Heidegger

Joseph Polanik wrote:

> Heidegger writes:
>
> “The entity to which Being-in in this signification belongs is one which
> we have characterized as that entity which in each case I myself am
> [bin]. This expression ‘bin’ is connected with ‘bei’, and so ‘ich bin’
> [’I am’] means in its turn ‘I reside’ or ‘dwell alongside’ the world, as
> that which is familiar to me in such and such a way. ‘Being’ [Sein], as
> the infinitive of ‘ich bin’ (that is to say, when it is understood as an
> existentiale), signifies ‘to reside alongside …’, ‘to be familiar with
> …’. ‘Being-in’ is thus the formal existential expression for the Being
> of Dasein, which has Being-in-the-world as its essential state.” [Bat p.
> 80]
>
> this analysis may remind you of an earlier thread in which the origin of
> the existential construction was discussed. I will try to summarize.
>
> the ‘absolute signification’ of the verb to be as that phrase is used by
> the OED is what linguists call an ‘existential construction’. there are
> two formats for the existential construction; but, they are analyzed in
> a similar fashion.
>
> the first format looks like a sentence containing a subject, a copula
> and no explicitly stated complement. examples would include ‘I am’, ‘you
> are’ and ‘it is’ or ‘God is’. the second format has a placeholding
> subject such as ‘there’ and the actual subject appears shifted to the
> complement position.
>
> an existential construction asserts that its subject ‘is’ but doesn’t
> say what it is. so, ‘an even prime number is’ means the same as ‘there
> is an even prime number’; but, doesn’t tell you whether numbers are
> realities of type 2 or type 3 (I’m just going to assume you won’t try to
> find ‘2′ under a rock somewhere).
>
> according to the OED, the existential construction as we know it had its
> origin in statements like ‘there is a tree in the garden’ when the
> connection to an actual location was severed.
>
> so, when Heidegger analyzes ‘ich bin’ and concludes that it means ‘I
> dwell alongside’ he is reverting to the etymological history of the
> existential construction as if that governed anyone who says ‘I am’.
>
> ironically, Heidegger *did* catch a glimpse of the significance of the
> existential construction: the necessity of a [root-predicate]-typology.
>
> “In the assertions ‘God is’ and ‘the world is’, we assert Being. This
> word ‘is’, however, cannot be meant to apply to these entities in the
> same sense, when between them there is an infinite difference of Being;
> if the signification of ‘is’ were univocal, then what is created would
> be viewed as if it were uncreated, or the uncreated would be reduced to
> the status of something created.” [BaT p. 126]
>
> of course, my theory is that the ‘naked is’ (the existential
> construction) asserts the root predicate only. it is left to us to
> decide what [root predicate]-type is appropriate in a given case; and,
> that accounts for the multi-vocal ‘is’.
>
> in any event, Heidegger recognizes that there are different senses of
> ‘is’. consequently, until I decide what sense is asserted of ‘I’ when I
> say ‘I am’, how would I decide whether I am in, of, or alongside the
> world (even if I previously decided which of the 4 uses of ‘world’ was
> appropriate)?

So you are asking why Heidegger prioritizes being-alongside over
being-inside. There are several avenues we can take with this. I don’t
prefer Heidegger’s etymological avenue, not because it’s wrong, but
because I think there is a much more convincing avenue - one which
motivated Heidegger to break from Husserl. That avenue is that if we
prioritize being-inside (so that I am a physical being next to other
beings, all inside the universe), the history of philosophy showed that
this leads to the complete subjectivization and denial of the world. If
I am one thing next to other things, the first priority is to figure out
how I come to be aware of those other beings. That epistemological
question is what caused Husserl to require that philosophy *begins* by
denying the metaphysical existence of the world, reducing it to merely
the world of my experience (something similar to what Descartes does at
the beginning of the second meditation). Given that dead end,
being-alongside represents an alternative starting point that is immune
from such epistemological doubts, because beings are not posited as
physical entities next to one another inside a physical universe from
the start.

Posted on Wednesday, February 27th, 2008 at 1:40 pm
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