Date: Mon, 17 Mar 2003 03:53:44 +0800
Subject: Re: Being and Time-section one



On Monday, March 17, 2003, at 02:45  AM, Paul Murphy wrote:

> Is Heidegger rejecting the Enlightenment in favour of a subjective, 
> Utopian,
> irrational, instinctual, pre-logical notion of being?

I'd say ... definitely not. We're starting here in section 1 with what 
will become an ontology of being, with a phenomenological method. 
Heidegger respects logic, rejects ir/rationality as a subjective 
dualism, and bases his entire critique of traditional philosophy on a 
'deconstruction' of the notion of subjectivity.

In part this will be a critique of the Enlightenment but certainly not 
a rejection of it, more a re-interpretation and re-grounding of its 
conceptuality and presuppositions.

As an ontology it isn't directly concerned with politics and 
anti-liberalism, and chronologically it comes before his Nazi 
commitments. I think it sets up his later confrontation with Nazism in 
terms of the basic concepts he uses to critique machination and the 
will to order, while his 'anti-liberal' tendencies are rather complex 
and have nothing to do with biologism and everything to do with a 
rather strange utopian dream about the possibility of an awakening of 
humanity to the world historical truth of being. What I'd call his 
'Star Trek' vision. Or is that 'Starship Troopers'? Anyone up for yet 
another new world order?

However, I think we can read BT without recourse to this political 
problem, and more in terms of a logical 'pre-empirical' investigation 
into the phenomenon of being. It's about the origins of human 
understanding in general, irrespective of whether that understanding is 
liberal or fascist. So shall we stick with the question of being qua 
being, or go off on a Nazi tangent?

Regards,

Malcolm



     --- from list heidegger-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---