Being Prioritized
March 3rd, 2008, search relatedRelated posts :: Being Prioritized :: Being Prioritized :: Claim 1 :: Being Prioritized
On 3/3/08, Joseph Polanik wrote:
> Anthony Crifasi wrote:
>
> >Joseph Polanik wrote:
>
> >>>So you are asking why Heidegger prioritizes being-alongside over
> >>>being-inside.
>
> >>not exactly. Heidegger, like anyone else, can choose where to put his
> >>attention; but, choosing one viewpoint to the exclusion of the other
> >>doesn’t seem like a well-balanced approach to me.
>
> >I never said he excluded the other. I said he *prioritizes* one over
> >the other.
>
> the argument you give for prioritizing being-alongside over being-inside
> is clearly exclusionary. you argue that any philosophy that takes note
> of being-inside will fail; either, because it does not “question as
> deeply as philosophers like Descartes and Husserl do”; or, because it
> *does* question as deeply as Descartes and Husserl questioned — and
> then gets stuck in eternal skepticism which you say is inevitable and
> unavoidable.
Eternal skepticism is the enevitable and unavoidable result *if*
being-inside is prioritized over being-alongside. Once being-inside is
*subordinated* to being-alongside, then no matter how skeptical the results
of scientific being-inside may be, there will be a prior way of encountering
beings that is not subject to its criteria. In that case, a scientific
approach to being (i.e., as being-inside) may still ultimately result in
Husserlian transcendental subjectivity, but that would no longer be the
first word (nor therefore the last word) on the being of the world.
as an empirical statement concerning human developmental psychology,
> Heidegger’s claim (the ‘I’ is in the ‘it’ or ‘they’) may describe one
> stage in the individuation process. as I recall there is an earlier
> phase in which the infant fails to realize that the world is outside
> itself (the ‘it/they’ is within the ‘I’). in any case, if/when the
> individuation process successfully runs its course, we end up with an
> individuated self (assuming ’self’ is the correct noun to use for
> *this* … I, here, standing out from yonder world).
>
> this still doesn’t tell us what a human is; although, it does tell us
> that a mature human is individuated.
Heidegger isn’t talking about developmental or temporal priority when he
prioritizes “they” over “I”. He’s talking about phenomenological priority. A
*mature* human spends most of the day coasting along acting according to
what “everyone” agrees to, thinking what “everyone” says about things,
reading what “they” read, etc. When walking past a car, even if no
individual is around, it’s still “someone’s” car - that’s integral to the
very identity of the car as a car in the first place. So the THEY is first
and foremost, and the “I” appears only upon analytical reflection and
removal from everyday acting.
at the end of section 27 Heidegger writes: “there is ontologically a gap
> separating the selfsameness of the authentically existing Self from the
> identity of that ‘I’ which maintains itself throughout its manifold
> Experiences”.
>
> it seems clear to me that ‘the I and its experiences’ is Heidegger’s way
> of speaking about the I-2, the phenomenological experiencer, and its
> experiences; although, one might question the claim that the I-2
> maintains a constant identity.
>
> the I-2 that reads Heidegger can come to know “I-2 am not the
> ‘authentically existing Self’; so, what then am I-2?”.
>
> it seems from the context of the past several sections that the I-2 and
> authentic Self might be related as the false self that must come to know
> the true self — which is itself but with a more accurate understanding
> of itself. if so, it is difficult to see how the I-2 can come to know
> itself as that which it is without questioning those beliefs about
> itself that it previously acquired — including those that it acquired
> as a child before the capacity for philosophical reflection and inquiry
> fully developed.
For Heidegger, Dasein is THEY prior to being “that I which maintains itself
throughout its manifold experiences.” You must understand that before going
on to distinguish the latter from the “authentic” self. Scientifically, you
are an “I” from the start, whether or not you “know” it - you are an
individual mind/psyche/consciousness first and foremost which subsequently
encounters Others. For Heidegger, the latter is prior to Dasein as
individual.
