Date: Sun, 30 Mar 2003 10:57:10 EST
Subject: Re: Being and Time-section 2 Part One



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Subj:   Re: Being and Time-section 2    
Date:   30/03/2003  
To: <A HREF="mailto:heidegger-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu">heidegger-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu</A>    
    
Part One

In a message dated 30/03/2003 07:40:39 GMT Daylight Time, 
michael-AT-sandwich-de-sign.co.uk writes:

> >> 
>> 
>> Jud: 
>> We must first of all consider the two ways in which we talk about those 
>> things that exist, and here I am not referring to the so-called "ontic" 
>> and the so-called "ontological,"  differences, but rather the way that we 
>> describe on the one hand:
>> 
>> 
> michael butting in:
I have been arguing softly for some time that the ontic and the ontological 
are modes of thinking and speaking concerning the things of philosophical 
concern rather than the (kinds of) things of concern themselves.


Jud:
Anything and everything that we say involves thinking and speaking about 
things of concern whether those things are matters of our everyday lives 
[what brand of toothpaste to purchase] comments we make about the Iraq war or 
items of philosophical interest and discussion.
What I am addressing is the way that we think about things that actually 
exist  - things that you can feel. smell, see,  hear, taste, etc.
Bearing in mind that I hold that  there is only one type of entitic existing, 
namely being present, comprising phenomena which essentially are experienced, 
or at least experiencable, it can be seen that for me and people like me, the 
things of philosophical concern ARE the things which are present and  the 
(kinds of) things of concern themselves. So, in order to talk about these 
present entities we need to be able to say:
(1) They are present in the first place.
(2) The way or manner in which they are present.

> >> 
>> (1)  the fact or reality of an entity being present or existing in the 
>> cosmos, or "being found" [as the Swedes say] in the cosmos. Some 
>> philosophical  linguists refer to this as "simple existence,"  or 
>> sometimes "simple presence."  The term "simple existence" is employed in 
>> that there is no elaboration as to the 'way' or 'manner' or 'mode' in 
>> which the entity exists.  It is in fact more difficult than one supposes 
>> to make  a statement of this nature, and it NEVER WORKS if one attempts to 
>> employ the BE-word in any of its forms for this purpose, for the  BE-word 
>> ["is"  etc.] always addresses the WAY an entity exists, and NOT the FACT 
>> that it it simply exists.  It doesn't need a great deal of concentration 
>> to work out that for any entity to exist it must exist IN A CERTAIN  way 
>> or  number of ways or modalities.  In fact the modalities/states in which 
>> any entity exists, including the smallest microbe or single atom, are so 
>> manifold, that it would be impossible for any human being to describe them 
>> all, not only because of their uncountable number of modes, but also 
>> because they are constantly changing their character.  The word "exist" 
>> [which the Greeks didn't have] was introduced in order to differentiate 
>> between this "simple existence" and the "existential modalities" or the 
>> WAY entities exist, in order to avoid the confusion that the Greek lack of 
>> such a term imposed upon philosophical discussion. The persistence of 
>> people like Heidegger in restoring the term "Being" for purposes of 
>> philosophical discussion, together with the resultant confusion which it 
>> reintroduces merely undoes the work of others who attempted to clarify 
>> discourse in this area as is amply demonstrated by the arguments now 
>> taking place on the list..
>> 
>> 
> michael:
Your way (1) has been metaphysically thought as thatness, existentia, ousia 
(see Aristotle).

Jud:
It is the use and reliance upon these imprecise words which blows metaphysics 
off course, for  my (1) addresses "that which is present" which is a world 
away semantically from the intimations of  modality or statehood imparted by 
the suffix "ness" and "ia."   "Thatness" is suggestive of differentiation 
(thatness rather than thisness] which is to depart from the simplicity of 
being present rather than not present as an entity in the cosmos. Likewise 
with the words "existentia" and "ousia" [the meaning of which is still hotly 
contested amongst Hellenists] these words do not address specific entities, 
but are reificational generalities which address the concept that some things 
exist,  rather than "that pen which is present and can be held in the hand."

Jud earlier
> 
> > 
> (2) The second way of talking about the things that exist in the world, is 
> to talk about the WAY or MANNER in which they exist, their shape, their 
> colour, their position, their name, what belongs to them, their number, 
> what sort of things they are according to human classificational 
> parameters, and all the other countless billions of things that we can say 
> about them and the way that they exist, or the way that they used to exist, 
> or the way they might exist in the future.  In order to describe the way 
> entities exist we employ the BE-word, which we morph into various 
> conjugations (like we do with verbs) in order to introduce additional  
> temporal and numerical information.
> 
> 
michael:
Your way (2) has been metaphysically thought as whatness, quiddity, essentia.


Jud:
This is true, but here I have in mind Heidegger's lack of understanding that 
the role of the  IS-word is to indicate the whatness, quiddity, essentia.is 
described in the predicate that follows it, and does NOT refer to the fact of 
 the  entity's being present, which would be a redundancy and tautologous 
anyway, for the sentential presence of the leaf has already been established 
with the introduction of the word leaf together with the definite article 
"the"  {as in "The leaf is green."} Heidegger is convinced that the "is" is 
to be "found" in the entity itself - presumably as its "isness?"  He totally 
misunderstands the syntactical and semantic function of the device.

Jud earlier.
> 
> > 
> These then are the two ways that we talk about that which exists - but 
> there is no "ontological difference" involved, for once an entity is named 
> it  is nominally extant  or "sententially  extant" for the purposes of  
> making some comment about it, though that of course does not mean that it 
> actually exists in the real world as an actual spatial and temporal object. 
>  Some [many] of these subjects of sentences are not actual entities  
> [either imaginary or real] at all, but reifications of actions, whereby 
> something abstract is regarded [for communicational convenience] as a 
> material thing. Many transcendentalists appear oblivious to this practice, 
> and treat reificational abstractions as if they ACTUALLY EXIST, much to the 
> frustration of most linguistic philosophers.. 
> 
> 
michael:
You seem to be suggesting that the very naming of a being is enough to 
linguistically grant it existence status

Jud:
No, you misunderstand. You have disregarded a whole sentence in which I say: 
"once an entity is named it  is nominally extant  or "sententially  extant" 
for the purposes of  making some comment about it, though that of course does 
not mean that it actually exists in the real world as an actual spatial and 
temporal object. 
In other words if we say: "The leaf...is green" we are introducing the leaf 
as viable subject of communication, and extantalising it sententially for the 
purpose of making a statement about the real or imagined entity which may or 
may not exist in the real world as a referent of the word "leaf."
You can now see that by the a priori  nominalisation or referentialisation 
the entity which corresponds to the word "leaf" it is existentialised for the 
purposes of making the proposition that it "is green."  Hence the role of the 
"is" can be seen as indicating this modalic information [its greenness] and 
not that of existentialising the entity which corresponds or is 
referentialised by the word "leaf," because that has already been 
accomplished. It was right in front of Heidegger's eyes but he failed to see 
it.  Once the opportunity to spot this existential truth the whole of what 
follows in B & T becomes no more than interesting extrapolation grounded upon 
a basic misunderstanding, and Dasein becomes an absolute requirement in order 
to paper over the ontological cracks.

Michael:
and that being content with modes/ways of speaking of being -- existentia 
(that something is) and essentia (what something is) -- we have no 
> need for recourse to the so-called "ontological difference". 
> 
Jud:
Yes, you are right. There is no ontological difference between the fact that 
something is present, and the way or manner or mode in which it is present. 
There is a difference for US in the way we refer to the entities that are 
present with us in the cosmos, in that we require two different words to 
differentiate between the fact of being present of  that which is present, 
and the way that something that is present is present.
In English these two words are BE and EXIST.  The differences which are 
communicated by the employment of the two words are not "ontological 
differences" however, because an object or entity can only simply exist once, 
it can exist in different ways (countless billions of them) of course.

Michael:

And now I'm trying to understand, how for you, how the one (speaking in the 
two ways above about some being) leads to the other (no need for 
> recourse to the ontological difference): it seems, following you some of the 
> way in my own way, that it just might be that both existence and essence 
> (meant in terms of the philosophical tradition) already are overdetermined 
> by the ontological difference, that they already assume it somehow, thus 
> 

Jud:
I think that you are on the right track here if I understand you to be saying 
that  there is only one kind of existing for an object, and that is the fact 
of an entity being present in the cosmos, and that the way or manner in which 
 it is an entity corresponds with the fact of its existing as that entity?  



      > >> End of Part one.
 

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