by many fellow Athenians to be so. — Arne

Good point, but they were not inquiring into the question of justice. They had their opinions about it and felt it was a threat to question them.

↪Joshs

Is there a concern for the human things in this more originary thinking? Where do we see it? — Fooloso4

The basis of Dasien’s being-in-the-world is care. By care, Heidegger does not mean sentimental concern. He means that our connection with other people and things ( the things we experienced are understood by reference to their relevance to our human relationships) is one of pragmatic involvement. The world of human affairs always matters to us in a certain way, affectivity as well as cognitively. there is very much an ethic running though his work, which tries to teach us to notice the always intricate way in which our concepts and values maintain their health by refreshing themselves in an open-ended way. Ironically, his political
weakness was his failure to appreciate the capabilities of groups less familiar to him than his own to adopt this ethics of creative becoming.

Heidegger’s concern is to uncover the presuppositions... — Joshs

:up:
Wittgenstein did this, offering a hint of what he was doing in passing. Heidegger not only did this but made his approach itself explicit. Philosophy is time, time is temporal.

I suspect many who condemned Socrates to death sincerely considered themselves just and were considered by many fellow Athenians to be so. — Arne

:up:

Yes, indeed. And many can mouth the words 'justice' and 'truth' without caring much for either.

Yes, indeed. And many can mouth the words 'justice' and 'truth' without caring much for — plaque flag

I suspect this who believe in such concepts
most zealously are the most dangerous.