I once read Heidegger and most of the works associated with him.
I tried to distil a simplistic essence from his thinking which
I put into my 'Mary Poems' (which can be found at
http://www.bath.ac.uk/~exxdgdc/poetry/library/ark1.html).
My Heidegger is not very complicated and is basically a simple soul.
He provides an alternative framework to religion.
Douglas Clark, Bath, England mailto: [log in to unmask]
Lynx: Poetry from Bath .......... http://www.bath.ac.uk/~exxdgdc/lynx.html
On Thu, 18 Oct 2001, Erminia Passannanti wrote:
> On Wed, 17 Oct 2001 14:58:11 -0700, Mark Weiss <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
>
> >Martin: I've read Heidegger on several occasions with various degrees of
> >incomprehension.
>
>
> I am not surprised, Heidegger is generally a philosopher speaking and
> writing for other philosophers who like that kind of extreme
> sophistications(the French got very enthusiastic about Heidegger).
>
>
> >Your little explanation is very helpful.
>
> .......but it can't be. Heidegger 's philosophy is too complex for anyone
> to find relief in our reductions.
>
> In Sein und Zeit, Heiddeger idea of the "self" as "being" (the being in
> process) dealt mainly with the dialectical relationship between language
> and the mind .
> Language has an intuition of the being, and attributes to this being a
> word, the self.
> The self as we understand it comes to us through language. But its meaning
> is not merely a linguistic effect. It is just the preliminary understanding
> of what the self is - which happens in an extra-linguistic sphere - to
> make language possible.
> In Metaphysics, Heidegger states (sorry about the rough translation):
>
> "Let's suppose that this indeterminate meaning of the being is not given,
> and that we do not understand not even what it means. Which thing there
> would be then? Only one word less in our language? No. There would not be
> then - generally speaking - no language at all. "
> To maintain the sense of the being, at least in part, outside of linguistic
> games was perhaps for Heidegger one necessary condition to safeguard the
> essence of language itself.
> So, to analyze the meaning of the self(in German Sinn), one must understand
> the meaning of the word representing the being to the mind. To be able to
> ask oneself: What is the "being"?
> For Heidegger, as for every philosophy, the sense of this "being" is so
> central as to be the primary task of all our speculations: if we do not
> clarify what we mean with the word "being" than we cannot speak about a
> self at all.
>
>
> >question: it seems to me that our sense of individual selfhood is
> >conditioned by our sense of self-within-society.
>
> For Heidegger the problem concerning the being is not merely a linguistic
> problem but in fact is something that gradually identifies itself with
> linguistic issues. Being is an ontological primumn cognitum, it is
> phenomenologically given and it is not created by language, it pre-exist
> language. What is phenomenologically given can only be understood starting
> from the being itself and therefore pre-exist to any linguistic
> formulation. And yet, we are caught into the necessity to express it
> linguistically.
>
>
>
>
> >Even those of us who
> >believe that individual selfhood ends with the last breath often behave as
> >if we assume that self-within-society continues (sorry for the shabby
> >terms), otherwise we wouldn't work so hard to influence events that will
> >only unfold after us, often at the risk of death. Does Heidegger ever
> >address this, or is he wedded to a sense of self in isolation? And if so
> >how does he deal with apparent altruism?
>
> The being escapes any speech and signification because it is that very
> beginning from which every speech and signification is made possible.
> Derrida Writes: Consider it as essence or existence [...], the being
> of "the being" does not belong to the field of speech, because it is
> already implied in every speech in a generalized manner and it renders
> speech possible. "
>
> In this light, the sense of the word "being" is not an effect of the
> linguistic articulation of the word representing it since it is the base
> itself on which the entire articulation of that very representative word is
> based and is structured. The true sense of the being cannot be explained by
> or through language. Therefore the sense of the being, the self, can only
> being explained outside language.
>
> The sense of the being, our "self" transcend language, but can only be
> communicated by language: so one must understand how to live within
> language to understand how indefinable the self is.
> In other words, because the self is unique, it cannot be really defined
> since definitions imply comparisons and the self in being unique cannot be
> satisfied by any definition. So, its meaning is identical to its being. It
> does not refer to anything else. Its real sense is not given by the
> language game, although we can only represent it to our mind with a word.
> You see how complicate and radically abstract this is?
>
> We can doubt of whichever ent, but we cannot doubt of that it means " to
> be " in contrast to what it is " not to be " in the Hegelian sense :so we
> can understand what to be is starting from our understanding of what not to
> be will be.
>
> The issue is of the great importance, because it is this determination of
> the being that decides the essence of language. Either the being is
> absolutely indeterminate, to the point that its sense is the nothingness,
> as in Hegel 's theory, and therefore language, than stands on the sense of
> this word, the being, does not mean anything, and does not represent
> anything; or the being has a sense that is in toto opposed to "
> nothingness", and consequently language has a sense, in other word,
> language therefore can refer to something that is to outside of language
> itself. It is not therefore society or language that justify the self, as
> the being, but some pre-existing condition outside language and society
> themselves, in other word an ontological primum. Because it is very
> determinate, there is no possibility there for perspectives, points of
> view , interpretations of what the being is. The being cannot be
> interepreted, since it escapes the linguitic game of cross references.
> The self, the being is not an object that stands in front of us and offers
> itself to our interpretations.
> In a way, it is just the excess of evidence of the being - its mater of
> fact - that renders us blind to it. It is too determinate...
> Erminia
>
>
>
>
>
> >
> >Mark
> >
> >At 07:04 PM 10/17/2001 +0200, Martin J. Walker wrote:
> >>These are very knotty questions which are not as simple as saying "the
> self
> >>is an illusion, amen." For Heidegger, as I understand it, Being (das Sein)
> >>is indefinable by being-there (Dasein), which all persons have in common:
> >>their selves are constituted by that community & their language (based on
> >>understanding,Verstehen, plus Rede, speech), both of which also imply the
> >>project (Entwurf) & the care (Sorge), the latter comprehending the past &
> >>present as the condition & the future as the field of self-realization
> which
> >>must end in death, thus my dread (Angst) until I affirm death as my most
> >>real possibility, thus devaluing in a sense all the projects etc of
> >>Being-there & attaining authentic existence, though Being is always far-
> off.
> >>The transcendent Self of the Upanishads is actually closer to Being than
> >>Being-there, thus only a logical step forward (and a lot of meditation)
> was
> >>necessary for Gautama to realize _sambodhi_ as the illumination that
> >>transcends the object-subject of normal consciousness: this results in
> >>_nirvana_, in which the distinctions of the normal self have vanished.
> >>Thus in both philosophies the normal self is something to be transcended
> as
> >>not finally constitutive of Being, but it is hardly a simple illusion.
> >>Heidegger would presumably frown on any belief in survival after death as
> >>inauthentic.
> >>I can't understand why you find the implications of non-self <a bit
> scary>,
> >>as death (nothingness) will relieve you of your self in any case, a much
> >>scarier consideration I would have thought; I myself shall be quite happy
> to
> >>wander around the Bardo or various reincarnations before being relieved of
> >>self, if death is not the end. Amen.
> >>Martin
> >>
>
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