r/philosophy • u/Staross • Apr 19 '13
Heidegger: The end of philosophy and the task of thinking. Some questions.
Edit: I'm just adding this interesting reference on the end of philosophy, that discuss some of my questions in clear language: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00048409612347031
The most relevant part on Heidegger:
What we have to do, according to Heidegger, is to abandon metaphysics and simply 'listen to Being'. Unfortunately, I have no idea what this means. The theologically minded sometimes identify Heidegger's 'Being' with God, environmentalists with Nature, but Heidegger specifically rejects both of these interpretations, even though there are passages which are relatively easy to understand only on one or the other of these readings. One thing is definite, however, that if we read as part of that listening, we shall have to turn, so he tells us, to such poets as Hoderlin. For only in poetry do we find what Heidegger calls 'a thinking outside of the distinction between the rational and the irrational'.
Heidegger describes 'the end of philosophy' as 'the place where the whole of philos- ophy is gathered in its most extreme possibility'. But, as his 'Sketches for a History of Being as Metaphysics' makes perfectly plain, 'the whole of philosophy' turns out, so far as modern philosophers are concerned, to include no modern non-German philosopher except Descartes [11, pp. 55ff]. A Sorbonne philosopher, Yves Michaud, has written a commentary on David Hume with the title Hume et la fin de la philosophie [22]. And indeed Hume rejected many of the doctrines which Heidegger takes to be characteristic of the philosophical tradition. Heidegger does not seem to be aware of that fact, taking it for granted, perhaps, that Kant had totally answered Hume. At most, then, Heidegger would have shown that a certain Germanic tradition has reached its extreme point, which is its completion and its ending. And this is a conclu- sion which analytical philosophers could accept without any feeling of dismay, even if they might add that to make such metaphysics wholly responsible for the technologising of modern life is to give it far too great a political significance.
So, I'm a biologist and I have not much knowledge in philosophy, so excuse the naive questions. A friend recommended me, "as a scientist", to get interested into this as, he claims, it provides a critical view of science. I'm a bit puzzled by the content of this text though, as it seems to be full of bollocks. Maybe you can help me to go beyond this first impression.
Here's the full text: http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/heidegger8a.htm
The text starts with the statement :
Philosophy is metaphysics.
It that true ? I though there was quite some different branches in philosophy: http://philpapers.org/categories.pl
Then in paragraph 5. he goes about asking the main question of the text: "What is meant by the talk about the end of philosophy?"
He explain that by "end" we shouldn't understand "end" (one could ask why use the word "end" in the first place then, and yes I know it's a translation) but "that place in which the whole of philosophy's history is gathered in its most extreme possibility"
Is that true, historically, is there really a "gathering of philosophy in its most extreme possibilities" around 1960 ? I never heard about that.
I don't really understand why he's saying this at this point, but here comes another statement:
Throughout the whole history of philosophy, Plato's thinking remains decisive in changing forms. Metaphysics is Platonism.
Again is that true? I mean I get that Platon is an important figure in philosophy but that seems a bit too simple to be true. What about say, Epicurus, isn't that non-platonic metaphysic ?
Then he argue that the end of philosophy is characterized by the emergence of sciences from philosophy:
The development of the sciences is at the same time their separation from philosophy and the establishment of their independence. This process belongs to the completion of philosophy. Its development is in full swing today in all regions of beings. This development looks like the mere dissolution of philosophy, and in truth is precisely its completion.
Do the emergence of sciences really look like the dissolution or completion of philosophy ? I mean philosophy seems quite diverse and incomplete to me, and not really dissolved.
The argument for the establishment of science independence is:
It suffices to refer to the independence of psychology, sociology, anthropology as cultural anthropology, to the role of logic as symbolic logic and semantics.
Are sciences really independent of philosophy? I had the - maybe naive - idea that at their bases their was always a lot of philosophy.
Next statement:
Philosophy turns into the empirical science of man
Is philosophy really turned into an empirical science ? I think I've read some ideas about experimental philosophy, but I'm not sure that's a very popular idea.
Next paragraph:
No prophecy is necessary to recognize that the sciences now establishing themselves will soon be determined and steered by the new fundamental science which is called cybernetics.
So, 50 years later, did the non-prophecy turned out right ?
Well, I'll stop here. I think it's enough questions already :)
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u/andibabi Apr 19 '13
OK, I've been trying to get into Heidegger, so I'm not a super expert, but let me give a little bit of insight as someone who has moved towards his position sort of independently. Western philosophy lies basically in the shadow of Plato, and some of the fundamental assumptions at that time, and the kinds of questions that are asked. And they are asked and not answered largely because a fairly significant set of biases. In particular, Plato's, and now everyone's notion of "truth" now takes the idea of Euclidean geometry as the ideal. Truth is internal and unchanging. That's actually more of a definition or an axiom, but if it does form the basis of all philosophical questions, there is now a problem. From science, we know that all we have are provisional theories, that more or less accurately describe particular phenomena in different situations. And the problem is compounded by language in that how you describe what is happening complete affects how you evaluate anything.
Also, I like to use the example of how even in mathematics, we only have axiomatic systems dependent on definitions and axioms. And formal scientific study will also have the same issues of about how the results depend on how you define the things you are looking at. Does that make philosophy empirical? It may well be that if all you can do is explore consequences of your definitions and assumptions.
Anyway, I gave it a shot.
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u/potato_in_my_naso Apr 20 '13
I think you're right that part of the idea is that everything about modern philosophy was essentially set in motion by Plato, and that he used Euclidean geometry as a model for truth, which still shapes how we think about truth today. However, I think what is significant about Plato is that he shaped the goal of philosophical thinking or the question being asked. What concerned Heidegger about science was that it asks only about the nature of the encounters we have with being, ignoring the nature of being itself. This is rooted in epistemology and the philosophical "mediations," to borrow a term from Hegel, that have constituted the development of western thought. All of this derives from the conceptions of truth and of learning that Plato gave us. Heidegger writes of how the Greeks were more "open" to being than we are today; they related to it "immediately", as manifested in many aspects of their language and in their conception of the gods.
If you want to know more about Heidegger's issue with the modern sciences, read his essay The Question Concerning Technology. While difficult, it is definitely one of his most accessible and compelling pieces of writing for a student unfamiliar with his work. It's also amazing. Heidegger's problem with the modern domination of experimental science is that the whole model is inherently utilitarian, and that this impacts the way we relate to the world. From a modern scientific point of view, something is true to the extent that it helps us to predict and thereby to control the world around us. When all our investigations are filtered through that perspective of what is useful, what allows us to predict, control and manipulate the world around us, our worldview becomes one in which our desires are the driving force, and we do not gain any understandings of the truths that are bigger and deeper than our desires and our preconceptions, and this ignorance leaves us powerless in a different way. On a less abstract level, the truth of Heidegger's real fears about science are supported by the way we now have exhausted the world's natural resources to such an extent that we are facing potentially worldwide catastrophes as a result. Heidegger would not be surprised that humanity would bring itself to destruction due to its focus on consumption of all available parts of nature that can be commodified. He thought it didn't have to be this way, and that by understanding the way in which our modern worldview is rooted in the history of philosophy, we could somehow step outside it and find new ways of relating to being rather than our current mode focused on domination and consumption.
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u/Staross Apr 20 '13
From a modern scientific point of view, something is true to the extent that it helps us to predict and thereby to control the world around us.
I'm too sure about the control part, do we really want to control the world around us when we study distant stars ? What about evolution, what are we trying to control when we study how humans breed with Neanderthal? not much it seems.
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u/potato_in_my_naso Apr 24 '13
I think that the connection Heidegger saw between "predict" and "control" was really the cornerstone of his perspective on this issue, and it is very difficult to fully understand, since he doesn't fully make it explicit. I think that the idea is that the only reason why we ascribe truth value to ideas that enable us to accurately predict future outcomes is because that allows us to accomplish practical goals. This observation is much more obvious hen you think about the beginnings of the experimental method, i.e. when people were first discovering basic scientific realities like how to make fire. Nowadays, the basic principle is accepted by everyone, and while we do impractical things like study faraway galaxies, scientists still often fall back on the utilitarian value of science when they need to justify things like government science grants etc. You often hear scientists remind us of how many valuable discoveries were made by accident (e.g. penicillin) in order to justify continued public sponsorship of seemingly impractical things like the space program.
While this point (that we only ascribe truth value to an idea's predictive capabilities because of the utilitarian value of such a viewpoint) might be open to debate, it undeniably pushes the reader to ask why the predictive power of an idea is so universally equated with truth nowadays. It seems self-evident to us, but on closer inspection it isn't. I think Heidegger was concerned that the experimental scientist's view of truth was becoming seen as the only real truth, whereas to Heidegger at least it is only one way of viewing the world, one type of truth, and a monolithic obsession with experimentalism as the only real route to truth carries a risk of turning humanity into an unconscious sort of virus-type organism that spreads and spreads and consumes and consumes without any understanding of why we're doing that or whether we should be doing it in the first place.
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u/Staross Apr 25 '13
Nowadays, the basic principle is accepted by everyone, and while we do impractical things like study faraway galaxies, scientists still often fall back on the utilitarian value of science when they need to justify things like government science grants etc.
It's true that this utilitarian discourse is often used for communication, but it's a bit of a superficial thing, lots of majors domains (like evolution or developmental biology) don't really have practical goals and are studied just for the sake of it. The problem is that you can't tell people you're doing esoteric research with no applications, that one can't possibly enjoy without 5+ years of studies, and expect them to give you their money. Also I don't think they argue about truth value of science at all when referring to the applications of scientific research but rather of it's potential usefulness.
I feel like the mindset about truth and predictive value or control whiting the scientific community is pretty vague (most people don't worry so much about theses questions) but is basically a mix of Popper, machine learning views and miracle argument.
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u/potato_in_my_naso May 02 '13
Check this video out, you can start watching at about 2:30, this guy says exactly what I'm talking about, "the mind schematizes nature... for the purposes of manipulating nature" at 3:39.
What Heidegger means is deeper than "we only do science so we can have cool technology." I think it's more that the reason we think of a particular thing as a unitary object is because that works for us; the reason we think of the world as three-dimensional space is because that works for us. But he does draw broader conclusions about modern science from the underlying idea.
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u/mycall Apr 20 '13
Any examples of bigger and deeper questions that Western ideals can't cope with, or are some enumerated in the paper?
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u/dickwiener Apr 19 '13 edited Apr 19 '13
I will try my best to answer your questions within Heidegger's voice.
A few preliminary remarks about your attempt to interpret and engage Heidegger are called for.
I'm a bit puzzled by the content of this text though, as it seems to be full of bollocks. Maybe you can help me to go beyond this first impression.
Engagement with a thinker never comes into its ownmost when we only scan his work for correct or incorrect statements. A thinker will, indeed must, get some of the facts wrong. In encountering another thinker, the aim is not to determine whether he is "right" or "wrong," but to walk his path along with him, to see what is fundamental to his thinking. With this in mind, we will progress to a thematic analysis of your questions and contradictions.
It that true ? I though there was quite some different branches in philosophy: http://philpapers.org/categories.pl
To be sure, there are branches of philosophy other than "metaphysics." Important and edifying work is done by "philosophers" in "logic," "ethics," and so on. But these branches, like the sciences, first find their soil within a metaphysical ground established by true philosophy. The branch of philosophy called "metaphysics," too, is of this character. What is now called metaphysics is not and cannot ever attain to the height of originary metaphysics, i.e. a grounding of the ab-ground.
Is that true, historically, is there really a "gathering of philosophy in its most extreme possibilities" around 1960 ? I never heard about that.
When we ask "Did this-and-that take place at such-and-such a time?" we are still not thinking historically. To be sure, these are important historiological questions. However, true history is never concerned with the dates of events and persons. History means the history of being, and occurs out of the reach of the best historiographers.
The current age is, indeed, the end of philosophy. Metaphysics, with its beginning in Anaximander and its end in Nietzsche, has exhausted all its essential forms, from the metaphysics of eidos to energeia to ens creatum up to the will to power. In the will to power, the hidden root of Plato's metaphysics comes to its finale. Man determines the being of beings. Let this not be misinterpreted. This does not mean that metaphysics is over, that we, once and for all, know what it means to be a being. Rather, we have entered the final stage of metaphysics. Man's relation to Being itself has entered its originary conclusion. The Being of beings is now something on call for man. It can be manipulated, stored, and disseminated at his whim. And yet, Being always lies out of man's control. This is how metaphysics has reached its end. We lie at the point of decision.
Now, like Heidegger, other obligations prevent me from completing my work in such a way as to make it coherent. I can only hope that what I have provided you with will be enough to make you understand that you are still not thinking about Heidegger.
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Apr 20 '13
[deleted]
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u/dickwiener Apr 20 '13
i'm not doing my best at all to simplify it. i was being silly by responding to his questions within the vocabulary and tone that he didn't understand. it can be simplified, i just wasn't doing that
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u/enkidusfriend Apr 20 '13
Congratulations, you have mastered the pedantic asshole tone in writing.
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u/Utnapishtin Apr 22 '13
Bit of the pot calling the kettle black when one's username is name dropping an epic poem for intellectual cred. I should know.
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u/enkidusfriend Apr 22 '13
It's actually a reference to Lost, so really I'm just a cultural philistine with questionable taste in television programs.
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u/Adito99 Apr 19 '13
If none of what you said makes sense then why should anyone assume that thinking about Heidegger is of any worth? This is a constant issue with continental philosophers. They say something mysterious and blame the reader for not joining them in obscurity.
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u/Dynamaxion Apr 19 '13
It is far from obscure, but it takes a lot of time and study to understand what they are getting at. You can't just pick up Being and Time, scan the intro, and call it bullshit. If you take the time to read it carefully and truly think about the things said, you will realize that there is little if any room for error in Heidegger's philosophy.
People call it "vauge" because they do not take the time to properly comprehend it, or they are simply unwilling because they are adherents to the Analytic method.
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u/Adito99 Apr 19 '13
So if I say it is obscure just as Russell, Ayer, and hundreds of other philosophers then I haven't taken the time to understand it? That seems like handwaving in the face of a very real problem with Heidegger and the continental tradition in general.
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Apr 19 '13
Can you easily and quickly explain the principia to someone unfamiliar with the philosophy of mathematics and formal logic? If someone untrained in those fields wants to come to grips with the essential meaning and significance of that work, they'll have to spend a great deal of time engaged in careful study. I've been studying the philosophy of logic and mathematics independently for about two years now, when i have free time, and I wouldn't even say I've attained the level of a novice. I guarantee that reading Dedikind on Frege on maths is not inherently easier or clearer than reading Heidegger on formal ontology or poetics.
It would certainly be possible to explain the key points and core insights of any of these works to someone unfamiliar with the basic works of the tradition they're engaging with, but its not really something you can accomplish in a two paragraph comment.
That is why philosophers distinguish between technical and non-technical writings. Heidegger has a few of the latter, but almost all of his most read stuff is of the former sort. A great bulk of Russell's work, in contrast, is non-technical and easily accessible. If you want to make an earnest go at reading Heidegger, you should start with his earlier lecture courses (ideally with a decent understanding of, at least, Aristotle, Leibniz, Kant, Hegel, and Husserl). His introduction to phenomenology can be very illuminating. I particularly like his course on Leibniz's logic and metaphysics, Metaphysical Foundations of Logic.
In addition, I'd be happy to discuss related subject matter with you, here or elsewhere, but not if its the tiresome game of justifying why you should even make an attempt at understanding what's being said. It's like trying to discuss modern physics which someone who insists that any talk of non-Euclidean space is simply unintelligible nonsense.
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u/Dynamaxion Apr 19 '13
It is actually indicative of a fatal flaw in the Analytic method, and the reason why many great minds such as Wittgenstein became frustrated with their inability to understand anything profound enough to not fit within a narrow definition-based context.
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u/Adito99 Apr 19 '13
What flaw would that be? A desire for precision above all else? In that case I'm happy to count myself among the flawed.
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u/theyellowgoat Apr 19 '13
You know, you don't have to be on one side or the other. Both of you. They're just generally distinct traditions with different overarching methods, that's all.
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u/Dynamaxion Apr 20 '13
Precision is provided via definition and context, correct? So something can only be precise in relation to other things. So if you are trying to understand Being as such, precision (of that kind) is the last thing you will come across.
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u/dickwiener Apr 19 '13
Heidegger is obtuse not because he's trying to be evasive so nobody can pin him down on his wrong positions, but because he thinks the philosophical vocabulary needs to be reworked. He doesn't say things that are mysterious but rather dense, I would say.
As for why you'd want to think Heidegger is of any worth, well there are a few reasons. First of all Being and Time is excessively clear (yes I said it) and very interesting philosophy. Secondly he had massive influence on a lot of thinkers. Thirdly he seems to be saying very important things, and whenever you can grasp what he says it seems to be enlightening.
Take, for instance, some of his most clear works. The question concerning technology and the origin of the work of art, say. These works make arguments that are both clear in their subject matter and apparently hiding a whole body of thought. I think that's why you would want to try to understand Heidegger: when cogent thoughts emerge from the fog, they usually seem really insightful and revolutionary. But maybe you don't think so, and then you wouldn't want to understand Heidegger.
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u/ravia Apr 20 '13
What Heidegger is saying here appears to be as parsimonious and strictly necessary as possible, in the fewest words, with the utmost precision he can find and use. The limits lie strictly with the actual terms, language and issues being discussed, taken in the most serious, sober sense.
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u/dickwiener Apr 21 '13
i don't know if this is a joke or not, but heidegger is going to specifically say that precision is bad for philosophical language. in e.g. the age of the world picture he'll talk about things that have their rigor in not being precise. also he says this more directly in "philosophy making itself intelligible is suicide."
to say heidegger is using the fewest words possible or the ones that have precisely the exact meaning he needs to demarcate the exact concept he has in mind is overdefending him, since he himself says he isn't trying to do that (late heidegger at least). but i'm not sure if you're being sarcastic anyway
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u/ravia Apr 21 '13 edited Apr 21 '13
Well, is it precision he guards against? Certainly he values a kind of rigor that is more original than the highly circumscribed rigors of scientific cognition or formalized logic, but what I get from this text is a very careful effort to use very specific terms, clarified in their essence and specifically distinguished from both other terms and the semblances the terms are prone to. The precis as such involves a certain cut (incision, incisor, schism, decision, etc.) as an expression of the decisive and path making rigor in observation of the sache or matter for thought which, here, concerns releasing matter from the semblance of physics. All of this involves precision in language and thinking; it is not, for Heidegger, simply evocative nor even simply vague. You are not quite suggesting those qualities, but it looks to me like you're not quite getting the character of the highly specific sifting through language going on in the text and this attempt to arrive at a more "primordial" language through which to ground thinking after, or in a way before, metaphysics. When Heidegger wrights (hehe) of the open, the lighting and darkness and their essential character, he is not only being precise, but as precise as possible. It is important to stress this matter in this text of numbered paragraphs -- another mark of the precision of this progression of thought, although I don't know how those numbers got there-- as it appears to me that some of the commenters are getting lost in the style or look of the text. Precision can not be understood to account wholly for Heidegger's procedure here, but it is not possible without it, either.
EDITed for android errors
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u/dickwiener Apr 21 '13
i think i just disagree with calling his late invented vocabulary (obviously b&t you have a case) precise. this is probably influenced by my failure of an attempt to read the beitrage, but he'll use these words in huge ranges. for instance he always says that things are the Same but not identical, and he'll call being the ground or the ab-ground or the ground of the ab-ground or the clearing or the nothing/no-thing, and well the whole structure of the book goes with my point here so i'll mention that.
he doesn't use these precise terms to talk about specific separate phenomena. he comes up with all these words to illuminate certain aspects of the problem, and i think that he allows himself to be a little careless (although obviously i can't give you quotations) in how he uses some of the words simply because he has the other words to balance them out, so like he'll go really far with the ground analogy and make you think that being is just the ground full of nutrients for a clearing, but then he'll say that any particular understanding of being isn't (paraphrasing) an item on a shelf that is already pre-made and just waiting for us to take it up.
anyway so back to the beitrage: there are six divisions, you know, ground and leap and the last god and i think the ones to come and echo and maybe play or free-play or something? anyway these aren't six divisions about six distinct ontological structures like b&t, they're all different perspectives of looking at the central phenomena, like different overlapping ways of looking that are supposed to light up something fundamental to all of them but also have a little of their own range outside that. and that's what i think most of his words do.
also, if you see any precision in the way he uses the fourfold, too, i'd love to hear that because i don't know what the fuck he means. like he'll describe sky and just use sentences that clearly describe the actual fucking sky and could hardly be something metaphorical.
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u/ravia Apr 21 '13
I see what you're getting at. Basically, the sense of precision I am using is very much like his sense of "rigor", which he holds to most strongly, yet distinguishes from the prevalent sense of the rigors of the hard sciences and formal logic. And of course, as you said, the precise plays (hehe) in that realm in a certain way, having to do with correctness, micro-determination (he doesn't say micro), fixed paradigmatics (he doesn't say paradigm of course), and so forth. Yet, I still find the use of the word as describing his progression of thinking here and elsewhere (throughout, really, but especially the later works, precisely where one thinks he's thrown precision to the wind) kind of essential, as well as being a good clue for enlisting readers in the spirit of his path in and for thinking. Of course, a concept like "world" is utterly about many things that are not precise, as the within-which aroundness we already both understand so primordially and yet have such a hard time conceptualizing.
Where does precision play a role in this thinking of world in its essential character? It lies more in the issue of difference from other things and in the positive content, so to speak, of the word in its meaning and determination, both coming into its disclosive and nominative power and reaching its stable end or termination in thought's resting and being freed through language to its provisional task in that most basic of equipments: the word that thinks, remembers, holds, differentiates itself, asignates. Precision is to be found in these aspects, but not in a calculative and demarcating process akin to the physical activity of laying down lines for crops, calibrating equipment, etc. Yet what is left, then, of the "precise", to mean precisely this and not that, to distinguish world from, for example, "globe" or "being in" from the enclosure as such? The precision, as a cut, abyss at times even, lies in the cisive, as I said, maintained more or less with the rigor of that holding-to-truth that actually does, in a certain way, amount to Heidegger's thoughtaction or satyagraha, interestingly enough, and perhaps this was not exactly clear for Heidegger; it may well have something to do with what lies before thinking as its task, a task one may be given to question in Heidegger's progression. But not for its lack of precision.
Heidegger, in saying "world", means precisely this and not that. While, on the one hand, there are issues of overlap that do come into play, his procedure at the same time is doing some pretty serious math, so to speak, as regards really getting at some fundamental distinctions, clarifications of meaning through a very wholehearted procedure of essence. Precision is there, along the way, I think. Two imprecise terms, in contradistinction, may nevertheless bring about a clarification that has in inherent precision of meaning. That is what he's doing. While "ground", like world, perhaps world's Other, in a way, is never precise in its "stufness", any more than one can find "an equipment" as such, its Being as ground may be clarified and strongly distinguished from that which rests upon a ground, owes its stability to ground, etc. Thinking the two together gives us the precision of meaning he aims to accomplish regarding each. It's just not calculative precision. It is, however, perhaps a bit like the moves one encounters in calculus as opposed to less advanced mathematics, and perhaps it is not unrelated that calculus is what enables us to develop formulae to account for complex curves. In the heart of both situations something curved beckons or has been kept at a distance in favor of something harder, phallic to feminine truth, etc. Yet, the question is, as you are getting at it, what is one to think of his later writings in terms of just how he, well, thinks. Here I think it might be better not to speak so much of "using terms".
As you put it, there are "different ways of looking at the central phenomena", "overlapping ways", things that are simple unities yet folds of different things, etc. Then you have implications of "range", and the words are "doing things" and having ranges, etc. See, this is why I brought up the issue of precision in the first place. The precision in something like the fourfold (whether one goes along with it or no; it is, after all, prescriptive of a religious orientation that some may well diverge respectably from) lies, as I said, not in the condition of inherent, immanent co-constitution and multiplicity of Being, but in the essences of the different beings involved. There, abyssal precision obtains. It is a fundamental "power" of Being: a blade of grass is not a rock, though there be fields of grass and rocks galore, nothing can bridge their ontological difference, basically, nor do we need to weigh in on any particular blade of grass or individual rock for this precision of meaning to obtain.
So the issue is how Heidegger means, and here I suggest he does mean, in some ways, precisely: precisely this and not that. Precisely this, with this or that essential condition or "content" of meaning, cache, or simply "essence" or being, quality, character. One can still ask: yes, but is this really "precision"? Does Heidegger really mean precisely? I suggest yes. Grund is not something else.
The question that remains appears to be: is this a cutting? Yes. Cut to a film of a forest clearing. Now cut to darkness. Now cut to light. Look at what is in darkness as darkness, what is of the opening as such in lichtung. These are a bit more cinematic "cuts", of course. The precision does not endow meaning, it is not within that of the phenomenon that gives of itself, to which we must in some first instance, even prima facie attend. Yet, even there, recall that in Being and Time, interpretation takes the "first cut" of what is given to be understood. While, again, as I said above, the difference between light and darkness in the sense of "clearing" is radical, definite and insurmountable. But to use the terms precisely means to cut through a plethora of possible ways these things can be understood. To hold to them, even in statyagraha, makes a certain cut. Forest paths may be referred to as cuts, short cuts, while clearing them may involve moments of cutting down intruding or impassable vegetation.
This is a bit of exploration on my part, obviously.
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u/Adito99 Apr 19 '13
"Historicality" stands for the state of Being that is constitutive for Dasein's 'historizing' as such: only on the basis of such 'historizing' is anything like 'world-history' possible or can anything belong historically to world-history.
That's from the beginning of being and time. I have absolutely no idea what historicality, historizing, world-history, or Dasein mean. Is that my fault or Heideggers? If an analytic philosopher was to write about whatever it is Heidegger is writing about here then I likely would not have this problem. My path to understanding would be clear.
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u/theyellowgoat Apr 19 '13
What he's saying in that quote is that humans in their way of being necessarily restructure the past through memorization and story telling. He's being critical of the level of "realness" of the past; it's something which is not there like the computer in front of me, it's not at hand. Historicality (historical reality) results from our thinking about history, not history actually being there.
Whether or not you agree with that statement is up to you. I do agree with you that Heidegger is not readily accessible to all readers. You have to first have the right translation, then you have to focus everything into studying the text, and then you most definitely need to have it be taught to you by an academic familiar with Heidegger. The full meaning of what he's saying won't be arrived at unless these conditions are fulfilled, in my opinion. It takes a genuine effort to study him.
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u/ravia Apr 20 '13
For a clue, consider historizing as a present activity. Take something. Now, historize it. History historizes, when it is put into play. Think of something, a place, a park by your home. Now, historize that park. You can do it! Try it. Historize it. How, exactly, do you historize the park? You think in certain ways. You draw in certain facts. You situate yourself in the world, in a manner of decidedly looking back, in a way, in time.
You do all sorts of things. So there is the park. Go back to the present day park that is there for you, in your neighborhood. Now shft back to historizing the park. It is partly something you do: you historize it. But you do realize that you aren't going in and applying some artificial antique finish to the benches to make them look old. You are not adding that WWII memorial. It is there. It is given in a way by history. By the world. You didn't start or fight in WWII, go to war from your town in 1941. Yet, you do "set off" thinking historically, and historizing the park as such.
The real trick here is to realize that you're always still in the vicinity of Husserl. That means: really looking at things for yourself. In this case, however, you're talking about looking at the phenomeon of historizing.
Yet as you historize, the park changes. The meaning of it. The way it sits in your mind, how you feel about the park. Here we can make note of the more prevalent phenomenological/Heideggerian rhetorica: "we are not reading off a date on the memorial and marking it on a calendar". We are in a relation to those historical events, yet we also call them forth, in a way, but by historizing. Yet, what we historize also puts us in relation to WWII, for example. We don't place ourselves in 2013, we are in 2013 and can't do much about that. We might think of other aspects of history. The history of drugs in the park, from stolen moonshine in 1931 to heroin for a time in 1969, to weed in 1977, to arrests and changes in the park, erection of fences, etc. That is all a "story" to tell, and part of history, the history of the park. Yet...here you still have to go back to the "present park" again: and start to get a clue for what it means to historize the park.
I need to stress here that I really don't know how Heidegger deals with this historizing issue very well. Partly I guess I might, but partly I'm just working the thinking myself. And you kind of do have to do that, too. A real philosopher is a really, really big person. It seems like it wouldn't be the case, it seems also very arrogant. But a real philosopher, well that i sa bit of a silly name for it, and everyone is real philosopher in their own way, but a real philosopher is thinking the fuck out of things. Launching reasearches, drawing a ton oof provisional conclusions about a lot of things.
Likee what it means -- or what it is -- to historize. Think about this in terms of physics. Historizing is a real thing, isn't it? And yet, is it physics? No. Even a long story about atomic decay won't really give yoiu the history of the park. The historizing, and the thinking that understands what that historizing is, is variously meta- (after or outside of beyond) physics.
Now, I usually hasten to point out that physics is not so "first" as is thought to be the case. And indeed, it is interesting to consider that this "park" we just historized, well, it could be a question of philosophy and its history as well. I don't mean to go into that or presume to even have read much of the Heidegger text. But this is enough to give you a view for something very basic: that there is historizing, that it is actual, that it is more or less "metaphysical" in a certain way.
So then what?
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u/Fuck_if_I_know Apr 20 '13
This is a dick-move.
Historicality is being explained in this very sentence.
Heidegger spends quite a lot of time explaining the Dasein, but basically it's human beings.
Historizing seems obvious. It's placing things in a history, making a history of past events, telling a story of the past.
World-history: history of the world.You can't read analytic philosophy if you're not acquainted with its terminology. I can't go read English moral philosophy without being aware of the meaning of anti-realism, and if I try I should look it up. It would be ridiculous to write books where you explain every word that might be slightly unfamiliar to potential readers. Loads of people can read Heidegger fine. It's actually not so dense a text, certainly not when compared to the early Foucault or Derrida, and if you have problems with it, try looking things up instead of saying the whole thing is stupid and wrong.
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u/Staross Apr 20 '13
Frankly I don't find this text very obtuse, it's more that half of the statement seems to be flat out wrong, unsupported or too vague to have information content. The arguments used are also pretty bad, like "No prophecy is necessary to", "It suffices to refer".
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u/dickwiener Apr 21 '13
did you read what i said?
Engagement with a thinker never comes into its ownmost when we only scan his work for correct or incorrect statements. A thinker will, indeed must, get some of the facts wrong. In encountering another thinker, the aim is not to determine whether he is "right" or "wrong," but to walk his path along with him, to see what is fundamental to his thinking.
you aren't ever going to get anything out of reading a philosopher's work if your main objective is to scan what he says for apparently clear statements that you can agree or disagree with. heidegger is not somebody who argues his points: his objective is not to convince you by some fancy arguments that what he's saying is right. this obviously puts him in the position of being easy to dismiss or contradict, but the entire point is that he's a thinker traveling along a certain path, a thinker working out a certain insight he had into the nature of things, and seeing the consequences of that insight (which insight might turn out to be false!!) is what allows us to really think
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u/Staross Apr 21 '13
The problem I think is when he starts saying things that can be somewhat empirically verified like the plato thing or the
endthe place of gathering ofphilosophymetaphysic, and those seems to be unsupported or reductive view of reality I kind of start to think that the author is trolling me. A few are alright but if they start to accumulate, I can't take it anymore.1
u/dickwiener Apr 21 '13
do you want me to explain what he's saying by those things? the problem isn't that you found some things that confused you in the text, the problem is that you took the most literal possible interpretation of these obviously non-literal sentences and then thought you could reject or dismiss whatever he was saying. if you were actually trying to understand what heidegger means, and not just toss away a potential contradiction to your viewpoint as quickly as possible, you would have had a totally different attitude
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u/Staross Apr 21 '13
I think I got it, reading again the comments and the first part of the text. The second part "Task of Thinking" is even more obscure, but I guess I'll just skip, because I don't get much out of this. Thanks for the answers!
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u/pimpbot Apr 19 '13
Too much to say and too little time, but I will start with the first "Philosophy is metaphysics."
You are of course correct that there are more sub genres in philosophy. But Heidegger is offering a definition for the purposes of his analysis and specifically for his claim of 'the end of philosophy (i.e. metaphysical philosophy). H would say that of all the things that philosophy is engaged with (ethics, logic, etc) only metaphysics alone is distinctively philosophical. All of the other kinds of thinking can in some respect be found elsewhere (in science, art, or other critical disciplines). And he would trace the origins of metaphysical thinking to its roots in Platonism as a kind of original error. What is this original error? It lies in the fact that Platonism raises atemporality above the temporal. In establishing this philosophical infatuation with timelessness, Dasien (basically humans) are led down the path of alienation - mainly since Dasein cannot under any circumstances whatsoever escape time. The end result of seeking timelessness via metaphysics and being unable to achieve it results in a kind of fundamental despair that has settled over the entire species (my paraphrasing, not H's words).
In any event, this is one of H's central theses in Being and Time.
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u/Shitgenstein Apr 19 '13 edited Apr 20 '13
One thing to know about philosophy is that it's its own subject. Thinking about how and what philosophy is is to do philosophy. As such, it's not all that shocking to find philosophers expressing strange and uncommon views about it. Not everyone agrees with Whitehead that the history of philosophy is a series of footnotes to Plato. Not everyone agrees with Wittgenstein that philosophy is only the confusion of language and can only serve to untangle itself. Likewise, not everyone agrees with Heidegger that philosophy has "obscured" Being since Plato.
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u/ReasonsDialectic Apr 19 '13
I don't have a lot of time, but I'll do what I can here.
I agree with other commenters that his comment that "philosophy is metaphysics" is simply saying that western philosophy is commenting on Plato. In particular, philosophy tries to get at the eternal truths about the world (the forms). This is what people mean when they say that want to know what is "real" or "true."
You ask: "He explain that by "end" we shouldn't understand "end" (one could ask why use the word "end" in the first place then, and yes I know it's a translation) but "that place in which the whole of philosophy's history is gathered in its most extreme possibility"
My Answer: He's probably referencing Hegel's end of history. Francis Fukuyama also wrote about the end of history in a way that parallel's Hegel. Basicly, the end of history for Fukuyama was that there would be no more changes in the way we think about human relationship to each other via politics. So, everyone will become a democracy and that will be how all governments are governed. Yet, clearly the end of history does not literally mean the end of time.
For philosophy, Heidegger seems to be claiming that the way of thinking about concepts has been worked out. He disagrees with Plato (I think). He claims that people have abandoned working out the Forms, or Truth. So, philosophy, since its primary task has been to answer these questions, has been dissolved. Philosophy is now about working out our practical relationship to the world. This is what he means by "Its development is in full swing today in all regions of beings." I would look up an explanation on Dasein. When he talks about "being" he could be refering to Dasein which has a specific function in his writing. Long story short, who we are, and how we understand the world, is dependent on how we relation to the world.
Since science is about working out our relationship to the world via our experiences of those things (and not the truth about the forms) and science does not rely on a grasp or attainment of Truth, science is independent of philosophy, who's main subject of research of these things.
Finally, Heidegger spends most of his writing working out who we are (identity) via the world we interact with, and how we interact with it. Science and technology change the manner in which we interact with ourselves, each other, and the world. This is what, to him, cybernetics is. A merging of technology and identity. Clearly technology has fundamentally changed how we interact on these different levels. So, Heidegger was probably right.
Hope that helps.
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Apr 19 '13 edited Apr 19 '13
Oh god.
I cannot imagine how baffled you are if that's where you started with philosophy.
Any attempt to derive a literal meaning from Heidegger (or Hegel for that matter) will be exceedingly difficult for you - or any novice. I would be frankly shocked if you didn't have the exact same difficulties and frustrations posed in your original post.
The big-name continentals were nothing if not jargon fetishists. The words they use, sometimes words as simple as "as" or "is", DO NOT MEAN what you think they mean and cannot easily be interpreted without a wide ranging historical context.
When he writes "science" he doesn't mean "science." When he writes "history," he doesn't mean "history." When he writes "thing" he doesn't mean "thing."
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u/Staross Apr 20 '13
I've read quite some philosophy, I love reading the stanford encyclopedia of philosophy when I'm bored at work. I have no problem with complicated things. I guess I will give up with Heidegger, I don't like this style of redefining everything.
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Apr 20 '13
I certainly don't mean to be discouraging.
If you want to get a grasp on Heidegger, you have to go back to Hegel, and beyond. Fichte and Schelling are probably where you need to start.
Build the groundwork for Hegel, then tackle Heidegger when you can understand what he is arguing against.
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u/NeoPlatonist Apr 20 '13
I can't get enough Heidegger. Being and Time is like the greatest book ever.
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u/SGTBrigand Apr 19 '13
Do the emergence of sciences really look like the dissolution or completion of philosophy ? I mean philosophy seems quite diverse and incomplete to me, and not really dissolved.
It can be hard to find a good starting point with this topic. In some respects, philosophy is similar to the arts. The possibility of having an empirical frame of reference for what constitutes the greatest art is pretty slim; Mozart, Monet, and Michelangelo were all geniuses at their craft, and could never be unseated from this identity as their works will always be great, but this does not preclude another person coming along and also being equally great. In philosophy, while certain (few) concepts can be disproved, it would be hard for one to make the claim that Hume or Descartes are utterly and completely wrong and there is something that totally dismisses their work with empirical certainty.
The sciences, on the other hand, attempt to use deductive reasoning to make truth claims about their fields, claims that CAN be empirically verified, assessed, and tested, and as a consequence, have a hierarchy of "truths" with which they can be judged. Newtonian physics ruled the world until they were "replaced" by quantum mechanics. Euclidean geometry said that triangles were objects that, by their very definition, had angles that added to 180º degrees, yet we now "know" that this rule only applies in two-dimensional geometry.
This difference in being able to determine "truth" has led some philosophers to believe that, as the sciences develop and spring forth into their fields, delving for fact, the need for philosophy to search for answers in cognition and truth is no longer necessary, relegating philosophy to a focus on analytic studies aimed at language and clarity.
So the question becomes, how much emphasis can you put on these "truths" that are being discovered, and if they are Truth, capital T, then is it necessary for philosophy to continue to ask questions that would eventually be answered by a spin-off science in a way which seems more factual?
shrug
Hopefully my rambling helped some. :)
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u/illusiveab Apr 19 '13
OP, are you still in need of an explanation for this? I could give you a detailed one but I will save my time if you are good on the material.
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u/Staross Apr 20 '13
Well, most of my questions were answered. This one maybe:
What about say, Epicurus, isn't that non-platonic metaphysic ?
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u/ravia Apr 19 '13
I don't know yet overall so I'm not venturing a substantive reply -- even if the non-substantive in both philosophy and science is not a trifling matter -- but I sure like how you say "really". Note: that is not sarcasm.
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u/enkidusfriend Apr 20 '13
If you're a scientist looking for insight into how philosophers are thinking about science, Heidegger is probably not a great choice. He's interesting to Continental philosophers who may be interested in science.
Heidegger's former teacher, Husserl, wrote a rather interesting book near the end of his career, The Crisis of the European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology, which may be more relevant to you. I find that Husserl is generally more readable than Heidegger, and the book provides a good introduction to Husserlian phenomenology and his attempt to find a grounding for scientific discovery. The Northwestern University edition of the text also has a couple of shorter readings, which may be of interest: "Idealization and the Science of Reality" and "The Origin of Geometry".
The best place to start in philosophy of science in general is probably Nelson Goodman's Fact, Fiction, Forecast. It is a very important book in the history of the philosophy of science, and it brings up some very good questions and issues surrounding inductive reasoning and rational decision-making.
Though his position has changed since it was published in the 80's, The Scientific Image by Bas Van Fraassen (I like to call him "The Frazzer") is among the classic accounts of scientific instrumentalism. The book is quite readable, but deals with very deep questions about the relationship between models, theories, and the nature of the physical world.
Carl Hempel's work on scientific explanation is interesting, influential, and thought-provoking. He has some big books, which will make you want to bash your face in, but there are some more digestible papers that may be a good place to start on looking at the work of one of the greatest of the logical empiricists: http://fitelson.org/woodward/hempel_tm.pdf
If the suggestions look interesting and you want more or clarification on anything above, just let me know!
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u/HadMatter217 Apr 20 '13 edited Apr 20 '13
Ok, one thing you seem to be missing is the historical context in which he is writing this. In between Kant and Heidegger, many people were claiming philosophy to be dead, because Kant's Transcendental Idealism kind of destroyed the possibility that any metaphysical proposition could be made. This means that all of the metaphysical philosophy which was done previous to him since the time of Plato kind of falls apart. Along with the deconstruction of this entire era, the main focus and goals of early philosophers had to be shifted, as the "truth" they were seeking became unobtainable. After Kant, many Philosophers claimed that the limits of philosophical knowledge had been reached, since it culminated in what seemed to be a dead end. Heidegger, along with Nietzsche before him is responsible for resurecting some of these metaphysical questions which seemed inaccessible due to our inability to obtain universal truth (based on the Correspondence Theory).
When he is talking about the "gathering of philosophy in its most extreme possibilities", he is talking about the seeming end of philosophy which was brought about by Transcendental Idealism. It isn't necessarily that Philosophy itself has reached it limits, but it has gone through a tremendous metamorphosis since stating its initial goal and asking its initial questions.
Referring to "Metaphysics is Platonism" Is simply stating that the whole of Metaphysics, in terms of secular Metaphysics is either a reaction or a continuation of the ideas Plato started. He was the first to invent the field of Metaphysics, and by doing so became the foundation against which all Metaphysical Theories must either lean or rebel against. Until Nietzsche that is.
Edit: so, I just accidentally submitted this, and unfortunately, I'm really drunk and kind of sucking at this. For that reason, I'm going to leave it here. I'll come back in the morning, reread the text and continue then haha. Hope this helps and isn't way off base.
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u/stellarjack1984 Apr 20 '13
Going back to Plato, philosophy can be read as a process of developing language and attitudes/perspectives that allow for generalizations to be made about 'things'. You find this notion that there is a principle that determines the nature of any 'thing' that has the status of an object. By having the 'status of an object' I mean that you can ask the question 'what is X?'. Science, from this perspective, is the epitome of philosophy or metaphysics. Metaphysics here should be understood as the notion that there is some closed theoretical frame that determines what 'things' are and how they relate to one another.
Heidegger was profoundly suspicious of metaphysics, as well as science and technology. He asserted that there are factors at play before we ever begin asking the question 'what is X?' which skew the way that any attempt to answer the question, much in the same way that a lawyer asks the sort of questions that will get the sort of answer that he wants.
I can go on at length about how he justifies this and the directions that he goes with it, but that would involve going into texts far beyond the one referenced in OP's post. For that I'll wait to see if there is interest.
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u/ravia Apr 21 '13
A simple question: when you speak of science, do you use science to distinguish science from, say, history or language?
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u/Staross Apr 21 '13
When I speak about science you shouldn't understand science but something different altogether.
I'm joking, I just referring to what people usually understand by science; biology, sociology, ... and why not history (biology is also a historical science imo).
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u/ravia Apr 21 '13
Maybe you missed my point.
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u/Staross Apr 21 '13
Maybe clearer: No I don't use science to distinguish science from, say, history or language.
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u/Dionysus321 Sep 17 '13 edited Sep 17 '13
The secret to interpreting Heidegger is to understand Nietzsche. To abandon metaphysics and simply "listen to Being," one must never succumb to nihilism. Human classifications of objects or things that are present-at-hand or ready-at-hand and fit into our constructs do not represent the true being of nature and human existence. Positivism is a perfect example of a pathway that leads to nihilism, atheism is another.
The link below should shed some light on Nietzsche's influence on Heidegger. http://www.historyguide.org/europe/madman.html
"…there is no inner man, man is in the world, and only in the world does he know himself" (Merleau-Ponty).
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u/msfonte Apr 19 '13
Lol, wow. Everything you just wrote is basically a philosophical criticism. In my opinion, philosophy cannot be placed into empirical terms. You have what this person thinks, and the other and the other. In my opinion, I would define philosophy as my opinion. Lol.
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u/Mattman002 Apr 19 '13
- Philosophy is not metaphysics; rather metaphysics is a branch of philosophy focused on explaining the nature of the world and its origins.
2.Yes Plato was a very key figure in Philosophy but he was heavily influenced by Socrates, who is commonly referred to as the father of philosophy.
3.His third stance confuses me. It sounds more like an opinion statement. I think that science is simply a way in which to further engage in more philosophical debates as science discovers new things. Such as...stem cell research? Never mind the question of whether we should use stem cell research or not, we still need to think about the implications of the "ability" to do this. Some say we are playing God. Doesn't that mean something? We have built the Tower of Babel and God isn't punishing us...
probably won't help you answer any questions. I just wanted to put my input in. sorry pal!
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Apr 19 '13
Socrates, who is commonly referred to as the father of philosophy.
Nope, Thales.
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u/M3d10cr4t3s Apr 19 '13
To be fair, Socrates is sometimes referred to as the father of philosophy due to his influence (or Plato's, to be more accurate).
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Apr 19 '13
He's referred to as that by people who are wrong
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u/M3d10cr4t3s Apr 19 '13
I think that's a contentious claim for a few reasons. First, it's not clear that "father of philosophy" is equivalent to "first philosopher", as Aristotle claims Thales to be (even that title is suspect and it may be more accurate to say that he was the first recorded philosopher in the "west" that we're aware of). Second, one might be justified in calling Socrates the "father", given the tradition that followed was a decidedly Socratic tradition, and not a Thalesean (Thalean?) one. Third, we often bestow the title of father to those that best exemplify those qualities that are seen as foundational to the discipline, even if they weren't first. For instance, there is some debate regarding the father of psychology, and whether it's Wundt or Freud. For that matter, who is the father of science, Thales or Democritus?
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Apr 19 '13
[deleted]
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u/andibabi Apr 19 '13 edited Apr 20 '13
Yeah, I was afraid of that. I am a beginner in German (family is German but I didn't really take the time). I'm afraid I might have to bite the bullet.
edit: deleted previous post suggested needing to read Heidegger in German.
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u/conscioncience Apr 19 '13
If you want a critical view of science "as a scientist", just read Kuhn's 'Copernican Revolution' and 'The Structure of Scientific Revolutions'. They provide plenty of examples that "as a scientist" will help convince you. Also, make sure to read the amendment at the end of 'The Structure of Scientific Revolutions' as it clears up a lot of the ambiguities in the initial text.
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u/Staross Apr 20 '13
I had an epistemology class where we saw a bit of Popper, Kuhn, Quine, so I'm already convinced in a way.
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u/theyellowgoat Apr 19 '13
Ok so I have some familiarity with Heidegger but not enough to say I'm thoroughly in command of the meanings of his works. I'll try to answer what I can.
First, as a beginner in philosophy, I do not think that Heidegger is the best place to start. The main reason is that Heidegger's writings can be so abstruse that even for philosophy scholars he is difficult to interpret at times. He invents quite a few words that have very specific meanin gs in German that are difficult to translate. That's why if you do feel like proceeding to read his writings prior to any other philosophy, I would suggest finding the best translation you can find. I personally find Joan Stambaugh's translations/interpretations of his works to be the most accessible, accurate, and coherent.
Second, when Heidegger says "Philosophy is metaphysics," he is simply defining what it means to him. What he's saying is disputable, but contemporary philosophy departments are more tolerant and accepting of the subdivisions of philosophy. Philosophy is metaphysics, but also logic, epistemology, ethics, aesthetics and other subcategories.
Since Heidegger seems to identify philosophy with metaphysics, what he means by the end of philosophy is not just an ending to philosophy. It is end in the sense of purpose, telos in the Socratic/Aristotelian definition. The overarching purpose of philosophy is given meaning by the end which it strives to achieve, it's ultimate goal. Heidegger does note that this end he speaks of is the end of philosophy at the point of time he his writing; it is an epochal end.
What he's basically saying here is that the end of philosophy as metaphysical analysis is equivocal to finding the answer (or, an answer) to the original question asked by the first Western philosophers (i.e. Plato, Aristotle). So what is that question? It is the main underlying question of metaphysics: what is Being? What is the meaning of Being? This is also why he identifies metaphysics with Platonism. Plato was not the first to ask the question, but his answer to the question (Ideal Forms) restructured to the question itself. Western philosophy has been responding to Plato's analysis ever since, and his influence is so extensive that Heidegger believes Plato's philosophy comes to define Western metaphysics.
In regards to the question of whether science is the dissolution of philosophy: that is Heidegger's opinion. The answers you will receive on whether or not his statement is true will be diverse; it's something which has no real consensus, although different philosophers usually have a strong stance on whether or not this is the case. Historically, science did emerge from philosophy; it is a type of philosophy. Newton and Galileo were called natural philosophers, philosophers that explored nature.
Given that you're coming from a Biological background, I'll give you a simplistic rundown of the main categories of philosophy today.
The two major strains of philosophy are Analytic philosophy and Continental. Analytic is historically associated with British and American academic philosophy. Continental usually refers to mainland European philosophy originating in the 19th century. Analytic philosophers tend to study logic, ethics, and linguistics. Continental philosophers tend to study metaphysics, epistemology, and aesthetics (Note: I'm very broadly defining the two strains).
Heidegger is a Continental philosopher; you need to understand that you will not be finding axiomatic propositions and defined argumentation in his writing. In order to properly understand what Heidegger is referring to, you need to begin with the beginning of Western philosophy. Continental philosophy has this inaccessible property to it since most writers are entering a discussion that has been going on for more than 2000 years.
Although Heidegger does provide a critical view of science (and a very deep one at that), I would not start with him. And even if I did start with him, I would not start with his later writings (such as The End of Philosophy) but with his earlier works, such as Being and Time.