Heidegger

Joseph Polanik wrote:

> it seems that your excursion into the history of philosophy is mostly
> designed to avoid the central fnord in Heideggerian philosophy:
>
> I, *this* here, have a first-person viewpoint; and, I ask ‘what am I?’
> because just knowing that I am doesn’t tell me what I am.
>
> you seem to be making three claims:
>
> [1]: that asking ‘what am I?’ requires prioritizing being-inside over
> being-alongside;
>
> [2]: that prioritizing being-inside over being-alongside is a mistake
> because “the enevitable and unavoidable result” is eternal skepticism,
> solipsism, and ultimately idealism — precisely where Husserlian and
> Cartesian philosophy ended up; and,
>
> [3]: prioritization of being-alongside necessitates the subordination of
> Dasein as mind, spirit, soul, a group of neurons.
>
> ===
>
> claim [1] seems dubious because the connection between asking ‘what am
> I?’ and prioritizing of one mode of being over another is not obvious.
> how do you establish that just asking ‘what am I’ requires any
> prioritization at all let alone the one you postulate?

It is specifically being-WITH-others that Heidegger prioritizes here.
That is the equivalent to being-alongside when it comes to *me*. “I” am
first and foremost with-Others, not an individual first that THEN comes
into contact with other individuals. That’s what it means to prioritize
Them over “me”. So treating the question, “What am I” (in the sense you
mean - a mind, soul, psyche, neurons) as fundamental already presupposes
that “I” am first and foremost an individual thing, and secondarily
among others (as individuals too). In other words, you would be already
presupposing the philosophical priority of “me” over “Them,” which is
precisely what Heidegger is calling into question.

> claim [2] seems even weaker. as I see it, claim [2] is empirically
> false. there are those asking some form of ‘what am I?’ or (more likely)
> its third person analogue, ‘what is a human?’. the fields of
> neuroscience and philosophy of consciousness seem devoted to pursuing
> this and related questions; but, eternal skepticism and solipsism are
> unknown within these fields and idealism is extremely rare. the dominant
> philosophical position within these fields a monistic physicalism
> generally known as ‘naturalism’.
>
> clearly, it could be said that some of these researchers and
> philosophers should question more deeply than they have. I would like to
> see them actively investigate the origin of phenomenal awareness,
> particularly reflexive self-awareness, instead of simply assuming that
> these are brain functions.

exactly.

> however, you seem to think that these researchers and philosophers have
> some sort of moral obligation to question so deeply that they get stuck
> in the quagmire of skepticism, solipsism and idealism.

I must be misunderstanding you. You can’t possibly be saying that if
getting “stuck in the quagmire of skepticism” is the result when a
position is philosophically questioned “so deeply,” that this then
absolves one of any philosophical obligation for such deeper questioning!

> in any event, you’ve offered no empirical evidence that asking ‘what am
> I?’ inevitably results in a philosophy of a very specific features. the
> practice of asking ‘what am I?’ and the closely related ‘who am I?’ has
> been around for centuries as meditative exercises. if these practices
> inevitably lead to such extreme results, don’t you think we’d have
> empirical evidence by now?

We do - it’s the evidence presented by Descartes in the First Meditation
(from which the only escape he can think of is to prove God’s existence,
which I assume you agree doesn’t work) and by Husserl in many texts in
which he argues for the phenomenological reduction. But most cogsci
philosophers and neuroscientists, as you point out, dogmatically assume
from the start that it all comes down to brain functions. Both Descartes
and Husserl would correctly point out that the arguments in the First
Meditation call into question the existence of ALL material things,
including the brain. The fact that they don’t address that problem
doesn’t eliminate the problem.

> claim [3] is utterly bizarre. the fields of inquiry mentioned in
> connection with [2] make inquiry into the origin of awareness an
> important aspect of their enterprise. who is going to subordinate them
> … and to what or to whom?
>
> in the case of the individual, I wonder how a philosopher could even
> construct a rational argument designed to persuade that individual to
> subordinate their curiosity as to whether a human is anything more than
> a human body. is this something that you as a philosoper have chosen to
> do in your own case, to suppress any interest in investigating this
> matter?

You completely misunderstand. The investigation of the question “What am
I - a mind, soul, or neurons,” logically results in the dissolution of
“me” (a la Descartes through Hume) in the first place, of which there
are two possible results: either I don’t exist (a la Hume), or the
presupposition underlying that problem (that “I” am first and foremost a
being that then comes into contact with other beings) is wrong.

Posted on Friday, March 7th, 2008 at 9:35 pm
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