Heidegger

Bernx at aol.com wrote:
> In a message dated 10/16/2007 10:44:36 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
> jPolanik at nc.rr.com writes:
>
> disagree. I say “I know that I am; but, not what I am” precisely
> because *I don’t already know* enough about the properties of the
> referent of ‘I’ to specify its reality type.
>
> Joe:
> Since whatness is impossible to know because it subsumes I-ness
> the more viable ontological statement would be “I know that I am but not
> who I am.” Whoness is immediately psychological and which seems to be a
> dirty word for the transcendentally elite and the pre-psychological
> “philosopher.” Accordingly, the complement to the philosophical “I am”
> would be the psychological “who am I?”
> Bernard

it is interesting that you should mention ‘who am I?’ as an alternative
to ‘what am I?’. my interest in philosophy was (re)awakened when I took
up meditation to relieve stress. one of the exercises I found (in _How
to Meditate_ by LeShan) was the ‘who am I?’ meditation. the meditator
asks himself or herself ‘who am I?’; rejects whatever answer pops up;
and, asks the question again.

I changed the exercise to ask ‘what am I?’ because I got bored dealing
with the accidental features of life and personality. Q: who am I? A: I
am a star trek fan. okay, but does that tell me what I am — as in what
is the structure of a human being?

you are right about the psychological being immediate; but, it’s a
tremendous task to sift thru it all looking for what might be pertinent
to answering the question ‘what am I?’ — am I a being or an existing?

what makes you think that the psychological is a dirty word for the
transcendental elite.

Joe

–
Philosophy is, after all, done ultimately in the first person for the
first person. — H-N Castaneda

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 http://what-am-i.net
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Posted on Thursday, November 8th, 2007 at 6:25 pm
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