Abstract
Heidegger’s emphasis on phenomenology as the analytic description of intentionality in its apriori determines the task of phenomenology as that of inquiring into the being of that entity which constitutes itself and, in so doing, also constitutes reality. In Heidegger’s terminology this entity is known as Dasein, and what characterizes Dasein is existence.
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References
J. Haugland, “Heidegger on Being a Person” Nous, Vol. XVI, March 1982, 15–26.
J. Haugland, “Dasein’s Disclosedness,” The Southern Journal of Philosophy, Supplement, Vol. XXVIII, 1989, 52–73.
C. Guignon, Heidegger and the Problem of Knowledge (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1983): “[T]he technical term ‘Dasein’ cannot be taken as shorthand for ‘human being’ as this term is generally used” (104).
H. Dreyfus, Being-in-the-world (Cambridge: The MIT Press, 1991). Hereafter Dreyfus.
Dreyfus’ adherence to a non-individual approach to Heidegger arises out of a fear of distorting Heidegger’s ideas by interpreting Dasein as a conscious subject. It will, however, be our contention that this fear is in conflict with the very phenomenological principles on which Heidegger bases his project. According to Dreyfus, the interpretation of Dasein as a conscious subject implies seeing it as a worldless entity — an “I” given prior to and independently of the world — and hence, one would in fact end up identifying Heidegger with the very position he criticizes. However, it does not at all follow from an intentional interpretation of consciousness that subjectivity is worldless. On the contrary. According to phenomenological orthodoxy, a conscious subject is essentially and exhaustively characterized by intentionality. That is, there is, according to this principle, no non-intentional residue of consciousness or subjectivity withholding from intentionality. Thus, there is no “inner” worldless subject prior to its involvement with the world. Rather, subjectivity comes into being with its engagement with the world. In what follows, we underscore this point by showing that a notion of self-consciousness coherent with phenomenological principles is a self-directedness that essentially involves the world.
GA, 27 (Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 1996). Hereafter EP.
EP, 72 (our translation). The original reads: “Das Dasein ist aber nichts anderes, als was wir bisher ‘Subjekt’ nannten, Subjekt, das zu Objekten in der besagten Beziehung steht.”
See T.R. Schatzki’s article “Early Heidegger on Being, The Clearing, and Realism” in Heidegger: A Critical Reader, edited by H.L. Dreyfus & H. Hall (Oxford: Blackwell, 1992), 82–4, for a conclusive argument in favor of interpreting Dasein as an individual person or subject. F. Olafson makes a similar claim in Heidegger and the Philosophy of Mind (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1987). We quote: “We must now look at the kind of entity that is in the world in the special Heideggerian sense — namely the ‘existing subject,’ whose mode of being is the topic of Being and Time” (52). In a subsequent footnote he claims “That a seiender Subjekt is the equivalent of Dasein is made clear in GP, 308” (52n). We get back to this discussion in Chapter V, Self-Consciousness, last section.
“[W]e have no right to resort to dogmatic constructions and to apply just any idea of being and actuality to this entity, no matter how ‘self-evident’ that idea may be; nor may any of the ‘categories’ which such an idea prescribes be forced upon Dasein without proper ontological considerations. We must rather choose such a way of access and such a kind of interpretation that this entity can show itself in itself and from itself. And this means that it is to be shown as it is primarily and usually — in its average everydayness” (BT, 37–8).
There is, however, one difference. Whereas in Husserl the phenomenological reduction requires a “leap” (Sprung) on the part of an inquiring subject Heidegger is more phenomenologically sound in that he offers a pre-ontological confirmation for the phenomenological reduction. We return to this point in Chapter VI, Constitution.
“[O]ntologically existentia is tantamount to being-present-at-hand, a kind of being which is essentially inappropriate to entities of Dasein’s character” (BT, 67).
“the term “existence,” as a designation of being, will be allotted solely to Dasein” (BT, 67).
We shall use the term ‘situatedness’ in translating the German term ‘Befindlichkeit’. We find that the translation of ‘Befindlichkeit’ as ‘state-of-mind’ is very unfortunate. Other possible translations of this term are “affectedness,” “disposition,” and “where-you’re-at-ness” suggested by H. Dreyfus in Being-in-the-world; “disposition,” “being-disposed,” and “disposedness,” suggested by T. Kisiel in the Glossary of German Terms in his translation of HCT; and “already-having-found-itself-there-ness,” suggested by W. Richardson in Heidegger: Through Phenomenology to Thought. Our choice of translation is suggested by C. Guignon in Heidegger and the Problem of Knowledge. These terms are all approximations of ‘Befindlichkeit,’ but together they should indicate the meaning of this German term.
What Heidegger has in mind with the phrase “not only” is obviously the fact that existence is also essentially situated. However, although the importance of facticity in Heidegger’s existential analytic is indisputable, one must be careful not to overstate its importance and claim that facticity is the guiding principle for his analytic. Heidegger does claim that “existentiality is essentially determined by facticity” (BT, 236), but this is not an invitation to disturb the balance between the two existentials situatedness and understanding. The claim that existence is essentially understanding does at least suggest that understanding is as foundational as facticity. Moreover, Heidegger’s presentation of understanding seems to indicate a certain emphasis on understanding. Understanding is terminologically more closely associated with existence than is situatedness; indeed, understanding is existence. Thus, Heidegger himself seems to stress the importance of understanding. However, it is our argument that he still upholds the fine equilibrium between these two existentials; they are structural moments and should be treated accordingly.
However, projection is not thereby mere behavior and thus Heidegger by no means advocates a kind of behaviorism. As we shall see in Chapter VI, Constitution, projection is not blind stimulus-response. It has its own kind of sigth, circumspection.
This theme will be treated extensively in the chapters to follow. The fact that our everyday comportment towards beings does not focus upon the proper meaning of this comportment will be dealt with in Chapter V, Self-Consciousness. The way the proper meaning of ontic comportment announces itself in situations of breakdown will be thoroughly discussed in Chapters VI, VII, and VIII.
A note on terminology: when Heidegger uses traditional philosophical terms he often adds phrases like “in a well-understood sense” in order to point out that he is concerned with the entities of traditional metaphysics, but he rejects the meaning ascribed to these entities. For instance, Heidegger refers on several occasions to Dasein as a subject, adding “in the well-understood sense of this term.” That is, Dasein designates the entity traditionally referred to as the subject, but it does not thereby take over the meaning traditionally assigned to this entity. Dasein is not a worldless thing-like entity; this subject is a Being-in-the-world. Likewise, Heidegger uses the term ‘Selbsterkenntnis,’ but emphasizes that it must be taken “in a sense which is well understood.” In this context this means that it must not be understood as a matter of “inspecting a point called the Self.” Self-directedness is a central topic in Heidegger’s analytic, but one must remember that his objective is to provide this phenomenon with a phenomenal basis. In our next chapter we discuss Heidegger’s notion of self-directedness in relation to notions of self-consciousness found in Kant and Sartre.
We investigate this claim in more detail in our analysis of Sartre’s notion of self-consciousness in the following chapter.
In quotation marks, Heidegger’s own translation of Aristotle’s De Anima, 431al6f.
It is very interesting that Heidegger here seems to equate intuition and thinking. As we have seen, Husserl’s notion of categorial intuition plays a fundamental role in Heidegger’s existential analytic. His development of the notion of sensuousness is precisely a result of his analysis of the founding/founded relationship between sense intuition and categorial intuition. When Heidegger suggests in this quote that his notion of understanding goes beyond the phenomenological intuition of essences, he is in fact simply repeating the insight he gained through an investigation of Husserl’s notion of categorial intuition. An intuition of an essence (eidetic intuition) is a categorial intuition and hence, it is a founded act. It is founded upon sense intuition. Indeed, in order to make his case and emphasize the priority of a founding sensuousness over cognition, Heidegger quotes the following passage from Husserl’s LI: “The idea of a ‘pure intellect’ could only be conceived ‘before an elementary analysis of knowledge in the irrevocable evidence of its composition”‘(HCT, 69/LI, #60). Thus, when Heidegger equates intuition and thinking and claims that both are derivatives of understanding, he is by no means confronting Husserl. Rather, he is introducing a fundamental Husserlian insight: that categorial intuition is founded upon sense intuition.
Although this will not be given a thorough treatment until Chapter VI, Constitution, we shall be using some of the terminology of the structure of Dasein’s worldliness (constitution) in order to shed light on the phenomenon of interpretation.
It is not our intention at this time to analyze Heidegger’s discussion of truth in § 44 of BT, but we do contend that this discussion is to a large extent a repetition of the analysis carried out in HCT. The difference is for the most part merely terminological.
The fact that assertion is secondary to interpretation and understanding has an implication for the project of existential analytic in that the assertions of this project too are a pointing-out of something already understood. That means that the ontological structure of Dasein’s being (which Heidegger seeks to point out in BT) somehow announces itself in our circumspective dealing with the world. This implies a problem of phenomenological evidence. Is there a phenomenal basis for claiming that we see our seeing and that we also see that this seeing primarily is a sight which is directed upon being as such? It is one thing to claim that we see things in the world, but another to argue that we see the seeing itself. Heidegger takes this problem extremely seriously, and we shall see how he deals with it in our discussion of pre-ontological confirmation.
This will be discussed more systematically in Chapter VI, Constitution.
Heidegger carries out an elaborate analysis of the status of hearing and keeping silent as articulations of intelligibility. We have seen that the key issue in this regard is the “about-ness” (intentionality) of the activity. With reference to hearing Heidegger points out that “what we ‘first’ hear is never noises or complexes of sounds, but the creaking wagon, the motor-cycle. We hear the column on the march, the north wind, the woodpecker tapping, the fire crackling” (BT, 207). Thus, hearing is every bit as object oriented as other ways of relating to the world, and Heidegger points out that “it requires a very artificial and complicated frame of mind to ‘hear’ a ‘pure noise”‘(BT, 207). Concerning the activity of keeping silent Heidegger points out that “the person who keeps silent... can develop an understanding” (BT, 208). By developing an understanding, the person who keeps silent articulates intelligibility, and hence, it follows that silence can perfectly well be in the mode of discoursing. However, it should be noted that Heidegger makes it clear that keeping silent not necessarily is in the mode of discourse. The keeping silent Heidegger has in mind is not just a matter of not speaking, it is a matter of “having something to say.” Heidegger refers to this kind of keeping silent as reticence.
This negative opinion surfaces in some shape or form throughout Heidegger’s career. A couple of examples: in What is Called Thinking!, translated by J.G. Gray and F. Wieck (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1968), Heidegger talks about shaking the foundation of the philosophy of language (see 200); and in The Question Concerning Technology and Other Essays, translated by W. Lowitt (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1977), Heidegger identifies philosophy of language with the theoretical, objectifying languages (see 175–6).
Already in 1931 Wittgenstein discussed the issue of what constitutes, and what makes possible, an understanding of language. In his notebooks he writes: “Perhaps what is inexpressible (what I find mysterious and am not able to express) is the background against which whatever I could express has its meaning,” Culture and Value, translated by P. Winch (Oxford: Blackwell, 1980), 16. In Philosophical Investigations, translated by G.E.M. Anscombe (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1958), this mysterious and inexpressible “background” gets expressed as a “form of life.” In section 19, Wittgenstein says that “to imagine a language means to imagine a form of life.” This sentence exemplifies at the very least a dominant theme of PI, namely the theme that concepts such as meaning, rule-following, and language itself cannot be adequately treated apart from the context of our everyday practices. We are not about to claim that this is entirely compatible with Heidegger’s position, but one can at least argue that there are certain parallels between their positions. Several scholars have discussed this affinity, see for example C. Taylor “Lichtung or Lebensform: Parallels Between Wittgenstein and Heidegger,” Theoria, 1, 1989, 9–21; S. Mulhall On Being in The World, Wittgenstein and Heidegger On Seeing Aspects (London and New York: Routledge, 1990); and C. Guignon “Philosophy After Wittgenstein and Heidegger,” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Vol. 1, June 1990, 649–672. See also M. Murray “A Note on Wittgenstein and Heidegger,” The Philosophical Review 83, 1971, 501–3. On a more general treatment of Heidegger’s relation to philosophy of language see W.D. Owens “Heidegger and the Philosophy of Language,” Auslegung, Vol. VIV, No.1, 1987, 49–66.
Instead of the unfortunate translation of ‘Sein bei’ as being-alongside in the original translation of BT, we shall use a translation suggested by Dreyfus: being-amidst.
This mode of being, and its role in Heidegger’s analytic, will be discussed in detail in Chapters VI, VII, and VIII.
Heidegger quickly points out that the term ‘care’ “is used in a purely ontologicoexistential manner” (BT, 237). “[Care] is to be taken as an ontological structural concept. It has nothing to do with ‘tribulation’ ‘melancholy,’ or the ‘cares of life,’ though ontically one can come across these in every Dasein. These — like their opposites, ‘gaiety’ and ‘freedom from care’ — are ontically possible because Dasein, when understood ontologically, is care” (BT, 84).
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Øverenget, E. (1998). Existence. In: Seeing the Self. Phaenomenologica, vol 149. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-010-9768-0_5
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