Elusiveness of the Particular: Hannah Arendt, Walter Benjamin, And
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Ontotheology? Understanding Heidegger’S Destruktion of Metaphysics* Iain Thomson
T E D U L G O E R · Internationa l Journal o f Philo sophical Studies Vol.8(3), 297–327; · T a p y u lo o r Gr & Fr ancis Ontotheology? Understanding Heidegger’s Destruktion of Metaphysics* Iain Thomson Abstract Heidegger’s Destruktion of the metaphysical tradition leads him to the view that all Western metaphysical systems make foundational claims best understood as ‘ontotheological’. Metaphysics establishes the conceptual parameters of intelligibility by ontologically grounding and theologically legitimating our changing historical sense of what is. By rst elucidating and then problematizing Heidegger’s claim that all Western metaphysics shares this ontotheological structure, I reconstruct the most important components of the original and provocative account of the history of metaphysics that Heidegger gives in support of his idiosyncratic understanding of metaphysics. Arguing that this historical narrative generates the critical force of Heidegger’s larger philosophical project (namely, his attempt to nd a path beyond our own nihilistic Nietzschean age), I conclude by briey showing how Heidegger’s return to the inception of Western metaphysics allows him to uncover two important aspects of Being’s pre-metaphysical phenomeno- logical self-manifestation, aspects which have long been buried beneath the metaphysical tradition but which are crucial to Heidegger’s attempt to move beyond our late-modern, Nietzschean impasse. Keywords: Heidegger; ontotheology; metaphysics; deconstruction; Nietzsche; nihilism Upon hearing the expression ‘ontotheology’, many philosophers start looking for the door. Those who do not may know that it was under the title of this ‘distasteful neologism’ (for which we have Kant to thank)1 that the later Heidegger elaborated his seemingly ruthless critique of Western metaphysics. -
Feminist Theory and the Frankfurt School: Introduction
wendy brown Feminist Theory and the Frankfurt School: Introduction Feminism is a revolt against decaying capitalism. —Marcuse There is a quaintness to Herbert Marcuse’s manifesto on behalf of “feminist socialism,” here reprinted for the first time since its appearance thirty years ago in Women’s Studies. It is not only an open- hearted and hopeful little effort at theoretically codifying the expansive revolutionary promise of the second wave of the Women’s Movement, a promise that would soon be dashed from within and without. Marcuse’s political and philosophical assumptions were also vulnerable to emerg- ing postfoundational critiques of the humanist subject, progressive his- toriography, and their entailments: essentialized identities, totalizing identities, undeconstructed binary oppositions, faith in emancipation, and revolution. Openhearted, hopeful, vulnerable, imaginative, revolution- ary: precisely the qualities Marcuse thought feminism brought to the unyielding and ultimately unemancipatory rationality of a masculinist radical politics, on the one hand, and a dreamless liberal egalitarianism, on the other. This unemancipatory rationality was the terrain that the Frankfurt School worked from every direction, as it upturned the myth of Volume 17, Number 1 doi 10.1215/10407391-2005-001 © 2006 by Brown University and d i f f e r e n c e s : A Journal of Feminist Cultural Studies Downloaded from http://read.dukeupress.edu/differences/article-pdf/17/1/1/405311/diff17-01_02BrownFpp.pdf by guest on 29 September 2021 Feminist Theory and the Frankfurt School Enlightenment reason, integrated psychoanalysis into political philosophy, pressed Nietzsche and Weber into Marx, attacked positivism as an ideology of capitalism, theorized the revolutionary potential of high art, plumbed the authoritarian ethos and structure of the nuclear family, mapped cultural and social effects of capital, thought and rethought dialectical materialism, and took philosophies of aesthetics, reason, and history to places they had never gone before. -
Kierkegaard on Selfhood and Our Need for Others
Kierkegaard on Selfhood and Our Need for Others 1. Kierkegaard in a Secular Age Scholars have devoted much attention lately to Kierkegaard’s views on personal identity and, in particular, to his account of selfhood.1 Central to this account is the idea that a self is not something we automatically are. It is rather something we must become. Thus, selfhood is a goal to realize or a project to undertake.2 To put the point another way, while we may already be selves in some sense, we have to work to become real, true, or “authentic” selves.3 The idea that authentic selfhood is a project is not unique to Kierkegaard. It is common fare in modern philosophy. Yet Kierkegaard distances himself from popular ways of thinking about the matter. He denies the view inherited from Rousseau that we can discover our true selves by consulting our innermost feelings, beliefs, and desires. He also rejects the idea developed by the German Romantics that we can invent our true selves in a burst of artistic or poetic creativity. In fact, according to Kierkegaard, becom- ing an authentic self is not something we can do on our own. If we are to succeed at the project, we must look beyond ourselves for assistance. In particular, Kierkegaard thinks, we must rely on God. For God alone can provide us with the content of our real identi- ties.4 A longstanding concern about Kierkegaard arises at this point. His account of au- thentic selfhood, like his accounts of so many concepts, is religious. -
The Idea of Mimesis: Semblance, Play, and Critique in the Works of Walter Benjamin and Theodor W
DePaul University Via Sapientiae College of Liberal Arts & Social Sciences Theses and Dissertations College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences 8-2012 The idea of mimesis: Semblance, play, and critique in the works of Walter Benjamin and Theodor W. Adorno Joseph Weiss DePaul University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://via.library.depaul.edu/etd Recommended Citation Weiss, Joseph, "The idea of mimesis: Semblance, play, and critique in the works of Walter Benjamin and Theodor W. Adorno" (2012). College of Liberal Arts & Social Sciences Theses and Dissertations. 125. https://via.library.depaul.edu/etd/125 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences at Via Sapientiae. It has been accepted for inclusion in College of Liberal Arts & Social Sciences Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Via Sapientiae. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Idea of Mimesis: Semblance, Play, and Critique in the Works of Walter Benjamin and Theodor W. Adorno A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy October, 2011 By Joseph Weiss Department of Philosophy College of Liberal Arts and Sciences DePaul University Chicago, Illinois 2 ABSTRACT Joseph Weiss Title: The Idea of Mimesis: Semblance, Play and Critique in the Works of Walter Benjamin and Theodor W. Adorno Critical Theory demands that its forms of critique express resistance to the socially necessary illusions of a given historical period. Yet theorists have seldom discussed just how much it is the case that, for Walter Benjamin and Theodor W. -
52 Philosophy in a Dark Time: Martin Heidegger and the Third Reich
52 Philosophy in a Dark Time: Martin Heidegger and the Third Reich TIMOTHY O’HAGAN Like Oscar Wilde I can resist everything except temptation. So when I re- ceived Anne Meylan’s tempting invitation to contribute to this Festschrift for Pascal Engel I accepted without hesitation, before I had time to think whether I had anything for the occasion. Finally I suggested to Anne the text of a pub- lic lecture which I delivered in 2008 and which I had shown to Pascal, who responded to it with his customary enthusiasm and barrage of papers of his own on similar topics. But when I re-read it, I realized that it had been written for the general public rather than the professional philosophers who would be likely to read this collection of essays. So what was I to do with it? I’ve decided to present it in two parts. In Part One I reproduce the original lecture, unchanged except for a few minor corrections. In Part Two I engage with a tiny fraction of the vast secondary literature which has built up over the years and which shows no sign of abating. 1. Part One: The 2008 Lecture Curtain-Raiser Let us start with two dates, 1927 and 1933. In 1927 Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf (volume II) was published. So too was Martin Heidegger’s magnum opus Being and Time. In 1933 two appointments were made: Hitler as Chancellor of the German Reich and Heidegger as Rector of Freiburg University. In 1927 it was a case of sheer coincidence; in 1933 the two events were closely linked. -
The Authenticity of Faith in Kierkegaard's Philosophy
The Authenticity of Faith in Kierkegaard’s Philosophy The Authenticity of Faith in Kierkegaard’s Philosophy Edited by Tamar Aylat-Yaguri and Jon Stewart The Authenticity of Faith in Kierkegaard’s Philosophy, Edited by Tamar Aylat-Yaguri and Jon Stewart This book first published 2013 Cambridge Scholars Publishing Layout and cover design by K.Nun Design, Denmark 12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2013 by Tamar Aylat-Yaguri, Jon Stewart and contributors All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-4990-1, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-4990-6 TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Contributors vi Introduction vii Acknowledgements xvi List of Abbreviations xvii Chapter One Jacob Golomb: Was Kierkegaard an Authentic Believer? 1 Chapter Two Shai Frogel: Acoustical Illusion as Self-Deception 12 Chapter Three Roi Benbassat: Faith as a Struggle against Ethical Self-Deception 18 Chapter Four Edward F. Mooney: A Faith that Defies Self-Deception 27 Chapter Five Darío González: Faith and the Uncertainty of Historical Experience 38 Chapter Six Jerome (Yehuda) Gellman: Constancy of Faith? Symmetry and Asymmetry in Kierkegaard’s Leap of Faith 49 Chapter Seven Peter Šajda: Does Anti-Climacus’ Ethical-Religious Theory of Selfhood Imply a Discontinuity of the Self? 60 Chapter Eight Tamar Aylat-Yaguri: Being in Truth and Being a Jew: Kierkegaard’s View of Judaism 68 Chapter Nine Jon Stewart, Kierkegaard and Hegel on Faith and Knowledge 77 Notes 93 CONTRIBUTORS Tamar Aylat-Yaguri, Department of Philosophy, Tel-Aviv University, Ramat-Aviv, P.O.B 39040, Tel-Aviv 61390, Israel. -
Temporality and Historicality of Dasein at Martin Heidegger
Sincronía ISSN: 1562-384X [email protected] Universidad de Guadalajara México Temporality and historicality of dasein at martin heidegger. Javorská, Andrea Temporality and historicality of dasein at martin heidegger. Sincronía, no. 69, 2016 Universidad de Guadalajara, México Available in: https://www.redalyc.org/articulo.oa?id=513852378011 This work is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International. PDF generated from XML JATS4R by Redalyc Project academic non-profit, developed under the open access initiative Filosofía Temporality and historicality of dasein at martin heidegger. Andrea Javorská [email protected] Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra, Eslovaquia Abstract: Analysis of Heidegger's work around historicity as an ontological problem through the existential analytic of Being Dasein. It seeks to find the significant structure of temporality represented by the historicity of Dasein. Keywords: Heidegger, Existentialism, Dasein, Temporality. Resumen: Análisis de la obra de Heidegger en tornoa la historicidad como problema ontológico a través de la analítica existencial del Ser Dasein. Se pretende encontrar la estructura significativa de temporalidad representada por la historicidad del Dasein. Palabras clave: Heidegger, Existencialismo, Dasein, Temporalidad. Sincronía, no. 69, 2016 Universidad de Guadalajara, México Martin Heidegger and his fundamental ontology shows that the question Received: 03 August 2015 Revised: 28 August 2015 of history belongs among the most fundamental questions of human Accepted: -
Life Is Suffering: Thrownness, Duhkha, Gaps, and the Origin of Existential-Spiritual Needs for Information
Roger Chabot The University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada LIFE IS SUFFERING: THROWNNESS, DUHKHA, GAPS, AND THE ORIGIN OF EXISTENTIAL-SPIRITUAL NEEDS FOR INFORMATION Abstract: LIS scholars have spent considerable time investigating the incipient stages of information seeking: the so-called “information need” as well as a host of other motivators. A study of twenty New Kadampa Buddhists, whose experiences were collected through semi-structured interviews, sought to explore their spiritual information practices and their motivations for engaging in such behaviour. An analysis of these interviews suggests that Martin Heidegger’s concept of thrownness can be paralleled with Buddhism’s First Noble Truth and Dervin’s gap metaphor, all which identify existential-level faults as inherent to the human condition. This paper offers that it is these closely-related problematic elements of human existence that are the origin of spiritual and existential motivations for engaging in spiritual information practices. 1. Introduction A need for information can be understood as “the motivation people think and feel to seek information” (Cole, 2012, p. 3). LIS scholars have spent considerable time unravelling the complex web of needs, wants, desires, and states that have been used to describe the incipient stages of information seeking. In a similar manner, psychology of religion scholars sought to explain the origins of the motivations behind individuals’ pursuit of religious or spiritual paths, concluding that they satisfy one or more ‘fundamental’ or ‘basic’ human needs or motives (Kirkpatrick, 2013) and that they are a manner of “facilitat[ing] dealing with fundamental existential issues” (Oman, 2013, p. 36). Spiritual teachings, understood as information, play a large role in the everyday practice of spiritual paths and thus could be similarly motivated by these concerns. -
Historiography and Remembrance: on Walter Benjamin's Concept Of
religions Essay Historiography and Remembrance: On Walter Benjamin’s Concept of Eingedenken Charlotte Odilia Bohn Institute for Art Theory and Cultural Studies, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, 1010 Vienna, Austria; [email protected] Received: 15 November 2018; Accepted: 5 January 2019; Published: 10 January 2019 Abstract: Engaging with Walter Benjamin’s concept of Eingedenken (remembrance), this article explores the pivotal role that remembrance plays in his attempt to develop a radically new vision of history, temporality, and human agency. Building on his essay “On Some Motifs in Baudelaire” and on his last written text, “Theses on the Philosophy of History”, it will trace how memory and historiography are brought together in a curious fusion of materialist and messianic thinking. Emerging from a critique of modernity and its ideology of progress that is cast as crisis—the practice of remembrance promises a ‘way out’. Many of Benjamin’s secular Marxist critics such as Max Horkheimer and Rolf Tiedemann, however, denied the political significance of Eingedenken—dismissing it as theological or banishing it to the realm of aesthetics. Rejecting this critique, I suggest that the radical ethical aspects of Eingedenken can be grasped only once the theological dimension is embraced in its own right and that it is in precisely this blend of materialist and messianic thought that revolutionary hope may be found. Keywords: Benjamin; Baudelaire; modernity; progress and catastrophe; materialism and mysticism; remembrance and historiography Only our momentary and accidental knowledge makes something rounded and changeless of the past. The smallest modification of that knowledge, such as any accident may occasion, sheds new light upon the “unchangeable” past, and suddenly, in that new light, everything acquires a different meaning and actually becomes different. -
Heidegger, Being and Time
Heidegger's Being and Time 1 Karsten Harries Heidegger's Being and Time Seminar Notes Spring Semester 2014 Yale University Heidegger's Being and Time 2 Copyright Karsten Harries [email protected] Heidegger's Being and Time 3 Contents 1. Introduction 4 2. Ontology and Fundamental Ontology 16 3. Methodological Considerations 30 4. Being-in-the-World 43 5. The World 55 6. Who am I? 69 7. Understanding, Interpretation, Language 82 8. Care and Truth 96 9. The Entirety of Dasein 113 10. Conscience, Guilt, Resolve 128 11. Time and Subjectivity 145 12. History and the Hero 158 13. Conclusion 169 Heidegger's Being and Time 4 1. Introduction 1 In this seminar I shall be concerned with Heidegger's Being and Time. I shall refer to other works by Heidegger, but the discussion will center on Being and Time. In reading the book, some of you, especially those with a reading knowledge of German, may find the lectures of the twenties helpful, which have appeared now as volumes of the Gesamtausgabe. Many of these have by now been translated. I am thinking especially of GA 17 Einführung in die phänomenologische Forschung (1923/24); Introduction to Phenomenological Research, trans. Daniel O. Dahlstrom (Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 2005) GA 20 Prolegomena zur Geschichte des Zeitbegriffs (1925); History of the Concept of Time, trans. Theodore Kisiel (Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 1985) GA 21 Logik. Die Frage nach der Wahrheit (1925/26). Logic: The Question of Truth, trans. Thomas Sheehan GA 24 Die Grundprobleme der Phänomenologie (1927); The Basic Problems of Phenomenology, trans. -
Arendt's Critical Dialogue with Heidegger KOISHIKAWA Kazue
Thinking and Transcendence: Arendt’s Critical Dialogue with Heidegger KOISHIKAWA Kazue Adjunct Faculty, University of Tsukuba Abstract : In the introduction to The Life of the Mind: Thinking (1977), Hannah Arendt explains that it was her observation of Adolf Eichmann’s “thoughtlessness” — his inability to think — at his trial in Jerusalem that led her to reexamine the human faculty of thinking, particularly in respect to its relation to moral judgment. Yet, it is not an easy task for her readers to follow how Arendt actually constructs her arguments on this topic in this text. The purpose of this paper is to delineate Arendt’s criticisms of Heidegger in order to articulate the characteristics of her own account of thinking in relation to morality. The paper first suggests the parallelism between Heidegger’s “wonder” and Arendt’s “love” as the beginning of philosophizing, i.e., thinking, and point out a peculiar circularity in Heidegger’s account of thinking. Secondly, the paper traces Arendt’s criticism of Heidegger’s account of thinking in §18 of the LM 1. Thirdly, the paper discusses why Arendt thinks Heidegger’s account of thinking is problematic by examining Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics (1929). Finally, based on the above analyses and discussions, the paper explores the nature of Arendt’s account of thinking to show how her conception of thinking provides a basis for moral judgment. In the introduction to The Life of the Mind: Thinking (1977), Hannah Arendt explains that it was her observation of Adolf Eichmann’s “thoughtlessness” — his inability to think — at his trial in Jerusalem that led her to reexamine the human faculty of thinking, particularly in respect to its relation to moral judgment. -
The Uses of Afro-Pessimism
Part One The Uses ofAfro-Pessimism To begin, it is necessary that the reader confront the sort), the kind novelist V. S. Naipaul gave us in noxious "idea" of Africa as a substance. But to do so requires us writings like "The Crocodiles of Yamoussoukro." The to struggle with a central paradox of this substance, by British press has recently regaled its readers with the virtue of the fact that Africa is always perched on a cruel stories of Zimbabwean misanthrope Robert Mu precipice, on the threshold between something and gabe, and, with no sense of irony, even brought Ian nothingness, between survival and the negativity of life Smith, former racist leader of the now expired Southern cycles. At the core of our consideration is the unrelent Rhodesia, as expert witness against him. ingly grim view of the world Africans occupy. This is It is in the nature of the ;truggle to understand what the terrain of Afro-pessimism, that impossibility of Africa is and her place among other cultural spaces in fathoming another kind of understanding of w~at history that it excites a lot of passion and sometimes re Africa stands for in the larger imagination. It could be gret. We choose which Africa suits our intentions, or, as said without exaggeration that Afro-pessimism is as it were, inventions.4 Each of these choices surely will old as the invention of Africa as the darkest of all places correspond to a "correct" representation. In this way, in human history. Afro-pessimism proceeds by first in Africa ceases to exist as a concrete reality.