Heidegger

—–Oorspronkelijk bericht—–
Van: heidegger-bounces at soca.ecu.edu.au
[mailto:heidegger-bounces@soca.ecu.edu.au]Namens allen scult
Verzonden: zaterdag 10 juni 2006 23:24
Aan: Discussions pertaining to the philosophy of Martin Heidegger
Onderwerp: Re: a question if I may

>Allen wants:
>
>> I’m wanting to better understand what Heidegger means when he says
>> that being alone is a deficient form of being with.
>
>Hi Allen, is the reference to being alone (being a lone(r)?) one like the
>state of say being on one’s own in a room? Or when we say “I’m all alone in
>the world” or in the oft quoted ad “you’re never alone with a Strand” {a
>brand of fag} or in Sinatra’s confession of “my way”, etc. Crusoe took the
>whole of his society with him in his (a)lonely sojourn on the island…
>
>Perhaps Heidegger is trying to refer to (say [note Anthony]) an other
>concept of being alone (the ‘mine’?) in speaking of these possibly
>”deficient” modes of aloneness. Along the lines of: one can only be with
>(others, the Other) if one is alone (one’s ownmost, myhood); and one can
>only be (’deficiently’) alone if one is always already (in-’deficiently’,
>fecundly, fundamentally) alone…

Hi Michael,

Interesting you should read it as you did, suggesting that Heidegger
is referring to a deficient form of being alone. I too would like to
think that there are deficient modes of being alone in contrast to an
authentic being alone, and then we get to talk about which is which,
as you appealingly do. But it seems obvious in context that
Heidegger is pointing to being alone itself as a deficient form of
Being-with, perhaps in the ways Anthony suggests in his subsequent
post.

Yes. But realizing, after working through BT, that Heidegger
almost immediately had reservations concerning (transcendental)
method and terminology of BT, it might be more rewarding to follow
Michael’s line, which is also harder.

Once we discussed Heidegger’s loneliness - Gary Moore was there -
and this loneliness seems not to be in any way deficient, as clearly
also not the mineness of “my ownmost question” of the Contributions.
I would even suggest that the entire BT problem disappears, when also
the we-saying by Heidegger is included. I then appears that, like other
traditional oppositions, also this one, individual-society, is exhausted.
And that the position of the thinker is to be determined anew and from
bottom up.

In all such cases the decisive is not to desire one meaning beforehand,
but bring oneself *before* the opposition which has become rigid.
By *asking*: who are we?
Heidegger once said, that through all of his texts, always this question
sounds. But so then it is *not* certain of what one is speaking, but
philosophy first has to find out. In utter loneliness, sure. But which is
not a psychological separetedness - which is the deficient mode - but
precisely BEING the Da, which is always also mit-sein. Masses, society, HAVE
NOTHING TO DO with MITSEIN. Just as hoi polloi, which is, as you would say
perhaps, the WAY OF BEING of the most. ‘We’ first have to find us, there is
nothing left to recur to but technology, when we say ‘we’.

Another example - but it goes for everything - is “God is dead”. Heidegger,
in “Nietzsche’s word G.i.d.” distinguishes between the metaphysical saying
by Nietzsche, and another meaning, which can only become apparent after a change
of tone.

We are the change of tone, and utterly boring when Dasein is restricted in monotony.
(Mozart as Silesian instrument of God)

regards
rene

It could be as simple as saying that Being-with is necessarily prior,
that being alone assumes an already existing condition of Being-with,
from which we inauthentically extricate ourselves, and thereby sever
ourselves from the dialogical nature of understanding. I’m sorry to
be bringing out these parallels so constantly, it seems like showing
off, but there is here also a similar hermeneutical principle among
the rabbis, “Do not separate yourself from the community (literally,
the “neighborhood”).” Now that I’m thinking of it this way, if we
look at Heidegger’s saying from a purely hermenutical perspective, it
also seems to reflect Aristotle’s insistence on deliberation as a
necessary prerequisite to good judgment. Good hermeneutical practice
then consists in the construction and maintenance of a well ordered
deliberative community. I think that Heidegger is engaged in such a
practice as he deliberates with his philosophical masters as part and
parcel of teaching philosophy to his students.

>
>Perhaps the ‘deficiency’ means something more like a dependency (on the
>’in-deficient’) than a lessening (of the ‘in-deficient’)…
>
>Perhaps it is mis-taken to take these modes (’deficient’ and in-deficient’)
>as separate, on different sides to a divide; rather they might be conceived
>as being always together, entwined, embraced…
>
>>The other place
>> where he uses such an expression (there might be others still) is
>> when he says that assertion is a deficient form of interpretation.
>> It seems obvious that there he means “a lesser form,” that is,
>> hermeneutically less adequate.
>
>… and then Heidegger’s assertion that “assertion is a deficient form of
>interpretation” can be interpreted as not saying (although speaking)
>assertion is a lesser form of interpretation…
>
>>
>> Every factical enactment of a hermeneutical possibility may be more
>> or less authentic. It seems that in order to be so, every authentic
>> step in understanding must have its pseudos: It looks like the path,
>> but it isn’t. I know many examples of this, most of them for some
>> reason are in the realm of religion.
>>
>> Well, the confusing conclusion I come to here is that being alone and
>> being with are each pseudos of the other.
>
>… then the psudos of each other could mean the entwining of the modes that
>are never found apart (although they are different: just as the keys of C
>major and A minor use the same notes but they sound differently; just as in
>(Plato’s) Parmenides true speech and false speech are not opposed, rather
>false speech is an other form of true speech that does not understand its
>dependence on be-ing {an other form of true speech}, etc…)…

The realization of dependence is an important aspect of Being-with.
Transcendence then becomes a matter of seeing and appropriately
defining that dependence for what it is and proceeding from there in
what Hegel might call (but probably wouldn’t) “development.”
Somewhat the same sort of enactment occurs as a child-becoming-adult
differentiates (notice the spelling) himself from his family of
origin.

I hope the muses are treating you well, Michael.

Allen

>
>[sorry, Allen, the musical example is naff, but I cannot be bothered to rub
>it out…]
>
>regards
>
>michaelP
>
>
>
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Allen
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Posted on Monday, June 12th, 2006 at 1:10 pm
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