Monday, April 6, 2009

For 4/7: Martin Heidegger


Heidegger's work may be best described as a combination of phenomenology and existentialism. The question of Being, for Heidegger, is the most fundamental of all philosophical questions, yet one which can only be raised from within the individual subject. For Heidegger, human beings are the beings for which Being is an issue. His use of the word "Dasein" is meant to capture the uniqueness of this human experience. In "What is Metaphysics?," the question of Being (or Nothing) is front and center, as Heidegger tries to carve out a place for philosophy particularly within an age dominated by the natural sciences. Whether he succeeds, you decide!

1 comment:

steve c said...

one thing i found most interesting about Martin Heidegger was how even as a youth, he was in control of his peers. This is reflected in his writings because they are so influential and true. Heideggers ideas included many powerful thoughts such as why do humans exist. He determined that as human beings we will always question our being because we have such an advanced level of comprehension. Through such thought we can enter the realm of the metaphysical. this whole process is described by Dasein. His teaching on dread is even more interesting. He says that human beings experience dread similar to experiencing fear. Except it is like having a fear but one does not kow of that. So humans experience dread but do not know of what. This leads to a separation from the physical because they are always in dread and thus become surrounded by nothing. This nothing is what Heidegger explained as necessary for anything to exist because without nothing, we would not comprehend the things around us. So advanced is this subject of nothing, that the brain contradicts itself in thinking of nothing.