ACTA UNIVERSITATIS STOCKHOLMIENSIS STOCKHOLM STUDIES IN PHILOSOPHY 24

THE LOGIC OF LIFE

HEIDEGGER'S RETRIEVAL OF ARISTOTLE'S CONCEPT OF LOGOS

CHARLOTTA WEIGELT

ACTA UNIVERSITA TIS STOCKHOLMIENSIS STOCKHOLM STUDIES IN PHILOSOPHY 24

THE LOGlC OF LIFE

Heidegger's Retrieval of Aristotle' s Concept of Logos
CHARLOTTA WEIGELT

ALMQVIST & WIKSELL INTERNATIONAL

Doctoral dissertati on Department of Philosophy Stockholm University

S- 106 91 Stockholm

ABSTRACT
ln the work of Martin Heidegger, the quesl for the proper philosophical beginni ng is
motivated by an awareness of the "historicaI" nature of thought: ilS dependency upon the be gin ni ng of philosophy in the historica! sense. This study explores the early Heidegger's attempt to provide philosophy with a new beginning by explicitly addressi ng the legacy of Aristotle, regarded as Ille philosophical origin, which ph ilosophy cannat avoid to confront without remaining naive with respect ta ilS own foundation. Heidegger 's projeci is here considered with respect to how it conceives of the question of human reasan, and it is taken to be d riven by the ambiti on ta corne to grips with a traditional logical and theoret ical ideal of cognition. Turning to Aristotle as the alleged originatar of this ideal, Heidegger focuses on the concept of logos, taking as his point of departure Aristotle's classica! detinition of man as zoioll logon echoll, commonly rendered as "the rational animal". The stud y explores Heidegger' s retri eval of Aristotle's concept of logos . In this pursuit, Heidegger tS guided by the assumption that this concept must be traced back ta Aristot le 's understandi ng of life and praxis, since it is based upon an experience of speech as the basic trait of human cognition. 11 is shawn how Heidegger on the basis of his interpretation of Aristotle tries ta develop a notion of a speaking or discursive reason. Thereby , he hopes to overcome an idea also present in Aristotle: that the supreme form of knowledge is cOlltained in the simple apprehension of nous . lt is argued (hat the point in revealing the "practical" foundation of Aristotle's notion of logos is essenti a!ly to find out what it means for philosophy to be a fonn of praxis. The reby , the aim is to show that Heidegger affirms Aristotle's idea that philosophy as theory, theoria, is the supreme mode of praxis. For this reason, the therne of logos is situated w ithin the comex! of Heidegger's interpretation of Aristotle's teleology. A guidi ng assumpti on is that Heidegger think s that the concept of killesis, change, provides us with the ontological background to Aristotle's inquiry inlo logos. lt is shawn how Heidegger argues Ihat Aristotle conceives of logos as a kind of kinesis. Yet he also s hows that Ari stot le was not able to fully affirm {his because of his assumption that. being in the true sense is not kinesis but entelecheia, unchanging, complete activity, wh ich belongs not ta logos but to nOlis. Key words: Heidegge r, Aristotle, logos, kinesis, phenornenology, teleology, assertion, sunthess, dihai resis, theory, praxis, everydayness.

2002 Charlotta Weigelt

ISBN 91-22-01996-0 ISSN 0491-0877 Printed by Akadem itryck AB Edsbruk 2002

1Il.\ 1 II I III/1'(lllI uIIOIi 1I' 1Il PllIl ll1 l' ill lI l Pl dJu'iophy NIUI k!lIll l1l 1 S 11111 'I I Sl<\e, 1 10ltll

CONTENTS
ABSTR ACT

ln 111 1.: work or Martin Il eid cgge r, th e quest for the proper philoso phi ca l beginning is 1i1OIivntcd by un Hwa rcness of the "hi stori eal " Ilnture of Ihought: ils dependeney lIpon Ihe bl.:gi ll ning o f phil oso phy in the historien! se nse. This study explores the early II cideggc r's Ht lCll1 pt 10 provide philosophy with a new beginnin g by explicitly oddrcssi ng th e legacy of Aristotl e, regarded as Ih e philosophical origin, which philosop hy cann ot avoid to confront withoul rernaining naive with respect to ils own fUlI l1dnl ion . Hcidegge r's project is here considered \Vith respect to how il coneeives or Ille questi on of human reason, and it is taken ta be driven by the ambition to come 10 HI'i[)S wilh a !rad itional logica l and theoret ical ideal of cognition. Turning ta hll AdK lc 11$ th e alleged originator of this ideal, Heidegger focuses on the concept of l''WI\, liS his point of departure Aristotle's c1assical definit ion of man as zoioll l'';,fnll 1'1' 1t0 1/, co mJn only rendered as "the rational an imal". The study exp lores rct r' it! val of Aristotle's concept of logos. Tn this pursuit, Heidegger is Iii .!ld. Il lIy Ille IISSlunpt ion that [his concept must be traced back ta Aristot le's uwh. IIII HIIII J!\ o f life and praxis, since il is based upon an experience of speech as the 1111 Il lIull of' hu tl1l.l 1l cognition. It s shawn how Heidegger on the basis of his IIlh 1 plItullol1 of' A ris lotl e tries Lo develop a notion of a speaking or discursive reason. 1111 11 111), ho hopt.:s l a overcome an idea also present in Aristotle: that the supreme I lIlIn lit is contained in the simple appl'ehens ion of nOlis . Il is argued that 11 11 l'p lil t 111 fr.:v caling the "praclical " foundation of Aristotle's notion of logos is l Il' lilld out what it means for philosophy to be a fonn of praxis. Thereby, 11h11 ls 10 show that Heidegger affirms Aristotle's idea Ihat philosophy as theory, "" 'III'/fI , is Ih l! supreme mode of praxis. For Ihis reason, the the me of logos is situated I\Il lh l" Ille context of Heidegger's inte rpretation of Aristotle's teleo logy. A guiding is that Heidegger thinks Ihat the concept of kinesis, change, provides us wll h 11lt.: onlolog ica l background to Aristotle 's inquiry into logos. lt is shown how 1 hllduggcr argues Ihat Aristotle conceives of logos as a kind of kinesis . Yet he also show s Ih at Aristotle was not able to fully affirm this becallse of bis assumption that bci ng in th e truc sense is not kinesis but enteiecheia, unchanging, complete aclivity , wll ich be!ongs not ta logos but to nous.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

viii

IN TRODUCTION

1. 'l'Ile clnri ficalion of logos as a central philosophical task 2. ;\ lm and structure of the present study 1. ;\ survey of previous literature
CHAPTER ONE: HEIDEGGER'S PROJECT AND ITS RELATION TO ARlSTOTLE
1. Th e ph ilosop:ly of facticallife 2. Th e phil osophy of logos: phenomenology, logic and hermeneutics

12

20
26

1. Qnlo logy and teleology 'I. Th e nolion of a firs! phi losophy

1Icid egger 's critique of ethics
(J . Jlhil osophy

32

as historical knowledge

38 44 49
54

- Ili stori cal inlcrpretation and systematic philosophy "

CI-IAPTER TWO: THE EPISTEM IC LOGOS

1. o'n lhe task of qu estioning a Iraditional interpre tation of logos

2.. Sl/IllI,esis and dihairesis as the bas ic constituents of the assertion 1. 'l'he lingui sti c and the olltologicallevel of sunthesis and dilwiresis
II. Th e as-s tructure

60 64

'l'l'ulh and apopJ/tIl1sis

68 73 78
82

Key wo rd s: Heidegger, Arist otl e, logos, kines is, phenomenology, tel eolo gy, slllllhesis, dihairesis, thcory, praxi s, cve rydayness.
@ 2002

Charl otta Wcige ll

(,. 'l'ho l1 ect.!ss it y of co ntcx lualising the asse rti on J. l'Il!,; as found ed 0 11 a change in c:veryda y cOlll po rtlll enl K, 1he probl el11 \V ith Ihe l'C cluclion in assc rl ori c speec h
'l, 'Ille p,'oblcill \V ilh Ih" "piSIClllic idcal
10, {'Otlcluding l'cillil l'ks

89
9'1

ISII N 91220199 0

98
101

ISSN 049 10877

JlI'ill lcd by Akrldcllli ll ,Yt' k Alli Il,,111111 1110 1

CHAPTER THREE: THE EVERYDA y LOGOS

1. Eve rydayness as a phi losophical themc

2. He idegger' s reading of the Nicomachean Ethics 3. Everyday speech as the basis of Aristotle' s concept of logos

4. Techne and concern. The poietic perspective of everyday life 5. Phronesis and care
6. The discurs ive nat ure of ac tion 7. Truth as disclosedness and nous

103 106 108 113

Ils

125
13 0 134 139 140

8. Logos as kinesis
9. Logos as fall and empty speech

10. Concluding remarks CHAPTER FOUR: TI-lE PI-I ILOSOPHICAL LOGOS

1. Philosophy as an orig inal possibi lity for logos

147

2. The raIe of interruption in the genes is of philosophy

3. Anxiety and reduction 4. The limited scope of dialectic 5. The theoreticallife

6. The moment oftruth in vision:
nOlis and AlIgenblick 7. Philosophy as counter-move ment and rctrieval

150 155
159

165
171 177

8. The formai indication

9. Concluding remarks

182
188

CHAPTER FIV E: LOGOS AND BEING

1. From logos to being 2. Being as manifold and unity. Aristotlc's critique'ofthe Eleatics 3. The princi ples of change and their teleological interpretation 4. Change ana lysed into poiesis and pathesis 5. The common foundation of logos and kinesis 6. The pri macy of the assertion and the question ofbeing 7. The question of the meaning ofbeing. Logos as the uni ty of bein g 190 194 199

202 206
210 2 15

8. Temporality as the unity of being CO NCLUS ION

I.IST 0 1: WO I{KS C I1' I;I)

2 19 224
22')

I\C KNOWLEDG EM ENTS A Ilumber of people at the Departmellt of Philosophy ill Siockhoim have been important for the genesis of this thesis. First of ail, 1 would like ta thank Staffan Carlshamre and Hans Ruill, \vho have supervised it. r am particularly grateful to Staffan for his encouragement in times of crisis, of which there have been quite a few. His broad philosophieal
outloak has also becn a source of inspiration. 1 am deepJy indebted to

INTRODUCTION

Hans for the philosophieal guicbnce that he has granted to me for severn l years by now. No one cise has bcen 50 important for Illy intellectual development.
Dag

Pra witz and Gunnar Svensson have contributed to crenting a

still1ulating milieu at the department. 1 am also grateful to Anna Ahlstrll1S oeh Ellen Terseru, Stinelse for tillalleial support.

r woulcl

like to thank the following persans for stil1lulating scminars

on phenomcnology and ancienl philosophy: Gosta Gromoos, Jim

Jakobsson, Per-Erik Malmnjs, Per Martin-Lof, A lexander Orlowski, Nicholas Smith and Karl Weigelt. Amollg these, 1 am indebted 10 Karl
in particular for intellectual as weil as emotioll.:J 1 in spiration. F inall y, cJuring ail thi s time, 1 ha ve bellefited from Jim's ca l'efu l, often critica l reading of my tcxt, without which this thesi s wou/cl probably Ilot klve rcached complction. What is more important, he aJ so provided my work wi th its guiding idea when he asked me whether l hac! p;'lid any attention ta Heidegger's statement that logos is a fOrln ofkinesis. 1 dedieate this book to my mother.

1. The clarification oflogos as a central philosophiealtask " II might be that the beginning is the greatest part of everything", Aristotl e says, and he continues, "and therefore it is the most difficu[t pari as we il ; and the mightier it is in power, the tinier it is in magnitude, and as such the beginning is also whal is Illst di fficult ta see .,,1 The idca that Aristtle himsel f reprcsents such a powerful but yet elusive beginning, which is still waiting to be unders tood, was of fundall1ental importance to the development of Heidegger' s philosophieal projeet, in particular wh en it was still in its bcginning. In his early lecture courses, Heidegger returns time and again to Aristotle 's works, seeking to reveal what he takes to be their as yel hidden possibilities. In this pursuit, however, Heidegger is not out ta simply restore some kind of
Aristotelian doctrine, but his primary aim is to exp lore Arislotle ' s thought precisely as a philosophieal beginning and to understand the nature of ils legacy. In this projeet, he is driven by the conviction that cvery attempt to begin anew in philosophy must proeeed by way of a confrontation with the Aristotclian beginning, sinee it by and large has circumscribed the scope and nalure of philosophieal work as a who le. In this sense, then, Aristotle is to Heidegger Ilot just one innuential philosopher among others but simply the Philosopher. However, Ileidegger thinks that in spitc of the de cisive influence that Aristotle has exerted on the subsequent philosophieal tradition, he nevertheless constitutes a lost or " unseen " origin. Accordingly, Heidegger simultaneusly wants ta use his interpretatiol1 of Al'istatle in arder to lurn Aristotle against a tradition that assumes his philsophy as a basis,
1 Sophistical Re illfa/ions, 183b22-25: "I-IylO'1:0V yp 10'w lraVtOC;, ... 01(:' Kal XC.E 7tOHatO V 0(1<1) yp KpatlO''tov 1:fj ouval-lEl, 'toO'o\mp 1l1Kprrawv OV HP IlEY6El

XCl t.errw'W1'6v an v Ail translation s, also of Heidegger 's works, are ru)' Qw n. Dy \\Iu y of cnnvcni ion, wllen rc fcrring ta the works of Aristotle, J IIbbrevit HCd l'nrlll '! or the !,nlin titl es for page refercnces. Sophistical Refutations Will occonlillHly he I Cllll ll' d In" l( ".\'(l/ Ilt M .".

IN IlW I) [Je li O N

IN 11 llt l'l'ION )

Hnd accuses il of nol rca lly knowing what il is doin g. In l!l b \\Illy. Ih e reinterpretation ofAristotie eonlronts Heidegger with no less " t", k than that of rethinking the philosophieal tradition as a whole. According ta Heidegger's OWIl testimony, it was his early encounter with Brentano's dissertation Von den mannigfchen Bedeutung des Seienden nach Aristote/es that initiated his "first elumsy attempts to penetra te into philosophy", eonfronting him for the first time \Vith the question which was to become the focal point of his entire philosophical endeavour: the question posed in the Metaphysics concerning being as 2 being Eve ntuall y, Heidegger would get to the point where he cou ld

launch his own Ihesis on "the mani fald meaning of being": the poi nt wh en he presented his project of fundamental ontology in his main early \York Sein und Zef!. By that lime , however, Heidegger had bccome
convinced that, when thus raising ane\\' the question of being, he \Vas

actually reawakenin g a question long forgotten , which had becn "reduced ta silence" after the time of Plato and Aristotle 3 But even though the ontologieal perspective is present in Heidegger's 1V0rk from the start, the lecture courses that precede the publication of Sein und Zeit display a slightly st ronger focus on the tapie of reason or rationality. There Heidegger devotes himself ta the task of developing an ontology of life, thereby trying ta modify the thematic field of phenomenology and to steer the phenomenologieal projeet in another direction than what Husserl had done. Early on , Heidegger was eonvinced of the need 10 challenge the ep istel11ol og iea l and tao Cartesian orientation of Husserlian phenomcnology, with its focus on consciousness and subjectivity. The ambition to come to grips with his Qwn mast immediate philosophical background and heritage gave Heidegger an impetus ta refleet upon the nature of philosophy as s uch and to reconsider not only its basic questions and concepts, but also its
very aim and direction. In parti cu lar, Heidegger wanted to reconsider

Ih corcti cflll y biuscd ami Ihu s redu ctive view On rationality, thi s ideal assumes tl di chotomy bctwecn theory and praxi s, the consequence of wh ich is that Ilot only theory but also human understanding in general is rcgardcd as something essentiall y different trom life and action. But with the help of phenomenology, Heioegger hoped ta be able to uncover th e origin of this ideal, and this in such a way as ta get at the cxperiences that once led ta those concepts of theOl'y and knowledge which are now entrenched in the philosophical vocabulary. The search for this origin eventually led Heidegger ta Aristotle . One might perhaps think that the beginning of Western rationality should be loeated in Parmenides or Plata rather than in Aristotle, but Heidegger puts emphasis on what he regards as a decisive breakthrough or development in Aristotle. Heidegger thus approaches Aristotle as the culmination of previous Greek thought, and of Plata in particular, c laimi ng that Aristotle's achievements essentially consist in a "more radica l and scientific" elaboration of Plato's thought' Not oilly has Aristotle inquired further into the nature of rationality th an hi s predecessors, but this inquiry might itself be said to be of a more " rational " kind than before. The camp Iain! made in the Sophist, that the carly philosophers "seem ta tell us a story, muthos , as if \\le were children"', is aftirmed more strongly by Aristotle than what Plato himse lf could do, his suspicion of myth and poetry notwithstanding. Ari stotle takes the decisive step a\Vay from myths and spec ulative di scourse, tOlVards a more "con crete" and scientific philosophy, in whi ch it is no longer lIluthos that articulates the order of the world, but

logos. Il is also precisely the concept of logos that stands at the centre of
Il eidegger's interpretation of Aristotle as a thinker of rationality, notab ly with respect ta Aristotle's definition of man as a being endowed wi th logos. This has become the classical definition of man as a rational bc in g, not J east because of its Latin translation , animal rationale. Il o wc vc r, in Heidegger's view, what this definition really says about the nature o f rati ollalit y has actually been lost in the tradition aCter Aristotle, t" ough il mi ght wei l be the case th at Ari stotle himself did not fully
"/(11011" Sophistes (110. 19 in Ille Gasomlollsgobe, whi ch hence forlh is referred to as "UA"), pp. 11 - 12.
, SrJ/IIIII", 242ct-: rr.

the notion of philosophy as theory, notably with respect to how it fits into a modern scien tific and logical ideal concerning cognition as a whole. Nearly ail of Heidegger's early writings involve a critique ofthis idea!. This critique stems From his belicf that, apart from entailing a
"Mein Weg in die Phanomenologie", pp. 8190 n Zur Sache des Denkens, p. 81.

) Sein I/nd Zeit ("SZ"), p. 2.

IN 1I{()I)LJ " li ON

INTR

l) l)

" l'I ON

rea lise ail its implications. Wh ile he does not di spule Ili lIt " d N ll e's to der.nition concerns man as a rational being, Heidegger wa nl s 1 siress 0 that this definition proposes as the basic characteristic of man not plain reason but rather speech. Speech is the key ta the question of reason, because, and thi s is the crucial point, speech is the basic constituent of human action or act ivity as such . For in virt ue of its power of distinguishing between different things, speech lets man have a world and share it with olhers. Il is thus the experienee of speech, or sa at least Heidegger claim s, that Illakes up the foundation of Aristotl e's concept ion of rationality. As Aris totl e hilllself puts il in the ramous passage in the Politics:
Why man is a soc ial an im a l in
<l

higher degree than <.Iny bec or

any grega rio us an imal is clear. For, as wc say, nature does nothing in vain, and man a!o ne alllong animais possesses speec h.
The Illcre sound or voice can 110 doubt ind ical e pain flild plcasure, and therefore, il belongs 10 the ot her an im aI s .:l. S weil ... , but spee ch is for the sa ke of revea lin g the advanl agcOLJS a nd Ihe

harmfu l, an d Iherefore nlso the j ust and the unjusl; l'or thi s is proper ta man as compa red wi th the olhc r anim ais , namcly la alone have perception of good and bad and jusI and unj ust and other such tbings, and it is joint participati on in Ihese things thal makes a househo ld and a corn munity. 6

The present study exp lo res th e way in which Heidegger seeks to retr ieve and evaluate thi s defin iti on of man , both as re ga rd s its implications for the nature of reason, and its idea concernin g the right approach to this tapie. More precisely, it wi II be shown how Heidegger attempts to develop Aris totle 's notion of a di sc ursive, "speaking" reason . Heidegger hil11self does not use the tenn "disc urs ive"; as a rul e he s imply talks about "speech" (Rede), since one of his major points is that speec h or articulat ion is no thin g extenial to th e act of understanding, but on th e contrary constitu tes its reali sation or
6 Po/itics (" P ol. "), 1253a7-18: "olon o 1tO/.ltIKv (, avep JlTOS 00v ncLOllS !-U::/d"ttl1S KOl lTfNts YEa.ou sebou 110ov, ouStv yap , ms $OIlV . l-l at l1 V $UO"lS lTOtEt Oyov o !-l OVOV av9pwlToS xe l "HV 0wv )1V ouv w

urr 'lPO Ka t EOtl OlO Kat ws a).olS urrclpXE I s00ls ... , 6 o 6yo b '!Cp OIlOV tan 1 aWI$pov Ka t 10 WOtE KC TO iKOiOV Ka t T alKOV wm yp rrps t Qa s0a "toS vOpwlTolS Hhov, -r yaOo Ka i 1<"CtKO\l KC c nKoio"U KOt ciiKOU Kai "tWV (i),J,wv oi:08llOiv XElV :. tO"lJtwv KQ L\iWvia rr l e. oi l< i av I<ai ltI V. "

CII H IIIl CIII . ln Ih e litcraLurc on Al'i slotlc, however, Ihe concept oflogos t: is on en rcgard cd as a notion of discursive reason and interpreted as the cupa city fo r reasolling or making inferences. Logos in this sense is opposed ta nOliS, " intuition", which has access to those premises from whi ch an inferenee starts and which must be taken for granted by the in fe rcnce it se lf. But He idegger emphasises anothe r aspect of the l'istote lian logos: that it is const ituted by combination and separation, . 'fll1lh esis and dihairesis. Thi s structure, Heid egger arg ues, is what \ rnakes it possible for us ta understand someth ing as something, in a particular regard or in a specifie sense. On account of this structure, logos to Heidegger displays the not ion of a finite reason, in contras! ta an idea l ofknow ledge as simple, ullmed iated "seeing", which he thinks is ex prcssed \Vith the concept OrnaI/s. ln retrieving Aristot le 's concept of logos, Heid egger seeks ta preserve what he regards as Aristotl e' s most important insight in thi s context, namely that the inquiry into reason or rationality must bc situated with in an analys is of human praxis or existence. However, Il cidegger thinks, or at lenst suspects, that Aristotle was not reall y ab le la do justice to this insight. For even though Heidegger is not w illing ta simply subscribe to th e rather common view on Aristotle and on Greek th ought as a whole as essentiall y naive with respect ta language, he suspects that there is a celiain confl ict in Aristotle's thinking between a phenomenologieal mod e of ill quiry on th e one hand, and his Illetaphysical or ontological assumptio ns on the other. As a consequence of Ihis, Aristotl e \Vas not fully able to themat ise or reflect upon hi s own di scoveries. As wc will see in the course of this st udy, the idea of an ambi guity in Aristotle's thought makes Heidegger somewhat hesitant as to how far he can follow Aristo tl e in his OWIl project, wavering between ft criti ca l an d an approving stance, as it were. But it seems that Il eidegger at last becomes more or less certain that the metaphysical tcndency in Aristotle 's thought finally triurnphs, and that thi s tr iumph Illakes up the fou ndati oll of the logiea l and theoretical ideal of rn li onality. III th e lec lu re course Platon: Sophistes, de li vered in 1924/25, Il cidegger gives the fo ll owing diagnosis of the fate of the Greek ulldcrstandill g of logos:

INTRODUCTION
'l'he clnrilicn lioll of logos \Vas to the Greeks aflllulamelltal:ask,
/l ild 1l1l1rCOVCr such a one, in which they only \Vith difficulty and slowl y could ndvancc and where they to sorne extent remained

INTRODUCTION
nrlh.: ulation . Phenomenology means, on Heidegger 's definition,

sluck , if one llwy designate as this point tha wllich has been
hand cd clown as the Aristote li an lagie, traditionally speaking.

InilSlllu!.:h as the tcac hin g of logos among th e Greeks fina lly \Vas
dcvelopcd in a thcorc tial se nse, the pri1}/ary phenomenoll of logos \Va s (h e sentenc e , Ihe th eore /I cal asser tion about 7 sorneth ing.

In his attcmpt to make the clari fication of logos into a task of his OWI1 ) Heidegger wants to challenge thi s "theoretical development" 01 logos, insofar as it has led to the beliel that the assertion, or to use Aristot le's term, logos apopltantikos, can be regarded as the basic mode or speech,
in the sense of being the mst fundamental clement of truth and

"(JjJophaines /hai ta phainomena: to let that which shows itscl r be seen l'rom itself SllClt as it shows itself [rom itsel!'.'" Hence the nced to clu cidate the nature of logos and in thi s lVay to make clear the conditions of possibility of letting something be se en "as" somcthing. Ilut when analysing "phenomenology" in terrns of apopltaineslhai, Il ' idcgger has simultaneously established a connection with that notion 01' logos which constitutes the target of hi s critique, namely logos as lop.os apophantikos, which rerers to a form of speech which in virtue or Ils unpophantic" nature precisely lets something be seen. ]n this way, Ih' Iflsk of conrrontin g Aristotle's understanding of logos is embedded in Ihe very term "phenomenology" .
l

knowlcdge. But even more important to Heidegger is to question the logico-grammatical approach to language IVhich the foeus on the assertion eventua ll y entai led. For the consequence of this is that lan gua ge is expe lled From the domain of human praxis , and so are theory and knowledge. Thus the aim is not to do away with theory or logic, but to restore ta it its original and proper place as a form of Iife or action. On Heidegger's view, this aim can only be fu Ifi lied by means of an investigation of speech. For if the presently prevailin g view on rationality is based upon a certain interpretation of speech, th en the attempt to challenge this view must apparently proceed by way of a reinterpretation of speech. And if it is precisely Aristotle's interpretation of speech that - albeit in a round about way - makes up the loundation of the modern view on rationality, then the of speech must equally involve a confrontation \Vith Aristot lc. This reinterpretation should be of a phenomenological kind, but it
wi ll al so in its tu rn contributc to a cl ari lcation of th e nature of

Ailll QI/d slnlc/ur e of/he present study 1li ' [lim 01 this study is to show how Heidegger pursues hi s criti cal

, 'Il' cvnl 01 Aristotle 's notion of discursive reason by bestolVin g upo n it nn onlo log ica l interpretation, which seeks ta challenge the logicoHI'UIIl1r\uli a l pe rspective on speech and reason. On He ide gger's 1It.'l'Otllll , Ihe ontological approach is already present in Aristolle. th ough

phenomenology itself, since it is the task of phenomenology ta present "the lo gos of the phenomena" and thus to give them their proper
7

GA 19, p. 252: "Die Aufklarung des yo war fOr die Griechen eine Gnmdallfgabe

und dazu cine solche , bei der sic nur sc hwer und langsam voran karncn und gewissermalJen stecken blieben, wenn man ai s dicSCIl Punk t do s hC/ci chl1cn wns aIs die aristotelische Logik, traditionell gesp l'ol.: hcll , nbcl'lldclt 1 51.

1 l' lulent or undeveloped way. More precisely, Heidegger believes that " Ihe lllli ological basis of Aristotle's conception of logos can be made V lh lc iflhis conception is brought together with Aristotle 's teleology, IN I1lI d 111 parli cular with his notion of praxis, action. Thus wh en claiming II UII lI u Hll!:llysis of rationality or logos cannot do without an inqui ry into .: IIIOII IHI/J r"xis , Il ei degger's point is al so that Aristotle 's conception of , ,,1 ,,,,,,Iii)' Illust be interpreted in the light of his understanding of 1"1/\ l" , I\usicll ll y, what Heidegger discovers in Aristotle's teleological !11h 1pl 'I/ltion O li fe as a whole is an idea of the directedness of action r "11, 1 IIIIIlI ght Ih at is less mcntali stic than Husserl 's notion of 1 1I1I"III'lllIliIY. Il owcver, Il eidegger is silllultaneously convinced that the "llOli whi ch Arislotl e's teleology is based is an ontology of IIH 1 la \1, 1\ of whi ch is that Ari stolle tends to regard 11111111111 I I \, 11011 liS including the activit y of logos, frol11 th e point of 1 \1 ,01 Il ,, lsh 'd, il 'rli,:cled bci " g. Bul j" his II lt empl 1 q"esli oll Ih is 0
1

n{l mlich di c Le hre vorn Myo bei den Gri cchcll ICII.:lich ill cinl"11l IlIl'lIl\\tlsc hcli Sinll \.: ausgcbildct wu rde, WOI' das prillic e f!I/ Il OIlI C' 1I /f .Y\li,f d"1 Sr lf ", dl/ Ih l'Il I'I" dllJ AII.\'.wgc: Obel' cIWflS."

Il t t
Ililll li

" PIl IiIIOlllt\IHl lnHIr: !t1 HI (lUllII ; 1

r INL ,ri Will ,'<j

VOII 1 111 11

li N

t' O/lift! VI'OO(I1 m I d.!!. VOI1 111111

r QfUl V6 p1 1 \'lA : I)ns

sich

II C selle Il I'

My

INTRODUCTION ideal , Heidegger nonetheless draws on Aristotle's teleology, ta the extent that he argues that logos must be eonceived of as a form of kinesis, a kind of movement which involves differcnce and therefore is open ta change. With this c\aim, Heidegger th us wants ta retrieve an idea already present in Aristotle, while at the same time transforming it, in that he does not subsume kinesis under the model of complete and terminated movernent. 1t is a major thesis of this work that this ontological or tcleological interpretation of logos not only lets Heidegger inquire further into the constitution of understanding and articulation as compared with a traditional logical and theoretical perspective, but that it in fact also gives bim the possibility of re-establishing the primaey of theoretical knowledge. This might perhaps seem like a somewhat paradoxieal
claim, but the point is 1hal the meaning of "theory" will be substantially modified, once it is realised that its origin and foundation must be

INTRODUCTION bcing. Throughout this study, 1 will toueh upon the temporal implications of Heidegger's interpretation of Aristotle, but 1 will not address temporality as a theme in its oIVn right until in the last chapter. This is not a comparative slUdy, whieh is not to say that eomparisons will be wholly absent, but as my primary aim is ta explore I-Ieidegger' s
th o ught , Aristotle is [rom the beginlling situated within the context of

Il eidegger's philosophy. The scope of the study is more or less

rcs tricted to Heidegger's \Yorks lroH! the twenties, since al11105t ail of

hi s lectures on Aristotle as a whole belong ta this decade. Praetieally ail or I -lcidegger's lecture courses du ring this period to a greater or 1esser
cx te nt involve a con frontation with Aristotle, and the presence of A ri s to tle can be felt even in those works where he is no1 explicitly

loeated in life or action. Thus Heidegger ' s elaboration of the Aristotelian logos is equally an attempt at questioning the traditional distinction between theory and praxis, and a1so, as wc will sec, the idea that Aristotle is the originator of this distinction. Aeeordingly, when trying to retrieve a genuine sense of theory, Heidegger in a sense rehabilitates the traditional view on Aristotle as a proponent of the primaey oftheory. Heidegger's point is thus not that this view is plainly false but that it is based upon a misguided interpretation of Aristotle's notion of theoey; therefore, one has not been able ta understand what this primaey of the theoretical really amounts ta. Heidegger's preoccupation with the question of logos could be described as a prelude ta the project of fundamental ontology, inquiring into how we speak about being, in order ta tinally get at the meaning of being as such. This more far-reaehing ontologieal perspeetive will however only be briefly explored in this study, though the relation between Heidegger's inquiry into logos and his ontological project is discussed at the end. When treating the problem of logos as intimately conneeted with ontologieal and teleologieal issues, one incvitably eomes aeross the question of time or temporalit y in Il eidegger and Aristotle, not least when eonsidering Heid egger 's s uspi c ion lh al Ari stotl e's concepti on ofratiOl1[1lity as Cl wh olc IIllly uitilil ll i 'Iy he trn ccd bock 1 th l,: 0 thal bl: lI g in nu.; tru c IN PI \"W II I , nld sll 'd

In entioned. For this reason, the study covers nearly ail Heidegger's writ in gs from tbis period. But of particular importance are the two ex tens ive courses Platon: Sophistes from 1924/25 and the reeently publi shed Grundbegriffe der oris/oteUsehen Philosophie from the

prcv ious semester,9 Whereas the former work puts focus on the discuss ion in the Nicomacheal1 Ethics of the intetlectual virtues and
th eir re lation ta action and production, the latter brings together " l'i stotl e ' s understanding of logos with his teleologyW The overall
IlI'lC tltlltion of bath these courses is to explore Aristotlc's works as

phellomenological investigations into different aspects of life, but also to draw out their ontological presuppositions. The same strategy ean be 1,\1 111(\ in what is known as the Aristotle Introduction written in 1922, " 1'll fl l1o mcnologische Interpretationen zu Aristoteles (Anzeige der il '1l1lcncuti schen Situation)"I1, whieh is the first text Heidegger devoted "x pli clt Iy to Aristotle. The interpretation of the concept of logos is also 111 (' cClltl'nl iss ue of Logik: die Frage naeh der Wahrheit (1925/26), and Il ,Idegge r retuills ta it in Sein und Zeit (1 n7), Grundprobleme der
Il 1;
j 18 , 1 also mnke use of a texi th at has not yel bcen published, l'//lI/lf11111'I/Olo}llsche III/e1 )/'era /ionell ZII Aris/old e,\', Oll/ologie II/Id Logik, which was Ih II Vtl l N I 111 1922, Th is lectu re course prcsc nt s the sa ill e bfls ic tcnd ency as II I Idt\l!f-1t' l ',II otlter CC1urscs 0 11 Aristollc duri llg thi s pcr iod, sinec it 100 . tri cs 1 make 0 h'lu IIp w Arltl h) I IC'S 011101 0UY is rCh\lC 1 his undcrS d 0 lllndin g or li re, Th is co urse is j11t+ 1 ll'd "c 11 0, 62 ort he (/IJSl1I11WU.W//) tr Iwd il will he l'cfcl'l'cd 1 Wilh ;]11 uSleri sk 0 ,dtl r llc(' VO lll tll C lIlullbcr, lU 1." nll1l) lhe l'C ll tr , tI lhl'Il\co f ArI,\/f//I'/('S , A 'I(,/ofJh)',dk I . j , VOII lVe'scn 11111' Il li Atll'!tkclr r/4'" Al'f /fi ( 1() t l , (lA 11), 1 111111"'1 .I11/whl/ch (, ( 191N), nI' , 2172/IK , I l l' llu' lllt lh rdllrrl.'d 10 1111 ""A", '

INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION philosophy. Each chapter is organised around thrcc points. Bcginning with "the given", that is, logos as >t is first of ail accessible or with respect to how it has been interpreted tradilionally, the investigation Ihen proceeds to an analysis of the structures that are constitutive of the mode of speech under consideration. Finall y, on the basis of this a nalysis, it is asked what kind of access to being and truth is admitted by that particular mode of speech. To some extent this is also the order o r th e Huee main chapters, so that each of them represents one of the Ihrce points enumerated above. . Accordingly, Chapter Two centres on Heidegger's encounter wlth
w hat is in his view the tradition al or cornmon conception of logos.

Ph iil/Olll enologie (1927) and GrundbegrifJe der Metaphysik. Well Endlichkeil - Einsamkeit (1929/1930).12 Final ly, the main source for
Heidegger' s interpretation of Aristolle 's underslanding of lheorelical life is Einleitung in die Philosophie (1928/1929).'3 Accordingly, my interpretation primarily conccrns Heideggcr's encounter with Aristotle du ring this period, when the project of fundamental ontology is being devcloped, and it is not my intention to exhaust ail the views lhat Heidegger ever held on Aristotle. However, sinee it is not my aitn to give a chronologica l exposition of Heidegger 's thought, i.e. to trace a development or perhaps a change in Heidegger's attitude towards Aristotle, 1 use later lexts whenever they are bene/ici al to my argument or seem to throw light on Heidegger's earlier position, th us assuming that the later works are not opposed to lhe earlier ones to such an extent that lhey musl be kept slriclly apart. '" For the truth is that wh en it cornes to Heidegger's understanding of Aristotle , it is not entirely easy to delimit a hOll1ogeneous "early" view that cou Id be contrasted with a "Iater" position. The ambiguity lhal Heidegger wants to locate in Aristotle is retlected in Heidegger's interpretation, causing it to point in at least t\Va directions: one which puts emphasis on what Heidegger regards as Aristotle's metaphysics of presence and the primacy of propositional thought, seeing this as the final target of the destruction of the history of ontology and [agie ; and another which concentrates on the phenomcnological character of Arstotle's thought, receiving from it the very means to pursue this destruction. In Chapter One, 1 give a survey of the relation between Heidegger and Aristotle in order 10 loeate the place of Aristotle wit hin Heidegger's philosophical project, and also in order to indicate the background to the question of logos as a philosophical theme in Ileidegger. This chapter thus has a somewhat introductory character. The three following chapters deal with each of the three levels of logos that Heidegger regards as most important: theory or science, everydayness and
12 GA 21) GA 24 and GA 29/30 respectively. References to Sein und Zei! are !lot to the Gesamtausgabe but 10 the Niemeyer edition. Il

Il owcver, Heidegger is not entirely prepared to aseribe this conception ln Aristotle hill1self, since he thinks that it has its origin in a specifie IInd in sufficient - interpretation of Aristotle. That is to say, in the tirst H ge o f his inquiry into logos, Heidegger cannot direct ly tum to ltl MiSIOlle himself, for Aristotle' s philosophy of logos is accessible only
Ilil

Ihe basis of a confrontation with the received view on this topic. On

titi s v ic w, Aristotle is, if not the originator, then at least a major pl'o poncnt of a theoretical, or as 1 will cali it, an epistemic ideal of \'OHl);ti o ll , according to which the assertion is the primary mode of since it is the basic element of truth and knowledge. The overall nl ll' 01 Ihis chapter is to show how Heidegger tries to question this view ' Il ti n inl erpretation of Aristot le. His basic argument is that, wh en 11 11 1t! th e assertion in tenns of sunthesis and dihairesis, Aristotle ItUN IImnagcd to point out a basic feature of hum an understanding as 1I\'h, tHllI1 e ly its discursivity or "as-structure". On the basis of this \ 1111 111, Il uidcggcr argues that assertoric speech as theoretical articulation PIl\t( IJpp oSes an unthematic mode of understanding and articulation ,, 1 1I1'1i is Ihought to make up a more basic level of man's d l" ,1I'Mlv il y or logos. ' 1 'hh.:ggcl" s preoccupati on with the pre-theoretical, everyday logos is Ihr Ill ple (J I' 'lltlpl e r Threc. Il will be shown how Heidegger makes use
II I hl'i 1 l1 l1 ys is 11

or cverydayncss

in ord er to reveal precisely the

Heidegger' s interprctation of Ari stot!e, il is nbovc nll one IrHor 1 fhM exI is of interest, as il is co ncc rn cd with the 11 0tion of" lCi VIlOtrt: " VOtll WCIit1 tl und Ilcgrilf AriS[O !cS, Phys ik n, l" ( 1939), P[1 . 23 9-1 01 III Il '1')'IIIIIIA,',, (f ,', / 1 , IU '1 der

GA 27. ).1 As

"

tl Il Y", phenOlllenal basis

01' AriSloll e's phi losophy 01' logos, which

1 M l le lii," scll' s upp o secll y w ns nol ab le 10 th ell1/lli se, and lo 11111 11 111 11 '(luN Il11'n$ 1 ly 0 (C Il 'Ir> in thi s lI' The qu esti on I d hl U,1Ii1 will hCI'c I II Il HI' III e x lc ill he I I' '/lI ed ftS fi ql1 c:-: li o l1 C cl;rnil1 g Ol1

INTRODUCTION
th e discursive nature of action , regarded as a sHent mod e o f arti c ulation.

INTRODUCTION

For this reason, this chapter focuses on Heidegger's interprctation of Aristotle's analysis of praxis and its mode of understanding, deliberation. Wh en bringing together logos and action, it becomes possible not only ta regard action as a form of logos or articulation, but also ta conceive of logos in its tUrll along th e lines of action, that is, ta estab lish a teleological or ontological perspectiv e on logos, interpretin g it in terms of kinesis.
Wh en the nature of logos thus has been furth er elucidated , it is possible to approach anew the question concerning the theoretical and its mode of discourse, this time from th e perspective o f teleology. This is the task of Chapter Four. Here 1 focus on Ar istotle ' s and I-Ieidegger's respective understanding of philosophy, sug gest ing that He idegger actually affirms the Aristotelian notion of th eory as th e supreme fonn of praxis, though he is convinced that it must be given a new foundation. Basieally, H eidegger's way ta retd eve Ari stotle 's noti on of Ihcoria is ta emphasise its discursive nature, thereby questionin g the tr adition al
su premacy of noetic, "intuitive" thought.

l'istotl c, as several ofllis students eventually became Aristotle scholars ln tll eir own right. 15 Among these, Gadamer should be mentioned in pluti eular, sinee, as wc will see below, his interpretation of Aristotl e has III its lurn had considerable impact on the contemporary view on the ,. I"ti on between Heidegger and A ristotle. Il owcver, though the Iiterature on Heidegger's philosophy as a whole h Il QW has become immense, th cre are sti ll co mp aratively few stud ics thcm!lti s in g the relation to Aristotle in particular, though tllere are of 'l ui te a few thattouch upon this issue. The reason why it used to
Iltlruct rclative ly little intere st is, in part at J east, that the lecture courses
J

II,,' ltl\,;ggcr devoted to Aristotle during the twenti es were for a long lim e

lUll e '\,;ssiblc to ail but a few scholars . Broadly speak in g, the tendency of lI u,: "\.I lli er'! lit erature on Heidegger and Aristotle is to emphasise w hat is
I l,'14(1 I'(I \,;d

as fundamental differences between the two thinkcrs, in Plllil eular w ith respect ta ontology. Heidegger's ontological proj ect is liS " profound critique of Aristotelian metaphysics, which seeks to l hu1l ell ge il S basic assumptions. This is the central idea of Werner tvllllX'S by now elassical work Heidegger und die Tradition (J 961).
Marx discusses other thinkers in the tradition in addition to

ln Chapter Five, 1 explore the relation between ontology and " Iog ic" in Heidegger and Aristotle. Beginning with Heidegger 's idea that the tendeney in Aristotle to identify speech as such with assertoric speech is
intimately connected with his understanding of being as presence, 1

,",k, to

Il totl e (l11uinly Hegel), the overall aim of his work is to argue that in

show how Heidegger's attempt at trans form ing Aris totle's ontology must be seen against the background of hi s re interpretation of Aristolle's concept oflogos.

3. A survey ofprevious literalure

ln spite of th eir polemi c tone, Heidegger 's lectures on Aristotl e very seldom involve an explicit confrontation with rivaliing interpretations of Aristotle . .Iaeger and Ross, the most famous Aristotle scholars around the tum of the last century, are only mentioned oeeasionally, and for the most part with respect to philologieal matters. This is perhaps not sa
surprising, for Heidegger's main target of criticism in this connect ion is

und erstand Heidegger's notion of being and essence, it is II<'I' NSllry to approaeh it as an attempt ta overcome Aristotle. A kindred , 0 1 k III thi s respect is David Starr 's Entity and Existence. An (}Ololll,ltl('ol Investigalion of Arislotle and Heidegger (1975 ), which , 1' 1\1 1 CS th e dimculties of what the author des ignates as Aristot/e's 11<1,,1 ,$0 11" on tology of ousia, arguin g that the means to solve these -,, dl ll l, tdli es ar e prov ided by He idegger's alleged "fi l'st-persan" pll l 01 H11 'IH .dogy, However, there is also a recent study on Heidegger ll l1t! Ad' Iotl e dcalin g wit h th e tapie of ontolo gy, namely Ted Sadler's
1

1 , n oc hlll , Das C /'IlII dlegcnde III/d das Weselllfiche: 21.1 Aristote/es' (

","tlm'h"'H "{jIN /' dCl:i S'eill III/d das Sc icllde" (Metaphys ik Z) (196 5); W. Brcker,
' ,h/ll lcl/,'I ( 1t>1 5); 1. Gn dl1l11 cr, "Prnk ti sc hcs Wi ssc n" ( 1930), Wahrh eil lil/d H, ,h"d., ( 19(,0), pp, " Di e hC cll euli sc hc I\ ktualitilt Ari stoleles "; E. l'llI III 1 01111 1 11, J'I 1\11'1'1 T1NOS" Hil/ e UIII '"I',\'IIG"lIIIIIR zu SirI/krill' III/d Urspnmx 1 ,1/ IH"/I,/hl/ll' " (,'l' lmdh t'grilfu ( 1 95H): r, Wiplingcr, Physis /Ill e! Logos: Zl/lll t..,I1/I,,/I/" '/I /J /J// '/I 11/ ,l'I'I' H'I' !kr/I' lI fl/lI.'! / 111' rlell rlv/' Mel(lphy!" ik bei (If} / I ), Il cfII'ly ,'ccepl ion of' Il ciclcl:\l;C lectu res on f'S 11 1111 111 , III' '1 Illll' rpn:tfl l\{\l1 of Art stOl le: /)y l/ o /ll ;,\' ancl l" , ! t Il' J 1), 1 IIU III"l.'()r Il , "II (. I! Il 1)c"!IIIC1Iull o f 111\ri}!ICS !S" ( 19H9).

c1early not a particular interpretation of Aristotle, but an entire trad ition whic h, as _ he sees il , ultimately points ba ck to th e scholasti c interp retat ioll of !\ristotl e. Heidegger's proj eci o f" Iibel'lllill l' Aristotl e
Ij'om 8choiasti ciS Il1 has givcn wa y 1 0
fi

rH.:W Ir'lI ditilll1 of' \V tll'k on

INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION
h ll ve bccll initially made possible by the circulation of stud e nt notes of Ih e hy th en still unpublished "Sophist lect ures,, ? 1 However, more

Heidegger and Aristotle. The Question of Being (1996). Sadiel' tak es into "ccount the carly lecture courses (though not the unpublished ones), but is no less convinced of Heidegger's essentially negati ve attitude towards Aristotle, suggesting that he only bothe red to read Aristotle because " he was followin g the dictum, ' know thy enemy ,,,.16 A mong th ese ontologically oriented studi es one may also cou nt Catriona Hanley's Being and God in Aristolie and Heidegger: the Raie
of Method in Thinking the Infinite (2000). T hi s work raises the question concerning the place and role of gro und or reaSOn in He id egge r and Aristotle, and evaluates its implications for their respective ontological proj ects. Eve n though it docs not display Heidegger as sa one-sidedl y critical of A ri stotle as the above-mentioned wo rk s, its aitn is neverthel ess to contrast Heidegger 's project w ith A ri stotl e's, showi ng how hi s phenomcno[ogy does 11 0t ask for gro und s or reasons in th e same way as Ar istotle and therefore has no need of Gad as a t-ina l or firs t princip le.

Imp ortant for the debate that was to follow was no doubl th e discovery III 1989 of a text that long had been considered losl: Heidegge r 's IIItl'oducti on to his projected book on Ari stotle (which never appeared), \V l' llen in 1922. 25 The discuss ion in th e writings just cited of the 1111 pol'tal1ce of Aristotle's thought to Heidegger's philosophy dra ws on 11lcsc Iwo texts in particular. As already indicated, th e rel1ewed interest in Heidegger and A ri stotl e il ns beel1 caused by the belief that Aristotle ' s Nicomachean Ethics has lu,,1 H decisive influence on th e existential ontology of Sein und Zeit, in pli ri iCtd"r as this is worked out in ilS tirst division. In brier, what above 11 11 h"s attracted attention is what has been acknowledged as a striking IIl,; H larit y between the concepts with which Heidegger articulates the !\1l1t! tllll cnta l trai ts of man's everyday dealings and those used by A1'is to tl c in connection \Vi th his analysis of poiesis and praxis, " produ ction" and "action" in the Ethics. Accordin gly, the discussion has f.I.' tllred on th e question of the place and function of th ese 1\\'0 A!'! N lc li an co ncepts in He idegger's existe nt ial analytic, though lo 1lt,,' I( lcgger himself, as Bernasconi points out, devotes more space to his IlIt crprclnt ioll of the forms ofunderstanding that are commonly thought ln /l ccompa ny action and production, namely phronesis and tee/me, " pl'lId c IlCC or "practical understanding" and " art" or "know-h ow" " I Wl p ' ' li vc ly,26 There s thus a consensus as regards the importance of co nce pts for Heidegger's existential analytic. O r more prec isely, !lIll/li Cl' li cs see m to agree that what Heidegger found in Aristotle '.\'3S ,d)\ \V (\ 11 an an. lysis of human life and its relation to truth and tll llle rstHlldin g th at docs not red uee these phenomena to an alleged Ill lllll1l'y model of th eo reti ca l cogniti on. Still, there is no general
!. ; Il 19, For thi s info rm ati on, sec Bern asconi ' s " Heidegger 's Destructio:1 of 'hHII H'1ls" , p. 11\ 5, nO 12. . Ie . . . , l' t. I.'m infol'lnati oll llbOll1 thc gcncs is ofl his tex!, sec Gadamer's IIHroduclion to It hl /.1I1111'I i... lo/i,./Jllc!J 6 ( 1989). pp. 228-23 4. . .
' j 'I!l I I II H. htl WCVCI', tIOI'III1 'lC()I1I ',1 clnin l 1 H11 ' 1 1 1 11 (1 fi ne! Itol q

The idea that it is abo ve ail ontology that makes up the basic albeit negativ e point of contact betwecn He idegger and Ar isto tl e has been questi o ned during the last two decades. According to Robert Bernasconi '5 testimony, in the middl e of th e eigh ti es "a number of schol ars, wo rking largely independ entl y of each other, began to discover Aristotle 's Eth ics in Being and Time"IJ, the scholars bein g, among others, Walter Brogan," Theodore Kisiel,l9 Thomas Sheehan,2o

Jacques Taminia ux,21 John van Buren 22 and Franco Volpi 23 . The
"discovery" of Ari stotl e's pos itive influence on He idegge r seems to
16

17 18

P. 17. R. Bernasconi, "Heidegger's Destruction ofPhronesis" (1989), p. 129. (ln the following, 1 also incJude 5uch lexIs on Heidegger and the Ethics that were

no! yel pub li shed wh en Bernasconi wrale his arti cle.) W. Brogan, "A Response to
Robert Bernasconi 's 'Heidegger's Destruction of Phronesis " , ( 1989); "Heidegger and Aristotlc: Oase in and the Question of practical Life" (1990); "The place of Aristo tle in the developm ent of I-Ieidegger's phenomenology " ( 1994). 19 T. Kisiel, The Genesis o/Heidegger's Seing and Time (1993) . 20 T. Sheehan, "Hermeneia and Apophansis: The early Heidegger on Aristotle"

( 1988).
Taminiaux, Lectures de J'ontologiefondamentale. Essais sur Heidegger (1989) ; Le thtre des philasophes (1995). 22 1. van Buren, "The Young Heidegger, Arislotl e, Elhi es" ( 1992), 23 F . Vo lpi , "D ase ill CO lllm e Pr ax is: L 'llss illl i lrlli ofl cl ln md icI'l li s1 11ion heid cggc riGllne de la phi loso phi e pnt t ique cl ' Ari stole" ( 1988): " lIolll,if tl/lf l 'f'illle : 1\ of the Nicol/loc!Jelll/ Et/lies?" (199/1 ),
211.

' ft It " 1h,:idcggcr 's I)CS11'\lC1O II of Phrollcs l s", p. 30. On hls Ihl " dl it'f.' rIJ I1 Cc.: 1 j(.;lIs is pI'(lbuhly dlle 1 l he i nf1l1 !.! ncc 0 1 11. Arcl.ld1. 11 0

w ou.lcl bIc more Illl c,rcsl cd 111

lS

tru or (,11 1J only, I II ,C,II 18, he jlll y. IIHII(\ tu Ihe lutt f.'r ]1r\h' (If cu ncept !! hut Ihl s I ctme sen es wns of 1 IIUl yUI Il vllll llt1 w ill'Il thr: nhovf., .. 1\1cllt h)lll't! dllhrll f.' \ ook pince, lc

INTRODUCTION
agreement concerning hm\' exactly the relation betwecn Heidegger and Aristotle shou ld be understood. 27 However, one basic tendency can be

INTRODUCTION 1hough Gadamer would always reeognise his indebtedness to Heidegger Ihis point, he did Ilot, in contras.! to the scholars mentioned above, thil1k that it was Heidegger's aim to appropriate Aristotle' s practical phi loso phy. Instead Gadamer emphasised Heidegger's theological ])IIckground. On his view, Heidegger's aim was in fact uitimately to liherate theology ti'om Aristotle, but since this would lirst require that Ari s!otle in his turn was liberated from scholasticism, it was no! entirely 31 .,;usy to sec the critical ambitions of Heidegger's interpretation. Even l''oll gh 1 do no! share this view on Heidegger, 1 believe that Gadamer W II S right in thinking that he wanted to do something different with M islolle as compared to Heidegger. This is seldom recognised in the Ill t,; I'Hture on Heidegger and Aristotle, the consequence of which is, 1 Ih ill k. thal one tends 10 mistake Gadamer' s interpretation of ArislOtle 101' Il cidegger's own views. But as 1 will argue in the course of thi s , tu<l y, lI e idegger could not Iike Gadamer look upon phronesis as a IIl mlel for philosophical knowledge, not least beeause of the ontological <l11I,,:ns iol1 ofhis projee!. Il owcver, the focus on practical philosophy in connection \Vith Il 'I<lcgger and Aristotie is perhaps about to diminish, as the las! few sccm to testify to a renewed interest in I-Ieideggcr's encounter \Vl lh ri stotle's ontology. Apart from the works of Sadler and Hal1ley IIH\l1l iollCd above, there are a few articles that seek to give a more 1'" Iti vc cvaluation of Heidegger's attitude towards Aristotle on thi s ]Illl llt , notnbl y with respect to the topies of teleology and temporality. 1 wQ uld like to mention in particular Walter Brogan 's article l ' 11 "1 ,, 'Hge r 's Interpretation of Aristotle on the Privative Charaeter of 1 Iltl" ,,"d th e Twofoldness of Being" (2000) and Thomas Sheehan's \l It! ' 1 tex t " ll eidegger's Interpretation of Aristotle: Dynamis and 1 , "1,'I,,I,\''' ( 1977) 32 Both th ese authors suggest that the concept of
il

\l/l

extracted from nearly ail the available texts on this topic, and that is the idea that Heidegger's interpretation of the Ethics is a kind of "ontologisation" of Aristotle's practical philosophy,28 By contrast, th e question whether it rnight be th e other way round , 50 to speak, that is if the influence of the Et/1l'cs on I-Ieidegger's work suggests that there might be an cthical dimension lo Hc idegger's ontological investigations, has not been discussed to any great exten!. Basically, what the "ontologisation" is supposed to amount to is that Heidegger translated into the domain of existential ontology an ana lysis of man tha t in Aristot!e's Ethics is thought to concern on ly the ethica l dimension ofhuman existence, th us neutralis ing the eth ical st ructures 50 that they cou Id be applied to man's being as such . One of the consequences of this focus on Heidegger 's preoccupation with Aristotie's "practical" philosophy is that the question conccrning the relation between Heidegger's and Ar istot le 's ontology has been pushed into the background, and most of the above-mentioned sc holars are more or less silen! on this topic. Still, one might ask if the idea of an ontologisation does not at least imply an assumption to the effeet that Heidegger eould not make use of Aristotle 's ontology because of its metaphysical presuppositions, and so had to turn to his praetieal works 29 instead. ln this connection, Gadamer's work has apparently been a source of inspiration . Gadamer has on a Ilumbe r of occasions called attention to what he regards as the dialectic between universality and particularity in phronesis. Therefore, he thinks that phronesis may be regarded as a hermeneutic concept of understanding that can be of help in the attempt to challenge modern scientilic methodology30 But ev en
27 Apan from the authors who took part in the debate at the beginn ing of the last decade, one ma)' also mention W. McNeil!'s \York The Glanee afthe Eye. Heidegger, Aristotle, and Ihe Ends of Theory (1999), which also puts emphasis on Aristotle as a thinker of praxis ratller than of being. 28 This view is ta ken by Bernasconi in his above-mentioned article, by F. Volpi, "Seing and Time: A 'Translation' of the Nicomach ean Ethic.I'?" , as \vell as by J. van Buren, "The Young Heidegger, A ri stotle, Ethics" and T. Ki sicl, 'l'he Gcmesis al Heidegger 's Being and Time, p. 537, noie 15. 29 Thi s view is cxpli ciUy sta tcd by J. van Buren, "The YOllllll Arsloll c,

'l'l' " lI cl ucggc l" s ' lh eolog isc he' Jugend sc hrift " (1989) and "Die Marburger Il,, "IUfll." (196<). 1
11 11 III CII1 C

Hf
Id 111111'''

o f t ln poml il y in Il cid cggc r and Ari stotle has recently been 111 T. CI1S1tUer, " Il cid eggc r's Ulld erstandin g of the Aristotelian Concept (/ O()() III Id in.l. n ll is, " l h; idcggCf, Ari slotl c, r1lld Tim e in Basic Problems

Blhi es", p. 171. weI". abovc, p. 13, nnlu 15.

lu' t lf UIO ). III Il li s cOllll celi rll l, one co ui c! Ill so menli on A . Vi go's work Zeil 11l1d t'",d, " .,1 AI'I,I'lme/I',I' 1)1(' l:.'tldk /ll/ d die zeil-oI/IOloS-{ischen ' l'' HI/I H" III/Hf' ll (/c',\' 1hllldd ll .\ ( 1996), whi ch Ihat Il . '11111, 111 '' Il killd of " cxIK 1 lent llll" C(lI1C(.' pIOII ('l I' 1!lll e in the h'1!lic.\, ln P8fll clI lar lIu1l!lp h hlli Ilu l lOIi \1 1 "w li \m" (nu rl) ,

INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION " vcrcorne, the idea that Heidegger develops his own notion oftheory or Ih w reti ca] speech as the supreme [orm.of action makes it possible to t1111 into question the view that Heidegger's in terpretati on of Aristotle l''sumes a distinction between a [ruitful practical philosophy on the one I", uct and a metap hysically bi.sed ontology and logic o n th e oth er. t t",vever, it also gives cause for reconsidering the relation between plli losophy of life and ontology in Heidegger ' s own project. In other \\lo rd s, the id ea is that th e perspective of logos and praxis mak es it
poss ib le to see th e re lation between He id egger 's and A ri sto tl e's

d lll/wllis wOlild have provided Heidegger with the means 10 think the liniwde and temporalily of being, and in particular Sheehan maintains Iha t this involves an attempllo challenge Aristolle 's notion of being as energeia or actuality w ith the help of Aristotl e himself. 80th these texts ha ve been im portant to the interpretati on given in this stlld y o f Heidegger ' s und erstanding of kinesis. Sheehan' s arti cle is also one of few studies that deals with the relation between Ileidegger's rein terpretation of logos and his e lab orati on ofAristo tl e' s on tol ogy .33 For in spite oflhe inlerest in Aristotle as a thinker of life and in how it might have affecled [-Ieidegger' s philosophy, th ere has not been much atte ntion paid to the logos or speech of li fe. Excep ti ons to this are A nas tas ia Tzavaras-Dimou, Phiinom en% g ie der Al/ssage. Eine
Heideggers exiSlential-on/olog ischel' Interpretation der Aristote/ischen logos apophan tikos ( t 992), and Franco Volpi ' s art icle o n th e same topic." A stlldy on He idegger' s und erstandi ng of speech, which focuses o n Heidegger ' s interpretati o n of Aristotle' s Rhetorie in the lecture course Grundbegriffe der aris tote/isch e n Philosophie, is Christopher Smith, Th e Herm ene uties of Original Arg ument. Demonstration, Dialectic, Rhetoric ( 1998). T his wor k discusses the connection bctween ac ti on and speech, although it does not dea l \V ith any notion of a di scursive nature of action but puts emphasis on how the basic aim of rhetori ca l speech is ac ti on. Finally, there is a more independent study, though insp ired by Heidcgger, of th e concept of logos in Aristotle, Barbara Cass in' s Aristote et le logos . Contes de la phnomnologie ordinaire (1997). fn relation to this set o f wrks , whic h hav.e callcd attention to Heidegger' s reappropriation of Aristotle's philosophy ofli fe and praxis,
Zll

" 'sJlcctive ontological projects in a different li ght, as compared to how

il hus been conceived of in th e earlier literature on this topi c. For now

I",th of these projects are taken to share the same ontic foundat ion, II II IIJ oly the analysis of logos, and, moreover, to have the ir basic ll H'li va ti on in the idea that the possibility of ontology presupposes a rl t.: is ioll 10 realise one of th e poss ibilities for the enactment of logos,
III "OI 'jtl ,

Unters lichung

the present study seeks to take a step that does not seem to have been
taken so far, at lea st not in a systemat ic lfIanntr, na me ly that of re conciling th eo ret ical and pract ica l rea son o r lo go s in He idegger.

Thereby, th e study aims to show what it means fo r Heidegger to also conceive of philosophy, theoretical activity, as a form of praxis. Since Aristotle ' s notion of theoria is commonl y regarded as based lI pon precisely that metaph ys ics of presence which Heidegger wan ts to
Jl Thi s is al so thc thcmc orhis "Il cid eggcr, Ari stotl e and Pll l.:ll ol11('lluluHY" ( 1975 ), ,,\ "La qucs tiOl1 dll IO {(os dn ns l'm't cll lat iOIl de 1 rncll{'it t' 11H11 1 h\lIIlt' 1hl idcggcl', :1 \' IcCI l! IH' d' Al'islnlo" ( 1996),

(' II " I'TER ON I;

loo k \V ilh A ri s to ll e wh c ll hc reactcd a ga inst \Vha t he liS Pl nto 's und uc pos itn g o f idcas or essences existing apart

1.

Chapter One

HEIDEGGER'S PROJECT AND TTS RELATION TO ARISTOTLE

l, The philosophy offaclicallife Heidegger's phi losop hieal beginnings are marked by an ae ut e awareness of the need to provide philosophy with a new foundation, The idea that philosophy in our time has reached its fina l stage is often assoc iated with Heidegger' s later thought, but as early as in 1923 , he dec lared phi losophy as it had been traditi onally pursued to be over,
c la irn ing that the lime had come to face entirely new tas ks . 1 The task

Ihal Il cidegger initia lly sets himself is that of developing a philosophy oC"!;,cli ca lli f,," (jklisches Leben).' Thus li fe should now conslitute the l(lII lldnlion o l'phil osophy, and, more precisely, li fe in its facticity, thal is 10 say \Vith res pect to how it is aclually Iived and experienccd within a L:OII CrClc, dctcfmi nate situation. However, when introducing thi s conccpl ion of philosophy, He idegger do es not envisage a total break wilh the IradiLi on, but tries to return to something old in a new way, For in iL overall outline at least, Heidegger' s proj ecL repeats, though Irom a s
modified pers pective, the tum towards th e worl d "here and now" that
1 in d ie phnomen.o'ogische Forsclll/Ilg (GA 17), p. 1. And al ready in one of , h ls earh esl courses, He idegger env isages a n "e nl irely new co n: eption o f phll osophy", ZlIr Bestimm ung der Philosophie (GA 56/57), p. I I. See al sa Phal/om en%gie der Anschauung ulld des AlIsdrllcks. n /corie der philosophischcn Begriffsbildllllg (GA 59), L. spea king, .the expression "l ire" is unl il 1923, when il is rep laced by DasclIl , tho ugh HeIdegger uses these terms mte rcha nge ab ly for a wh ile. In his of genesis an d development af Heidegger's co nceptualIY in this respect, r. Kl slel pOlnl S ta tbe course Ontologie (Hermellelil ik der Faktizildt) (G A 63 ), p. 7, of " Dasein" as a techni ca l term , thaugh he notes that a lready ?S the tirs: ln the revl.e w . zu Karl Jaspers Psychologie der We/wlIscl/CI lIIlIIgen" (pp, 1-44 111 GA 9), wblch was conceived in 1919- 1921 , Heid egge r spcnks nbout " being !here" (Da .sein, p. 13) as an essential charac tc ri sti c or life , Sec Ki s icl's The Gemtsis ofNeiclegger's Sein g and T illl c, pp . 14 1- 142,274,491 ,

III\: il" IIlA ll if'cslali ons in the world of individual, sensible Ihal L world is cnough to ccount for Ihe nature of reali t}, his p' 'ciscly, in t\ri stotle's vicw, it is onl y along these lines that it is l'" . Ihl ' lill' p"i losophy to fulfil its principal task, which is to do juslice h' ' II ' ""l'li eulur, concrele thing, the Iode li or the "this here", precisely Il Il '' , cs " CC I 10 il s part icularity, in stead of exp laining it alVay by 111 11I ll ll [\ it 1 a mcre illstantiation ofa uni versal id ea. III il 'II. nlldin g u new beginning from philosophy, Heidcgger's aim is LII " '11 1 'vc and elaborate the critique that Aristotle directed against 1'1 '" , L"')lI gh 1 Heidegger, the target is not Plato but Husserl. Thus, 11 01' 111'<1 ,1< '' l'i sloll e's philosaphy ta a great extent is moLivated by his ,,",lIlillll' 1 challenge Plata's thought, Heidegger cansiders it essential 0 III L grips with his predecessor. This parall el is not merely a O IIln ll l' l of' hi storical circu mstances, but as we will see later on, III ",,"pflcr rccognises it and emplays it in order to indicate the aim and ,1111 '\ lion uf hi s own proj ect.
f Hl lII

""'1<'

III Ih ls clHlpl Cf , 1 w ill present this projecl in broad ou tlin e and 1111 111 Ill e Ille l'o lc Ihat Arislotle plays in it. Thereby, 1 w ill put particular 1 tl lp ll l1 "i IS on ll cidegger ' s lecture courses from the earliest twenties, sa

how and for what l'easons Aristotle first entel'ed into project. Apart from indicating what Heidegger actually ,"" III'cr'cd in M istollc, 1 will also discuss Heidegger ' s own views on Il li 111 11111' (.: or Ihis " discove ry" : how he looks upon hi s own interpretation ,,,,,1 "'" bO"fl Li on of Aristolle's work and what this says about his views "" 'h., cO lldiLi ons or philosophieal work as such, notably as far as its ., 1 11 00 ' n Lhe Iradilion is concerned , 11
Il

III

IlI r

programme that H eidegger la un ches at the beginning

III II Il' " ""elliies centre s on the q ues ti o n co ncern in g th e be in g of li fe.

Il''lVl'W '', IV hcn ",aking lire into a ph ilosophi ea l theme, Heidegger does nll l Inlpl y Inkc il 10 co nsllu tc ail o bj ec t of investigation. The idea is Il,,.LIl ,,, 1I 11lo,'C o l'philosophy ilscLf c,," only bc propcrly understood if i!
1 1\\HllI l h il S h ll Vi ll g ils Ill oti vatiotl Hnd o ri g in in lite, wh ich mcans that .'d tilt lI uw! tl o u!'l tlnd ctlll ccpl s o f fl rc 10 be led hack to life as

il Il " IIII III"lI c SO ll" CC 11 11 (1 fOulldnli oo, 10 lIii s Wlly, Ihe philosophy of life
)1

20

CII A I''I'ER ONE

is jus! as mu ch Iife's philosoph y, a ph ilosoph y Ihat, bc illg il scll" a specifie mode of life, springs from life and is conscious of Ihis .' Aceordingly, ail philosophical issues should be approached by w ay of an expl oralion inlo the nature of life, and fo r thi s reason, Heidegger does not inlend the an alys is o f life 10 be onl y a speeiali sed discipline, but, as wc w ill sec below, conceives of it along the Iines o f Husserl ' s nOlion of philoso phy as a "primordial science" (Unvissenschaft) Wh en thus IUI'nin g lowards life as Ihe supposedl y proper foundation ofphilosophy, Heidegger siluates himself, themali cally at least, within wh at is at this time a major philosophieallrend. Indeed, aecording ta his own tes timony : "The problems of contemporary philosophy centre on life as a primordial p henomenon ... ",4 ln these lectures [rom the earliest twenti es, Heidegger critieall y examines bas ically two differcnt and by then current approaches to life . Apart fro m th e Lebensphilosophie advanced by such thinkers as Dilthey, Spengler, Bergson and Scheler, he also, and to an even greater extent, explores th e neo-Kantian position o n Ih is lo pi c, nota bl y the work o f Ri ckert and Na lo rp .' When co nfro nlin g Ih ese Ihinkers, Heidegger is guided by Ihe qu es tion co nce rnin g Ihe poss ibilily o f attainin g the proper aecess la life. Most spee ili ea lly, hc wa nls to know what the stalcment that life as Ihe realm o f experi ence is somelhin g "given" ta philosophieal anal ys is is rea lly supposed ta me.n o This question is particularly urge nt to him because o f hi s idea Ihal philosophy in a w ay bath is and is not identical wilh its theme. For on the one hand, phi losophy is a specifie " how" o f life, which means that the inquiry ioto Iife must be rega rded as a realisa tion of that whi ch constitutes its own theme. But on the other hand, as a
l

l'II AI'"I HH ON I;

1'''"

Iii. ",,'Ikll l p"rs" il, phil osophy brill gs li fe 10 a coneeptuallevcl which is li lt! IIlt l lns i ' 10 il , a l Ilot as nu' as th e degree of explicitness is "l lIcd. More prec isely, Ihe problem as Heidegger sees it is that, at It III(lN blls ic or f"Llndam ental leyel , life is non-theoretical, nont IIhll'I' ti l"y in g cx pe ri e nee, but w h en th eoreticall y arti cula tin g and

thi s cx pe ri e nc e , one runs the risk precis ely of II h k 111 lI g il an d lhe re by of concealin g its truc nature.7 A nd in )l hllllll l ",'SI poss ihl e tcrm s, th e verdi ct t'hat H eidegger passes upon ail the Ildilk ' l'S II1clltioncd above is that they have not yet given a satis factory 8 l UI " \\I ' 1 10 th e qu estion o f how life could be properl y cx plicated. Thus 1111' thal Heidegge r draws from the confrontation wilh his \ 11111 '1I1 po ra ri es is in essen ce th al life has not yel been anal ysed and lU IIl nl(,:t! in cat egories and concepts proper to it. 9 Il IIl1s beon poinled out Ihat, from the po int ofview of Se in und Zeil, 1I I' Id would eventually be criti eal even of hi s own inilial version .11 III' philosophy, for the re as on that it had not yet made life inlo an 11111,,1"lliell l problem w Thi s is true, but one need not look as fa r as to 1,' /11 IIlIrI Zeil to find thi s shift o f perspective, for th e ontol ogieal l'ri pcclivc o n lire em erges a lready in the earliest courses o n A ri s totle , ll 11111 1 !l oI l'o r accidentaI rea so ns . O ne way to explain why H e idegger Iliid ' II ly begins to devote sa much time and effort to Aristotle wou ld be JI"'I'ls ' Iy by re rerring to hi s foregoing preoccupation with modern l'lililisophy o f life." ln this conneetion, it would be possible to argu e
i IIIU' c plililli s in g ..'

See e.g. P A, p. 23 9; Grundprobleme der Phtinomenologie (GA 58), p. 174; Phanomeno logische Interpr eta/jof/en ZIl A ristote/es. E infllnmg in d ie

phal1omenologische Forschllllg (GA 6 1), p. 80. GA 59, p. 15: "Die Problematik der gegenwarli gen Philosophie st um das Leben ais Urphdnomen zentriert. " 5GA 59, pp. 15ff. Here He ide gge r di fferentia tes between these IwO sch ools of thought by describing the latter (neo-Kant ian ism) as K II /(I/rphilosoph ie, because il lo dks upon life as a m a nifesta tio n of cul ture and va lues. By contrast,
Leb en sp hilos oph ie has il th e al her way round and regards eve rything as a

" '< IiIl 56/57, 15, 17 . 1hl" vl: l'di cl Illay be abstracted from Heidegge r's discussio n of li re and its as CI whole. Sec 1:11 50 note 7 . Cln Ihl 'i point, Heidegge r is criti cal even of Dilthey: al though hc shou ld be credited 1'11 1 !llVlng assessed the import ance of exp lori ng hUlllan life and hi story, he \Vas too .nw Il wl th in the co nfines of psyehology and 3nthropolo gy and 50 could not help bllt 1'1I1'u.ppo:d ll g the bei ng of life; see " Wil helm Dilt heys Forsc hungsarbeit und der .'1W,l'!l wlll tigc Kampr UIll cine his tori schc Weltanschauung", Dilthey-Jahrbuch 8
( 1'1I12/ 1993 ),pp . 143- 177 and GA 17, pp. 11 2- 11 3. III I l I{ul tl , Hll iglllfltic Origins. TraciJ/g the Th eme of Histority through Heidegger 's

manifestati on of life. For J-1ei degger's discuss ion of these phi losophical positi ons, see
6

also GA 56/57; GA 58. ln GA 56/57, pp. 111-112, Heid egger ex presses di ssati sfact ion with the notion of

the given, as he suspects it of irn plyi ng a divi sion between a bject and kn ow ledge, 0 which does not do j Jslice 1 the way in whi ch ph ilosophy encounters lire .

Il fl/kI, p. 47. Sec nlso D. r. Krell , Daimoll Life. Heidegger and Lif -Philosophy, pp. e PI J, Orcisch hns suggcstcd lhr\1 Heidegge r wou ld even be crit ical of ontology in III ,. C llrSes; " La ' 1apisse ri e de la vic' , le phnom ne de la vi e ct ses hill' II'I IInlo lis dons le (inmd"roblcme der l'htmomen%gie ( 1919/ 1920) de Mart in li t hl"' "HCI", p. 152. Il ( 1, Iwlo\V, Sl:cllon 1. Il Ait Il .. 11' the /1v/1i lnblc tex ts (Ut.: c(lIlccrncd, thc nppcarance of Aristot le in 1922 in JI I lltlll UA 62+ {n nd tn SOI1l C cx tCll t ill (ill 6 1) does scem quite suddcn, since the

22

'1lA l' TER ONE

ONI\

that Heidegger turned to Aristotle in order to show how modern philosophy of life, like the philosophical tradition in general, ultimately leans on Aristotelian concepts and categories , but that these are inapplicable to life, since not derived l'rom life itself, but from the region of "objective" being D But even though one sholiid not overlook
the critical motives behind Heidegger's turn to Aristotle, il is, at least in my view, c1ear that Heidegger - albeit contrary to his own intentions discovers a philosophical compatriot in Arstotle. Having concluded his

hl
III

IlI lh 1\1'1'1
III

(I r to co ll knowlcd gc what he has said, but in arder ta l' 'peu t f'or ollCscl r his In ode o f research, 50 thal one may " see th e thin g with the saille originality and genuineness."17

or

Wh ' 11 Ilyill g 1 c luril y how Ari stotle " saw" life, Heidegger uses 0
\ 1\ Ih, lI l" s ex pli cati on o r life as for his own phenomenological IlIl pd l Il1t o lilc, thu s appl y in g a phenomenological perspective on

discussion with modern philosophy of life , Heidegger now provocatively stales that Aristotle was not only the first philosopher to give an explication of "natural lire consciousness" (natrl iches Lebensbewuj3tsein), but that he was in tct ev en the last to recognise this as a philosophical task." This claim does of course not exclude the possibility that Heidegger's aim in connection with Aristotle nevertheless was critica!. The point Heidegger wants to make is not that Aristotle necessarily has the correct "theory" of life or even that his conceptuality is entirely appropriate for this phenomenon, but more imporl antl y that Aristotle has raised the being of life as a problem in a way Ih at modern philosophy is unable 10." Heidegger does indeed take a crilieal stance on Aristotle's conceptuality, but not simply in order ta di smiss it as unsliitabl e for the articulation of life, but because he cO li sid ers it 10 be a principal lask for philosophy to question the concepl s it has inherited from the past and in this way try to make lhem 16 speak again, to the present age. As Heidegger tells his sludents on one
occasion: one should not read Aristotle just in arder to learn how to use
earlier courses hardly contain any referenccs at ail to Aristotle. However, sinee Heidegger evidently \Vas already planning a book on Aristotle when he began to
focus his attention on him in public, the history of I-Ieidegger's assessrnent of Aris\otle's philosophy must apparently have an carlier beginning than what the textual mate rial implies . 13 See PA, p. 263, where Heidegger daims Iha! the theological trad ition has borrowed ils categories From Aristotle, but that these are alien to ilS "fjeld of being" (Seinsfeld).

Id. llIl l " s WOl'k s, at th e same lime as he approaches Aristotle as a 1'1111111 111 ' nnlog ical thinker in his own right. For on the one hand, I ii r w" nlS 10 show that Aristtle's conceptuality may not only be 1 pltd ll cd hy rcfc rcnce to the way in which Aristotle has experienced 1111 . 1"'1 Ih ul il lIlay ullimately be traced back to (Greek) life's preIlin",'I! 'II I ex pri ences ofitselfand its world. But on the other hanel, he IllInk . 111 111 il rislotle 's investigation into life in its turn is conducted \l 111111 Il phc no mcnological perspective, inasmuch as Aristotle has II ld l (Id tlte importance of trying to explicate Iife from within, so to
l" 11 1 II l1d to take into account th e way in which life is given to itself, \1 18 pl hl, tu ull y th co rctical articulation of it. Accordingly, in rereading

il I1 S (l phenomenologist, Heidegger simultaneously hopes to be ,,1111' Iii l' 'illterprel phenomenology with the help of Aristotle. tH 1 1IIrllClllnr importance in this connection is Heidegger's idea that
tI 'dO ll c' s Ic lco lo gical interpretation of life conveys an experience of 1111 !I,r tl\,,:u l, s iluation-bound nature of Iife, which Heidegger wants to " 1 ln J\l'der 10 challenge an ideal of cognition that he thinks elsewhere 1 H V l1Jill g Ari stolle ' s thought. This is the idea that truc knowledge, " " '/!/\(f'llIl '. Ilccessarily concerns the universal , sinee the particular is 11I111' lllIlte and in exhaustible; an ideal which has had considerable 1l1I1'1l!.-' 1 0 11 the vicw on knowledge in the subsequent tradition, and which lllil\' ul ll llluh.: ly rcs ult. n'om the inDuence ofPlato. Because ofthis Ideal, lili IIIM Ih at il ri stotl e initially ascribes to ontology - ta explain k 1Il Ji Il Itll ltd 0 1' l'act ica l be ing - proves to pose serious , perhaps nl vlt hl' di rri cuhi es lo him whcn inquiring into the ousia or nhN lIlI nlit y" or bc in gs, so that., contrary to his own intentions, he llI lIill th l'i sk or subsumin g the fode fi und er a notion of universal being. Il 10 1his noti on o rknowl edge and to show how it
I ii 1 p. 1S: .. ... die Sache i l) dcrselbcn Ursprllngli chkc il und Echth eit Wil l 1I1l111111tUI IlC 1." The wholc 1 is itn liciscd illileidegger's tcxt. If Il d,. dl/illilt tllfnt,t-!Y is Ill fUlifcs t nhove 01 in GA 18. 1 lU

This passage no doubt speaks in favour of Gadamer's yiew, noted in the Introduction, that the ultimate aim of Heidegger's Interpretation of Aristot!e as a whole \Vas to retrieve a genuine sense of Christianity through a destruction of ilS Aristotelian foundation. "GA 62', pp. 3-4. 15 See GA 18, p. 21. 16 See GA 18, 12, where Heidegger introduces the topie of Ihis course, which is precisely Aristotle'g conceptuality, and explains his motives behind this choice.

sehen

24

2\

t' li AI' 1ER ON Ii is in fact possible to have knowledge of the pa rt iclI lar Is 011 ' ni th ' 1I10st important tasks for the philosophy of facticalli fe. And as wc will see in the course of th is st udy, Heidegger's interpretation of Ari stolle as a whole largely aims at spelling out the confl ict in Aristotle ' s thou ght between these two approaches to life and being.
l,hl III IIp ll \
1111 Il
1

Il''1 Il pl\L: no l11 t,; ll o log ica l inquiry into life or existence

11111 11 11 1)' hl: ,'c lo rnw la tcd as a phil osop hy of logos , and more

l"" l'II , ,,1

Arislo icliail logos. 11 III10st a il of Ileidegger's early lecture courses have l "dll\ , l, , " pllh ll _lI ed, il is naturall y much easier th an before to see how , "Ilil l A+i sttll lc ' s concept o f logos was to the deve lopment of
I II 1111 II I Il h
II I

2. The philosophy of logos: phenomenology, logie and hermeneuties He idegger makcs use of several te rms in order to specify w hat the phi losophy of factical Iife in vo lves. ln the A ristotle Introd uction, he describes il in the ro llowin g \Vay :
The probJerns of phiJosophy co nccrn the being of fac ti caJ life wilh res pec t to how il is add resscd and cxpl icatcd in each part icuJar case. Thal is 10 say. as ontology o f facticty, philosophy is simliitaneously ca lego rial interp retat ion of add ress an d explicat ion, Ihat is, logic. Ontology and la gie are 10 be brought back to the orig inal unit y of the problern s of fa cticity and l a be understood as the dscharges of Ihat fundamental research which may be des ignated as the phenomenological or racti city.19

und a lso 10 und erSland why the older Iiterature on l'clali ve ly little interest in thi s concept, not to say in

Wh a t thi s den se passage implies for Heidcgger 's conception of o l1tolo gy w ill be discussed in th e next secti on. Hc re 1 w ill t'oc us on the inte rre la ti on between phenomenology, logie and hermenculics. Wi lh

III 111'11"" 0 1 specch (llede) as sllch." This might otherwise seem a bit "It" 1 IIIM' . llIec Il cidcgger a rtel' ail dennes phenomenology in Sein ulld /1 plI'd "c ly wilh re le rence 10 Aristotle 's concept of logos, and also 1111111 IIII'N Ih ll t Ihe mcanin g of phenomenology wi ll become clear only 1 Il Ihe Ili cil il ing of lo gos as speech has been s uffi ciently .. 11111111 'd.21 T hu s wh en Heidegger ana lyses the not io n 1lllIlIlIlI ll' ll o 1o g y" in te rm s of logos and phainomenon, o ne m ust not '"I 111 1 1 Ihi s fo r a lI1erc allempt at tracin g the etymo logical roots of a Jo 1111 11 11 \V hat Il c idegger is doin g here is actually to reaclivate what , ,"ld III' "" ll cd a G rcck (Ari stotelian) sense of phenomenology ." Of 1111 1 li pl1c ll o mc no lo gy in that sense has to be tran s for m ed by I I I l, II sincc hi s project a lso, a nd e ssentiall y, in volves a

,,,h

1t ,1I1

II tl ' lIl l1l perspective. Still , il is noteworthy (hat in these secti ons

thes e term s, Heidegger dis tin guishes between different, though intimately connected approaches to li fe, ail of which shoul d serve to answer the question concerning the bein g of life, as weil as to give directives for how life can properly be made accessible . To assess Heidegger's un derstanding of these "branches" of philosop hy, aIl of
which he sceks to redefine in accord a nce w ith hi s own agen d a , is

' " I pll<' " o lll cil ology, Heidegger, at least initially, suspend s th e Il " II 'l' Ild clillIl pcrspecti ve, to gether w ith the modern notion of
Ir l \Vith th e topie of hermcneuties in Heideg ger, on which III l' III IIf Il IllIm be!' of stud ies , thi s thcm e surfaces con stant ly. But as far as 1 can 1'1n h \JI logos hns scldolll been scell as a therne in ils own righl, or as a basic l,Il, concept in I-Ici dcgger's philosophy, in terms ofw hi ch he tries to 1IIIIIr tl ll! IIl OS! brls ic trait of hum an reason. If this had been reeogni sed earl ier, il 11111.1 !ull d ly h flVC bee n poss ible to mi sinterpret Heidegger's attitud e towards the logos tlte \Vay T. A. Fay has donc in hi s Heidegger: Th e Critique of 1. Il Il Ile idegger is supposcd to have criticised Aristotle' s defini ti on of 111')11 ln h \ l lll 'l of' logos roI' bc ing inndequate wh ile regarding man as a rational animal, III Il Il 1 III filct the L:lt in tra nslat ion of Aristotl e' s de finit ion that is the target of " Il. Idl)II'''' 'S cd tici sl1l (S2, p. 165). The sa ill e in terpretat ion retu rns in D. F. Krell , ,. OIl/.lII 1 I/'f and Life-Pll ilosoplty, p. 51. l "II' S/., 7(J , in pMtj eulnr p. 32. Th e ro ll owin g discussion of I-I eidegger ' s wli ii i ofplt cllQlll cnology drnws ol1lhe whole of 7. llil, 1111 Il 1lI1ljol' pol ili in T. Sltcl!hul\'s " Il cideggc r's Interpretat ion of Ari stotle: "ltl,III/1r und ld.\(lI". Il e nrgucs Ihut il \Vas pnl'tly ll ei dcgger's allempt 1 redefi ne 0 Illtt ,j'tlil 1I0lu l:o\Y \Y lth the lu.: lp o r Arislotle thlll made him break with Husserl ' s l" 1111111 111 111(': pp. 2K 728R.

naturally no small task. Here these concepts will be treated mainly w ith a view to showing how Heidegger emp loys them to capture different aspects of the problem of logos, and to demonstrate thal Heidegger ' s

19 PA , pp. 246-247 : " Die Prob lematik der Philosophie betrirrt das Se ill des faktische n Lcbens im jewei ligen Wie des An gesprochen- und Au sgelegtseins. Das heif3t, die Philosophie ist ais Ontologie der J7akt izi H zuglei eh katego ria le Interpretation des H Anspreehens und Ausl egens, das heif3t Logik. Ontologie und Logi k sind in die Ursp rungseinhe it der Fakt iziHitsprobl ematik zurUekzunehmen und zu ve rstehen ais die Ausladungen der prinzipie ll en Forsch ung, die s ich bezei chnen Ili/3t a is die phanomellologische Hermeneu/ik der Faktizitat."

26

27

ph t;IIOfll cnology, Hnd instcud work !"-i out Ids OWIl !,. \III\ \Ipl il l ph '11\)llH.;n0I1 on th e bas is of an illt crprct atiOIl or th e Gl'cck 1I 0t!OIl/Jllflhw m CII QI'J. In do in g so, he emphas ises that phainomenon mus t bc 1I11dcrsl ood as something thal appears or shows itself of ils OWI1 ac cord , and that the Greeks therefore sometimes simply identified phainomenon with being (ta on). But if, as Heidegger indicates in thi s and the following section, the very notion phainomenon as understood by the Greeks implies that there is someone, namely a being endowed with logos, whose nature it is ta let beings be phenomena, i.e. show themselves, th en there is a kind of "phenomenal ogy" embedded in Greek thought itself. Moreover, this is a phenomcnology intimately connccted w ith ontolo gy, and thi s is
someth in g that Heidegger draws on in order to distance himse lf l'rom

Inl d 1 0 1

nct l vi li ..:s w it hill , und in relll ii on 1 fi wOl'ld , 'il ds \Vil S 0

'1I IIrthln t\. 1h.:idgscl' fll' gUL:S, th at Ari stoll c and th e Grceks saw, th anks III Ilw Olli niogicai and 14 wo rl dlyll orientation of' thcir phi losophy. Oui tl, ], p ' rspc cti ve has been lost in modern epistemology , in eluding 1111 I'l'liu ll phcllolll cno logy, bccausc of the turn towards subj ectivity 111,,1\,'I)l1sciousncss. 25 hll lh cl', w hcl1 brin g ing together apophainesthai \Vith lo gos, 1h Iii 'gger seeks ta attaek what he regards as a trad itional notion of , ,. 11 111 u::; th e prim ary se ns e for the acquisition of knowledge, w hi ch in 1'1"' IIIHll c no logy is ex pressed wi th th e con cept of " intuiti on" 1/1'dwl/lIl/g). One wo uld perhaps expect sueh a chall enge ta invol ve 11 /1 0 ex puls ion of vision for the sake of hearing, but this is something

Husserl. Phenomenology should reveal throu gh logos that which in some sense and ta some extent already was accessible or man ifest throu gh logos. But among th e phenomena is of co urse al so lhat which lets the phenomena be seen: human li fe. Life is philosop hicall y accessible in virtue of its logos, that is, because it articu lates itself and in this way becomes "visible" . However, this is also the way in which life has aeeess ta itself; in Heidegger's view, self-understanding on ly cames through articulation. And in arliculating itself or taking a stand on itself, life relates to its world of coneern. ln other words, self-unders tand ing is, for the most part at least, mediated by the understand ing of the world 2 J As Heidegger puts it on one occasion: "Factieal life ... also speaks the language of the world, as soon as it speaks ta itself. ,,24 Ta Heidegger, this means tha t, even though ontology shou ld be based upon a philosophy of li fe, philosophy must also proeeed in the opposite direction and show how th e being of li fe is in its turn constituted by its relation ta intrawo rldl y bei ngs. Therefore, life must be caught in the
23 Whereas this is an important point of Heidcgger's as far as everyday existence is concerned, he seems 10 en tertain the idea of a possibi!l ty of breaking the "worldly

1h; lcgge r does only in part. He eertainly repeatedly stresses that th e l'lI plICily fo r speech is equally a eapacity for hearing, but th en he is - for Iii ' IIl ost part - talking about speech in a concrete sense." To extend th e IIOI ion of speech so that it also in vo lves articulation, Il cldcgger necds a model of address and response, accord ing ta whic h 1111111 acldresses beings and they respond by showing themselves in some IVlly . Besides, th ere is in th e trad ition, not least in Aristotle, a notion of nn important connecti on between speech and vision, i.e. betwecn logos und apophansis, and Heidegger wants ta find a \Vay to account for thi s \"'tH1 J1 Cc tion withi n the framework of h is own proj ect. Th is is al least wll at he seems to be say ing in the following passage : "In arder ta preserve the connection with it [the tradition ], one may formalise sight 1 1I1 seei ng to such an cxtenl that one th ereby achieves a universal term , wlli ch characterises every access to bein gs and ta be ing as acceS5 as
The motives bchind l-leidegger 's suspicion of th e v iew on knowl eclge in terms of vision are complex. In this eonnection, it might su!TIee to IIl cntion Heidegger's idea th at this idea l has led to the belief th at the
, \ III GA 17, He idegge r discusses extensive1y Ihis thematic shi ft from wo rld to IJonsc iousness; sec in particula r p. 56. E.g. SZ, p. 161; GA 18, pp. 44, l-Iowever, the point in connect ing speech

bond" in connection \Vith his notion of authentic existence. ln his essay "Refraining form Dialect ic: Heidegger's Interpretation ofPlato in the Sophist Lectures" , G . Figal

suggests that, in sp ite of his critique of the Gree k concept of vo, Heidegger has not completely abandoned the ideaJ of intuition as something that is free [rom (linguisti c) mediat ion; pp. 102-104. Th is discussion is taken up in greater detail in Chapter Four orthe present thes is. 24 PA, p. 243: "Das faktische Leben ... spricht auch die Sprache der Welt, sooft es mit sich se lbst sp ri cht."

wi th the capac ity fo r heari ng is al50 to ind icate that logos is both passive and active . The rel ati on between passi vity and activity is discussed in Chapter Three, Section 8. 1.7 SZ, p. 147: "Um den Zusammenhang mit ihr zu \vahren, kann man Sicht und Sehen so weit formalisie ren, daB damit ein uni versa 1 Term inus gewonnen wird, der jeden er Zugang zu Seiendem und zu Sein ais Zugang Oberhaupt charakterisiert."

28

29

( 'II AI'II ' H(I NI

is Ille mS I promin cnt t'onn of speech, as 1t hU h 'CII IhtHI hl :-I Ih ll l ll nl y the asserti on makes thin gs l'ull y vis ibl e. '1'0 questio n Ih ' Imd iti onal loc us on the asserti on, Heidegger has to show thal "bcin gs urc saiel in many ways'\ to use Aristotle's famou s expression, not only in the assertoric mode. 1'0 Heidegger, thi s is nothing but the task of chall engin g the eotire traditio n of logie, in sofar as this has been eoneern ed with " sentence logie" (Satzlog ik). But even though it was Aristot le who initially made possibl e the develo pment of logie,

II APTER ONE Il was argued above that Heideg ger found someth ing like a phenomenolog ical approach in Aristotle, However, it migh( seem more dub ious that he could have fou nd a hermeneutics prefigured there. Th is is of course not to deny that Aristot le ' s work actually proceed s hermeneutically. Indeed it should, if there is any truth to the repeate d daim that Heidegger, in contras t to hi s predece ssors in thi s area, conceives of hermeneutics not primarily as an art of interpretati on but as a basic condition for expli cation and understanding as SUCh. 11 . In the Ari stotle Introducti on, which is olso one of Heidegger's first texts explic itly devoted to hermeneuti cs, Heidegger sets himself the task prec ise! y o[ revca ling th e hermeneuti c situ ation in Ari stotle's philosophy , thou gh he begins by clai ming that th e herm eneutic situation

lIl1derstanding, wh ich is anal ysed as a threefold advance possess ion of meanin g context, conceptuality and perspective. 3o

for address ing and exp li cating beings in different ways and in differen t senses. To Heidegger, this is eq ui va lent to clarifying the "as-nes s" of logos, which he also declares to be the basic charaeter of logos in hi s first attempt at delining it." 1'0 determine the as-struc ture of logos and thereby to expia in wh at makes it poss ible to understand or address someth ing as someth ing is a task that Heideg ger ascribe s to hermeneutics. In short, hermen eutics reveals the circular movement of underst anding by show in g how underst anding , in realising certain presuppositions as it directs itselfto wards some object, also turns back upon itself and thereby e ither confinn s or challen ges th ose presupp ositions from which it set out. In Sein und Zeit, Heidegger will describe this condition in terms of a " fore-structure" (Vorslr llktllr) of

address, in arder to clari fy, from there on, the conditions of poss ibility

eonducted hi s investig at ions inta logos ." Thus in go in g back to Aristotle, Heideg ger hopes to retrieve a possibility of reinterpreting logic, and thereby to give that "eatego rial interpretat ion o f address and explica ti on" which he talked abo ut above. Th is task requires logos itself to be made into a phenomenon . That is to say, logos must be pennitt ed 10 show itself in ils diverse modes of

Heidegger wa nt s 10 emphasise that \Vhat we know as lagie to A ri stotl e \Vas only one direction - lhough no doubt a decisive one - in which he

Aristot le properly 32 Lcav in g as ide He idegger 's own hermen eutic

of modern philosophy must be made clcar for us to be able to interpret

lU

MOlct ur c of undrsta ndi ng is already in place in the Ari stotle Introduc tion, thou gh it 11 ' .. cd wilh 1\ sli ght ly diffcrclll terminology.

GII 19, pp. 252-253. /J p. 256. II, IQ S/" pp. 150 1'. The clements of th e VOl's/ruktur are thus Vorhabe (o f mean ing), VOI'R/'iff (o f Il conccptu ality) an d Vorsich / (o f a perspective). The idea of a fore-

important ams in thi s conn ection is to point to the neccss ity of revealing the " as what" of Ari stotle 's work. That is to say, by explori ng the overriding perspec tive or " meaning" of Aristot le' s philoso phy, He idegger hopes to be ab le to see \Vhat k inds of logo; or modes of address are possible wilh in the eontext of Aristot elian thought. More speeificall y, howeve r, he w ants to know what kind of logos or address eventuall y led Aristotle to establish a primaey of propositional speech and thought. For only when redueing this address to its presupp ositions wi ll it be possibl e to reall y understand how it eou ld become so power fui , and onl y then will it be possible to deeide what it cou Id meon to questio n or transfo nn it. In thi s way, ArislOt le 's logic and eventually speech or logos as sueh - is brought back to its hermen eutic foundation. The steps involved in the phil osophy of logos are thus as follows: by approac hin g logos phenome no logicall y, one w ill see that there are different ways in which world and Iife come to express ion. 1'0 reveal the foundation and possibility ofthis diversity of "speeches", one has to
See e.g. J. Risser, "Phi losophica l Hermeneutics and the Question ofComm unity", p. 22 ; P. C. Smith, The Hermelle ulies of Original Argumel ll. Dia/ec /ie. RhelOric , p. 2. But Heidegger does daim that the Rhetol'ie may ln a sense be regarded as a henneneulic <l na lys s of speech. Th is point is developed in Chapters Two ilnd Four. 12 PA, pp . 237-238.
JI

situat ion for the moment , one should note that one of his more

JO

:t tA P't bR ONH

I.! hu.:: idIlI U the constitution of " as- ness" as slich. On the basis or suc!! on c luc idation, o ne may categorise logos, di v iding it into diffe rent basic poss ibiliti es for speech. Th is route is also in accordance with th e task that Heidegger envisages for himself, which is
... for onee to grasp rogie more radiea ll y than the Greeks courd, a nd in th e sa me \Vay si multaneously to work out a more rad ica l understanding of language itself and thereby also of lingui slCS. H

Heidegger's "more radical understanding of log ic" enabled him to recogn ise three basic modes of speech, whi ch in this study are described as the cpistemic, the t:vt:ryday and the philosophi ca ll ogos respective ly .
3. On/a/ogy and /e/ea/ogy

ln spite of the tUfll towards life as the bas ic th eme and foundati on of philosophy, I-Ieidegger's project has an ontological amb iti on more or less from the beginning, that is, also be fore he explicitly poses the question of the m eaning of bcing as sllch, as il is fonnuJated in Se in und 34 Zei/. ln th e Aristotle Introducti on, when Heidegger has declared that philosophy is concerned \V ith th e be ing of fac ti cal li fc, he goes on to state that :
Philosophy in this respect is fu ndamc ntal [prillzipie/le l ontology,

and Ih is in s'.I ch a \Vay Ihat the speci fi e panieular worldly regiona l ontologies receive both the foundation and the 1lleaning of their
proble1lls from the ontology of facticity ,1S

Heidegger does Ilot only envisage it as a future tas k to work out different regional ontologies, he also, more importalltl y, thinks that phi losophy should develop somethillg like a gellera l onto logy, the aim of which wo uld be to lay bare th e onto logica l structures of beings in general, or, as he himself pUIS il, to arliculate the :'princ iple" (Prinzip)
33 GA J 9. p, 253: " ... ci ie Logik e inmal viel radikaler zu Cassen, ais es den Griechen gelang, und au f dcmse lben Wege zugle ic h ein radikalercs Versliind nis der Sprache selbst und damit auch der Sprach wissenschaften auszuarbc iten," T he whole passage is itali cised in Heidegger's lex!.

or bci ll gs, that is Ih e Illcanin g 01" sense o f Iheil" bein g (Seinssin n).36 To th e best of my kn owledge, th e noti on of a "meaning of being" (Sil1l1 des Seins) turns up for the first time in Heidegger 's lectures on Aristotle,37 and it seems that th e need for such a notion originally grew upon I-Ieidegger in connectio n w'ith his read ing of Aristotle, as demanded by hi s interpretation. That is, apart from the rathe r ap parent fact tluu I-Ieidegger was influenced by Aristotle 's onto logical project and its questi on concerning being as being, it seem s lhat his idea of a unif"i ed meaning of being was not merely conceived on the basis of hi s understanding of Aristotle 's ontology, but that he found such an idea necessary to be ab le to work out a unitied interpreta/ion of Aristotle 's philosophy as a who le, notjust his ontology. The mem1ing ofbeing th at Heidegger thinks is govern in g Aristotl e's thou ght is fini shed or produced being: Fer/igsein or J-/erges/elL/sein 3 ' In Chapter Five, 1 will disc uss holV Heidegge r rel ates his project of fund a me nl al ontology and its questi on of th e meani ng of bein g to Aristotle 's ontology. I-Iere 1 basically restrict myself ID ind icatin g holV Heidegger's ontology of life involves a con frontation w ith Aristotle 's teleology. Heidegger's interpretation of Aristotle 's teleology is complex and ambi guous, as 1 will develop in greater detail in Chapter Three. Broadly speaking, one mi ght say th at, even thou gh il is crucial to I-Ieidegger to qu estion the not ion of Fer/lgsein as the unified meanin g of being, he hopes to find a possibility to batlle th is notion fromwithin the teleological perspective itself. Before further elucidating He idegger's in terpretation of Aristotle 's teleology, we should have a look at Aristotl e's ow n description of this. T hough th e natural reference in thi s res pect wou ld be Book IX of the Me/aphysics, I have chosen to point to a passage in De Anima, where Aristotle gives a condensed version of th e bas ic tenets of teleology. Here Aristotle asks us to distin gui sh betlVee n two kinds of potentiality or capacity (dun amis) in connect iol1 \V ith knowledge. Man can have th e
Sec GA 61, Part Il. Ch. 28 . PA, p. 267; GA 62*, p, 45. , , 18 The express ions Hergesfellfseil/ and Ferligsein lurn up for the first tl/ne PA, pp. 253 and 260 respectively. At Ihis stage, Heidegger has th us not yel lm of presence in the sense of Allwesenheir, though the term Anwesendsem IS used 111 GA 19, p, 178, ln GA 18, He idegger ta lks instead abo LiI Gegellll'drligse in, p, 93. T he rela ti on bct'l-vecn these ICrln s is di scussed in C llnpter Five.
36

l<

SZ, p. 1.

J7

35

PA, p. 246: "Die Problematik der Philosophie betrifft das Sein des fakt ischen Philosophi e ist in dieser Hinsicht prinzi pielle Ontologie, 50 zwar, daO die bes tllnm ten einzelnen weltha ft en reg ionalen Ontol og ic n von der Onto loD"ie der FaktiziUit her Proble1llgrund und Problems inn emptungen." 0

32

:13

CI IA PTER ONE

CI IA PTER ONE itself' iLS ow n end , which is th us fulfi ll cd already al the outsel, since it is nOlhing di fferent from the activily itself41 Eve n though energeia or 8nlelecheia represents the ideal mode of being in Ari stotle's teleology, whereas k ines is is re garded as an imperfect activity, Hei degger thi nks that kinesis is in fac t the basic concepl of Aristolle 's te leology, and, more preeisely, kinesis in the fOrln o f poiesis, production. That is to say, Aristolle's notions of energe ia and enrelecheia are onl y possi ble to understand on th e bas is of an analys is of th e concept of kinesis. This is precise ly the idea behind Heidegger 's express ions Hergestelltsein and Ferligse in: what characte ri ses "actual" being is that it does nol need to be produ ced, since it is already fini shed and complete. With these notio ns, Heidegger thus wants to emphas ise th at Aristotle does not have a neutra l concept of being and presence. This is also the assumption that governs his interpretation of ousia. Accord ing to He idegger, ol/sia, the basic concept in Aristotle 's ontology, refl ects an onti cal as weil as an ontological sense : it is a being in lhe specific "how" of its being." Ousia is not only to Aristotle bU to I the Greeks in general that which is Grst of ail "there".43 And the way in whi ch it is there, its " how", is its be in g fini shed. Even though Heidegger' s lectures on Aristot le does not display any simple continuity as rar as hi s attitu de towards Aristotl e is concern ed, one may nevertheless see how Heidegger aroun d the midd le of the twenties becomes more and more certain thal wh a! di slin guishes him [rom ArislotJ e and the Greeks is that they cou Id not or did not re fl ect upon lhe Found ation of thi s "how" . In this res pect, the Sophisl lectures are somelhi ng of a crescendo. Here Heidegger descri bes the Greek und ersta nd ing of being as Herges telltsein in the following way:
This is a natmal and naive expl icati on, becau se Ih is meani ng of bci ng moreover - that s preci se ly the ma rk of navet - s taken ns the absolute mean ing of being as sllch. But that shows that the Grccks \Vere not explicitly conscious of the natura t ori gin of the concepl or be ing, thus had no in sight into that speci fi e field F rom whi ch lhey aC luul1y derivcd the mcaning of being, . 44
/IICf .

eapaeity for know ledge in a formai sense, that is, only in virtuc of bcillg human, sinee knowledge is a distinetly human property. Bul we also say, Aristotle notes, that man has the eapac it y for know in g, or is potentially knowing, when he has aequired s uch a capacity thro ugh learn ing and practi ce, with out mak ing use of il for lhe moment. Finally, man can natu rall y also be said to possess (the capacity for) know ledge when he is making use of il. We may lhus draw the followin g threefold distinction:
Each of them ha s the capac ily , but in differc nt ways; the one in

Ihat his gCllllS is sllch , Ihat is, hi s l1latter, the olher beca use he is capa bl e of think ing if he wants to, . .. But lthi rd ly] th e one who is thi nking is in a slate of actua lity and he is knowi ng in the
stron gesl sense, e. g. Ihat particula r A. Th us Ihe fi fSI Iwo are

pOle ntia ll y knowing, bu t whereas the one cha nges th rough

instruction and, for the most part, through tra ns fo rmati on l'r o m the opposite condi tion, the way in wh ich the ot her passes fro m th e mere hav ing of [e.g.] sensation or gram mur wi lhollt exercise, to actually exercising il, is di ffe rent.39

Whereas the transition from fo rmai to ac ti ve ly acq uired capacity is a process invo lving chan ge, a kinesis, th e realisalon of know lcdgc L hal one a lready possessed is a form of energeia or ente lecheia, and th is activi ty in volves no change, since the knowl edge, as we il as the person who knows, remai ns the same. 40 In other wa rds, where as a kin eti c process is a means to an end (leloS) eventually to be ac hi evcd, whi ch in this way is externa l to the act ivity in quest ion, the acti vity of energeia is
)9 De Anima ("De An." ), "KtltepO 1:0UTW o TOV a 'rov 1:ponov V S\JVUT 01:l V, )..;r (, Ilv on T yvo 't010TOV KUt Ti \)ll, 6 o' 01 1 PO\J)..llOei. O S\JVOl'O gewp ... . 6 l) ilS.., Oewpwv, VTe),exe it OOV Ka l K\Jpi w 1tt.Ota)levo v, tBE tO A. )lQtEPOI )l.v ov oi. npwmt Kor ci"),,),,' 6 )lv t ci'A.OlWlEi K 1to'A.aKl va vri a at Ero (, D K , tO XE IV 'l"T)v a !o lllot\' il ti)v Y POIl)l On KTtV, )lit V EpYElV s' Ei C; 1"0 VEPYEl v ov 'l"pnov. " 1 have fo ll owed Hicks' emendat ion of the text, Ihough nOI his translat ion; see his edition of De Anima, pp. 73, 40 That is. the change is only from inact ivity to activity. For the distinction between KIVll01l; and V PYE lO, see Met. IX. 6. Though Aristotle states (Mel. that VPYElO has the connotation of VtE XELO, "co mplete actua lity", i.e., as the expression literally reads, "hav ing the end within", he also uses vpye lO to speak abou t rea lisatio n in general and then he characteris es KtVl10l as an vp yetCI Ct'tEI\; see e.g. Physics ("Phys." Wh en [ speak abo ut vp-ye w wit hou t fur lher qu,lliti cation , 1 use il \Vi th th e limited se nse in minci, Ih at is , as dilTcrillH ""0111 K' ivl"lOI .

1048b 1
CIiI C Illl Wrli cln: chnrnklcdslcl'I chen di Nlll vl!111

"E in Sci cndcns im Wi c seines Sein s", GA 18, p. 24.

"' 5,,, GA 18. pp. 30-31.

(,'11 19. p. 270: "Gs ili l

weil diese l" Sinn vo n Se in II ls nbl:> oIU!I;I' Sinn von Se i n

34

Il

' IIAPTER ONli CI lA l'TER ONE The "natural origin" of the concept of being is the everyday e ' of th' 'h' h xpenencc h mgs wH ln t e world as products, as ava ilable for use, Thus we can , cre sec why Heidegger must be ab le to show how the understanding of be,ln g s 15 constituti ve for understanding in ge neral , u mg one s self-understand ing, For thi s explains originally a determination of non-human beings, be mto the human sphere in Greek th ought. Eventually Heidcgg ' l ' 1
Ihat lIel"ge ia or actuality is depri ved of ils former priority.4& This might ind ccd scem to be the case w h en one considcrs th at Heidegger is critical of Ar istotle's concept of nous, insofar as nous represenls a kind of

. ' . er \\ 1 envIsage an ontolagicaI project that, on the basts O ,f ana lysis of lime, will detcrmine the "how" Ilot onl of

s imple seeing, which does not involve any change or diffcrence, s ince it does not take its abject as something, Thereby, it disp lays the supreme 1'0n11 of acccss to rea lity as actuality or energeia, whereas logos, in virluc of its as-structure, involves the poss ibi lity of change and thcrerore is a form of kin esis. But as already indicated, as Heidegger
sees it, the problem with Aristot lc's teleology does not n:a ll y li e in the

human Dascm, but also of other bCings, Thereby it should reveal ;hat temporal horizon within which presence cmerges . 'Ii ' d 1 h' a speci IC tcmporal mo e: n t IS it could res tore to Herges/ell/seill its proper dehmlted place, But during the years leading up to Se in und Z ,/ Heldegger's focus is mainly on the being of Iife or Dasein B e/ , Dasem, that which lets there be a " th ere" th 1 : y posmg e n h' ,as e onto oglcally basic n 1 y, ta W Ich aIl ot11er phenomclla arc ta be relatcd f-fe'I(l egg'" 1 ta be bl t d ' , , , lopes ,a e a elermme Ihe conslilulion of the "how" of th b' , 'th' D e emg of Dasem frOl .. ' ' " ", WI m ilsel f, and in this way to cha llenge the pOletIc notIOn of man, ln doin g so, however, Heidegger will also ask hll11self whether Anstotle mi ght not actuall h Ih' " ' y ave pavcd thc way for IS of man, sinee he himself cJaims that il' is not productIOn but actlOll,praxis, Ihat is Ihe essellce ofl ife." Il IS sometimes , thought Ihat in Heidegger's analys is of human
eXlstence, Anstot le s teleology is tllfllcd lIpside-down , so 10 speak, in
schlechthin genOlllmen wird. Das zei t aber d '. . BewuJJtsein von dem natOrlichen ;lln ' d aJJ kem ausd rOckliches Einsicht in das bestimmte Feld aus d P . g. es hatten, also keine ... " , em sie cigenthch den SIOn von Sei n schopften This view is also prapaunded b J T '. ' Heidegger, pp. 6' niaux, Leel ures de {Ot/l%gie 1 "Iso DasclIl IS a "bei ng in the how f' '" ' . meanmg of"Dasein" is nat captu rcd ciO Ils b.em g '. Bu.! '.llIS "there-being" or somethi ng ]ike Ihat W]1:11 trans lall.ng Il mlo Engllsh (i.e. with "Dasein" is a normal German nouo) 0' t obscu res the fael Ihat gives the impression that "Da .".' r W en eepmg Il un trans lated, for this a/ most d . sem IS a proper name sa that 't be esrgnation only. For Ihis reason l seld k' . 1 seems to an ontical
45

conccpt of energeia but in kinesis, in that it tends to be identified with production, Therefore, Heidegger cannat sim ply replace energeia with kinesis as the supposedly proper model for the interpretation of the bei ng of li fe, but has ta reinterpret il. In other words, the question that Hcidegger has to confro nt is: how might il be possible to conceive of Ihe being of life and its logos in terms of movement or change but wil hout reducing it ta a model of production? What kind of answer Heidegger gives ta this queslion wi ll be explored in the course of this study; here 1 have just wanted to indicale the problematic withi n which Heidegger situates his projec!. Brielly put,
Heidegger follo\Vs Aristotle in describing life in terlns of movemellt, as

bcing on the way towards something and th us bcing outside itself; what Heidegger, especia ll y in his earliest courses, te!lns as the " mobility" (Beweg/heit) of life,49 When taking su ch an approach ta life and its logos, the logico-grammatical perspective is regarded as in sufficient,
s in ce il does Ilot take into aCCQunt the concrete rea lisation of speech or ex plica ti on . But as opposed to the model of production, Heidegger !hin ks that the te/os towards which li fe directs itse lf is not so much a

0,

prod uct as a possibility of man 's being and understanding, However, thi s is th e point at wh ich Heidegger tums to Aristotle's analysis of praxis , in the hope ta find th ere precisely such a conception of telos,

om ma e. use ofth ls term, but prefer "Iife" or are not. wholly unproblematic inquiry into man as e.g. a t1hbat. what IS a stake is an amica l 47 Tl " 1 . r 10 aglca elng li S Ilcme IS explorcd fur!her in Chapler Thrce. . th

"human existence" etc thou ei ther, si nce they m"ight

hth

4, Tite 1I0/ioll ofafirsl philosophy We have secn thal lI eidegger thinks that th e basic questions of ph iloso rhy III LI st be Icd bac k ta lire as th e ir origin, and more
W. MM,X, lIe id cmNr /ln d die 'Ii'(ldilio/l, pp. 11 8 120; C. I lanlcy, 8 eing and Gad ill ,,,l''(,'rorh' (lI/d IIl'fclcgy,c".' /h l' Nole of !\lfe/h ml in "/1n"//ki",C!. ,h c l"finirc, pp. 28, 104. \ l'II, pp , 2401'1', C; II 60, pp, Il il- 11 71'r. ,

36

17

CIII \ I'II ' R <lN I '

'11 Al'l ' ll R ON E spcc ilica ll y, that th e onlo logica l stru ctu res 3rl lcu llit 'li \1)' pldh llHlp hy ure ultim a le ly consl illiled by Ihe inle rp rela live ene o unl er belIVecli (l nd wor ld . T hal is why spee ch or logo s is Ihe key 10 on lolo gy : 10 in,!u ire nto the natu re of be in g is to explore the con diti ons of o ur d i I rent l'c way s of exp lica ting or add ress ing bein g. Lale r on, Hei deg ger 1V0u id desi gna te hi s analys is of lire or Das ein as prep arat o ry. as the first stag e in th e proj ect of fund ame nta l ont ology. But in Ihe begi nnin g of the twe nt ies, it seem 5 that Ihe inve sti gati on of life, and mor e precisel y, into the logo s of Iife, is thollght to be esse nlia lly the sam e thin g as onto l ogy , the " logo s of bein g". In view of this char acte risa tion o f phil osop hy, one cou ld say thal the inqu iry into li re and ilS poss ibili ties o f spee ch is to Hei deg ger a kind of first phi loso phy, thou gh he seld om uses exac tly Ihis exp ress ion to desc ri be his phi loso phic al proj ec!. 50 Still , a com pari son w ith Aris totl e's noti on of a first phil osop hy (prote philosophia) is no dou bt poss ible , to som c exte nt at leas t, si nce Hei deg ger co nsid ers th e kind of phil oso phic al inve sti gali ons he is purs uin g as mor e basi c or prim ary in rela tion not on ly ta eve ry kind o f spe cial phil oso phie al disc ipli ne but also ta th e pos itive sciences . In this way , he seems to ho ld on to a rath er trad ition al view on Ihe rela tion betw een phil osop hy and pos iti ve scie nce , wh ich is also end ors cd by Hus serl. Thi s is how eve r at the sam e tim e a point on whi ch Hei deg ger seve rely crit icise s Hus serl, as he thin ks that HusserL' s phil oso phy is gov ern ed by a scie ntific idea l of kno w led ge that date s bac k la the age of sc ienti fic revo lutio ns, and in part icul ar to Des cartes' phil osop hy.51 The tirst phil osop hy or onlo logy in Ari sto ll e's sens e cen tres on lhe qu estion con cern ing bein g as bein g, whi ch rece ives ils answ er w it h the a rti c ul atio n of th e lirsl prin cipl es and cau ses (G/'chai kai aitia i) o f bein gs,52 By co ntrast, the oth er scie nce s "co n cern them selv es with a spec ific bei ng, that is, with som e spec ifie gen us, w hi ch th ey [jrst hav e circ ulTIscrib
Il 'cds ucccss 10 slich pl'ncipl es w hich arc cO tnn\On l a il scie nces , and Ih lll holo ngs 1O li rst philoso phy. Ana logo usly , Heideg ger thin ks that the " li rst" or Illos i fu nda me ntal lask o f phil osop hy is to eluc idat e the natu re or our undc rstandi ng of bein g, whi ch the othe r scie nces silentl y assu m e, and thu s also to reve al the poss ibili ty and natu re of the artic ulat ion of Ihe pri ncip les of bei n gs. . How eve r, i f onto logy is base d on an anal ys is o f a mod e of bC\11g th at is pcc lIlia r to a spec ifie bei n g, this mea ns that onto logy ncc cssa rily has an onti cal fo und at ion. 54 On Hei deg ger' s acco llnt, this is true a lso of Ari stot le 's onto logy : not only bec ause Aris totle transfor ms his que sti on of bein g into a que stio n con cern ing ausia, but also on acco unt of his view that th e first phil oso phy is a th eolo gy, sinc e God prov es ta co nsti tute the prim ary prin cipl e and ca use of rea lity .55 How eve r, Heideg ger also sugg ests , nota bly in his rcad ing of the Nic oma che an Ethics, that ther e is ano ther onti eal foun d atio n in Ari sto!le ' s \Yor k, nam ely hmn an prax is, and th at th ese two pers pec tive s, i.e. the di vine and the hum an, are in con flict in Ari stotl e. S6 As we wi ll see late r on in thi s stud y, this con flie t is one betw een nou s and logo s, unm ed ia ted, " intu itiv e" reas on and fini te, di sc urs ive reas on . For ln Illaki ng first phil oso phy into theo logy, Aris totle con cciv es of Gad not merel y as th e obj ect ofk now ledg e but also as its sub jeet ." l n thi s way o ne co uld say that to Aris totl e too, the questi o n of be in g in fact co ncer ns bein g as give n , that is, as give n to the divi ne nou s , th ough poss ibly also to the hum an logo s. . Heide gge r argu es for the orig i nali ty or fund ame ntal stat us o f hts proj ect prim aril y by dem arca ting il agai nst pos iti ve scie nce and wor ldv iew (Weltanschauung). But as . rem arke d above, tn t h l y twe ' e ear ntte s,
GA 24, p. 26. Thus Heid egge r alwa ys insists that . . .1 Aristotl e's God has noth mg III com mon wl t 1 the C hristian God ; il is simp ly a name for eternal bei ng or pure prese nce; sec e.g. GA 19, pp. 22 1-22 4 . This point 1S slres sed by D. E. Stan . , Elllity and Existence . An Onl% g/ca l Inves tigation of Aristotle alld Heid egger, pp. 72-73, 78-80. " Met. 983n5- 10. SlI Thi s di cho\ orny Is di sclIs scd abov e all in GA 24, 2-3; in the who le of GA 27; GA 2 9/3 0, 1, 4: GA 56/57 : " Die Id ee de r und das Welt anscha uungs prob l c m" (w he n rc rc rrin g 10 para grnphs III Ihls cour se, 1 nbbrc vintl on "GA 56/5 7:1" ), .use the 1-2 . Heidegge r's critiq ue of the notio n ofph lloso phy Il '' worl d-vi w is ex plore d bclo w , Section S.
S4

bei ng".53 Acc ordi ng ly, a part ic ul ar scie nce or epis /eme can nat a sce rtain the trut h of its Qwn basic principles. Aris tot le states, for in arde r ta do ths , one
An exception to this is GA 27, p. 19. This critic ism is exte n5vely elabo rated
oV 'H

ed, but not with being unq uali ficd , nor as

rrpaY J.lme ov'W \,

52 SccM el. IV. I,V I.I. 53 Met. 1025b8 - IO: "Itep i

in GA 17 Chap ter Two . '

1tepi. 'tou'tou

1:\ ltEptY aU' ovxi TrEpl vro cntf> o Uav".PCtI.llO:).l EVcn

Kat yvo

1<)

CII AP'J'ER ONE

Ci rA l'TER ONE

of Heideg ger nonetheless describes his philosophiea l proj eet as a kill(l ri etly put, phi losophy in science , namely as a "primo rd ial science".59 B is di se lose the "primordial " level of reality or intellig ibility wh ich sc iences whil e necessa rily suppos ed to be inaccess ibl e to the other 60 presupposed by them Thus even though Heideg ger at this stage does to not hes itate to ca li philoso phy a sc ience, he is simultaneously try ing stingu ishes work out a concep tion of philoso phy that clearly di s phil osophy fro m science, as he lh inks that the scientilic pursuit involve of theory and or rests up on certain assumptions as regards the nature if theoreti cal know ledge, which he wants to cha ll enge. Accord ingly, phy is not theoret ical theot-y is the same as positive science, then phi/oso know ledge. a However, in Heidegger 's view, those who deny that phi losophy is kind of"prac tica l" (theoretical) science tend instead to reduce it to some undertaking, arguing tha t philosophy should provide man with norms
as to thi s sense shou ld precede the positiv e sc iences in slich a way

ly, relation between the theo retical and the practica!. More precise g a Heideg ger wants to escape From these two alternatives by revealin is more original sense or(phi losophi cal) rcsearch and knowledge, which to [n this pursuit , however, Heideg ger simulta neously hopes to be ab le t of redefine the nature of science itself and eventu all y also the concep world- view. Heideg ger' s discuss ion of science might be said to toueh on three not "ep istemic " idea l of kn ow ledge, and to show why thi s should ry govern philoso phical research. Secondly, to achieve this, it is necessa of scientifi c to reflect upon the constitu tion and the pres uppositions
S?

the and va lues and to be of li se to man 's life in gencra l. In alher wards, ilosop hy as worldalternative ta philoso ph y as science seems to be ph sc ience view. Thus Heid egger's att emp t to demarcate ph il osophy frol11 ing the involve s th e task ta c ome to grips \\'th th e questio n concern

ti fi c condu et. not conceivable in term s of cither practi cal- moral or scien

But such a reflection is also mol vated by the broader task o f' e1ucidating the nature ofkno wledge and understanding as such, since ng sc icntific knowle dge makes up one, specifie mode of unders tandi work in th is respect bas ically Hmong others. Third ly, if on on the conditi ons of scienti fi c consist s in a transce ndenta l refleeti any knowledge, th en il might seem that philosophy cannot rca lly give positi ve contribu tion to science, and Heidegger also states that science cannot and shou ld not "wait for philosophy" .61 However, even though phi losophy is not positive in the way science is, but interpre ts on the ry, onto logical level that which in science is an ontical discove tation eventually can Heideg ger still seems to think that this Interpre give a contribution 10 science, at least to the sciences of man, in virtue of ils determ ination and concep tualisat ion of the being of human is, Dasein ." ln the following, 1 focus on the first of these points, that shou ld not imitate positiv e why philoso phy in Heideg ger's view 63 . SCience. For the most part, Heidegger speaks rather generally about science , but it seems elear that he primari ly has the natu ra l and mathematical has science s in mind, and that he is usi ng "scienc e" in a sense it ger is careful to acquired in modern times. In his later wri tings, Heideg , di stingui sh between different stages in the dcvelopment of science wh ich has resulted in the age of technology, as he calls il. This he takes ed to involve quite a different experie nce of nature and reality as compar not only to the ancient era, but also to the age of seientific brcakthrough not in the modern sense." By contras !, in the earl y wo rks, while t and change in the dcnying that there has been substantial develop men in course of hi story as regards the concept ion of nature and bein g e genera l, Heidegger claims 1ha1 the Greek noti on of science as epistem
kllowlcdgc.
61

ic, basic issues. Fifst, Heideg ger wants to Come 10 grips wilh a scientif

62

pp. JI 'I- 117,

ive 5 1 "prc- world ly" (vo/"ll'elt/ich) in the sense of bcing constitut

56/57: J The notion of a primord ia l sci ence or Urwissenschaft is developed in GA as ar; 2, 18-2? ln GA 58, Heidegger nstead spea ks about ph ilosophy UrspI' /lIlgswlssellschafl. g", wllich More precise /y, il shouJd disclose the Ur-etwas . the "primordial somethin

or wOI'hl: GA

SZ, p. 5 1. psychology of See SZ, 10, where Heidegger accuses anthro pology and prcs uppos ing an essenti ally Ca rtesian notion of man. in 1. J. Kocke lmans, Heidegger alld J Thi s is onc of the Illore important points 18. Sciel/cc. Sec in parti culal' pp. in Holzweg e (GA 5); "Gelasse nheit", ;Dic Ze il des Wcltbild es", pp. M See e.g. < l.\'s /c ellltcil; " Di e Fl1lge na ch der Tec hnik", pp . 940 in Vorrrdge und in (ic pp . later Heidegg er's AII/sti /ze; Urcmcr III/d Freibllrg er Vorlrtige (GA 79 ). The nach dem HlIlIdillij of scicnce is Ireli tcd by E. Richt er, Heideggers Frage utldCr.' c:luiftell, who al so de voles considerable space C/(III'III"'('lIllvlI 1/I1f{ die rroklel/ lV.w.!1Is 0 1 Il con lpnrl so ll hC1WCCll KfI!lll1 11d 1lcidcggcr in ll1is l'CS pCCI.

1 <0

II <

( 'li A 1'1 1;1{ ONh is slili I>OVCill llI g lhc vicw on know ledge of' lhe prescili dll y, Wilh idcn, he docs nO lmC nlO suggesllhat there is a conceplion or seiellec in !l G"cck l11 0 ll g hl that would have sorne modern equivalenl. 65 On the co nl l'lII'y , in vicw o r Aristotle's tripartite divis ion between the " Iheorcl ical phil osophies" (phifo sophiai theoretikai) of theo logy, physics and malhemalics, Heidegger argues that it is important to nOie thal whereas the Greeks regarded the sciences as different kinds of philosophy, the modern view has it the olher way round. 66 Bul in spite of this difference, Heidegger thinks thal th e nolion of epis telile rightfully might be said to display an ideal of know ledge lhat has bearings upon the modern view on philosophy and science alike. Thi s is the idea, mentioned above, that true knowl edge coneerns the un iversal and lhe immulable and moreover has a deductive structure. 67 And on his view, thi s is thc reason why one has looked to preci se ly Ihe mat hematical sciences for a mode l for know ledge as SUCh . 68 Just as Ari stotle thinks that ep isf eme ca l1 oil ly presuppose ilS own basic princip les, Heidegger argues lhat science necessarily is blind to ilS own foundati on and possibilily, fol' lhi s is accessible to philosophy only. ln a way not dissimilar to Thomas Kuhn, Heidegger thin ks lhat the possibilily of scientiCic progress requ ires periods of "normal science", during wh ich the princi ples, crileria, methods elc . upon which lhe sCentific work rests, are nol put into question . Since this involves a certain naivet, Heidegger thinks th al lrul y fruil[u! scientific \York happens in limes of cr isis, wh en it becomes urgenl 10 sc ienti sls themselves to re fl ect upon their basic concepls, logic, epislemology etc. 69 However, even though thi s kind of fou ndational research invol ves a transformation in lhe underslandin g of being, il cannot be idenlical 1 0 philosophical reflection, for it wi ll never be the task of science ta rai se the fundamental questions concerning trulh and being, nor to approac h
sc ience as a possibil ity fo r human ex istence, i.e. as a parti cular form of

t' II AP rE l ON I;
knowkdgc and und crslandin g as such, phil osophy is ab le to understand
th e nature o f sc ientillc conduel in a way that is ina ccessib le to the scienline perspecti ve ilselr. For this reason , philosophy should not try to

life. But s ince this is, or su He id egger argues, prccise ly the proper

philosophical per5peclive on science, as it is lhe ri ght approach 10

65

imil ale sciencc, lhough this is exactly what has happened in philosophy. Arislolle's characterisation of the difference between first philosophy and lhe olher sciences is to some extent, though certainly in a differenl way, preserved in Heidegger. As noted above, He idegger describes science as an ontical inquiry which deals witll a specifie region of be ings, whereas phi losophy as ontology, although it has an ontical foundation, does not in the same way con cern ilself wilh a demarcaled field of research, as it has the capacily to ask with respect to anything what and how it is. This is also Heidegger's position prior to the introduction of the projecl of fundamental ontology, since life' s access to its world must be anal ysed without prejudices as to what different kinds of entities there are. In this sen se, philosophieal refleclion cannol be "positing" or objectifying: il must reach a leve l o f meaning more basic than thi s, parti y in arder 10 be ab le to understand prec isely how the scientific disciplines are con stituted. For the demarcation of a particular region ofbeings is rooted in an objectity in g act, which makes it possible to approach beings as e.g. phys ical obj ects . In this way , as science circumscribes ilS fie ld of research, il adopts a certain "attitude" (Einstellung). Thereby it estab lishes and res tri clS th e ways in which beings can be given and known , as il assumes a specifie kind o f knowledge and a particular mode of givenness. 70 Bul philosophy cannol restrict itself to a single position or atlilude, sinee ils task is to gel allhe gi venness of beings as such, prior to any di vision into di fferent kinds of beings; correlatively, it seeks to uncover the fundam ental characlerislics orman's access to beings, whether scientific, practical, etc. ln Heidegger 's view, this kind ofphilosoph ical inquiry should make it possible to see how both philosophy and science have their origin and poss ibility in the constitution of Dasein, in its understanding of being, which is the condition o f possibilily of human aClivity as such. But since science is restricted in the way JUS! outlined, it do es not cnact ils
unde rstan ding o f bCll g as fu ll y as philosophy, wh ich has access to th e

66

GA 62*, p. 21. GA 24, p. 24; GA 27, pp. 18- 19. Aristotle m.ke, hi, divi , ion in Met. 1026.18-19. 67 Cf. GA 19, p. 34. 'EItU: T1I1'l is further discussed in the next chapter. n 68 See GA 17, pp. 81- 83. 69 S2. p. 9 ; GA 24, p. (: 67.

nature o r undcrstanding prior to the specification imposed by sc ience.

70 For Ihe cUllce pl nf !','1I11/d/llll};.

(,hupler Four, in paJ'li cular Section 3.

42

. 11

C' II AI" I'I 1( (lN I '

\'01' Ihi s t'cuson, what sc ience is in part , philoso pll y 1 " Il " ideggcr puts it o n olle occas ion, phi losop hy il1 thls mo rc scic ntilic than science itsclf. 71

'"'IN 1., ,, tllll ll y

ni

!t il t

() I il S

5. Heidegger's critique of ethies

Philosophy should not be a theoreti cal discipline in the same sense as science, b ut nor should it be " praetical", if that is taken to mean that philosophy sh ould artieulate a world-view or be an ethi es. Heidegger's relation to clhics. and to practical phi losophy in ge neral, becomes a particul arly urgent malter in connection \Vith Ari stotl e, s ince Heidegger has turn ed precisely to Aristot lc's " practical philosophy ", Poli/les, Rhetorie and not least th e Nieomachean Ethies, in o rder to find a testimony of A ri stotl e 's ins igh t into th e fact ieity of life and it s experien ces. Of parti cul ar impo rt ance in thi s co nnectio n is Ihat the Ethies does not encompass a scientifte methodo logy, wh ich to Ari stotl e means that ethics does not 50 tnuch ask "why" human co nd llet is as il is, reducing il to certai n bas ic princip les and causes, but rather seeks to make clear " that" il is of suc h and such a nature, thus tak ing a nOI1reducti ve view on life. However, one of th e most stri king features of Heidegger 's interpretation of the Ethics is that he does not read illi ke a wo rk on ethics in the co rnrnon sense, but regards it as an analys is of human existenc e as a who le, prior to th e divi sio n between the theoretical and the practi cal, or belween whal is and w hat should be. 72 But considerin g that Heidegger's ow n work ha rd ly is " neutral" in to ne b ut c learly permeated by the co nvi cti on that there is an au th entic possibili ty for human existence - to ta ke ho ld of one's ow n ex iste nce and to deeide in favou r of the truth - his stated suspicion of eth ies might seern a bit surprisi ng. It becomes unde rsta ndab le, however, w hen related to hi s understanding of the notion of ph ilosophy as wo rld- view, in connecti on w ith whi ch Heidegger tri cs to show that to questi on a traditiona ll y theoreti eal approac h to life does not have to lead to a 7i reduction of the theoretical to tht: prac lical.
GA 27, p. 2 t9. Heidegger's in terpretation o f the Eth ics is discussed in Chapter T hree . 1] Heidegger deals with the not ion o f philosophy as world -view primari ly in connection with the ph iJosop hy of va lue (Wertphil osophie) of the neo-Kan ti ans Windelband and Ricken, and also w ith respect to Lotze. These thinkers a re discussed ex tensive ly in the who le first part of GA 56/57: l, and a s im ilar disc uss ion takes up
71

Aceord ili S 10 Il cid cgge r, cven th ough th e not ion of ph il osophy as worlel -v icw m ighl scem diametrical ly opposed to the idea that phi loso ph y should be mode lled a fter th e positive sciences, both v iews an..: in nlet th e Qutcome of a rcsignat ion concerning the tas k and worth or phil osop hy. They both stom from the belief that phi losophy must try to j usti fy its existence by referring to sorne kind of "practical" utility." Aga ins t thi s, Heidegger wants to retrieve w hat he regards as the tru e spirit ofGreek philosophy: philosophy as pure Saehforschung, as a kinel of resea rch which is eoneern ed w ith the fundam ent al quest ions of phil osoph y and wh ic h reali ses th at thesc qu est ions are worth pursuing for their own sake and not because of ther re leva nce to " practica l"

mauers. 75
Now ethi cs does not necessaril y have to be norm ative in kind, in other words, it does not have to endorse certain valu es on the basis of wh ich it is possible to distingu ish belween mora lly jllstifi ed and unjustifi ed it can also be cri t ical, th at is, investigate the fOllndatio n of val uation, the reason why we eonsider some thi ngs to be good and others not, etc. According to Heidegger, however, phi loso phy should affirm neither ofthese alternati ves. First, w h y cou Id philosophy not be a cr itieal ana lys is of the phenomenon of va lue and va luati on? ln fact, l-leideggcr 's criti cisl11 of the philosophy of va lue propounded by the neo- Kantians ean be secn as a contri bution to such an analys is, insofar as thi s c ri ticism ail11s at showi n g th at these thinkers fai l to see th e phenomenon o f va lue since they are still movin g within the opposition of what is and what should be (Sein and Sollen), objectivity and subj ecli v ity, th eory and practice, etc. T hey have j ust reversed the tradi t iona l priority and th us take th e
most of Heidegger's li me in the olhe r course con tain cd in th is volume: " Phanomenologie und transzendenta le We rt philosophie" (GA 56/57:2). See also GA 58, 2. N Cf. GA 29/30 , p. 3. ?5 The ward "p ractical" is Heidegger's own, GA 19, pp . 254 255 . There Heidegge r c laims !hat it is cha ractcristic of our time that even the most sc icntifica!ly oriented ph ilosophy can nol res ist from appeal ing to "the practical" for its j ustification, since it is anxious to show that its otherwise " theoretical" results have a determinate value ta the extent thal they cOlllribut e 10 the formati on of a worl d-view. ln Ihis lectu re, ll e id eggcr accuses Ch ri stia nity for this deve lopment, arguin g that because of the innucnce or C hristianity on phi losophy, phi losop hy was put on a par with literature, in general, wh ich we re thought ta be of use nlusic, Ci e. , i.c. \Vi th c ullurn l in so fu r as tlley cOlitriIJut !.!d 10 tl le education o r a soc iety <.md its mcmbers .

72

44

,45

' 11 i\I'TER ONE

primaey of praet ieal reason fo r grantcd as thcy try to ex pl "l " tlie stfttu s of objecti ve, transpersonal va lidity traditionall y ascribed \0 thenry an d sci ence in tc rOl s of a will to truth as va lue (where the va lu t.: lhu::; is objectivity)76 ln thi s way, this phil osophy is mundane an d as such
na ve, wh ereas phenomenol ogy, insofar as it s task is to inves ti gate w hat cssc ntiall y th e saill e kind as the pos iti ve sc iences and is thus fro m the bcg inni ng prevent ed rrom be in g o ntology o r phenomeno logy .78

il means to be given, moves beyond these oppos itions in order to be able to understand the ir genesis, i.e. how it is th at they can make up forms of give nness.
Thus, eve n though one mi g ht thin k tha t Il eidegger has somct hing in

C Olll1l10n with (h is fonn of "practica l" philosophy, since he has shawn that for exampl e th e pursuit of knowledge cannot be un ders tood in isolation fro m th e sphere of fee li ng, desire, will , etc. , he would still insist that he is doing somethin g eompletely different from th e neoKantians. For one thin g, Heidegger argues, even though these thi nke rs
want to round theory upon practica l reaso n, they sti ll val ue the fo rm er

phil osophy ne ither should nor can give guidance fo r action in the sense o r rul es or norms. It should n ot, since its truc aim is not to be producti ve ("poieti c"), but to enaet a parti cular "how" . That is to say, the essence of philosophy is its ve ry activity, or, in other words, " Phi loso phy is philosophi sing and nothin g else".79 This is nOlhing but He idegger 's inlerpretalio n of th e A ristotelian id ea th at phil osoph y sho uld be rega rde d as a farm of praxis, actio n. The reason wh y philosophy cannot at ail preserib e ways of li fe to oth ers is di scussed at great length in a lecture co urse from 1928/29, Einlei/u/lg in die Philosophie'o Here Heideggcr suggests that if we take
"world -v iew" in ilS literaI sense, i.e. as a \Vay o f seein g the world , th en it e mes cl ose to w hat th e Greeks expressed with th e co ncept o f elhos.

more hi ghly, in th at th ey think th at va lues and nonns pertaining to scientific conduet (s uch as c .g. truth) have a more uni ve rsa l character than those belongin g to ethi cs and aestheti cs. In thi s way, they are thus still holding on to the tradit ional csteem for the theoreti cal. Agai nst this, Heidegger for mulates his own view th us:
Th is predo minance of the theoretical must be broken , certa inl y not in SI/ch a way that one proclairns a pri may or the practical, and not in arder to for once br ing rorward someth in g else wh ich disp lays the proble rn from a new point of view, bu t becausc the theoreticrl l tsc lf lInd as such points back into somethi ng 17 theorct ica l.

T his is a \V ay of inhabitin g th e wo rld in th e sense of occup yi ng a partieu lar "stance" (Hal /ul1g) w ithin it; it can thus be compared to l-le idcgge r 's own noti on o f being in the worl d." In thi s sense, Heidegger claims, philosophy is actually foun ded on a particular worldview, and exactl y for that reason it cannot be the task of philosophy to develop a worl d-view and to " distri bute this buil ding as a ho me fo r everyone"." That is to say, inso far as ph ilosophy is a for111 of life, a \Vay of being in the worl d, which involves a perso nal commi tment - as
A ri stotle says, to save the truth ,83 o r in He idegger's words, to assume

As this sho uld make clear, one of the reasons why phil osoph y as Heidegger conceives of it cann ot be eth ics is th at it cannot be divided into special branches, for to do so is to bestow upon philoso phy a
dete rmin ate sphere o f obj e cts, w hosc mo de of be in g is m ore or Jess taken for gran ted. l n this way, phil osophy bccom cs LI disciplin e of

rcspo nsibility for the und erstanding of man - philosophy does indeed necessaril y imply somethi ng like an ethiea l dec ision or convicti on. Morcover, in ass uming thi s responsibility, the phi losopher can be said to act a5 a kind of ideal (Vorbild), though not in th e moral sense, but by 84 disclosing his elhos as a possibility for human existence. But prec isely beca use phil osophy is ethi cal in this sense, in volving a choice of a

'" cr. GA
79
HO

59, p. 172, GA 27, p. 10.

G A 21, p. JO; "Philosophie ist Philosophieren und nichts we iter." See also GA 29130, p. 6.
GA 27.

" GA 56/57 , tO, see atso p. 143.

77 GA 56/ 57, p. 59; "Diese V orherrschaft des T heoretischen mul3 gebrochen werden, zwar nicht in der Weise, dal3 man ei nen Pri mat des Praktischen prok lam iert, und nicht deshalb, urn nun mal etwas anderes zu bringen, was die Prob leme vo n einer neuen Se ite ze igt, sondern wei l das Theoretische se lbst und ais so lehes in cin Vorth eoreti schcs zurUt:kwci st. "

lit It O rn ca ns both "place" and "home" as weil as "charaCler" and "c ustom". Oe; Il cid eggcr translat es il as lIall /lllg throughou i G A 18 and GA 27 (among ot her wCll'k s). III (iA 27, p. 379. eN. 1096u\4 - 16.

(1 1127 , p. 7.

46

,17

ON I'
particular good, il ca nnot be cthi ca l in th e oth er SC II 1'IC. 1. " N lluw w llll i il means to be good in genera l. In enac tin g a parti cu lal" lill!,

'1l A PTER ONE

philoso phy delimit s itsel f, leavin g other poss ibilitics behind, and "ann ot sh ow in the same way what it wou Id mean to lead these other lives. T he reaso n w hy thi s de limi ta ti on preve nts phil osop hy fr om articula ting a them)' on ethi cs is, in Heidegger's view, lhat an indiv idual decisio n cann ot be a direct co nseque nce of a th eory, since it necessa rily in vo lves somethin g mo re th an what a (heory can say. O f cou rse, th is holds for a th eory of knowle dge as weil, so il is not reall y ethi cs as such that is imposs ible in Heidegger's view; but first o f ail , he rejects every kind of "calculative" clhics, Le. the idea lhat it could be possibl e to es tabli s h beforehand the co nseque nces and content o f act io n. Accord in gly, th e task of ph il osophy as regard s ethies must be eonfine d to being a thinking o f elhos, o f what it means to be situated in th e world as human and what this implies eoneernin g th e poss ibili ties for man 's understandin g of bein g. COllccived of in {his \Vay, cthi cs is an inquiry into the essence of l11 a l1 .1;5 Insofar as lhis inquiry draws a dist inction betwec n authentic and inauthe nt ic enactm cn l of the essence of man, it is not neutral as regards man's possibilities of existence but in vo lves a ki nd of imperati ve, callin g upon man to exist in accordanee with his Q nature . Importa nt to Heidegger is that this im perat ive callnot wn be just an ideal, but must be eonfirm ed by life itse l[ as an ac tual poss ibility. That is to say, life itself must testi fy to the possibi lity o r authent icity. A nd as we w ill see in Chapter Three, on Heideg ger's view, Aristol le records such a lest imony in his Ethics. Howev er, philoso phy ean only " formall y indicate " this possibi lity, w hereas its exact content or meani ng must be left undetermi ned." T his mea ns th at if one reads th is inquiry into elhos as if il provide d us with fif{n principl es which wc
8S This is how Heidegge r \Vil! [orm u! ate hi s idea of an "ori gi na l ethi cs" in "Brief LIber den Humanismus", pp. in GA 9, p. 187. But in lex l, I-Ic-idegs er seem s 10 have cha nged his attitude towards Ari stotle's eth ics, as he daims lhat the h\qo- \Vith which his "elh ies" supposed ly would be conccrned, is preservc d in a more or igi nal way (anfdnglicher) in the traged ies of Sophocles Ihan in Arislot le's Ethics; p. 184. However, W. McNei ll has argued th at th is statement does not have ta be read as a deprecialio n of Aristo tl e; "A 'scarcely pondered ward'. The place of tragedy: Heidegger, Aristotle, Sophocles". 86 The idea that clhics only can be form alJy in dicated is propounded by J. van Buren, "The Young Heidegger, Ari stolle, Et hi es", p. 178. The notion of formai indi cnlion (fo/"l/1ale Anzeige) i.'i discussed in Chapter Four, Sect ion 8 of this study.

or

could use to seill e moral questio ns, one vi olatcs the idca of philoso phy '" phcnollleno logy and ra di cal questi oni ng. There w ill always be a gap bclwee n a ph ilosophi cal analys is of th e bas ic po ssibili ties fo r hum an existence o n the one hand and the ind ividual 's eo nerete enactm ent o f th ese poss ibilities on the oth er; no th eory ea n close this gap, but thi s is brOlight abo ut on ly as th e indiv idual decides in fav our o f a parti e ul ar \Vay of life, thereby bestow ing deterrninate content upon an otherw ise formaI or "empty " poss ibility. Accordingl y, an important as pect of He id egger's concepti on of phil osophy is hi s co nv iction th at phil oso ph y must a fft rm its own rac ti eit y, and not fo rget that its sll pposedl y univers a l c1 aim s are u ltimate ly found ed upo n a parti eu lar expe ri ence w ithin an equ all y parti cular situati on. ln lIe idegge r's v iew, howeve r, th e fae ti c ity of philoso phy is o ften forgo tlen, an d to forget this is also to be blind to one's historie al origin . 6. Philosophy as hisloriea! kllolV!ed ge As a speci fi c " how" of li fe, philoso ph y shares th e basic he rm enelltie condi tion o f Iife outline d above . In oth er w ords, it belon gs to th e fact icity of phil osop hy th at it has to take its departu re [rom preestablis hed concep ts, ques ti ons, etc., w hieh it moreov er can never fully d ischarge, as H eidegge r states in the earl y manusc npt on A mta II 87 . ' e. Wit h this idea, he wa nts ta chall en ge the ideal o f a philoso ph ieal beginnin g wi thollt pres up positions, emana ting From Descart es an d still prevale nt in Husserl. For as Heideg ge r recalls in an autobio graphie al sketch wr itten late in life, th e lesson he leam ed fro m Husser l, th at fliifilling th e phenam enologiealmot to to gel to " the thin gs themse lves" requires a radi cal bracketing of the traditi on, soon came ta have a dirferen t mea nin g for him. He discove red that ph enomen a logy d id not 50 much rree him From the hurden of trad ition as rather make him sense th e need to .go ever deeper into it, and into Ar istotle' s th ink in g in particul ar:
Husse rl 's leaehing was eonducled in the form of a prac lice in phenom enologica l "seeing", wllich requ ired that one rct'raincd from Illakin g lise of philosophical know ledge
17

PA , p. 2'1 8,

48

Cll AP l' I( ON I'

tcs ling il, but al so (hat one gave up bringing the authUill y ni 1 11(1 great th ink ers int o the discuss ion. Ho\Vc vc r. 1 \V as CVCII 1 t:1l1j
capabl e to pari l'rom A ri stotle and the oth er Greek th ill kc l'!I the clearer il became to me how my growing ramiliarity \Vith the phenomenological seeing ferti li sed t he explication of I ll e

'1lA l'TER O NE
which tll ey \Vc rc Ilot al ail in tc ndcd in the first place. Thus, the goa l of destructi on is to ma ke clear th e " phenomenal" basis of Arislotle ' s

Aristotelian leXIS . Ta be sure, 1 was not yet able to direct!y foresee what decisive consequences the renewed turn to Ari stot le
would entai l. 88

The phenomenologieal seeing did not on ly clear the way to Aristotle's philosophy but it also made Heidegger awa re of the impo rtance of reOecting lIpon the way in which philosophy , perhaps neeessaril y, assumes Ari stotl e' s thought as a rou nd ation. For only agai nst the background of such a re flection will it be poss ible to decide what it eo uld mean to give a proper response to this foundati on. The name Heidegger gives to this reflection is " destruction" (Deslrukl ion). For al this stage at least, the goal of destruction is to make precisely Aristotle and no one cise - accessible." Even though we still lea n on Aristotle and make use of his conceptuality, Heidegger rem arks, th e traces of Aristotle are today almost imp oss ib le ta see, sin ce th e modern philosophieal framewo rk is not directly derived from A ri stolle, but relates to him only in a roundabou t way, through a traditi on of interpretations and transformations of hi s thought. This tradi lion has also brought w ith it a fo rgetfu lness of the facticity of Aristotle 's thought. That is to say, we have lost track or the hermc neutic situat ion of Aristot le's philosophy, which gave hi s thought its specifie direction. With this loss goes the risk of app lying Aristotle's concepts to things for
86: " Husse rls Belehrung gescha h in de r Form ei ner schrittweiscn Einbung des phanomcnologischen 'Sehens', das zugleich citl A bsehen vom ungcprLiften Gebrauch ph ilasophischer Kenntnisse verla r.gtc, aber auch den Verziclll , die Autorilal der gro/3cn Dcnker ills Gesprach ZlI bringen. Indes konnl e ich mich von Aristoteles un d den anderen griechisc hen Denkern utn sa wen iger trennen, je deu/ lic her mi r clie wClchscnde Vertrautheil m il dem phanomenologischcn Seben die Auslegung der Arislu leli schell Slo;llri ften befruchtctc. Zwar konnte ic h noch nicht sogleich bc rsehen, welche entscheidendcn Fa lgen die erncute Zuwendung zu Aristote les bringen sollte. " 3'1 See PA, pp. 248-249. G. Fi gal has stressed that with the proj ect of fundamenta l ontology, H eidegge r's notion of destructi on is transformed: al this stage, He idegger can no longer hope la base his work on a ret rieval of hidden possibi lit ies in A rislolle, but must now turn to everyday, pre-ph ilosophical life as the source for orig ina l experience; see Marrill Heidegger ZIII" Eifljllrllllg, pp. 60 , 74. In Chapter Three, 1 will try to show that these Iwo perspectives CIre not incompat ible .
88 "Mei n Weg in die PhH nomenologie", p.

ph il osophy, an d iflhi s is an inlegral part ofphilosophy, then philosophy 90 lI1i ght ri ghtl ll y be called "historieal" knowl edge. /\ecordin gly , deslruction"in Heidegger ' s sense does not have a ne galive aim: it is not pursued for the sake of poinling out mistakes made in the past, but it seeks to uncover the truth lhat is embedded in th e tra diti on, albeit in a disguised form . Thererore, it will always be more directed towards the present than lhe past, whieh means that philosophy, in sofar as it is conscioll s of ilS own historical foundati on, intends to criticise itse l f as il critieiscs the past, namely for relying on lhis pa st without understand ing either the scope or nature of (his predicament. 91 As Heidegger puis it: the crili que does not eoneem the
facllhal we stand in a traditi on but how we do it. ln undertaking this kind of hislorical reflection, Heidegger is not mere ly try in g to make his Qwn s ituation tran sparent in relat ion to Aristotl e , but he is in fact rct rieving Aristotle's view on philosophica l research precisely in order L understand what is invol ved in such a o
92

retlection. However, this re(rieval might in its tum be regarded as a part of I-Ieidegger's clarification of his own historieal, hermeneutie situation \Vith respect 10 Aristotle, since Heidegger, as we wil l see in the next sect io n, wa nts to cha llenge the dichotomy between hi story and systemat;cs in philoso phy. That is, if th e " thing" (Sache) to whi ch phenomenology supposedly should direcl its attenti on, does nol exist independently of its interpretations, then inquiring into e.g. the nature o f ph ilosoph ieal research is not essential ly different fro m exp lorin g Aristoll e's understanding o f il. An importan t reason w hy Heidegger can turn with approval to Aristotle in th is conneclion is that Aristotle does not have any idea of a phi losophical beginning without presuppositions in the modern sense. I lcidcgger otTen emphasises that, in Aristotle's view, philosophy in its beginnin g must endorse already estab!i shed doxa, the op inions of th e wi se and th e many; an idea which has resulted in hi s fam o us mC lh odo J ica l dictulll that wc must "stal1 wi th that which is inte ll igib le og
Q(I

l'I I. p. 249.

9'
ql

r. GA t9, p. t 1.
51

PA, p. 251.

50

' II AI''J' I-'I{

10 US,

NI:l

in order 10 procccd 10 Ihal whi ch is inl c lli gl!> I,> hy 11111111''': '',93 Accordin gly, Arislollc almosl always begins hi s discussions \V ilh Cl statement of the cunent opinions of the matter at hand , und he is also Ihe first la write something like a history of philosophy, No t because he thinks we should re main there or assumes that doxa represents the trutll, but because he is convinced that the hi gher form s of knowledge grow out of less elaborated modes of understanding, and th at opinions, even ifthey are confused, nonetheless contain some element of truth, insofar as they are developed in contacl w ith the things whose nature he is about to explore, ln ather \Yord s, doxa is, al th e QutseL at least, w hat provides philosophy wilh an aim and direction, Initially, Ihe phi losopher cannol deliberate on the opinions of the past, but must take his stat'tin gpoint from Ihem, ass uming that traditional phi losoph ieal questions are meaningf111 and worth posing, Thi s principle is put to work al the beginn ing of th e Metaphy sics,
where A ri stotle introduces his inquiry inta th e nature of philosoph y or

positi on 10 say th al the philosophers of the pa Si have been posing the same question he is posing now, though Ihey were not fu lly aware o f what they actuall y were seekin g, since they were not ab le to art icu late their question as the question,concerning being as being, As these chaplers in the Metaphysics make c1ear, Aristotl e turns to doxa not onl y in order to find out whal the causes and principles o f beings are, but also in order to discover thal they eons!i!ute the theme of philosophy, What is the moti ve behind this mode of inq uiry? Accord ing
to Aristot le, ifwe do not pay altcnton to such diffieu lti es pertaining to th e tap ie ta be discussed that have been in th e tradition, wc w ill

not be able to do a\Vay w ilh the problems, since we will not know what Ihe difficullies consist in , Wc will be, as he says, like men who do not know where they are headin g, for the te/os of our research will remain concealed to us, Hence, even Ihe ab ility to pose philosophieal questions
in th e right way requires a e lear view o f the way in which the th ink ers , 97 orthe past used to pose tllese questlOll s.

wisdom , He noies that it is gene rally assumed that w isdom is knowledge of primary causes and principl es; accordin gly, Aristotle declares this opinion to be the point of depa rture for his discuss ion ," The dependency on doxa does nol end Ihere, however, for since there is no simple access to Ihese principles and causes - they are supposed to represent the ullimate level of explanat ion - Aristotle concludes that the best thing is to begin by questioning the common opinions about Ihe wise man, When we know what is peculiar 10 him, we wi ll , hopefully, be clear abo ut the nature of wi sdom itse! f, and eventuall y be ab le to reveal the nature of Ihose prineiples and causes the knowledge of whi eh is precisely wisdom," At this poi nt, Arislotle has finall y achieved the in itiall y stated las k of developing his own form u,lation of the essence of philosophieal work, and Ihe resu lt of his inte rro gations proves 10 be that the search for the primary causes and principles is in tct the same thing
as the quest ion conce rning bein g as bc in g .96 Hence Aristotle is now in a
93

He idegger hardi y eve r uses the word "destru ction" itself in connection with Aristotl e, but he often emphasises that Aristotle ' s philosophy proceeds as a critique of its predecessors," On this view, Aristotle wo uld thus have a ffirm ed Ihat on the one hand, philosophy
must receive its tasks throu gh an cncounter w ith th e tradition, but that

on the olher hand, this tradi li on is o nl y lru ly accessible to the person who has a lready begull to engage in philosophical q uest ions, that is, who has succeeded in seeing through the surface of doxa and reached behind il. Heidegger' s idea thal Ari stotle pursues his ph ilosophieal
in vesti gations as a critique of hi s predecessors is imp ortant to keep in

mi nd in connection w ith the ques tion about what ki nd of origin Aristotle is to Heidegger. For Heide gge r occasionall y seems to th in k that the reason why philoso phy must in volve a confrontation with
A ri stot.l e is that hi s work represents th e "natmal" views on the world, w hich arc no t achieved throu gh an encounter w ith the tradit ion as is th e

E.g . E. N. l095b2 -4, PI/ys. 184a I 6- 18; M el. I029b l O-13 . In GA 62*, Hei degger

discusses at length how Aristot le in the Melaphysics achieves his concept o f cro$ia Ihrough an examination of the cornillon op inions concern ing il; see in particul ar p. II. ., Met. 981 b27-29, '.15 Met. 1.2. 96 Mel . J003a21- 32 .

case wilh later phi loso phy , ln thi s way, Aristotle would Ihus be re lati vely "simple" or unmediated origin,99 But in view of his emphasis on the aspect of eri!ique in Aristotle's work, it is c lear that He idegger
9J

'lMGA

M el. 18. pp. PA , p. 264. fi') Sec hnpter T hrcc, Sec tion 1.

52

51

l'liAI' Il ' 1( ON I'

lhinks th at such a vicw on I\ristolle is lOO simpl e. t\l'I slotl
,1 ,"1

wOlk is lIl\

origin not 50 much on account of ils "carly" and CIHll'lIc tc.:l", but above ail because of its philosophieal power. And it is a rdlccled origin, as it is based upon a confrontation with carlier thought. In other
words, Ar istotle had 10 "destruct" hi s tradition no less than Heidegger.

7. Historical interpretation and systematic philosophy We have seen that the destruction oflhe tradition necessari ly in volves a retum to Aristotle, which should make us reali se not on ly that his
thOll ght has heen concealed by th e tradition, but also that our present

situation is constitutcd by this concea lm ent. ln relation to this predicament, Heidegger envisages the following task: "ln accordanec wilh our position, the original posilion should be developed anew, that is, thi s position is aecording to Ihe changed historical situation something different but still the same.,,100 Historical relleetion should not only enable us to understand ourselves, but also make it poss ibl e to understand the past, i.e. Aristotle, in su eh a way that we release him from the tradition W I But the task of Iiberaling Arislotle's "original position" is pursued not simply for the sake of bcing able to reinterprel his philosophy against its tradition al reeeption, but above ail in order to make his philosophical position or situation accessible again, 50 as to undersland his mode of questioning. 102 The idea that Aristotle too was forced to develop his philosophy Ihrou gh a critique of his predecessors, and in parlieular of Plato, is occasionally employed by Heidegger in order to compare his own philosophical situation to Aristotle 's. For just as Aristotle is the c10sesl heir to the legacy of Plato, so is Heidegger 10 Ihal of Husserl. Accordingly, Heidegger hop es Ihal, by lurninglo Aristotle, he could bring out the true meaning of Husserl's phenomenology in the sa me way Ihal Aristotle had radicalised Plato. This self-interpretation constitutes the background to Heidegger's leclure course Sophistes, where Heidegger suggests thal, when Husserl
100 GA 63, p. 76: "Entsprechend unserer Stellung ist die lJrsprnglich e Stellung wieder neu auszubilden, d.h., sie ist entsprechend der getinderten historschen Lage etwas anderes und doch dasselbe." 101 GA 19, pp. 4 13.41 4. J02 Cf. GA 62*) p. 2, and above, pp. 24-25.

fram cd hi s noti on o r intcntiona lity, he in faet redi scovered an idea whi l.:h had long bcen lost, but which \Vas realised already by Plata when he claimcd that specch is a'ways about something, it always ha s the fonn of logos linos. 103 Thus the philosophy of Plato and in some sense also Husserl represenls somthing new in Ihe history of phi losophy ; but being new, their thinkin g was also vaeillating and unfulfilled, It had to be brought to completion by their fo ll owers: Aristotl e and Heidegger. For if il was Plato's (Husserl' s) achievemcnt to discover intentionality, it was Aristotle 's (Heidegger's) merit 10 gi ve il its true signification by showin g that it must be situated within an ontology of human li fe, which is nol developed in Plato (Husserl). Hence, when Heidegger says that "There is no scientifie underslallding, i.e. historieal return to Plato, without a passage thal goes Ihrough Aristotle.,,'04, he wants to imply that on ly through his OIV II philosophy can Husserl 's thinking be understood, just as Aristotle ' s philosophy sheds new light on Plato. Plato is more difficult to uilderstand th an Aristotle, because his ideas and queslions are nol yC I fu ll y developed and point in many direclions, whereas in Aristotle thcy are "worked out in a more radical and scientific way".105 With the names substituted , this means that Heidegger has fulfilled certain possib ilities which no doubt were inherent in Husserl 's thinkil1g but which were hidden to Husserl himself. In Ihis way, Heidegger has nol on ly radiealised Husserl's philosophy and taken it a slep further, bui he has also artieulated a new horizon with in which to interpret it, in that he has inv it ed into I-Iusserlian phenomenology the onlologieo-te leo logica l dimension , whieh he has received From Aristotle. Precisely on this point, however, it becomes elear how Aristotle's histori eal situation differs [rom that inhabited by Heidegger. Heidegger understands his own philosophy to be reintroducing the question of being 10 philosophy, thereby breaking wilh an epistemologieallradilion wilhin philosophy and reawakening a tradition of ontologica l work that
J GA 19, p. 598. In the Sophisl, 262eS6, Plato says: "It is nccessary that a se ntence, 03 if il tS 10 be a sentence, is about somethi ng; without thts someth ing it is impossib le." r'A6yov vayKalov, nvoc; Elval Myov, of: nv ,suvawv.")
0.1 G A 19, p. 189: "Es gibt kcin wissenschart liches VersUind nis , d.h. hi storisches Z urOckgchc l1 zu [)talo aime Durchgc hen durch Ar istotc les." Whole se ntence

ita lic iscd by lI eidegger.

105 GA 19.pp. II - 12.

54

55

:I IA I''I'ER ONE
was at il s ms t powerl'ul during th e anc ie nl CI'U. 1111 Il acco unt, w ith Aris totl e and fo ll owed by an incrcasin g Inl\;1 in th e nature of know ledge in stead of bein g) whi ch, as wc saw abovc. is OIlC o f Heid egger 's charges aga inst Husserl. This mea ns th al Il eidegge r 's

histori cal position is marked by th e need lO crilicise the history not only bec a use of its for ge tfulness o f bein g, but a lso beca use of its forgetfuln ess of A ri stotl e, insofa r as it has es tablished what in Hei degger 's view is a far too one-s id cd pict ure of hi s thin kin g. Consequ entl y, Heidegge r 's cri tique has to be two fo ld: il must be directed against the traditi on so as to re lease the true Aristotl e, who w ill provide Heidegger with th e phil oso phi eal lools w ith whi eh to criLieise the trad iti o n, an d w ho the reby partakes in th e trans format io n o f pheno menology call ed for by Heidegger. Bul eve ntu all y, lhe criti que against the tradition will encompass A ri stotle as w eil. Thus the " tru c" A ristotle has seve ra l faces, and o ne of th e maj or moti ves behin d He id egger's interpre tatio n o f Aristotl e is to ass ert prcc ise ly Ihi s ambi guity, s in ce it indica tes th at A ristot le is do in g fo undali o nal philosophica l work an d has not go t stuc k in establishe d pos itions or "standpoints" . Aeeordin gly, the pl ace of Ar istotle in Heidegger's projeet revea ls how importa nt it was fo r him to overcome th e distin clion between historie al an d systemal ie phil osoph y, O n He id egger's acco unt, systemat ic philosophi s in g and hi storiea l in terprelatioll do Ilo l o nl y represen t two compalib le e nd cavo urs, but w ill ind eed turn ouI unsuceessful if pursued in isol ation from eaeh other. The atte mpt to do away w ith this di stin cti on is re flected ciearl y in th e lect ure course Phiinomen%gische /nfelprefationen ZIl Aristote/es , 106 ln this wo rk, as in many others, Heidegg er see ms la never aeco mplish the init iall y state d tas k; instead he spends lhe entire lime OIi preparato ry \Yo rk,107 Ari stat le is hardl y menti oned at ail , but Heidegge r, seemingly preparing himself for th e in ter pretati o n, onl y presen ts lo hi s audien ce an
"" GA 6 1. See al 50 GA 56/57, p, 132,
O lhe r examp lcs arc GA 19, wh ich was to be a course on Plato 's Sophist, but Heidegger devoled half of iL to Aristotle; and "Ei nle itung in die Phnomenologie der Rel igi on", Phtillo men'Jlogie des religi6sen Lebens (GA 60), whe re H eidegger \Vas supposed to speak about Christ ian ity, but spent 50 mu ch time on the introduc tion, whic h \Vas itself a discussion about the very meaning of introduction, that the studen ls complained.
107

ex p li cn ti oll o f fac ti ea l liI'c, A s th is clearl y s hows, preparatio n or clarificali ol1 or lh e situa tio n peculiar to philosophica l in terpretation is of ccnlru l importancc to Heidegger. This k ind of methodological rell ection sho ulcl not o nl y enab le us to avo id incorrect interpretati ons, but also help us to und ersta nd what it means p ursue philosophy and what happe ns whe n one reads a ph ilosophieal tex!. However, as he himself
says:
The re is no point in methodological speculat ions when there is no Ihing [Sache} behind Ihcm. We wanl !i rsl of ail L pursue concretc o Interp retations and Icave the " quest ion of method" bch ind. Ta be sure this question involves more than the wo rd indi catcs; it is , 111 ' namely " lts turn a rcscarc h mto th' Illgs thcmse 1 ves. 10.

Meth odology is a justified end eavour to th e exle nl that it belongs to the ana lyti c of human li fe or ex iste nce, w hose mode of bei ng is prec isely interpretati on or exp licat io n. But just as a theory of int erpretati on wi ll be uninformative if it fails to aeknowledge th e to som e exlent unique character of every ind iv idual aet o f expli cati on, met hodo log ieal spec ul ati ons must go together w ilh actua l phil osophiea l interprclati on, for if they are pursued w ithout a specifie context, th ey will be devoid o f con tent and too general to be of use to the indi v idua l case, Or rath er, methodology eannot but be dependent upon actual philosophical work, for even he w ho claims to undertake methodological qu est ions w ill onl y be shaw n lO ha ve framed his meth odology on th e bas is of hi s ex pcr ienccs of sorne specifi e situati ons of int erpretat ion, whi c h he cove rll y has turn ed inlo a general model. Accord in gly, as Heidegger remarks in th e above- mentioned course on Ari stotle, we should not believe th at lhe preparatory work eould be regarded as th e systematic, tnd y phil osophieal part whi le the follo wing interpretati on of Ar istotl e is j usl a hi storiea l exegesis, Co nversely, we mu st n ot thi nk th at the introducti on is arbitrary, as if it would be nothi ng but the express ion of the author 's pre fe re nces, while the ex plicat ion o f Ar istotl e is wh al is objecti vc ly lrue, l09
1 G Il 19, p. 62: "Mcthodische Spckul al ioll cn haben ja 08 Sinn,. werm Su c!1c dnhinlcr stcht. Wir wo Ucn zlltlllchst kOllkrele l ntcpreta tl on trelben und dIe

'Mclh oden rragc' 7urOck stcll cll. Frc ilich is t dicsc ist ll!hnli ch se lbst wieder Sachforschung."
Ill') (}A 61, p. I IO .

dann mehr, ais das

Won besagl; sie

56

57

'11 i\ I'TER ONE

On Il c id egger's accoun l, w ilhin pl1iluso plll c nl UI. II\!/ Iy nl l'I 1 no $ such thing as history of philosophy in th e sense o f \;xlcl'llal to
t\ r S10ll c w il l! hil11 in Ihi s . Thi s lll cant that he had to make a genuine fl UClllpt lO undc rSland the doxa laid down in Aristotl e's works , 50 as to

the systematic pursui!. Il is not only the case Ih at a " prcpura lory" analysis of factical life will pave the way for a proper eneollnler wi th Aristotle, but this preparation is itself prepared by a reading of Aristotle. The philosophy of letieallife eould not work as a proper preparation to Aristotle if it was not from the beginning projeeted in the light of an interpretalion of the nature and aim of the philosophieal problematie in Aristolle. That is to say, the aim ofthe reading of Aris tolle is not merely
to achi eve a heig hte nerl awareness of wha t presuppositions one wi ll

be ab le to lake a step beyond hi s horizon, thereby receiving the poss ibility ofrevealing the inherent but perhaps unfulfilled possibilities in Arislotle. ln accordanee with this view, Heidegger coneeives of his philosophy as a retrieval (Wiederholung) of Aris totle: it projects itself towards possibilities that are contained in A ristotle 's work, but these
poss ibilities are truly accessible only on the bas is of a crit iq ue that is

enaet when approaehing the "thing itselF', for 10 Ihis "Ihin g" belongs Aristotle's interpretations of it. In other words, if the task of philosophy is ta let li fe and ils logos be expressed, one way to do sa is prec isely to make visible Aristolle' s logos. For if philosophy is a speeili e mode of life, of its own theme, then the philosophieal explicati ons of life may be
investigated as an int egra l part of lire itse lf Por thi s reason , the inquiry into logos must involve an inqu iry into Ari stotle's "speech" on logos.

direeted ogainsl some of their implications and presuppositions.11 In lhi s way, one eould say that Heidegger's aim is to develop a philosophy Ihat both was and was not articulated by Aristotle himsc1f.

And al! the di fferences belween Heidegger and A ri sto tl e notwithstanding, one might in faet say that it was Aristotle who initiated or at least prepared such a view on philosophieal wo rk. For as we saw earli er, Aristotle claims that the suecess or fa ilure of philosophieal investigations depends upon th e ab ility to encounter doxa in the right
way. This means on th e one hand that the sys tematic pursuit cannot do

without historieal investi gations, but on the other lhat the fruitfulness of our interpretations of doxa requires a systematie ambition from us. Il requires that we have ta ken a step beyond the leve l of opinions,
othenvise we wi ll not be able to get a clear v iew of them, "For on every

subjeet the earliest philosophy is like one who fa lters, while being new and in its beginning. " 11O Beeause of this interdependence of historieal and systematie research, Aristotle th inks that hi s own philosophieal
results cao be described as saying something that in a way both has and

has not been articulated before. l l l Heidegger did not think of Aristotle as faltering. His aim was no doubt to formulate his own philosophieal agenda, but he wanted to take
yp OtKEV
O't VEa tE Kat Kt apxa 01)00."
I II

h 1tpdrrll

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1tEPl

rrcivn:ov,

Mel. 993al 1-15 .

Sec ( iA HI p. 270.
1

58

,9

Clli\PTER TW O

Chapter Two

THE EPISTEMIC LOGOS

1. On the task ofquestioning a traditional intetpretation oflogos Following his own dictum that phi losophy is possible only as critique, Heidegger's shifting approaches to logos as a ph il osophieal theme ail have one thing in common. [f yet with various degrees of explicitness, they involve a confrontation with that conception of speech which he regards as altogether dominant in the history of philosophy, l10tably so far as the development of logic is concerned. This is the view that the declarative scntence or the assertion (die Aussage) is the locus of trulh and knowledge.' A decisive step in this direction was ta ken by Aristotle when he singled out th e assertion as a form of speech particularly worthy of interest, which must be investigated separately, since its basic characteristics are not shared by the other modes of speech. [n De Interpretatione, he deelares that:
Every sentence is meaningful, though not as an instrument but, as
wc said, by convention. Not every sentence is an assertion

On th e bas is o f this dcJinition of the assertion or logos apophantikos, Aristolle was able to dismiss the non-positing modes of speech from his " Iogical " investigations. Since they cannat be true or false, their investigation belongs to the disciplines of rhetoric and poeties 3 ln doing this, he at the same time cleared the way for instituting th e judgement as a model for genuine cognition, since the judgement is the kind of knowledge that finds its proper expression in the assertion and thus can be true or false. 4 The critique that Heidegger directs against this conception of logos does 110t primarily aim at showing that other modes of speech th an the assertion, su ch as questions, imperatives, etc ., are also of interest in connection with truth and knowledge. Rather, it seeks to challenge the very category of indicative speech itself, Illaking lhe assumption that this i5 not a homogeneous phenomenon when taken beyond its formai
or logical context. Heidegger does not dispute that there is a particular

though, bUl only thase in which trulh and falsity are present. There is not truth and falsity in every sentence; for example r: prayer is a sentence, but il is neither true, !l Of false. 2

l "Assertion" is the common translation of Heidegger's tcrm Aussage. It may pcrhaps seem at b it awkward to speak about a "negative assertion", but as Heidegger does not make uny distinction bctwccn affirming and Ilcgat ing sta te ments as far thei r assertoric force is concerned; to deny that something is the case is no Jess an assertion than ta affirm this . The meaning of "assertion" will undergo change as the analysis proceeds, but init ially, it refers ta the indicative, whose basic runction is ta state or assert "something abOLIt something", tt Kal"c1 'tl voS, lO use Ar istotle's expression (see e.g. De An. 430b26). Though for the most part! wil l use the tenn "assertion", J will occasionally also speak about "statement" or "propositional speech", but without any difference in meaning. 2 De lnlerpretatione ("De [III."), 16b33- 17a4: "crtl yo Cl7tCl ,I v Olll l ()V"t 1K6C;.

form of knowledge and truth peculiar to the assertion, and the point of departure for his inquiry is the conviction that one must take seriously the ciaims made for the primacy of the assertion in this respect. What he does criticise is a treatment of the assert ion, and of language in general, as something that can be investigated in isolation, without reference to ils role withio human understanding and action. In other ward s, the target of Heidegger's attack is above ail a philosophieal interpretation of the assertion that he regards as too limited or one-sided in that it has discarded the context of speech as something external to the meaning and nature of speech. This has resulted in a static conception of speech that docs not pay attention to the activity of speaking but only ta its result, i.e. preciscly the assertion. For this reason, the task that Heidegger sets himself is not merely to show why the inquiry into logos must refrain from looking upon the assert ion as a basic model for speech, but a1so and equally to question
ci n'
v tO a ll8euElv il \!/E.ueo8co UnapXEl" OUl( exn M-yo pv, u; Ot' OAllOnS O1:E: 'VEUOr')S." ).

V onCIal

U1tCiPXl, OlOV

l',

J /Je. 111f. 17a4 -7. .1 And silice A ri s toll c [!link s [hal the pos itive judgc lll cnt g ives more knowledge th an

auX

w op-yQVOV M, ",),: W01l:Ep ep r)1:CH

KC11 cr\JVe l; KllV. nO$CLv't"I

8t\

0\1 n(ic;,

Ih e tlcgal ivc, Ile dcc lnrc s the fi fS sy ll ogisttl 1 bc the 1ll 0S 1 sc iell tific one . Tt is the l 0 ol1fy sy ll ol:\ ism Ihll l is hOlh pos iti ve rl nd l.lni vc rsal. Sec PO.l"lerior Ana /ylies ("An. j 'ost.") 1.1 '1. 25.

60

(JI

'11 1\1''1 1,1{ '1 W()

the formai or logica l app roach to lan guage 1'01' th " hcnc l1t o f " phenomenologieal interpretation. ln order to revea l the nUlur" of the
assertion, and of speech in genera l, th e forma i ana lys is is not cnou gh, insofar as it focuses on the logico-grammatica l, "slatie" [eatures of
speech, for in order for something to qualify as an asserti on, a special

llltde rstand why th e a ssertion ha s been granted this specia l cpistemological status requircs ultimately that one should also examine
the ontolog ica l assum pt ions that organ ise such a view on speech. In this

kind of situation must obtain. Since this condi tion is shared by ail modes of speech, whieh means that speec h reee ives its specifie character or differentiation - sueh as assertoric force - on ly within a g iven contex t, it was wrong to sup pose th at the asser ti on should be
s ing led out merely on th e bas is of Hs grammar and lag le. As an

chapter, however, 1 wi ll - on ly touch brie fly upon that aspect of Heidegger's anal ysis. ln th is connection, Aristotle is initially approached as the ori gi nator of the for maI or logical approach to language, together \V ith its
elllp hasis on assertoric speech, which He id egger thus wa nts to c hall enge. But w he n tracing thi s int erpretat ion of lo gos back to

Ar istotle, Heidegger l'i nd s that Ar istotle's understand in g of

propos itional speech is in ilS turn based upon a braader notion of

a lternative to this kiml of Iinguistic analysi s, Heidegger proposes to seek the foundation not just of propositiona l speech but 31so of uttered, "concrete" speech as such in a more primordial discursivity belonging to man. Wh en reach ing th is more [undamental level of th e constitution of speech, wc will have the opportunity to sec what reatures are pecu liar preeisely to the assertion. furt her, if it sho uld turn out - and it w ill that there are forms of understand ing that arc not propositional in kind and therefore cannot be coneeived of \V ith the assertion as a model, but yet make up the foundation of propositiona l speech and thought, then we cannottruly comprehend the nature of the assertion itself un less wc c1arify these other forms ofunderstanding. It should thus be no ted that l-Ieidegge r's inquiry in to the assertion
will eventua ll y lead to a tra nsfo rm ati on of th e ent iJ'e problcmatic.

Initi ally, he goes along with the form ai perspective on language, and

affirms what he takes to be th c cOl11mon meanin g of "assertion ",

aceording to whieh it refers td an ullered or pronounced statement - der ausgesprochene Satz, as he puts it. s But eventua lly, tbe assertio n w ill be regarded as a speci fi e mode of access to the \vorld. Par th is reaso n, a central question for the phenomenologica l analys is concerns wha t kind of k.nowledge is involved in assertoric speech. But of equal importance is the quest ion of what kind of ideal of kn ow ledge goes along \Vi th the focus on the asserti on in philosophy. Th is is, on Heidegger's account, a theoretical ideal of knowledge, what 1 will cali the "epistemic" ideal of cognition, thereby referring to that kind of knowledge which Aristotle designates as epis/eme. Fin ally, Heidegger (hinks that to fu ll y
' CA 2 1, p. 1;,1 0.

speech, even though Aristotle may not have been entire ly clear about this himself. In virtue of this double tendency in his thou ght, he can show the way forward to a beller understandi ng of the essence of speech. Thus on the one hand, Aristotle is the target of Heidegger 's " destruction" of the history of the philosophy of language: he is the sti ll not accurately explicated origin of that which in this context first of ail "shows itself' , that which is primaril y given ta the investi gation of logos, namely the notion that language and thought are essenti all y invested w ith a propositional structure. Here it should be noted that Heidegger regards Aristot/e as the origin of this notion of language not because he takes this to be an obvious fact, but because this has become the common view on Aristotle. In other wards, the po int of departure for I-Ieidegger's inquiry into logos is not simply Aristotle himse lf, but rather a traditiona l in terpretation of Aristot le. Accordingly, the first task that Heidegger sets himself is that of exploring Aristotle 's understanding of the assertion. More specificall y, he secks to revea l the structure which in Aristotle's view constitutes the possibil ity o fm aking an assertion. This is the structure of sun/hesis and dihairesis. In do in g so, however, He id egger fin ds that A ri sto Ll e 's ana lysis or thesc concepts, albc it too limited in its approach sin ce Aristotle Feil short of inquiring into their existential foundat ion, may ncvertheless be extended beyond the sphere of propositional speech, to th e domain of human undcrstandin g as such, co nceived of at a deeper level than that of concrete speech. Within the lirst stll ge or the illqlliry into logos, that is, before he
bl.:gins clnhonllin g hi s OWIl vicws , Il cidcggl:1' (h us thin ks il necessary to

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'11 Al'llm 1 Wt)

de vo le SOJl1C c lTOrl to jU Sl li slcning 10 ri Sloli c !lnd 1\1 w lHlI Ill' h!l' ln !'l lly
abou t the meaning and nature of logos. A s he put s il, hc hu . Il'llmin g

ally new conception of logos and ilS relation to truth and knowlcd gc, wc must first try to get behind the history of logic, down to its origin, and listen to Aristotle's own Collegium logicum. 6
2. Sunth esis and dihairesis as the basic constituents o/the assertion ln the 1925/26 lecture course Logik, whi ch the fo llowing discussion primarily draws upon, Heidegger sets out to discuss what logic is, describing il in a preliminary \Vay as a discipline Ihat in vcst igates speech, logos, insofar as il ean be truc and ral se. 7 Thus tb e question of

logos is from the beginning formulated as a question concerning the nature of truth. In the lectures that fo llow, Heidegger devotes mueh time to a carefll l serutiny of different modern views on the relation between truth and speech, notably with respect to Husserl and Lotze, eventuall y
working himselfback to A ri stotl e' s work as thcir supposcd ori gi n.

Since Aristotle states that "Truth and fa lsity are a matter of combination and separation"S, the initi al task must be to exami ne the meaning of comb inati on and separation , sunthes is and dihairesis. Heidegger' s interpretation of these concepts puts focus on what he will later state to be one of three basic features of the assertion, namely predication, by which he understands the dctcrm ination (Bestimmen) of the subject by means of the predicate.' According to a common view, sunthesis and dihairesis are related to affirmation and denial, kataphasis and apophasis, in such a way that sUl1thesis and kataphasis fonn one pair, and dihairesis and apophasis makc up another. The ensui ng result is that to make an affirmation, for in stance that "man is white" is to combine the two concepts "man)' and "white", whereas to deny the same thing would be to separate them from each other. lo One could thus
' GA 2 1, p. 25. 'GA2 1,p. 6. 3 De In/ . 16a I 2-13 : ''n:Epi. yp OU9EOlV K(.Il wi peoi v o tO o/eooo:; 'tE u

KUl1

9 GA 2 t, p. 133 . The other two characterist cs are "mani fest ation" or "showing" (Aufze ig ung) and communication. These are treated be low. 10 See e. g. 1. DOring, Arisfoteles . DarsteiiuIIg und Interp r etatio n seines Denkens, p. 66 ; W. D. Ross, Aristotle, p. 26; E. Tugendhal, "Der Wahrheilsbegr iff bei

say thut SlIlIfltes is and dihair es is explain what is involved in making an affi rmative and a negative judgement respectively. Il eidegger, however, rejects this interpretation and argues instead Ihal denial and affirmation alike involve both combination and separation. Whether you affirm or deny that man is whi te, you bring logether or "synthesise" "man" and '\vh ite", and th is implies at the same time a form of separation, not only in the sense that "man" and "white" are kept apart in the assert ion , but al 50 that, in making the assertion, the property "white" is singlcd out among other possib le properties. 11 This interpretative move is very important to Heidegger; in fact, it settles the horizon for his interpretation of the Aristotelian logos as such, and it also provides him with a background to his own project. The reason is that this interpretation opens the possibility of taking the struct ure of sunthesis and dihairesis beyond the context of predication On the propositional leve!. Granted that dihairesis represents the act of " spelling out" or separati ng subject from predicate in the assertion, it can be understood as a kind of apprehension that, insofar as it singles out that qual ity which is to stand as prcdicate in the assertion, may fun ahead of and be constituti ve of predication. Hence, there are two claims involved in Heidegger's interpretation: first, to make an assertion means both to combine subject and predicate and to separate them from each other. Secondl y, predication (s unthesis ) is based upon a foregoing separation, which gives you access to an object in a particlliar regard . As an interpretation of Aristotle, Heidegger seems to be confident in the appropriateness of the tirst claim, but hesitates as regards the secon d, for whereas the former still moves within a formai concepti on of th e asserti on, the latter indicates someth ing about its foundation. But even though Heidegger in the end wi ll conc illde that s untllesis and dihairesis as portrayed by Aristotle are too formai to capture what he himself is after - namely a synthet ic-dihairetic nature pertaining not only to propositiona l speech and thought but to man 's very existence, as weil as to the givenness ofbeings as such - he is not prepared to tie Aristot le to an entirely logical conception of this structure.12 Heidegger's hesitation in thi s connection is to some extent caused by an ambiguity on the part
IIGi I 2 1. p. t39;SZ. p. 159. (iA 2 t. p. t 68.

Ari stoteles", p. 252.

64

' ll l\l''l'ER TWO or i\rislotle, who does IlOl al\Vays stale cxplici tl y \V hoth e, ho ls lIsi ll!; the concepts o f sl/nth esis and dihairesis \Vith an o nto logica \ or togical meaning in milld . However, Heidegger does not co nsidcr this ambi guity only as a problem, but thinks that it is also w hat is tru ly fru itfu l in A ri stotie's conception of sun/hesis and dihairesis . [ wi ll returo to th is point below. But tirst so mething more must be said abo ut the notions of kalaphasis and apophasis, su ch as they are und crstood by Ar istotle. In De Interpretatione, th ey are defincd as follow s : "A ffirmation is an asse rti on predicating one th ing of anoth er, and negoti on is an assertion deny ing one thing of another." l) Note is that it is not a (grammatical) predicate that is amrmed or den ied of a (gramm a ti cal) subj ee t, but a quality of a thin g. ln this way, th e assertion by its nature "aims at", and is guidcd by things. Ifwc look ta the Categories, wc ftnd the following distinction between the assert ion and its object:
T hat w hic h falls u nd e r a ffirmatio n and nega lion is no t itse lf a ffi rmation or ncgat io n, fo r a ffir mat ion is an aftirming speech , and negation is a negati ng speech, bu i Ihat wh ic h rai ls under 14 affirmat io n and negali on is not speech.

cn l! a il thi s di vis ion .,, 1 I\ s far as 1 kn o\\', thi s is the cnly place in 7

Ar istot lcs works that can really be taken as contirmin g Heidegger's interpretation. On th e other hand th ough , 1 can not see that Aristotle ever 18 says a nylhing that con tra dicts Heidegger on th is point. And as we w ill see shortly, Heidegger points to precisely thi s passage in De Anima as a k ind of tuming-point as far as the inq uiry into logos is coneerned : it makes up the end-point of Ari stotle's a nalys is of logos, a nd thereby, it marks th e limit of the traditional inquiry into logos as such. For this reaso n, it also provides Heidegger \Vi th the startin g-point for his attempt ta take the analysis ur logos a step rurth cr than what Aristotle himself did. But so far _ the preliminary co nclusion that Heidegger draws is that, once we realise that dihaires is cann ot be ide ntitied with denial and slm/hesis with amrmation, we see not on ly that every asserti on has a sy ntheti c-dihairetic stru cture, b ut a lso th at thi s is a more bas ic pheno menon than affi rm atio n a nd denial : "Combination and separation precede affirmation and deni" l as th e condition of their possibility and as the condition of possibility or conceal ing and uncovering.,,19 With

sun /hesis and dihairesis, we thus seem to have found th e basic structure
of lo gos as assertion. T he next question for H eidegger is how far
the Oxford Class ic al Texts edi tion. See also De lnl . 16b23-25, where A ri stotle remarks that not only the word bcing (El vat) bul nl so " no t-bei ng" dvat) implics a ouvgeOl <; when regarded in iso lation. II De. An. 430b3-4: "Evxetm o KC OWiPECHV 1ttV'tCl ." 18 ln hi s ed itian of De Anima , pp. Hicks interprets thi s passage in a way rath c r si mi lar to Heidegger. Heideggc r's Interpretati o n seems to get further con firmati on From the faet that Aristot le not o l1ly di sc usses OUV8EOt and oWlpeal in co nn ection with his analys is of the asse rti on, but also speaks about them as fea tures of think ing; see De ln/. 16a 14; De Ali. A t least in the case o r lO i peau;, thi s seems to be the most common sense of the te nn, and Aristot le makes ex tens ive use of it, both in the sense of disti nguishing between things, and to designate a philosophical method ; sce e.g. Cal. 10[116- 19, 14b34-35, Priol"

How are wc now ta understand sun/hesis and dihairesis in this context? As stated ab ove, Heidegger's idea is that to eve ry asserti on, regardless of whet her it affirms or de ni es sOl11cthing, thcre belongs a sy ntheticdihairetic structure. The cruc ial text for He idegger in thi s conn ection is De Anima. F irst, as He idegger notes, Ar istot le states th at s lll1thesis is necessa ry if falsity is to be possib le, an d s ince negatin g assertions apparentiy also can be fals e, thi s seems to impl y th at sunthesis belongs to apophasis as we il. " Aristotie explains why th is is 50 : "For cve n if [one were to say that] w hite is not white, one hs brought [wh ite and ] not- w hite into a combi nation ."" And he add s: " lt is equall y possible to
13 De lm. J7a25-26: " lm'[41am anv arro41a vm Tl voS Ka-t l i vo, clnoQacrt<; E.o nv cm$avol 'tlVO mo 'tlVOs." 14 Categories ("Cal ." ), J2b5 -JO: "o ille a n o OOE. tO \mo Kara$am v Kal arr$am v Ka'ta$am.; Kat orr$am ' Ilv yp Ka-tcjlacrt 010 Eo'tt Kataq,aUKo Kal cbt$am yo cmocjlan K6. tmv Of:. {m 'tTW Ka'ta$am v li nq,aow O8v Ean )'6yo." 15 De An. 430bl -2; GA 21 , p. 136. See also Mel. I027b I8-20. 16 De Ali. 430b2-3: "Ket! yp v t I,e\JKov 1-1." euKov t E\JK'OV KCt II '1'0 Pll EUKOV a\Jv9rtKEV ." The wa rds in brackcts are a recon structi on by W, n , I{O')5 in

Alla/ylies ("Ail. Pr.") 46a31 -34, An. Post. 9t bt2- t5, Phys. 184a21 -24, De Ail. 402a 19-20. As regards ov9cot, it is o r course truc that Aristot le has the expression 6yo ou\.8Eto, speech composed of severa! assertions (De 111/. 17a2 1-22), and that Ol. But for the he, as rerr.arked above, says that being and not -being l11ply a crUV9 mos! part, w hen talking about the sentence as com posed o f parts, he uses the !e rm (e.g. Cat. b25ff.; De 1111 . 2 Ia5). On !his poi nt , one sho uld also nOie Ihe absence of a discussion of ovOeal<; and oWlpe<n in De Interprelatiolle, whosc expl ic it intention is to investigate the assertion 7). t9 GA 2 1. p. 140: " Verbind e n und Trenne n li egt ja abe r vor Zusprechen und Absprccll cn ai s Bcd in lALtl1 g ihrc r Mogl ichke ilund a is Bcdingung der Moglichkeit von V:rdcckctl und Entd cckctl."

66

67

'liA!''! lm '! wo
Aristo tl c has int errogatcd into thi s stmcLurc, o r in ollier WOI d .... w hal is the scope of s Ull lhesis and dihairesis.

C IIAPTER T WO clca r th al a ncgatin g statemcnt co rresponds ta ontologica l sepa ration, and a n affirmative stat ement to ontological combinat ion, it is not easy ta dccide whethe r Aristotle also thinks that, when passi n g e.g. a negative judge ment on somethin g th at is dihairemenol1 we are only Cllactin g a

3. The Linguistic and the ontologicallevel of sunthesis and dihaires is

A ristotl e speaks about combination and separation at the onto logical level as weil. For example, if we look ta the Me/op"ysics , wc read that " The true has on the o ne hand affirmatio n of that which is com bined, and on the other hand deni al of that which is separated, but the fa lse has the contrary arrangcmcnt. ,,20 Heidegge r does Ilot to any great extent discliss how exact ly the rel at ion betwecn the ontologica l an d the linguistic or logicallevel of sun/hesis and dihairesis in Aristotl e should be unde rstood, though he notes the amb igu ity in A ri stotle, cspecially in

d ihairesis and not a s lll1/h esis - unless we take the ab ove quotations From De Anima as evidence in favou r of Heidegger 's interpretation. Or rat he r, it seems suffi cie ntly clear that Ar istotlc at least occas ionall y thinks that sunthesis is pred ication, whelher affirmati ve or negative, but it is more doubtful whether he has also enl ertained th e idea th at thi s
sUllth esis must be a\;l.;ompanied by a dihairesis . As mentioned above, one problem in this co nn ecti on is that Ari sto tl e is not so careful in distinguishin g between th e linguisti c and th e ontological level (that is,

connection with the concept of slllllh esis. He remark s, however, that

this seemi ng lack of clarit y as regard s th e rel at ion between the ontological and the logical shou ld not sim ply be explained in term s of confusion on the part of Ar istotl e . Il mu st be recogni sed as philosophically prod uctive, for it implies that Aristotle has se nsed the close affinity bctween th ese two spheres." But in a rder ta see w hat Heidegger w illmake of th e relation between these two levels, SQ me re marks on Ar isto tl e's v iev\/s o n this matter a re needed, th ough il is not en ti rcly easy to sort th em oul. As nl r as 1 can tell, to Aristotl e, combination and separation at the o ntological level representing the case when a property belongs ta an a bj ect and wh en it does not re spec ti ve ly - constitute lhe most bas ic instance of this distinction, inso far as they determine whal is true and fa lse ta think or say. Accordin gly, when a property belongs la an abj ect it is correct ta affinn the com mun ion, and when il does not it is correct ta de ny il. The qu esti on is whelher these two possible ontological situations are ta be 22 identified wi th sUl1lhesis and dihairesis as hith erto outlincd. While it is
20 Met. l 027b21 -23 : "t )lv )'p rtf'I1Gb; Ko't"cHpacn v bd 't"c9 crtlyK q.l v(fl8Xt, 'Ct1V 0' lto$aO"lv ltl. tc{! OtDPll].lVqJ, 'Co 8 'l'eoo; 'CoutOU "tO\) tt1V avtt$acnv" 21 GA 21, p. 168. The charge that Ari slotle con fu ses the onto logical with the linguisti c Jevel has been put forward by E, Tugendhat , " Der Wah rheitsbegriff bei Aristoteles", p. 252. 22 When talk ing abou t combination and sepa rati on on the onto logical level, Ar istotle uses the passive form s of Otatpe v and OUV1" i ElI1].lt , as in the quotat ion abovc. See a1 50 Met. [X. I0. Aristot[e talks about ouvgeou; a[ so as an onto[ogi ca l stale, bUI Ih en il is nol a question of a property Ihat be[ongs to an abject, but th e very ol>j l..:CI itsdl"

the meanin g of a stale ment a l'firmin g or denying that a quality belongs to a n abject and th e obj ect' s mode o f existence respective ly). More precisely, A ri stotle does not always specify exaclly what kind of co mbination or separati on he has in mind; that is up to the read er to understand from th e contex!. But in view of Heidegger 's claim that Aristotle has a not ion of a synthetic-dihairetic structure belonging ta the asserti on as l uch, whelher it is an affirming or negating assertion, it seems that a di stinction must be drawn between separation al the object ive and al th e linguisti c level respecti ve ly. For if th e dihairesis of speech represen ts th e di scernment of one predicate amon g others, it is appli cable not only ta the situation where we hav e a separat ion at the objective level, but also ta the one where we have a combin ation. The reverse also holds, of course. Thal is to say, we combin e th e tenn s in speech or lhou ght ev en w h en th eir ontological counterparts are di vorced from each othe r. What should one think of thi s seeming ease w ith wh ich A ri stotl e moves between th e onlological and the logical or lingui sti c level? Among Ari stotl e scholars the opi nion is rathe r w idespread that he, and the Greeks in general, had a somewhat nalve co nception of language, or more precisely that th ey were sa thorou ghly at home in their lan guage

that has a composi te na tu re ( in contras! to the incomposite, crv9cta, E.g. in De Allima, whc n Aristot le discusses (and rejects) the idea that the soul IS a o vO e o t " of con lrnri es (407b27-408a I8), and below, when he remarks that the clClllCtHS COllSl llll c tll ill H" in virtn c ar " a partic u[ ar formul a and sy nthesis" O6'YC!l tl Vl ..
KCl I 01)\'0" 1 1) , 1 "0 11(1n l . ,

6X

'1lA 1''1 I,R 1 WII

that they wert! nol abl e la rellcclupon il. t\ccordil1 gly. Hlldull u ( 'ussn

'\ IAI''Il;J\ '1 WO

has designatcd Aristot le's phil osophy as a "happy phcIlOlll cllology", referring to the view that Aristotle sees no problems co nneetcd with the transition from the perception of a thing to its Iinguistie express ion ." Heidegger has olso put forward the idea that the Greeks were "fall en to" and absorbed by language. Indeed, he claims, the Greeks were in a sense in love wi th 1 0gos.24 And because Greek life to such a great extent was centred on speech, in their society the greatest threat 10 a lire of knowledge and truth came prec isc ly fro m la nguage, th e c learest
c,;xprc,;ssioll ofwhich is th e emcrgence ofsoph ism. 25 But Ihi s on ly s hows

bctwccn thcorctical and cvcryday speech.27 But al the same lime, when th us mak ill g logos, and in particular logos apophantikos , into a theme of its own, Aristotle made possible the subsequent divorce of language from lh e ontological domailj, as weil as pavin g the \Vay for the notion that not only human thinkin g in its essence is propositional, but ev en being itsel r. But on the other hand, to the extent that Aristotle' s logic remains intimately connected w ith ontology, which makes Aristotle extend the app li cation of sun/hes is and dihairesis beyond th e context of
propositiollal speech, thi s is also somct hin g th nt Heidegger beth

the immense effort Ihat \Vas demandcd from Pl ato and Aristot le to seize the possibi li ties of lan guage so as to frame a new philosophi cal conceptuality and to devclop a science o f logos. And, Heidegger continues, \Vhat is truly extraord inary is that in this pursuit, Plata and
A ri stotl e did not look for a gu id ing ci lie elsewhere, ou tside G reek

endorses and questions. Heidegger too wants to use these concepts with such a broad application, since he believes, just as Aristotle, lhat the ways in which beings are given are constitut ive or our ways of thi nkin g and speakin g, and that one shou ld therefore seek to find something like a cerum en structure to th ese do mains. But as indi cated , in Ari stotl e. the
Iinguistic (i.e. predicat ive) and the o nto logicall eve l are often fused . and thi s Heidegger wants to avoid , since he thinks that th e result of thi s

soc iety, but managed to retrieve th e poss ibi lity of a scientilic att it ude

towards speech trom wit hin Greek life itself: "They made good the possibilities of speaking. Thal is the origin of logic, the tcaching of logos,,,26 Still, the emergence of a criti ca l re tlection on logos in Aristotle is
somethin g that H ei degger considers 10 be at the sa m e time both fruit fui

and problemati c. As he sees il, it is in part prcc isely because Ar istot le

did not completely trust in language but saw that ail form s of speech are Iimited in differen t ways as far as th eir power of arti culation is concerned, that he reali sed the need to distinguish between different kinds of speech which admit of dilferent kinds of access to the world. ln particu lar, He idegger argues, il mad e A ri s tot le awa re of the difference
23 Aristote et le logos. Contes de la phnomnologie o;'dinaire, p. 4. See also the cssays "La charte de la phnomnologie" and "De "objet de la sensation au sujet de

la phrase" in the same work. Cassin herself, while beginning her own work \Vith Ihis characteri sation of Aristotlc's philosophy und ta sorne extent affirming it,

fusion is that bath being and language are in th e end common ly assigned a propositional nature. ln this way, the seeming lack of a re fl ection on logos prod uces essentia ll y the same outcome as its contrary, the H logical" attitude outlined ab ove. For as Heidegger sees it, even though Aristotle saw that th cre are di ffe rent levels or aspects or slln/hesis and dihairesis, he did not manage to fu lly elucidate the relation between them. As a consequence, Aristotle was too vague about the foundation of the assertion, sa that thi s analys is of logos to some extent remained fixed on the level of proposition al speech. This idea of Heidegger' s is parti cularly important to keep in mind when readin g his interpretation of Aristot le's discussion of sunthesis and dihairesis, for it explains hi s vacillating stance towards Ari stotle on thi s point. More precisely , Heidegger does not vacill ate as regards the ambiguity in
Ari sto tl e himself, but because Aristotle's thinking in this context poi nts in two direction s, He id egger hesitates as to w hether he should grant

nevertheless seeks to question il as being tao one-sided. ln this connection, one migh t also mention R. Mortley, who bas traced the history of a growing mis trust of language. He thinks that it originates in Plata and is st ronger in him than in Aristotle.
See From Ward to Silence 1. The rise al/dfall oflogos, pp. 1 1Off.

" GA \8, pp. 262 -263. 2.> GA t 8, p. t 08. 26 GA 18, p. 109: "Sie machten Ernst mil den Moglichkeiten des Sprechens. Dns ist der Logik, der Leine vom 'Yo. Sec also GA 17, p. 18; G/127, pp. 58.

Aristotl e ail understandin g of the w ider ontological impl ications of sunlhesis and dihairesis.

27' Cf.

(,lI nplUl' " hl'cc. Scclh1ll 2.

70

71

CII APTEI{ TWO

CHAPT ER TWO
logos 1S. aSSCI il is oil ly on the basis of a more far-reac hin g inquiry inta and what Aristot le actually that one wi ll be in a position to underst vague indicati.on" concern ing sunlhes is and dihairesis. meant by this U

ta l-lowev er, Heideg ger' s respons e ta thi s prediea ment is not j ust e separat e the ontologieal From the linguistie level, aseribin g ta languag have no its Qwn struct ure of sunthe sis and dihaire sis which would he takes this structure 10 a equivalence in the things themse lves. Instead ry deeper level of speech Ihan that of Ihe asserlio n, where the bounda Ihat between languag e and being can be dissolved anew, in such a way retic structure. In this Ihey are both discove red la have a synthet ic-dihai

mcanin g of \Vay , one ca n say that Heidegger tries to bring out the truc di sti nc ti on showin g th at A risto tle indccd \Vas ri ght in blurrin g the

by Aristot le's attitude towards the re lation between language and being,

ll y between Ihe two, althoug h it shou ld be done at anoth er, onlologica prior leve l. in Thus at the end of hi s discuss ion of sunlhes is and dihairesis Aristotle, when Heideg ger raises anew the questio n of where one sholiid of look in arder ta get a cilie as to what conslilules the basic struct ure logos as assertion, he states that:
Apart from an esse ntial , though agai n tao vague indica ti on, Aristotle himself decJines to answer. He and the Greeks - and the ensuing tradit ion as a who le - have neg lected to interrogate Ihis structural ph enomenan in it s own right. Co mb ination anu l separa tion are the struclUre s by means of \\Ih ich, and as the fina ent, is clarilled, ... 1'0 rema in with stage, the assert ion, the judgell1 A ristotle him self, he could not Iiberate himsclf from his g orientation tow ard s language - for the Greeks so met hin as wi ll be shaw n, in him, the struct ures imposs ible - and sUlllhes s and dihairesis and their relations ta truc Jnd false karaphas is and apopha sis are not at ail so tran sparent as 28 compared to how they were elaborate d abovc.

on This Hvague indicat ian is, 1 take it, the passage in De Anima ately slln/hes is and dihairesis diseussed above. And, Heidegger immedi
H

zu unbestimmten GA 21, pp . 141- 142: "Von einer wesent lichen, abe r doch wieder es selbst die Auskunft. Er und die Grieche nAnwei sung abgese hen, versagt Arstotel unt erlassen , diesem und die weitere Tr adition berhaupt - haben es ci gens nachzufragen. Verbinden und Trennen sind die Strukturphan omen noch ... UIll mit denen aIs einem Letzten die Aussage , das Urtei l gekHirl \V ird, zu bleiben, so ist er nicht von der Oricnt icfung fille! der Sprnche be l Anstoteles selbst .- fLlr .die Griechcn c.ine Unm oglichkcit - uli d wl c Slcll 110.;; 11 :tC ig/l lll UlHcli " ' COI lle bel Ihl11 e Strukturen O\)\,O ; und lh a ipcou; 1I1ld IlIl l' Jl l" lr wlrd, smd
28

4. The as-structure e the The next stage in Heidegger's analys is of logos is th us la continu ion investigation into sunthesis and dihairesis sa as to reach the foundat sets Ollt from somethin g of the assertion. Where should he begin? He 100 wh ich he takes ta be problcmatic in A ri stotle, the fa cl that he gave him much priority ta Ihe synthet ic element in speech, for this made predication at the cast of other attach undue impo11a nce la the aspect of as feature s of speech. Even sa, Aristotle's concep tion of predica tion ta sunlhe sis contain s an insight o f great importa nce, namel y that predica tion belongs an "as-structure". Th is is , Heidegger argues, the Aristotle's great achieve ment over agai nst Plata. Wherea s Plato in something,29 Sophisl discovered th at every propos ition is always about as Aristotle took one step further in determining the Slructure of speech Heidegger interpre ts this li kala tinos: "something about someth ing".30 and as saying that to pred icate an attribut c of a thing means to display il, thereby to see it, in a specifie regard; ta see il as (ais) some thing, rather 31 than as anoth er. Ta interpret li kola linos in thi s \Vay means of course if ta have already taken a step outside a strictly linguistic sphere, for wc are faced with a question "saying as" pertains to a "seeing concerning th e nature of this kind of access ta beings. That is, wc have to that of predication: to be 1l0W encountered a level of meaning prior qua lity, one must understand il as ab le to as sert that a thin g has a certain being of such a quality. 's Thi s s hould thus serve as a further elucida tion of Heideg ger Predi cation interpre tation of sun/hesis and dihairesis discuss ed above. thi s as sunrhesis mean s to say something about something, and of a foregoing dihairesis , cOInbination is only possible on the basis whi ch cannot, consequ entl y, be said ta reside in proposition al speech the o nl y" but must rather be recogn ised as an acti vity that precedes rehension, when propos itio na l level. In thi s sense, th e momen t of app
1J 2 (' f. hnpl c,. One, p. 55.
1111 . ! 702 1Ir.
J

\V ic sic obclI herausgcarbclcl wlIrdcn."

Wahr llnd Falsc ll 1(mc):$ucu c;

lil le!

$U01 OItO

II lIdl

11111 "II dIUI'I Htl\.'ht IH

ln th'

'

Il ,,'/.. p.

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Il

'II A!,'II ' I{ '1 W() you takc notice of a n a bject in a certai n regard , und h ' Ill''"' out" a parti cul ar featu re of il, is as much in vcsted wi th th e lI!;t lll !.! liS is th e e nsuing predi cation. Of course, th is m uch A ri stotl" 100 \Vou Id agrcc upon; i.e, th at ta predication there belongs a foregoin g apprehcnsion, where you pay attention ta a particular feature of the abj ect in question, but the point Heidegger wants ta make is th at this dihairetic "seeing as" ca nnot be conceived aft cr th e m ode) of predi cati on, s ince it does not belong exclusively to propos iti onal speech (and tho ught) but to man 's very existence. Pu t in another \Vay, ma n 's most funda me nt aJ way of be ing in the wor ld is mark ed by an as-st ructu re of it s ow n, an d thi s means th at his ex isten ce is essenti all y co nstituled by exp liction (A IIslegllng).
The articu l<1t ioll of that which is undcrstood. as a bei ng is brought close in an exp licatio n \V it h the "somethi ng as somelhing" as a cl ue, li es te/ore the thematic assertion aboli t iL The "as" docs not
tum up for the lirst lime in Ihi s assertion, but is JUS! cxpresscd for the fifS! limc in il, and Ih is is possib le only beause il lies bcforc us as someth ing expressib le. The fact thal the explicitness of assert ion can be abse nt whe n wc j ust look al so meth ing does not make il jllstified to de ny suc h Illere sce ing eve ry k ind of art icu lating expl ication, and hencc to dcny il ilS as-structure. 32

'II A I''J'EK TWO

we il aS 11H11 whi ch is 1 be intcrprcted itsclf, are taken apart and 0 . 33 must be ke pt aparl in the cnactme nt 0 f t1 mterpretatlon. le

Ta e ncounte r a n ind ividua l thing, one must have a preconception of th e eidas - ta use Aristotl e's term - of the thin g, whi ch one accordin gly mllst "brin g to ge th er" \V ith the individual thin g to perform an act of un derstandi ng. Howeve r, i f th e ei d as, th e "o ut of w hi ch" of und erstandin g, is to fulfil ilS fu nc tion. il can nol be idcntical or coincide w ith the indi vidual th in g; it is general and is thus somethin g " more" th an the indi v idual (conversely, the indi vi dual is somethin g more and th us othcr than the general kind under wh ich it fa ll s). T hat is why the general and the particular must be kept apart in a dihaires is. B ut just as an indiv idual th ing is not und ersta nd able in isolation, its " general" meaning does not appear by itself either, but is involved in a nexus of meaning, w hi ch determines what can occur together at ail. We a re thus w itnessing a yet more fund amental sunlhesis that belongs ta bein gs th emsel ves, and which gives ri se ta a preconcepti on on our part ofwhal is possible ta encounler together. In Logik, Heidegger gives an example o f what he thinks is the most basic forl11 of seeing " as": ta see a bush d urin g a wa lk in th e forest but beJiev ing that it is a deer. The possibility o f this m istake is determined by an a nticipat ion o f w hat is at ail possible ta encounter in such a context. By contrast, H eidegger add s, one w ill surel y nol expect ta meet the Shah o f Persia in th e fo rest, th ough il is o f course poss ible th at he wo ul d turn up th ere. Howeve r, whereas it is possible 10 mect a deer in the fo res1 - and in a sense also the Shah - il is cJearl y not possible ta come upon the third root of 69 in the fore st. This poss ibility of encounter is an expressio n of th e
33

34

ln und erstandi ng somelhing as so methi ng. i. e. w hcn performi ng a dihairesis, one is not only direcL to th e ind iv id ual th ing, but one a lso ed understands (in ad vance) a mean ing (Bedeu fung), in terms ofwhich one has access ta th e Ihing in qu estion . The relation betw ee n meani ng and thing also proves la be one of sunlhesis and dihairesis. In olher ward s, th e dih airet ic " unders tandi ng as" is s imultaneous ly a sunlhesis. Heidegger ex plains:
Thal out of wllich the interpretation takes place must be broughl or put togcthcr with the "wh at" 01" Ihe interprelation - slIlIlhesis, in wll ose bring ing a nd putting toge lher it is al the sa me lime imp lied that bath of llit:l1l, tht: "Ulil ur which" o f interpretation as

SZ, p. 149: "Die Al1ikulat ion des Verstandenen in de r auslcgenden Niihe rung des Scienden am Le itfade n des ' Etwas aIs etwas' liegt vor der thematischen Aussage dar ber. In dieser tauc ht das 'Ais' nicht zuers t a u f, so ndern wird nur e rst ausgesprochen, was al1e in so mgl ich ist, dal3 es ais Aussprechbares vorliegl. DaO im sch li ch ten Hi nsehen die Ausd rcklichkeit eines Aussagens fe hl en ka nn, berechtigt nicht dazu, d iesem sc hlichten Sehen jede artikuliere nde Auslegung. milhin di e AlsStru ktll r abzusprechen."
32

GA 2 1, pp. 14 8- 149: "Das, von wo aus gedeutet wird , mul3 mit dem \Va s der De ulu ng zllsammengebrac ht, zusammengeselzl. - crUV.OEO"I, in weI cher Zusflllllnenbringung und Zusalll lllCnSclzllng zuglelch Ilegt, daO das Woher des Dc utcns und das Zll Deutende sclbst, auseinandergenommen sind und im Vol1zug der Deut ung ausei nandergehalten werden mss en. " the pro?lem with translaling T.he reason Delltllllg as " interpretfltion " ; it must no: be taken tn. any why Il eidcgge r i5 using D elllll1Jg he re IS that he thillks that JI IS consti tutI ve of Ihe I)ede lllllllgen of words. J., Il is ha rd ly innocent ta speak abou t "the genera l" and "the particu lar" in cOllnl::ction \Vi th Il eidcgger, s ince he has tried, on the basis of a n interpretation of IlIcaJli ng (Dec/eu/lIl1g) as possibi lity, to show that the of the cannot in any si mpl e way bc rega rclee! as an instance of the unlvers.a l, as It IS spcc Hi<..'"<.I accor<.ling to the Sil\l!ui oll . St ill , He idegger cannot do w ltnollt some killd of .!loti oll (If' Il rc pcatnb lc Illcu nillg. hi s poiO! is trclltcd in Chtlpt crs Titree and Four.

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possibility or th e most original sUllt!resi,\',

together. 35 ln brief terms, predication (which does

111 11 1, ln thl'l cuse,

forest an d dcer, but not rorest and the th ird root of 69, ": 1I1l OCC lU". i.e. be
110t

cons ist of a suu/hesis o nl y

but also o f a dihairesis, to the extent that it divorces predicate F rom s ubject in the assertion) is made possib le by an understanding dihairesis, where you pay attention to the parlicular thin g as bei ng o f a specifie kind, and this understanding is al the saille lime a sUlIlhesis of the particu lar thing and that in terms of wh ich il is understood. J6 Ta distingui sh bctween these two forms of sunthesis and diha ires/s, Hcidegger tenns the former an "apophanli c", i.e, assertiori c "as" and the lattcr a "hermencuti c 'as,,,.37 The henneneuti c apprehension is in ils
lurn founded on a pre-given, "synthet ic" con tcxt o f the lhin gs that can

Or in other ward s, the c larificulion of the as-structure hinges on the possibility of givin g a propcr exp li cat ion of the phenomena of understand ing and interpretat ion (Bedeutlll1g).40 Out \Vhen making this ITTove From assertion to a supposed ly more basic level of (pre-proposition al) interpretation, Heidegger does not merely take a step fu rther in his inquiry into the asserti on but actual ly transfortns the inquiry itself. For the discovery of a pre-propositional level of the as-structure motivates Heidegger to explore the domain of th e pre-theoretical as such, on the basis of which the question of the
fu'gUS, dctc fmill cs th e asscrti on's fUllction.

39

nature of the assertion has to be raiscd anew, [rom another perspective.

be together, and, although Heidegger does not say 50 himself, this context may also be call ed a dihaires is , si nce it excludes such thin gs that do not belong to il. Fin all y, as th e last fo unda li on stands a foregoing disc losedness of being as such, which shou ld not, 1 thin k, be analysed in terms ofslIn!hesis and dihairesis 38 Ail thi s makes clear, Heidegger says, tha t th e rea l work of understanding docs not take place on thc level of prcd ication, but precedes and founds il. This insight was however lost on Aristotle, since he conceived of the structure of sunlhesis and dihairesis basicall y in terms of propositional thought. This contention does no! aim at reducing the importance of Ari stotle's work, but it im pli es that, in order to truly understand th e nature of Ihe as sertion , one must take notice of that disclosive activi ty which constitutes its foundation. For this, Heidegger
l5
36

ln briefterms, the change is this: 50 far it seems - not least on aCCQunt of the above quotation from Sein und Zeir - that the assertion only puts to words what has already been un derstood: there is an articulation or expl ication (Auslegung) that " lies before" the asserti on, yet becomes expressed by it. Hence the necess ity of elu c idat ing the pre-pred icative
foundation of the assertion ; thi s is w here wc must locale the ll ild erstanding or interpretative effort. But once lhi s is estab li shed,

Heidegger will ask himself whether assertion in the proper sense mi ght not involve a theoretical altitude towards its object, wh ich in its tum presupposes a "practical", hermeneutic fami li arity with the worl d. Thus
here the perspective changes: the assertion is no longer regarded as a mcre verba l or lin gui sti c express ion, or as just a "man ifestat ion"

GA 21 , pp. 187-188.

On thi s po int , one may pe rhaps com pare \Vit h Ka lH's understanding of the di stinction betwccn sy nt hcs is and analysis. According to hi m, synthesis is a basic fca ture of the spontanei ty of our understand ing (i.e. the Versla nd) and il consists in a bringing logether of our prese nta tions (Vo/'s/ellllJ/gen) given in in tuition. Thi s "subject ive" sy nt hesis is the cond it ion of possibility of observi ng feat ures com bined in an abject. A nd il is also a prerequ isite of analysis, i.e. of the possibility of disintegrati ng the presentations again, and therefore also of pred ication. See Krilik der reinen Ve/'l1unfl , 15 in the "T ranszendcnta le Oedu ktion der reinen Verstandcsbegriffe (B)".

(Aufzeigung) of something previously understood, but it is thou ght to involve its Qwn mode of access to the world. The rema ining parts of the present chapter are mainly concerned \Vith the implications of this rcnewed approach. As we will see, the result of this approach is that the relation between the hermeneutic and the apophanti c level of logos is s hown 10 be mu ch more complex in comparison with how it has been outl ined so far.
lQ

GA 21, pp. 140- 142. E. Tugendhat has in Tl KATA Eill.e :lIr Sll'lIkl/ll' /liu/ Urspnlllg arislolelisclter Grundbegriffe cJallned ln a sJl11llar fa shlOn
that the as-slructure cannot bc laken to bc of a gra mmatical or log;cal nature only. He [II'Sucs instcad Ihat it has ils ori gn in Ihe t\Vo fold structure of being. ilself, and - bc in g pcrhnl)S more conced ng lowards A ristolle in Ihi s contex! than Heidegger - suggests Ihnt thi s is clca rl y rccogni scd by ri stotle himself. However, cf. above, p. 68, note

" SZ, p. 158.

38

For, as 1 will discuss in Chapter Three, Heidegger see ms to think that th is primordial disclosedness is of a similar nature as that of the Ari stotclian vou, i.e. non-discursive.

21. 21 p. 152. .

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5. Tr1llh and apophansis As indicated al the beginning of this chapter, Ileidcggcr th inks !hat in
arder to understand not only the nature of predication and

speech but speech as such, it is necessary to c1arifY the nature of truth. ln this sense, truth is a more basic or broader concept than speech, which is not ta say that truth could be explored without reference to speech. Still, the re lative priority of truth over speech is, as wc will sec shortly, of fundamental imporlance to Ileidegger 's interpretation of
Aristotl e's concept oftruth.

Heidcgger's undcrstanding of trllth, his atlcmpt to I11Qve beyond the confi nes ara "theoretical" notion oCt ruth, is certainly a comp lex matter. ]n the following, it is not my intention to givc an outline ofHeidegger's struggle wit h the problem of truth in its entircty, but only to deal with hi s attitude towards that kind of lruth that is supposcd to bclong to assertoric speech. Common ta ail of Heidegger's attempts to rcveal the essence of truth is that he on ly takes into consideration one concept of Iruth, and that is the correspondence-Iheory of Iruth. At the time of Sein und Zeit Heidegger often begins hi s discussion of truth by summarising what he regards as the basic assumptions in thi s con nection : the "seat" (Ort) of truth is logos in the sense of assertion, truth consists in a correspondence between thinking and bcings, or between a judgement and its object, and, tinally, these two views have Aristotle as their 4 originator \ But even though Heidegger sets out to criticise these views, describing them as "since long prevailing prejudices"," he actually ends up - as usual , one is almost tempted to say - affirming them, though on the basis of a reinterprctation of thcir mcaning.'13 Logos is indeed the "seat" of truth, provided that the meaning of the word "logos" is not restricted to propos itional speec h, and the critique of the correspondence-theory does not aim to replace it \Vith anolher model for truth, but ta reinterpret the very notion of Hcorrespondence". Finally, on the basis of this reinterpretation, it is possible to attribute to Aristotle a kind of modified correspondence-theory of truth .

t\ccordin g 10 !\riSIO c's c1assical formulation oftruth, "Ta say about ll thal whi ch is that it is not, or about that which is not that it is, is fa lse, but to say aboul that which is that it is, and about that which is not that it is not, is true."" The point of departure of Heidegger's discussion of truth as a whole is the convition that this notion of truth can hardly be rcjccted. There is something fundamentall y "true", if this term may be allowed in the present context, about this definition which has to be preserve d in any account of truth. The crucial question here is how to lIt1derstand legein and ils relation to that of wh lch Il . I -Ieidegger' s account, the problem wi th thls. relation JO teI111S of correspondence is that this might give the Im preSSIOn Ihat the assertion or the judgement could somehow be understood in isolation from th at about which it is su pposed to be true, so that it relates to its obiect only by representing or imitating il. Once such a perspective is es;ab lished, there is nothing to prevent the suspicion that the jud gement Illi ght aner all not relate to th e object it self. but rather to a representation of it, for how could there be a correspondence between such different things as a judgement and a thing? Heidegger remarks: " But knowledge should 'give' the thing such as it is. The 'correspondence' has the relalional character of 'such - as' .,,45 Thus correspondence can only be made sense of by refcrence to the asstructure, and therefore, to clarify the latter is necessary in order to understand the nature oftruth. At thi s point, Heidegger turns to Aristotle ' s expression logos apophantikos, cOI1lJ11only identifi ed with the declarative sentence or the assertion. Literall y , however, the adjective apophantikos means something like "manifesting" or "show in g". and its cognales apophansis and apophasis46 can both mean speech and assertion, as weil as manifestation. These etymological connotations of "showing", " displaying", etc., are important to Heidegger insofar as they serve as a poin\ of deparlure for hi s philosophical elucidation of logos apophalllikos. First, Heidegger points to the fact that Anstotle sJl1gles
40\

Me. t. IOllb26.27: "'(0 11 v 'Yp :YElV tO V I.lTJ E\VCH 1\ tO

KctltO pil Vl111 E!veu

v ElvOl 'l'EOO, tO .. ,

"sz, p. 214, GA 21, pp.

128-129. 42 GA 21, p. 128. Sec also PA, p. 256. 4 ) This is pointed out by A. Vigo, "Wahrheit, Logos und Praxis: Die Transrormation der aristotel ischen Wahrhcitskonzeption durch Heidegger", p. 75.

01 1 S Z, p. 216: " Aber sol1 doch dlc Sache.s,o" geben, WIC Sie ISt. Die 'berein slillllllung' hOI den Relallonscharakter.: 'S? . " Not to he cOllruscd wil h Ille 611:641001<; W h 1$ denved rrolll the verb 01toQOVot hlC II nd "dcllinl",

cl I10 .".

"

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out logos apopl/anlikos w ilh re fc rcncc to il s pmlN illllll y tif Il IlI g InlCo; S peeclt Hl ld Ih o ughl have in vi rtu c orlh c ir vcry nalure a "re lation" to Iheir objects: Ihe 3sscrt ioll docs not imitate its object bul, as He id egger s4 stalcs in e ill und Zeil , Ullcovers (emdeckt) it. Thus here we can see

and fa Ise, th at is, th at he in fact detines logos wilh the hclJl oJ'I" lIlh, not the other way round," This implies, Heidegger argues, Il'''1 il was by no means obvious to Aristotle that tru th necessarily is " propcrly of assertions onl y," And if the assertion is determined by rcfcrence to its possibility of being true and false, the clarification of truth wi ll in its tum provide us with a c lue to the nature of the asse rti on, Indeed, apophansis is to Heidegger the key to both truth and pro positional speech." Heidegger interprets apophanlikos as " Iett ing be seen by showing
forth " (aufw eisen d se hen lass en d): ta make an assert ion about

how Il cidcgger approaches lhe asscrti on from a differen t perspective Ihan be l'orc, as the assertion now is said to be one way in which man un covers beings, rather tha n an expression of somethin g already un covcred. One reason why Heidegger takes this perspective here is pro bably that he wants 10 draw on Hu sserl ' s notion of truth as
identi fi cation. 55 Heidegger's favourite examp le in thi s connect ion is a pcrson making the assertion: "The painting on the wall hangs askcw'\

something is to make it maniresl in a specitlc way by ascribing a 50 determinate prope,1y ta it. ln thi s way the thin g in question becomes
v isible in a certa in regard, that is, it is made express ly access ible by the 51 assert ion. The meanin g of propos ili onal "as-ness" is thus furlher determ incd in tcrms of a "show ing forth" (Aufteigung) of somethi ng as somethin g. This is the second o f th e Ihree senses of "assertion "

enumerated above, lhough in I-Ie idegge r 's view Ihe primary." Heidegger noIes:
If onc has understood this basic st ructure of legeill , then it is by no means possib le to find somct hing in th is deterlllination of beng true and false that co uld make one take tru th to be a representation or imitation of bei ngs in consciousness in the sense of a remeasuring correspondence. The showing forth is according to ils sense already with the beings Ihemse lves, . 53

whil e not seeing th e paintin g itself. What happe,lS, Heidegger asks, when one tUfilS around and sees the painting? "The being which was intcnded shows itself such as il is in itself, th at is, it shows thai il is, in ilS selfsameness, such as the assertion displays, uncovers il as being."s6 Th is situation could also be described as follows: wh en making the assertion about the painting, one addresses the painting in a particular way, namely as han ging askew and not as e,g, ugly. The assertion turns out 10 be true if the painting responds ta this address by showing itself
as actu all y hang in g askew. In other words, the assertion is true if th e

"as" of th e assertion "corresponds" to (proves to be the same as) the " as" of the givenness of its abject. ln this way, the trutlt of the assertion is conceived of along the lines of accomplishment, as it is located in the activi ty of speaking. Thi s is imporl ant to Heidegger for two reas ons: first because he thinks thal
trulh primaril y belongs to man or Dasein J and only in a secondary sense
10

41
48

Cf. above, p. 60 . H eidegger ' s interpretation of A rstot le's broadcr notion of truth is treated in Chapters T hree and Four. . 49 T h s ide nti ficat ion of the esse nce of th e asserti on \V ith its truth s of course problematic, and H eidegger later criticised himse lf for not hav ing taken enough account of fal sity and decept ion in his deterrn ination of the essence of the assertion;

thin gs. Th is idea is worked out into a notion of Dasein's discloscdness (Erschlossenheil) of being as the prima ry phenomenon of
trLl th, on th e basis of which trulh in the sense of uncovering of bein gs is
10

bc e luc idated . Secondly, the basic problem \V ith the traditiona l

GA 29/30, p. 488. 50 GA 21, pp. 121ff. "GA 21, p. 133. " SZ, pp. 154-155.
53 GA 21, p. 163: " Hat man diese Grundstruktur des YEl V verstanden, dann ist es gar nicht mogli ch, in dieser B estimmung von Wahr und Falschsein etwas zu finden, was Anhalt gabe, W ahrhei t ai s Abb ildung und N achbi ld ung von Scicnde m im Bewul3tsein im Sin n einer nachmesse nden bere instim mu ng zu fa sscn. Das Aufweisen ist j a schon seinet11 Sinn nach beim Sc ienden selbs t, .

nl crpretati on of the asserti on is th at it neglccts the context of speak in g, th e aclual e nac tm ent of the asserti on, and tends in stead to approach the nsscl'tion as an isolatcd entity. T'hi s point is discusscd fllrther below.

" Sec i id.. whcrc Ilcidcggcr refcrs prcciscly to this notion. . . 'b Sl, p. 2 18: " Das gCll1clItc Seiclld c sdbsi zcigl sich so, lI'ie cs an Ihm selbst Ist, das heiflt, cloU cs in Sl:l hi gket so ist, ais wic sc icnd es in de r Aussage aufgeze igt, Cil ldt.:cki wlrd ."

p. 2 18.

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why th e perspec ti ve hus becn thu s limiled is parll y that

What res ult has Ihe present investi gation given th uS 1 ' 1110 es,cnec o f ,,1"/ the asserti on is ta make things manifest as being of li pari ieulli r ki nd, by way of separating and then bringing together subject and predi catc. [n Heidegger's view, the assertion ' s nature of making manifest is the
foundation of il S synthetic-dihairetic structure. Thi s mean s that the assertion 's ontological role is more fundame ntal than ilS structures or
57

the fln a lys is IIp to now has ma inly f'oll owed the Ar islOtle of D e IlIterpreta/iolle, where he does not in vesti gate the situation of speech, but is exclusively coneern ed with reveal ing the structures of the
asse rtion. I-I owever, il wi ll 50011 become clear that the re is yet "another"

elements. That is ta say, the latter can on ly be understood on the basis of the former. J-lowever, wh en wc abandon the inlerpretation of s unthes is and dihairesis as just grammatical features, and explicate them in lenus or Oleir role of disp laying "somelhing as something", they preci sely take on onto logical meaning and must be said to Conn an
integral part o f the assert ion 's uncovcring nature . But evcn if th e

Aristotle available ta LIS, who ean serve as a guide for the present task of cx pli cati ng the situation of speech. This is the Aristotle ofthe Rhetorie. We thus once more eneounter an oscillation in Aristotle' s thinking. Ile i. not ollly the father of logie but also a phenomenologieal thinker:
hc has managed ta point out th e primary phenomenon of speech , bcca use he has seen how it is in faet enacted. Heidegger remarks on this double nature of Aristotle 's thinking:
When we said that the history of logic in the West, and thereby Ihe sc ience of langua ges in ge neral, is determined by the Greek theory of logos as asse rtion, il must at the same lime
oe mentio ned that the very Ari stotle, who ... for the fi rsl lime reached an insight into the sentence-structure, in hi s Rhetoric also
rec ogni scd and grasped the grandiose task of interpreling the

in vesti gati on has moved beyond a purely lag ica-g rammatical understanding of the assertion, it has 50 rar given onl y a very genera l determination of il. Il is therefore lime la ask whether these basic characteristi cs as hitherto spelled out allow for different kinds of asse11ions.
6. The neeessity of eon/exlualising the assertion SA far, Heidegger' s interrogation into the nalure of the assertion has not, but for a few exceptions, taken into accollnt th e co nlext within which
assertions arc lIttered. Il has not considered wh ethcr the assertion's function varies w ith the form of givenness pertaining to the things wc make assertions about, or if our intention s play any part here, etc. Even

ki nd s and fo rm at ions of non-post ing speech. Ta be su re, for

di frerent

reasons the power o f logic \Va s tao strong to Icave open j8 to this pursuit ilS own possibility of development.

ln an earli er course, Crundbegriffe der aris/o/elischen Philosophie, Ilcidcgger ca ll s on precisely the Rhetorie for assistance in the seareh for
Ih e rundam c ntal characteri stics of non -positing speech. thus tryin g to

though Heidegger' s interpretation of Aristotle's understanding of logos apophan/ikos repcatedly has bcen forced ta tran sgress the limits of the
fo rma I approac h, and al so al a number o f occasion s has pointed to the pre -propositi onal foundation of the assert ion, with the charactcrisation o f trllth as unco ve ring. the nced to Illove beyond th e initia l perspective becom es partic ularl y urgent. For granled th at il is pecu liar to the assertion to uilcover beings such as they are in themsel ves, the question

take on that grandiose task which Ari stotle once recognised. Indeed, the Rhe/oric is here characterised as Aristotle ' s "hermeneutics ofDasein", where Dasein ' s everyday self-explication is made explicit.'9 This might
at lirst glallce seem like a somewhat speculative claim; it is, however,

nothin g but the natural consequence of the idea mentioned above, that
GA 29130, p. 439: "Wenn \Vi r sagten, daf3 die Geschichte der Logik

)8

of the possibility and genesis of this uncoverin g arises. Ta be able ta

reveal thi s, il is necessary to look at the situation of speech.

V(lil der gricchisc hen Theorie des ).,010<; lm Si nne des Aussages atzes bestlmm l lst V01l do nus die Wi sscnschafl von den Sprachcll Obcrhaupt, dann muB doch zugl: lch crw'll1l1l wcrden dafl dcrscl be Aristotcles, der . . . ZUtll crsten Mal vordran g zu clner in di e Struktu r des Sal zes, auch in seiner Rhetorik die, Aufgabe

crkonlli c und in An gri ff ll tl hm , die Formen und Bi ldungen der mchl thetlsch en cille.' Interpretation ZlL ullt crwcrfen. Frei lich, v.:ar
M nchl Logik zu stark, um dicsem Versuch CIIlC cIgcne Enl wl cklungsm oghchkelt

" SZ, p. 33.

l1ffcn 'lU[ossen." ':1( ;A 18. p. 11 0.

R 2

K 'I

l' li A I' Il ' 1 '1 Wt) (

'li A I' Il ' I( WO

Il l.'IlilllIlIl l l1 l lon

the wo rk of

and PlalO clllcrgcd lhr'ou" h

\Vi th

COIll CS II hOnl ltud \V hut it look s likc, wC Illu s t intro du ce th e no ti o n or u s pc nk c l'

sophism. Thal is to say , what Heidegge r wa nls 1 1'0111110 hCI c. ls slI1ply 0 Ihat to the Greeks, the everyday , common mode of s peech \Vus prcci scly rhetoric. and not only on account of the existence of sophislIl , but in general because of the central raie that public speech played in their society 60 For this reason, we sho uld not read the Rhetorie as if it just \Vere concerned \Vith so rne specifie "arf ' (techne) of speaking, for in this work, A ristotl e actually tri cs to come to grips \Vith an absolutely basic and di stinct phenomenon within Greek life. Of co urse, this is not ta claim that when oullinin g th e s ituation of rh etarical speech, Aristat le thinks that he has a lso laid bare the fundamental structures of speech as such, But whatever Aristotle's own views on the statu s of his analys is of rhetoric rnight be, Heidegger is conv inced that th is ana lys is is in fact app licable ta the cantex t or speech as such, and thu s must be brought into the discussion of"theoretica l" speech (the assertion) as wel1. 61 First, in order ta avo id the idea that th e Rhetorie is just an " art", as works on rheto ric were generally called in the ancient era , Heidegger points to Ar istotl e's ow n characlerisati on of rhetoric as " the power (dunamis) to sec the poss ibl e ways of convincing in rcference to any sin gle tapi e whatsocvcr."o2 Such a conception ofrhetoric paves th e \Vay for the fallawing definition of its consti tution : " [rhetari cal] speech is camposed o f three parts: the speaker, th e tap ie of which he speaks, and the persan ta wharn th e speech is addressed and to whom the end also is related; 1 mean th e hea rer. ,,63 T hese three elements constitu te the situation of rhetorical speech, and that means that they are indispensable for an understanding of rhetoric. ror it m akes no sense to speak about convi cti on w ithout anyone be ing conv inced; ta see ho w conviction
Ibid. 61 Haweve r, in his work on rhetaric, whi ch ta a great exlent is devoled 10 Heidegger's inlerprclalion of Arislotle ' s Rlte/orie, P. C. Smith argues Ihat even thaugh theoretical discourse must be understood on Ihe basis of an ana lys is of rhetorical speech, il pres upposes a suspension of rhetorical speech, the im pe rativc. For whereas the latter bas action for ils aim, the fo rmer has only a fa ct-stating funct ion; The Hermenewics o[Originaf Argument: Demonstration, Dialectic, Rhetoric, p. 16. 6 Rltetoric ("Rltet."), 1355b25-26: "VEatw '" petopuOl val-W; nepi. KCXOtoV m 9EOOPlcrca ta eVEX!lEVOV m9avov." Noted by Heidegger on p. 114 in GA 18. 63 Rhel. 1358a37-b2: "crUyKE1Wl )lV yp EK 'TplOOV Cl oyo, K tE 'to YO V'to Kcli rtEp t ou ].YEl Kat np ov, Ka t t 'to 1tp '[Ot OV e onv, yw O -rv Kpoaniv. "
6IJ

und puy ull c nlion to hi s mo ti ves; and fin a ll y , th e na.Lu re

?r lhe

nrgllme nl s lIsccI dcpends upon th at abOlit whi ch the speaker IS try m g ta convinec th e hea rcrs M 1'herc l'ore, Heidegger says, th e Rhelorle IS mllch more va luab lc to us Ih3n is "IIlY philasaphy of language; here Aristatle is 65 approa chin g speech as a way of being or actin g toward s other people. But for thi s "t ri ang le" w hi ch Aristat le h as es tablish ed ta be appra pri ate l'o r He idegger's purpases, it must be sli ghtly madified, For c ve n th ough Heidegger probabl y would not deny that the ambItIOn ta con vince people is often an important aspect of speech, he does not scem ta rega rd it as absolutely central. More important is that the Rhetorie operates \Vith a tele olagical notion of speech, accardin g to whi ch speech is governed by an anticipated end (telo s). The result of Il eidegger' s modili cation is as foll ows: lirst, the nature of speec h ca nn at be reac hed without taking notice of the speaker and his interests. Sccondly, one must alsa consider the hea rer, to whom the speech is direcl ed for the anticipated end, or th e effect of the speech on the hcare r co-const itutive of th e motives behind the speech. Besides, the c flect speech depc nds nat only on the speaker's intentions but also on how speech is und erstood, Lastly, we must not di sregard that w h lch the speaker talks about. 1t affects the nature of the speech insofar as the way in whi ch th e object is g ive n ta th e speaker has bea rin gs on th e rcason . why (a nd thereby on lhe nalure) or his speeCh." ln brier tCrIn s, what has been revealed as important const ltue nts of spcech arc th e speaker's interest or the anticipated end of speech and the mode o f givenncss belonging ta the thing in question. A lthough Il eid egger states co mmunica tion as the last of the tluee major
(,1

d.ifferent it ca n (1KCI.V1KO ) or ; "i11ustrative" (bUOE1Ktl KO). In the !i rst case, the (u:o) IS to declde \\helher sOlll clhi ng is benefi cial or harmful , and so consultat ive speech by wa.y app cnl or dissuflsi on. In j ud icial speech the end what IS Just and .UllJ.US.t, 'Iccord in gly its fonn is either derence or accusatlll. FlIlal ly, the end of epldelctlc is hOllounlblc and the shamefu l, and 50 ilS fa rm is praise and blame. Rhet., 1358b6-29. l, is thllS ta be noled Ihat the end of rhetorical evcllIll.ally CO ll siSIS in f\ course of lcti on on the part of the hearer, as Ils Imtlal end IS a conviilclll g (kl11 onstrati on of 50lll cthin g as being o f a certain kind; nam ely of 5uch a kind as Ihe ural or wanls il to seem, 18, p. 11 7.
be de libcrati vc or "con sultati ve" (ow!30ueUtlKo),

ccordin g ta Ari stotlc, rhetorica l speech can take ,on

:" Sec (;1/ 1R, t 18- t 24 fr.

84

l' III\I'

""1 Wt)
1
IIClI l

't
r II 1111
lIl it HII

'l'WO

charaCLeri slics of assertions , th e notion ora

nol abso lut ely essent ial 10 him. He ascribes

pCl'son is

I!l ing

ti r;;

0 lIt c ns il and , look in g away l'rom it s rc lational structure, wc

illh'!I':mhJl.'c tl vc unI un.:

or

speech tirst of ail to ;'the one" (do s Man), i.e. Ih l: puhli c II1cHIln g-

context or "explicatedness" (Ausgelegtheit) in tcrm s of wlti!.:!t wc have

access to th e world. Since sentence-meaning in th is way is cOl1stituted

by this public rncaning-co ntext, speech is in its essence intersubjective,

cven when a persan juS! speaks to himsel f, w ithout anyone cise being around. Consequently , when purs uing the different iation of the assertion, Heidegger foc uses on th e situation in which a speaker relates ta a thing only and not to a person in rcference to a thing. If it is true, as the Rhetarie tells us, that speech must be determined

rega rd it o nly as an objcct is cndowed with a certain property.67 i\ ccordin g to Il cidcgger, it is really only the last of these examples th flt < li{ies ror th e llIa "asseI1ion", for it is only here that the overridin g intention behind the proposition is to attribute a property to a thin g, while disregarding the living comportment within which it is prilll ari ly given. With this view, Heidegger thus wants to challenge the ((mna l perspective for th e sake of phenomenological anal ys is : the llsse rtion cannot be identified with the indicative. This is se ldom
l'ccogllised in the li terat ure on Heidegger, but as 1 w ill show in the

by refercllce to ilS end, then apparently, the lagieal or grammatical perspective on propositional speech mu st be, if not put aside, then at least not regarded as th e most important one. for rhetorieal arguments may obviously consist of assertions in thc grammatical sense, but they may be uttered \Vith a number of differen t emls or purposes in mind. More precisely, th eir end is not merely to show that something is the case, or to communicatc a faet, but also to brin g about an effeet, and in this way eventually to cause action. Thi s id ea is al so taken up by Heidegger. ln Logik, Heidegger asks us to distinguish betwee n three forms of assertion, which display shifl in g de grees of detachment as regards the relation between the assertion and its object. The first is an assertion made in the service of some kind of performance, for example if one remarks while writing on the blackboard that the chalk is too hard. In this case, the assertion is made Ollt of one's present circumstances, wherc the chalk ofIers resistuilce to being used, and the assertion is intimately connected \Vith the actua l way of relating 10 th e chalk; it
works as a kind of explication

l'o ll ow ing section s, il is crucial to the question of the relation between . ' the apophantlc an d t he hermeneu t IC " as ,,68 .

But before proceedin g ta that point, one might ask what the challenge o f the gramm atica l perspective implies fo r Heidegger's view on the grammatica l distinctions between different kinds of moods. Heidegger
occasionally discllsses Aristotle's remarks on the prayer, namely th at it is ne ilher true , nor fai se. According to Heidegger's interpretation of Irulh, Ihis wo uld mean lhat the prayer, as weil as other non-assertoric

modes or speech, lacks the function of showing forth an abject so th at it beeo mes accessible in its determination. In Sein und Zeit Heidegger says that the pray cr has its Qwn way of making manifest, but he does
Il o t

< scllss this any further. 69 ln anather text, however, he observes thal Ii Ih e d iscriminating point between theoretical assertions and other modes

of" s peech is the desire for knowl edge and for communicating this kn owledgc to others. When asking for something, 1 am not looking to
in c reasc th e otheT persan 's knowledge, nor am 1 asserting that 1 wish

or one's

present' involvemcnt. A more

distanced way of speak in g is to make an assertion in th e form of a

sOl1lcthin g. That is, 1 am not making a statement about the object of my . wish, but 1 am di splaying myself as a person who WIS hes someth'mg. 70 ln this way, 1 am no doubt making myself manifest to another person whcn asking him or her for something, and therefore, it seems that the
prayer also discloses its object, thou gh as something desired.
(,1

descript ion of the environment. Heidegger is not really concerned about th is stage, but th e point is probably that in this case, the assertion is still bound by a particular context in wh ich one is not completely detached from concernful dealings. The third form of the assertion, finally, is the
one that consists in a determination of th in gs that arc present as objccts. Here, we are no more li ving in an understanding that is directcd towards

GA 2t, pp. 156- 158.

Excepli olls (Ire O. 0, l)aI11 5Iro111, Dtls logische Vorur leil. UlIlersllch ungel1 Zllr W"hrhei lslhcorie desfriih cn IIeidegJ;er. pp . 145- 153 ; A. Vigo, "Wahrheit, Logos und I)rt\xi s: Die T ransrol'l1l(l ti oll der artistotelischen Wahrheilskonzeption durch
t Iciclcggcr", (l . t,i) S%, p. 32.
/Il

92.

something which is to be don e, but have taken a stcp back Ii'om th e

GA 29/30, pp. 011 7, 448 .

86

WI

CI 1 1\1''1 l' I{ 1W() Does this mean Ihat Heidegger himsell' lIlI" . SIIIIHI , III/ l"l'Ilt s or speech on the bas is of the assertion? Thi s lIli ghl 'CC II ' 10 be Ih c consequence if ail forms of speech are marked by Ihe charllelcrislic or mak ing man ifesl, since this was established as the essence o r the assertion . As far as [ can see, Heidegger thinks o f the assertion as the most common form of speech in the grammatical sense, but, as [ have said carli er, to Heidegger the grammatica l struct ure is not very inleresting in this connection, sinee it is not enough ta defi ne what he means by "assertion"." The reason why Heid egger can talk about speech in general as of a displaying nature is his idea that man 's \Vay of relating to bein gs neeessarily involves di se los ure, i. e. is always a tarm of trllth. I-Ience, even if apophansis interpreted as "making manifest" is reserved for the assertion only, aIl kinds of speech, inso far as they arc
human act ivi ti es, revea l something, albeit in d i ffcrcnt ways. According ly, in discussing the prayer, Ile ideggcr 's aim is Ilot to show thal th e struct ures o f J1l oods th at dirrer l'ro m th e ind icati ve are

CI 1 1'11\1< TW O 1\ /lnd H chan ge in our comporlmcnt towards beings. In arder to ulldcl'stund thi s, il is ncecssary lo have a look at its genesis within cvcrydoy, " practica l" lifc.
7, The assertion as jolll1ded* a change in evelyday comportmenl on When describ in g the genesis of the assertion, Heidegger simultaneously wanls to rcveal an essential, though not exhaustive, prerequisile of the gCll csis of lh eory and sc ience: the emergence of a certain detaehment l'rom everyday, "absorbed" life. Thus here we come across th e im port an t qu estion of view on th e relation between the Ih coreti ea l and the praetieal: does Heidegger take theoretieal activity, including asserloric speech, to be essentially parasitic upon everyday, " praeli cal" li fe, or does he think that theory has its aIVn possibility of ori ginal diselosure?" On thi s point, there is no daubt a tension in Il eidegger ' s work, whieh J will try ta resolve on ly in Chapter Four, where 1 will argue for the latter of the two altematives just stated. Most spee ifically, [ will show how Heidegger, partly by means of his ili lerpretation of Aristotle, tries to Qvercome the very distnction bClween the theoretieal and the praetieal. Some remarks in this direction will ho\Vever be given already in Ihi s chapter, in arder ta indicate what such an at tempt implies for Heidegger's conception of the assertion. But befa re addressing that point, 1 give an outline of what seems ta be Il cidcggcr's argument again st the notion that the assertion cou ld invo lvc gcnuinc diselosure. Whon Il.u bert Dreyrus suggested that Heidegger wou ld locate the constit uti on o r meanin g entirely on the level of everyday life , he drew prilllari ly on Sein ulld Zeit, whieh at that time was still the major source li)r Il eidcgger's conception of theory and praxis. In particular in the pnrn grap hs on Dasein 's evcryday \Vay of being in the world, Heidegger .sCCl'ns indecd to dri ve al the point that knowledge and theory are simply lh; d v {\1ivc rorms o f' conduet, and that cvcryday li fe essentially consists ill dea lings \:vilh lhi ngs. More precisely, when describin g cveryda y COlllporllllcnt, Heidegger emphasises the aspect of use of lilin gs J'o r Ih e purpose o r mak in g something, whereas he hardl y
'1li t: liJ lln c r vic\V is tnkc n by 1L Dr'cy rus, ',,' fleing fl ntl T iIIlC /)(\llslolI J, p, 12 1, ,
A COlllmenlQ/y 011

equiprimordial or perhaps evcn more " original" . Il e lises this example in arder ta say somethin g abou t everyday speech regardless of its grammatical structures. He wa nts ta make clear that speech is usually not enacled simply for lhe sake of estab lishing a fact, or in arder to make somethi ng access ibl e to others; su ch in tentions are always directed by other pUl'poses, such as to eonv incc, deceive, communieate, make an impression, and sa forth ." This was clearly displayed in the Rhetoric, for whereas rhetorieal speech can ccrtainly consist in assertions in the gram matical sense, Hs final end is not to reveal a faet, but to convince the hearers that something is a faet. Acco rdin gly, the assertion in the proper sense is, in Heidegger's view, guided by something like a theoretical attitude towards the world
Sec GA 29/30, pp. 438-440; GA 24, p. 299. 72 Bere one might want la compare Heidegger ta J. L, Austin , who c1aimed Ihal s peech as 5uch must be characterised in te rms of a " Ioc uti onary act " (utteri ng a sentence \V ith a certain mem1ng), an " ill ocut ionary aet" (perfo rming an action 5uch as ordcring, \Varning, etc.), and a " perlocutionary aet" (bringing about an effeel 5uch as persuading, deceiving, e tc ,); see HolV to do Things IVth Words. Apparently, Austin thought that he \Vas the first one to put fo rward a theory of speech as action; however, one has late\y aeknowledged the existence of such a theory about 50 years Munich phenomeno logy, where Iwo of ils !l1 cmbers, Reinach earli e r in the and A. Pfander, shou ld be mentioned in parti c u lar. Sec K, Schuhmanll , " Di e Entwicklung der $ prcchakttheoric in der Milnchcncr Phllnolllc noloBie".
71

1\

88

t' li A 1''1 l' I( '1 WI 1

mcnLions such JOI'Il1S o r con clue l whi ch, Oll e tllln"' . lU CUI1I1l10 1l to both everyd ay Iife and th eo reti eal in vest iga ti o ns, Ilk llbscrvin g,

(' 1lA 1''1 ER 1 WO

ealeulatin g, inspeeting, etc. I-Iowever, as Robert OCl1lflsconi has pointcd out, when readin g th ese sections o f Sein und Zeil wilh Il cid cgger 's Interpretati on of Aristotle in mind, il beeomes clear that Ilcidegger is not simply presenting his own views on the natu re of everyday eonduet. He is just as much invo lved in a destruction of traditional ontology, and more precisely of th e Greek notion ofpoiesis, which in the lectures on Ari stotl e is regarded as so methin g of a paradigm fo r the G reek und ers tanding of bein g. 74 Later on, Heidegger w ill also state this ex plic itl y, re mark in g Ihat bcca use of the impurtan ce of th e episleme poielike for the G reck und e rstandin g of the world , he considered his task in Sein und Zeit L be to clarify the relation between man and work O in tenn s of hi s dealings with equipment or too ls, and " not in ordcr to 0 correct Marx or 1 put forwa rd a new politieal economy".75 For thi s reason, one must regard He idegger's descriptions in Sein und Zeit of the theorctieal and Ihc praetiea l as prcli minary genera lisations; obviously, there is a wide ran ge of d ifferent activities between abslraet analysis on the one hand and use fo r th e sake of produeing something on the other. As Heidegger explains a few years later:
... in Sein und Zeit 1 attempted an ini tial characteri sation of the world-phenomelloll through an interpretation of the way in wllich we proximally and for tlze masl part !/love daily in our wor/d. ln Ihis conllection, 1 set out from what is da ily availab le 10 us, wha! we use and undertake, and Ihi s in such a way Ihat we do not know of the pecu li arity ofthis co nduct, and, when we are ta describe il, ill isconstrue it a l once by usi ng concepts and quest ions which have thcir origi n clsewhere. This, which is enti re ly close and eve ry day fam ili ar, is at bouom already th orough ly di sta nt and incomprel:e nsible 10 us . ... I-Iowever, it has never OCCU fred 10 me 10 want ta maintai n and prove, by way of Ihi s Interpretation, that the essence o f Ill a n consists in us ing a spoon a nd fo rk a nd travell ing on the tramway. 76

Eve n th ough Il cidegger inilially seellls to dislinguish between everyday, " praeti ca l" lifc and th eoreti eal work by claimin g that the former is llIarkcd by in vo lved preoccu pation wi th things while th e latter consists in dis intercstcd looking at or inspeeting things, this is in the end not the point. 77 Rath er, w hal he is tryin g to get at here are th e bas ic c harac lcri stics o r man 's "world ly" existence in general, so as to be ab le, on th e bas is of this determination, to eircumse rib e different modes of ulld crstandin g, sueh as e.g. the theoretieal and the praetiea!. In his ow n word s: ''' Practieal ' dea li ngs have their OlVn ways of tarrying. And just as praxis has its own specifie kind of sight ('theory '), lheorelical rcsearch is not witho ut its own praxis."" Heidegger's major target o f eriticislll here is the belief that it is possible ta learn what knowledge is wi th out tak ing notice of its human context. That is, not only praet ical in vo lvcment, but also Iheoretieal inves tigations are eonstituted by l mong other thin gs - their specifie concerns, interests, purposes, etc. In ot her words, every kind of "attitude" towards the world must be seen as a detcrmna le fOrln oflife whieh for He idegger means a specifie form of CO ll ce rn (Besorgen) or dealings (Umgang): "Use is ju st a proxim ale mode o f the bas ic sense as il belongs to the being lowards the world, 10 concern.,,79 But as he himself notes, "If only it were not plain [rom this Ir ivia li tv th at it is by no means obv ious where the ontological boundary hel wec;l ' lhco retical' and ' athcoretical ' conduct rcally run s! "so ln Sein /lnd Zeit, Heidegger tries to arti culale this boundary part ly by rn ca ns or th e di stinction between Vorhan.denheit and Zuhandenheit .
dCJl1, \Vas uns all tagli ch zuhand en ist, \Vas wir gebrauchen .und und zwar daf.\ wir von der Ei gentmlichkeit dieses Gebarens gar Il1c hl w [ssen. und es, \Vi .. cs besc hreiben so lle n, a lsba ld mi l Begriffe n und Fragen fl ilderswo hc r Wltllll1 Cll . Dieses uns ganz Nahe und jeden Tag Verstandl iche 1St un s. lm Grunde sc hOll relll und un versUind lich .... Es ist mir aber n ie eingefallen, d urch dlese
zu woHen, das Wesen des bestehe Interpretation beha uplcn und dnl' in , dnB cr mi l Lffe l und Gabe l hantler1 und auf der Stralknbahn fhrt. 17 C h:a .. 1) slaled in SZ, p. 69. . . 11 S'l, p. 35 8: "Der ' pra ktisc he' Umgang hat seine. Verwel,lens. Und \V ic der Praxis ihrc spezifischc Sicht (' Theofl e ') cigne!, 50 tst dIe theoretl sc he . Forschung niehl ohne ihre cigelle Praxis." 1(1 GA 21, p. 14 3: "Gcbrau ch ist nur c in na hel iegender Modus des Grundslllnes aIs des Seins ZUI" Weil, des Bcsorgens." . "0 SZ, p. 358: " WCtlll nicht lin di eser Triv ialiUU dcutlich w(i rde, daB es am 'J'H g wo clc tltl m ll l cigcnt!ich die onlologische Grenzc zWlschen dem ' tI U '!("Ifctisc llcn' Vcrlml tcn lttld dcm 'ilthcorcti.schctt' vcrIUufl !"

SO,

74 R. l3ernascon i, "H eidegger's Destruction of Ph ro nesi s' . A simil ar line of reasoni ng is co ntain ed in W. Brogan , " Heidegger and Aristotle: Dase in and the Question of Practica l Life", pp. 137-138. 7S GA 33, p. t 37. 76 GA 29/30, pp. " ... versuchte ich in Sein und Zeit ei ne ers le Kennze ic hnung des Weltphanomens durch eine Interpretation der Art, wie wir !/I lS zunachst Iwd zumeist alltaglich in unserer IYelt bewegen. Hi\!rbci gin!:; icll nus von

90

91

' 1I AI'TI m '1W(l

Heidegger uses thcsc concepts in scvcm\ diflrC l1l II l1 tl cspccinlly Vorhandenheil is a rather ambi guous lcrm , but al Iculi t III Iile bcginnin g of Sein und Zeit, in connection with th e analy sis of' th e \Vorl d H man 's nd

CII i\ l'l'ER l'Wc)

11 11 10 who wc arc and how wc understand ourselves; and in this respect, onc can say that ail our acti vitics are for the sake of ourselves. But in Ih c case or th eoretica l in ves ti gations, or when making assertions ullh ough, as human lhey obviously also contribute to our selflIndcrstandin g - this immediate "personal" or existential concern is noncth clcss transform ed into another kind of concern, namely that of knowledge for the sake of kn owledge itself. This is because in the th eoretica l attitud e, one does not relate to the thin g in question as meallingful to one 's awn existence in an unthematic and unprablem atic v.,T ay, but one deals w ith it as an abject of investigalion - lhis is nuw lhe horizon that furni shes it with meaning, Thi s at least is what Heidegger sec ms ta be saying, but l nonetheless think th al, in the end, it is difficull to draw a sharp line between these forms of concern. Il eidegger also describes this change of perspecti ve as a transiti on li'om VII/sehen to Hinsehen: instead of looki ng around oneself for the I11 can s with which ta realise whatever it is one is aCter, in the mode of /l insehen , one looks away From the "living" sphere ofmeaning in wh ich thin gs arc ordinarily givcn and looks af them from a certain them atic perspccti ve." And it is on ly on this level th at the " thin g" trul y becomes an o bject, divorced from the knowing subjec!. For with this Hinsehen, the thin g, whi ch was form erly gi ven as meaningful in some parlicular \Vay and/or as a means to an end, is reduced to th al about which we make an assertion ,85 As Heidegger puts it, it passes from being that with whi ch (!vOmi/) we have to do to that about wh ich (worber) we make an asserti on. Thus when the everyday context has been expelled in thi s way, the poss ibility of a pure making manifest is given, as the object c ircu\l1scribed by the assert ion is there in full presence, as itself, libera led From its former context-dependence. Now o ne Illay ask what the intentions behind Heidegger's description o r this scenario are; where and when is thi s pure predication supposed to l''ippcn? One suggestion is of course that this picture would represent dctached scicntifi c discourse or perhaps philosophy, in which beings are

way of being in the world, they are described as follo ws . ZU!J{[l1denheit is an unobtrusive mode of being of things when available to concernful dealings, whereas the experience of thin gs as vorhanden in volves a kind o f explicit awaren ess of the thi ng which is absent in the former case, where one in stead is directed lowards th e end of the acti vity one is occupied with "1 Accordingl y, in ord er [or something to count as an assertion in Heideggcr's sense, its object must be vorhanden, wh ereas in non-assertoric speech, beings are for the most part available or zuhanden. 82 1'0 account for the cxpcrience of things as vo rh anden or as present at hand, Heidegger introduces the notion of interruption. When
our everyday preoccupat ion with thill gs in sorne way goes wrong, sa

that the thin g in question is no longer avai lable for use, it passes into the first mode of Vorhandenheil, which is thus to be understood as a kind of negation of availabili ty. Now the thing just lies there as something unavailable, and it is for the first time really seen as such. In this situation, He idegger s ugges ts, o ur re lati on to th e thing loses its immediate, un complicated character and becomes instead marked by distance. This distancc in relalion to the thin g, which is here described only with respect 10 its initial stage, ma y then be developed into different degrces of " purity", where the last stage would thus be an altitude towards things as mere ly present objects or as th oroughly vorhanden 83 Apparently, this experience changes the way in which th ings concern us. When describing everyday life, I-I eidegger puts emphas is on its selfre lati onal structure: w hen wc are preocc upied \V ith some thing or

another, wc are al th e same tim e di rected tow ards our own ex istence. This is to say that we usually act, make, inspect, etc. , from out of our present situat ion, in relation to our past experiences, with a vi ew lu our nlture existence, and so forth. In this way, ail that we do and think add
For a discuss ion of the di fferent senses of Vorhandenheit , see J. P. Feil , "The Fami li ar and the Strange: on the Lim ils of Praxis in the early H eidegger". Feil al so questions the alleged pri ority of Zuhan denheit in H eidegger, emphasis ing that Ihis
81

rriority be longs to everyday ex istence only .

2 S2, 1S. " 52, 16.

_1'1hi s concept is discussed al grcal Icnglh in GA 62*, The context is the ti rs! lwo chl'l plcrs or Ille M efapltysics, and Il cidegger argues that Arislot le's description of the dlrrcrcnl lcv cls of know lcdgc roun d in (al O a"crt ), ex pcricnce (1' II Trf' lplrl ), nrt (t exvl\) und ph ilosophical wisdom (oo41 ia) respectively, conveys an llysis orllt\\v Ihe theol'cti cnl llu\Ildc can <I rise OUi or evcryday inlcll igibility, Ill H
WI. UA

2 1, p. 15'1.

92

(' 11 1\ t' I im TWO

given ln the mode of full objective presence. Il''1 Ihls is 11 0 1 rcu ll y Heidegger' s principal idea. W hat he is aller is ra lher 10 show Ihat the fOfm of speech just outlined is an extreme case: speech as a sl,,;ries of theorelical assertions may stand as an ideal of theoretical discourse, but it seldom looks like that. 86 ln other words, a purely theoretical attitude is in rea li ty somethi ng of a limiting case. Of co urse, as compared ta everyday speech, w here the speech act is re lated ta other thin gs, persa ns, ends, etc., and thus pointing beyond ilself, th eorctical speec h differs insofar as ils predominant interest is to di splay thin gs such as they are, ta convey their nature. ln other words, it seems that the making manifest of beings in th eory has no ex terna l end but is enacted so lely for the sake of itself. This is not th e case in everyday speech, since there one always has a further purposc, c.g. 1 con vince a persa n. This means 0 that apaphansis reac hes its hi ghest possibi lity in theoty. That is what Heidegger has in mind when he says that the onl y form of proposition that deserves th e name " assertion" is the one in wh ich a pure making manifest takes place. However, since il is doubtful whet her one can really imagine a sc ientitic end cavour w ho ll y deprived o f any further intentions or purposes that organise the theoretica l work, the boundary between theoretical and everyday d iscou rse is not absolutc.
8. The elemenl alreduclian il1 Gsserloric sp eech

conce ption o f' nsscrtor ic spece h Ile idegger wou ld be susp ie iolls of III II gUl1 gC us slIch, hopin g 1 be ab le to escape into a pre-lingui st ic 0
SI' 1 ns .Il were. " ln Gl'llIIdprobleme der Phot/omena/ogie, Heidegger di scusses what Iwppcns 10 Ihc mcaning of1Jein g in the asseltion and seems to suggest 11 H11 Ihe 1l1 can ill g of " is" loses whatever specifie, differentiated eharacter

it had in pre-propos itional understanding:

Th e " is" in the propos ition can, as il we re, affo rd Ih is indelerminacy of ilS meaning because, as expressed, il springs l'rom th e Dasein who is expressing itse lf and who a!ready undcrstands in one sense or another the being intended in the "is". /Jefore being expressed in the propos ition, the "is" has already 89 rece ived ilS different iation in factical understanding.

Il is often emp hasised that Heidegger th inks that the transition outlined above, whereby a thin g becomes an abject of the assertion, in volves a 1055 of mea ning, a " levelling" (Nivelliel'ung), as Heidegger himself puts s7 it. Wh en the " with which" of our involvement is transformed inta the " about which" of th e assertion, the henn eneutic "as" is reduced ta an apophantic " as", whieh wo uld th us in some way distort or caver up its own fo undation. ln this section, 1 will argue that Heidegger's view on thi s malter is not that simple. Thereby 1 w ill also questi on the idea occasionall y put forward in thi s con nection , that hecause of th is
GA 24, p. 299. G A 21 , pp. 153 ff. The derivative nature of the assert ion is stressed by J. Tamin iaux, " Les ' recherches logiques' du Manin Heidegger, de la thorie du juge ment la vrit de l' tre", p. 26; F. Vo lpi , "La quest ion du logos dan s
86
87

Conseq uentl y, Heidegger says, this " indiffe rence" of the " is" does not s ignify an y kind of deficieney on the part of the assertion, but onl y indi cates its deri vative nature as regards our access ta the wor ld, as cOll1parcd w ith our " li ving" understanding of il. In this sense then, it SCCIl1 S as if it does no! really matter that this levelling of being takes place in th e assert ion, sinee our primary access to the wor ld is already di rfe rentiated. 9o But o n this account, does it not look as if the asserti on ilas no task ta fulm at ail except putting into words that w hich is already ut1d crstood? I f 50 , waS it not preeisely stlch an und erstandin g o f langua ge that Heidegger in the end wauted ta dispose of? And we have secn earli er that th e (theoretical) assertion not only has its own specifie
U

l'articulation de la fact icit chez le jeune Heidegger, lecteur d' Aristot e", in particular
p. 41; T. A. Kell y, Language and Transce/l dellce. A Study ill th e Philosophy of

Suggcs ted by G . Fi gal, "Refraining from Dialect ic: Interpretati on .of Pl uto in the Suphisl lectures", though he also states that thl s lS really al odds wlth Il eid cgger's concept ion of understand ing, p. 104; M. Ruggen ini , " La fin itude de l'ex istence ct la question de la vr it: Heidegger 1925-1 929", pp. 159-160; F. Volpi , 'ILn ques ti on du logos dans J' articulation de la facticit chez le jeune Heidegger, lecleur d' Aristote", p. 56. By contrast, P. C. Smith accuses Heidegger of betrayi ng his discovery that the original mode of speech is rhetoric or hermeneutics, inso far as 1 in hi s OIVIl work privil eges apophantic discourse. This is no doubt to sorne extent 11': llcccssnry, but in any C<lse, the consequence of this is Ihal hi s phenomenology almasl loses it s chat'nctcr of bc in g a hcnnencutics of facticity; Th e Hennel1eufics of Original Delllom.'lrC/lioll, Dia/cc/ie, Rhetoric, pp. 314-31 S, note 5. M (lA 2 4 , p. 30 1: 'I ' ist' im Satz kann sich diese Unbest immtheit sei ne r Ilcdctll \1tlg glcichsum leisten, weil cs aI s ausgcs prochenes dem s ich aussprechenden Duscin s lltspri ngt, dlls schOll das im ' ist' gemei nte Sein 50 oder so versteht. Das hlLI schOlL VO l' sc inclll Ausgcsprochcnse in im Satze seine Differenzie rung lm
IIL ktlscllcn

Martin Heidegger (ll/d

Apel, p. 811.

( ,/1 24, pp. 100-30 1. '

94

'111\1' l'J cl{ '1W() way of uncove ring be ings, but indced is the hi glicSI lUi 111 of 1Ilicovc rin g, sinee it is guided by no furt her moti ves th an thal of' lI1"king bci ngs manifes t such as they tru ly are. T his seems on the oth er hand to imply that in arder ta aceomp lish this superio r form of mak in g mani test, speech must liberate itself from the everyda y eontext, sinee this is not condue ted by the aim of display ing Ihe truth of thin gs. But why must Ihis go toget her wi th a levelli ng ofbein g? ln our everyday, unthematic understanding of being, "isll has a

'111\ 1'11\1{ 'J'WO

exampl e whe n wc express it in speech , His" is noneth e less furnish cd with a dctenninate mcanin g. This is becaus e our asserti ons arc intimately con nected with the present cirelll11 stances, wh ich "tic" the sentence-meaning and in th is way proteet it From becomin g amb iguous. [fthis is sa, if the " li vi ng" speech does not cntai l a levellin g of being: ' then theoretical di scoursc does not necessa rily reduce the meanin g of being either, since it has il S Qwn praxis, i.e. ilS own context, within which the meaning of being is determined in some specifie sense. As th eoretical, the asserti on is a dcrivat ive fo nn of discourse in the sense of presupposing an unthem ati c familia rity with the world. That is ta say, theoretical discourse would not be poss ible were it not for our pre-propositional, "herme neutie' acccss to the world. Of course, it is also the case that cvery assertio n, wheth cr th eoret ical or not, has a fo undatio n in the herm eneutic fo re-struc tu re of underst anding, but that hold s for every kind of exp li cation. Even though H eidegg er occasio nally describes the asserti on as fo llowin g upon a foregoi ng prepredicalivt: understanding, l thnk that one nevcrtheless has to say Ihat, in the concrete situati on, these t\Vo clements cannat be separated as c\early as they were initially, in Section 4: when making an asserti on about someth ing and th us address ing it as somethin g, we do not simp ly express something already understood, but realise this und crstandin g for
91

Heideg ger's con cern is no lo nger ta show that thi s cveryd ay underst an din g of bein g is not proposi ti ona!. What he wants ta say is that in thi s understanding, even in slich cases w hen il is proposi tiollal , as for

de tcrmina te Il1 caning, since wc are always mov in g wit hin a specifie context, whic h diffc rcn tates "is" in ulle respect or anothe r. This is an aspect of th e as-structure of our existence. In thi s connection, howeve r,

th t.; fina ti me, j\lst lik c in th e case or prc-propositional explication. For this rcaSOI1, th cre is no clear hierarc hy in the relation between the IIcllneneu lic and th e apophantic: the latter is itself a realisat ion of th e rormcr. 92 O nc must thus disfingui sh betwee n the notion that th eoretiea l kllow ledge in general requires a "practical'" pre-predicati ve access to Ihc wo rl el , anel Ihe idea that theoret ical expli cation - li ke ail forms of expli cati on _ enacts a forego ing underst anding, which however it is onl y insofar as it gets explicated. Bul if the assertion, no less than pre-pro positiona l explication, has its own hcrmencutic praxis, what is then the problem here? l mention ed nbove the idea that the assertion would cover up its own origin, that it cannot of its own accord make visib le ilS foundation, and that this would render it ambigu ous or bestow upon it an indifferent meanin g. Il owcvcr, as wc saw earl ier, this is not the case when actuall y mak ing Ille asserti on : the speaker as we il as th e hearer understands what is said in fi spccific sense in accorda nce with the situation. The meanin g of an asse rt io n can become ambiguous only when it is deprived of its contex! . Na tura ll y, this holds for uttered speech as such, not only assertio ns in Ihe grammati cal sense. lt has been argued that Heideg ger wou ld think Ihat theo retical predi cation in volves an exp ul sion of the everyd ay " re rercnlia l whole" (Verweisungsgal1zheit) , in terms of which we are "b ic ta encoun ter a particu lar thing as endowe d with meanin g, and Ihcre forc wou ld be without context." Th is mi ght perhaps seem ta be confirm ed by Heidegger's notion that the assertio n should determ ine its ohjcct solcly on the basis of this abject itself, and thus, it might seem, not with respect ta an ything else. 94 But th e point of the notion of the hcrm cneutic character of understanding is precise ly that to see a th ing os il is " in itsc!P' would be impossiblc withou t the fore -structure of ail 'xpli ca tio n, and thi s struct ure necessaril y endow s (theore ti cal) l!xpli ca ti on \V ith 11 specifie context. Finall y, cvcnlh ough Heidegger's work as a whole to a great extent is " "' rked by an awa rcness of the diffi culty of ph ilosophicall y art icul at ing
(I//(I ,h e IfcrlllC/I(!/Ilic prnjeci. pp. 73-76; H. Ru in, Enigmal ic Orig1S. Tracing th e 1h(' I1/(' ol ll/slOI'id ly Ihrol/RIt Works, p. 96. Sec M. Okl'ctll. llI'it/cgg el"s l'raR /l/ olism. Ullders /(II/dillg. Being, al/d Ihe Critique MI/(I/J"y\'iO.

I>oinlcd oui by J. D. Ca pulo, Radical lIermel/el//ics. Repetition, Decans/rI/clion.

Sec GA 24, p. 303.

tli

(,'/I2 1, p. 155.

l(J

CI 1 l'TER 1 W() 1\ th e pre-p re dica ti ve Icvel of und e rsta ndin g, sili ce Il.l Oi nrl il.!tdati o n necessarily has to maye on the level o f asse rtori l.: sp..:c\.: h, this is l'l ot 10 say that th e fo rmer level is completely free from lin guisti c Il1 cd iuti ol1. On the con trary , s ince thi s leve l too in volves articulation, it is dependent upon - among oth er thin gs - an existing conceptuality. Moreover, th e fa et that language is public and therefore in saIlle sense anonymolls is 1101 in He idegger's v iew just an obstac le 1 ge nuin e 0 und ersta nd ing but also what makes thi s possi ble . The prob le m ar ises

' 11 1\ 1"1

"1{ '1 WO

lunguu gc und thou ghl, bul alsa ou r comprehensio n of being. The reason why lhis cou ld happcn is thal being was understood with the formula "S 1" P" us a clue, whi ch rc sulted in the degradatioll of being into cop ula. III Ihi s way, th e an to logicai problem "was forced as ide into logic,,96 and Ille qu esti on o f'bein g \Vas l'cduccd ta a question of sentence-structure. Thc prob lem is not necessarily that one has tri ed to understand be ing 0 11 Ihe bas is of lhe assert ion, bu t that one has been mi staken about the

nature of the assertion itself:

Rego rded naive ly, an assertion offers itse lr as an obj ectively prl.!sen t complex of spoken words that are thern se lves present as a bjects . ... If an objectively present comp lex of sin gle words is thus given, the question ari ses: What is the bond that establishes the un it y of Ihi s interconneclion? The quest ion of a comhination, 97 a copula, arises.

w hen speech is experienc ed not in the for m of legein , but as legomenon, that is, not in the concrete situation of speaking but as an entity, as an iso lated state ment. When rc gard cd lhus, the speci fi e, situati on-bo und characte r of speech is 10st, and 50 is the foundation of speech. However, this loss is not intrinsic to the asse rt ion itself, but is a conseque nce of a particular way of relatin g to speec h, whi c h assumes lhat speec h and asserti ons could be suffi cientl y understood in iso lat ion. A nd on Heidegger 's acco unt, it is suc h an att ilude towards speech that has become dominant in the philosophi cal tradition.

Whcn lh e assertion is und erstood as a series of words, the access to lhe ontological question of being is occluded from the start. The tho ught is fi llnili ar by now: wh en th e assertion is re garded as a kind of "entity" und the way in which it is enacted is dismissed as being somethin g "cxterna l" to its essence, we do not only fail to grasp the essence of the Hssc rli on , but meet with the more seri ou s conseq uence of be in g prcvcnled from posing the question ofbeing in the right way. When being is unde rstood as copula its meaning gets redu ced or kvcll ed; it is, as in Kant 's famous saying, " not a real predicate", it does
1101. add a ny thin g to th e concept of which it is predicated.

9. The problem lVith the epistemic Ideal

Regarding Heidegger 's attitud e lowa rd s Ar istotl e 's conception of episleme, same remarks were given in the previous chapter, w here it was notcd lhat Heidegger calls atte nt ion 10 the fact that this kind of knowledge is said lo con cern th e uni ve rsa l, w hi c h moreover is immutable. As Ari stotle has il, "That abo ut which one has know ledge cannat be otherwi se.,,95 T his is th e "what" as we il as the " wh y" of reality. If applied 10 the traditiona l lreatment of la nguage as Heidegger understands this, olle cou ld say that th e consequence of this view on knowledge is tha t onc has ana lyscd la nguage in general , and its predication-structure in particular, in an indifferent way, tha1 is, one has asked " whaC' the constitutive clements of language are, but not " how" they are. In this way , one has objectified language, trcaled it as static. On Heidegger 's view, the ri se of the assertion to its position as the superior mode of speech has affec led not onl y o ur conception of
95 An. Pos t . 74b6: "0 )'p 1tlO'[OOtCH, o uVO'[OV cD.wC; xct v". On the episte mologica l superiority of the uni versa l ("ro KaOO\) as com pilred \Vith th e ind ividua l (t KO' KOOW) sec An POSI , 1. 24 . The "w llat " (ri ro C! ) (Ilia the "w hy" (t otan) are both ex tcnsively disc usscd in the wholc work of Iho 11/1111,,(/('.\',

This IIndc rstandin g of th e copula dates back to Aristotl e, who, in the passage 1 which 1 have referred carlier, says that 0
ncither "ta be" nor "not ta be" signifies a thing, nor does "being" when uttcred in isola tion. Then taken by themselves they are l1 ol hin g, but they a syn th es is, which cannat he 99 cOllcc ived wilhollt the things that are corn bined.
QI,

98

III

24, p. 252. UII 24, p . 292: "Eine Aussage gibt sich fr den n<liven Btick ali ein vorhanden er gcs prochcncr vorhandcner Worte . Wenn sa cin vorhandener / .II'!:flllll ll cnhnng vo n Wrtcrn gegcbcil ist, cntsteht d ie Frage: Welches ist das die !,: llIhclt d il.:scs Zusamrn cnlu\I1gs slinendc Band? Es ent springl die Frage nach eiller VCI!>IHhlll g, nflch ciller Kopuln ." Il" '':l'frit deI' l'(! lt ll! /I V(!/'II/I/!fl, A 59RIB 626. I,.l Ik II/r . "o yp l' IvOI i\ elv(!I cr q)l (,'i6v o n '[O\) rrpaY)1oto;. o' ,\v 'Iv dlt\l<t Il,{ ).OV . (j ,'lra IIPv yrlp O\Jrv pany. rtpocro lll.lO lVC I O cruvOEO IV
(;1/

to

1)<)

CII i\ I'TER 1 WO So conceived, the meaning of being is levellcd d01Y1l in Ih " asscrtion and hence is undifferentialed; Ihe only function il perlo nns is that of sy nthesising words. This means that wh eu being (Sein) is rega rd ed as copula, it is taken to be nothi ng more th an a partieular being (Seiende). That IS to say, as cop ul a, being gets separated l'rom beings, as it is spell ed out as a predi cate, di ffe rent from the s ubj eet, so Ihat one does not see that beings "are" nothin g in isolatio n from the ir being. The problem of the copula is th us essen tiall y a philosoph ical
problcm, namcly that what is ultimately an onto logie::!l question has th e rccc pii on or Sein
Ill/d

Zeil. Perh ap s due to the ail too

syslcmali c o utl oo k o f Ihat work, togeth er with its somewhat rigid COllcc ptualily , th e slruclures of Dasein were, at least according to Il c ideggcr him self, 'o, un derstoo d as es tab li shed and indifferent properlies instead of as d ifferent aspects of man ' s existence, whose bcing depends upon how it is enacted in a concrete situation. 10. Conclud ing remarks Thi s chapter has fo ll owed Ihe first steps of H eidegger's a((e mpt to challenge th e noti on that the assertion constitu tes the basic element of Irul h and knowledge. Tracing thi s noti on to ils alleged ori gin in A ri stot le, H eidegger showed that in Aristotle, the assertion is in fact not Iho ught to display Ihe bas ic element of tru th and kn o\Vledge, for the assert ion is in ilS tum resolved into sll17lhes is and dihairesis. And w ith Ihcse concepts, Aristotle has not only articul ated the essential elements of lIssert oric speech but poi nted to the essence of discurs ivity or logos liS such , that is ilS as-stru cture, even though he himself m ay tend to Ihcmali se it primarily with respect 10 ils propo siti ol1al lcvel. Thus, just us Il cidegger 10 con front the epistemic ideal of cogn ition and its
pri vileging ofpropositional speech in arder to approach the questi on of'

been tran s Cormcd in to a que stion of log ic. 8ecau se of thi s transformation, one has not becn ab le 10 sec that bcing as copu la, Le. as synthes is, is on ly possible because of a more fundamcntal syn lhesis that

belongs to (he things themselves. Th is mcans thaL"js" ean work as a

copul a and combine words to an assertion because il is itself '"directed" to beings and thus determined by an ontalagica l synthes is. 100 So be in g has been reduccd 10 copu la merely in ph ilosophi ca l InvestIgatIons, whl ch me ans Ihat Ihe cop ula sho ul d be interragaled only In order to evade thls philosophical mistake, not 10 reveal something about how we actuall y speak, for in actua l di scourse Ihis levelling of being does in tct not lake place.

However, as indicated in the former section, the nature of asscI10ric speech still p oses a prob lem to ph il osop hy . The task of phil osophy, at least as HeIdegger eoncei ves of il, is to reveal how things are given, how they show th emselves, whi ch is Ihe same thing as to disclose the ditTerent forms ofbeing. But ifbein g "is" Ilot ofa slati e nature, then the philosophica l di sco urse is traub led by a serious prob lemalic for it . d.rr. ' IS
1

logos in an at least comparatively unprejudiced \Vay, he cons iders it ncccssary to question Ihe rece ived view on Aristotl e in arder to be ab le lu see Ih at Ari stot le has a broader notion of logos than logos afJophanlikos . [n Ihis way , Heidegger's interprelalion of Ar istotl e ' s lI1lll lysis of logos apophalllikos has paved the way not Gnly for a new lI pproach to the question of logos but also for a renewed interpretation o f Aristotle ' s understanding ofthis question. This new approach to the ques ti on of logos sets out [rom Ihe disco vcry of a pre-predicative mode of discours e, which was shown to he cndo wccl with an as-s tructure on ils OWI1 , but w hi ch nevertheless was snid to consttu te th e foundation o[ the assertion, conceived of as a Ihco reli cal mode o f co ncluct. I-Iowever, this mode of speech is not
IIcccssaril y pre-predicati ve, bu t ils ba sic charactcri sti c is that it is preIh !.: orctica l, that is, th al il is Ilot conduclcd I11 crely for the sake of

lCult

10

poin t ou t chan ge and faeti city and to preserve it as it is

More precisely, w h en an ex peri en ce of being is expressed

In

assertlOns "abOlit" being, it is almost impossible ta avoid the risk that

being is d!splayed as ifit were an enti ,y with a stati e nature, and so the

dan ger an ses Ihat th e philosophieal discourse will be misunderstood This is also exacll y what has happened to Heidegger hi mself, notably
nVG: flv aveu .1CV 01>IC on voijOOl." As copula, bcing is thus on ly aUllPePlllC) . T his s not the case whe n being is

an eXistent/ai mean ing; see De. 1111. 2 1a2 5-32. I-Ierc 1 J e.wc out tI t ktnd of predicatIOn. la ' 00 GA 24, pp. 302,303.

fI/Joplta llsis, for th e sak e or making th ings l11anircs t. To expl ore this,

'''1 Sec (il ' 29/30, pp.

10 1

100

Heidegger turns to evcryday life and il s logos, !lIlli In o l'l,; nrcciscly, to Aristotle's explication of this phenomenon. The inqury int o cvcryday speech should thus make manifest something likc the proximate mode of speech, that is, a supposedly morc basic or common mode or logos as compared with the apophantic logos.

Chapter Three

THE EVERYDA y LOGOS

1. Evelyday ness as a philosophical theme

III Sein und Zeil, the theme of everydayness is introduced together with

Ihe question of the right aceess ta Dasein, as Heidegger thinks that

phil osophy has tended to interpret Dasein with inappropriate categories:

The mode of access and explication must rather be chosen in such fi \Vay that this being can show itself in itself and From itself. And ta bc more precise, it should be shown with respect to how it is p /'Oximafly and for rhe mos! part, in its average evnydayness. l

Olll y wh en the proper access ta everyday life has been secured is it poss ible ta see that its understanding is not theoretiea!. That it is not Ihcoreti cal means, among other things, that for the most part, everyday does not relate to the "things" it conccnlS itselfwith as objccts. That is to say, wh ether or not the understanding of everyday life is vc rbali sed, its articulation, unlike the assertion, do es not involve obj eetilieation. Aeeordingly, everyday speech should not be analysed wi th the assertion as a model. However, everyday speech ean of course he propositiollal in the grammatical sense. Thus the investigation of 'vcrydayncss encompasses the twofold task of accounting for both prepredi cative and predicative articulation. Even thoLlgh everydayness displays a partieular mode of existence, Ihe point or subj eetin g it to philosophieal analysis is "to exhibit not fH'bilra ry or accidentaI but essential structures! which, as determinative n i' Ih " be in g or Dasei n, pcrsi st in every mode of being of factieal
18/., p. 16: " Die Zug<l l1 gs- und Au slcgu ngsart !lluf3 vi elrn chr dergestalt gewahlt sein, dtl cli c..;\.:s Seicndc sich nn ihm se lbst von ihm ber zeigcn kann. Und zwar soli .'Ile da 'l Scicndc in dt.:ll1 Zl..!igcll, wic cs ZllI/ aellsl II/ ICI Z lIl/I e sl ist, in seiner
{hu cllSclHl ill li cl1 m1

102

101

CII AI''I I,R IIIHI 1

VII A!,'II ,' \( 'J 1110 ]1, pli isuil , Il cilh.:ggc l' Onell sccrns 10 regard Ari slolle as a forerun ner, IIppl'ouching him aS somconc who has managed to affirm everyda y, preIh corelic al li fc as a phi losophi cal beginning. Occasi onally, howeve r, Il eidggcr secms to imply that Aristotle's interpretation or everyday li fe is in I\.ct itsclf " everyday"; that is, rooted in everyday life itself, so that il mainly just gives vo ice ta the "natura l" views on life and world which tire embeddecl in everyday li fe itsel f. On this aecount, the analysis of cvcrydayness would essentially be the same lhing as an imerpretation of Arislot le's ana lysis of everyd ayness , but it wo uld require a noni\ristote li an perspective, since the philosophical interpretation cannot simply go along with everyday li fe but has to distance itself from it to a cCrlan extent. But ta make things even more compli cated, this "nonAristotclian" perspective will in fact be retrieved from Aristo!l e hi mself. Again , thi s waveri ng attitude toward s A ri stot le has to d o w ith Il eidcggcr' s hesitanee concerning what kind of origin Aristotle really is, wilethe r he is a "simple" or an already reflected, critical origin . ln tlli s chapter, 1 will show how Heidegger, mainly on the basis of his inlerprelation of the Nicoma chean Elhics, argues that Aristot le has lIrli culated the perspective of everyday life - which Aristot le himsel f thus may o r may not be entang led in - by means of his concep ts of !,o ies is, produc tion, and techne, art or know- how, which Heideg ger di,cusses under the heading of"concern" (Eesorgen). In order to furt her eluciclate th e nature of concern, Hei degger introduces the concept of "carc" (Sorge) , wh ieh he finds prefigured in Aristot le's notion ofactio n (praxis ) govern ed by phrol1esis , the underst anding of what is good for one' , life as a whole. Both leclme and phrol1esis are by Aristotle saicl to he lII ela logo" , di scursive, but they are neither theoret ical , nor necessa rily propositional in kind. Thus here, Heidegger has found that nOl ion of pre-propositional discursivity in Aristot le, which he had been lookin g for. On Ille basis of his inte rpretat ion of Aristotle's idea ofhow th is di scurs ive structur e works in praxis, Heideg ger can go on to nrgue th ot, as was indi cated already in the prev io us chapter , one cannat 'oi llprchcnd lhe nature of speech if one takes it to be something distinct fi'oll1 tilinkillg, sincc the discurs ive structur e of speech is constitu tive of illlrnan 1I1lderslal1di ng as slIch. Moreov cr, speech or logos does not heloll S cxclusivcly to the domain of rcaSQn c ither, bUl must rather be lucntcd in Ilc tnn 0 1 praxis. In other \Vol'ds, \ove will sec how He idegger '
105

this reason, Aristotl e plays a comp lex role in Heidegger's anal ysis of everydayness. When dec laring everyda y unclerstanding 10 be th e basis of phi losophy and theory, it might seem that Heidegger's projeet of destruc tion has undergo ne a transformat io n: the aim can no longer be ta retrev e a Gree k or Ar isloteli an origin , for morc origina l th an phi losophy is everyday, pre-philosophicalli fe 4 Still, in his analysis of everyday life, Heidegger does not simply tum to this li fe " itseIC', but rather to Aristotle's explication of il. This he can do because of his question ing of th e "every day" interpretation of Aristot le, such as thi s was eluciclated in the previous chapter . Accordin gly, Heidegger 's ai m is not merely to let everyday life come forward on ils Own tenns, but also to let Aristotle "show himsel f t'rom him self', that is, before his views are subjet ed to critieism 5 ln thi s
SZ. pp. 17: "An dieser sollen nicht beliebige und zutllige , sondern wesenha ft en Strukture n heralJsge stetlt \Verden, die in jeder Sc insart des faktisc!u: n Dase ins sich ais seinsbest imm ende durchhal ten ," J Cf. GA 19, p. 10, where Heidegg er remarks that the legacy of Plata and Aristotle nowaday s is something ailliiglich , something we no longer are able to see.
2

Ar is totl c is co nce rnee! , fo r prox im all y and fo r the most pari", philoso p hy Jeans on Aristotl e w ithou l confront ing him as ilS ori gi 3 n. Fo r

"everyday ness" in eonnee tion with philoso phy and theory, since it is primarily intencled to refer to pre-theoretieal activity, philosophy cou lcl be said to have ilS OWI1 everyda y mode, Il ot least as far as its relation ta

everydayness. Even th ough one shou ld be carefu l with the tcrm

Dascin" ? ln Ihis sense, then , evcrycla y liI'c c OIi SIiIUI C'i H kind of beginning for phenomenolog ieal analys is, Iholl gll l'rom \1 philosoph iea l perspective that is not what is given allhe bcginning, sincc Illis is rather certain theories and opinions concerning the nature of lire. On Heideg ger's account, ev en though phi losophy must try to let everyda y lire explica te itself, as it were, this require s a certain distanc e. Everyday explica tion cannot be properly interpreted if the analysi s remains on the same level as the explication itsel though it must begin there. Thus in workin g out hi s in terp re tation of everyd ayness , Heidegger has to con front the common, "every day" interpretation of

t :

Cf. Chapter One, p. 50, note 88. But even thougll Heidegger had not introduce d the notion of everydayness when he initially worked out his conception of destruction, he thought already al this stage tha t Aristotle's conceptuality in its turn has an importan t relation to pretheoret ical understandi ng, see PA , p. 253. 5 This strategy is manifest notably in GA 19.
J

104

C II AI' II 'I( 1111111 ,11'I"lI MIh" poss ibilily of inl "rprclin g in l" r111S of kll I['S{s, 50 that it is regarde d as an activit y difle rcnce and ciuIIl ge. Finall y, on the basis of th e elucidati on of th e bnsic co nstituti on logos, [ disc uss Heideg ger' s underst anding of how thi , comes to express ion precisel y within everyda y speech. ln whnt mi ght SC" 'll to resist Il e idcgger 's linc o f interpr etation , " d stotl e c lai",s th at his e thi es is of " practica l" lItility. He asserts thal ItS nil11 is nol 50 l1luch knowle dge as acti on, for th e inquiry should enabl; liS tO rcoll y be good and npt only to kn ow the good in an abstrac t way. 'J'herdo re, it should be use fui to tho se who want to bring the lr actIOns 10 " ccorda nce w ith logos . Further , the Ethics po ints Ollt what vlrtuoli S hcllll viour is, nan1cly the ab ility to hit the me an while / he 'X II'CIllCS, and he also g ives con crete exampl es of such b ehavlOu r. In lh is \Vay , the seope of the Ethics appear s quite d iffe re nt from Ihut wh en it eomes to ethics, one must be content if one succeed s in ind icatin g th e truth in broad outline, and this is also ail that the audienc e should e xpect from his in vesti gation. ' For the human good is of sllch a cllUngcab le nature " that il might seem to be determ ined by eustom onl y

or

the possibilities for

kind of " ontolog isation" of A ri stotle 's ethics. This is co rrec t insofar as Hei degger does not take th e Ethics to be eoncern ed wi th e thi es o r moralit y in a n<lrrw sense, but in sists lIpon approac hin g it as an analysi s of th e bcin g of human Dasein, the ai m of whi ch is to lIncove r

there is a lairly widespread vicw that this appropriation consists in a

H eidcgge r's "appropri ation" o f the EffIies ta hi s existcntial analytic , and

2. Heidegger 's reading of the Nicoma chean Ethics Since thi s chapte r centres on Heideg ger's rather unorth od ox Interpre tat ion of the Eth;cs, so me remark s on thi s Interpre tation are ca lied for already at the out set. As mentio ned in the In troduct ion, the literatu re on Heideg ge r and Ari stotl e has I,n' ge ly becn devoted to

II t,; idcggcr 's existcntial analytic. IIowever, Aristotle also makes It clear

also o fHeid egger's re.ding of Aristotl e 's other " praetieal " work s, such as th e Rhetorie and th e Politie s. In wha t follow s, l restricl Illyse lf to Heidcgger's interpretati on of the Ethics . The motives bchind Heideg ger's approac h to lhe Ethics are partly to be found in his conv iction that philoso phy ncither sholiid nor can be ethi cs as a special discipline. What it can do is to inquire into man's ethos, hi s " habituai" way of being si tu aled in the world, whieh admits of differen t forrns of access to truth. This is also how Heideg ger reads the Ethics. At th e ee nlre of thi s interpr etation stands Heideg ger 's underst anding of Arislotl e 's noti on of the good (/0 aga/hon). Heideg ger is a nx iolls to point out that Aristot le is the 'first to aehieve a strictly ontolog ieal underst a ndin g of the good, in accorda nce wi th whieh the good is Ilot 50 much conceived of as a moral property or as some kind of va lue, but rather as limit and end, that which determi nes and delimit s human activity as sueh For only on the basis of this interpre tation ean Heideg ger claim that the Ethics is not restriet ed to the "ethical " aspects of human con duc!.
' GA 18, p. 43 ; GA 19, p. t23.

access to truth. This tendene)' is charactcrislc

111 "!1ll ing or content of the ability to hit tbe mean must be seuled by th e circums lances. Aceord ingly , it is not possibl e to give lInqllalified rliles I(lr action, but onl y to point o ut what elem ents are constitu ti ve of (s ucccss flll) acti on. In thi s way , Ar istotle at Jeast renoun ces the possibi lit y o f ail ethi cs th at calcula les the conseq uences of aclion, th us nnt icipatin g Heideg ger's view on th e limits exphc.alion. or cqual importa nce to Heideg ger's interpre tatlon lS that An stotJ e ncbi cves his concep t of v irtlle through co ncrete phenom enolog leal wnrk . ror th e virtlles, as they are dea ll with by Aristot le, are Ilot IIl1posc d on man " frol11 above", i. e. the y are by

nlld not by nature". JO Virtue is situation-bound , and therefore, the

pl'cdctennined , etcrnal va lues. For virtue in the Aristotehan sense l5 ora ll a matle!" of H viability", the capacity to live one's life in a sensible \\Illy, in accordance with human nature. On this view, life itsel fprovid es

us w ith th e

opposcd 10 thal or the sc iences, is to clarify the "that" (o f vlrtuous, I\cli oll) nl1hcr Ih an the " why" .ll The key to ths nt erconne ction 0 1

fOllnclation o f virt lles, whi ch means that the aim o f ethi es, as

virtucs and the capacity 10 exist is Aristot le's notion of the good.

, ti N. 109505-6, 10- tl.

N. nook I V. " /,' N lOI)4h 19-2J. 111 Jo' N. 1091 6: .. ... 1h1 Il f N St.;t.; 01 s()

50l\cv \.6pQ) p6\'o\' chol ,

COllllllC1l1 '\

on tllis possog,c In

, St'! P1l:" ,
GA

18, p. 77 .

106

t ll l

' 11 1\1''1'1\1( ' 1111( 1' 1'

Ta Aristo tl e, the Elhics as an inquiry into Ihe nature of th t..: gaod, or more specificall y inta the nature or the good li re, is simultancously an

l'lilI in Ihe courses 011 Al'istOl lc, he dcv01 Il1l1ch effort in showin g that CS

investi gation of li fe as such, since il is peculiar to life as slich 10 Hil11 al somethin g good, as the first sentence of lhe Elhics le ll s us." Thal is why Aristotle thinks that ta live a good life is ta be lhat wh ich one already is and lhus la fulfil human nature. Accord ingly, he considers the task of elhics to be to nnd out wh8t is pecul iar (idion) to man as man, in arder ta From the re on unco ver lhe dirferenl poss ibilities for human action and thinking. 'l These poss ibilili es constitute dirferent l'orms of virtue, and on Aristot!e 's accounl, lo be virtliOllS , i. e. lu trul y t:Ilal:l
Oll C'S

own nature, whether this takes place in specu lativ e lhinking or in

interaction \Vith other people, is to attain the truth. Thus Aristotle's conception of virtue does not know of any divi sion bctwcen "practical" or "thcoretica l" conduct, but virtue is (or rather can bel peculiar ta human act ivity in general, since to be virtuous is ta be in truth, and truth is a fun dament al characteristic of human existence as such . Thus wc can see the legitimacy of tak ing the nOlion of truth as a guicling clue when reading the Ethics, nslead of approaching il as a work on the nature of virluous or morally juslified action. This is not to say lhal Aristotle's nOlions o f virlue and the good are wholly neutral, or unrelated to good and bad in the comlTIon sense. The point is that Aristotle's understanding of thcse phenomena is not based upon a dichotomy ofwhat is and whal shoulcl be, in Heidegger's words, between Sein and Sollen. Ethics as Aristotl e conceives of it ean never be a separate discipline, divorced l'rom an ana lys is of the being of man, and this is precisely what Heidegger is out ta show. l4
3. Everyday speech as the basis of Aristotle 's concept oflogos When explicat ing everyday Iife through or wilh the help of Aristotle, Heidegger frequentl y begins wi th a discussion of logos as speech in the concrete sense, i.e. as communication. ln Ihis way, communication is regarded as a basic phenomenon not only for the analys is of logos bUl a lso for lhe analys is of life as such. Heidegger is o ft en accused of not taking enough notice of the intersubjecti ve nature of human existence,
"EN. 1094.1 -3. Il E.N. 1097bJ4ff.
14

to th \! Grccks, the primary sense or logos is preci sely communication wi lh others, and that thi s is prescrved in Ari stotle ' s conceptio n of rnliona lit)' .' j That is ta say, il \Vas onl)' on the basis ofh is understandi ng of Ihe Grcck experi ence of speech as the locus of social intercourse that 1\ rislotl e evenluall y coul d press forward ta his notion of a speaking, di scursive reason. Thereby , however, he moved beyond the everyday IInd c rstanding of logos, s in ce \Vith th is step, logos is no longer idcnlifl ccl with concrete speech, but with the as-s tructure. Accordingly, 10 c lu c id atc Aristotlc's definitiol1 of man as a bcing endowed with logos, il is necessary \0 relate il ta hi s concep ti on of everyday speech. This is a task that Heidegger now takes on, notably in the Sophist leclures and in Grundbegriffe der aristotelischen Philosoph ie. ln th e lall er course, Heidegger calls upon the Ethics, the Po/ilics and the IIhetoric in arder ta c1arify what it means that man is a zoion lagon cellon, in the sense of a speaking being, The ultimate purpose of the cou rse, however, is to understand the nature of scient ific \\'ork, and in partic ular, th e scie ntifi c logos or conceptu alily. More preci sely, Ilcidcgger wants ta poin t out that if theory is a poss ibi li ty for hUlllan ex islence, then every theorelical conceptuality, whether sc ienlific or phil oso phical , must ta some extent be prepared fo r in life's own expli cations o f itself and its world: "If the conceptualit)' is rooted in Duscin it sc lf, Dasein itselfmust in sa me sense be this conceplllality.,,16 '1'0 s ub stantiale this claim , Heide gger investigates Ar islotl e's concepluali ty - wi th the help o f Aristotle himself. Thus on the one hnnd, Il eidegger tries ta explain the nature of theoretical articulation by Irac in g il back la everyday speech, and in thi s pursuit, he turns ta t\r istotl e's acco unt of th eir in terre lation. But on the ather hand, he silll uilancously app lies Ari stotle ' s account ta Aristotle 's own work, in
l' This charge has becn put F orward with respect to Heidegger's interpretat ion of ,lh,.oll es i. by J. Tamin iaux , Le thtre des philosophes, 174- 175; Lecture de l 'o/l w logic fondamelltale. Essais S Ill' Heidegger, pp. 172ff; J. Risser, "Philosophie al 1k l'llIcncliti cs and the Question of Commllnity", pp. 22ff. In their arti cle" Aristotle "'Id Il ddcggc r on EmOlion and Rhcloric . Questions of Time an.d Space", M. Hyde und C. Smilh urglle Ihal Heidegger could not approve oF rhetonc because he cou td Ilot clllcnuin tll e id ea of ail liuthC c "llley" - thus Ihey npparcntly confuse das Man l1li Wltll MII,'(. " . Sec also nbovc, p. 94 , not e 86 . \ UA 1H, p. 27 1: "WeIHl di c Bcgrin1ichkcit Ill t)nscill se lbst bodenstandi g ist, lill/fi rlo.\' f)os";/I se lhsi dit, Ik j.(I'ljjlichkcil ll/ H'ci.\'(.! sein."

Cf. Heid egger's rClllarks

0 11

the ELllics in GA 18, pp. 179- 180.

IOX

10')

Cll ll l'Tl ' l(lllO 1

:II II PTlR T IIR t;E

primari ly be regarded as an articu lation afa sclf-und crstanding intrins ic to Groek li fe itsel":
L ege ill , speakin g, is the bas ic con stitu tion of huma n Dasei n. When spcakin g, il arti cul ates ilselj; in such a \Vay Ihal il spea ks

s uggests that the definiti on of man as zoioll lagon echon shou ld

arder t show how his conccplllHlity in ils 1111'11 IN plu'll y buscd upon everyda y speech. In this way, Heidegger lets Aristotl c pcrl"orm a kind of self-analysis: with and through Aristotle, it should be possible ta " Iisten in ta" everyd ay speech , and From there on eventua lly ta rcach the essential features of language and speech. 17 I-Iowev er, Heideg ger emphas ises that Aristot le himsel f has tried ta thus " Iisten in" ta everyd ay life, in arder ta put his phi losophy on a "sol id foot ingH . 18 Regarded in th is way, Heidegger argues, we can in faet say that there is no other tendenc y in Aristotl e th an la make clear the meanin g of endoxa , commo n ly accepted opinion s, but th is is often what is most difticult of al\. 19 ln accorda nce with Ihis view, Heideg ger

H 'SCI"l iOIlS12 Hut if speech is thus ex pcricnc ed already in everyda y Iife, Ihen A l'i sloll c's dClcrminati oll orth e asserti on as logos apopha ntikos is I"llnled in evcryda y lire itself. Again, Heideg ger' s point is not that

A l"i sl otl c's Icac hin g of logos is a mere conti nuation of the "naive" ullclcrstanding o f speech, but that il has a phenomenal basis. Whcn clabor[lti ng his interpretat ion of Aristot le' s understand ing

l! vcryday speech, He idegger focues above aH on the Rhetoric, since, as

of

about something, about the world . Th is lege ill \Vas for the Grecks somethi ng 50 persist ent an d evcryday , thal "' th respect 10 thi s phenoll1 cnon and on th e basis of it Illey achieved the defin itio n of 20 man and detcrmined man as 20 iOl l lagon ecl/Ol1.

The notion of man as a speaking bcing is connec ted wit h the idea that speech is the proximate mode of aletheuein, of our access to the worid, which, however, as we will see in the next chapter, is not to say Ihat it is the ultimat e mode of uncovering. 21 Recall ing the context of Aristotl e's definiti on of man in the Po/itic s , the pur pose of speech is ta reveal (de/mm ) va ri olls di stinctio ns, e.g . betwcc n good and bad . In Heideg ger' s v iew, de/mm is just another na me for apopha inestha i, to uncove r in the sense of making mani fesl. Accordin gly, apopha nsis is now rega rd ed as the basic feature of speech as such, not only of
17

wC ha ve secn earlier, he thinks that this work may be regarded as an ex pli cation of everyday Iife as such. Indeed, he c\aims, when correctl y inl crpreted , one sees that the Rhetarie not only lets the " pecul iar domain" of cvcryda yness show itself, but that it also contain s a hi ghly dcvc lo ped concep tuali ty for the explica tion of everyd ayness 23 Il owever , apart from arguing that Aristotl e in the Rhetol"ic has manage d la letlife explica te itself on its own terms, Heideg ger wants to show that on the bas is of the expl ication of everyd ay speech , Aristotl e has IIchieve d cerlain preliminary determ inations of logos, which recur in the nnalysis of the logos of action, though in a differe nt sense." Thus, Il cidegger argues, we see that Aristot le's conceptuality both preserv es und transforms the experie nces that are embedd ed in everyday speech, in Ih at it has sharpened and brough t ta explicit arti culation what is only ll lllhiguo usly articulated there."
As far as Ari stotle 's understandin g of rh etoric is concern ed , the

cOllcep ts that receive most attentio n from Heideg ger are doxa, ta (/)!.f/ th ol1 and pathos. In doxa - to which 1 will return at the end of thi s chapter _ Heideg ger sees the basic or everyday phenomenon of logos:
speech in th e fOl"m of establis hed and publicl y accessi ble op inions 'onccrnin g variotl s th in gs that govern everyday action wh ile prov idi ll g il \V ith an aim and dire cti on. For Heidegger emphas ises that even
Ihough rh etori c

See GA 18, p. 41.

"GA 18, p. 37. "GA 18, p. 45. 20 GA 19, p. 17: "Das Y El v, Sprechen , ist di e Grun dverfass ung des menschlichen Dase ins. lm Sprechen spricht es sicll aus, in der We ise, daf3 es ber etwas, ber di e Welt , spricht. Dieses -YEIV \Var fUr di e Griechcn etwas so Au fdri nglicbes und All U igliches , daf3 sie mit Bezug auf dieses Phn omen un d von ihm hr di e Delini tion des Mensche n gewannen und ihm bestimm ten ais wov yov xov " "GA 19, pp. 17,25. . '

pl'OdllcC H convincing op inion, a doxa piston . Therefore, one S may I hul Ihe pritnary aim o f rh etoric is ta let people see what speaks

has action as its aim, il !eads to action only insofar as it

III

JI

19, p. 18. UII 18. p. 136. . . ' l ' / 4 l ld s Id cn is pnrlicularly clent" in GA 18, wherc HeIdegger tirs! An slot e.s ll l1d crsto ndi llg of evcrydny speech fi S C011l1l111 cnti on in ni wlth Rhe ron c und the r ol/rit:.\', Md Ih ell procecds 1 Aristolle's accOlln! of 0 the relall on bctween h lHOti (lI \d ncti oll il1111C
J\

UA 1MIl 2i!, ,

11 0

Il

t' li AI' Il ' 1( 11110 1

of 1:1 particular opinion, so thui (bey 1 C Il . cOllvin ccd of ilS li: III 11I,. '6'1 b "0 e convll1 . . cll1g, ru hOIVever, Ihe Oral or has 1 cvokc " specifie 0 pathos in hi s audience. That is ta say, he has 10 aileci his aud ience in
Il o\V\';VCI', th e c illph us is on th e di stin c ti on bdwcc n th e advanta geolls

lI iid

Aflslot le has deve loped inlo his ontologieal concepl of the good , accord mg 10 whlch Ihe good is Ihal which conslillltCS the lelos of aclion.
For Il'd . . el egger ,S . Interpretation of O Cl, see GA 18, 16. In (bi s (,;onneCl on Heidegger nl so kan s on the Tapies and the Metaphy sics . ' " SZ, 30, 40. T. Plum h.as devoted a sludy to Aristotle 's analy ses of different kinds of public speech, argumg,that for the part, is. more the service of efficacy th an truth, on account.' thls charactenstlc IS constitut ive of speech in genera l; Wlrksamkell des Logos. Aristotel es ber Sprache, Sprechen Ulld das Sehrelbe n uberzeugender Texte fr den Gebrauch ;'1 der Schule, im Th ea/el' III/d ail' dem Markplatz.
26

Heldeg ger's interpre tation because he thinks thal il indicate s how the good is experic nced in everyda y life, namely as that w hi ch is benetic ial 28 10 .one ' s conce rn s. This undcrst anding of the good is thus what

advanlageous, which Ari slol le also employ s in his characterisalion of logos in lhe Politic s. This distinclion occupies a prominenl place in

not any grea t .exte nt discuss this rorm of speech , he devote s conside rable a ttentIOn to the distinct ion bClwee n the harmfu l and the

of address and response. Ali kinds of rhetorical speech concern the good. One of them is sumbouleutikos , "cons ultati ve", di stingui shi ng what is advanta geous (swnpheron) l'rom what is harmful (blaberon). Whereas Heidegger does

logos as discurs iv ity, so that th e as-struc tu re itselr is analyse d in tenns

a response, an ac tion. Wc will see later on how Heidegger makes use of this notion ofpass ivity and activity in conneclion wi th his disclission of

constltu ted by pathos , the rhetoric al situation of speech indi cates that sp eec h invol ves an interpla y betwcen activily and passivit y, poiein and paschein: what the speaker says affects the hearers 50 as ta bring about

which is hardly surprising on acco unt of the imporlance he ascribes to man's pathos or Stimmu ng (mood) wi th respect to the conslilution ofunde rstandi ng. 27 Here J would only like to point to one aspect of Heidegger's interpretati on of pathos, since it is of fundamental imporlan ce for hi s analysi s of logos. This is his idea Ihat, if logos is

such a way that they confide in his doxa and Ihen (let in accorda nce with their convict ion. Heideg ger devotes conside rab le lime 10 thi s notion

poss ib le Ihe tran s iti on l'rom logos as concret e speech ta lo gos as the astl cturc. For jusi as one may take council to gether (sumbo uleuest hai) !rI order to rcach a conclus ion concern in g the best course of action, one 11l11 Y nlso c1clibcratc (bou/eues/liai) on how ta act in private, as it were.

lire Ir nrmfu l nllows Il cid cggcr 10 nol on ly con nect the Rhetorie and lire l'otities , bul al so invile Ihe Etliies into hi s analysis of (Aristo tle's Ilil erprelati on of) cveryd? yness, something that in its turn will make

liliroll esis are ways in which the soul attains the truth, ail of which cxccpl nous are discursive, me/a logou 29 But whereas sophia and l'Ilis teme are epis/em onikon , contemplating such things th al are not suhjecl 10 change , phronesis and teclme are logistikon, deliberating on wlllil should be done and thus concer ned with that which can be nlhcrlVise. Accordingly, with phrollesis and teclme , Arisloi le has !loinlcd out two modes of underst anding that are not theoretical but yet d iscursiv e. I-Iowever, before exploring the discurs ivity of fechne and Illtro nesis, il is necessa ry to point out their role in Heideg ger 's thought il\ more general tenns, as this has been a point of mu ch debate in the lil cI1lture . On the one hand, scholars have agreed upon Iheir inOuen ce on 1tcidcgger' s existenlial analylic, but on the other hand they have disugrced about their role in the analysis of everydayness.
_ '\'cchne and COllcern. The poieNc perspective of everyday fife /.

h'/hies, which Heideg ger di scusses on a number of occasio ns, Aristot le slutes th at , to gelher with sophia , episteme and nous , techn e and

And preci sely deliberation is the mark of two forms of underst anding IlInl are c1iscu.c;.c;ed in th e Ethics: teclme and phrone sis. 1n the famous passage in the beginn ing of the sixth book of the

,.

lIeli on. T hi s v icw has expericnced a strong reviva l in modern phil osophy, duc 10 a growing critique orthe modern era a5 the epoch of Icehn olngy; li criliqu e th al is onen inf1uenced by the analyse s of Icchnolo gy providcd by Heidegger in his later writings. On this point, 11 1 1lll1nh Arendt has al so bccn an . JO T Importa nt source f'n
0 111

III Ar; stotl c ' s view, produc tion is an inferio r activity compar ed to

uence.

J>I

h'. N. VU .
'I ht!
/(1/1// ( 11/
If)

'J

lU II I

pi\ lltlclnllll ,

('o ll(/i l irJII , site argues Ihnllllnn has always had ri tcndency, Ilot least l.:l1 Co urngc produ ctio1l inslcnd of II cl ion. sil\cc th e former \Vay of

11 2

II I

'liAI' Il ' 1 IIIIU 1 { CIIAI''I loR 'III RUE b ' , , C: le e mg 01 poiesis is illljJcrfccl pdll llll'lly Ibl' leleo log ie'll reasons: ItS Illovement 's . l " ' . ' . 1 1l1COmp ete and Hs end IS cXlcl'lml 10 il , since il IS a proeess lllvolvlllg cha T d
1/
. n ge.
0 hO WCVC l",

M islol/

literatu re relatin to

cs pcciall y in the

l!

h. . 111 crrns 0 praxis and 1 where the former is more or Jess identifi ed with human IllteractlOn, and the latter is regardcd as a kl'nd f' If d ' h' J ( a se -un crslandmg w I C 1 cames through such interaction TI t ' . . . H) 18 to say thraugh
on e

. " , ree an unpre dl c lable ,whosc Inl eraction is a 'wa ys oll e of cha ll enge and c han JC ThcICJ.OIC, hum an bchaviour must be understoocl' t f ,g ,

', , g HeIdegger and Anslotle, the moral impli cal ion s of th e d ISlmctlOn between prod t' d ' . uc IOn an actIOn are cmphasised more stronglY, Even If one does not identify poiesis with production of works b ut takes It ln the wide ' ' f b' , ' . r sense 0 nnglng somcthing abOlit, it is still a mall er of achlevlng a result, something of use, The idea is that th' mlodel hl as become decisive ta our way of relati ng not just to things a SO 10 lU mans But 50 it is a g d " " r lie ,pOIeSIS and teclme a re inappropriate for our behaviour to\Vards and understallding of humans t cy make us regard humans as means, as so mething \V hi ch c ' b con tro ll ed and calculated upon instead o f as li d . an e

lili s COllncctioll, Il cidcggcr is occasiona lly regarded as someone who IIIIS ovcrCOlllC thc "poiet ic" noti on or man by showing how this idea has \t s l'OOts in man 's everyday existence, Against this, Heidegger has jltli nt cd out the poss ibili ty o r authen tie existence, which is action M!lVcrned by phrollesis, the authentie understanding of one's own self]] 1bere is one probl em with this view, thou gh, and this is that Heidegger Wll llt , - indeed by rererring to Aristotle - to articulate a basic situation

or hUI11f11l ex istence, in terms of wh ich not onl y everydayness but a lso

uHthcnticity ca n be understood. If one ident ifi es everydayness with prod uction, whil e reserving action for authenticity, it is difficult to see

uma n, whl ch then

tS

an unders la nding of whal il10 be retlected bac k on one 's sel f-underslan din g. J 1

. However, one has also sensed the diffi culties in co nce ivin g of aCli Wlthout recourse to producti on, not least sinee it has been A n stotle hllnself tended to d d " ' un erstan praXiS ln tenns o f poiesis .32 In
re/ating 1 Ih e wor/d is eas ier and ad mit s of f . 0 A nd she beljeves that this te d . nOie control o ver humans Ihan the latter l' ' n ency [s present a lrend . A' aClion in tenns of produclion 1'0 A r Y, III , rrstol et Le. I hat he mteraction and the poss ib ility of ta l..:' " end t: aC ll o n IS the sarne as hurn an production represents a pa rt ln the of society, from Ihe uncertalnly and aH the dlfficu!ti es inherent in pol iti cal lit'", A involving an affinnation of thc Ing understands the vita activa as membcr of (he sociely , responsl 1 lIy one has towards olhe rs as a l" < A of Ihis vie\\' is J. Tamini au:>.: Lectllre /' , EssG/s slIr Heidegger see also F VI ' "D". s e omo/agie fondamellta/e . radical isation PhO' IP', praxis: L'assimilation et la 32 Th' . . . I OSOp le prat ique d'Ari stote" , [S pOint IS dlscussed by R. Bernasc . fi. . . ' . EXlsting, pp, 2-24. S Broad ie Etl i ' h OllJ ,. eldegger III QuestIon The Art of although A ri stotle not as' (Ch. 4. III) that q,pOVTlcJu; as one usually has claimed he to ,between tXV'l and of the 't' of 't'XV 'l and h lm 0 t e TEO of in Le. that errpa ia we ll-perfornled l' re le ar/ed 10 s,ee tllat the fo rmer is emp ly Il t" ae Ion, las no specJ fie t t' . ' we -perrormed act io n in generaJ. 1 retllrn 1 B' r " ' . ' con enl , I.or Il concerns 5. a l oae Je s o bJ l!ctlon belo w, III

how the latter eould be a modification of the former, Thus the question is Ilot prim aril y whether poiesis and techne belong within the domain of cvc ryday life, but whether this phenomenon can be accounted for wi lhout the help of phronesis and praxis, The answer is no: if techne l'eprescnts an understanding of how to bring things about and phronesis Ihe ability to see what is good ror one 's lire, they are bath needed to expla in the form of conduct that is characteristic of everydayness, Grantcd that techne and phronesis are two di stinct form s of undcrsta nding which belong to everyday life, what about the distinction hc lween poiesis and praxis? ln Sein und Zeit, Heidegger seems to draw IlpOIl both lee/me and poiesis, since he describes ho w man in his cvcryday dea lin gs makes thin g \Vith a view to an external end, whi ch is the basie trait of poies;s,)' But as noted in the previous chapter, when Kiv in g thi s description, Heidegger is out to question the Greek In terpreta ti on of man 's existence preci sely in terms of poies is. Thi s J1 1c il l1 S th at cvcn th ough he no doubt uses poiesis and fechne to i1 lustrate wll a! conce rn is, tbi s is still within the perspective not Ollly or G reek IhOllght but of everyday lire itself. Thus Heidegger 's point is that, even Ih,," glt it certainly can be said that we engage in poietic conduct in ovc ryday li le , \Vhat is important is that this olso affects the \Vay in which wc cx pcri c ncc o urse lvcs and o ur conduct. ln this way, poiesis or
Cf, nbovc. nOlc 32. SIlice l! e idcggcr does 1101 likc Ar istot le makc a distinction between understanding 1 O vit y. Il is onccpt o r lJesorge/J cn!l bc compa red to both 'tXVll an d 1tOlllO'l, 11l(l Cli lu'" II ke cnptures aspec ts or bath $p6 V110I Hnd 1Cp6t, dcpending upon what pel N 'Clive Olle lokcs . WIJe r! Il cideggcr 's roc us is o n Ihc aspect o f unders tandi ng, 1 p dlli W 1\ pltr'ull e l lo 'trXY l rmd 1 but whc n il ;s f\ question or the tc lcolog;cal II lrUCl l ll C of' I)(',WII'.I.:(' II und Sm'111.', 1 compnro Ihes!.: con ecpts 1 7tOI'lO'l and n:p \. 0
Il

14

Il '1

Il

'1IIII'T13R 'IIIRI ' I '

cOl1cern is taken to be what is primarily gi VCll 10 Ill e plu':'/l o l11 cno log ica l

(; 11 11 1'1'101( T II Rl m

inquiry, serving as a name for life's own self-explicalion. Bul once Ihis has been established, everyday life must be further elucida led , with the help of praxis.
Heidegger is convinced that Aristotle has seen that poiesis is the dominating perspective in everyday life, and that the truth about life requires the perspective of praxis. However, he also indicates that Aristotle was not eompletely able to free himself from the perspective

of poiesis, but tended to understand being as Hergestelltsein. Il is

agaillst thi s bac kground that th e followi ng statemcnt s hould be rcad:
The Grc:ks had ail appropriate term for "things": pragmata, i.e. th at whl ch on e has ta do with in one's concernful dea lings (pr:iS) . But ontologically, they le ft in obscurity precisel y the speclfically "pragmatic" cha racter of pragmafa <l nd determined them "proximally" as "mcre things". 35

The work tlHl l is produccd docs not oilly refcr to the "for what" of its Ilsability and Ihe "of \Vhat" of wllich it consists; in plain artisan circlllllstances il also has an assignlllent to the person who is to wea r or use il. The v..'ork is cut to his figure; he " is" there along \Vith th e emergi ng work . Th us along wi th the work, we cncount er not only beings that are ava ilable, but also be in gs that have the mode of be ing peculiar to humans - beings for which the product becomes av ai lable in their concern; and logether with these we encounter the world in which wearers and users live, which is at the same lime our world .37

or re lating to

ln Ihi s way Heidegger conneets our dealings with things with our ways
human s . In so doing, he wants to bring together man 's

und crslanding of things with his self-understanding, As he puts it,

Dasc in is the primary "for what" illsofar as it is a "for the sake of

whi ch". That is to say, our use of things is ultimately for the sake of
o urse lves, s ince human existence in virtue of its very nature has a selfrc lati o nal structure ; in every activity , its own being is an issue for it .
38

The Greeks tended to reduce beings to "mere Ihings", for sinee it was sa
natural for them to rega rd beings as prodllc ts, they failcd to see that thi s is only one form of givenness and 50 did not see the phenomenon of as SUCh.
36

Thus if Aristotle's uncl e rstanding of being

0 1' in oth er words , "As concern, Dasein is care for itself, for th e most part o nl y implici tly.,,39 As man becomes dispersed in his occupation w ith things, h e understand s own b e ing [rom out of thi s conduct, and

ultlmalely must be re [erred to his notion ot' poiesis, his philosophy is essentially j us t the natural elaborali on of everyday intelligibi lity.
On Heidegger's aCCollnt, in accordance with th e poi e tic view on the

world, when things are experienced as equipment, they are also la ken to be invested with a teleological structure, that of "in order to" (Um-zu) and "for what" (Wo zu), as they are regarded as means to do something.
Th at
IS

ta say, the logos of concern ad dresses beings in tenns of their

Ih is mea ns that his self-understanding (phrone sis) tends to become dOll1inated by his con cern (techne), ln this way, even though teehne and /) //l'onesis are two forms of understanding in their own right, they are dcpe ndent on our perspective, insofar as it is peculiar to everyday Iife Il ''' 1 Ihe self-relational aspecl of understanding is more or less concealed l'n,. Ihe benefil of an object-directed concern. But ta aecount for this possibility one must use preeisely the notion ofself-unders tanding. That
is 1.0 say, the co ncern w ith things is only comprehens ible against the ba c k g round o f the m o re bas ic structure of man's relatio n to his own
Il S'Z, pp. 70 -71: " Oas hergesle llte Werk verwe ist ni cht nur au f das Wozu seiner VC ndbarkc it und das Worau s seines Besle hen s, in ein fa cheTi halldw erk li chen l'wc ZustU mlcn liegt in ihm zlig leich die Verweisung auf den Trager und Benutzer. Das Wcrk wird ih m au f den Lcib zugeschnitten, cr 'ist' im Entstehen des Werkes mit dnhci. ... Mit dem Werk begeg nel delll nac h nicht a ll ein Seiendes, das zuhanden ist, tl ollCh.l I" \ jl\lch Scicnd cs von der Se insart des Menschen, dem das Hergestellte in li ln("11 l3 !.!sol'gen zuhllndcn wird; in oins dal1lit begegnet die \VeIt, in der die Trager Iiml Vcrhrnllcl H !cben. di c zuglcich die unscrc ist." .:r lM ,....';., p. 8il. lU Cr' JI p. 180 : " f) (I ,e l n (II,\' lJe'\"ol'xolI i.l'I Sor ge 11111 sich sel bsl, zumeist U IHIII'HhOcklich."

te/os , as ava il ab le for thi s or that. In contrast to the epistemic logo s, the end of everyday speech in this sense is not simply the apophansis itself

but a work. From here on, however, Heidegger wants to show that the sphere of teleological relations between intraworldly beings also
IIlcludes man. For things available fo r us e do not only refer to other such things, but also to a possible use and thereby to a possible user:
35

p. 68:. "Die einen angemessen Term inus fr die 'Dinge'; d.l . das, W?01n man es lm besorgend en Umgang (1tpu;) zu tun hat. Sie ontologlsch gerade den spezifisch 'pragma ti sc hen' Charak ler der ln DunkJen und bestimmten sie 'zlIIichs!' ais 'b lof3e Dinge'." GA 19, pp. 269-272.

11 6

11 7

(' 11 1\ 1"1 1',1( l'IliUm

being, for it is hi s self-understanding lhat g ivcs hls conc..: rn a spec ifie direction, that makes him choose some poss ibil ilics fol' poiesis and leave others behind, The logos of con cern th us has ft twofold direction : when addressing a being in terms of its end, i,e, the work 10 be done, 11 0wuvl:r, il is seldom Il oted Ihat already in th e 1922 man uscript on

man is simultaneously directed towards his own existence, in terms of which he interprets his situation, Therefore, concern is only intelligible within the framework of care. A nd as already indi ca ted , even though Heidegger suspects that Aristotl e's philosophy has a poietic basis, he thinks that Aristotle himselfhas paved the way for its overcoming, as he has show n 1hat not poiesis but praxis is the esscnce of li re.

5. Phrones is and care

l-Ieidegger's inlerpr ctati on o f phronesis an d p r ax is has attracted co ns ide ra ble a tt en t io n in th e lilcraturc. Whercas sOllle think th at Heidegger uses phronesis and praxis 1'0 point out ce rtain fu nd ament al features of everyday life, others beli cve that Ih ese concepts ex press 40 authentic ex istence in He idegge r's se nse. Finally , il ha s been s uggested lhal Heidegger h ere has ro und a model for his Qw n philosophieal project. 41 These suggestions are not as disparate as they might perhaps seem, for they ail set out from one and the same

assumption, This is that Heidegger has discovered that, when presenting hi s notion of ac tion gove rned by phronesis, Aristotle appears to challen ge hi s own metaphys ical assum p tions, th e ideal of ete rnal , unchan gea ble being, whic h is th e domain of episleme and sophia. For in Aristotle's view, ac ti on is what it is only wit hin a spcci fi c situation, and therefore, if phl'oll esis is to make action possible, it has to be an understand in g of particular, changeable be ing. Thus here, it would seem, Heidegger has found a not ion of facticity in Aristotle, by means of whi ch he can question the equally Aristolelian idea that kn owled ge necessarily cOllcerns the uni versal.
The former view is taken by R. Bernasco ni , " Heid egger' s Destruction of Phronesis" , p. 142; R. Mak kreel, "The genesis of Heidegger's phenomeno logical hermeneutics and the red iscovered 'A ri slotle introductio n' of 1922", p. 315. For the latter view, see above, p. 116, note 32; W. Brogan, "Heidegger and Aristotle: Dasein and the Quest ion of Pract ical Life", p. 138; C. Han ley, Being and God in Aristotle Glld Heidegger, p. 28 ; W. MeNeill, Th e Glance of the Eye, pp. A. Vigo ' "Wahrheit, Logos und Praxis", pp. 41 D. Starr, Entjty and Exislence, p. 95; G. Figal , "Refra in ing l'rom Ointeclic", p. t04 .

Mistot lc, Il cidegger claims tha t there is an ambigui ty in the concept of III/I'ollesis, Whil c not dc nyin g th at Aris totle has managed to capture life ill its cOllcrete situati on wi tl' hi s discussion of phl'Ollesis, Heidegger Ihillks that, when describing that \Vith which phrollesis coneerns itself li S tha t whi ch can be ot herw ise, Aristot le fa ils to give thi s a posit ive cll arac lc ri sa ti o n. Fo r thi s deter mination is only achie ved through a llcgali on of unchangeable being,42 Even though th is statement dO,es not neccssarily have to be regarded as Heidegger 's final verdict on "ltrollesis, il should not be negl ected. For if H eidegger suspec.ts that th e nnti on of un changeable being makes up th e ideal ev en in Aristotl e's " pract ical" philoso phy, then the idea that He idegger co uld somehow " nppropriate" or "ontologise" it certainly becomes more complicated. For the moment, however, 1 postpone any [urther comments on the ilupli cations of Heidegger 's crilical attitude towards Aristotle onthis point, and focus on what after ail seems to be somethin g hke a pOSitive ,'ctr ieval of phronesis on the part of Heidegger. As noted ab ove, one questi on in this connection has been whether phrol1esis in Heidegger's vic\\' displays an everyday or an authentic mode of existence, The truth is, 1 think , that both alternatives are correct. To make this clear, we should lirst have a look at Aristotl e's own charactcrisation ofphronesis:
It seellls as if the person who is phrollimos has the powe r to dc\iberate on that which is good for himsel f and beneflcial to him, and th is not in a single part of hi s li fe, e.g. as regards his hcalth or , . 43 strength, but in what concerns the good II fe as a whole.

I\ccordin g to Aristotle, the capability to see what is good for one's life is dependent up on practice, ln this sense, it would thus not belon g to I W III as man , w hi ch mi ght seem like a problem for the attempt to illi e rprcl cvc ryday life in te rm s of phron.esis. Hmv ever, Aristotl e' s descripti on o r Ihe sensibl e or "carefu l" man certainl y recalls the 'hnl'octcri sati on o r logos as the abi lity to di stinguish between the lId vllnlagcous and the harmful, etc, Logos is delinitely something that
l 'A. p. 260. AriSlotlc's ex prcssion is t.vc.x.oj.levov o.w XE lV E.N... 1140a l., , "50Ke t 51) $POVip O\1 dvat 1:0 OUVClOOat 1 pl trI U r41 yaO Ka t 0 t ou 1(Ct!r1 prpor;. olov 1t01O npoc; uylewv, I\!H\1f 10x.\.I\'. ej . n:o w n:pb 10 It rlV
Il

nI\' N.

11 8

Il Il

belong s la man as man, but in arder tO fullil il s it has to be develop ed, and th is seems ta be appl icable to p/ll'ollr sis il S we il ' " For phrone sis is a virtue and , as wc saw abave, virluc in Ihe G rcek sense is tirst of ail an abi lity to live one's life in a sens ible wny. Accord ingly, Aristot le remarks that one can even say of some anima is that they are phronimos, namel y those that have the power of foresight or precaut ion, w hich lets th em see what is good for their lives" Sa conceived, unders tanding of the good is cam mo n ta ail men, th ough it can be more or less perfect. In this way, there is in Aristot le a vacill ati on belwee n pllrone sis as that un derstandi ng whieh guides our li ves by necessi ty, and as someth in g which only belongs to sensibl e men. T his vacillation is present also in Heideg ger's interpre tation of phrone sis , and that is why one can sec similar ities betwee n il a nd bath everyd ayness and aut hcnl ic ity, as Heideg ger conceiv es of lhem. But even though Olle find s mu ch in Hcideg ger 's interpre tation of phrone sis and other Aristote lian concep ts that elsewhere is put rorward as his own philoso phy, one must be earefu l wh en trying to identi fy comple te matche s between Aristot le' s concep ts and those used by Heideg ger" Heideg ger has not copied Aristot lc's concep tua li ty but affi rmed SOllle of its bas ic trait s and tried to deve lop them furth er. Inso far as phrone sis repre se nts a n unthem atic underst and in g of the good that can be interpr eted as a ki nd of sel f-under stand in g o n the part of the agent wh ich makes act io n poss ible, it is no do ubt useful ta Heideg ger 's explica tion of care in its everyda y mode . Howev er, the concep ti on of phrone sis ad mits of a more "authen tic" fo nn of und erstand ing as compar ed w ith w hat Heideg ger terms the inauthe nti c adh erence ta the p ubl ic explica ted ness susta ined by "the one" (das Man). Phronesis stands out from other fo rms of underst anding because of its relation to the virtues of character. Aristot lc suggest s that one way ta describ e the relation bctwee n phrane sis and th esc virtues is that th e latter make one see the right end of action, wherea s the former lets one
4,1 ln E.N. 1143b6-13 Aristotle seems to da im that $pOVllou; is a gi ft of nature_ In Pof. 1334b15 18 il is stated that logos and vos make up the ends of our nature; therefore , our habils must be regulated with a view to them. An undevelo ped logos may be found in the slave: he has il, but in a deficient way; 1259b281260aI4 . 45 EN. 114 t a26-28. 46 For such an attempt, see F. Volpi , "Beil1g and Tim e: a ' T ran slati on ' the Nicomacheall Elhics?"

th l; For th e virtucs are a k incl of disposi tio ns (hexeis) whieh let uS ori ent Olllseives in th e wor ld in accorda nce with what is proper ta li S, but the virtlles onl y fll ncti on in th is way insofar as they listen ta the prope!' (or ,IIas) logos, and th!s is the work of phronesis. Thus the vi rtu es ILre Ilo l poss ib le wit holl t phrone sis , and that is why, Afl stotle remark s, 0111.: o rten _ wrong ty - believe s that all virtu es are the same as !'//l'alles;s. I-Icnce on Aristotl e 's aceoun t, alth ough m an's charact er he regarde d as so methin g he has in virtue of his nature, fo r tht s characl cr to be develop ed into a truc virtue, phronesis is req uired. 48 ln wha t way mi gh t A ri stotle's discuss ion of phron es is hav e ill ll ll enccd Heideg ger's notion of care? Does he ever testify ta th e possibility of lInderstandin g phronesis in this way? At the beginni ng of l'li s d iscussio n of care in Sein und Zeit, Heideg ger remarks that
The way in which "care" is viewed in the foregoin g anal ytic of Dase in is one which grcw upon the. a.ut hor. Lil con nection \V ith bis attem pts to interpret the Augustll llan - I. e. "G reek.Christian" - anthropo logy \Vith regard to the princ ipal foundat ions that were achieved in Aristotle's ontology.49

ln his " own" writing s, Heideg ger hardly ever uses the term " action" (llandl llng), which is probab ly due to his effort ta overco me the di chotomy of action and th inking. The concep t of cnre is intende d to cu pllll'C bOlh these aspects of hum an existen ce in such a way as to make il imposs ible to conce ive ofthem in isolatio n from each other. 50 This is IIlso re flected in I-Ieideg ger's discuss ion of phrone sis , to the extent that he Ireatsp hl'onesis as vi rtu ally insepar able frompraxis. T he aspect of phl'Ollesis that recci ves most ofHeid cgger's attentio n is lts sclf-relational structur e. As we saw above, the one who is phronim os

" Ii N. t 144b I4-2 1, 3 t -32.

or

..... Z. p. 199 , note 1: "Die in der vorstehc nden . . . . Analytlk des Dase ms hc t'olglc Bli ck ri chtung auf die 'Sarge' dem V:rf. 1l;t der VeaslLchc einer Interpretation de r augus\\Im chen - das tltlu'opol og ic mit Rlicksi cht <luf di e grundsfit zlichen Fundam en:e, die .In der ()Il\{lh)gc dS Arislolclcs .Sec 62"', p . where Heidegger !II for (he Il CCcsS l y of 1tllcrprellng Anstolll! S \VIth the help of the UlIlcc pt nf CUI'C. Sec also abovc, 11 6, noie 39, : vhere He idegger speaks about the 1lll l,1 !1'clfitiOll of cnrc f1 nd CQ l1ccrn wlIh respect to rrpau;. \ 0 Accord in gly. lI eidegger elllphasiscs Iiml the not ion of cure does nol ex press a pl cvnlcncc ( Ir the " pt'lIcI!cn l" OVI.!I' the "Iheo rclku l", SZ. p. 193.

120

121

knows what is good for himse lr. In cOl1trusl 10 {('

' //1/ (',

Ihe ab il ily to

l-i ood li re as s uch, w hi ch is an undcrstanding of telos , and phronesis as

produce works, phronesis is Ilot primaril y cOllccrn cd \V ith things different from man . What it '"produces'\ the poss ibi lily to aet, is a possibility for man 's own existence. Thus even thou gh action has social
aspects, Aristot le 's focus concerns the way in which aclion affects the agent himself by developing his character a nd habits. On th is view, man can be said to act fo r the sake of him self, not to achieve some extemal re sult. This is also emphasised by Heidegger: "What phronesis delibcratcs upon is not that whereby a praxis l'caches ils end. A result is Il ot co nstitutive of the bcing of action, but only th e eu, the 'how , ."SI T he te/os of actio n is eupraxia, successfu l action. One tnight think that this depend s upon the \Vay action relates to other people, and Aristotle states this as one of the constituents of action." But Heidegger is more interes ted in showing that Ar istotle 's co nception of phronesis and praxis indicates that he regard s man as th e ultimate for Ihe sake of which o f his Qwn ex istence, as il is a fUlldamental tra it of man that his own existence is al ways at iss ue. Wh en thus conceived, praxis is not a particular activity as opposed to poiesis, but s imply ou r existence, i.e. care, which however may be enacted in different ways. 53 But illsofar as Aristotle's aceount of praxis (and of phronesis) a lso shows what it means for man ta act or ta take a stand on hi s own existence on the basis of an understanding of himself and nol o f thin gs, it comes close to He idegger's nolion of authentic care. The notion of action as an end in itself is thus of Fundamcntal importance to both Aristotle and H eidegger. But what does it really mean ? As noted above, Sarah Broadie has objected to Aristotle's characterisat ion of phronesis as the ability to de liberate on that which conduces to Ihe good life as a whole. She claims that this life cannot form the objeet of deliberation, for Ihis object must be a si ngle good. She therefore eoncludes that phronesis lacks a specific te/os, and that it is jusl an ab il ity lu behave sensibly in genera l. S4 This objection apparenlly rests on a conflation ofphronesis as an understanding of the
19, p. 51: "Und was die $PVll0t<; Oberlegt, ist nicht das, wobei ei ne ltpl zu Ende kommt. Ein Resultat ist I1icht konstituti v f r das Sein des Handel ns, sondern lediglich das e, das Wie." "E.N. 1IIIa3-5. " GA 18, pp. 188-1 89.
51 GA
34

dcli bcralioll, which is cOllcerned with the ITIeans of However, IIroad ie' s o bj ccl ion touc hes upo n another important point in this co nll ecli on , nam ely th e di fticu It y of i llust rating the nature of dcli bc ratio n on how to act without transforming this action into an cXHmplc of production. 56 For if deliberation is to make action poss ible, Ihcn its end musl be a particular end, but when the end is thus specifi ed, Ihe aclion scems to be transformed into an instance of production. Il is evident from the Ethics that action is al ways the enactment of a v irlue , otherwi se it would not be desirable in itsdf. Accord ingly, an nclion coun ts as an action only when it is regarded in this way; e.g. to sove so meone from drowning is an action when it is regarded as (e.g.) a brave action, bec au se then il is desirable in itself, and the end (to act hru vely) is fu lfilled in evely moment of the action, being intrinsic ta the H n. lIowever, if this action is Ilot re ga rd ed thus, but just as the elio p"rti cular act ion of saving someone from drowning, then it is not an nClion but production, for the end is the savi ng and this is not fulfilled II ntil the activ ity is fini shed. Of course it is poss ible ta say that one 1'I HVS somcone in order ta be brave, that is, prod uces something in arder 1 aet. S1 This is still not satisfaetory, sinee here, the saving is the means, 0 hlll il scems that the saving is in mueh more need of dcliberation than th e action insofar as it is brave. That is, ev en if the former is a possibilily to achieve the latter, one still has to deliberate on how to il QUt. This in volves asking what things one needs in arder ta calTy
" '11 1 I\lPOV IlGU; has aeeess to both the ll1eans and ends of actio,n is emph.asise? by H1 (ln do1llcr, Wahrheit und Methode, pp. 326-327 , Thus when. $povT\Gl IS ldent lfi ed wlt h truc delibe ration, epoUAt a , it is a fonn of understandmg of more or less kind as 'tlixvl\. But $pOVT\Ol could not be an abi lity to deliberate on that whlch conduccs to the good life as a who le, were it Ilot an understand ing of the ends of Ilcli on in Ihe rorm of an ab ility to distinguish bet\Vcen good and bad ends, For even IIHl llgh the virt ucs le i the agcllt .dctect particular for his actions? the power of dI vision is nOI granted [hcm, SIIH; t: Ille y do not mvolve logos but to ,logos. Accordingly, QPOVf\CH <; in Ih is conlcxt is Ilot idcntical \Vith act of (of huw to Ilchicvc a good life in gCl1cral), bul is an understandmg o,f IS good :or u lle' s lire ilS sl1ch, of eatpovia , whi ch is a particular rorm of hfe. Il IS the chOlce o f' slIc h ri lile !hn! ul limatc1 y go verns one's co mprehcnsion or whatends good for 1I1ll"/t lire fw d who! cncls lIrc bac! . ln Ih i s way, $p6v1lcrl<; as self-understandmg can be I ll wl t rXV1l,j usllIs CiH'C govcr1l,s c.oncern. . . ., 'ft le n C lfl sconi CVCll cinillls Iha! II 15 11 0 1 Olll y dlfri Clllt bul m faet nn poss lble, lI IIlf fdt'1;gl'I' ;1I {llll'stioll , pp , 8-9,

Etlll'cs \Vith Aristot/e, p. 198.

" 1: N. 11 1?n15. tI J9h I. '

122

121

'li AI' l'ER 'l'II R''E

out the action. But in ArisL olle's vicw, a lhin g CUU llt S us li n instrument of action only if the use re sults in noth ing bllt in th e lise itsclf," an d here it does result in something else, namely in the sav in g. One might perhaps think that on this view, one pllshes th e distinction betwecn po iesis and praxis too far, but as wc will see in the next chapte r, this is what Aristotl e h imself w ill do in order to argue fo r th e supremacy of theoria over against every other kind of praxis . For now, however, what is important is preeisely to see th e problems th at arise wh en eonceiving of the distinction between poiesis and praxis in th is \Vay , as an "objective" di stin cti on. In other word s, the point is that, eventually, Ari slotle will abandon hi s discovery lh at the distinction between production and action must bt:: conceived of as a difference in p ers pect ive, though one co uld no do ubt wish th at Aristotle had expressed hi mse lf more c1early alrcady in this contex\. St ill, given that Aristotl e ' s ent ire mode of thinki ng rests on the ins ight th at evcrythin g depend s on how, as what, one addresses thin gs, the mst plausible interpretation must be that Aristotlc thinks that it is our perspective that determines whether an acti vity is 1.0 be countcd as action or production at least as long as he do cs not bri ng in theoria in to the discuss ion. Thus even if it is " more intelli g ible to us" to regard the abovementioned saving as an instance of production, once wc have managed to reach the level of that whieh is " intelli gible in itself', we see that th is activity can on ly be comprehended in tcnns of action. For to detcrmine the natu re of thi s action is to cxp lain why it should be co unted as precisely brave by referri ng to the time it was performed, what persons it invo lved, its mode of enactment, the things uscd, etc. Hence, what eharae terises th e virtuous man is that he is ca pable of understanding his concluct as an end in itselfand not merely as production. Thi s is not to say that poiesis and tecl1l1e represen t a fa lse perspective, but they only depi ct one level of human conduct, when this is regarded as being directed towards and eoncerncd with things that tran scend il. To th is model, praxis and phronesis add another level, in accordance with which man 's acti vities are conce ived of as selfrelational, and wh ich displays man as concerned with his Qwn life. Analogous ly, Heidegger 's ana lys is of every day ness begins w ith a
" Pol. 1253b23-1254a8.

descl'iptioli orilUlllun cx !oilCl1cc from the po int of view of con cern, since

Ihis cor responds to th e perspecti ve of everyday life itself, b ut th en procccds to th e levcl of carc, showing that w ith thi s step is the truth of I1l1rnan ex istence

6. TIre discursive nature of ac/ion

Iloth lechl7e and phronesis involve deliberation , \,,'hi ch is discursive,
me/fi logou. l n hi s inlerpretation of deliberation, Heidegger's chief aim

is to show what it means to regard not only reason taken by itse lf but hllm an action as such as discursive. ln what fo ll ows, "action" wi ll be lIscd to refer to acti v ity in ge neral , whereas ils difference from production wi ll be left as ide for the most parI. ln order to make c1ea r the basic traits o f th e logos of action, it is necessary to get at least a brief overview of Aristotl e's conception of action. As he sees it, action has th e following constitutive elements: its lirst stage is a conception (logos) and a des ire (orexis) of that for th e sake ofwhich the action is to be performed. This is th e ruling principle O ori gin (arche) ofone' s choicc ofa specifie course of action, in such a r lVay that, given th e rea son why of action, one deliberates on how to pcrform it. 59 Eventua ll y, the deliberati on terminates in a co nclus ion concernin g how the action should be performed. When we have reached this conclusion, our desire is in accordance \V ith the dcliberation, and thi s govem s our choice. The choiee (prohairesis) is th us th e outcome o f Ih e deli berating process from unfound ed to fo unded des ire, and i\ristotl e delines it accordingly as "deliberate desire" .60 On his account, Ihe choiee must then in its turn be regarded as the origi n of action as th e origin of its movemcnt. As this makes c1ear, il is not primarily the end 61 or ac tion that is chosen, but rather the "how" ofits enactment. III hi s discussion of action, Heidegger ca lls attention to the questi on or how to und erstand th e re lation between the "actual" course of action 1I 1Il! the dcli bcratin g net thut mnkes il possible. This is becausc he wants 10 fin cl a way to acco llnt for human co ndu et without establishing a divi sion bctwccn acti on and thinking, and he bcl ieves that Aristotle's concep tion o f action is prccise ly \Vhat is nceded. For even though
\fI

Sec Il N. 11 39n3 1-33.

", ti.N. 11 39035-36.

124

t,.N. 111 301 0-11.

CI It\ JlII ' I( 1111( 11

Arislot le makes a co nceptual distill ct(,1l hl.itwcu li li 'lion and Ihinking (e.g. between praxis and boulellsis), he nevCI' libslrllcls li'oll1 Ihe aspect ofunderstanding when discussing action. Convcrsc ly, he .!lmOSl always applies a genetic perspective on thinking, regardin g il as an aClivity. This implies that Aristolle wants ta show that Ih cre is bath a

C II t\I''J' lm '1'1110

c l;

t\c li o ll is 1101 int e lli g ib le w hn a bs tracting [rom ilS moment of

dc1 ibernti o n, in v rtuc oC whi c h the agent structures the situation of COll vcrsc ly, the deliberation is not complete if it does not

"subjective" and an "objective" side to action. Thal is, in order to

understand the nature of action, it is not enough to aCCQunt for the agent's understanding. Action musl also be regarded as a process or as a "real" occurrence in the world, which is accessible to others in the [orm of the agent's behaviour.62

Sinee il is imporlant lor Heidegger to show that Ihe s itualion of action canoot be strictly divided into the deliberatioll and its conclusion as if they were understandable in isolation t'rom elch other, he show that the latter is actually included in the former. On Arislolle's view, in deliberation, the agent sets out from a given end and deliberates until he reaches the lirst principle of aclion, which he leads back to himself in order 10 make clear Ihat the end is possible for him. Hence \Vith this principle, which concludes the deliberating act, the action . . begms. 63 1-1 el'ct eggcr mterprets thi s situation as follows:
Th is houleuesthai, the thorough deliberaLion, is enacted as iogizesthai in such a \Vay that a context of speech is anilllated thereby, a speaking-together or con-versation, suliogizesthai, sullogismos, superficial!y designa ted as "infercllce". Every delllonstration has a conclusion, sllmperasma. The conclusion of bOIl/euesthai is the action ilsell; il is not SOllle kind of sentence nor a J'ind of knowledge, but the breaking Joose of the agellt a; such.

62 This distinction is drawn by E. W. Orth in order to criticise the way in which one in contemporary philosophy . On his view, these speaks about 'theor;,'" and nawadays <l.s operat lve concepts, and this is wha! has made possible the terrns be.lw.een. actIOn and thinking; "Einleitung: Philnomenologie und Praxis". A distinction between the 1wo aspects of action is drawll by D. Charles, s of Ac/ion, who argues that Aristolle's analysis of action is a ta modern theory of action, which is based either primarily on or on teleology and knowledge (von Wright, causalJly (DavIdson, P:acock, 6inscombe), whereas Anstotle combmes the two perspectives. E.N. 1112aI8-1113aI4.

nvo lve articu lation , a " oncillsion" in the form of a chosen action. t\cco rdingly , the teleologieal notion of action does not only prevent us rrOIll co nccivin g of action as mere behaviour, without recourse 10 the agent 's motives and understanding, but it also commends us to regard ' ' 1l 1111 k'mg as ac t Ion, 65 Fven though Heidegger w<trns us against believing thal: the co nclusion of Ihe deliberation is some kind of statement, one can to s Ollle extent compare lhis inference with the apodeictic syllogism. For ju sl as the latter is a course of thinking which consists in several 'co nsecutive steps that result in an assertion, the deliberation results in lin action which is surely not an assertion but which may nonetheless be rega rded as an act of at1iculation. The task of deliberation is ta make the s ilumion of action accessible. Initially, the agent is faced with a number of" possible courses of action, which means that he has to ehoose one of Ih em 50 as to transform the initiall y inarticulate or unsettled si tuation llto a determinate possibility. This demarcation involves the work of ,wJJfhes is and dihairesis. In the previous chapter, three levels of slIn/hesis and dihairesis were distinguished: belonging to articulation or Ill e assertion, ta the act ofhermeneutic understanding, and finally , ta the conlexl of beings themselves. However, wh en applying this model to Ille s ituation of action, it becomes more complex; not because we move frolll asse rtion to action , but because of the teleological perspective, For whal one regards as th e basic object of action depends upon whether one takes a poietic or "practical" perspective, as we shall SOOI1 see.

d ie Ilmld lung sc lbst; er st nich t irgendein Satz,

POUEEOOcn, das Durchberlegen, wird aIs OyiEoOW so em Zusammenhang des Sprechens lebendig ist, eill Zusamlllcniiul1erlich bezeichnel ais 'Schlllf3'. Jcder Bewclsgang hat clnen Schlul1satz, Dcr Sc hlu/lsiltz der (3oUElu;:aOo l ist
64

GA 19, p. 150: vOllzogen, daf3

Erkenntnis, sondern das 1().\'/)rec hen des Hallde/llelen ais so/chen." Th us HeIdegger does no! make any tlistil lCli on bctwecn the praclica l syllogism and the de!iberation. For the idea IlliCh fi di stincti on must be drawn, see J. M. Cooper, Reason and Hl/man Good /II Chapter One, Secti on 2. . . . . Il' Thu s 1Icid cgger slat es Ihat (GA 24, p. 393): "U nd erstandlng as self-projection lS th e b/ls ie 1'01"111 of the happening 01" Dasc n. It is, as we also Illay say, the proper 111 clll ilng o f acri on." (" Du s Vc rstchcJl ai s Sichcntwer fcn ist .die des (,'{'.\'cll/ ,/lell.\ etes l)l\soi ns. ist, wic \Vj l' [\ \lc l1 sngcll kl1l1en, der elgcnlllche Sm n des Il lllldcllls,")

12G

127

CI/ I\ I' Il ' 1 III UI 1 <

'1I I\ PT"lt 1'1m l'; " as llesC I Il le ""l'Id ot conccrn a nd ends s tl t , a Ions e twccII tltll c!'cll t ki nds of' means usability 0 r Of l,a Tour obJect of concern is undc!'stnod in teJ'ms of its ' e os, a use Heldegge ' a ha mmer as bei ng too heavy th own example, when cxperien cing . , ' e rom out ofwhl ch" of interp t rIS not an Indifferent property but the " for what" (W ) h re a IOn hammer. 66 In this ca ' . ozu, tete/os, of the synthellc-dlhaireti c relation thus holds belween th e hammer the lelos itself? H 'd elos, But w ha! a bout Our understandi ng of , el egger presents us with the l llowing sugges tion :
To bring the e nvironm ent d oser in ci rcull lS " . . has Ihe exi sl.e llti nl I1lcaning of a k" ' pCCllve de li bera/Io n 'b ' If/a. mg presel/ t . " . 8! J /' [le dc l 1 eration is to be ab le 1 . U ' 1 then" 0 move wtl hlll the schem e or the " if , concern mus! a lready undcrsland . in a "s uJ'vcy-li ke" W'ly TI '! l ' 1 . il contex! of 1l1 Vo!vem cllts '. la w li e 1 JS addrcss'd ' t f " if" must a lrcady be underSIOod , , Il " 1l' ln e/'l1ls 0 the
l,
lM

ane

(laI .

Deliberati on " makes prese nt" th e " " a determinate end in thi s cont to acl by dll'ectm g itsclf to , ex a wor ' T he net ot' k' terminates in the "co '1 . " ., ma mg present Il e U SlOn o f Ih e dclibe t' 1 action is Icd back to the ag t ' ra 1011 , as 1 l e fi rst stage of . ' l:11 S presen t capabi litics . Thus in act ion J of arlI cul ation is th e concluding cho ice whi ch takes ho ld of posslbJ!!ty or end, leaving others behi nd, Thal' t e prohairein is to "take" a . ' b'l' lS 0 say, ta chaase, , " passi 1 Ity or end " before" tI th do 50 l11eans ta " take int o j " '. ', ' 1e 0 e rs, and to distin guishin g one

"IOII H !thln g. 11 crc wc cOllle across th e hc rm cne ut ic " as" . Ta put il briefl y, tu ll y Oll the basis of il fo rcgoin g access to meanin g is it possible ta direct onescll' ,o a n e nd as m ca nin gful in a concrete s ituation, That is, the pllrtie ul"r e nd receives its specific c haracter when it is sy nthesised with rom ) the " cantext of involve ments", (hu t s imulta neo us ly divorc ed F IlI c rcby becomin g a fac tical end, Properly speaking, this does not o nl y IIp pl y 10 th e " ir', the end, for the fu ll scheme of " if-the n", th e act ion II lIti cipated in its cntirety, receives specifie content from the context. S ince wc are here moving on th e leve l of con cern or poies;s , the s ituatio n of action is regarded as an env iron ment consisting in th ings II vai lable for use, which makes acti on possible by gl'antin g the agent an undc rstanding of the mcans with which to perform the desired acti on , '1'0 th is conception one must add the level of praxis and to approach the c nd o f action in tenns of man ' s self-understandin g, As Heidegger puts il : W survey which ilIumi nates one 's concern receives its ' li ght' from rIte I)asein' s potentiality for bein g,Jor Ihe sake oJwhich concem exists as earc,,,69 Th e end o f action is also understood in tenns of one's selfunde rstanding, A nd insofar as ac ti on is regarded as a poss ibility for onc's own existence, it involves a concept ion of the re lation betwcen diflerent aspects ofone's own self. That is to say, to grasp of the end of II ction is to proj ect towards of one's own future self, w hat one can be, T hi s proj ect ion is governed by a conception of one' s past self, which in Ih is connection could be rega rded as a kind of backgrou nd context, T hus, the sel Fis co ntinually crea ted (anew) in the syn thetic-dihairet ic process oF encou nterin g th e future in tenns of th e past and v ice versa, Just as 1 see a thing as something because of m y foregoing access to IlIca nin g, 1 und ers tan d what 1 in each instance can be in terms of Ill y pllst sel f; whi ch ca nnot be exhausted by any fu ture possibility oF action, Wc have seen that man und erstands the abjects o f his con cern as avai lablc for a work, and that he understands th e work in its tum as a poss ibility tOI' his own existence. BUl on H eidegger 's account, these two re lati ons arc not e nou gh ta account for the u1 rsta nd ing in vo lved here. roI' whcther one concei ves of action fro m 1dc Ih e pe rspec ti ve or sc lC -und ers tandin g or whet her one puts focus on the
S%, p, 359: " Di e dO!l Bcsol'gc n crhcJlcndc bcrsicht crnpnin gt ihr ' Li cht' aus dem det:; D:l'1ci tl'l. Il'0/ 1111/\111111:11 das UC'Iorgcn :lI s Sarge cxistiert."

SII11ultaneously a sunthesis ' wh en

relates it to th

,IS C Dlce IS

' " P orml!1g a course of action one e present sIluat!on, as the la tter e ' de te rminate poss ibility If act' '1 g ts tra nsformed mto a , , Ion IS t lUS regarded a' f artIculation based up on the d l 'b ' > an act 0 " e l eratl on th en as l-Ieid ' r 111 the quotation above th d "d ' " egger m!orms us ;::-:-:-::-:-:_ _ _ _ _,__ eSlJe end must already be understood as e
GA, 18, pp. 93, 300. .!-lberlegllng ha! den .. , Damrt aber die Ube rlegung s ich im Bewand tniszus31llmenhang 'Obe rs' 1 J' muO das Besorgen schon cinen 2pgesprochen wird, mul3 schon aIs verste hen. Was mit dem ' Wenn ' n as se in." " Th us A,ristotl e explains the meani n g The chalce is di scursive and govern d b as foll ows (E.N. 1112aJ 5-17)' ind ic ate that something is takell e y lI,n, erstanding, Even the Ilame Scems to' , li' " o r e Sornet l lll g " ( " . , p ,
67

For He idegger' d. . p. ,3 59: exrstenzmlen Si nn eiller Gegenwdrti Sc hema des ' werln-so' sol!
66

td.o,

1/11

t III der

see,

Kat

tavow. UTcOO"lllWivEI V ' Ol1

' ,. " ya , npoatpecrt pe't'O: oyou Kat -rOUVOjJ (.( w ov 1t'pO ;-rpwv a ipetv.")

/28

' 2'1

CIIAI"I I' I( Il \lU 1

relation betwccn si tuation and end, the undcl'stunlJhl ij ill vo lvc ill action
presupposes a " light" . T hi s " li g ht" is Dasei n 's " isc lose"ncss o fb e in g.

possible . sincc Il c idcggcr al so CI1lcrtain s the idea o f a d iscurs ive nous. nul il! [h is c ase, IIOIIS is nothin g dirfe ren l l'rom logos . T h erefore, thi s ;l1l c rprcl:J li o n

or

Il c idegger s till leaves unans wered the qu estion

7. Truth as disclosedness and nous ln Sein und Zeil, di sclosedness (Erschlossenheil), the onto logical level
of our understa ndin g, is said to display th e most original phenomenon of truth , since it is a condition of ontical truth , that is, truth in the sense of un coverin g.'o Apart trom a rgu ing th at it mu s t be permil1ed to desig natc as truth that which mak cs poss ibl e truth as unco ve ring,

t.:o l1 ccrning hi s attit.ud e toward s non-di scursive nous.

""1 n o fdi sclosedn ess is prefigured in the A risto!elian nous. But ifthis io
is tru c, th en 11eidegge r in fact implies that A ristotl e is not sa far from a no tion o f a tran scend ental conditi on of understanding as one usually Ih inks. 7J Firs! il mu st be no!ed that Heidegger spe ak s a bout di sc losedne ss in di ffe rent res pects. As constituted by understanding, s pch and stat e-of-mind (Befindlichkeit), it is di sc ursive, involving an ull coverin g of a specifi e bein g, and admits of truth and fa ls ity.74 1towever, H e idegger also speaks ab out di sclosedncss as an openness ta, o r as a " hav ing" of meanin g and being as such, w hi ch is presupposed by di scurs ive lh o ught. In this sense, di sclosedness gives expression to th e I() re-s tru ct ure of understand in g, poi nting to the fac t that understa ndin g
li S logos is poss ibl e only on the basis of a foregoing having of meaning.

'l'he idea to be presented here is that H eidegger thi nks that hi s own

Heidegger motivates his termillology by taki ng Ar islOtle as his w itness.

Fo r Aristot le tao has s uggcsted that there is a truth that is presupposed by truth in the ordinary sense. This is the truth of nOlis:
Evcry saying th at sta tes sO lll cthi ng about someth in g, like an affi rm ative aSSCl1 iOIl, is always true or rai sc. Bu l as regards nOliS, this is Ilot ahvays the case, fo r when ilS a bj ect is the "whal" in the sense of esse nce, il is [aJ ways] tru e and does 110t involvc "som eth ing as somelh ing". Bul jusl like the seeing of the proper abject s [a!way s} true, whereas il is nol ahvays !rue wth respect to the quest ion whet hcr or not that whi te object is a man , so it is wit h that which is without matter. 71

T hu s co nceived. it does not seem to mak e sense ta speak about fa lsity wi lh respect to d isclosedness . Just as in the case of nous, " fal s it y" is
co mpare it to nOlis; "La question du logos dans l'artic ulat ion de la factici t chez le o.ne on G.A 29/30, pp. 4 52Jeunc ll eidegger, lecteur d'Aristote". On th is 456, where Heidegger indeed does speak of a dIscurSI ve voue; that lS pr,csupposed by logos as asscrtion in a \Vay Ihat he did not do in his earl ie r courses, slnce Ihere, he _ .. dcs ignated Ihis understanding too as logos. 11 Wllctller or nol Ari stotle ever has entcrlained an ide a of VOUt; as a co ndItion of since he does not seem to lugos as such is no doubt very difficult to decide, he thn t int.crcs lcd in ils role in ord inary know ledge, If Il has any, but rather wants 10 nnd OUI wllal il must look like if il is to do justice to the supreme aspects of reality. hl ord er 10 seil le Ihi s questi on, it is nece ssary ta eluc idate the rel atio n belween IlIld (I.\OOl,cr\ <; , sa as 10 decide whet her il is 0 1: 0:81'\0\<; atone that grants cx pcri cnce ilS ca pac ly to disl in guish what a thing is, and .10 Ih at, d1fferent 11I11lBs ail are of one ki nd, or if vO' is needed a!so for thl S H. S.e ldl seems 1 argue in fa vour of the latter alternative, as he suggests that vou can elther gras p 0 lite CS>cnce of a concrcte th ing, in whi ch case it works together with a'i0:8no:t, or L'I1H!lHC in morc abstract Ihinking, contemplating the essence in full isol ati on from concrclc abjects, Der /3egrifJ des Im eflekrs (nous) bei Aristote/es, pp, 58, 83K5. On thi s poi nt , he 1 in agreement with C, Kahn, "Aristotle on Th ink ing" p. S I\y co ntrAS1, M. Frcd e, who ha s traced the developme nt or the concept of ln Ch eck ttlOu ghl in gcneral , notnb ly \V ith res pect la Socrales, Plata and Anstotle, j.I H"C'I lItut to Ari stotlc , vo is Il hi ghcr intetlectun[ power wlli ch has to be developed tHI. or ot llel' f'o r'rlI S of uIHJ ers\{1lldin g; seC his Introdu cti on 10 Ratiollaliry in Greek
n Ul/lghl.

No us is thus , at least wh en il co mes lo simple, in composite being, w hat

provides logos wi th an object. ln thi s way,
flOUS,

be ing itself j ust true, is

the condition of lo gos and thereby of truth and fal sity . ln the literature on Heidegger, one se ld o m pays any attent ion to hi s interpre tati o n of nous. To the extent tha t one does di sc uss il, il is primarily in connectioll with Hcidegge r's concept of und ersta nd ing (Verslehell), where both nous and Versteh en are s uppo sed to in volve an as-struc ture which prece des the levcl o f llill arti culati on." Thi s compariso n is no doubt
" 52, pp. 220 221. 71 De Ali. 43 0b26-31: "cr1\ 0'

1\VOt;, oomu:p il Kcna4locrtt;. !Cct!. Elvat 0:).119 t'ts. lI:O t 0' .. \. KCl1:c1 n vo' o.).).' 0501tfJ "lI.) op v 'tO i{ ou cD,Tj8e, El 0' av8pw1tot; , EUKOV 11 1ln, OK ll8e El, o{),oo ocra aveu Ilt;. " See also Mer. IOSlb22-28; De Ali. 430.26ff. 72 This is, 1 take it, because on e id entifies logos with the assertion. On this view, there is no other concept !eft but vo with which one cou ld compare Heidegger' s notion of pre-propos iti onal discursive understanding (Vers/ehen). Sec W. Brogan, "Th e Place of ArislOtle in the De velopment of Heidegger's Phenom enology "; M. Ruggenin i, "La finitude de l'existence et la question de la vrit: Heidegger 19251929". F. Volp i also wa nls to disti ngui sb Vers /ehen from logos, bul he docs not

il o/Euoh :rcro' 0 o vo ov n, '" 0 , O ,i cr, l KaT , - i r

11 Jlv $aO"lt; 1\

K01

'" SI, p. [11.

130

t1 1

CI 1 1\\,'11,' 1( 1111( 1' 1

here a matt er ofnot hav ing.75 This is (\ problclI Hlll c poi nt. howcyc r. For H eidegge r states tha t disclos edn ess in vo lvcs ils ow n counlc rparl, a concealment ( Verschlossenhe it), which is attribu ted to Dasein 's t llin g (Verlallen) to th e public explicati on of thin gs, w hi ch makes o ri g inal experi c nce superflu ous . As an alternat ive to this, Heideg ger introdu ces th e noti on o f aUl hentic di sclosedness," But fa\Jing seems precise ly ta presupp ose discJos edn ess, no less th an authentic disclos edness , The on ly way to make sense of this situati on is by regardi ng f lling not as a mark of fals ity o r ina ulh enti city, but s impl y as Ihe finit ude of di sc losedne ss. whi ch mcans that, whethe r a uthenLi c or inauth e nti c, o ur disclos edness is essentia lly limi ted in sc ope, since it is 110 1 div ine. 77 T he distin cti on betwee n two as pects of di sclosedn ess rec urs in H eidegge r's inlerpre tation of nous . H e di slingui shes between nOliS as an underslanding of somethin g as somethin g, in whi ch case he re fers to the term dianoein in order LO emphas ise ils d iscursive stru cture, and nous as a conditi o n of dianoe in.7'6 Heideg ger paralle ls this d istin ction to the di v ision between nOliS poietiko s and nOliS pathelikos, acti ve and passive reason . This di v is ion is made in De Anima, w he re Ari stotl e co mpares the act ive or produc ti ve reason ta light, since it makes ail thin gs knowable JU S! like light makes ail thi ngs vis ible. By contraS!, passive reaSQn can be said to becoll'lC ail thin gs, sin ce it co nsists in the capac ity to receive thcir fo rm s or essences. 7? Man y o f Arista tle ' s reade rs have found it difficu lt ta decide what the rel ati on betwee n these two kinds of reason looks like. One way to so lve this diffi cul ty is to cJaim that active reason belongs 10 God on ly.80 But as already indicate d, He idegger
75
76

' suggcs ts , tnstca ct t1lU t actlve rcaSOll should be ta ke n to co nsti tute th e

co nd iti on o f possibi lity or passive rcason:
Noeill is in SOlll e sense a path os, a beillg -aflected by the world. T hi s kind of bei ng in the worl d, characte rised by ullcovcred ness of li a I/ S, is only poss ible insofar as the world. IS disdosed as SllCh, illsofar as nOlis is determined by a nOl/s wInch Ullcove rs the worl d in genera l. 1 can intend someth ing only illsofar as this th inkable something is disclosed as such. No us palli elikos is only poss ib le on the basis of nOLIs poieliko s, on the bas is of a lIoeill wlli ch uncovers Ihe wortd. 81

Il owcver, even though Heide gger docs not cali nous poielikos di vine, he :-:ccrn s to think that divine rcaSQn has been th e model for nous poietiko s. For he states th at in Aristotle ' s v iew, prod uctive rcason is not strictl y hUl1l an, but e xceeds hum an reason , 50 th at th e latter is regard ed as a possible instanc e o f the form er." This is no do ubt someth ing that Il c idcggc r conside rs as problem ati c, as we "vBI see in the chapte r, in co nnccti o n w ith the qu estion concern in g the philosophlcal nous. Nc ve rlh e less H eidegge r seems ta affirm one o f th e co nsequ ences of l!lis noti on reason , a nd th at is th at huma n reason onl y has thi s primordi al openn ess - in H eidegge r 's words, di scloscdn ess - in 50 fa r as il rc trieves it, and th at is ta say enacts it in arti cul ati on. 83 Therefo re, cvcn lhough nous precede s and makes possible logos, it is only through logos that /l OUS is accessible . ln Heideg ger' s words, this means th at our disclosedness o f being onl y is what it is as an uncove rin g of bemgs that lakes place in logos,

Alel. IOS2a l -4.

SZ, pp. 22 l-222. 1 return to the notion of falli ng in Section 9. 71 For this po int , see also H. Ruin, Enigma! ic Orig ins" pp. 23 1-232, who th inks that, when disti nguish ing between two levels of disclosed ness, Hei degger fac es a proble m which he does not sol ve in Sein und Zei!. For if falli ng belongs to disclosed ness, it seems that one has 10 pose an independent correlate, to wll ich di sclosedn ess would relate in a more or res.c; correc t \Vay, but it was precisery suc h a preph enomeno log ical noti on of truth that Heidegg er wanted to escape. Howeve r, if falting is interpreted as the inner fi ni tude of di sclosedn ess, there is no nced fo r such a correl ate. For this problem, sec also E. Tugendh at, Der bei Husserl und Heidegge r, pp. 295-298, 328-330, 356362. " See GA 18, pp. 279-28 1; GA t 9, p. 179. 79 De An. 430a I4- 17. See al so De An. 111.4 . RO See M. Frede, "On Arstot le's Concept ion of the Soul"; W. McNeil l, Th e Glonce of Th e Eye, p. 29. H. Seid r argues instead Ihat active and pass ive renson mu st nOI be regarded as t\Vo dirrerenl l'casons or capait ics, bu l thn! they ure tO be cOllcc ivccl in

tClllIS orthe IwO modes of actual ily; Der Begriffdes lnlellekl s (no us) he; Aristote/s, 1111,2.3, 117- 11 9. . ' . . . d .W 1 l i GA 18, )). 326: " Oas voe:t V st ;n ge wlssem vo n el e. t Di eses charakte ns lert durc h dIe l'nldcckt hc il des vO' <;, ist Il ur dadurt: 1i Ing lll;h , ual3 dIe Welt Uberhaup t erschlossen h l, der vO> bcstmmt st du rch einen vO<;'"der die Weil entdeckt. l: h klll ill ll ur vct'l ll eincn, weil Il diescs Dcnkbarc uberhau pt ISt. vou It((O l\ fn:6 ist 1lur mglich durch den vo 7tOlll'tU:O, durch em V OEIV, das dI e Welt
( !!l deekt." . l UA I R, p. 200. II I De AI/ima a l Icas\, Ari stoll e l:cver .desc n b.es

as hum an, IhOll gll he: di l:cusscs Ihc conseq ucnces of rCilson bemg Slluated 111 man, namc\ y !'V\lll lhOll gh' rcason ilsc r!' is illl lll ortni Illld pcrree l, man's n tcll cctua l powers wll l illl hnc. slncc Ill llil is ll lOl'w l. l)..,: Ali . 408b I 8-29. Il C:/I 1 p. 202, H,

132

1 1

'111\1''1 1' 1< 'IIIIU ' I

8. Logos as kinesi s. Having present ed his interpr ctation of the re lution bctwce n nOliS poietikos and nOlis pathetikos, Heidegger states that:
The determinations of poiesis and patllesis reach into the aClual

CII I\ PTER l'lIR EE

01' kill esis \Vi lh n.:spcc l

ail und erslandin g of how the Greeks have app rehended being depends lIpon the \Vay in which one understands kil1esis. 84

centre of the Greek concepti on of world and lire. This means that

rllc t nlready been cstabli shed. For the point in makin g thls connectlOn IS h,,,icall y to show that only kines is capture s the differen ce that be longs 10 logos, the diffcrence bctween beings and being. In other words, It IS a 1I\I111 er oCassertin g the transce ndence in volved in logos
III; idcggcr's int erpreta tion o f Aristol le's as ",ho le la.rge l.y centres on the co ncept of te/os. His basic argume nt lt1 thlS conncc tlOn. I S Il lU t Ari stotl e has an ontolog ica l conception of te/o s, in accorda nce w lth

tO th e conce pt of logos .8fl Howev er, most o f tl:c 'ssentiul aspects of th e co nnecti on bctwee n logos and l.n

unde rstands logos in tenns of kinesis, and 1hat is to say, as an inte rp lay of poiesis and pathesis . Th is is al Jea st ll eidegge r's view o f th e matter,

That the concept of kinesis is determinat ive of the Greek or Aristot elian conception of life and world means, among other thin gs, that Aristotl e

wlti ch lelos is th ought to be constitutive of the being of movement IIetio n. For as the end (Ende) or Fertigk eit of action, it makes

interpretalion of Aristot le 's te leo logy, 1 w ill not dea l \Vith it in its e nl irety at this sta ge but mai nly reslrict myse lfto Heideg ger's retrieva l

A rist otle, the meaning of being is energe ia or enle/echeia in the sense of Fertigsein: fini shed and complete being. This conviction makes him somew hat hesitant re ga rdin g the questio n wh ether or not Aristot le was rea ll y able ta do justice to dunamis ; a that does Ilot seem 10 be present in th e latter course. Becaus e of the comp lexity of Heideg ger' s

twenti es, He id egger becom es more and more convi nced th at ta

for J-Jeidegger's interpre tation of Aristolle 's teleology are Grllndb egriffe der aris/o/elisehen Philosophie and Aris/ote/es, Metaphysik IX 1-3: Von Wesen und Wirkliehkeit der Kraft from 1931 . 1 have chosen to focu s on the earlier course, sin ce il is more in Iinc with He idcgger's attitude towards Aristotle in ge nera l durin g the Iwentics. fo r cven though these courses are perhaps not incompatible, they dirfer quite sign ifi ca ntly from each other. The basic difference is that wherea s the earlier course above ail [ocuses on the noti on of realisat ion or enactm ent, i. e. on energeia and kinesis, the latter is more co ncern ed \Vith th e mean in g of dunamis .85 A s noted in Chapt er One, during the urst hal f of th e

the impli cations or which are to be dea lt w ith here. The main sources

clin bc said to delimit the action, to restrict its scope, and therefo re, the basic meanin g of te/os is end in the sense of limi! (peras )." And, Ilc idegger adds, it is only because this is the basic sense of tdos that It II1 ny also mean " goal,,'8 In this way, Heideg ger wants to obJect to the idea that Aristotelian teleology necessaril y involve s ascnb mg to nature Il goal or design, as if everyth ing that happen s would do 50 accordm g to some plan. We must be care ful with the ward "teleology", Helde gg ;; SlIyS , for Aristotle did not in fa et have any teleologl cal wo rld- vlew. Instcad , the basic idea of his teleology is th at be IS ta be It m lted, wl\e rcas what is unlimited borders on non-bcl11g. .
W c have seen that A ristotle takes action, praxis , to be an end .JO

10ss ib le by gove rning or affeetin g it in every momen t, "mec It IS that which the acti on receive s its specifie direction. Thereb y, the e nd

il self. I\s such, it is not a form of ki/les is , since kinesis does Ilot have clld itnmane ntly, but has the mode ofbein g of energeia or IIlIt apparently, insofar as action in volves It IS 111 fact a l"'I'1ll of kinesis , though it is possible fo r us ta regard It as an end m
Itsc \l'. ln kin es is, we are ourse lvcs , direc ted towards an e nd
III hnplcr FOll r, 1 will consider \Vhat Heidegger re gard s as the 1IlIlscqucilces of Ari slotle's tel eology in .whal co n.cerns the questi on of .th e p\lllosop lli ca l logos. In CI:apter 1 wil! dea\ wlth the broader ontologlcal Implicmions of I lcideggcr's 1Jlterpretatlon of Anslotle s teleology. I l Sec Mel . V.l ? U (i,ll 1S, pp . 39, R2.
1" U,II 1R, p. 82. .,I Scc( iA 18, I>p. 1, H 9. -3 1 VI J "ul' Ille of Ihcsc ' Cri n s, scc (, h:lplcr One, Sewon 3 \'or 11C I(1 t1 ea 1at III tlll..\ l1 pcI' sc no;c C IOI be Il fonn of Ki VI\CJl C;, sec 0150 li (el . 1048b IIIlI ro 18-27

14 GA 18, p. 326: "D ie Besti mmungen der 1toi 110"l and m:i8110"l reichen hinein in dus cigent liche Zentrum der griechischen Welt- und Lebensbetrach tung. Darin liegt, daO alles Verstiindnis dessen, wie di e Griechen das Sein aufgefaBI haben, daran hangt, \Vie man die KtVl1<Ju; versteht." For the di stinction between 1tOlllOt and 1tciel1<H , sec Phys . 202a2 Iff. Moreover, in GA 33 , Heidegge r's understand in g of logos has begun to change, and he re fers ta his ear li er treatment of logos in GA 19 \V ith the rC1l1ark "insu f(i cient ", p. 5.

114

'II AI'TI\I( 1111( 1'1 that we do not yet possess. This is clcarl y the CIISe wi lh dcl iberat ion, si nce the deli berating agent has to "reach OUl" 10 th !.! ullticiputcd end as
somelhin g that can be realised in different ways. In oth er \\lo rd s, since

' li A1' 11 ',1( '1II1WE

l ll1l1uctcr uf J)USCiIl .',94 Fo r if th e bas ic rUllclion o f e nds is to make our

the end of action is successful action and in thi s way is dcte rmined by its "how", the end cannat be fulfilled already at the outset, and that is why act ion is in need of deliberat ion. Thus conceived, ac tion involves bath poiesis and pathesis, tOI' to act is to " cffcet", to bring about a course of action, and th is is possible on ly because we have been affected by an end, an end that appears as somethin g desirable. Moreover, even though (1 bas ic trait of energeia is that it in no way affects the dunamis wh ich it exercises, since it only changes from inactivity to activ ity , in th e Ethics, i\ristotle repea tedly claims that our acti ons (energeiai) do in fact affec t our d ispos it ions (dunClmeis).92 But thi s m ea ns that th e end of act ion ca n be regarded as a dtmamis , as a eapacity or poss ibili ty. For if act ion is the enactment of a virtue or capacity, which in its tum is atTected by the action, thcn action seems to be a movem cnl rrom one dunamis to another dUl1amis , and that is precisely the mark o f kinesis. Thus evc n th o ugh Aristoll e wants praxis to be a forlll of energeia, si nc e he l'c ars that, otherwise, th e differcnce between praxis and poiesis will collapse, he has actually shawn how action can be a form o f kinesis and still not have a work but a potentiality or capacity as its end, And even though Heidegger suspects that Aristotle's conception of dunamis is go ve rned by the ideal of Fertigsein, so that possibility in th e proper sen se is a " fillished ", complete possibility, whieh does not admit of any further development, he thin ks he can retrieve anoth er sense of possibility from Aristotle's teleology. ln Sein und Ze it, Heidegger pursues his ana lysis of possibility as an inquiry into the fin itude of human existence, a nd he takes the same tine o f approa ch in the course now un der con si deration. He begins by pointing to Aristotle's own remark that " In a tran sfcn ed sense, onc al:so speaks about death as an end, sinee they are both something ultimate. For also the ultimate ' for the sake of whic h' is an end."" Heidegger remarks: "With this transference, te/e ion, te/os shows itself as a
E.N.I!. I, 1105b9-I O, 1114 b21 -2S. Met . 102 J b28-29: "Sl !(e il Li. KotO ],I e-ra$op J..ye1"Ut to. 6-r1

I1cli vili cs poss ibl e, th cn when regarding death as such an end the I1lelll1ing of le/o s is in some sense lost, since death as te/os annihilates " "" cxistence. Therefore, the _a nalysis of death "throws us back" to the 'xpli cat ioll of li fe." For withinlife, death exists or has meaning only as l'oss ibi li t.y. That is why, on Heidegger' s view, the possibility o f death ,evcals particularl y elearly the mean ing of possibility as such. More l'l'eciscly, it shows that ends make action possible precisely in virtue of tltcir po tcntia lit y, that is, illsofar as they are not ac tuahsed
IlIIli c ipated as possibili ties. 96 Thus the point in bringing up our relatIOn 10 UUI' own death in this context is to show that act ion, and hum an

I1cti vity as sueh, presupposes a difference between end and activity. MOI'cover, if man essentially relates to an unful filled end or posslblhty, i.e. dcath, th is implies that his understanding of him self equall y llivolvcs an understand in g ofwhat he is not, wh ich is constitutive ofhis , a.:) o in that il too delimits his exi stence. ln other word s,
III ne t Jll ca ns to re late Ilot on ly to the ends that we choose, but also to the

clilis that we do not choose. 97 ln thi s way, we are outside ourselves in

killesis not only because we relate ta an external end but also because Ihi s end in its turn points beyond itself, to a context of other possible

",Is. in which it has its place, On one occasion, Heidegger states that on the basis o f kinesis, and more. precisely with respect to Hs relation to krinein, determination , il is possible to understand not only what it means to be in the world but also -1 'd Ill e II1caning of hermeneuein. 98 The reason why 1 el egger men t'Ions li l'cciscly krinein in connection with kinesis here is that he wants refer II I th e cha racteri sat ion o f the so ul in De Anima, where Afl stotl e
, . UA 18, p. 87: " Mi l dieser bertragu ng zeigt s ieh 'tEtOV ,
1)'It:lc llscharak ter."

ais e in

"cr. SZ, pp . 248-249 .

QI

ij, (iA 18, p. 90.

. ' d' 1. . hl lht..: lule r CDurse 0 11 Ari stDlle 's Icleology, w lll t 11S pDtnt ' Xlc nsivc\y, in eo nlle ctioll \Vit h Aristotl e's expressIon .uvClll t ),oyou . Every I:llfl!H il y wlli c h is .: )..6yo\l necessa ri ly admit s of It.S con trary. For a is cllpnhl e of producing not o nly health a lso d lsease: Thus p.asslb lhlles ulwuys poss ib le in sOllle spec ifi e way . ,and they req mre a /111 '1. I047b3S- I048n 13. T hi s poi nt 15 c mphas lsed W. Braga n, He idegger s 1tl l<:1prctn lon of Aristotlc on lht..: Privat ive C h<lraetcr of l' o ree and the Twofoldness of

93

crxam . Tl,o t. K'Ctt

t ou VEKa f::OXCHOV." See GA 18, p. 82.

Il, 1''1(. pp, 12 1 "1 UA 1H , p. lit! .

rr.
117

136

C' II AI'II ' I( IIII U I

jU\IUPOSCS thcsc Iwo term s?) KI';/lC;1I is how 'vel IIOlllill g dlffcl'cnt frO lll
III ' 1111111 CXpc l' CIl CC

logos . Kinesis prov ides us \Vi th a clul.! 1 th e nuture of hermeneuein 0 y preserves th e di fferencc in logos hCl wCl1 th e a bj ec t sin..:!;! il Il ot.onl understandmg and that out of which thi s Obj ccl is lIllderslood, bu t also

revea ls th e nature ofthei r interrelati on. Bas ieall y, this re lation is one of address and response: to speak or to think about something is to address it in one of its aspects, whereupon the thing answers by showing itself III so rne specifie way.'OO We have seen that the disc losedn ess of be in g is determined by a Vors truktur, w hi ch de limits in advance th e scope and direction of and action, But as an clement of discursive underslanding, our cltsclosedness is realised only inso far as logos directs itsel f towards some object, and if to understand somethin g is to understand it in terms o f its te/os, logos directs itse lf towa rds its object wi th res pect to a SpCC ill C poss ibility, whil e leaving oth ers behind . There fore, ou r
undcrstand ing is finite in several respec ts. First, insofar as wc

Irulh in undcrslandin g somcthing, but it is a1 a so ,,'II IIII(H1 0 1' iil lsity. For s inee logos as kinesis is not self-sufficient but III\nlvcs Il'unsccndcl1cc, it makes it possible for man ta fall away from 1I1111. ctf. Lo possib il ities whi ch are nol his oIVn. This is what Heidegger .J.-<IH'lUtcs as li l'e 's tendency towards " falling" (Ve /Jallen ), which is to lu' in the fo llowing section. ln the next chapter, however, wc " II I sec how ll e idegger also thinks th at the kinetic nature o f logos 1i 1Itil 1 1 ' o r th e poss ibil ity of countcri ng this tendency towards falli ng.
IJ

as jctl/ Gild empty speech

necessarily address things as somclhing, the possibility always remains that th e thin g in ques ti o n has to be approached anew, fro m another directi on. In oth er words, beca use of th e difference in logos, there cannot be a ful l idenlity between thought and its object, as there would be if thi nki ng hacl th e mode of bein g of ene rgeia. Furth er, when enactin g our di se losedness in an aet of uneoverin g, the response of the thin g whi ch has been uncoverecl will always in so rn e sense atfect the di sc loseclness itself; wh ether by confirmati on or chall enge. Therefore th e address of logos does not lead to a fi nal end or Ferligkeit . Wh en have rcali sed a poss ibility, we stand in a new situation with new poss i bilili es o f und ers tandin g. ln thi s way, logos di splays an II1terreJ atlO1l of po iesis and p a thesis, or, olle ould also say, it is itself a dunalllis, since its nature is to be able to effect by addressing a thing, as we il as to be affected by the response. As sueh, logos is th e possibility of change. 10 1
Logos displays the mo vement of li re, in v irtue of whi ch life is ou ts ide ilself, directecl towards an end, which it does not possess in any s"n ple way. As such, logos is finite, and there fore, it is not only what
99

AM we saw al lhe beginning of lhis chapter, Heidegger introduces l' vc l'yday ness as a methodologica l co ncept, indicating that th e phcllomcnologica l analysis must begin with Dasein 's existence sueh as Il CO II H':S la expression "proximall y and for the most part", in its average IUOdl; of ex istence. 102 As such, everydayness has nothing to do with the Ili'11inction between authenticity and inauthenticity. However, it seems llll' Iha t Hei degger thinks that, ev en th o ugh il is not necessary, Itlllllthen ti c ity is in faet the most co rn mon mode of existence. That is ta Il)1 . "proxi mally and for the mos1 part", we are not rcally ourselves, 1I11"l 1 lll uch as wc rcly on what lIane" says is meaningful ta do and to 11l 1 , cte. ' D) For authentie existence, as Heidegger often points out, is 1lk \H ll y poss ible as a react ion against inauthenticity, When eoncludin g hi s analys is of di sclosedn ess in Se in und Zeit, Il eldcggcr remark s that he has in a sense lost sight of precisely th e \'vcl'Yday mode of disclosedness. 104 This is because the analysis has not yc l Inken inlo accounl Dasein 's falling (Verfalle n), As noted earlier, th e \'IIIICCpl of fallin g is ambi guous in Heidegger, as he sometimes speaks IIhout it just in th e sense of finitude, and sometimes seems to think th at il Is somcthing that can be overcome. In the former case, fallin g is lIolhill g but kinesis, sinee finitud e is an aspect of kinesis, as wc saw uhnve. " avoid confusion, 1 will speak about falling as a mark of ro 1IIIIII titenti c everyday ex istence, where il however plays an important 1Il le ns regards the constituti on of mcaning and understanding.
,.. , SI., pp. 42 43, 53. Il' I ,....'/., p. 129 : "Proximull y. [)nsc in is likc onc. is lIn'.1 ror the \\IllY," (i', lll llIcllst iS das Onsc in Mfln und ZUII1C lst bl ed)1 es 50. ) l IIltSI, PI), 166_167 .

De An. 427aI7- 19. "" GA 18, p. 212.

Sec GA 18, pp. 238, 248,

.
part,
11

.
remams that

10l

UN

119

C II A PTI \!( 1111( 1' 1 The fall is a recu rrenl lheme in Il cllI'ly Idl 0 1' Il c idcsger's leclures from the period preceding Sein und Ze it , Ouri ng lhis lime, Il eidegge r is continuously changing and modifyin g Ihe Icnns w ilh w hi ch he lri es 10 give expression to this phenomenon, There is hardl y any olher concept in Heidegger's philosophy at this time which rec eives su ch a thorough and diverse explication as the fall. This is because Heidegger is anxious to make clear why philosophy has been unable to do justice to human existence, This predicament must thus be led back to Iife itself ' 05 In particular at the beginning of the lwenties, the fall is treated within the conlext of th e investigation uf the 1110vemcnt of life, or, as Heidegger also calls il, ils mobilily (Bewegtheit), The idea lhat mobilily is lhe basic
trait of liCe is developed l10tably in two texts from the earl iest twenties: the Aristot le-Imroduction and Phdnomenologische Intetpretationen zu

( '11 1\ 1' l'l ' II 1 11111', 1'

Ily lllnlogiclI l , to

Aristote/es, Here Heidegger argues that only on lhe basis of mobility are we in a position to undcrstand the olhcr existential structures, since it is l110bility that: decides how life " has" these structures . This is also the time when the concept of care makes its debut, since care is needed in arder la design"te the kind of mobilily that is characteristic of factieal Iife, as il shows thal life does not move in an indifferent way but by caring for itselfand the world ,
Among Heidegger 's many experimenta l expositions of the phenomenon offalling, one may mention in particular the one contained in the latter of the Iwo courses referred to above, which is not only the most power fui accou nt of lhe fall but certainl y the most peculiar as weil. In this text, Heidegger works with a number of different terms (for this once borrowed from L atin 106) , ncarly ail of which are introduced here 101' the first lime and lhen never taken up again, Some of these concepts stand out tram Heidegger's subsequent terms for falling in that they emphasise particularly slrongly the in terre lation of the constitutive and the concealing function ofthe fall, In this course, Heidegger states that the basic categories of movement, which are simultaneously the primordial structures of factic ity , are Reluzenz and Praestruktion ,'07 Without going into
This is particularly clear in GA 17, where Heidegger tries to show that Husserl 's rrhiJosophy is in fact based upon fallin g. 06 Probably due ta the course on Augustine the preceding se lll ester; GA 60. I07 GA61 , pp.11 7,13 1.
105

" . t Il al l'e/ll ce o mca ns, among o th er lllay JusillO C l >' Heidegge r I ' ( ( .. lllil C b'lck" , '111C th is is also th e !11 (;:al11n g 11 11 " , l 'Id in such a way that It IS lll lllhil les 10 ile/uzel/z: Ide ," rall en W01 ich me ans that its self1 d '1II II lninaletl " by th al whl ch Il con ron s, w 1 ' 1 tl' vay Reluzenz can be compare IIndel'Slllndin g is not immcdlate, n liS \ 'h 't outlined earlier and concern suc as 1 was , III lite rellilion belween care , d' 'd 1 acts of concern are uS lhi s outline showed tha\ the In 'V I lua Heidegger thus l 'g the wor d Re uzenz, \ 1I1l gtituli vc of care. n USII1, I.n that its source is nat so mu ch Id r concern, dIH I(lCll (CS lhe IUlIlen na/urale, Imp yi g ' , " . k by itself as rather the wor 0 ,""H or subJ cCli vIly ta en OII l' 'If but in everyday life al Mu n d ocs Ilo t have .111lI1lcdl a.te ta ':re-illuminated", by way h Reluzenz represents l 'lISI, his existence lS accessible to hlm on y ui' Iti s co ncern for the world, Hence ev en , g, d 't If,108 ' 1 f Iife in its encounter-Iaden directIOn towar sise ,' l110vemcn 0 a fall ta the world, This means thal man IS Ih lS lhrccuon comc.s abOli: as uch a wa as to simultancously turn away d \rcc tcd towa rds hl11l self ln S Y h' rr "[all into ,, (, Il 0 1 From him self, w hich , in its turn makes IS 1 e '(" ur li ,
Oll e

ccs rw..:On Heidcgger 's account, whereas ,or 1

" d' spersel l (zers treuen) Itself. R i z is das zerstreuende, that e uzen.. . .1 , that it illunllnates Il retrospectl ve y, wlli ch scatters or disperses 1 e In "t f dispersion which thus is , '1 rstrcuen the actlvl y 0 , 1)/'o cS fl' l.Ik/lon 15 (; as ze , .' fR 1 This comes ta d 1 . re-illummatton 0 e uzenz. I.'o nslitulcd by the ISC OSlve ' t h e world of concern and , t 'n way of structunng cx prc::;S lon as a cer al "beforehand)) and '0 '1 If '09 Praestl'uo means both to arrange 1 d b th fthes e senses Iltcrcby Il e 1 se ' " 10 bu il d up in front" , and Praes/ruktion allu es to 0 0 , f lh ' e , d bt reminiscent of the notlOn a 'l'Il e l erm Praestruktion IS no ou ' d" 1 rays to , d wi th whi ch our understan mg 15 a \\ Von lr/lklur III accor an ce h' y tl1e " wa , . enl sett led or "arrange d" b e f 0 l'eh and . In t IS . so mc eX I , ' , " t''' ' it "bui/ds" life, it is conslltullve of lhe }> ,.aestrukl/O/7 IS a construc Ion ' l . weys in w hi ch life has or relates to itself, But since Ide IS re, ' If in terlns of ils pre-organISe or pre't If for its dealings ill lIlllin alc d, address lllg Its e , '( blocks Its access ta 1 se , 1'I 1I'uc tlll cd occ upatio ns, 1 . .. . ltaneouslv a :-l tund in th e way. \\() Thu s th e co n5tructlOI1 IS Slmu
IIIK

"

( ;A 6 1. p. 120:

" B CWCg llll g

des fak lischen Le b ens . d e r begegnishafte n Richtung ln

huf cS sc lbsl. " 10'1 cr. ( !A 61. p. 13 1.

1 III

UA 6 l , pp. 1

120,

140

14 1

'1I AI'I I ' 1 111I1I1 1

le to an ima gine d self-tran spar ency on Ihe pari o f lile , '1h ' dcSl1'uc li on indi cale s fini tude a lso in the sens e that life as it CO IlSll'lIclS ilsc lr s imu hall coll s ly destroys that which il \Vas and 81 50 wha t il co uic! be. 111 To fail lo the wor /d is to fa ll to the pub lic exp l icati on oft hin gs. Tha t is to say, in eve ryd ay lire , wc are " illu min ated " or ach ieve our und erst and ing thro u gh our acce ss ta al read y esta blished opin ions , doxa. Thu s here we return ta the poinl at whi ch this cha pter bega n: dox a as basic phe nom eno n of eve ryd ay life. As stated the n, wh en exp lori ng Aris tot le's und e rsta ndi ng of dox a, Hei deg ger is not mer ely out to establish the basi c trait s of evcr yda y life, but he a lso wan ts ta kno w how Aris totl e's con cept of logo s is rela ted to (Ar isto tle's und erst and in g al) eve ry day spee ch. Of part icul ar imp orta nce in this con nect ion is to see how A ri stot le co nce ives of th e re la ti on be twe en eve ryd ay and them et ical spee c h. Fo r cvc n thou g h ll eide gge r thin ks tha t Ar isto tle a ffirm cd c/oxa as a form of uncl crsta ndin g in its ow n ri ght, he susp ects th at Aris tot !e's att itud e tow a rds c/oxa is gov erne d by hi s noti on of theo ry in part ic ular and by his onto logica l ass llmp tion s in gen era /. Bas ical ly, Hei deg ger 's idea is th at Aris totl e cou Id not find the limi t, the peros, in eve ryda y Iife. For doxa is itse lf imp erfe ct, w hil e bein g inca pab le of hor iz ein , of deli mit ing il S abj ect 50 stri ctly as ta be a defi nitio n, since it on ly says w hat thin gs are " more or less " , Mor cov er, the th in gs of eve ryd ay con ce rn arc a lso imp erfe ct, sinc e th ey are cha nge able. lI2 T his idea of theo retic al spee c h as horizein, as com pl ete dem arca tion , is som eth in g that Hei deg ger can nat just take ove r, sinc e he be liev es, agai n, that thi s idea is root ed in the noti on of bein g as Fertigsein. Sti ll , in spit e of his hesi tanc e o n th is poin t, He idegger thin ks, as was also note d abo ve, that Ari sto tl e's dia gno s is of do xo dep icts essential aspe cts of ever yda y Iife, incl udin g its shor tcom ings . Of parti eula r imp orta nce to Hei deg ger is to emp hasise that li fe in dox a is a lit dom inated by assertio ns , th at is, spee ch inso far as it has bec ome sep arat ed from th e very acti vity of spea king . To som e exte nt, wc alw ays rcm ain dep end ent upo n doxa in thi s sens e, for if one co uld See H, Rui n, "Think ing in Ruin s Life, Deat h and Dest ructi on in I-Ie ideg ger's Ear ly Wr iting s", whe re this des truc tio n is expl i cate d in te rms of Ruinanz, the " nJ jnous" mov emen
I II
112

l' li A!''! ER 'IIII \ EI',

I,.' llUl tllg

H ructi on" , thou gh not only in th dcst e seml!,; o !

un ob stac

11111 \II HI ' !'}; Io nd w ll al 15

" . , v..'th o ut ha v in g m ade o nes e lr the l ' s o l' Ol)ini ons a shar ed wor ld ' ' 111'1 h: IH; C}; 1lHlt 111,1 k C l Il) th e I aun eall on ' J , . , ,' bl' Il But thl s ' a 15 0 th e mas t prab lem allc 15 Il Il,, ld Il\lI he l'0SS I c. . f' b e of its falli ng, Ii fe te nds to , " y(h y li or eca us plll' 1l 0ll1 CIHl ll 0 l ( , bl ' h d opi ni ons 50 th at the ' li t, 't llll C 1c d " \1\ d li'ca dy esta IS e , " ," ' ann ihila ted, . 1 ", lhil II Y 0 1 chan ge, o f see in g th1l1gs \11 a new way , 15 " . 'ble by prov idin g the agen t , , ANwc saW car l ICI, ClOX'Cl mak es act Ion pOSS I , h d r: iti on of rhet oric as the , ' Acc ordt n g ta t e eill1 \\ \\ 1\ uim and e hrcC \l on, " ' 'ble ta convince the aim o f 1 hy whl ch It IS pOSS I l' IIWC I' 10 sec t l e ' , , 1 h con vinc ing argu men ts, In orde r to 1Il ..' 101 ie is la crca1e op m!O os thrOl g h or gen erally con trol the . III hieve th " , the spea kc r nlU st try to can ge 1 k r is not prim aril y out to . . 1 . ""It lldcs 01 hls leal.ers. How eve r tle spea e .' h th'n g itsel f but rath er to let , 's ,11, COl Ihe " Ite ntlon 0 f h 1 aud iencfe ta t e l , 'n 't . aks in favour 0 a ce rt al attit ude tow .rds th e thin g. Ilu,' 1I1 sec W 1 spe, 1d , , '1 see the thin g but a cert a1l1 d' cco rdin gly, the .all lenc e doe s not pnm an Y nd so rhet oric al spee ch is characte ri sed by 1111 'rpr etat lon o t It, a doxo, a h h' them selv es . W hen this Cll re l'or opin ions and not for t e t mgs hllpp cns, " e rnpt y spee ch" , Gerede, anse s:
Sd IC .

re

s ecch whic h has the facti cit)' to not dev'e lo a certa in cont entm ent, to ICI the thlllgs be seen , but: P says . d' that whl eh one tilU S, The dom inati on of rcnHlI1l stan mg bY b , ' r. Dase in and mak es tt emp\y speec'1 pree1'sely conc eal s emgs Lor 1 , da ld al50 10 the P05S,lbt. hl Y bl ind la lhat whic h has been unc avere 1 , Ullco vcn ng, 11 4
l.oXos is :Irst of ail emp \y

or

e nds tow .rds emp ty spee ch, it spea ks not so tll, o rur a S evcryda y spee ch t h' 1 t 'eall y sec so met mg, b t mor e for the s ake of U IIiile h III 0 1'( el' 0 1 . k f spee ch itself. In this way , . .' 'lt Il 'vcl opll lg a pmiOns, th ( IS, for the sa e 0 k . h lace of pra xis in eve ryda it y ilile cou l(l say l1a logo s tend s 10 ta e t e p , 1 r as we wi ll see in th e ncx l 1lre..:, Thi s is a lso wha t, t 1e o Y t' 'ay For in emp ty spee ch , , , 15 111 an mau t hen l e v. ,'l1 l1 l't C bul hc re It lapp e l . ' I', . ther words one 's spee ch Ull e sl1caks wi tb oul gcn uine d lsc\o sure , or 111 a ,
11'(iA 19 pp 25-27 , ,, II I ( lA 1 197: " Dcr )"6 yo isl ZlIII1 lSI 1 G'l'cde d'ts di e Fakt iziit hat, die ; 1d " Genil gsam ke it ' . Sn chen n; cht s e hc lI l.lI l 'C il so n(l c rn " " 150 SI\otb Oic ll e rrschaft des Gere d , ' nU I(,ub ildclI , be l dcm sic 1' 1 bl Clbc n W 1\Hl I IIS es 'b ' lCI! , , Scicndc und mac hl also blln d gege d s v" I!lchll cll t cnl de rtl1: tl as n a .. lIl1d InO C iil dcckcn, ijll llC

1 9

t of Iife, See GA 18, pp, 132, 139-1 40 ,

142

1'11

(' II AI'I I' I( 111101

halls III ,"Illy. i, is nol l'lI lfillcd by ail uncoverin g of the thin gs thernsclvl,,;S, bu t " Ill y conlinncd by ongo in g speech, as one 's op inions are taken IIp by Olh c l's who co nlinu e to speak
rcmain s an H emply significH tioll",

'1IAI''1I\H '1'I1 HI\Il

1\ I l yduy lire nS [1 \V holc, thal is, irphil osophy is unablc to move beyond 11 1\ CVCl'yda yness and inslead lets it constitute its standard.

about Ihe opinions which have been ullercd. In Ih i, way, Ihe resull of ongoing speech is that the assertions are eventually cul off tram the acls of uncovering that once were their origin, This leads in its turn ta the sedimentation of assertions: they gain a kind ofself-sufficiency, insofar as Ih e speech that is conducted so lcly for the sake of speak in g contmuously sustams them . In this way, logos as doxa becomes bath the origin and th e dri ving force of speakin g with one anoth er, that is, it becornes the ultimate te/os of everyday speech. l 15
What happens when esta blished op in io ns gel the lIpper hand aver th e activ ity of s peakin g? O ur cx periences become anony mou s and

seemingly ava il able to everyone but in reali ty to no one, since no one bothers to make Ihe experiences for himsclf when th ere are alread available expli cat ions of them. Thus hav in g an opini on means that does not hav c to seek anymore; tbi s is the cssential fcature of doxa as Aristotle co nceives or it , w hi c h lets him di stingui sh doxa F rom d I"b . 11 6 el eratlOn . In thlS way, th e activity o f speech find s Hs end in doxa: the speaker takes hold of that which is souled instead of deciding or choosmg for hllnself. I-Iowever, thi s stability only intensifies the restlessncss, for, as Heidegger says, it is characteristic of doxa that one always can cont inu e ta speak about il, in other words, it is implied in il Ihat the Ihin gs about whi ch it speaks can alwa ys be dirferen!.l" Accordingly, living in doxa gives ri se to a ccrtain kind of instability, it causes one to be on the move, to continue the speech, Since the stability of oplll ions IS dlusory, the discussion is continuously no urished by a constant des ire for rest.
Howev er, empty s peech is not a problem ta everyday life Itself, From its point o f vie\v; for obvious ly , th cre are a number of dea lin gs in everyday Ii fe in con ne.ction with w hi ch il would be pointless t? ask for a more genuine form of uncovering than that which ju st whal "one" says is Ihe right thing ta do. The real problem arises 1t phdosophy rcmains nai ve in its relation to everyday speech or ta .
18, p. i 5!. E.N. i142b6-1 S. See also He idegger ' comment in GA 18 pp 137- 138. GA 18, p. 59. ' .

1 III \VUS indi catcd alrcady in the previous chapter, Heidegger thinks 11 1111 It is beca usc 0 1' philosophy's fa ii to doxa that speech has been IlIlll 'l'slood in tenll S 0 1' iegomelloll rather th an legeill, so that the "" " li "l1 has been considered to be of greater philosophical importance 11 11111 Ihe ac ti vily of speaking. This has had two consequences, which are Illllli li lll' 10 uS by now: one has objectified speech, believ ing that it has a Il Il Hic 0 1' bcing simil ar 1O that o f things; thus one has lhought that h\l\w 1U gC can be used as a tool, Ilot seeing that its essenc, lS e \' l'{) lIdl y, o ne has come to beli eve that th e q uestion of IS 1 llUlleetcd \Vith the assertion, and not \Vith the activity of speakmg, and II lhc idca oftrulh as correspondence has arisen, ln this way, Heideger III Ihe phil osophical care for legomenoll has obstructed its access to

1"

nr

If) ('o /lcludillg remarks Whut task rcmuins arter the explication of everyday li fe? lnsofar as an "'"Cli li ai aspect of everyday life is that it is fa llen to the wo rld of IlIlI ccm , whi ch it moreover understands in terms of a public l' ' pliealcdness, th e task still remains to account for the nature of IHllh c nt ic understandin g, that is, such understandi n g tha1 is able to \])lIl1l er Ihc fal lin g of everyday li fe, However, this has to some extent I,,'cli l'ulfi lled by means of the di scussion of ph/'ollesis . To be sure, the 1CIi SOIl why ph/'olles is has been treated in this chap ter is that, wh en IIl c'lll'cting ph/'onesis as self-understanding, Heidegger paves the way I tll' n co nceptio n of phronesis in accord an ce w ith wh ich th is for111 of tllld ersllIlld in g is regard cd a s ail integral part o f human exis te nce as l'I ueh, be il in ils authenli c or illauthenti c mode. But insofar as pltronesis \." 111 ulso be rcgardcd as authentic selr-understanding, it points. III ' " eXl chapler. FrI a bOlh Aristotlc ""d Heidegger, Ihe possJlll hl y 01 is foundcd on phrollesis, th" t is, 0 11 an illsight int o \V hat IS
III . l'ill III/ri Ze i!. 1h.:idcgg [' says ubo ut hi s ana lys is th at l' Il w ill torn

roI' oncscl r.

to Dus 'i n's di Slillcti vc il nd most rar-reachin g possibili tics of disclosul'c.

117

II I

Scc( ;A II), pp. 26-27.

144

C' II A J'II ' I( 111 1\ 11

" tif) TI ' ,0, lC 111 05 t f'O UIl ( l ln tee1 ' te me Or . h' . ' e, l uuslcc y i n th e sense o f aut entIc care for one' s j ' jC' l ' , own !te. nstead, It be lon gs 10 philosophy as

far-rea '1 ' 'b'j " , c "ng pOSSl 1 lly 01 dlsc los urc i5 no [ concern. H owever nor is it not xl 1b

in ord er lo get information lbout

bcl ug

Il'0 111

Il lcs'

[ 0 ") '

Chapter Four

ontologleal knowledge, which not only breaks with everyday eoncem but also moves beyond the confines of self-understanding, Therefore, to tllln ta the phllosophleal logos is, at Jeast as Heidegger sees it to tum to
the most onglllai possibility of logos. '

THE PI-lILOSOPI-lICAL LOGOS

1 I>/ii/usophy as an uriginal pussibi/ity fur lugos

Wli cil [ul'I1ing to Heidegger' s understanding of the philosophieal logos, [II i, siudy retums to the question coneerning the nature oftheory, with whi ch the inquiry into logos originally began, though from a new ln the meantime we have followed Heidegger's attempt to cSltl bli sh a connection between logos and kinesis, according to which it Il ot. onl y th e case that human activity as such is invested \Vith a
di sc ursive structure, but logos must in its tum be conceived ofalong the

of action, Against this background, the task remains to determine wllll l il could mean to regard even philosophy as a form of action, and 1'1'0 111 th ere on to make clear \Vhat directives issue From such a
co nce pti on of philosophy for the question concerning the scope and !l nl ure o f th e philosophical logos. A s indicated at the end of the

j1I'cv iolis chapter, one way to motivate the shift from everydayness to philosophy is to point to the necessity of exploring the most "farand di stinctive" possibility of diselosure, which is authenticity, 111 whi ch lire becomes truly itself or eigen, as opposed to inauthentic,
Uil Oll y ll1 0 US

lire . In thi s chapter, however, authenticity will be

'09

ErschlieJ3ungsmoglichkeilen des Dase 'lns [[ ten llm ausgezelchnete n weittragendsten Je . la vo ' [ [ Selenden entgegcnzuneh1ll en. " n 11Ilen (cn Au rschl uf3 dicscs
!

SZ, pp.

"Und sic wird sich an d"

eonsidercd as itself a possibility for philosophy, More speeifieally, it is 1\ IllO llcr of sho wing what it could mean, from Heidegger's point of vicw, 10 stand in an authentic relation ta the tradition, and, one could pCl'haps say , to have an authentic Mitsein with Aristotle. 0 11 Il cid eggcr's account, wh en tracing the most far-reaching or (H iginal possibilily of logos, we will simultaneously encounter its limits. III way, Ih e sca rch fo r an authcnlic logos should make it possible to 'l n.alll 1.'H.:r ibl.: phenomcllon or l ogos as a whol c. And the most farl' 'lichilig possibili[)' or logos is, in Hcidcggcr's view all east, lo be found IH '\.:cil'l.:ly in !\ ri sloll c' s work und il S com.:cpll HlIil y, on account o f the

146

11 17

CII I\ I'II ' I( HII II( innuencc it has cxerl ed on ph il osoph y and 0 11 Weslern Ih oughl as s uch, Accordin gly, granted that philoso ph y ncccssaril y rema ins tied to its Aristotelian beginning, the attempt to revca l th e limts of Ar istotle 's logos at th e same lime aim s at dem ons trat in g th e limits of th e philosop hieal pursuit as sueh. We have a lready seen how Heidegger, in trying to let Aristotle's logos exp lieate itself, has touched upon th e limits of Aristotle 's project on several occasions. But now th is logos must be illterrogated with
10 il s own mOSI original o r far-reac hing possib ility , where ilS

' 11 1\ 1' Ii m l'OUI(

n:p,lu.d Ihe non.discursive di sc loscdncss of 110 /IS as a condition of logos, Iholl gh il is Il cc essaril y cnac ted through logos. But in this chapter, wc \V iII see how Aristoll e, due to hi s suspicion of the limited scope of logos, trics ta liberate n'lus from its un ion with logos . Th is point l'eceives fairly extensive treatment by Heidegger, since he thIIlks that, \V ilh th e concept of nous and the concomitant view on theoria as a kind (lI' vision, Aristotle has not only eneountered the limits of logos but also pointeo out the limits of his own view on logos. In the end, he could not ul'fi nn Lhat speech rather than vision is the most original posslblhty for
!/l'ax is fiS thcOI'ia. , '

supposed ly should be particlil arl y vis ible. And on Heidegger 's account, it is precisely in connection with Aristotle 's conception of philosophy thal we can rea ll y see the power as weil as the limits of Aristotle 's projeet. When try ing to cireumscribe the scope and nalure of Aristotl e's philosophy, howe vcr, Heidegger does not s imply go behi nd Anstotle 's back, as il were, but int errogatcs Aristol le himseJf with respect to what he takes to be the most origina l possibility of logos, and thlS lS precise ly philosophy. In Aristotle 's words: philosophy as theory, theorlG, lS the supreme form o f praxis.
!lIl1ll S

This chapter centres on I-Ieidegger' s interpretation of thi s idea. r wi ll argue that Heidegger in faci also adheres to Ihis view of philosophy, though he belteves that it has to be transformed. For 0 11 the one hand \V ith the notion of theOJ'ia as supreme praxis, Heidegger hopes to able to reconci le th e theoreti ca l and the practical and th us al so ta overcome Ihat epistemic conception o f logos which has led to the primacy of assertorie speech. Bul on the other hand, he Ihinks that the way in which Aristoll e conce ives of theoria explains why Aristotle hlmself evenluall y eSlablished logos apophal7likos as the primary mode 01 speech . For even though theoria is regarded as a fonn of action il simultaneol1s1y gives expression ta an idea l of knowl edge as nous, rather Ihan speech, logos. And logos apophantikos is that mode of speech which has the pm er o f making th ings visible, though not ill the v same degree as vision or nous tse lf. To help theoria be that which it was intended to be, namely the ultlm,ate form of praxis, Heidegger has to show that also philosophy as a seemg of the ultimate principles is a discursive mode of thinking, To achIeve thls, he has to come ta grips \Vith Aristotle's notion of nous. As we saw in the prevous chapter, Heidegger think s thal il is possible to

S in ee there are reasons to be li eve that the role of non-dIscurs Ive Iho ught in philosophy constitutes a div iding line between He idegger !l nd Adstotle, this notion is accorded a central place in this chapter. Il owever I-leidegger's philosophy itself bears witness to a suspicion of reasoning, notably in hi s idea that philosophy involves a fn clical break with speech as such, whatever [orm it may have, At lcast (ln th e face of it, he scems to have tried to conceive of a specifie kind of cxpcrience that would be somewhat similar to th e noetic experience "" li ed for by Aristotle. This is the idea of the Augenblick, "the wink of the eye", which i s simultaneously a mom ent of truth. ,WLthout II l1licipating too much of the subsequent discussion, one I11.ay Just note Ihat one of the reasons why it is possible to see a eo nnectIOn between 110 ilS and the Augenblick is that none of them is a mode of reasoning. I\ nd Heidegger uses the notion of Augenblick atleast partia ll y in order 1 complicate the relation between experience and linguistic expression, 0 os he seems to imply that this kind of momentary, singular expen ence lS Ilot entire ly expressible . Further, since the Augellblick is o ne of Il e idcgger ' s morC important tem poral concepts, designat ing an HUlhcntic presence, it plays an important role in hi s attempt to to grips w ith the Ar istotelian con cept of time in ge neral and wIth _the noti on of presence involved in the concept of nous ln partlcu lar. rhe juxtapos ition of nOliS and the A ugenblick thus also brings us into th e lieurt of the quest ion coneerning the nature of temporality. The chapter begins with an exposit ion of Heidegger 's and Aristotle's res pecti ve views 0 11 Ihe gcnes is of philosophy, w ith partieular foc us on tlie idea th at th e poss ihilit y o r phil osophy requ ires an interruptron of cvcrycla y speech. 1 w ill Irsl cxpl nrc J Icidcggcr's claim that thi s idea

148

'111\1'11 ' 1( HHII<

makes Aristotl e develop hi s concept o f prllxis i" such a way as ta guarantee the possibility of non-disc urs ive vis ion, whi ch is Ihought to completely surpass everyday, discursive conduet and thus ta preserve the initial break away from il. Then 1 w ill show how Heidegger, turnin g to the very same concept of praxis, sees another possibility for philosophieal vis ion, the Augenblick, which lets him frame his idea of philosophieal aetiv ity as counter-movement and retrievaJ. With this notion, he seeks ta affirm the di scursive nature of philosophical praxis whil e s imulta neous ly revealing il S finit ude. r'' inally, 1 will discuss the consequences of this idca for the question of th e poss ibilities and limitati ons nherent in philosophical speech or articulation .

'11 1\ 1"1 HR l'OU R

lIudcrstu nd . 1 i\ ri stot lc expresses a similar view in the Ethics, as he dl Me lisses SOlll e or th e di fferences betv,'cen phronesis and sophia, notin g Ih l1t pcople co mm only think that men Iike Anaxagoras and Thales are wise (sopllol) )'et unabl e see what is good for their lives (they are not /1 111'0 111111 01) , and that people " say that they [Anaxagoras and Thales] kllOw that wh ich is exceptionaJ , wonderfuJ, difficult and divine , but not IIIlything lIseflll , for they do not e xp lore the human good,,,2 1n th e Me fQphyslcs, Aristotle suggests that the sciences th at do not ni lll at utilit y co uld arise only when such arts that provide man with the I1 ccess iti es of li fe had been developed, as th is for the tirst time enabled IIlen ta have lei sure 3 Only when it was not necessary ta be continuously " ccllpied with hllman affairs was it possible ta tum the attention away Ii'om thin gs of immediate concern and to direct it towards more abstract tliings. This is particularly true of philosophy as sophia, as Aristotle Stll tcs in th e famou s passage in the Metaphyslcs:
That il [philosophy] i5 not product ive is clear also from thase fifst phi losophised, For il is through wonder lhat men now beglll and originall y began 10 philosophise, wondering first al common

2. The l'ole of interruption in the genesis ofphilosophy

How docs philosophy ari se, how ca n il be Illotivated [rom with in the perspective of eve rl'day life? This questi on seems to be particu larly worth posing when exp loring th e lradition al estecl11 for philosophy as metaphys ics, as proie philosophla, which places philosophy at the top of the hierarchical order of knowl edge. This view is ollen accompanied by the idea th at philoso phy not only makes up a particularly farreaching or compreh ens ive form of knowledge, bu t that it is also something exceptionaJ and extraordinary, so mething which cannot be conceived of simply as a continuation of our everyday understanding of the world . For the ri se of phi losophy is not only concomitant with but indeed dependent upon a negligence of everyday concerns - which however does not prevent p hil osop hy from aspiring ta possess the ultimatc truth even abo ut that everyday life on whic h it has tumed its back. This is how Aristotle sees it, and even more sa Plata. In th eir view, it is not bec au se philosophical w isdom is especially useful to us that il can Jay claim ta superiority , but becau se its abjects constitute the most ad mirab le and overwhelmillg aspects of rea lity. And it is possibl e ta uncover the truth about th ese things but yet be ignorant in "practicaJ'" everyday matters, as Plata has brought out most cJearly in Theaeleilis. Here Socrates portrays the philosopher as a man who, because of a total lack of interest, is sa completely ignorant of his neighbour that he does not even know whether he is a human being at ail or pcrhaps so mc other creature, But whal a human be ing is, thi s he is intercs h.: d in and sccks to

perplexities, and th en by gradu ai progression being perple xed by

greater thin gs as weil , ." , He who is perplexed and wanders thinks that he is ignorant ( .. .); hence if il was to escape ignorance

that men began to philosophise, il is obvious that Ihey pursued science for the sake of knowledge, and not for the sake of
uny thing useful.
4

l'liiloso phy ari ses out of wonder (ta thaumazein), from a feeling that the wo rld is no longer familiar but on the contrary more or less obscure and Ilvc rwh e lmin g. Here we can see how Aristotl e co nfirms th e v icw cx pl ored in the previolls chapter, that the ordinar)' perspective on li fc is Iwodu cti ve or poictic, wh ich makes us pursue our act ions for th e sa ke o f
'JlIcoefeIIlS, 174b l M6, N, 11 41b6 . 8: "Kat Tt pu't'o jJ v Kat 9alJjJ.OCHIl Ka t xa4Tt<l K'ni 8CII]l 6v l (. I,\rvc.u aU'tO q,om v, aXPllOW '. on 1 <lvOpwru va <lyoO 1\10m v," , Mel . 98 t b20-25. l Afl't, 982b 112 1: "on 5' o n:Ol llt l KIl, i\)'ov Kal K' nv n:ptimv lI t oooI\l IlO'(.Ivtf lV' "((.cp 'to OaWH ici\' 01. avOpolltO I Kat vv K'ai 'to '! tpnov cl" .OOUI\II' 1v,, j" PX IIC; I.II" V 'til np6xc l po 'tlV c:in6pwv d"ta lw tCl npof ovf" C; ,.;'(.1\ rtTp \ 1fJV !-I r l 6v(Qv .... " 6 unopfllv 1\:(.(\ of " t(,lI <li'vociv ( .,, )' olar' drt"(J 8lrt t6 qfc\.ryr tv 't 1 (1'y\lO IOV rcjl l .ooq,f lOf{V )V , $HvrrHlv o't\ 816 t6 1 1 ' t p rdowaOcn rB ulKoV K'((\ ou XP1\Ol' t !1vu,", C;
l

J H

ou

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150

1 1

(' 11 1'1 1''1 l' R 1,( li III

somclh in g cise, ror an ex tcrnal end . Uy
'tlil ll'USI , 1 engage in 0

phi losop hical activ ity j usl for the sa ke oF altai ning kno wlcgc is not a shift of perspec ti ve to lake pl ace, th e world must thus display itse lft o us in a new way, which shakes our ordin ary fa miliarit y with it; onl y th en do we begin to wonder at it. When appearin g as wonderful , the world
an overwh c lming address to whic h th ere rca ll y is no co rrespon ding rep ly . In stead il places man in sil ent aw c. B ut precise ly by interrup tin g
COO1m OI1 thin g but somct.h ing rathe r ex trao rdin ary. In ord er fo r such a

interrupts man 's ordinary, uncomplicated \Vay of address ing il, as tself

sense.

bring p hronesis and sophia cl oser togeth er, Heideg ger seems to agree with Ari stotle (a nd Plato) th at philosophy is in conflic t \Vith commo n

con tain s th e germ o f the sharp oppos ition belwee n theory and action 1hat wa s to fo ll ow upon A ri sto tl e. I-I owever, in spite o f his efforts ta

has ta cha ll enge Ar istot le 's concepti on of th e relati on betw een phronesis and sophia, since he suspects it ta be based lIpon the idea that th e sllprem e form of kno wledge is non-dis urs ive in kind . T hereby it

that il ca ll s thi s all eged corrcspondcnc e in questi on. To ach ieve thi s, he

knowle dge can th en onl y be fult,lI ed by (no n-discurs ive) vision. One of the more im portant aspects of Heideg ge r's concept ion of philosophy is

wo rl d in its wond erfu l appeara nce, and lhat can fU!1h erm ore be a proper res ponse to th e expe ri e nc e of wo nder. The expec tations of suc h

seems to be th at th e experience of wo nder gi ves ri se to the idea th at th ere must be a fonn of know ledge th at is ab le to corresp ond to the

v is ion . Even though he does no t say so ex plic itly himself, the reason

and the possibility of ad dressin g beings in a new way . Traces of this tradi tional view o r the relati on betwee n philosophy and ordina ry life can be fou nd in Heideg ger as weil . He too thinks th at philoso p hy is fo und ed on an interrupti on of everyday li fe, and th e way in which he conceiv es of this is not entirely different fro m Aristot l e 's v iew of tha umaze in. A t the same lim e , howev er, He idegge r is conv inced that already the no ti on of wonde r harb ours a tende ncy toward s seeing and he lps paving th e way for the idea of know ledge as 5

man's concern , it grants him the possibility of a new mode of speech ,

philosDphy if it is 10 bc ab le to li ght thi s struggle aga inst commo n l'Iense'l III w hat \Vay and what extent' must phil osophy distanc e it sel f r,'0 1l 1 cvcryda y li fe in order 10 sec that which is hidden From it?' And \V IIII I can th is te ll us about the philoso phical logos, ilS speciflc way of f1 t1drcssing Ihe world? ln Heidegger, these kinds of questions are largely IIlotivaled by his desire ta un derstan d how philosophy might be able to superse de the inl ell igibilit y of eve ryd ay Iife without los in g th e 1,I'i,elld igkeif or faclicity of everyday experie nce' . l n th e previo us chapter , it was pointed out th at Heideg ger, draw mg IIpon Arislotl e's noti on of poiesis, argues that the underst andin g th at everyda y life and its various activitie s simulta neously makes life I\dl o ff fi'om itselt; towards its objects of eoncern . This is beeause the p(J ieti c perspec ti ve on th e wo rld re quires th at we look away not on ly Il'( 11) the thin gs \Vith whi ch wc occupY ourselv es but also from the very Ilcl ivity we are enactin g, w hite directin g ourse lve s to the work that is to he done. Such a perspec tive no doubt forms our self-und erstan ding, but 11 form s it by turning us away from ourse lves. rn one lectu re co urse, li ci degger tri es to ca pture this aspect of li fe by argu in g th at life is 1I1 uI'ked by "self-su l1ciency" (Selbstg eniigsa mkeit). At a first glanee, thi s tcrm scems to be dirccted agai nst Husser l's not ion of reductlOn, silice lIe idegger cl aims that sel f-sufficiency mea ns tltat life does no t hfl vc la move beyo nd itse lf in order to br in g its te ndencie s ta rul fl llllent.' T hat is, th ere is no need for a philoso phieal redu cti on that prouuccs a perspecti ve From which wc are abl e to uncovc r t.h e /1 bo ul lire rrom abave , 50 to speak, but wc must inqu ire how h fe ttse lf IIlighl conta in the mo ti ves for th e genesis of philoso phyW Ho wever, Il cidcggel' also indicates that self-suffi ciency refers to life's tendene y to N itsel f up, to get entangled in one perspective. In this sense, th e Itul selfoflife is also the foundati on ofi ts falling. I-Iav ing no need ta
" (i A 60, p. 136: " Abe r die Ph ilosophi e 1S1 nichts aIs ei n Kampf gegcn den gesunden MO llschC llvcrstfl nd!" Sec also GA 24, p. [9; GA 33, p. 82.
1( 'r. C' hnplcrO nc,Scclion 1.
f

Il ' cxc laillls on OIlC occasion: Hl3ut phi losophy is l10thin g but li Il ugg lc against C0l111ll 0n sensc!" Whal , thell, is re quir cd fro m

, IIO Ihis POilll, see GA 18, p. 32; GA 58 , pp. 29, 101, 203; GA 60, p. !' 269.

'GA 19, p.1 26.

III

I IIIs i'l how J. Orcich IIlIdcrS ds il, sec "Ln 'tapisse ri e de la vic''' , pp. lI1n 137rr. (Ill ';8, pp. 1 1t 171 175. 1

152

l' II I\ I'II 'I< I II I II{ dislance ilsel f Ii'um ilscll; life docs no l 1I 1I 1I) lI g C ln Hcl ho /d uf ilse /f." Thus it seems Ihal iL is in tact evcryday lire Ihal is murked by dista nce. . ,This implies, Heidegger will later forlllu laic il . !hal in eve ryday IIfe , w e a re ontlca ll y cIoses t to but onto logica ll y l'a r lhest From ' . ourse1 yeso 12 Th IS 15 truc not on ly of our re lat ion ta our own being bul also of our lInderstanding o f Ihe bei ng of bein gs in general, s ince no art icul ate ont% gica / knowledge is reqll ired in arder ta be able ta cape wlth ll1traworld ly beings. On this account, then, philosophy must seek ta Iransform th e ontical proximity of everydayness in ta an ont%giea/ one. Recalling wha t was sa id a baye, thi s ontological proxim ity is to be achieved thru ugh an act of d istancing, al /cast wi th res pect la the ontieal perspective, but prec isely thereby wi ll il be able to co unler Ihe onlologica l di stanc e pec u/iar to eve ryday li re . How mi ght such a come abou t? For jf il is Ilot oil ly the case tha l everyday IIfe ea n do wlthout ontological knowledgc, but jf, moreover, philosophy takes a view on thin gs that is mre or less d islorted from th e perspective of everydayness, then the poss ibi/ity of philoso ph iea l thinking is not something Ihat man is in camp /cie mas lery of. /n arder for Ihe everyday understandltlg to be threalened, somethin g must happen w ilh us which forces us to see th e wo rld in a new ,vay.

'I/ I\ I"/ I',R l'OU /(

woul d Icsliry to ail ill sight on Ar istot le ' s part that phil osophy is more lliun " malter o f changing pe rspecti ves. It requ ires a more pro fo und

It'Ilns fo rm ati on, which is not completely at man 's disp osa!. During the Iwenl ies, and even more dur ing th e foll owing decade, Heidegger ux p /ores different kinds df moods, but anxiety (Angst) is of particu /ar impo rlan ce in Ihis connection, since it represents He idegger's most cln bnraled atte mpt at explicating th e place ofreduction in phil osophy.

J. Anxiety and reduction

ln

...

hapter T\Vo, we came across He idegger's idca that th e of li thcoretical attitude requ ires a kind o r di slurbance of everyday conce rn. When this happens, however, the rcsult is not only that the a bj ect o f CQncern loses ilS availab ility and enlers th e mode of Vorhandenheit, but

!t is at this po int th at He idegger can tu rn \V ith some approva l to

Ihal the entire s ituali on changes . T he conlext of Ihe wo rk w hi ch /o rmerly went unnoticed becomes more obtrusive and is pu shed into the roreground. We cxperience a di stance between ourselves and our work whi ch gives us a clearer v icw of our situation , of what wc had do in g ail along. Instead of be ing oriented towards the work, that \s, a /lIlure end we are drawn back into the present, so to speak, and are now IIb le to s:e w hat th e object of concern had becn ava ilable fo r. This, /I eidegger argues, is the first step towa rds an undcrstanding of the object's mode of being. More important, ho wever, is that the w ilhd rawal of the work lets th e world announce itscl f, though al lIlIs sta ge onl y as a context of invo lvements wh ich enab led us 10 work w ith di n'e rent things. Insofar as this disturbance of everyday activity may give \Vay ta a Iheoretical H insehen , it invo lves reduction but it also lets a new end present itself, that o f pure uneovering, which lets beings be rnanifest just as th ey are, as apposed ta the un coveri n g of everyd ay concern, 'whi ch is guided by some further end ." Thereby, Heidegger says, this
11

Anstotlc's notion o f t/wumazein. For in his v iew, thi s no tio n gives testimony to the idea Ihat underst an din g is constituted by pathos. As indi cated in th e previolls chapler, Heidegge r thinks Ihat lhe noti on of

pathos explains Ihe possibi/ity of change (Umschlag). As such , it can both deslroy and rescue our und ersta ndi ng, as it were, name ly w hen it destrYs our ordinary speech for th e benelil of another, superior logos. Il To bnng about s uch a change is Ihus the tas k of thaumazein .1 4 Moreover, s ince moods are supposed to represent Ihe passive aspect of coglllilon, ln Ihat they determ ine how the world concerns man prior to every kincl o f "activ e" conceptualisat ion, the concept of thaumazeill
Il

Sec GA 58, pp. 27, 29.

see GA 19, 16b; GA 62"', pp. 8-9, 1. 1 he .Illost of the rela tion between v and the IS c,?ntamed ,in the lectu re coursc Grulldfragell der Philosophie, noti on Ausgeil ah /le Probleme d(! r Loglk (GA 45) rrolll 1937/38,

" SZ, p.16; GA 24, p. 220. IJ See GA 18, pp. 196-1 97. 14 F or H'd egger ' s understand.i ng :1

" S2, 16. . ' . '. 1" ln Th e Glal/ce of Ihe Eye. pp. 89-90, W. McNe11l tfles to explam gCllcs is or theory, arglling Ihal thi s is dependent lIpon an. act.of tem?orahsatlon hrin gs nbout a killd of "bsent future, i.e. a fut lire that .IS as abse nt or empt) , s ilice Ihe theorelical pe rs pect ive ari ses as one stops be lllg dlrected t?wa rd s a end Ihal is \0 be nchicvcd nnd instcnd turns towards the pre.sem, .I. e. the obJects, of the whic h fOl'lllC rl y were nol llOli ccd as such ril lurc. Il owcvc rl Ihis vicw d Ilot full y eX plaltl lhe tcmporaill y or thcoretlca l work ,

/ 54

C I III!' Il ' 1 1 (11 11 ( 1

' 11 11 1' Il , R l'OU R

new

fOfl11

of seei ng counters the

CUri OLI S

scci n lhn l o rten gui des

lllvo lvell1c nl , Ihe worl d aS th e hori zon by means o f w hi ch we ordin arily II d elll oUl'sclvcs appca rs. B ul it appears as a hori zo n that no longer 11l1l k 's sense, and sa ail onc ca n do is ta be appalled by it, to wonder at l '1hOll gh pc rhaps o nc should say that the experience of anx iety is fa r II 1(1I'C distl'css in g lhan not least sinee there is an element of Itthlli ration in wonder. S inee it is peculi ar to the e xperi enee of an xiety Ihll l il has no a bject, it is possible to regard the analysis of an xiety as an IIll clIlpt ta la y b are t he conditi o ns o f p o ss ibilit y of Husse rl ' s plle nome no logiea l redu ction, Le. th e move from th e 'x pc ricnccs c haracteristic of the natura l att itude to th e level 1 1 1 Ihe expe ri enees themselves that constitute the a bjects and 111 thls w ay . li re givc n to phenome no lo gieal re flection. H owever, He ide gger IS
III IXious to point out that " reducti on'\ has anoth er meanm g for hlm:

everyday life, in that, inslead of just loo kin g H way, towan.ls th e new , t makes a haIt and le ts itse lf be cxposcd to the presence 01' beings, l7 However, w hereas this view of th e ge nesis o f lheo ry is present in Heidegger 's work m ore or less from the start, hi s earli est writin gs seem to contain a suspicion o f the noti on o f a phi losophical reduction, probably du e ta h is belief th at, in Husserli an ph enomenology, the res ult o f the redu ction is that one loses s ighl of li fe in ils COller et e enactment. 18 A nd ev en th ou gh Heidegger soon begin s to spea k about th e need for some kind of di stance in philosophy \V ith respect to everyday Iife, it is o nl y in Se in und Z ef! th at a n otion o f a redu cti on th a t di ffers s ignifi cantly From the theoreti cal reducti on is c1carl y arti cul ated. This noti on must expl ain th e possibility of an und e rstandin g th at is not objectifyin g in the sam e way as Hinsehen. For whereas this rem ai ns ontical in ils approach, as il is guid ed by a foregoing delimitation o f a specifie fi eld of abj ects, whic h is Ilo t transpa re nt 10 the ael o f Hinsehen itself, a philoso phieal redu cti on must not onl y enabl e us to look at th ings in a new way but also let us tum our gaze towa rds th eir being. Th e possibility of sueh an anal ysis hin ges on th e poss ibility o f a more comp reh ensive k ind of d isturb a nce, whe re th e wo rl d as mea ninghori zon can full y appea r. Th at is, th e di stu rb ance at th e ontieal level must be replaced by a brea kdown at the onto logieal leve!. T hat sueh a breakdown is possible is co nArmed by the phenomenon of anxiety.19 the " most ori ginal" poss ibili ty of d isc losure.2o On his view, the radical trans format ion of man ' s way of being re lated to his world that takes

o f leadin g ta pure conseiousness it moves fro m the grasp of lleings to a n unde rstand ing of their being-" The exp eri enee o f an xiety \' 111 1 brin g about sueh a rcd uction beca use, one co uld perhaps say, IS an \.'x pc rcnce th at b ord ers on pure di sclosedncss, du c ta th e suspensIO n o f . 22 Idl " th .. Ihe aCli v ity of uncovenn g or concern . Here, a \Vor ess cre or tl isc losed ness is revealed as the presuppos iti on of that d isc urs ive ' whi ch belon gs to our " \Vor ldl y" b em g. 21 Uut in what way mi ght it be poss ible for philosophy ta respo nd to Ibi s rcd uc tive an d, as it seems, rath er extre me experience on it rests? T hat is to say, how could it be possible ta properly coneeptualtse
Il (iA 24, p. 29. Still, it is an important aspect of the analysis of anxiety th.at it reveal s wh/ll 1 proper (eigc II ) to Dasein, j ust as Husse rl wants to show \Vhat lS proper. to 5 CU ll.'\ciousness. But whereas he laullches his thought-experi ment with the d.estrucll Oll ur Ille worl d for th is purpose, Heidegger wants to that the destruction the wn dd is not merely accessi ble in tho ught-expe n ments but can be . d f'o r l' usse rl's destructio n oF world , see Ideen zu CIII Cf i' (J /l H! 1I l'xpc n ence . " . ' l'hrillomellolog ie /I/ld phti/l ome/l ologische/l Ph tiosopille, 49. " 1 Il 11 " Wn s i5t MC 1 laphys ik?", p. 11 2, Hei degge r ca ll s it a "p ure. (. 0,1 I(l ///(: Da-seill ) . Howevcr, the above portrayal of anxi ety. dCplcts Ihe e.(.' ,I /C/l fI(':' o r phi losophy (and 50 does Aristo\l e's desc npllon 111. 1 1I)\Y li ns shown how a disturbanee cano lei Ihe .warlel ltself IIUlhingncss. The cx istcntial genesis of plulosophy IS expl al1led only 1 Ims bcc li 1 1\1(IIcd in Dnsein's being, and to do Ihi s, Heidegger shows Ihllt cnll nlise 1 11 I)n'{cin bcc:l usc, bric lly pul, Dnscil1 's bcing is il sc lfpenncated?y Il.Olllll1 g1 ICSS. II Ilcidcggcr nHlkes precisely IhlS di stinction bclween our belil g 1Il,Ihe wo rld nnd "worldl css" condit ion in COllncCli on wl lh Ihe IwO se nses of (lA 1H: 279, l 'lI of the ll1'iodl y or 1I0rlWIllhm ll Cl't ovcr tllhC IIII(!11 III fIlI X lIlciC lc\y, \11 O J, it .. S Il C . . l 'd " " 1hl' fn 1\lilinf nntl Ihe lillllll"l': \1111111.' 1 i\1I ot'prm: ls ln thc carly 1 C Cl-W.C l , 1I11 I

The experiencc of anx iety as Heidegger descri bes it is constituti ve of

place in anx iety is of such a kind th at it m ore than di stu rbs , it in faet destroys the world o f concern . A nd as intrawo rldl y bein gs lose their
gra nl ed Ihal this is a mod ifi cation of e veryday existence, il 1 is ruture-or iented 00 whi ch mak es il loo k as if Ih is "absent fut ure" is an initi al and trans ito ry statc canna t last. Sec below, Secti UII 8. "GA 62*, pp. 15- 17.
IS ln th e ea rl ies! courses, Hei degger emphasises Ihat philosophy must itself be an enactmenl of life Ihan a theory "about" il; PA , pp. 239,246; GA 56/57, pp. 5, GA 6 1, p. 80. But 10 GA 58, p. l OI, he notes th at ph ilos ophy cannot be described Just .as the .enactment of experience, as it is the task of phi losophy to understand thlS. Cf. Chapter One, Section 1. ' See SZ, 40. 20 SZ, p. 182.

.0. :

156

t' li A 1''1 hi( H Il III

for this notion does nOl capture ail aspects o f philosophical work. In particular, it impli es thal philoso phieal re fl ection is only a matter of shiftin g perspec tives. But the reductio n or change af focus Irom beings to their being cannot be regarded as a purely intellectual act or merel y as a shift of altitude , since it presupposes a tra nsform ation of one's ex istence - that is why philoso phy is not something that we can si mply " eely choose to perfarm , alternatively abstain from performing. 28
For the notion of E/llleblll1g, see GA 57/57, pp . 85 fT. ; GA 60, p. 48. I,n !deel!, Husserl talks about "die phanome nolog ische Eir. slellung " in the bcgmnln g 32-3 3) of his discu ss ion or the phenome nological F.1Toxl\, which is thouglJl lU make Ihe sphere o f purc conscious ness accessible; p. 59. 26 G A 59, pp. 142 -143 : "Phi losophie ai s Einstcllu ng ist Abdrang un g vo n ihrem Sinn." a1 50 GA 56/5 7, p. 216; .GA 60, p. 62. . Sec GA 17, 111 partl cu lar 46-50. ThIS sense of attitude is manifest above ail in Hei degger's cri tique of Husserl, in suc h a way that Heid egger charges Husserl with be ing entangle d in his epi stemo log ical interests, in hi s "care for ac knowled ged knowled ge" (die Sorge wn erkannte Erkcllntnis), and thus unable ta pose the of being. 2 See e.g. GA 57/5 7, p. 110.

cannot be properl y unders tood whcn it is describ ed in terms of attitude,

perspecti ve. Thus to be trapped with in an attitude is more or less the same thing as to be "self-sufficient" in the way outlined above." Heideg ger's main point, howeve r, is that the philosophical pursuit

auitude , this indicatc s lhat its ran ge of vis ion, 50 ta speak, is limi ted to a de finit e point ofv iew, which onl y lets thin gs appea r l'rom out o f a sin gle

works on two leve ls: first, if ph ilosophy is conducted \V ithin a specific

Husser l 's express ion th e " natura l attitude ", as we il as in conne cti on with his notion of ph enomcn o lo gica l re fl ec ti on. 25 This is From the start Olle of th e m ost importa nt points on which He idegger feel s h e mu st tran s fo rm I-Iusscrl 's phenom eno lo gy. For " Philoso phy as a ttitude is dev iation from ilS proper sense.,, 26 I-Icidcg ger's crit ique o f thi s notion

of res ulling in Entlebu ng and to destroy the "living " experi ence of beings as it distances itself from it in order to conceptualise it," This s uggests that philoso phy, eve n if it is found ed on reduction, must not shut itself up in a specific altitude (Einste llung); a tenn that tums up in

ontical di stan ce brough t about by the reducti on? But then il l'uns the risk

this experie nce, in which th e di sc loscd ncss of bc in g "p pears as a condition of every kind of understanding of bcin gs? 1l' philoso phy is to corres pond to this "onto logica l proxim ity", must il. not preserv e the

I r phil o so ph y , as il \Va s fo nnul alcd above, is founde d on an " ove l"whe lmi n g ad drcss", to which il ean only respond th en

It canna I in any simpl e way hold itself steadily at that 11Igher level of intclli gibi lity which the reduction has opened up . But th ls predl cament Is not recogni sed as long as one conceives of philosophy as Slmply a ki nd of attitude . Accordingly, Heidegger states lhat "The questIOn IS If
th e theoreti cal does not have a more origina l form , and not an !ik c eha rac ter. If one succee ds in unders tanding this posslbl hty ori ginall y, one has ach ieved enough. ,,29 Th e first step such. an und ersta ndin g is ta realise lhat ph ilosoph y, like theory m t S ,a

l'o rm of li fe or, in other words, of action. Only when plllioso phy IS llp proache d in this way is il possib le ta reveal the nalure of th e phi losophical response ta the cali ofbeing . . Even though anxiety and wonder are supposed to work as an Impetus l'or phi losophy and not to guide it in its entirety , both Heideg ger and tuistoll e seem to think that phi losophy continually needs to be mforme d by an experience that at least is kindred to one that ori ginally gave ri sc ta il. In Heideg ger, thi s is expressed as an Idea that phtloso phy bc open ta the possibility of an experience that calls il into questIO n, thus interrupting its prevailing mode of discourse. In Anstotle, there IS the view that philosophical understanding in its suprem e form, as noetlc vision exceed s speech alloget her. The question is how these two of philosophical activity might be reconcilable, that is, how the notion of redu clion or interruption agrees with the Idea of phllosophy as .. tOll Basieally thi5 is th e question caneern ing the relation bet ween de 1 . , , . 1I0l/S and logos, concernin g the place of non-dis cursive expenence 111 di scursiv e action . In the next section , 1 try to determine furlher the background to the desire for nOliS or vision by tuming to the questIO n of the place of dia lectic in philoso phical work.
.J. The Iimited scope of dia/ectie

ln his attemp t to demarcate philosophy from dialectic and sophism , Aristotl e states thal:
" C. 1 S9 14 4 ' "F s iSI chen di c Frage , ob das Theo retisc he nicht ci ne 1 / ,p, . ' ' n 'Sl Wenn es IIl"spr llllg1i chcrc Gcs lnl! 11 01 h/\\I , tll.c l\l wC lllSlcll ungS!11f1IJlg<:11 Ch kt arfl . ers. 1 ' " I;tl.:li ngt, u rsprtlll Hllch (lIc'IC Ml\l1 li chkc il o'lI verslchen , dann lsi genug crreLcht.

158

(' 111\1'11 I( 1 (1111 1

Sophi Stn li nd di al!.:clc (U'C COII C - 1 el!) philosophy bu t I)hil osollhy ,l ' l'l' l,ct wlth lhu /( 11 11 1 :lubJccl ns 0 . ' 1 crs 10111 th Il l! 1 1 Ils power and from the <' ' ." lorm er III li S choie ' 1 01 Il t le tHlI1U'C o f makes an atternpt at that \vl, ' ' 1 1' 1 cO C. 1 lClpl l osophy k ' '01' dmlccti c '

( 111\ 1' 11 1/ 1111111

T I H! I"CrO l'c. h l: ";1 111111'1 1\\' Il l 1 111.'I.I 111 H

rnt' '

seems

10

be philosop hy b ' ,
ut

15

not.

JO

nows. ami

SOphlSIl1

phi losopher, who is tll.: \1\11\1 hll hl\l\ :-Iclt', und docs Il ot \II . about how to arran ge a dll1 lugllC, H 'Ibus illsof'al' as il is peculia r to dlH lcclic that il rcmuin s dCpe.! lIdclll upon elle/oxa , which Arislot le

1 14 , 1'

l'CSCI1 1 h 'c

fI S

th e.!

ln spite of his claim that the f' , , philosophy at least when th P owerS 0, dtalecttc are , k mfenor to those of . . ' 15 15 ta 'en ln the sen f . It IS clear Ihat Aristotle th ' k h ' , se a proIe phtlosophia . .. In at ' ' 1I11tlai stage, For he say S t h dlalectlc is use fiu l ta phllosophy ' in its , s, w en Il emes ta t bl ' l ' princip les of a sc' , the basic , Icnee, one has no alter t' esba IS lIng " di scuss ion of the genera ll na Ive ut ta begm wlth a , y acccpte d api ' ' pnncip les, since they are prim ' , nions concernll1g these cannat be cxplain ed in t ' ar y 111 relation ta everything e1se and thus clms 0 f anyth ll1g cise 31 Ad' . own work essentially is l ' Il smce Amtot le 's the first princip les and a edgomenon, seeking not only to establis h la un atlOns of real't b understand wh.t such a pursuit illvolve s ' , 1 Y ut first of ail to sueh a need for dia1ectic in Ihe 1' " ' Il secms to testl fy to precisely , II st Slage ofph " o" l' l' " J' lt IS equally clea 1 , op lIca mqu trles,' ,f, loweve r thal Ar istotl l' k . enough to guarantee the of a hie ,t llI1.'S .dlalectic is not bey?nd opinions and theorie s to lhe lru;h lI1S1 ght that dlsttngulShes betwee n philoso phy and dial : us mthe Toplcs, he former deals with the problems in ' ectlc c1all11lng that the latter with a view to 0 . . 33 w lth the truth, but the pllllon. Il1so lar as tl d' 1 .. opinions, he is dcpendent on the form of la ectlClan examin es person s that partake in it: how the flll.le dialogue .as wei l as on the y Ot ll1ulate thelr questions and
Mel. 10004b2226: "1tf:P l j.lv yp 10 1l} $lOOO$lr,t, ci:U, 10U PlOU 'TI npowpEoel' Eon o: Tt O
30

II p\1l1J'ently thinks, dialccl e is

11 01

enough l'or the require ments of

".

n op. 101a34-b2. , Most specifically, Aristot ". .. a .way that accords \Vith his lc onen secms t description of phtlosophlc al Investigations in dla lectic begins with a controversial quest' la ectlc ,m the Topies . Thcre he states that p or not?" (IOlb32-33) Wllen d's . Ion, a ltPOp 111l 0 , which has the form "Is S , ' 1 cussmg the prob! premlses conslst of propos iti ons which hav b e:n, one uses arguments whose 32), and which give expressi on t e een put ln Ihe fonn "ls S pT' (lO lb30example is the rrpopT\1l0 of the opinions, vSol;a. 50 for the sou1 is in motion and in Ihe PI ,0 1 De Amma the question whether or nol . . . ' lyS/CS b " opm lons whlch are then examined are h W lethe r emg lS one . The common lS which are refuted as lhey soul h 111 motion and that being is one Top, l05b30-JI. own to ave untenable consequences.

YE:'OS ?1pe,$EWl Tt OOQ10UKTt KOi. 11<; '[(P 'tramp TI\<; 15uvcl)lew<;. 'tiis nopi OOV $l oao$ia

Ilhilosophy, ln his interpretation of Aristot le's understanding of dialect ic, Il oidegge r emphasises lhat it is the ideal of (heoria as viSion that makes i\t'istotle suspicious of dialecti c, However, Heideg ger is to some extenl N ympalhetic la Arislotle's attitude lOwards dialect ic as he understands it, Ihough he believe s it necessary 10 uni\\' a conclusion differen t from M istO lle's as far as the raie of speech in philoso phy is concern ed, Al l11is stage, 1 will not deal wilh Heidegger's critique of Aristotle's notion '''eoria, but focus on what seems to be an affirma tion on the part of Il cidegger of Aristot le's insight into the limited scope of dialeetic, Wilh one exception, Heidegger never, 10 lhe best of my knowle dg e , l'cfcrs to dialectie in order to characterise his own philosophical work, nnd on one occasio n at least, he demarcates his own project by cxplicit ly opposing il to dialecti c. 35 The exception is the lecture course UI'/I/ldbegriffe der aristotelischen Philosophie, Here Heidegger refers to l\J'i slotle's division betwee n dialectic, philosophy and sophism in order ln point to what seems to be a decisive difference belween himsel f and I\ ristotle regarding their respective aims and methods - at least as far as l!lis course is concerned, For, Heidegger states, in this course, his aim is Ilot to frame a new philosophy, but he will confine himsel fto philolo gy, pJ'ov ided that th is is the same as "passio n for knowl edg e of that whi ch 1111 5 becn said [dos AuSgesprochene]",J6 Therefo re, in lhis course he wi ll olll y pursue a dialectical inquiry, which mcans that hi s ail11 is ta sec ",1 IS meanl by speech, and 1110re speci[ieally , by Aristotlc' s specch 1lI1 ," ' 1'0 jud ge from Ar istotle' s O\VIl notion of di alectic, thi s I11 c '-\n s 11H11 Il cidcggc l' is out to reveal the presupposition s and consequ ences I\ l'istotlc 's logoS.38 One of the reasons why Heidegger hcrc dl,;sc l'ihcs

,,l'

or

" I""p. 15S b7rr. S'l, p. 25. ln GA 18, p. 4. l' ( i l! I S. p. ? " Scc 'f'op, IOSllt 6. 1 K

1 60

1(( 1

(' II"I 'II ' I( 1 tllll (

CI t",, 'I1 ' (( 1 'Oli R

his Qwn age nd a thu s is appan.: ntl y t!l ll! Il ' Wl lIll s to lI tt ack th ose (liu sserl?) who fai l ta see that phi loso phy wi ll romuin " clplessly naiv e if it does not come ta grip s \Vi th il S Dwn Il'i:HJiti oll .39 i\ga inst thi s background , it seem s that dialecti e could be rega rd ed as that kind of phi losophy whi eh is pursued with a historiea l awareness or, in othe r words, as destruction. On this aeeount, it might look as if Heid egger wou ld want to indicate that philoso phy in hi s sen se dirf ers signifi can tl y from Ari stot le's underst anding of philosophy. How ever , th is does not really seem ta be the idea. 1 think one must take seri ous ly Heidegger 's claim that he has, to somc exte nt at Icast, put aside his own philoso phical ambitions for the moment and primarily wants ta let Aristotle's logos come forw ard on ilS o\vn tC . Whe n translat rIns ing a part of the pass age from the Melaphysics quoted abave, he makes an int eres tin g addition: ''' The dialektike on ly makes th e attcmpt ' to exp eri enc e wha l could be meant by the logoi, ... ,,40 As already indi cate d, Hei deg ger' s aim in this cou rse is preei sely ta revea l the experie nces that mak e up the foundation of Aris totle 's logos or con cep tuality. But as wc w ill see sho rtl y, su ch an abil ity ta reve al the phe nom ena l bas is of logo s is som ethi ng that Heidegger is not prepared ta grant ta dialectic. Heidegger 's interpretation of Aris totl e's attitude towards dialectic is partly intended as a criti cism of the view that Aristotle wo uld depreciate dial ecti c because he did not rcal ly und erst and il. On the con trar y, Hei deg ger claims, Aristotle had a better understanding of dial ectic than Plato, because mode of philosop hisin g was mor c radical".41 Thi s cJaim is in line with the idea that guides I-Ieidegger 's understanding of Aris tolle and Pl ata as a whole, i.e. that they do not really repr esent two diffe rent phi loso phical pos itions, but that Aris totl e's phi loso phy mus t be regardcd as an elab oration of the poss ibilities that are con tained in Plato 's thought. Ifthis is truc, then Aristotle's vicw on dialectic mus t be prcpared in Plato. And thi 5 bec omc s clear, Hei deg ger argues, onc e wc realise that the basic trait of Plat o 's di alec tic is its tendency towards seei ng and making visibl e, whi ch is mot ivat ed by the ex isten ce of
GA 18, p. 7: '''D ie ota E"Kt lKtl machl bl of3 den Versuch ', in Erfah rung was denn mit den MyO l gemeinl sein konnte,. " 41 GA 19, p. 199. Sec also SZ, p. 25 .

JI 'cch in tlle sense of sophl.stll or G" l'" Thu s Heidegger thinks that e, . r k ow ledg e el e. s a t'" On and that this \Il term VISI l'tllto ulso a ' Il . C tly the task of dialectic is ta t\lw t.; r!l q hi s view 01 .. to cou nter the disguise s 1 Ilch an altack ag,all1s t s.Ophlst 1I1I lC sp 'ne commu nication, whi ch tl lltI lricks of sophl sm by means of this is preeisely what it N ows how thin gs tru ly are III li them se v. differs h h it intro duc es a mod e a f spee e h \ emp ty talk to the , bl of fulfillin g that which is its dnv lllg force, nam Y Cllp ll C fi wh ich is that it rematns ln the sphere bcin gs in thcir truth , the ,reaso n or 't . .' Thu s as HeIdegger sees l , the difference between Plato and th is point is that Aristotle has spe lled (Ir ;his view and realised that it is only theO/'ia out the that IS enoug 1 . d , 'ilch the things themselv es. 43 An'. H . deg ger emphaslses the way III "1 . lecti c' and thearia whi eh Ari stot le conceives of the rela uohn betw een ld lsauperi or ta speech. s b r d to l11s Idea \ al VIsIon ":':\I\I1,o t, insight il1 to the natu re of speeCh, l'or 11 1S precl has , ' d to see thlS IS not 1 him see the limited scop ..:.1 e of , IIcccssarily ta dep reciate dialectic but ta grant lt ItS proper place.
Only out of a withn life, as we )\1 lt 111 " tely and basis on whic h he COlll? b; no thercby see diale g e:5f hm mO le, s 1 a1r , drag dialecllc down, S1l1CC orYi,im di'llectic is in virtue of " 1llcan s . l' its meaning already down, 1laI a, epal"atol"y stage oftheorem, pl" k ' d of clever re ara tory stage Il IS , " and , as a, p P d thinking but in not some 111 virwe of ils mean 1l1g II IS will 10 ,see'in g, as logos has the meaning of apophainesthai, of lettmg be seen ,

"Se e GA 18, 2, pp. 333-334.

LU

bringen,

.) UA 19, pp. 197 198. Ibid, ' i t i v e n Verslandnis des Phan G A 19 pp. omens des "N ur aus e,mem. , .' lb d Lebens \VIe \Vlrpos ln se',ner R/letorik fin den, gewann es 11lnerha es " 1 anz konkret zu inter pretieren und.dadu h d I\ ristotclcs den das toteles konnte also die Dialektlk rc , as fllCJ?.yeoOol gar mch l ZU, nach schon unlen, d,h , eil1e Vorstufe hC des l'lIbziehen, well SIC fOr lhn scharfsill niges Ope rieren und Denk Or'ulp eV ist und aIs VorSI\lfc ll1 en, C li :rgcn , S-'heoll'nllell sofern der ),.oyoC; eben den t'l Ond e rll ihrc1ll Sinll c nflch 11111I1 CI' SC 10n C lll ,7 ' :-:1 1111 des rro$al\ppoOW hut , Schclll usscns,

. 162

11>1

(' 11 1\ 1' Il ' I( 1 ( HII (

'11 1\ 1''1'1:1( FOU I{

Even lhough dialecli e is dri ven by n wi ll 1 seo IllI oli gli Ihe unrounded 0 opinions of the many, it cloes not admit o r a 1 1,;111 t.;lIoll gh break with '0(11 endoxa but remains captured within th e sphc rc o f t.:s tabli slh.:d opinions, concepts, ways of speaking, etc. And whether Or not tbi s is a fair view on Plata, Heidegger thinks that when discovering the limits of dialectic, Aristotle simultaneously saw the limits of Plato's own project, namely that he could nOl, as Heidegger puts it, really sec the beings 45 themselves. Thus in ihis connection at Jenst, Heidegger interprets the difference between dialectic and Ihearia as a difference between an inquil)' into opinions on the one hand and a phenomenological seeing of the tllings themselves on the other." For Ihis reason, Heidegger suggests thal Aristotle's treatment of endoxa is in nlet not dialectical, for il does not simply speculate on the
consequences and presuppositions of opinions but measures them

1\lllI bl} by l'cvcaling th H logos is consliluled by pathos . This means that 1 I dlil i 'clic cannot l'ca ll y explain what it means that logos IS a form of liI'n",\', cvc n Ih ough il in fa ct treats of logos as a praxis, as dialectic "IIC llol1" consisls in speeh and is conducted for the sake of speech Il ,c ll'. Thcrc fore, wc must leave dialectic and look elsewhere for an l'xpl ll ilali on of the relation between speech and action. For only on the of an explication of praxis will we be in a position ta see the
o f the transformation from everyday ta philosophical speech .. Il l('; semch for thi s explication teads Heidegger to Aristot!e's notion of
,hlIO/';O.

against the lhings themselves . That is, Aristotle's dictulll that one must begin with what is intelligible to us and proceed to Ihat which is intelligible in ilsel!' cannot really be ta ken to say that one should move From one kind of opinion to anolher. Rather, il suggests that philosophy must begin with an inquiry inlo beings stlch as they are given
"proximally and for the mo st part" and then proceed to the supreme 47 mode of givenness. WhatHeidegger seems t be saying hcre is that in dialectic, one does not ask how being is given in thase opinions which

are under scrutiny, or how this givenness is determined. ln other wards, one does not investigate into the constitulion of speech. For this reason, il seems that, on Heidegger's interpretalion, dialectic is insuffieient not only as a philosophieal method or as a mode of discourse but also as an interpretation of logos. As we saw in the quotation ab ove, Heidegger refers to lhe Rhelorie as a testimony to Aristotle's "positive understanding" of logos. And whal the rhetorical but not the dia leetieal
intel'pretation of logos shows is precise ly the constitution of speech,
"GA 19, p. 198. Figal har sugge,sted Iha,' is Heidegger's understanding of phiJosophy as sel,e nce that makes hnn SllSpiC10US of Plato's dialectie and makes him turn to A,nstotle's notion of theory instead, even though he wil! criticise this notion as weIl. .is in work on this point, nam ely Flga) argue.s th.at between sClelltlfc seelllg and dlalectlcal, henneneutlc discourse, where the latt er would be more akin to $POVllQt<; than to 9E:(Opla; see "Refraini ng from Dia lecti c" 17 See GA 18, p. 37. .

\ , 'l'he thea reticallife As Il eidegger sees it, Aristotle's conception ofphilosophy points in two On the one hand, Aristotle does indeed tum to praxis in IlI'dcr 10 accounl for the possibility and nature ofphilosophy, but on the OI hel' hand, he does not seem ta accept the consequences that follow 1 1'0111 such an approach, that even philosophicalunderstanding must be (iiscursive in kind. The problem is thus not that Aristotle abandons his Idcu lhat praxis is the essence of life, but that he makes philosophieal J1 cli vil.v , theorein , into such an extreme form of action that it is on the ve rge' o f being transformed into the exact opposite of praxis. ln Il eidcgger's view, because of this ambiguity in thearia, It IS pOSSible to "cgord A ristotle as the origin of the opposition between theory and tl t..: li o ll . Thi s idea makes Heidegger's interpretation of theoria a bit Illllhi g uOll S in ils turn, as he sometimes c1aims that theoria is Ilot ail a
1'01 '111

of action , and sometimes insists vehemently upon the necess lty of

(lI'flw in g the opposite conclusion .48 For in spite of his hesitance on this point , Il eidegger is convinced that il is highly problemallc to apply tlllS
' I lle IHos t e laborate allempt at interpreting 8 ffip.a as action is GA 27, whl!rCI1S the a im of C A 19 is almost the exact opposite; see pp. 122- 125. 11 III gc ncra ll y il c kno wled ge d Ihal Heidegger. wanted Il ' I WCC ll thCOly and prax s by means of a notlO11 of ktnd of ong.tnary o.ne sc ldolll pre pa ree! to g ran t th is to Aristot) e. one assocJates \VIth Ilrldcggc r's no ti o n of sc ie ntifi c kn owled ge obJ ectIve,. bemg, sec C.

!t

Illll lloy. alld God in Heidegger and An sfofle, 'p. 28, :V. ,McNetl ), Glanee 1 f 1tle, t:-, , p.o, F. VollJ , "!Jew and rime: A 'l ran slatlon of the Nleomaehean .ye t" 1" lhfcst', pp. 201 -2 02. Bui t!li s vi cw ove rl oo ks J-Icld egge r s eXI.sten la , 1t11l'o )ogic u) nlc rpl'c lli lio ll O !IJpl C1, whi ch r fo c us on holV enacts P I f,' 'I!lcly Ihe "originlH'y" pr'il xLs 111 11 \Vll y I)H tl1 0kes II Illc suprcme forl11 of actl on. ll
fi
("0 . , ".

or

164

" I/ AI''' ' I( 1 (/11/(

(, II M 'II ,R I.' OUR

ory il:'i: and aetio" lu Ad'lul l .', pl tl losophy, s in et il Y 0pposilion bill, On Ih u COIIII"II'y by Ihe 'd 1 th e essence of life '. r, J ca t 1(1! this opposition in lhcory, 'J'here lo re, if we read his views on this matter, nor will BaslcalIy, theorza IS superior to ail other act' 'l' ' h P Y IS, 'rt f' IVI les 1I1 t ree respects' in ue Ils structure, which lets il fulfil the essence of life' because' 't

1 VI,.\ t y IIct Otl ill vo lvcs thillkin g, but when this is a form of deliberation, o ICllds to un end ralh er than being an end in itself. In this case, it is poss ible to draw il coneeptua l distinction between the understanding

a perfect nature; and finally, in yirtue of its

\VI l

1
.

t ese

pOints ln

the indicated arder.

Wc that Aristotle has it that the end towards whicl orm of hIe directs ilself is somethin ) 1 every

Ethies, il is slated that cveryone agreesglhgaOtOtdl ' ln Ihe first book of the l ' , le Supreme good' rD ' lappmess or well-being (eudaimonia) 49 whicll' 't'II' U1 1 e IS 'fi , lnl la y 15 not glven an s:eci IC content, but is only formally determined as an end above wh' t ere IS no further end and which thus is desirnble i . account it is c1ear Ihat th e natllre of li fe will be' From thls
\V,ilh eudaimonia. However, Ihere maye

the
,

Slilce the only crilcrion Ihat has becn established is that

111 themselves, Thus what is settled so far is just that we . clI1g must be an instance of praxis not of ' . . IS only praxis that is endowed wilh this kind f t ' pOtes/s, for It 1 th P 0 au on omo us nature in n ,e Otlles, Anstotle says that since wcll-being can only be round

r"

ta praise, inactivity (la apraktein) more than

goes on to specily what thls activity should look like:

. . , if one should as ser t !hat Il b' , . 1 . we . emg !S action then the best ]"fi .and fo r . re atlve to athers, nOlh arle .only those thoughts practical which are , suc t ungs that result fro " b speculations [theoriai] and thoughts al' 111 ut th,ose whieh are end s in themselves and e mue more practlcaJ tl 1 are enacted for the sake of weil is the end, and therefore, the end is a as saille believ for the s[lk""

lilli i lIlakes acti on possib"!e and the action itself, as is shawn by the distincti on between phrollesis and praxis, The difference bet\Veen Ilcl ion and understanding, or between the "subjective" and "objective" of action, is the reason why it is possible to understand one's ,,,,,duct in di ffe renl ways, This means that, even though it is always po%ihlc to unaersta na one ' s activity as :m instance of praxis, ail forms III' virtuolls act ion can be regarded as means to further ends, and that is hl, ; ClIlISe lhey involve change. which makes them bring about a resul!. lilili is, even if the agent understands his action as an end in itself, his tlecd will produce a new situation of action and probably affect other people, etc, llut in philosophy thinking is itse lfthe activity and the end, since it is lI u l a l a il manipulativc or deliberative, Thus only theoria fulfils th e Slr'ucture ofpraxis because it alone is action bath From the "subjective" Hn d the " objective" point of view. It is the only activity that has no 'x lcrn al result and thus has nothing to do with production,52 But those wlt o bclieve that action must involve a relation to other people, be vis ible as physical behaviour, etc" of whom Aristolle spoke above, still IInderstand action in terms of production, Unable to step out of their poict ic attitude, they cannot sec that something like pure contemplation is act.ion in the truest sense. Put in another way, if the essence of life cons isis in being directed towards something good in understanding, plti losop hy llfils the essence of life, since it only thinks the go ad for 11 10 sake of thinking it, not using its understanding for the sake of a fl uther end, The relati on between philosophy and the essence of life stands at the centre o f Heidegger's interpretation of theoria, notably in the lecture
clvuytwiov e1vm rrp EtpOU, KCl9ltE:p o'ioV'ral 1:lve, ouM 'C; otavoia elVUl Il va tCtu'ta npaK'CIKo tt tWV XaplV y tyvollva K tou Itp6 nc lv , cL rro)" p D.ov 'tt Oto'tEet Kat 't autwv V KEV 8ropia Kat 51(AVo r lt;' il yop '\OC t:o. (OCl'tE KCtI n. p OtOW M Kat npcittetv

50

"Pol. 1325a31-32,

" EN. 1095a 1820,

Pol. 1325bI423: "ri1v euoaliloviav d m '

,
"'), aA

,
K?lVn rtcrll TOV rrj)W<:tlKOV OUK

av d'Y] Kai Kae' KUcrroV apIG't'o Pio

\J f:'or

K\Jp i u) Ka! 1"WV 'rrpaCiQV to tCl olavoia t pX t tK'tova." Ih t: di flCI1 C hc t\VCCIl Opl)lpiCl H Id ordi!\Hry np l o n Ihi s point, scc E.N. Il I

11 77/)1 '1.

166

1117

(' 11111' I l'I( 1 (lI lit

:.'In/eilll llg il/ die Philoso'J!ti<: 1 ' CO UI'. iC 1 1' the idca Ihat the concep t of . / , .' Il 111 11 g lvcs as slIch and notjust t

il( CI III 1''1'1 FOU R

1h.: ldcggL:r rc turns (0 10 Ih!.! nature of lit
of w hich s IIndcl'standi ll g of bci ng as Herges lelllsein, the express ion good as cause and principle, which Ihlll Ihe suprcmc good , i .e. the cS the object of theoria , is eternal and unchangeable, or, as

y li'olll prod ucti on. It is ae m also along these lineso h ort ot ac ti hv it . I . m erprets t eona F b le cmphas lses, we . is a fo nn of m ust not believe tha! theoria JUS acti on for produc ti on 54 lnst d ' on should be d eca use we mlstake d . ea , actI . un erstoo In terms of " f transce ndence, as the "ha g has th e , h form o f a move beyond bPePen mtg o o ur understandi n , whi ch mgs 0 t elr be mg ' TI ' . li S IS th e ontolog ical .' ' sense o f ac ti on wherea s Il . le IIl1 erpretatlOl1 of action in t ( ' . ' . erm s 01 p rodu ctIOn onl y captures its ontical sense 56 of act ion, Heideg ger interpre ls theoria lhus:' On the basls oftlllS Vlew

0;,

\! ()IlSlitul 60 W ith thi s remark , H eidegg er I lcidcgg e r puts it, already fin is hed ity of Indi ca tes th at, even though Ari stoll e wants to protect th e activ a l'' earia trom being mixed w ith poiesis, he cannot but regard Iheoria as that it IIcgatio n of poiesis , so th at the d isti nguishin g feature o f liIeoria is

ls not prod ucti ve, since the supreme good is already produc ed. O nce rity of Ihi s is recognised, it is poss ib le to see that even if th e superio
,heoria
50

unconcealment happen which . li

7reorein is indeed

SUcJl an action

il br:ngs Dasei n to th a l bc, the trulll, a possibility for the' c ssence 0 f"Dlsota,r . asclIl

as revea lmg only lets t lai ,H [ts,e lf, be longs ,10,

IS in

. belllgs, na mely that wh ich ca nn ot be th ' ord er .ta cmphas isc the often,. calls tl le Sllprem c goad TI "Y y and d ' " ( . . of theoria says He idegg cr, . .ItS on. gll1al ae t' " ( U; 1le Oun atlOn IS , r w ndlung): an unth ematic projection toward s bein g that le<ts eory tllrn toward s a lm of beings and th c delim ited rea erc lore must re main hidd en firom th e . '. . th eoretlca l act ivity itself Th 's IS what is genuine ly Iheoreli cal a bo ut theory." The orig; na/ ae 10 /1 w Ich !nakes Iheoria possible is its .
p '4Cf. Chapter Thrce,. 124 . "GA 27. pp. 174-175. GA 27, pp. 205-206. F I ' see or t le Idea of understa nding as happening (Geschehen). GA 24, p. 393. GA 27 ' p. 206. " " GA 27, p. 176: "8ewpd v isr in der Tat . solches Handeln, das ais offenbar machendes nur Offenbarkeit geschehen IM3l ZUIn. Dasein gehorig, di eses ,le:. zu dem bringt, was es se in kann sofern erendes ln der Wahrneit ist cine es qua eXlst r r s esensmglichkeit des Daseins;'

Theori a on ly lets unconc ea lment ha ppen, fo r ils lelos is 10 on bemgs as true or un covercd. Thi s is the s . . fi .upl eme arm of actlO11 in front of b . ln thal it makcs a hait e mgs w llhout slIbsu min g th f . ha . e ppen lllg 0 . un concealmen t un der any ot her end 58 H ' . owever, theorta IS rds to on hos al tl n ot dlfecled towa e 7es pure and sImpl e, but toward s a specific realm of .

far has been expla incd in tenns of if s structu re, the per fection o l'its slructur e is largely due to the perfec t nat ure of its object. of T his idea is stated part icul arl y clearly at the end of the sixth book sis and th e EliIics, where Aristot le discuss es th e relation betwee n phr01le 61 te this re lation, Ar istot lc sophia. Not slll'pri singly, in order to illustra brings co mpares it to th e re lat ion betwee n med icine and hea lth . Sophia to a nbout eudaimonia Just in virtue of being enacted, and s thus sm lar phronesis can be said stale of health whi ch sustain s itse lf. By contras t, \Vith to produe e sophia , sinee il involve s the abi lity to see th e mea ns as which it is possible to achieve a given end, fo r example sophia 62 wo ul d exercis e onia. Thi s is howeve r not to say th at phronesis

elldaim

j ust as auth ority over sophia; it can only hel p sophia to come into being, 63 lt is natura l for th e art of medi cine can pave the way for health phronesis, being a care for th e good li fe, to devel op int o sophia, th e best man, 1i Fe, whi ch cares not fo r the human but for the suprem e good . For le th ing in as Aristotl e is anxious to poin t out , is not th e most admirab
cos mos .
64

Si nce th e slipreme good is not of a changeabl e natu re , and

of thus is not somethi ng that man ca n produce , the th eoretica l ac tivity t sophia cannot be produc tive but o nly contem plati ve." But on accoun for us to of th e domin ance o f th e po ietic perspec t ive, it is no t easy . real se that thinkin g without alteration is the supreme form of action ta lose il!) cUllnecti on with praxis. It is at this point that tlzeoria secms for For as wc have seen earli er, acti on is a sceking , govern ed by a desire
M

(, 1

' " GA 27, p. 183. 27. pp. 196-200,2 12-213 . GA

Cg. GA 19, p. 123. E.N. Book VI.Ch.12. (,l /IN. 1144n2- 9. 1145n6-9 . 1:>1
(, 4

E.N. 11411\31 - h2 . l" GA

68 1

169

(' 111\ 1'1 1' 1{ I IIIII(

( 'II A 1' 11'1 l 'I)I II( {

out ta be satis fi ed and ta come ta rcst al il poinl wherc il is possibl e j usi ta take pleasure in the beauty of reality, 66 As Aristotl e puts it, we wanl ta end in Ihe opposit e of thaumazein,67 tha! is, one coul d say, not rcall y in philoso phia but in sophia: not in love for wi sdom but in wi sdol11 itself. If phi losophy were ta desire ilS abject, it would suffer ch ange while Ihi nking il. If thinki ng were ta be altered, il could be sa id la produc e different aspects o f its a bject, and this would not be ta preserv e the di gnity o f th e suprem c good, Hence, if theoria is to be praxis in the sense, il must be identi cal \V it h ils o bj ect. But, il seems, when theoria has exclude d every kind o f differen ce or kinesis, it is entangled in its ow n autono mous mo vement : a self-su rticient aetivity that is incap able of encoun ter ing anyth ing th at is differenl from or foreign ta il. Still, Aristot le mot ivates Ihe sup eriority o f the theoret ica l life by referr ing to the bas ic c haracte ris tic of actio n, nam ely th al its trut h consists in a vo id ing the ha rm f'ul and purs u in g the p leasura ble. T he theoretica l life is in fael the sup reme realisat ioll o f th is "practical" truth, for nothing can be pleasurable in Ihe same way as theory :
We think that well bein g m ust involve pleas ure, and it is generaUy agrecd Ihal Ihe mosl plcasura blc o f ail aCli vi s Iha l arc enacted in accordan ce wilh som e virlue is Iha l activily which is in acco rdan ce \V ilh w isdo m. At a Il c ve n ts il is thou ght Ihat philo so p hy ha s pf e as ure s th a t are wo nd e rful in pu rity a nd durati o n, and il is weil sa id Ihal Ihose who ha ve know ledge are dwc lli ng more pl cas urabl y than thase who are seeki ng it. 68

i r phllrH lophy in ils initial sta g ' can be describ ed as a carc to sec 111 0 re, as I lci dcggcl' says, Ihis Carc is

sOIn !.!th ing w hich onc tacks. Hui

1III I y li

, 1 r 'II . ' t!tl,;.on.:ll cHI [1 ' \ v1 M M ' II I cannOI cOl1tcm plale Iy, U I lei . , l ' Ihat he \s able ta pursue , for II nol CI,\' w\l l\lHII interru ph on, . . , 1" th at is to say reason . , ' . o f sotll clhlng ul Vlne , Il,,'n''y b ut ln vlrtue ortality Aristotl e claims, but , 1hel'd ore, wc muSt 11 01 succUlllb \0 our m ' t develo p our reason an d In this way try ta be , I\l U do ail wc can 0 St d Uit w ould be stran ge If ,. alise our essence , an 11\ IIIIori ai. For th ls IS ta re , 1 f other ,,70 , ' 111\1': \Vere ta choose not one 5 own il fe but n at a an
11icunS 10
l

" ' nouS al1d Augenb lick l 'l'he //I oment oft rut lm V /S IOI1 , If fli ' nt nature its k nowled ge " h' erfect se -su ICle , 1r thearia is ta have 1 IS P ' 1 t ' t sense sueh knowle dge is ,

Ph il osoph y is Ihe mosl pleasur able and durab le acti vity imagin able, s ince it is not a forl11 of seeking and has no unfu lfi l! ed desire, and 50 does not end or is interrup ted like other act ivities, There fo re, it is action in the truesl sense, To be sure, since man is mortal, he canna t engage in theoria fo rever; that is only a divine possibility, As a human being, the philosophe r lII ust oecasionally rest, but th e l'est is never an end in ilself,
66

' in kind l n t le s ne , ,lIUst be non-d iscursiv e ') Aristotl e makes clear in Book d'vine reason ( 110 1lS , as h tl ul y grante d to l ' " ln thls A ' st a tle ' s main concern is to S ow texl n X II of th e Metap 1 lyS/CS , ' , ' 1'1 r eapacity a dunami s, As a , ' not be a potentl a 1 Ya , , 1I11I1 chy me reason can Id b ffeeled b y other Ihin gs, Ils " d"' re ason w ou e a ]Inlcntl ahty, Iv me , d 'nee a potenti ality , a r IS o Id no t be contmu , us , an SI the 1I10vem ent wou 1 good but a1so th e " ' d \Vould th mk not on y " 'r contrari es, dl vme mm , Id , ' mos whlch \Vou not be proper ta iL Thus 1 . 1 rior th mgs m COS 1lfc , h ld be concerned with \Vhat 15 (l ivine reason is the bes; lthin g and Shouk itself there is no difreren cc ' 't , hest, it must tll1n k 1 se If. And as .It t m S h' h in Aristot le' s ' vicw k'ng and lts abject, w le . helween Ihe act a f 11 n 1" u 1 d static, The abse nce 0 1 h' f Vlty 1S etern a an th al t 1S ac l , 1 b Il thinki ng and ilS objeel mu SI ' 1 usly imphes t "'l at a 1 . , ' dirfercnce S ll11U tanco . . , ' d' . bl (adlhw r eton ) na t ur e , for otherw ise. Ihll1 kll\ g he or a s im ple, 1I1 IVISI e , h ks its obiCCl and th,,1 would h veral sleps as Il t III " ",oulcl run throug se " If-think in g Ihou ghl , /l ol's l ,! ' 1 12 Th us on th ls vt ew , se " c lan ge, , '" 'fulfilleci in every 111 Ihlll Il , t mal actlvlly that IS l f/oeseos , 15 an e e 1 t very rn om ent. Such f\ n I1 ctl"Vll y , , 't 1 los complete y a e 1 \l us its a bject, 1 s e , , , discurs ive in tlte 0 no l ' 1 . 1 {' Ilerge ia 111 t lC truCSt sense " and Il IS nonIiI bricOy y. , lor ta ' 1 iovolvm g any sta ges, 1 any d lffe rence, d pu . tand ilS obj\,;ct 10 1 Il n5 nor docs Il un crs , , di vine 110 US never rcaso , 1 f ' th e "'\S" docs 1101 \l lIve sOlllcth ing cIse or in general as somel1ll1 g, 01 l ,
(,o) HN, 1176b3S 11 77al. , '0 'Ii) N. 1178f13 4 . "toJtOV O\W 'Y I VOI "T Y. li).).ou,"
11

61

PA, p, 263: GA 19, p, 76, Mel, 983,18ff.

rrCtpa ll EIllX901 'tfj li: "t"wv Kat' pE' VepyEHv il K 1V Ct't 'thv cro<j)lav Oj1ooYOU vw e011 Y ' ]l O OI(E1. YO"Y $l ),oao$t a 9cw ]lao"t noov XEIV Ka lape l O 'tl"ltl Kat 1c\) Be rlai l[J, EOYOV o "toi e iOm "TOlV Sl1toV"T(J)v ol (JYW'Y 'lV El va l. "

68

E. N. 1177a2227: "oLolle9 t 'tE liEi v

...

Mel.

Il

1074hI5-15, Met , 107 5116 11.

170

1/ 1

(' li Ai' Il Il 1111 11(

( 'II A I'II Il I l any IllcH ni ng

Hill

Iwn:, cl uc 10 Il

thi nk in g and ils

'1 ' I( cl ll ll y Ihlll hold'l I1clwcclI Ihe <.Ic i of'

reason. is defi,ned as tl dilI/amis, as the Y th ' k ' h 73 D Ole aIl thmgs wnh out thclr maller in the sense 0(' 111 II1g t em Accordlllgly th r ' fi .' , e ac IVlly of hum an rcason is nOI per ect, as It moves between activity and in activi ty To J'ud C A t Il ' l' ' ge 1ro m 0 e s of argument in the Melaphys;cs, this should also entail li d 1 erence etlVeen the ac t of thin kin g and its obj ec t for ' . ' as " pOl entlalny reason is aITected by its object 74 H ' wh ' 1 . . . O\\ cver, 111 De Anuna IC l contalllS Afl stotle's mSI clabora te accOUn! of the hu ' man nous ' Ari stotl e does Ilot seem to be trou bled b th w Id Il fi Y e consequences which MOU 0 Ow rom the defin ition of nous as a dunam ;s according to the it capac ny. From Il
. 75

III Il cidcggcl" s Vi ClV, Ihc' proh le'" wl lh Ari slO ll c's 110li oll of" pure is that it ilil plics a helie!' in Ihe poss ibi lity of thematising the d,'(' peSI levcl of truth , Ih ll l is, OU diselosedness or bein g, without loss. I' 1 III Ihi, be lie f, the aecompl ishlllent of the phil osophical nous wo uld IIl1sist in a retum to and apprehension of that which always already had h ' Cil ul1dcl'stood in an unthematic way . Now Heidegger too conceives ni pllilosophy as such a return which seeks ta conceptuali se the pren" leclive leve! of unde rstandin g, th e di sc losedn ess of be ing. Bul if
""liS

pld loso phy is d iscursive, il will Ilot be able t gras p thi s level as il is in IIG cJfor w ith out in som e sense objecti fy ing it. As wc have seen earli er, Il ckh.:gger thinks that th ere are certain extrc me experi ences like anxiety

howevcr that in its activity, that is, when n Ica Wl t lits a bjec t, reaSOn is s till a potentiality or

IVlli eh have no abject, but precisely because of this lack, an xiety cannot ' cli lly be said ta involve any understanding at ail. Instead, Heidegger find a poss ibility of a proper response to thi s experience, Thi s
J'cs ponse ca nn at be de libera ti o n ; no t olll y becau se de liberati on is drccle d towards its end in such a ,"vay as to d is regard th e p resent, but

. as wc saw III the previous capter, cldeggcr hes ltates as to whcther A ristotl e take be a hum an poss ibi lit o r if h . c s pure nous ta . . . . y e lhm ks th a t hum an nOlis necessaril s For Heidegger thinks that the concept of nous cannot sin';;'ly
h H . . .
76
li

nature of movcmcnt as entelecheia

b . . le egmnlllg of his engagement Wilh Aristotle H 'd feels confident that nous in its pure fo rm is a natural c ' el egger ' on sequence of Aristotl , . es conceptIOn Of bcing and movement, for it alone can fu lfi l the
B {

e altri uted to An stolle's COmprehension of divine being, for it is also motl vated by Ills mSl ght into the pre-predicati ve level of understa ndin and h" d;;;covery that there arc other poss ibilitics for logos than th! assel tlon. 1f th,s IS correct, Aristotle does indeed have a n t' f predi cat' b ' 0 Ion 0 pre'" ve ut ye t discursi ve apprehension. We will see shortly that il . IS preelsely along these lines that Heidegger interp rets the f ac tion. nous a
Ali . 4.29a2 / -22 . SIIII, Anstolle insiSls Iha! reason is OnCle' . o.e An. 429a/ 5- / 6. See a!so the discussion recept iv: of dlffrculty that to thi nk is 10 be aet d . . a9, where he ralses Il as a ill1pass ive natu re. The notion of rea:onu;son, !h1s. does not agree with reason's 10 this prob lem , fo r Ihis means Ihat rea P?tentlallty JS Ihere presented as a solu tio n Ihat ils transition from inaclivly 1 0 JO. a sel"se a /ways a/ready has ilS objects , De Ali . 42 9b5-8 Y mvo ves 110 real change. . pp. 25-26. "PA, p. 263; GA 62', Cf. below, Section 8.
14

"

II lso because the end is not grasped as such. But, Heidegger indicates, wc II ced not turn away F rom praxis ta fi nd this poss ibility, The poss ibility of a more far- reaching "v ision" which moves beyond the conli nes of everyday action is represented by Heidegger's concept of llic A ilgenblick, which no doubt picks up certain traits of nous and the Idea l of vision, but simultaneously points beyond such an ideal. 18 This concept should serve to explain what it means to have a qUll lified access ta the situation of action. Therefore, the Augenblick wi ght sec m to bel ong to p hronesis rath er th al1 ta phil oso phy, and 79 I lc.idegger also di scllsses the Augenblick in conn ection \Vith phronesis. Il owever, as an aspect of auth enti c understandi ng as such, thi s co ncept !l lU give directi ves fo r the nature of philosophi eal understanding as st wcl l. For in arder to thematise properly the Augenblick of phronesis, pliil osophy must itsel f be in its "moment",'O
ln nIe Glal1ce of the Eye, x, W. McNei ll a/so suggests that Hcidegger's concept o r the AlIgenblick both fu/fils and breaks \Vith the pri macy of vis ion in ph iloso phy, Ihough he does not to any greal extent discuss Ihi s in connecl ion wi th vo. " Scc GA 19, pp. 164- t 65; PA , pp. 259-260. N The not ion of Il "ph i!oso phi ca l moment", as indi cative of the pro per phi loso phie:ll il fl nitllde. is exp loJ'cd by /1. Ru in, who cmphasises the conncction bctwccn the AlIgellbfick O the co nce pt o f K'o t p6: sec Enigmal ic Origill.f, CIHlplcr Pive, in lle! pnl'li cular Section 2,
1W

"

172

t' 11 "1' 11 ' ll 1 1 Il III

il conserves the notion ofk now lcd ge as vision pres ent concep t oCnous . Bul since it also has a temporal mea ning, dcs igllatillg a ki nd of moment, Ir th e; Aug el/blick is in tcrp rClcd us " th u
ul li n cyc"
,,

l'li A I' Ii m l'OUR

HI iii. l ln ll 1:-< 110 C,

rib ed as one of the con stituti ve elem ents of succ essful acti on." ln his inte rpre tatio n of kair os, Hei deg ger argues that, as the prop er time of acti on, il is not a tem pora l concept in the ord inary sens e. For it refe rs not to a spec ifie poinl of ti me but ta the circ ums tanc es of acti on. ln this sens e, kair os is not a " qu an tit at ive" noti o n of lime but the prop er s ituation of act ion as a w ho lc. Acc ordin gly, l-Ieideg gt: r sug gest s th at kair os cons titut es th e end of action, for the des ired end of deli bera tion is preeisely the prop er resp ons e to Ihe situ atio n o f action 8 2 The vi cw of kair os as a 'tqu alita ti ve" rat her than as a " qua ntita tive " con cep t of time is part and parcel of He ideg ge r 's a((e mpt to reth ink the natu re o f li m e, no t Jeas t th e not ion of the " no w", due ta hi s id ca of the trad ition al prio rity of th e pres ent. As sllch , I-kid egg er 's inte rpre tatio n of ka iras evo kes the q ues tion o f hi s atti tude low ards Ar isto tl e's und erst and ing of time as a who le. The de finition of tim e in Ihe Phy sics is e lsew here rega rd cd as th e pri me exa mp le of the eve ry day , qua ntita tive noti on of tim e whi ch ca nn a t do justice to our exp erie nce of tim e or of ours elve s as tem pora l bein gs . A ltho ugh Heideg ger very seld om discusse s how " kairo logi eal" and "qu anti tativ e" time are rela led to eaeh other in Aris to tl e, he seem s to thin k Ihat Aris totle had a broa der und erst and in g of lime than w hat the Phy sics su ggests, thou gh he was una bl e to go far eno ugh in th is dire c tion. 8J What furlh er com plie ates the pict ure is that Heideg ger 's und erst andin g of the A uge nbli ck as the time
81 ln the begin ni ng of the Ethics, Aris totle says tha! one of the senses in whic h one speaks about the good is with respe ct to Kat p, r096a23-27. When disc uss ing the relati on between Kmpr; and the Auge nblick, Heidegger rega rds them bath as aspe of 'p!',l rat"er than of $povqm; GA t8, pp. 179- 180, 189. See also PA, p. 259. cts 82 See GA 18, p. 171. 83 Mor e preci se ly, Heid egger the definition of ti me, given in Phys 219b 1-2, as pt 9)lo Kt . Kett 't Itp(hc:po v Koi 10 01E pOV, "the measure of l1l ove ment \Vi lh respect to the prio r and the poste rior", as saying fhat time (as measure) must be interpreted in term s of li me (as the prior and the poste rior), which ind icatcs , Heidegge r argues, that Ari stotle has seen the original phenome non of li me, thou gh he was unable ta unde rstan d ilS relat ion to the "natural" conc ept of tim e measure, GA 24, 19, especially pp. 340-342. See a1so Heidegge r's rema rks on the re lation between "CHPO and vv in GA 24, p. 409.

Hei deg ger 's resp o nse 10 Ar istOlle ' s co nccp l kair os . "op port unit y" or " the figh t mom ent" , whi ch in the Eth ics is desc

il ca n also be rega rded as

inte rpre tatio n of Aris totle, .but 1 k 84 ln the fo llow mg, hi s \l1\(h.!fst llndin g o f Chn stwl1 t 11n m g. t th Aris totle hllw .... vc l.. 1 w ill limit mys c lf" 10 I-Iei de gge r's eng age men WI li n Ihl'l poi nt. . . ,. d Z ., Heideg ger eha ract ens es the A uge l1bl ick as an 111 .)t ", 1117 . el , " l ' "the pres e nt 85 th 1Il lllIc " ti c pres ent , as . e Possi bility to enact or Ive th futu re wh ich is sup pos ed to \\ Ih o ul .onesel f th e past .or . e a \Va it usually is ilOt. In nillk e Ihe situatio n of actIOn In y d t tlle past and th e . lh lMse lise, th e mom ent 1$ no t a " now " as opp ose 0 l"t f our exis tenc e is m od ified liltU I'C. l'o r in th e mom ent, th e tem pora t Y 0 h held toge ther or lit .. Ieh li \Vay thal the tem pora l stru ctur es are som e ow t ' b ' 1\l ll liet!, in that lhey are emg dt 1ined or give n spec ifie con ten . e e tn . H'd 's ana lys is for Il is at this poin t that nau s ente rs mto et '6 ' th Ill' 'ortlin g to Ari slotl e, it is the wor k of the " prae ttcal /10U S 10 see e \.lrc tll1l5tanc es o f act ion:
,1 "

n ll

basc d

0 11 an ..

has to do with the ultimate on both sides (of an Rca son . n Il ot reasoning that is concerne d with inrcrence) ..For 1\ IS 'and the ult ima'te. That (reasOI:) whic h both the grasps the immutab le an? primary 1 to do 1::Is concepts that W h'JC h has to do \Vi th acti on grasps the uhl1nate, the , . . . . . . These thin gs are pnnc lp tes III tl1e of which one acls, for F rom these sense 0 el . articular s must be VOI particu iars the univ ers.a l t5 \d "l: Th . ese P Thus reaso n is an app rehen ded bY percepllo n' &j t 1S IS reaso n.... both a bcginning and an end. . . . , NoHlb ly Hl GA 60, HeIdegge disc uss es the early Chri5tians thcir r d 1 0 01 i IIl ldcrstanclt.ng 0 f le arn val of the Lor ne n ap u ' 0 , which Heidegger. 111terprets t . d' f terms of "\Vhe n" but only Il'' Il moment which cannot \Vith respect be 0 JO bsent . 1 a i. a IS prese nt as f t , sa to speak that is, as an 10 " how ", 111 that {le ' . 26 ln his book on Heidegger and . T An stotle, . . llIllC lcnn inat c bul yet Ihrea t, non_Ari stotelian sens e of tim e, whlc fl rgues that Ib IS IS an esse h . Y d' Il ddc ger has taken over . h1s understan mg 0 f t'nle , and that this ;s one of the l \Il .cl as pri mnri 1y n Chri stian , rathe r t h lude that H el egge r w an ICllso ns one .must d Ari slotle. T/Je Ques tion ofBeing, p. 1111 I\rislotelHln th 1l1kcr, el 16. egger ail . 11' Pi"e lilliche Gege mva rf, S2, p. 338: . .... . , used Hl De A11. 433a14 ff .,. TI\e express ion 0 n:poKtI KOr; 'lt' $<'rte pa KC yp tWV npol'tWV .7 H-N. 11 43a3S-b IO. "K (_O vou ttl v Kat 't Ct1tOO el;EI , .1. .I."'rov {lplV KU I 'tC))V eO)',u . , vou Eon Kat ou ,,-oy , r al ...\ v.)'(IJ,)V OpOIV Ka l rtpUl'tlV, 0' v '((.t npaK tlKO 'tou " K_ . . ' a' yp -co ou VEKO ouW , ,.. J. (oi pa np1oacU1r; t EK 'toov t\ v&r' xoll vou Km 1"lle; c. opX 1 .. OCl o'ioOqOlV. outIl 0 ." O' "KCIO{Ct 'Ybf' d l ",p06)..o,, ' 1\J"f EOH vou . t V O\J" eXCI " ..... 4'ho .. Ctl 10.:(1\ Sec [dso Il t I2n2 5-)O.
Q

1 :

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174

(' II AI'I I ' II 1 tll ill

Rca sonin g can onl y bcg in 011 Ihe bt l sls 0 1 SIIII \ 'Ihin g give n, Hnd lO provide Ihi s is the task of nous. In this 11011,\' llitis t Il ot ncc essa rily be rega rded as non -di scu rsiv e in any s ll'o ng sen se, but one co uic! interpret Aristolle as just say ing that sccing what is propef here and now is not a part of the process of deli beration itse lf since it is pres upp oscd by il. As the above quotation te lls us, nous is here concerned with the part icul ar, and

l' II I\ I''I'I ; I{ l'OU Il 'b'\" 1l10V le / -0 \'1111 11 , \l' th" pOSS I 'I ly l0 , C bcyond t1 cox of cveryday life and 1 A enb liek is the pos sibility , , '\se sens tll "rl' th tllln g as l , ll'" ln tht sT e, 11e ug ,,1 , hllil gC , of lInd crstandll1 g dl ' t\ Eve n thou gh it results from el en Y ' , itse lf to the , ,il Ilhcruti on, it 1l11c rrupts t1 de l'be ratlon as It exp oses 1e l , t' . ,r" of th e situa 100 - that 'IS the mea ning of and the Utllq ue as " elf s eaks to US91 Hen ce, its litlt lcggc r's ciaim ab ove that the form s a unit ary Iil , n u'sive nat ure notw tths tand tng, b tween the situ ation of acti on C tl ere is no dlscrepancy e lor 1 , ' h" h l" of our interpretatlOn 15 , , 't Il ,1(1 the way wc mte rple t l , in that t e as w a h 't ' , d ' 'ed by t e SI ua t'1on ltsel f. instead of be in g I11 l'I<,pc"clO 'by C' : (I /01e distorts the part icularity of the situ x ' ViIVCI'1I ation,
1 l'ilil vsop hy as COlm te, .-move men t Qnd retrieval , t f reso lve or dec isio n 1,I , of" r as the Auge n bl' k tS a mom en 0 le f t'Ion one cou Id say that it ,n ' g the , (FIl ISch l"F ) concern m, " best course 0 ac hoosin the phil osophica l life, just as to man the poss tbIltty of B gt to the cxtentt hat Aristotle 's . ' ve \Vay to sop l1a, u I,h,.o ll es i s may gt . , h' . base d upo n h is distinctton , ' ,ll<t lllCllon b etween p hro nesls and sop ID 15 , b l be ing phil oso phy 111 11 ' l\Ve en C1 gea ble and unc h an gea e , 1an l ' l 'H1d not onti cal knowle dge , , Il ri dcgger S sens e" that is as anto oglc a ( eSl'S al1d sop hia But this , h d' ' t' on between P1 11'011 doo s Ilot fit tOto te, Istm c 1 as is som etim es thought,' identify Il lso sho ws why Heideg ger , t , l 'th ?hrO nesl S, Tha t IS 0 s ay apa rt from mak ing , pbIi oso p 1y Wt 1 , estion of self_unders tandin g, It wo uld pliil oso phy tnto merely a qu, , f , 1 hy of its poss lbIitty 0 on t01og ical know ledge, dcpl'l vC P 11 oso p ' h is also in Heidegger' s view the Moreover, as ontology, 1Y st the idea ta be presented in this N llpre mc fonn of acti on, or that ,lS a ea , H .d says m connecu on 'th theOl' ia hold s fo r his Wh at el egg er as weil and that Wl is that here, logos does not I>WI1 noti on of phIioso phy , '" . . ' lf a praX IS smc e the telos ofp hiloso phy is olll y gov ern praX IS but IS ltse . ' b' g Ih e prop er conceptua l , t' n of reali ty Of em .93 Tha l is to say , it

nsion of esse nces, Thu s he conclud es that: "W hat we have here are Iwo pos sibilities for nou s: nous in ils ul/imale concretion and nou s in ifs ultim ale kath ololl, ilS mos t gen eral Nou s in ilS " ul timatc concret ion" is thus an app rehe nsio n of the particular, of the unique within a mom ent or situ ation, Such a seei ng can mak e up a startin g-po int of deli bera tion , as it apprehends the telo s of action, But Heidegger is mor e con ccrned wilh how nOli s works at the end of the dcli bera tion , and he desc ribe s il acco rdin gly as a "sim ple gras p" (sch lichles Elfo ssen ) of delc rm inat c circ um stances or of the bare 89 " faet" of the situation. For at the point whe n the exact course of acti on pres ents itsel f and one decides wha t to do, the situ ation is settl ed and there is no long er any question of how to act or with what means: "ln su ch noe in it is a mat ter of a pure ma king pres ent o f the th in g itse lf, 50 th at it speaks pur ely out of jlsel /, and th erc is no long er any nee d of an add ress or mak ing man ifes t on our part.,,90 T hi s seeing is not sim ple in the sense of lackin g the as-structure , but, on the contrary, it grasps the thin g in a delerm inale "as" , Thu s on Hei deg ger 's interpre tatio n, the nOli s of acti on is really the supreme express ion of logo s, sine e it is in virt ue of the sy nthetie-dihaireti e structur e of logos Ihat we are able to und erstand thin gs in their part icul arity, as thi s or that. On Heidegger' s view , however, norm all y wc do Ilot rcall y see the particul ar in Hs part icul arity, for we tend to interpre t it in terms of establis hed con cep ts, opinions , etc, Acc ordin gly, it is only the vision of the Aug enb liek that
GA 19, p. !63: " Wir habe n hier zwei l"Jglichkeiten des vo: den vac; in der auJ3ersten Konk retio n und den vo im (lujJers/en Ko9o).,.ou, in der
SB

il is l'his aspe ct whic h stan ds at th e centre of Hei deg ger 's intc rpre tati on. s ince he wan ts to op pose il to th e phil osop hi cal nou s as the apprehe

C, ,

t 5 a 10

a(fge m e ills /ell AlIg emei nhei/ ." CA 19, p, 159, 90 G A 19, p. 161: "ln solc he m voe v hand elt es s ich urn ei n sc hl ic ht cs Verg egen wartigens der Sach e 5e lbst, 50 nicht mehr eines Besprechens, Au fzeig daO sie rein von ihr selh!"/ her spric i!t und cs ens von uns aus bed.1rf."
89

- - - -- --- --: -;- ,. ' hat il re resen ts the incalcu lable aspect of iJ l Th is aspe ct the Glanee Eye, pp. nclio n, is elllphas l sed br w. ' 1.\ 01h in Hcid egge r's sense " ( ' f abo ve p. 120, note 4 IS Il ot exha usted 1. rhal p li OS 1 bY W B ogan "A . , , Response to Robe rt . sugg csted y hy th e con ce pt of . r , , 15 . S dl .' f Phro nes is''', p, 152 and by . T , a el', ' ICIIHISCO Ill"' S ' 1Icid c\l scr S Destru cti on 0 Ih' /dq ,{fJ,c rw ld llrif( ()/fc. pp . 116- 11 7 1 1 . St!c (;.4 18. pp , 2 17-2 I H .
1;1

176

<..' 111\1' 11 Il 1 (11 11(

uddn.:sscs bc in g s in1pl y for th e sak e 01 Ih ' r 'll"Opcr ud d rcss, i.e. cO ll ccp luality jtse lf. By con tr a sl, phl' o ll cs is or ilulhen tic se l fundersl and ing is "'more in praxis than in logos'" for ils logos or underst anding aims at a further end, which is to pursue a course of action and in this way to achieve someth ing good. 94 For thi s reason, the philoso phical Augenb lick must involve a more far-reac hing sceing than the Augenb lick pertain i ng to phrone sis. Althou gh it sh ares th e di scursiv e nature of phronesis, il has to see more, and among other th ings precise ly the possibility and nature of phrone sis. And that is to say, as we w ill see in th e next chapter, that philosop hy cannot merely be in the momen t but has to see it as s uch , namely as th at unified te mporality which is the ulti mate horizon o f und ersta nding in general . During th e twe nties, Hcidegger slron gly emph as ises the possibi lity of change in connec tion wi lh philoso phy. This is hardly s urpri s ing, cons idering that he und erstand s himsel f 10 be challen gin g an en tire philoso phical traditio n, not least its inlerpre lalio n of Ari sto tl e. Still, the focus on the beginn in g o f ph ilosop hy ra th er lhan on its end or res ults makes it a bit difti cult to decide how exactly Heidegger conceiv es of the "validity" of his own project. Howev er, as he himself says at the end of Sein und Zei/, whethe r the way one has chose n is the righl one can be decided onl y in retrosp ect." ln other words, w helher one's logos has rea ll y mana ge d to address things su ch as Illey tful y are is a matter for further experie nce ta decide. ln accorda nce wi th his emphas is on lhe aspect of challen ge and change in philoso ph y, Heideg ger occas ionally de scribes philoso phy as a "counte r-m ove ment" (Gegellbeweglll1g) 96 Fi rst, insofar as Iife is a fonn of movem ent or kinesis, philoso phy has to counter this movem ent, since it usua ll y involve s a fa iling to endoxa. ln t)lS sense, philoso phy can be sa id to move in the oppos ite direction as compar ed to everyda y li fe, for it returns to th at wh ich had always been und erstood instead of losing itse lf in intrawo rld ly beings and th eir commo n interprc tations, w hi ch only enact thi s underst anding. But the express ion "counle r-move ment" s imultan eously implies that philoso phy has no immedi ate access to ilsel f and ilS sphere o f intell igibil ilY bu t h as to take a detour. Thi s
94 GA 19, p. 139. This expressio n refers 10 E. N. 1 t 41 b2 1 "SZ, p. 437. %GA 19, p.98;GA61 , p. 153.

pl t' t\I ClIIlH.: nl is of course alt'cady ,in the and lhat is to say, kinetic constltutlOn of ake ,,11'LletLl l"c sinee this tells us that underst andll1 g necessa nly as m s liN' o f presup po.silio ns w hen it addres ses somet m g a

N IlIClhing . Il . . When discliss ing the hermen eutic circle ln Sem un d Z ./, Heideg ger . l "'II ,:; tll'It wc must not mi stake it for somc k ind o,r o rblt that slInp ,Y ) , . h' . 1 the " most original kmd of knowle dge lS N Sl 'lins itself, For In t lS circ e, tl f provide d that we succeed in workin g out ;;,e fore- strtture 0 '. ' U' ' f he thin gs thcmsclvcs", But ltl SO ar as we 111 telms 0 t . b i t "one" s ays our ' II' C nor mally govern ed by dOXQ or Y w ,a '.. , . ' fr ntation betwee n Qur presuppOSltlOnS tllld ersland mg mvolve s no con 0 . l ' kind o f self1 111(\ the thin gs thems elves , but mov es precise y ln a sum eient orbit. Howev er,
erydayne ss may seize upon the heritage, it happens thal the possibility 10 tear the heritage from. b 't tO an original explicale dll ess, that IS, !t1 t <;; leX IS and to 1 OUi of everyday ness and agai nst it, the nature of to appropn are , 98 conceptual ity [das BegrijJliche] in the proper sense.
'l'l\

Wh 'l

day ('vicioU circle" of und ers tandin g, and to 5 stcp out 0 f th e every . tuality th at does not n1erely sustam an every ct ay , tl cvclop a con cep , .' ct o f a rcso lve th at turns illhcriled intellig ibility , phlloso phy IS IIlnee. ' bl on ly if il . 15 ngain st lis ow n presu pp as ition s , W hl Ch . passi e her hori , zon turns toward s someth in g, that IS to say anat, 99 'or meanin g in relation to wh ich one's presuppositi ons o ffer III this way, there is in the philoso ph ical resolve a kmd 0 co . t and future. As far as Heideg ger 's mterpre talton 0 one could say that Heideg ger has to aga mst Ih e receive d v iew on Aristotl e, since it up 15 ow n 't' and to direct himself lowards that hon zon by means of prcs uppOSl IOns, wh ich it is possibl e to liberate Aristotle from everyda yness.

Q1

.\ d Alita liche di e Erbsc haft an sich reiGe n kann , es, ," WC.' ,as . g . nUi lichkeit die Erbschaft zu entre1i3e,n und dn ll dn s Dascl1l dl C Mogl! chkcll A 1 d h aus der Allta,glichkelt und
. .. ,/ ' ,,, 'II
,,')

SZ, p, 153, GA 1S, p.

1 \1 ClIlC,r SIC ln

(Cl

Cl

lell Zli nn g el , . . " illl eigen/lichen Simle Qllweigl1e,1.

GA 18, p. 272.
17<)

178

'II I\I" II :I( 1,1HII( To appropriale lhe pasl is in Il c id egge l"s wal'ds 10 rCll'icvc (wiederholen) il or 10 lake il back . Thcl'cby . olle eo mes baek 10 and takes aver that which one had always becn, \\Illich in ilS tmn is possible only bec8use one is also on the \Vay or dirccled lowards oneself as possibil ily.' OO Thal wh i ch philosophy has a lways bee n is Arislolelian ism. Insofar as H eidegger does not want to formu late jusl another version of Aristotelianism, it seems that even his attempt to Iibcrate Aristotle from the tradition requires that he turns against Aristotle as wei l and interprets hi s thou ght in the light of a conception of being Ihal was supposed ly out of l'eac h for him. MOSI specifically, in Ihis conneclion, wha( Heidegger has (0 COlliller is precisely Ihe idea lhat phil osop hy would need no such countering, since it is self-sufficient and complete. However, it is precisely this criti caJ assessmcnt of Aristotle that granls ta Heidegger the possibility of appropriating Aristotle's conceptuality " in ils truc sense" and thercby of seei ng that Aristotle in fact has shown the way to another co nception of phil osophy by means of hi s concepl of kinesis. ln lhis way, wh en direclin g ilself lowards Arislotle's concepl of kines is as ilS proper sclf-expl icalion, philosophy cornes to back to lhat whi ch il had always been: Aristotle. Thus here we begin to see lhe conneclion between kinesis on the one hand and temporality and historicity on lhe other. Insofar as philosophy is kinetic, it has access to the presenl only by being directed towards a

(11 1\ 1'11111 11 1 11

lhiitlSUphi sill g I1wk cs I1Hlllll co, I , ll\{ll lu.:l'I.': I1lUlI is 1111'0'""11 o ut l'rom and I . . l ,,103 Wilh lhis hi msclr und is hy 110 III 'ons hls. OW11, Y',
vic\V th e se if-sliflic icncy of th e th corctlcal Ide 15 ovclcome, for of philosophy is n O longer energeia but kin.esis, though .thlS undcrstood withut recourse to the model of productlOn - or that IS at
ICli SI

'o ,

Ile idegger's intention. . Il owcver man is beyond himsel f also in everyday understandlllg, "Ince lhat the sense of transcendence, which makes possible ulH.lcrstanding of being. But if this transcending, kinetic understandln g o r bcin g makes up the essence of lire, then ph il osophy corresponds to Ille essence of existence to a much greater extent than uther of lire. For non-philosophieal Iife involves usin g the understandlllg of hcin g [or the sake of some other end. As we saw ab ove, in Einleitul1g in rI/e Philosophie, Heidegger argues lhal the transcendence, that IS, achon o f' fh eo rein is not the mst origi nal one, in that it presupposes an und crswnding of being which it cannat thematise. Then he goes on to

i;

!-lay:
1f now transcendence makes up the bas ic humal1 Dasei n in general, then in explic it n?thLll g Jess happens than that the essentially transcendll1g Dasem essential in the explicit letting hap pen of transce nde nce . 1 becoming essential of Dasein in explic it expl1cJt question of being as such, is nothing but phllosoplllSJ1lg.

future end. This is the conceptualisat ion of being, which philosophy addresses in (erms of its past; il is however no longer taken for granted but is criti call y enacted. Accordingly, Heidegger can describe th e mcthod of phenomcno logy as reducton, construction and destruc tion : the rcduction from beings to being in the present has meaning only in a response, Ihat is, in a construction that projects a being upon ilS being, and w hi ch in ils lum has gol its specifie direlion from a destru ction of lradil ional ontology.'02 If th is is lhe structure of lhe phi losophical logos, then it is apparen tly outside itself, directed towards a horizon wh ich lets it address somelhing as somethin g but wh ich is nol exhausted in any s in g le act of understanding. Indeed: " Thi s is precise ly w hat
SZ, pp. 325, 339. And in GA 18, pp. Heidegger points to precisely this concept to show what it means to frame a proper conceptuality.
'00
11)1
Il)2

ln ph ilosophy, that which we already werc, our essence, is released, whcreas normally, we enact our essence with some further end 10 Vlew, nlld this end conceals OUf essence, and makes us turn away fr?m o urselves. But in philosophy, we are lranscending and understandlilg bcing or, to draw a paraliel to Aristolle, we are contemplating the good juSI for the sake of these activities themselves. ln fact, Heidegger takes
Ill' G A 21, p. I l: " Denn das wird gel'ade (lS offenbar daU darin de r Mcnsch aus si ch sel.bst und selbst h11lausgeworfe:l wlrd und ganz IIml g uI' nichl das Eigcntum semer selbst ISt. . 1 1().1 (j 1 27 2lY " Wenn nun die Transzendenzdas Grundwesen des mensch hclen ausmacht, so gesch ieht im ausd rOck lichen Gc'ringcrcs 'li s das da!} das wescnhaft tran szendierende Dasem un T rullS7.c nd cllz wird .. Wesentl1chwerden im nuscll'llCklicltc ll das Fragen nach dem Sel! Il l" sOlchcn, iSI 1lIC ondel'clI ni'! Phll osophLc rcn. hIS

GA 24, pp. 29.30.

180

1K1

'II APTI' I< l'()III<

( 'II A !' II ' I HHII (

one step further than Aristotle on this po int, liS h" stlltes Ihal philosophy as expllelt transcendenee not only fll /fil s bUI in(/oed is the essence of hfe; however, sin,ce this is norma ll y no! fui fi lIed or explicit, man is for the mos! part not 111 accordance with his Own essenee.'Ol ln this way, it seems that philoso phy, for Heidegger too, has IIke an praxis - structure, having its end Immancntly. For even If phiiosophicai th' k' .
. '. '. ' 111

'ccll is "soll1cr hing us sO lllcthill g", li kOffl fil/ os. ln other \Yord s, he

"us to Hnswcr Ihe qu eslio n why il is Ihat e.g. Ihe definition of man as " hiJlcd an ima l" (zoioll dipolll1) can be regarded as a unity and not as a 107 nIH II rold, w hi ch wou ld I1ljlke man not one thi ng but several. T he llllswcr is this:
We have a efinition, not if the name and the accoulll des igncHe the sa ille (for then ail accounts would be de fi nitions; ... ), but when the account concerns something pr imary . Such are ail accounts which do not in volve the predication o f one thing of another. J-Ience essence wi ll belong to nothing except spec ies o f a genus, but to these only; for these do not secrn 10 be spoken of in terms of participation or affection, nor as if Ihey were accidents. lOS

mg

15 110t

perfect or

filII s hed, It thlS nnperfeet, this kinetic essence of Iife to its supreme In oth er words, even thou gh philosophy on H eIdegger s account wIll address being in clifferen! aspects, ilS addrcss IS n everth e,less the supreme fOl"ln of speech, for exp licitly turning towards bemg an d determmll1 g Il in its particularity is th e highest change as eo mpared wilh eve ryday speech, whieh ca n only sec the genera!. However, II1sofar as ph ilosophy only releases Our essence it has no ,resu lt, and 111 thl s sense in vo lves no chan ge. It only lets us be th at whlch we already were. TI1US a Il th e diffcrences notwithstanding, it . looks as one could nevertheless with so me justifi cal ion say that, on HeIdegger s accollnt as we il, philosophy ca n be regarded as the most mlense as weil as th e mos t tranquil aCl ivit y, just like Ar istotle's theoretical lit. 9. The formaI indication

T he fonn of speech that is proper to the definition, insotr as this should

capture th e thing as it is in itself, is not lege i n li kala linos, since this

o\.: pi cts the thing in terms o[ something cise, but logos ka th } hallto. This
ccrtainly art ic ulates the essence and in th is sense in vo lves a kind of divis ion, but it nonetheless explicates wha t th e thing is, ra th er th an predicates something ab out il. One co uld say that the definition, instead
0 [' attri buting some foreign fea ture to the thing, lets it co me 10

In the previous secti on, th e philosophical logos was to aim at the , proper t r' cO,ncep ua .lsa tlOn 01 being. It is 1l0W time to take a more careful look at thlS pursult. In th e Melaphysics , as Aristotle discusses essence and detinlllOn (llorisIllOs), he deela res that:
The in a dc tinil ion musl form a unily, because the defin ll l?1l IS fi rormu la [logos) which is One and concerns substance 50 t.hal lt must a formula of one particu la r thin g; for the deslgnates one Ihmg and someth ing definite, as we say. 10li

expression in its own words, il forms a unit y, cons isting of gcnus (e.g. "ani mal") and differentia (e.g. "biped"), and th e gelllls has no existence lIpart from the essenc e (or it exists onl y as potenliality).' 09 Being

Aristotle's primary task in this context is thus to explain how th e unit y of the essence can be preserved in speech, grant ed that Ihe basic forrn of
See GA 27, pp. 3, 214. Met, I0 37b24 27: "oel 8 ye v etvOi oaa ev '"' -d O"nv et KC ouaia, wO"'te Ev6 nvo oei OfLO"/li", 0 yap oyo v n Kal 'toSe n OTif.Lai VEL, Wc; $/lEV." V El Val oyov' KCIL yp il ouata
106
lOS

107 This q uest ion is posed in Met. 1045a7 ff The discuss ion of the relat ion between c<;scnce and defin ition as far as Ihei r unit y is concerned is 10 be found notably in Mel. VII, Ch. 12, Book Vlll , Ch . 6. IOM Me t. 1030a714: "6p'\.cr)lo ' a1:.v O\H( av ovo)la "AO'f1J! WtO 011f.La\Vtl (nvte 'Y p av elEV oi "AOYO opm' ... ), U.." EclV rrp()'tou 1:lVO 1;' "[ow'ra s' v ocra l cr )''fE'tCH /li! (io lm't' DJ.ou )"'fEcr9at. OK a'tal apa oSEvi 'twv ).lit 'fvou ",Icv \mapxov 'to li Elven, /c totOt f.LOVOV (WllW 'fp O OKEi ou Kat \IEtOxl1v iYEcrScn Kat miSo oS' ffi crUf.LPEPllKO)" 09 M e l. 103832 6. M. KeBler has suggested that the basic problematic in this l:on ncction, that i5 to say, not only as regards lhe nature of delinition bu t a lso wit h res pect to the nature of essence, is that Aristotle expel s the matter from the essence, sa Ihat Ihis is thought to consist of forlll on ly, for the resul t ofthis is, he argues, that IIl I.! ca nn ection betw ee n the particular thing an d its essence is broken, which is cx acll y the problem Plata was racing and which Aristotle believcd he had overcom e. l'he soluti on to th is probl em, as KeBl er sees it , is th us to invite the matter back into Ill u essence ga in ;lIte! accordi ll gly in terpret the delinit ion's combinat ion ofgenus and difrc rclll in ns idc llli cili 1 fi combinatio ll of militer a nd form; Aristote/es ' Lellre von 0 dt'I' deI' Ik/J IIII/II ., he Icx lU n' !> uppOr1 ror Ihi s Interpretation IS Illainly Mel. II

182

IX1

C I 11\ 1' Il ' 1( 1'111 11( uni versal , the gentls must be delimitecl by Ihe dillc l'ellli u ill ord er to be proper to the thin g or depict something dcfin ile , There are two ideas of Aristotle's concernin g the deJin ition whi ch arc of parti culaI' im portance to Heidegger in this connectio n. Firslly thal Ihe de finiti on cannot predicate anything of the thing, for th en it woulcl annihil ate th e unit y of th e thin g, and seco ndly, that th e definiti on captures the thing such as it is in itself by del imiting or circumscribin g iL The latter aspect o f the dc finiti on means that il delimits ilS object and thereby is abl e to show what th is rcall y is, thus being the sharpest contrast to the indefi niteness of everyday speech, which onl y can say how thin gs are " more or less" . This aspect is emphasised by Heidegger in hi s di scuss ion o f Ari stotl e's co nception o f de finition in Gr undbegl'/f e der aristo telischen Philosophie." o E ve n though f Heidegger to some ex tent relrieves th e idea o f delimitati on in his own notion o f phil osophi cal ex plicati on, he thinks that the belier in th e possibility of a full delimitation is rooted in th e und erstandi ng of being as presence, or more prec ise ly as Fe rtigse in. If being is regarded as something that is fini shed and not on the way towards somethin g, it is poss ible to delimit it without loss, sinee the de tinition leaves nothing out. !ts aspect of limit has positi ve signification onl y, in that Ihe essence des ignated by the de nniti on, alth ough not uni versal like th e genus, is unrelated to th e contingent, particular state o f the th ing, i.e. to the

sumbebekos, But when being is understood in tenns of parti cularity and facticity, th e possibility of proper dclimitation becomcs a problem, since th e re lati vely general character o f the de lini tion makes it incapable of delimitin g the essence in iLS facti ca l particularity. For example, in Sein und Ze il it is statcd that the essence ofDasein is ilS exi stence,111 and the existence is th en explicated and differentia te d in its tum; but this existence is a lways enaeled in a particul ar way, il always has a certain meanin g, etc. , and this pa rti cul arity cann at be captured by the philosophieal ex pl ication. Not only because thi s would be an endless task, but al so because th e words and concepts that are used are
Book Vlll ,
III

gcncl'al. n ut il' the delinili on cannt do justice to facticity, it '1 'cms that il S Hccount is Il ot onl y insurncicnt, as if il would just be a ll Hl tt cr of cxtcndill g th e account, but that it in some sense says sO cth ing l'a lsc, for in arti culatin g general structures , or in using lll HOllnJi concepts, it speaks ab'out something which rea lly does not exist, 01' aS I\ ristotl e would say, which only has potential extstence. Thus tt seems that Hcidegger here is facing qui te a different probl cmati c than l\ J' istotl c. To Ari stotl e, the bas ic qu estion is how the de nnition can lll'ti culatc the essence in its unit y without destroying ilS generality when il eli vides and "particularises" it ioto genus and di fferentia, whereas to Il cidegger, th e problem is that gen eral concepts cannot depi ct th e eSsence in its particularity or factical enactment. Il owcver, as Heidegger sees it, th e gen eral character of language s ho uld still not be re ga rded as mere ly an obstacl e to ge nuin e philosophisin g. The task of philosophy is after ail to say something that is tJ'u c in principle and not just to account for the unique, whi ch 1Il0reover wo uld not be access ible, were it not for the existence of a gcnerali ty or normality. As he puts il in one or his earliest lectures, just as problematic as th e belief in the poss ibility of a general definiti on that is suitable to everything is the idea th at philosophy onl y has to do with 11 2 h ' Ihe concrete, and that this cann ot be fonnali sed. As we ave seen 1I1 connecti on with his explication of the as-structure, Heidegger is tryin g and in this he is surely not the fi rst one - to find a way to overcome tb e sha rp oppos ition betwee n the general and th e parti cular. Thus the gcneral meaning or concept in terms of which wc understand somcthing HS somethin g, albeit repetitive, is not thoughtto ever exist as completely undiffcrentiated and uni versal , but to always be differenti ated inso far as it forms a part of th e act of understandin g. T his view is not entirely dissimilar to Aristot!e's notion of the genus as dunam is, as somethin g Ihat has the poss ibility of being di fferenti ated and determined in
di fferent ways , although Heidegger would emphasise Ihat the d unamis ilSclf is faeti cal and th erefore individualised. Thus one should perh al's

6, whe,re Aristotl e indeed seems to suggest something similar, evc n

though he earher has reJected ma tter as a part

l'' GA 18 5 8.
SZ, p. 42.
'

orthe de fi nition.

J'Hth er say th at th e dan ger of the generality of language is one o f umbi guity and indefi niteness , whi ch comes about as concepts and slHtclllcnlS are und erstood in isolati on from th eir co ntext of enaclment.
1 Il

(i A 6 1. p. 2tt

184

1 Il ,11 ' Il Il 1'1" 1/(

uu, 1Il'i tl" ",., , ' /Il Il 1Il Illpl IH 1 tl lll! ' OI'/II "" 1 '1/1 1 ' 1 1 Ihlll ph lloN
.
10

'() (' II II !,'II , /{ 1 l! I(

" l h ui Illcll cali on" (ji'J1'1II0 /I ' IlN .. t' 1 ) 1111 Id , lC' llll t L: J'slood as " fol'lll . tfi': . ntl y III eo Heldeg ger 's leellires ," 'ior Il' \ '''1'11 lUI(1 Z 1,;;" l ' OCC lIrs Ircqu e , ('-" '" ' ' dmll1g IhlS concel' I, u ' Ji e,degg er sets Out fi ' . 10m IIu ssc rl 's di s, ' . . bc!ween l11Canill J.( and Ji JI , (Bedeutungsin lenlion )' I/1g 0 ' tull " ment b whlch In briefte rms is a distin t' ' , C IOn etween on Il le One hand intcndin u . . g someth ing Or h . Or meanm h' of ,avIn g a conceptIOn , , SOmet mg, and II present In experie nce or intuitio n (Al1schauul1g ) on the other. '14 1'0 h regard the assert ions ofph" ' 1 osop y as formai i d' t'JOns ln , Il Ica sense l S to reaJise that th ' " ey can on ly Con vey me ' th ", , ,aOln g mtentlOns but nOI l' h e It vl/1g" experi ences' ln w lIC these lntent' " fi l/ d" IOns are enacted and cl 1 e . This means th at l'he COllee t h t' P s lise by phi/osoph y cannot speak abOlit the ir theme in a s tra' b ' Ig l orward or direct . th d' way, ut only poim in , ' ' e trectlOn ofa possible e.xpcncnc e or fu/film ent:
, Il II I I ll ! rdll1ldd

fi' il; IV III IIIIS proble, " is 10 sug u" ' 1

J ..

1,1 rO I' -J'lIl Ilo t 10 regard phi loso phiea l texts as fi xed, general their , IIIII IIS, bill to ac knowl cdge Ihei r faet icity, i, e, that they have is nol altoget her ln Il eo nc rele s ituation of enactm ent which

In, u ll ll'''I I, , 17

1111..' rhnnal indicat ion ca lls upon us to real ise that language cannat be Thal lH l,p 1 wly ulldcrstood \v ithout a trans formati on of our existen ce.
"" " is to be underst ood require s that we leap into its proper or on 0I1 I1' ""5ioll , so to speak, so that il can be underst ood as it is in itself at we must li. I/ IV Il tcrm s , This seems to suggest that Heideg ger thinks th \V ith respect ta the re lation betwee n ,11 1(0 re-exam i ne the assertio n "hl 'cl IlIId predi cale, Il is one thing that, as a conseq uence of the notion nol 01' .d 1 111111 ind icati on, assertio ns about truth, being, lime, etc., must of a property to an object III' IlIkcn to ascribe a predica te in the sense ; bu t IV lde h is suppo sed to have this property in an indiffer ent way n 111"' co ver, it seems that Heideg ger too thinks that the re lat ion betwee of logos kath' . lI h jcel alld predica te sho uld be und erstood as a kind t let somethin g l/t lll/O, sa that th e assertio n is regarde d as an attemp t words, N otably in his Iater works, \ tune ln ex press ion in ilS own e Il c/dcgge r uses such seemingly taulolog ieal express ions as "die Sprach '1II'Ieil/" , "die Welt wellet", etc" whi ch can be interpre ted as sayi ng that, nguage Ir il w as possible, which it perhaps is nOl, phenom ena such as la [ro m \vith in ulld wo rld shou ld be articu lated in their own words and w hich IlIci!' Qwn dimens ions and not be describ ed by mea ns of terms 118 hllve th eir origin elsew here. ntl y Ilut s ince th e nature of philoso ph ica l la ng uage is appare be d ' pcnd cnl upon the reader, on his or her awaren ess thal th is must s ly not possibl e to make ,",de rstood as a forma i ind ication, it is obviou in ad va nce that the assertio ns of philoso phy will be interpre ted ing cOITecll y, A s stated earlier, the danger ofmisin terpretati on is someth the receptio n of his Ihll t 1 leidegg c r also has stressed in connec tion with n was misund erstood , 0\\' 11 work , c laimi ng Lhat h is ana lys is of Dasei tial s incc one conceiv ed of the relation betwee n Dasein and its existen . 119 Since il is always stru ctures as an ':object ual" (vorha nden) relation
he Alrcady in GA 56/5 7, howevc r, when Heidegger disclisse s the nature of value, 46, daI ms thut " dcr WC!'t Wet'tc l" , p, ", GII 29/3 0, pp, '12542Q,

c nac! a Iransfonn ation o f hillls If e

" They are in dica tive , 1hal 15 10 say the Ill e . , antem of these allll1g C d" ' concepts does Il ot den a te say re lati on 10 i l onl y . or I/'e.c tlyca f that wh ich if has a . g rves an IIldi .' , und erstandm g perSan is C'Cl Il ed upon by 11 . Ion , a 'WH thal the
.1
WII l

Ils COntex! of concepts to respect 10 his Dasei n."j

Sce GA 21, p, 410; GA 58, p, 3 GA 60 t42 6 GA 6 , . .' GA 63 , p. 80. But [hi s [he m' so pp. 63 -64 ;in GA 1, pp. 20, 28-34 ' 1,141 _ 29130 . e IS ,al tak en up K IS1C J argues tJ:at \Vi th thi T. ' pP;, language which is a la s nOll on, HeIdegge r breaks \V ith Ari s oUslological" of full POssessio n. The idca indication is in line as formaI being On the \Vay a ,, 1 el egger's understanding' of ma' s eX istence as alway n ' s pu re dynarnis m" ilL" d!catlon formelle de la f: '. . ge ' s ln nese ctsa transformat ion" p 2 13 ' not!olJ of forma I exp/ored by s log/sehe Vorurteil, pp. 30! _31 3 LoglSehe Unlersllchungen II/l 9 ' lU . and 1//2, Chapter One, " . G A 29/30, p. 430: "Sie sind D anZe lgend, darin ist ge ' dl eser Begriffe ':icht direkt das, worauf ei ne Anzei ge IJlWeis darauf, da O der Vers teh eZle t, er gibl nur von Dasein zu vollziehen " g aufgeforderr ist, eine Verwan dhrng SC Iller selbs l 111 das ' 116 GA 6/ , p, 33 ,

113

not nothin g, the ronn' J ' . . mdlcatl On is not empty ' , HeIdeg ger points out for lvl,e, glvmg a,a ' fi d 1 . . . th e Indlc,atIOn de limits the Poss ibilities . IrectIOn or lows a of unders certam "form" upon il 11 6 St' II t1e fom l' d' tandmg , il bes , ' 1 , , la m Ication has a prohibi tive charact er and should accord' ; b mg y e taken as a wam ing '' it c ommands us
. , IS IS
j

Jiowev er th'

'" cr. G1I 60, p, p, 64; GA 63, p, 80.

186

(' II AI'I I ' I( HlI ll( lh e rcad cl doe s not in hi s or her lum Iry to "' Iill " th e concept s but lets th em n':J1luill pos sibl e lhal ph il oso phie al spee ch wi ll hc IllISlIlId crslood , il'

'li A I' 11 ,:1( HH JR " 1hl s is pC l'hap s not n pal'ticularl y surpnslIl " It as far as Hei deg ger g ! l,;$ U , ." ' , ' , in raet th at this dese nptl n'IS mor e 1 Ollci.:l'll cd. Il owcvcr, Il SCCI 11S , 't is " .' l ' atti tud e to war ds l ogo s, suc h as 1 l'I' I"'ll pI'IlIte 10 1 A,ls tot e s I f Hei deg ger 's own view on thi s ' ''llIu J'slo od by He ide gge r: t lan or ' ' ' 1 b l pres ente d here, l mua II we saw how Heideg ger HHll l er, as Il HIS eCI y, A' 1 wou ld have a simp le 1 l 'LI ta co me to grip s \Vith the idea that n stot e . l , 't hantikos in the sen se of not sce lng ' s ""l Io n o f log os apop d H 'd r 's idea that Aris totl e , ' The el egg e jll esup poSltlOn S, . n we foll owe d. b t onl y bec ause he saw its "111 1<1 cert ainl y affi rm eve ryda y oxa , u h ve seen how Hei deg ger II nl;I
1 11

to regard them as forma i indications.

ion of ail idea of how ta read phil oso p hy as sue h, l2 oFo r i f ail form s of und erst and in g and exp lica tion hav e th e eha raet er of dun ami s, phi loso ph iea l texts sho uld not be take n 10 eon s ist in fini shed , com plel e assertions , but in pos sibi litie s, and to con ce ive of lhem thus is prec ise ly

notion of formai indicati on sho uld be rcgarded as an exp ress

in asta te ofambiguity and generalit y, phi losophi ca l speech l'uns the l'is" of bein g noth ing but Ger ede , that is, an exp lica tion that is s uita blc III eve ryo ne and ther efor e to no one , Tha t is one of th e reas ons wh y " con stan t task for philoso phy is to retrieve its own eon eept uali ty, T hus the s ugg es tion tha l ph ilos oph iea l arti cula tion sho uld he und e rsto od as forma i indi cation is not 50 muc h an idea of how lan gua ge aetu a ll y wor ks, as if Hei deg ger was hop ing that it might be pos sib le 1 0 esca pe obje etif ying lang uage, as rath er a cali to read phil osop h y in " new way , That is to say, even thou gh one mig ht tlr ink that it is only th e concepts rcfe rr ing to Dasc in that mus t be understood as formai indi ca tions, s ince the se concep ts can not be objc ctify in g in the sens e thal terms designating "object ive bein g" can , 1 think it is clear that tht.:

9, Concluding remarks Wit h the inqui ry into th e phil osop hieal logo s, the in vest igation of logo s as disc ursi vity is in som e sens e brou ght to an end, As the supr eme form of acti on, that is, of kinesis, the phil osophical logos does not only reve al the orig ina l poss ibil ity o f logo s, to unc ove r bcin gs just for the sake of the une ove rin g itselt; but it also poin ts oui Ihe lim its of this purs uit. If mea nin g is to be und erst ood in term s ofp oss ibility or dunamis, and if it belo ngs to the natu re of dunall1is that it nece ssarily poin ts bey ond itse lf and in th is way involves absence , complete articu lat ion is not pos sibl e. ln thi s way , one cou ld say that lhe rout e the tlue e last chap t ers hav e trav elle d is one from a bcli ef in the unre stric ted pow ers of logo s ta the d isco very and affi rma tio n of its finit ude ,

S as an th at Ans totl e 15 even tua y H 'deg ger who \Vas init iall y , el 1I 11 c ,."allvC ta 1ogo s, By , , efim tely en"l lea 1 0 f logo s , at leas t in its IIjl JlJ'oa ehe d as someOl le d 'bT 1 llico relic al form , but Wl0 was then sho wn to argu e for the pOS SI 1 1tY of , ' 1 l'Ce has finally bec n " 't d Il'' lI uthentie thou gh de rIml e, 10 gos JO " prae tlca 1<' , di spla yed as someon e who th mks h he life com plct ely dev oted to the t at t rI is in [aet the supreme one. I Cfdi sation 0 og as . bl ence s as regards thcir faith But in spil e or thel r p OSSl" e in 1 er 1 h t IngOs, Heid egg er and Aris totle hav e one thin g in eOn1l:100 , Yt lhey both agre e lhat the end of the phil oso phle allo gos IS ooto , COll ceptua l Isa t'lOIl or " Iogi e" of being, lt is to thls proJeet we \V I
tul'11.

t;c\ scopc.

in this

introduce nou

formally indicate their objects.

Sec GA 18 , p. 309, where Heidegger claim s th at Ari sto tle 's ca tego ri es on ly

188

1K')

[[ .\ 1' 1111 IIV I

Chapter Five

LOGOS AND BEING

\Vi th onlOl ouy IllId Hullnll II I (IN PI'CSC II CC, but al.so l'o r th e way in whle[) t t ' lrl tj ues ti ull o r th e mcanin g of hcin g. Th is proj cct must u[1[lIt I'ellll y ill vo lve a chal lenge to Aristoll e's undcrstandin g tim e ..ll owcvcr, w l1 en dcvc lopin g hls of lcrnp orality , Heidegge r is in flIC! rctri cvin g, or 50 alleast 1 Will argue, a lI ution of temporality th at is impli ed already in Arislotle's concept of

or

kill es is.

1. From logos fa being

T he guiding idea of this chapter, which sim ultaneously is to be cxamined by it, is the one indicated already at the beginning of thi s stlldy, namely that in bath Heidegger and Aristotle, the
pursuit is esscntially governed by their conception of l,agas. 1 hat
1$ ,to

ln the preceding chapters, Heidegger's conception of the eonnection between logos and being has reeurred continuously. For one thing, the analysis of the as-structure has not only distinguished between different
levels of logos but also tri ed to circul11scribe \Vhat in Heidegger's view are the basic ways in which il is possibl e to address reality, name ly thase that have beell de signated as the epistemic, the everyday and th e

philosophical mode of speech respectively. In particular, however, the question concerning the relation between logos and being has been treated as a question concern in g the being of logos itself. In thi s connection, it has been suggested th at Heidegger's conception of speech
and discursive reason iI1volves an interpretation ofman 's being in tcrm s

say , it moves from logic to ontology, rather th an m th e op pos It e direction. It is thus an implicit task of this chapter to justiry th e co urse th at the the sis itself has taken, since it too has tried ta approach Ihe questions of ontology by means of an investigation of logos. [ .w ill devote the remaining part of this section to a brief survey 01 th e dilTerent senses in wh ich 1 think this idea should be und erslOod . Thereby, 1 wi ll rep eat some of what has been said alread y in Chap ter One. As stated in that chapter, there is in Heidegger's work already at tlt e outset an awareness of the intimate connection between ontology an [ogic, granted that the meaning of "Iogic" is not restricted ta th at fo rm ai discip line which we normally knaw as logic, but can be taken 111 a \V ldel' sense, designating the inquiry into speech as such. This is also th e sense in which Heidegger speaks about logic for the most part , SO as 10 indicate that logic as il actually came to be devel oped docs not dis pl"y th e on ly direction possible for the philosophi c".l inqu iry int o ,In gos" Il cnce the necessity of developing alogie that dlsplays th e vU l'l cty 01 logo; in tenns of which man ad dresses re ality. Therewith, thi s [oglc reveals the different senses of being and must according ly fOI'1I1
1111

of kinesis which tries to put Aristotelian onto[ogy in ta question, insofar as this ends up locating the supreme poss ibility for man 's existence in

energeia or entelecheia. In this chapter, 1 will develop further th e eonnection between logos and bein g, and in doing so, 1 will spell out more clearly the ontologieal implications of Heidegger's retrieva[ of Aristotle's concept of logos, as it has been explicated thus far. In other words, the overall aim is to clarify the way in which logic as the investigation of logos is related to the topi c of ontology in both Heidegger and Aristotle.
Returning to that view of logos [rom which this study origillally set out, according to which speech and discursivity should be interpreted after the model of logos apophantikos, the assertion, 1 will expl ain Heidegger's idea that this conception of logos is inseparably bound up with Aristotle's understanding of being as presence. Against thi s background, 1 will show how Heidegge r 's e laborat io n of th e
Aristote lian logos ca me to be deci sive
11 0 \

intcgral part of ontology, The idea that the inquiry int o lin w ithout an analysis of speech will co ntinu e to gUide th roughout the twenli es, since il is part and parce l of !li s l'I oli oll 0 1 '

on ly for hi s co nfrontati on

phcnorn enolagy . Sti ll, the madilcation of Heidegger's prajeci tlt ut pl ace dllrin g this period res ults in a shill o f fOClIS. I2ventu ull y, Il IS co nc llldcd tltal th e phil nso phy o f li re is not altogeliter central bu t I,,,tltel' preparaI ory . il! !Iult Il clcnr th !! \Vay l'or th e (If' 111\."
19 t

1 90

<' I/ A I'II ' I( l ' I V I ' t 'II A I' II 1( II VI

existential analytic. J

I11 cHning of bcin g, Ihe scopc or wl1i ch is rh olJ ghr ro cX lcncl bcyo Jlcl the
OI Cll llill g o r logos lins bcoli l:4IVl' lI tw cll tt l:l.!lItral place in Ileide gger's l'lIgnge l11 ent. \V ith Mi stotl 's pliil osopliy Us a wh ole. . 1r Aristotle 's ontology is dcpcndc nt upon hls understandmg of logos, Olle l11ust be a bit care rul w ith lh e idea oceasionally mdlcated by Il cidegger, namely thal Ari stotle' s views of speech and reason could be cx plain ed by means of traeing them baek ta thelr 't' prcs up po SI lOns. TI,I'S must not be taken to mean that Anstotle ,s IInderstanding of logos, his "Iogie", could somehow be reduced to hls OJ1t ology, as if there were a simple route from logie to ontology m Ari stotle. Their interrelation must rather be said to constttute a kmd of circle. For as we have seen, a central tenet ofHeidegger's interpretatlOn o r Aristotle as whole is his conviction lhat Aristotle's work IS go verned by sorne speculative notion of being, nor m li anded down by the tradition, but rests upon an expenenee of the lhings thernselves", sinee Aristotle is a phenomenologie.1 thinker, and Ilot merely in a naive way . Even though Heidegger tends ta eonclude Il1at , in the end, Aristotle ' s ontlogy is more or a .natural continuation of the everyday understanding of being, th us that it was only within Aristotle ' s power ta artieulate this ullderstandmg but Ilot really ta refleet upon it, he does not seem ta think that the limlted seope of Aristotle's ontology ean be aceounled for simply by refernng to its pre-critical or nave character. Heidegger certamly 110t as cribe to Aristotle any conception of transcendental condi t IOns of L11l(1 erstan d mg, but he indicales th"t Aristotle has realiscd the need ta ( inves tigate both speech and reason in arder to be able to reveal the nature of reality. As he puts it on one occasion:

Thus when surveying Heidegger's philoso phienl dcvelopment fi'oll1 the philosophy of factieal life 10 the project of fundamel1lal ontology, one sees that the relation between logic and ontology in his work is not merely a matter of philosophical method but characteristic of his DWJ1 philosophical path. Setting out from an investigation of the being of life, whose essential trait is speech, he eventually presses forward to th e question of being as such. Later on in this ehapter 1 will argue that this is 1101 ollly charaeleristic of Heidegger's developmellt regarded historically, but also of the projeel of fUlldamental ontology itself, sinee its very possibility is dependellt upon the proper interpretation oflogos. On his philosophieal path, Heidegger ullderstands himself to be leallillg 011 Aristotle ill several ways, as we have seen throughout this study. But wllOl has Ilot really becll explicitly dealt with thus far is that Heidegger thillks that he is fOliowing an Aristotelian approaeh also in ontologieal issues. This is because he is convinced that Aristotle's investigation of beillg is essentially determined by his understanding of logos, the ideal of non-discursive reason notwithstanding. 2 With this claim, Heidegger docs not just wanL to eall attention to the rather apparent fa ct that Aristotle repeatedly illvestigates speech in order 1'0 say something about being, Moreover, he l11eans to suggest that logos guides Aristotle in a \Vay that was Ilot entirely transparent ta Aristotle himself. Aecordingly, wh en Ictting his ontology be govemed by logos, Heidegger is repe"ting an Aristotelian path at a level of rellection that proved to be out of reaeh for Arislotle. ln his attempt to Come to grips with Aristotle's ontology, Heidegger must thus take logos as the guiding clue. If Aristotle's ontology is governed by logos, then Heidcgger's confrontation with it cannot be direct or unmediated, sa to speak. Apart from exploring the \Vay in which Aristotle speaks about being, how his ontologieal conceptuality grows out of and is motivuted by a specifie mode of address, this confrontation has to proeeed by way of an interpretation of Aristotle 's articulate notion of logos. That is why the question concerning the
See SZ, p, 1. GA 19, p. 224.

Neither ancient nor medi evat onto logy is, as ,the ignorance holds, a purely objective an expulsion of consciousness, but what is pecul,mr IS preclsely that consciousness and ego [lch] are taken to be ln the same as
the objective is taken to be , This is shawn by the fact !ha! phitosophy orients its ontology towards logos and tI,lat one ,wlth

some justification cou!d say that ancient ontology 1$ a IOglC of being, That is correct insofar logos is the phenomenon that should darify what being means,
) G A 24, p, 104: " Die anlik c 50 \'/ohl wic das mittelal,ter!ich,e O,ntologie sind, wic cli c gc w hnli chc Unk cnntlli s me iJlt, cin,e ?bJek,tlve, mit l\ussc lwllUn[\ dCI! so ndc rn eliS Elge ntmll c he 1 gerade, daf3 das 5t

192

t91

'11 i\ I"II ' I( l ' I V I

What is problematic is llot sa Il1l1 ch I\ ri s lO ll c's ollla lag ica i investigations are nave with respect to th e l'o le o f logos or, gencrally

speaking, as regards the question of access, bul rather that his understanding ofJogos in hs tum is affected by his ontology. It is partly because of this repercussion of his omology on the conception of logos that Aristotle cannot help but cstablishing logos apophan/ikos as the basic mode of speech. And as indicated by the passage just quoted, Heidegger thinks this move by Aristotle proved ta be decisive not only for ail future investigations of speech and therewith for the development of logic as weil , but also for ontology, insofar as the model of logos apophanlikos in its turn \Vas read back illla the na ture ofbeing, resulting
in a "logie ofbeing".

hcing in a vari c ly or di il is every time we say that SOtll ethin g " is":' ln th e following, l will ,explore Il cidegger' s idea that, in hi s seal'ch Jo r al/sia as unit y, Anstotle IS dnven hy the hope of findin g a specific kind of presence, namely filllshed hcin g or en/elecheia, which should make intelligible or explam an oth erwise changeable and differentiated world. But 10 pursumg thls
int erpretation, Heidegger find s that Aristot! e 's understanding .of as entelecheia in ilS tum points ta the concepts of logos and kmesls, so th at it is onl)' on the basis of thcm that one can trul)' !\ ri stotle's notion of a unified sense of being. EvcIllually, we will see how Heidegger not onl)' affirms this as an of but also lets it guide his own se arch for the unit y of bemg. But slllce Aristotle's understanding of logos is governed by his notion of being as

Accordingly, if, as Heidegger says, it is logos that should clarii)' the meaning of being, it is necessary, in arder to get a guiding clue in this pursuit, first of ail to Come ta understand why Aristotle was forced to interpret discursivity in terms of the assertion. Gnly when this is made
clear are wc prepared to begin the inquiry in10 th e meaning ofbeing.

2. Being as manifold and uni/y. Aristot/e 's critique of/he Elea/ics Ta Aristotle, and ta Heidegger as we il, the question of being is ta a great extent a question concerning the relation between manifold and unit y, that is ta say, concerning the possibility of framing a unified concept of being, once the apparent manifold nature of being has been recognised. This question is evoked not least by the experience of the wor/d as changeable, as marked by kinesis, since change no doubt seems ta imply that there are different modes of being. Aristotle seeks this unit y in ousia, "substantial being", to which ail other senses of being thus are ta be led back. In this way, ousi'a is not only what makes it possible for other "things" to be, but it is also the presupposition of logos, of the articulation of being. Therefore, the search for the unit y of being is just as much an attempt to find the unit y of logos, which makes il possible to say "something about something" and tl1US la speak about
und Teh im sel ben Sinne sei end \V ie das Objektive aIs seiend genomm en wlrd. Das bekundet si ch darin, daB die antike Philosophie ihre Ontologie auf den oyo orientiert und man mit einem gewissern Recht sagen konnl e, di e ant ikc ,sei eine Logik des Seins . Das ist n so fern ri chti g, ,ds der Logos da s Phanomen lst, das aufk W soli , was Se in bedeu tet," ren

presence, Heidegger has to reinterpret logos in the light of renewed conception oftime. . . Heidegger's interpretation of Aristotle 's understandmg of the relatton bclween logos and being largely centres on the Physics, notably on the part that is devoted to a critiqoe of Parmenides and M elissus. Heidegger returns to this critique throughout his works, and eventually he will even claim that "The Aristotelian Physics is the hidden and hence sufficiently thought-out foundational work of Western phtlosophy. The reasons why Heidegger ascribes such importance to the PhySlCS are scveral. Most specifically, he is convinced that, in this work, Anstotle comes ta grips with the basic problems that troubled his predecessors. ln virlue of his understanding of the " Iogical" nature of bemg, he IS able
Il ot on1y ta bring out the truc meaning of Parmenides' thesls on the unit y of being, but a1so ta account for the nature of c hange in a way that surpasses the steps taken b)' Plato 111 thl s ln

other words, because of his insight into the nature of kinesis, Anstotle reaches a level of clarity in ontological issues that was out of reach for hi s predecessors. For this reason, Heidegger emphasises that the PhySlCS
is a work on on toI ogy and thus not concerned merely wlth a specifie
< See GA t7, pp. 25ff.

" Vom Wese n und Bcgriff der <lJUO"l. Anstoteles, Physl, ,pp. . 30 1 GA 9 242 "Di e (l ri stotelische 'Physik' ist das verborgene und deshalb me G rund buc h der aben dlandischen Philosophie." Whole

,.

'k B 1" ("WP")

239-

/) Sec GA 1t(, p,

se ntence ita licised in Ilcidcggel" tex l. . Tliid (;1/ 1Q, D. tlRtl rcspecllvcJy.

194

111\I' IIIlII VI kincl ,of bein gs, More prcc isdy, Ihe lop ie nI' III . l'I/y.\'}rs is no l s illlply belllg, Of! plwse l, but pllusis ilscl!', and Ii mi is 1 s'Iy Ihe be' 0 \' bemg 5. 7 Thus H ' . , , , e ldegger declare s that : 1 he rcsca rch (Ih al. dca lsmg 'll w0 pllllSIS IS not hlll. g but the QClueveme nl 0) Ihe prtllW/J . ' .r ' 1 1 ' categor ies which Anstot le e,tab hshes later on in his ontology,"S ' In Grundbegriff der aristote/ischen Philosophie, Heideg ger is led e 10 the Phys/cs by hls discuss ion of lhe conditi ons of possibility of p 1 co t ' r' b' 1 ncep ua Is mg emg, A l this slage, he has reached lhe po int roper y at whic h l e, can assc rt that: tO,Aris totle, ta address a bei ng as th is 1 In $ ilsclf means to address It wlth respeel lo its ori gin (Herkunji)9 Accord in gly, the proper logos reveals the ongms or principl es o f be'n Ad' . ' 1 gs, tl' - arc.: llal. len n to do so lS preclse ly the ail11 of th e Physics, But in order to reach pnnclpl es, Anstot le l11l1st first confro nt the thesis put forward b Parmel lldes a nd Mcll sSlIS, that there on ly is one princip le of rea rly y that " being" has b LI t ont::: sense. " ,, ln Ihl' s connec ti on Heide ,50 l emphas ises lhat this shows that Ari stot le purs lies his belOg as a cnllqlle of his prcdece ssors, That is to say, he is striving to eventua ll y bnng out Ihe trll e mea ning of their thes 'ls and . . t , as ft IS " ' no so metlme s thoug ht, Just 10 criti eise th em fo r th e sa ke of c 't' , itself,'o
ri l Cl s m

11H1 Ih e burth.: n 0 1' 1

pl\l ll i . l'Il l

(:l'H l1lcd th at one spcllks IIho\ll hcill g III d i fc renl senses, \\le - who are d(1l1btin g lhal be ing is OIl C do Ilot rca ll y have to put forward an ur gul11 cnl of our OWIl , a t IC1;Jl not initi ally, but it is enou gh that we inlerro gate our oppone nls, Tor lheir answer w ill by itself eontrad ict their Ihcsis, The two eqllally hopeless alternat ives th at the E leaties are fac in g lire, as Aristot le sees it, the fo llowing: granted that being has but one scnse, either you must say th at it is th e principle th at is, but then you lllUSt conclud e that that o[ which it is a principl e is not, or the other way
round .\3

II I N U"-.. II cs c 1l11n.: 1y \Vit h th e p

. Basical l?', the,arg ument that Ar istotl e directs aga in st th e E leatics is s lmp ly lhl s: belll g ea nnot be one fo r even if you onl aekno 1 d , , ' y want w e ge one of reality, you must ad mit that "a prinei le to is of so me thlllg or thlll gS",1l Besides , Ari stotl e continll es, we appal ently do 'speak abO lit be in g in seve ra l ways 've nlust b , 'b ' , eglll o lllqu lfy y asklll g w hat they possib ly can mean who say lhat being llr is one, Do they thlll k that it is the substan ce that ca n be said t b perhap s that it is some of th e ot her categor ies sllch al' e or . l , 12 , a s qua Il)' or quanllt y, t lat has belll g? Proeeed ing in th is \Vay, Ar istotle indieate s
'GA 18, p, 28 4. tbid .: " D'le F 'orse 1 lllllg, di e ber die $au; . Cewl17 l1 ng der primalTI I Kategur ien d' A' h an d l ' e t, tst a!s die an setzt. " ' le n stoteJes nac hher III se mer Ontologie 9CA 18, pp. 283284. Again the fo ll owing di . of the Phys ics as weil as of Arislotle' t 1 1sells.slOn 0 f 'ldegger's . l-Ie mterpret work. s e eo ogy m gene ral draws prirnarily onation 111is " Ph 18 1\ GAys
12 .

Us ing the termino logy of gramm ar, one may say that Aristot le is "ccusin g the EIeatie s for ne glecti ng the difference betwee n subj eet and predieate, namely that both subjeet and predi cate m ust be said to be, but in di ffere nt senses , I-Iowev er, as far as th e ontolog ieal leve l is eoneern ed, one might say w ith H eidegge r th at wh at the Eleaties are overl ookin g is really the ont ologiea l difference, th e differen ce betwee n bcin g and beings, for " Seing canna t be identica l \V ith a particul ar being, if being does not have a variet)' of meanin gs, sa th al each parlicu lar bci ng is" .\4 If being \Vere one, then Pann cnides' own say ing tl1at "bein g is" wou ld be im possib le, for as soon as you say th at a particul ar being is, you have introdu ced a differen ce," Thus Aristol le shows that the propon ents of the thes is that being is one do n ot j ust h ave a bad argume nt, they cannat in fact argue at ail, s ince their thesis, if it \Vere Irue, woul d destroy th e very possibi lity of speech, Haw ever, Ar istotle remark s, th e re are ncv e rth e less so rn e philoso phers who have trieel ta "void attribut in g to being ,everal senses:
Even the later of the old philosophers \Vere afraid lest the same thing should tum out to be one and many. Thercfore, some of them, like Lycophro n, eliminated the ex pression "is", and others changed their way of speakin g, 50 thal th ey did !lot say " man is white" bul "man has wh itened", not " he is on the way" bui "he on
Phys. 186a28-1 86b2. Phys. 186b2-3: "ou yp OW l OV

13

14

O1l

wh:re ' ascribes thi s view to Bonitz. a . 11 yap ap;Ol 'H VO l1 ..nvw .... " Ph)'s, 185a20-32 .

i s 28'

't\ aUlo EtvOl, el 1-1.11 1tO )J..t la V cnll1CttVEl That Ari sl otl e takes an important step tow ards an understanding of Ihe ontological difference is also emphasised by W. Brogan, "lIeidegg 's Interpretat ion of Arislolle on the Pri... ative Character of Force and the er Twolold ncsS of Oelllg", pp. 11 2- 11 3.

woU:

etvCtl n

Ka010V . "

15

186btl .. 11.

1 96

197

1 !I \ I' llll II VJI

way s" , in 1 a vo id Jl wki ng QII !,! i tilO OU ly by uddin g 0 il Ihus ass lIll1l1lg that "OIlC" and " be ing" only Im ve olle sense. 16

IS ,

or strcss ill g

rh ul 0 11 kJmUII /lf '1I011 is poss ib lt! onl y as legomenon, as 20 ex plicable wi th rcspect 10 S\lIllctltillg, lIamcly ilS pr inciples.

ln destroyi ng the possibility of speech, the Eleatic Ihesis s imultaneous ly makes movement and chan ge impossible. When ad dress ing thi s iss ue, HeIdegger argues that Aristotle 's idea is not merely that being must be manifold because th ere exist at least two Ihings, a principle and that of it is a prin c iple. Moreover, hi s idea indicates th at a principle is a pnnc.lple onl y insofar as it can be expli cated as somethin g's principl e, In01ls way, Ihe poss ibility of exp li ca lin g a being with respect to its belll g presupposes th al there is more Ihan one principle of realily." O r in other words:
Th is being be .detenn ined in in its onlologica l whl ch gels !ts preJ ill1 inary form by thi s: that this being a "towards whic h" or address and bespeaking, i.e. is llltende.d ln the "how" of the ' Ascharac ters". A being is categorJ cally .always th is som ethi ng as suc h and such, that is to say : the meantrlg of being is principally manifold (lll llltiple). 18

Thus logos itself sho ws Ihat Ihe me",ing of being cannol be one. Were it not for lhis differen ce, in virtue of which so methin g can be add ressed as somethi ng, movement and change, and consequently nature as such 19 ' . wou Id b e Impossible. Accord ingly, Heidegger concludes that, because of thi s in timate connect ion bet\Veen the o ntological and the logical dlfference, Ari stotle 's encounter with the Eleatic th esis on the unity of beln g mUSI also be regarded as a battl e conccrnin g the question of our access lo bcing, in which Aristotle strives l secure his th ern e by means

3. The princip/es of change 'lnd theil' te/eologica/ il7telpretafiol7 111 his attempt to delermine the principl es of change, Ari stotle begins by assertin g that one m ust reali se th al noth ing acts or is acted upon at rano m . T hat is to say , not s impl y a nyth ing (to tuchon) can be generated out of, or destroyed inlo anythin g: yo u do not change from c.g. " educated" to "whil e" but frol11 "nol- \\'hite" , for il is not as cd ucated yo u are ch an ging bu l as not._w hiIC. 21 Acco rdingly, everythin g Ihat comes 10 be or passes away c\oes sa rrom a con trary (enanlia) to a ca ntrary.22 Or, put in a differc nl \vay, th e principles of change are form (e idos) and its privation (stel'esis ).'] However, this is not enongh to aceo unt for change. Even th ough Aristotle does not explicitly make this point here, one might deleet th e reason why the pa ir of contrari es is not cnough just by examin in g our way of speaking: we do not normally say th at e.g. " uneducated becomes educated" , but "the (uneducated) man becomes educated"." Thus change cannot be described merely in tenns of a tra nsition from one state of bci ng to a noth er, but it requires for ils possibil ity that there is somelhing as so meth in g, i.e. in a part icular state of be in g, that becomes somet h ing. fn Aristotle ' s words, th e con trary principles do not act on eaeh other, so it is not really "unedueated" that bceomes "edueated", but it is some third thin g that is acted upon and hence subject to change. He continues:
Besi des that, one could also be pcrplcxed on thi s po int, \Voul d one not suppose another nature underlyin g the contra ries. For we do not see that the conlrar ies make up th e substance of any be ing; but the first princ iple or origin Ill ust not be asse rl ed of some thing underlying, a substrate, for then we wo uld have a princip le of a princi ple or an origin of the ori gin . T he slIbstrate or subject is the orig in and thus secms to be prior la that whi ch is asserted of it. 25

1 Phys . 6,
y E VlltCtt OUTOU; tO OU'[O EV

',j,

UKO,'i'ProV. Ol

GA 18, pp. 286f.

18

,l'T'IV ",e-,t v Ott 6 avBpwrro o euKo on v :U.. j3a?t,$wv, EOtlV j3aoil, Lva nOtE tO Ecrt11t?OOmovte El veu rrO l 0001 'r o EV, WC; )lovex;(w EyOIJ :VOU TO Evoe; '[o ovm."

<;: '

' t<

!Cc

O Kat ai orepol 'l"WV cpxairov

lto a. OU) 0\ II V t e
,..

Eoriv

ci';"", ) ,
'f ....

av, marrep

..

PA , p. 265: Seiende lll uB in der onto logi sc hen Struk tur im vorh inein angese lzt \Verden, die dadurch ist, daO es grundsatzlich ei n ' Worauf des Ist, d.h. verme int wird im Wie der ' Als-Characlere ' . Da.s .kategonal rll1mer dieses elwas a Is sa und sa, das besagl: Der Sinn des S eULS I St prmzlprcllmQl1nigfallig (meh rfaltig) ." 19 F I ' . t liS reason, Ar!stotle states from the begin ning o f bis di scussion of the Elenti c thes ls that the ques tion wh ether being is one is not really <r ques tion concerning nature, Phys. 184b25 185a2.

GA 18, p. 285 ; PA , p. 265 . Phys . 188a31 .1 88b8. 11 1'hvs . 188b21 . 23. 1) . Cf. Phy,. 190b20ff 24 Cf. Phys, 189b30190a8, where Aristotle di scusses the differenl ways in which one call give express ion la Ihi s kind o f generation. 25 Phys. "llp6C; TOtO En K'iv t o e tl moprl oE.t E.V, el Pll "tl<; Tpav UTtoOr'v:rer 'f0 ' <; UI " I!IUO I v ' oOr vo y&. p OpW p.v "tcilv ov"tOWV oolav "tavavTiCl,
20
21

1 98

19 9

(' 111\ 1' 11 ' 1{ l' IVI

When Aristotle introduces th e noti o n o f subs lralc, he is di sc uss ing it bath in the sense of matter (Inde) and as a co mposi te being, ln Ihe former case, il is a question of the generation afa composite (sun/he/on) being, whereas in the latter, il is thi s compos ite being Lself wh ich is changing in sorne respect. And if is primarily thi s kind of change QI' gene ration that is of interest here. This change would not be possible, wcre it not for somcthing that does not change. However, it is not unconditionally un changeable, s ince th at whi ch changes and that which rem ains in sOllle sense are one. For w hereas it does not change wi th re spect to its substance, e.g. Ihat it is a man, it does change with respect ta so me of the other categories, such as quality or quantity. Thus thal whi ch is subj ect to cha nge must be a composite being.26 For only as compos ite can sOll1clhi ng be ex pli cated as somcthing or in terms of something cise, and this was ro und to be th e presupposition of change, He nce the expuls ion of the simplc, indivisible beings from the realm of change. However, ta just enumerate the principles of change does not explain the being of change 0 1' w hat it means ta be a changeab le bei ng, for thi s only says what chan ge presupposes but not rcall y " how" change is. In other \Yards, the task still re mai ns to c larify {he being of change and mo ve ment. Such il clarificati on rcq uires a te leologkal perspective. On the basis ofthis change of perspective, Aris lotle ea n define change thus: "S inee in every gel1lls there is a difference between that whi ch is in actuality and that which is in potentiality, chan ge is the actualisation of a potential being as su ch [i.e. as potenti al], ... ,,27 Il is onl y at thi s stage that Heidegger sets in his interpretation. For hi s interes t concerns not primarily the pri nciples of change sueh as thcy are initially determined by Aristotle bu t rather their teleological interpretation, since it is only with this interpretation that Aristotle ach ieves th e concepts with which cha nge can be properly artic ul ated. Thus in Grundbegriffe der aristotelischen Philosophie, we read that : " Inso far as kinesis is

dCICnnin \!d by (1IIIIrlllIl,\' und

T he Ihi rd is a PCCUIi Ul' u1Ii o n llrbolh ." The rcaso n why Il cideggcr speaks about this union as peculiar bccomes clear when wc loqk at Aristot le's remarks concernin g the

l'1/{'1'}J,i'/a , 2K

Ill csc mak c IIp the two archa l.

delinition o f change:
The reaso n why change seems ta be indefinite is that one callnot place it among eilhcr potentia l or actual be ings. For nei ther that wh ich is potentially of a certai n size, nor that \\Ihich is actually (hal size, does necessarily cha nge to that size, and change seems 29 to be a kind or actualisat ion, but an incomplete one.

Change cannot be identified either with dunamis or energeia and must thus be exp licated w ith the help or both of th ese concepts. On I-Ieidegger's account, what is crucial here is to note that " naturaI" beings are not simply potential , for in arder to have a potentiality for somethin g, beings must already be something, and thus simultaneous ly be in the mode of energeia or entelecheia. As Heidegger puts it, that bei ng which is marked by potentiality or possibi lity must already be "there" or present (gegen\Vdrtig)JO On1y on the basis of thi s teleolo gica l perspective, which mak cs it possible to explicate kines is in tenn s of a " peculiar union" of dunamis and energeia, does Heidegger take into account the notions of form and privation. A being that is " there" or present in its poss ibili ty for this or that doe s not on1y have an eidos, but at the same ti me, it relates to th e privation of this eidos. In tb is way, il is marked both by presence and 31 absence, or in other words, bath by being and not_b cin g. Moreovcr, Heidegger continues, inso far as most thin gs have the c haractcr of " more or less", they are not simply eithcr this or that but they are on the way towards so me of their possible determinations and are thus ho ldin g
GA 18, p. 286: " So fern die K t V'10U; bestimm l w ird d urch UVOl-ll und Evpyeta, mac hen diese beide n zwei pXat aus. D ie dri tte ist eine eigenHlm liche Verei nigung von beiden." 29 Phys. 201b27-32: "'to 8 OKElV ap lo'tov elvctl KtVllOlV aluov on O1:. ei

28

16ap \J1tOKelllevov PXll, Kat ItpOtEpOV OKe m KO't1l)'OPOUIlEVOU elvat. "

Phys, t90at4-1 7.

,o KaS'.

Be yeo8ai nvo. Otat yp apxi] ti)

ta

UVal-llV 't0v ov'twv oihe el evepyewv Otl V 9Evm an;v" ot e yp 'to uvct'tov avYK'1 otE 'tc VEpyEt nocrv, te KlV'10I vepYElCl m acv E{Veu Klvettal I-tV dvOl n e; OoICE, td.i1 t""

27 2,0 l a?- II: :'1 O b=.amov yvo to Ilv VtEqE lf/1O Buvape l , Il tou OVTOEVTexew, tI tO l OtOV, lCiVI10l eO- lv,. " T

" GA 18, pp. 295. 299-300. 31 Il shou ld perhnps he poi lll cd out that do does not necessari ly mean "esse nce" hcrc, bUll hc dl stincllon bclwcCll 1"0 l1n and privation applies ta ail categories.

200

20 1

(' ll td' Il 1 lilVI

Il lfll!..: up by 1' 1'111 Hnd 0 J2 pl'lvHli on . Acco rdin g ly , a bcin g Ihal is tlllI/fIllH'; is 1101 on ly a lrcady something, thus being marked by el1lelecheia, but il is also " not yet" something. To be present in this way is to be in mol ion ]) Thus w hal

( Il ,11' Il Il II V I'
p" t!SCII CC 111 /11
liS 0 11

Ihl.' /lI NC l vcs bc twccn [Il e I wO CX II'CII H Ihlll .:,"I

i!'i flll ' h '.\' , or 111 o lil e i wO I'd s. 11H11 il is poss ib le 10 be prese nt th e way towtll'd!{ Ull cnd . . Thus insof'ar as th e uccoun l of rnovcmenl given in the former sectlOl1

"

Heidegger wants to s ugges t here is that eve ry bein g to w hic h potentiali ty or possi bility belongs is in motion, for to be in mot ion is 10 relate to somethin g abse nt, which in its turn presupposes a presence. He thus co ncludes that: "Movement is Ihe presence o f the potentiality of being there as such."J4 But iflh is is the essence of movement, then reSI

mi ght seem 10 idenli ly wi th difference, it is insufficient. On 1k idegger's view, this acco unt does not yet really expl all1 what 11 means J9 10 be present as bei ng in moti on. What is missi ng here IS a more far," cnc hin g elucidation of the rel ation between bein gs on the one hand and
th c ir fonns and privation s o n the other. Inso far as a be lll g th at lS

can ollly be a li miting case of movemcnt. A being is al rest only when iL

is depr ived of ils pote ntiality 50 th al il is no t o n th e way towards anythi ng. 35

Illovable o r kinelOl/ ho lds itsel f between th e two ext remes that are rcpresented by eidos and steresis, il is determi ned by pros li " in relation to". And that is to say, eyery movab le belllg IS there or
p:'esent only in re lation to so methin g thal moves it, o r as Heidegger puts it in a Mildasen w ith th at w hich moves, t 1 k metlkon. '0 le

4. Change G/wlysed inla poiesis and palhesis

T he a nalysis of 11l0vemenl is, Heid egger claims, 110thi ng but th e ul1coveri ng of being in Ihe sense of bcing present (Gegenwortigsein), sin ce movement is ro und to be tha t kind of prese nce w hich belon gs to
natura l beings.
36

This in sig ht \Vas o ut of reac h for J\risto tl e's

predecessors, since tb ey cou ld not affirm m ovemen t as a positive

phenomenon. They Ihere/ore declared it to be indefi nile and co mpared it to not-being, unlikeness and otherness. J7 Thus as Heidegger sees it, it
was A ri stotle 's g re a t achi evc me nt ("h at he cOli ld see that th ere is a
"GA 18, pp. 3 11f.
33 For the most part, Heidegger translates KlVllOl as "movement" (Bewegung) rather than as "change" (VeranderuJ/g), pro bably beca use he wants ta have a broadest he can use also in connection with eVpYEw and EvtEXEta, Possible"notion, c hange IS, as far as .' know, the cornillon translation of K"lVllo I. For a diSCUSSion ofhow ta translate see R. Wardy, The Chain a/Change. A Study ofAriSIOlle 's Physics VII. 34 GA IS, p. 313: "Bewegung ist die Gegenwart des Dase ink in nens ais solche." J5 GA 18, p. 3 14.

, Accordingly, the co ncepts that wcre missing in th e aboye ana lys is of Illovement are paiesis and path esis. Movement can on the han d be c1cscribed in terms of pathesis , acco rding to w hi ch the movem ent of th e 1110vable being consists in ils being affected. But on the other hand, Illovement can be rega rded as a f01'111 of pOesis, as lh e "e ffectOl of the 4 mover. ! T hus Ari s to tle sta tes that kinesis is the e11lelecheia "o f tha t which has th e capacity ta effect as weil as of that whic h has th e capac ity 10 be affected".42 Reca lling Heidegger's interpretation o f Illoyelll ent 111 tenn s of presence, the "actualisation" (ente/echeia) of the moye r and the moved can be described as a relation between two kinds of presence: by affeeting the kinelan, the kin etikan lets it be prese nt preeisely in its
trans ition, in its bei ng on the way towards sO l11cthing. But on the

GA IS, p. 395. Gegel1\11drtigsein, Gegenwar/, ctc., a re th us, in this COurse at least neulral tenns for prese nce, that is presence when it is not necess aril; CO ll cerved on the bns is of product ion. ln th at case, J-I eidegge r uses the term Herge ste/lts ein and also the tenn Ferligseill. as wc have see n earlier. As stated in C hapt er p. note 38, in GA 19, Heidegger begins 10 use the expression Anwesendsem, wh lc h., as far as 1 can see, also is imended to be primarily a pure ly concept, whlch does not necessarily implica le a poi elic basis. GA 18, pp. 317f. See Phys. 201 b l 6ff. For Heidegger's idea that Aristotle is the fi rst (as weil as the last) to sec movement as a positive phe nom enon, see PA, p. 25/; WP, p. 244; GA 19, p. 484; Vom Wesen der menschlichcn Freiheit. Einleit/lllg il/ die Philosophie (GA 31). pp. 30.32.
36

hand, the presence of the kinetikan is in its turn dependent upo n lts relation 1 the presence of the kinetan: it comes forward onl y mso far as 0 it lets the kinetan become present. On thi s acco unt, it is th e experi ence of kinesis as a mode of incomplete presence whi ch has enabled Ari stotle (0 his notion of enteiecheia as perfcct presence, that is, os a mod e of betng wh lc h lS not on the way towards anything, and which is found ta be presu pposed
J8

GA 18, pp. 318 and 32 1 respective ly. '' GA 18,1'.318. GA 18, p. 327. For Ihe nOlion o frrp e 'ft , see Caf. 6a36-8b24.
_. __ ,.

., GA 18. pp. 322rr. Phys. 202b26-27 :

TU\) 5vv6'H '1 ::\ 1'0111 t1 KOU

Ka l rraBrrnK ov .

202

201

(' 11 1\1'11 ' 1( l' IVli

by killesis . l-l cid t.:ggc l' is thus in H pos iti on ln tradition of Aristot le sc ho Jarship lhal :

lI gllinSI ail t.:ntil'c

, ' 1\ ..

ontology)43

The exposition of the meaJling of being, whi ch is pred ominant in G reek cnto!ogy as weil as in the actua! cu lmination of lhi s antalogy in Aristot!e; predominant, sinee it is experienced al ready in the inarticulate experience of the being there [Daseill] of world and life - the exposition centres 01/ the intelprelafon of movemenl ! But insofar as kinesis is posited in terms of energeia, ente/eelleia, these are the primary categories of being in Greek

ln [!ldr lrans ition onl y in sofar as we can . ll 1 ch they nlrc.ady \Ven; (10 I l. en e m. C ') , their eidos or essence\ . . . "cC t la W 11 , h 'd them w lth a Imllt 10w'll'ds whi ch th ey arc moY in g and whlc proYI es h presence t ' II nd ' thus lets th em be presen t or t1 lere, The primary" ' t us
" y ll 'I[ lJrnl bcillgs nn.:

1(

t.

bc longs

1'0

that

' W h IC h'IS

n ot in need of any productlOI\ slIlce 1 IS

With this diagnosis, He idegger has also Come across what he regards as the limits of Aristotle 's teleology, When search ing for the genesis of that presence w hich belongs ta kinesis, A ri stotle is led ta frame a notion of poiesis, of production, as that which sho uld explain the possibility of moyement an d change, More precisely, the only way in which AristotIe can account for the possibility of kinesis is by positing a moyer or producer. But ift his is th e origin or final principle ofbeings that are in motion, th en ta have knowledge of these thin gs is ta know what produces th em, sin ce knowledge in the proper sense is of origins. At this point, it wou ld perhaps be natural ta point ta Aristotle 's idea of the unmoved mover as th e ultimate principle of reality and its intelligibility, But Heidegger does not bring in this idea at this stage, Instead, his focus concern s the notion of entelecheia as that which is fully present while holding itse lf in its end. To know kinesis is to know entelecheia, for it is only on the basis of the latter that the former is accessi ble'4 That is ta
Sein, der in der griechische n Ontologie und de r in ihrer eigentlichen Kulmination bei Aristoteles herrschend ist, herrschend, wei l er in der unausdrcklichen Erfahrung des Daseins des Lebens schon erfahrcn ist - die Herausstellung zenlriert in der Jnl erprelalion der Bewegung l Sofern aber K1VT)<Jto; gesetzt wird in den Namen von evep'8w, EV"t" X s ind dies W, die primaren Seinsbtegorien der griechi schen Ontologie!" As W. Brogan bas po inted out ("l-l eidegge r's Interpretation of Aristotle on the Privative Character of Force and the Twofoldness of Being", pp. 11 3ft) , in GA 33, Heidegger argues against La Bren tano and others thm OlJvo)..tts and EVPY a re Ilot categories of being. This daim is however not at odds with the above quotation, for when saying that oUvo)..lt<; and EVPI'EW are the primary categories of being, Heidegger does not rnean la suggest that they are the primary predicates or that they would be determinations o f being on the same level as the other categories. Rather, the point is that ail categori es are ta be interpreted in the light of OlJvo/-w; and vpYELa, for these concepts provide us \Vith the means to give an ontological interpretation of the other categories. "Cf, GA 18, p, 388,
43 1'01}

'1i l'e'lcty finished, d th ( speaking as far as the ge nesis of beings are concerne, ere I d be an 'essence or a form towurds w hich beings move as mu st a rea y k' bout natura! ds their own te/os. And insofar as we are spea mg a . 1( \-. ar ) v . d to artef;"!cts they have the ir prin c ipl e of change belllgs as oppost: (ct'. ; th ey a lso have their le/os with in w ithin themselves. Acco r II1g y,
' [ e th e "producer" numcly ousia in the sense of essence, lhemse lyeso l er , , B ards such is nothing external to the being th at is produced.. ut as reg . l ' ge that is in accordance wi th the other categon es, such as quah ty or Clan . . . s we saw 1Il the q uantity, what has ta be there tram the begmnmg 1S, a , , H'
former section, ousia in the sense of a con crete) e , th us have the notion that change or movement IS pOSSI e 0 y v.e . because of the existence of' a hupo ke/menOIl, . sub.ject or substra te. a Accordingly, Heidegger cJaims that:
The hupokeimenon was uncovered for fi.rst. time by in connect ion \Vith his uncove ri ng of kll1esls, I.e. on the .of his new founding of the question of being from out of k!1l e.!.S What this is al1 about is that Ar islotle reached proper 0 that which already occu rred ta Plata: that there IS SOIl.lcthmg hu okeimenon in kinesis, in kinoumenon. ln thl.S \Vay t le

GA 18, p. 392 : "Die Heraussfellung des Smes

ories" were also discovered by Aristotlc, ln

has thus seen fo r the tirs! time that Iherc IS in movement lhat remains, that has slas ;s, that a lready 15 there.

lnsofar as Aristotle ' s ontology is based up on his ,understandin g of , ", , into that presence (entelecheia) w hlch 13 presupposed kmesls It mqutres k h If mat e by m;vement and change. In other words) it see ste li 1
- - -- - --:-:::---::,,:--:-, ' vov wurde erst von Aristoteles entdeckt, i111 45 GA 19, pp . 591-592 : \l7tOK EWE . ' d h auf dern Baden seiner neuen dei . ' aus Es handelt s ich hier bei Z usammen hang mi t seiner vorschwebte: dal3 es Fundamentierung der Frage des Sems vodn er 1 d . . ntliche Fassung essen, \V Aristoteles um eme elge d' am Kt gibt. Da auc 1 wu r en so etwa s wi e e in KlVOVIlEVOV also hat Aristoteles zum yon Aristote lcs (li e' Katego rJen ent ec. t gibt das bleibt das cJ""raou; hat, , , e rstcn Ma l gesChJ1 , dnO c.s an der Bewegun g e \Vas das m yorhinc ln qchon dO IS!' ''

204

205

CII !\ I"" ' I( l' IVI 1 I t Il ' 11 (( " VI

fb uildation of rea lity i n sorn cthin g ,hat cJ ocs Ilot Il/wC 1 be prod uccd. 0

Thus as Heidegger sees il, th e pro blem wilh !\ risIOll c 's "pproach is nOI primaril y that he disco vers (ha t somelhin g must alrcady be th ere or present but th at this presence itself is taken as an absolute fo undation. However, befofe turn ing to Heidegger's attempt to anal yse thi s presence in a way that moves beyond the steps taken by Aristotle, il is necessary to spe ll out the impl ica ti ons of th e abave account of Arislolle's teleology wilh res pect la hi s understan ding of logos. More specifi cally, lhe question Ihat now has la be addressed is wh ether Arislolle' s understandin g of killesis an d ente/echeia might in ils tllm be ro Oied in his conception of logos.

or d ifT crclll

hUI 0 11

1111,' nt hl'I hund l'cvcu l what is prcs upposcd by

ail kinds of logol whkh .. dd,css so nlclhing as being. Accord ing to the Iil lll OU S say ing in thc MetaphyslCS,
"Se ing" is spoke n in severa l senses, but with respect to a unitary phenomenon and some single nature, and merely a.s a eommon epithel. ... For one speaks aboui sorne thmgs as bemg because they a re subst ances , o thers because they a re modi fi cations of substance; others tl.1ey are on tI.l : way towards substance, or destructions or pri vat ions ?r productive or ge nerative of subs tance, Of of IS sald re lat io n ta substa nce, or negat ions of Ihat whlch lS sald thus or 0 substance. 47

5. The commonfoundalion of /ogos and kines is

J ust as cha nge is conceivabl e onl y in relation to somelhing th at does not change, ousa as hupokeimenon or su bstrate, speech pres upposes som ethin g about which o ne can speak , Dl/sia as subject or as th e "substantial" element of speech. As il is tormulaled in the Categories:
Substance in the strongest, origi nal and capital sense s that which is not asscrted o f a s ubject , nor presen t in a su bject ." The pri ma ry subs tances a re said to be substa nces in Ihe strongest sense a lso because Ihey make up tbe subjeci of everylhing else and everything el se s asserted ofthem or is prese nt in !hem .46

In this sense, ousio as subj ect is the fo undation of discursivity, making it poss ibl e 10 explicate somclhin g as somclhin g. For as the primary calegory, ousia is presupposcd by th e other calegori es . And as th e "primary substance", that is, as the subj cct o f legein fi kala linos, ol/sia is a concrete, composite being, whi ch in Aristotl e's view is the Corn mon or everyday sense of o l/sia. Ii is Ihis noti o n of ol/sia as subj ect th al A ristOile firsl must examine in order la tind out what is common to ail kinds o f s peech. In oth er words, when beginning to elaborate Ihe q ues ti on of being as be ing, on he on, Aristotl e must on the one hand seek to preserve or amrm the fact th al we speak about being in a vari ely
lCuptw"tata tE Ko i n:pffitw Kat l-la.lIJta .eYOI-lVll, Tl Ka8" imOICEII-lVOU tl ve .yetat IJnte EV urroKEql v(p tlV l OtlV , . . . tl ai rrpltat ocri a l ol To aO I arraOlv urroKeio8a t lCai rrcivta"ta (tUa Kata TOUtwv Katllyope'icr80l li ev Tau'Cau; elvC1! O toino POIO'ta ta OOlcn .YOVtat 46 Cat. 2a 1 ! - J3, 2b 15- 17: "O ai.a att v

Were it not for this single na ture, i.e. al/sia or substance, not only wo uld it be impossible to speak, but alt ribules or pred icates would not reall y exist at ail , since il is onl y in relatio n ta ollsia, or more by ana logy w ith ousia, th at ail olher Ihi ngs are and ca:, be s",d to be. Accordin gly, Aristotle ean co ne lude : " Hence ' bell1g 111 the pnmary sense, that is, not in any relative sense but sim ply or absolutely, should ,,48 be SU bstan ce. When this subject or ousia is of a simple, indivisible or when to th e wc maye from the initial noti on of ousia as a concrete proper con ce p1 of Ol'S'O as the essence or whatness of thlS be1l1g, .th.e 50 th at It IS powers of logos arc insuffi cicnt, as wc have scen Oilly nous that can give us aceess 10 lhese Accordmgly, nous and not logos is coneerned \V ith th at whi ch exists 111 lhe hlghest sense, I. e. th e subj ect or the ollsia as it is in itself, before every kind of expllcahon whieh understands its obj ecl as somethin g and lherefo re Il1 volves difference . Accordingly, Ihe range of vision that belongs to nOlis IS wider than that of logos. This also means th at it is r eall y n OliS th al makes logos possi bl e, for it is nous th al ti rsl of ail glves u s a subJ ect which we can speak abo ut - hence the non-discursive ideal ln Afl stotle.

'}.,)' Mel I003a33 -b lO : " T i> OV ),yetCLI '/to ....axw".a ,(.1

'

."

ta

v yp Ot l oatat, ovw ),eyEtal.

ta

'" " 'a on na,

to

ocri a

nv n:pe t11v ooiav

otaiav.

11 'tOu'Cwv 'tw o a rr
m'iOta av

oata'" 48 Met. 10280 24.29: " wmE. 10

" . " ').)" ' ov Kat ou 'C 'I ov a " DV 0 rr t..w.-

c'i11."

206

207

( 'II AI'II -I( I-IVI

as menti om.:d in th e 01 (!I ls chllplcJ' llei dcg'gcl' 1 " conv lllcc that , ev en lilOUg 1 " tS /"I 0 1lS and 1 Il , 0 not logos Ih a l is ab le to or corresp ond to the nature or be in g whcn Ihis is interprct cd in

t II Al' ttl ( II Vtnll'cady has bec Il deu il \\1 1111 on 1 IILllIlh c l' nI' uccnsio ns, No\\' it is 1 time to tl'y la scllic th e l'Cllltii.l1l bdwcc n th csc t"'JO concep tS. Wc have secn carl icI' th at Il cidcgge r thinks that the concepts that are needed to explai n the naturc of kil1esis, namely paiesis and pa/hesi s, must also be taken into in connection with 10gosSO Just as the movabl e being is affecte d by something that moves or is produc tive, logos gets affected by its object. Or as Heideg ger puts it: "Think ing is nolhing but this pros, thinking require s in v irtue of ils being: being open la samelh ing difJe/'el1/; its be in g cannot be understood or be origina lly sccn, if not the Ito whot ' is there".5 t C lea rl y , th e idea of an openness in logos and kinesis is in Heidegger's vicw one of Aristot le's most important insights . Howev er, the problem w ith Aristotl e's concep t of kinesis retums in his concept of logos. For just as Aristotl e has to explain the possibility ofmove ment and change by positing a moyer, he is in need of a productive reason, a nouS paie/ika s, in order to accoun t 52 for the object, the "to what" oflogOS. On Heideg ger 's accoun t, logos is rea ll y the primary theme of Aristoll e's ontolog y, since it is th e notion of the discursi ve structur e of logos that lets Aristot lc re gard the wor/d as chan geable, as marked by kinesis , ln thi s way , logos wo rk s as an a priori in Ari stot le's philosophy.53 But as we have seen earli er, Heideg ger also thinks that Aristot le's concep tion of logos in its turn is determ ined by hi s underst anding of kinesis , in accord an ce \Vith which logos itself is regarde d as an activity th at is afe/es, incom plete, and thus of a di fferent kind than the perfcct nou S. M oreover , insofar as Ar istotle tends ta interpre t kinesis in t e r11lS of product ion, 50 that th e final explana tion of kinesis is reached only w ith the el ucidation of a produce r that is not itselfpr oduced, this makes Aristotle, or that is at least Heideg ger's idea, conclud e that the proper task of logos must be to make accessi ble this produc er as thal which kinesis really is, namely the presenc e or e ntelt;;ch eia of ousia as essence.

o as : sm III th at nous not li ke logos understand ilS obj ec t e IIlg,. m terms of someth mg el se, it is nevertheless logos that is govenlln g Anstotl e's ontology:
eyond logos 10 a l1 oe in , which is l'ree l'rom legein. BUl

strives indeed, as we have seen, in the idea of sophia 10

more carefully . evcn his detcrmin ation o f that wh ich a. es up the . ach teved b l ' fina! .arc h.e, that wllich is adt"l, " elon, 15 no t 1 lall LI !Il 1 )C o n entatlOn frolll /0 . TI', u Ihe facl Ihal Ihe rundamenial as, the characle r of h/lpokeimelloll , Iha\ which alrcady' us 10 . . . det" ad vance ' the altog e.tl1er pnmary prese nce; that is the formaI 01 e J of somethln g that is fiS stlch. And 1 be sure th ' 0 ;;po that is to say, Ihm wh ich alrcady is Ihe;c

ad vance, before ail speech, is the re fo r th; con text, ln about which one 5 k . s speec , : . pea s, - IlIa( IS the hupokeimenon namely that the on the OUSla III the forma I sense Th e basl'c ch l ' d l" ' , . aracter ot, be in g is re neve rom the contex t of logos itself.49

in a

con ce t: fsee that He idegger apparen t ly thinks that A ri stotle 's p 1011 0 OUSlQ as hup 0 k el/HenO n may be interro gated f . . h perspec tive of logos as we Il l' rom t e s hould of course hardl as rom th e perspec tive of kinesis . This Heide ' , . y as a surpn se at thi s stage, where gger 5 ldea of an essentwl co nn ect ion between logos and kinesis
GA 19 , p, ... , ,Anslole les strebt 4. , . '' O'o$ia libe r den vo'" hin 'H's zu e,' e zwar'- wie \v If gese llen haben, in der Idee der ' 1 n III VOEtV das fre ' , t ' .en letzt 1 1; bese h Ist auch, sei.ne Besti mtTI ung desscn, AtYE tV: Ab,er genauer nur III der Onent lcrung am ) 6 - e aPX Il 1 was aOlCttpET OV i5t 51, Gru nd best immung des av d' ,'c o', llen - Das zei , , \ I o t a dgewCo'lllarakte d ' gt sic h dari n, dan en . was 'lm vorh inein schon vorliegt der g'. .. ' r es ' nz ' maren Anwese 1 '. d . hat, des sen ' . estun mung von etwas \Vas berha l ' pn U ,nlel1 B al . " ISl. nd zwar 151 d' , . as 151 .die fonn ale 50, was !Ill vorhmein schon da ,st up h ' !eses \J1tOKEl)lEVOV das . , ' ln emem Sprechen ber etwas Ivas' gese en aus d em H'111 bl'lck auf das B yElV: Was , "' , l i n espreche n eines
49

Recalli ng th e quotati on above ' whcre Heideg h k ger staled that tlle upo eimeno . . kinesis" we n was " uncovc red. r.01. t1 fi[rs t t!Jne III connec tion with ' le

. d Z ln: vorhlnem ver allem Sprechen fr dieses da i . . ' selen en usammenhanges \Vlrd , _ das ist das das 6 ?as, worber gesprochcn Grundch arakte r des Sei ns wird aus d 'z v, die O\laLa III formale < em .usamillenhang des oyoscJbst m Sinn Der

verlangt seinem Sein nach: of en sein J

Chapter Three, Section 8. GA 18, p, 234: "Das Denken ist nicht s anderes aIs dieses ltPO, das Denken ZI/III anderen, sein Sein kann nicht verstanden werden, prim(lr geschell werden, wenn nicht das Wozu da ist". Sl Sec Chllptcr Threc. Section 7, 5) PA , p, 265,

208

209

1 Il \ 1' 11 Il 1 1V I

6. The primot.:y oftlie ClsSrtion alld the questioll aj'he/II!!,

As we saw in. eonncet on with J 'Icid egger ' s di sc ussion of e veryday tlle basIc character of logos, whatevcr fbrm it may have, is that It makes the world present or accessible by explicating it in di fferent regards. But a.s in the former section, even though Heidegger suggests that, ln Anstot le ' s ontology, lo gos prescribes in advance the ways in whi ch the world can be given, he also thinks l'hat Aristotle 's understanding of logos is in its turn affected by the notion of being as presence, so that logos is thought to make present that which in some sense already was present. It is th is feature of logos that has granted to il Ifs prol11l1lent place in Aristotle's ontological investigations:
This fil 0.( logos, of the logic a l in Ihis slric1.ly Greek sense , Ir/ta Ihe ques.llon concerning Ihe on is II/Oti\!ated by the fact that the on, the bemg of beillgs as such, is inlerpreted primarily as pres. nce and that logos is the way in which 1 prnarily make e sO/17ethmg present, narnely that about which 1 speak.54

T o be sure, I\ l'lstoll \ ,IIH"oj 11 111 huvl' li l' "dul:l ivc vic\\' o r s peech . Ile docs not wanl 10 1/ 111 1 11 11 l, milS speech CO LI Id be ana lysc d usin g the stru cture o r Ihe fl sscl'li OIl - in th e grammati cal sense - as a model , as sumin g c.g. lI\at a l bottolll tilere is an indicative ke rnel in c very mode of speech. In his view, there are different form s o f semamein, of signifying, and only the assertion signifies by means of making manifest, since only it can be true or fa lse. 56 But precise ly because Aristotle does not think it possible to reduce ail fonns of speech to that of the assertion, he regards the assertion as mare interesting in connection with thl;ory an knowledge. And if Heidegger is correct, the consequence of this is thal, because of a certain theoretical bias on A ristotle's part, he tends ta think that making manifest is the most important aspect of speech as such, sa that it is only the assertion that really fulfils the essence of speech.

or

ln Chapter Two, we tb llowcd Heidegger's idea that Ihe reason why the assertion, logos apophantikos, could become a model for discursivity in general should be sought in way Aristol le determines Ihe assertion when he characterises it precisely as apophantikos, stating that its fundamental trait is that it makes ils abject manifesl as il explicates it. Even though Heidegger himself to some degree affirms this mterpretatron of Ihe asserlion and has tried to elaborate upon it, he is nonetheless conv lllced that it is intimate ly bound up with Aristot1e's of being in terms of presence. When bcing is identified wllh presence and regarded as somelhing finished and vorhanden, that IS, as which is constantly "there" for us, the idca arises that the pnmary task of logos as sueh, whatevct form it may have, must be to to and preserve this prese nce. S5 And sinee it is the assertIOn alone Ihat really can be said ta achieve this, it deserves ta be called the primary or superior mode of speech.
Einbruch des oyo, des Logischen in diesem stren Fragesleltwig /lach dem av ist dadul"ch morivierl, daJ3 da; S.erendeJ: primar ais Anwesenheit interpreti'!rt islund der oyo., le An IsI, zn der Ich Inll etwas, namlich das, worbcr ich sO fech e ... .. . vergegemvdrtige." 1 , p' OIIG/ 55 See GA 18, pp. 214ff.
p.

When speech is conceived along these li nes, the subject of speech is ascribed a certain priority over against its poss ibl e attributes or predicates . For as noted in the discussion ab ove, the subject is thought to be what is already present before we begin ta speak, since it is that in virtue ofwhich there is something at ail about which one can speak, and so the important thing is that this subject is made visible such as it is, that it is addressed in terms of attributcs that are proper to it. In ather wards, ifspeech is to perform its funct ion ofmaking manirest correctly, it must "submit" to the subject, it must let itself be governed by this, sa that the subject in its truth or in its disc lasure, and nothing eIse, constitutes the end of the speech. As we saw in the analysis of the assertion in Chapter Two, Heidegger is convineed that, in order 10 undcrstand the nature of the assertion and the motives behind its alleged supreme powers, it must be interpreted precisely with respecl to its end. Il is not enough ta regard il as a grammatical category, as the class of indi cative sentences or propositions, or ta refer to its htct-stating or predicative funct ion. For wh en a speaker is out to convince, threaten, etc., that is, ta bring about an effect on his audience or in general ta pursue a course of act ion of sorne kin d, the subject of his speech is ta sorne extent pushed into the background, whether or not his utterances are assertions in the
56

" .GA. J9,

.1 25 :. "D/eser
tn. chese

Sun,

De II/l , 16h13

17f1 1 , 1

2 10

2 11

l' ll ilP II 'I( II VI t '1tAJlI t' I( J' IVil grammatical sense, sincc the end of his speech is n OI I'clI l' y 10 makc (his subject manifest, to revcal ils nature. Thus OIl L! coulcl say Ih at, in thcsc circumstances, speech tends to poilll bcyond ilse lf, whcreas Ih e asserlion can be sa id to cali altention to its subjecl, in Ihat its aim is 10 make it manifest just for the sake of making il mani/est. From a teleological perspective, non-assertoric speech must accordingly bc described as a fonn of kinesis, leading over to a new situation of speech as it brings aboui an effect. In this way, such a logos is aleles, whereas the assertion is more akin to energeia, since it does not have any , 'II to bc \Vo ule! Ih us SCc ll1 to be pnnclpa y a quest'on of ident ity ' since J, ' c. ' ' simple bein gs arc 1I0t undcrsloo d 111 t crms 0 f somethmg dlfferent ,rom , . h e 1 1 I-Iowevcr lhis is denied by Aristotle, In thls connectlOn, ht 1 lcmse ves" , l' i ' l seems l0 ln d'cate , the realm of simple bemgs, . even thoug l It m g make up an ideal ofbeing, is something of a speCIal case. A ' t II ' ' ' does The question COll cern mg bcmg as bcmg, 011 he on ' . . not. fi.S 0 .e . s seek 10 establish the reason why a thi ng IS Ilself, for that IS ln orms u '. l.;ul task but the question always concerns the reason why not a meanmg" , " If " Wh something is somelhing oth er, something dlfferent from,ltse, e,n ' II we are scare llm g COI' tll e ' why' , il is always m the sense "why does thl s . b 1 t II ' [?",58 Thi s is of course hardl y surprisll1g 111 connectlon e ong 0 la, 1 t take w ith the investigation of " ord inary" assertions" s uc 1 as, o .. ' e Aristotle 's own eX3l11pl c, " 1 he man ISducated" , 1.e , such asselflIOns 1 whose atlributes are kota swnbebekos or be lon g to 0 IlC categories except ol/sia, like the category of quality, quantlty, etc, In these cases, wc arc apparentl y asking why a con crete, , e dowed with some pro perty which does nol belong to ItS essence, A ristotl e go es on to show that our question is of the ' klnd also' when we are interrogating abou t the essence of a thmg, 1 ne 'd . t ' mi ht believe that such a question asks about 1 enllly, b u, Il1 faet , W le n

extcrnal end.

wh en the primary tn sk of logos is thou ght 10 cOllsist in th e unco ve ri ng of its object as this is in itselt; and wh en the worthiest objects of logos moreover are themse lves purely present and not on the way towards any th ing, it also becomes clear why the assel1ion, insofar as it is has thc form of legein li kOla linos, in the end is regarded as an inferior farm of ex press ion. Illstead, th e s uperior logos is logos kath hauto, s ince this do es not ascribe ally predicate to the subject which is
J

foreign or external 10 it, thal is 10 say, si nce it has n o thin g ta do \Vith

that which is kOla sumbebekos, As wc sa\V in the previous chapter, th e notion of essential predication is in its turn motivated by the idea that the powers of logos in general are weaker than thase of nOliS, since nous can reveaJ and preserve its abject witho ut modification, in that it does not like logos understand its object as something, in terms of something else, Accordi ngly, it seems that one could say that, what motivates Aristotle to regard logos apophanlikos as the superior l'orm of speech is simultaneously what makes him sec the limits ofthi s mode of speech as weil as of logos as slich. lnsonlr as the lirst philosophy is not a universal discipline, but is a theology, concerned \Vi th Ihe supreme beings of reality, tirS! of ail God as the ultima te princip le of reality and then other simple entities such as pure forl11 s, its access to its th eme must be non-disc ursive in kind. 57 COl1sequentl y, the question of being, th e investigation of what it mealls
57 For an in vest igation ioto the re lation between onto logy and the%gy in Ari stot le, see H . Weid ellla nn, Metaphysik und Sprache. Eine sprachphi/osophische Umersuchung zu Thomas von Aquin und Aristote/es. As the title imp lies, Aristo!/e is here contrasted \Vith Thomas Aquinas, whe re the latter is said 10 airn at a slricll y universa l ont%gy,

1 for the "what" of an individual thing, we are asklllg why some o , matter is of a definite kind, Aristolle contmues:
Thus what wc are seek ing is the cause (Ihat fo rl11 ) in of which the matter is a definite thi ng; and thl s IS the the thing. Il is clear, then, that as regards simple I1l QUJ? and explanation arc impossible, but they reqUire a dlfferent mo e ofi nquiry.60

W hen we are inqu irin g into essences or

S , p 1 en lOfes , 1 C abo vcIJ11 e 1 l b mentioned mode of questi ollin g is not poss ible, for essences that the questIon 1 0 appre 1 d e d by nOliS onl y . There/ore, to the exlent " len . what it means for a particular being to be is a questIon concernlllg w ly

'",' , .., ., ......

,U

', ri

i(;).)..o ).).<.O "tl vl

i.lTtPXEl. " . . d f f in Met Book VII. Ch. J 7. S9 Arislotle di scusses thls km 0 ques Ion _ _. '").. f1010 " cnt 10 ElO<;! t9 11 60 M el . 104 t b7- 11: :'wot Ol;lOV .l OUK O"n oU C""ti V TO-rO If il ouai o. q,CLvepov vuv 0-:'1 E t , " (1)..)..: rp6rroc; 11;C; SlrrllO"Ero 1WV 1010U1.lV .

212 2 11

(' 11 1\ 1' Il ' I( l ' I V I '

t Il \l' I II( I I V t

it is of a certa in kincl, why it has a certain Jll odu of bcing, il cun only he app lied to compos ite beings. And as the ct uotati on from the Me taphysics tells us, this question ofwhal and why a thin g lcads us back to ol/sia . But also wh en regard ed as a ge neral or pri ncipa l quest ion, Ihe
question concerning being as being, or concerning \Vhat il means to be

which is und Il '1 lIltlik ill

""l I!li s hl!cotn cs clea r onl y when one

takcs inlO ilceoll nt Ihlll Al'i stoll c' s undcrslanding of ausia and the other

as such, in volves a difference. More precisely, the express ion "on he on" conveys an onto logical di fference , for the question concerns the reason why beings are and can be sa id to be, and the answer is given, as we have seen, by means of Dl/sia as form or essence, and thi s is
011

11 0 1

categories musl be ittlCr prctcd in Ihc li gh t of hi s concepts of dunamis and ellergeia, and mosl speci(jcally, in relation to the concept of kinesis, since kinesis conveys this difference which belongs to logos in the sense of the as-structure, and not merely to logos as assertion . Therefore, Heidegger states, we must real ise that Aristotle's conceptuality does not merely state what things are, but more im portant is that it seeks to show 62 how th ings are, namely by pointing 10 their origi n

identical wi th the first on of the formula, except in the cases when the is a simpl e entity or pure fonn, but in that case, the question is not reall y worth posin g.

Reca llin g He idegge r 's c1a im Ihal it is logos that lets Arislotle discover Dl/sia as th e subject of speech, thi s can now be interpreted as say ing thal, because of the influence of logos on Aristotle's inquiry into being, the questi on ofbeing is nccessarily a queslion ofbeing as being, of the possibility of explieal ing beings wi th res pecl to their being. Even if thi s essence itscl f cann ot be discursively understood, the attempt to circumscribe it is 1l10ti vated by thc experi ence of being as explicated, by the fact that we address thin gs as being in different senses. 61 [n other words, it is only on the basis of the experience of the manifold nature of speech that the idea ar ises that there must be some si ngle natu re underl yi ng this manifold. Morcover, even though this idea is the moti ve behind Aristot le's concept ion of logos apophantikos as the bas ic mode of speech, in th at th e assertion alonc is able to preserve its objecl properly, it seems that Heideggcr, \V ith his suggestion that it was on the basis of an encounter \V ith the di ffere nt ways in which one speaks abo ut reality that the question arose concernin g the nature of this reality, indi cates that the most important aspect or'this encounter was that il
made Aristotle rcatise that being is endowcd with a discursive structure that it has the fonn of "sorn cthing as something", not that il necessaril; has propositional form. That is, more basic than the idea of the asse rtion as a model of reality is the insighl into the discursive nature of being in

7. The question oft"e meaning of beillg. Logos as the unity of being At the end of the leclure course Gr llndbegriffe der aristotelise"en Philosophie, Heidegger gives an out li ne of Aristotle's hermeneutic situation : its fore-hav in g is the question of being as a questi on
concerning changeab le or movab le be in g; its fore- sight concerns being as presence in th e sense o fb e in g "there", which in ilS tum leads over 10

the notion of origin (Herkullft). Finally, the fore-conception is found in the concepts of dunamis, energeia and entelecheia' ) This is th us what determines Aristotle's logos, in which being is addressed as presence in the sense of fin ishcd bein g, ln other words, the meaning of being wh ich is articulated in Aristotle's logos is Ferligsein. To the extent that Aristotle's interpretation of logos is inseparab ly bound up with his understandin g of being as presence, Heidegger's principal task in thi s connection, must be to go deeper into thi s connection between speech, bein g and time . This means that he must show how a reinterpretation of logos can lead to or perhaps even requi re a concept of being which is not based upon a notion of presence as the privileged mode of time. [nstead, it should prov ide an analysis of lemporality as the condition of this presence and therewith al so of logos as a way of making present. On Heidegger's accoun!, only on the basis of an ana lys is of temporality can the phenomenon of meaning be clarified, since thi5 allulys is should reveal that time is that horizon
towards whi ch wc project in our undcrstanding and whi ch therefore is what constitutes mean in g. Accordingly, the reinterpretation of

a wider sense, the notion of the fundam ental difference between th at

Thi s point s also made by T. Sadler, Heidegger and Aristorle. The Question of

6]

Beiflg, Chapter Two, Secl ion 3.

" GA 18, p. 395. 6) GA 18, pp. 94-395.

2 14

2 15

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VI tl\ t' l'El( t' IVli

making Dasein instead of God into the ontical foun dation of ontolog y, Heidegger tries ta achieve what proved to be out of reach of Aristotl e, at least at the themati c leve l, namely ta in vestigate being with respect to how it is give n t a finit e reason, the human lo gos, in stead of letting divine reason constitute the standard . On this vicw, Dasein is that which fi rst o f ail is, in lhe sense o f bei ng that being which understands being. In other words, sinee thin gs are only in relation to Dasein' s uncove ring or logos, Dasein is lhat in virlue ofw hich ail other things can be sa id ta be. The ma nifold senses of bein g th us ail point back ta Dasein as that bein g whi ch underst ands and speak s about being in a vari ety of different senses. In this way, it is logos that provides Heidegger with the gui din g clu e in his questio n of being, since it is onl y on the bas is of'
64 Cf. the discussion oflhe not ion ora first philosophy in Heidegge r Hnd Ari Slotlc in Chapter One, Section 4.

may not have been entire ly clear about thi s himse lf. Accord ingl y, w hen

le/os of the whole cosmos. ln Chapte r One, we saw lhal Heideg ger takes Gad ta make up the onti cal founda tion of Aristotl e's on to logy." But as has been demons trated in the course ofthi s study, he thinks that the hum an logos in faet a lso plays 5uch a ro le in A ri stotl e's wo rk, ev en thou gh A ri stotle

of the conviction th at thin gs are onl y in relati on to God, being the final

ontology is a theology, it is God th at is the primary oL/sia. This means that in the end, lhe idea that evcrythin g except ol/sia can be designa ted as being only insofar as it has a re lation to ousia, is rcall y an express ion

'<sin gle nature" 10 which ail senses o f being ultimat ely point back. W e saw above that Aristotl e's unit y is ol/sia, and insofar as Aristotle's

temporality should also makes il possible to l'cveu l the presupp ositions and meanin g of Aristotl e's logos, Heidegger tao is faced with the question of how it mi ght be poss ible ta find a single concept of being whi ch can acco unt for ail the differen t senses of being which come to express ion as we exp licate beings in dirferen t regards . Even though he wants ta do justice ta the differen l senses of bein g in a w ay that he lhi nks Aristot le was unable to by avoidin g reducin g lhem to presence or Vorhan denhei t as the single, basic sense of bein g, he has to, just lik e Aristotl e, loo k for a hen, that

logos, out' Hl'ti cllllIlioll or bei ng, 1hat bein gs are accessible \Vith respect to their bein g. Thcrclore, one mi ght with some justification say that it is logos that constitutes the uni ty or pros hen of Heideg ger's ontology. For lhis reason, the possibility' of posing lhe question of being is depend ent upon the success of a foregoing inquiry into lhe constitution of Dasein. This inqlliry should circllmscribe the nalure of speech and reveal what poss ibili ties there are fo r our arti culatio n and concep tu ali sati on of
being. ln other words.

be a questio n of precise ly th e meanin g (Sinl1) of being. Or as Heideg ger puts it at the beginning of Sein und Zeit, the question that has to be posed is w hether wc kno w what we mean wh en we speak abo ut ' somethmg as bc mg. 65 In Se in und Zeit, He idegge r address es the. iss ue of meanin g in
66 connectioll \V ith hi s allal ys is of explica tion and il s as_stru c ture. Memlin g is hcrc characteri scd in term s of t\Vo basic fcatures : it is that

bein g address ed and ex plicated , the ques ti on of be in g mu st apparen tly

ir being is Lo be interrogated \V ith

respect to its

which is arl ic ulated and that towards or upon which (da s Worau!li in) we project our unders tanding. 61 Accord ingly, meanin g is nol reall y that which is understood, that is, it is not the abject of our understandi ng, but rather, one mi ght pcrh aps say, its content. As that towards which or in relation to whi ch wc proj ect our underst anding, meaJlin g is ta be expl ained in terms of the " fo re-strllc ture" .68 Since it is thi s foregoi ng structu ring o f our llndcrslanding that makes it possibl e ta un ders tand

some thin g as someth in g, th e clar ificati o n of mea nin g is no thin g differen t fro m th e investi gati on il1tO the H as wh at" o f our underst anding, which is what gelS artic ul ated or explicated our speech , w hcth er

verbalis ed or not. If the phenomenon o f meanin g is inti mately connec ted \Vith the asstructure of o ur underst anding , then it seems that one could say that the

questi on of the mea ning of being is a ques tion co nce rnin g H as \Vhat" wc unde rstand or address be in g. Thi s i5 al50 He id egger's vi ew: ;"B ein g ' and the ' as' poi nt to th e samc ori gi n . Or di ffere ntly put: The

clarification of/he essence of/he 'as' goes toge /her with (he questio n of

66

Cf. SZ, p. 1. SZ, 32. 61 S'Z, p. 151. 68 1 bid. cr.

65

l, Secti on 2.

2 16

2 t7

t' II I\I' Il ' R l' I V I '

I II

l ' III( II V(i

ill genera l

the essence of 'is ', 01 beiJlg ."h<) A cO liscqU l,;J1 CC of {hi s is, Il c idcggcl'
claims, that, when we pose this question, wc cann ot hclp but bcslowin g upon it basically the same linguistic form as the question concerning " as what" we understand bei ngs . Hencc the danger of mi staking th e 70 question ofbeing for a question ofbeings. Heidegger's first steps towards this clarificati on of the as-structure and therewith of being have been demonstrated in this study, in that it has tri ed to elucidate hi s analyses of the as-structure on its different levels, in partic ul ar with respect to the apophantic a nd the hermeneutic level. In this sense, the study has hecn concerned \V ith the meaning of being ail along. Most specitically, it has been shown that that towards which logos is directed as weil as that which is articu lated in logos is a possibility or dunamis
7l

SO I1l t; thll e tlm l II I the II/I/f) / n} ffl e cO I/C:ejJ f of

If being cannOI be rcduccd to Vorhanden sein, if it is a

point of

I-Ieidegger's ontology that. it seeks to preserve the manIfold sen:es of being, then how can one fram e a unilary concept o f belilg wlthout falling into exaclly such a reduction, ifnot to presence then to th e bemg of Dasein, of logos? Hei degger' s answer is that we must actually "mave beyond" b eing if we are to be ab le ta make clear Ihal toward s whlch being itselr is und erslood. 75 This '< bcyond" bein g is time.

8. Tempora/ityas the lillity ofbeing

Wilh Ihe idea that we must inquire into the nature of lime in order 10 be able to conceptualise the meaning of bein g, Heidegger reveals another dimension of logos as the hen of his anto logy: ev en Ihough ail senses of being point back 10 Dase in as Ihat being which explicmes being, Ihis explica ti on is itself lemporally constitul ed. So far, howeve r, the temporalily (Zeitlichkeit) of Dasein's existe nce is a hen only to the extent that it represents the most basic or final leve\ of the explanatlOn of the co nstitution of ou r und crstandin g, of logos. In other \Vo rd s, on this accounL, il is still Dasein or logos tb at makes up [-leidegger' s Ollsia, it is jusl that logos must be a nalysed with respect to its temporal character. Aecordin gly, Heidegger asserlS that lemporality can be sa ld to conslituLe the " mea ning" of Dasein 's existence, more precisely, of its care, since to explicale this mcaning is to point out that \-vhich possible its activity o f projection, its understanding somethlng as
1 somelllng. . ' To give a sufficient account of Heidegger's analysls of lemporality .
76

However, the preceding analyses were mainly

concerned with finding out the co nditions of the poss ibility of understanding beings as this or that. But when asking about the " as" of bein g, we are look in g for Ihal whi ch makes il possible to understand beings as beings in genera l. As Heidegger also puts it, we are them atisi ng our opennes s to the world as the manifestation (Offenbarkeit) of beings as su ch in genera l (im Ganzen)71 However, if being always comes 10 expression as thi s or that, if, "the articulation of being varies with the particular \Vay of being of a being,,73, th e question of the mean ing of being does Ilot seem to have a simpl e answer, i.e. there does not seem to be a single mean in g of being. In other words,
This (way of being1 cannot be restricted to presence [Vorhandense in ] and actua lity in the traditional sen se. The question of the possible mlilliplicily of beil1g and therewith al the

and its attempt to challenge Aristotle 's definiti on of tim e would

GA 29/30, p 484: " Das 'Sei n' und das 'a is' we isen in denselben Ursprung. Oder anders gewendet: Die Aujhelhmg des Wesells des 'ais ' ge/If ZI/sammell mil der Frage nach dem Wes en des 'isl '. des Seills." oc GA 31, pp. 49- 50. 7 1 Cf. Chapter Three, Sections 6 and 8 re spect ively, whe re il was noted that Heidegger argues fhal the abj ect of logos is understood in tenns of ils possibility and that the end, -rio, of logos is a possibility. T. Sheehan therefo re simply states that oUvoj.u lS the uniti ed meaning of logos; "Heidegger ' s Interpretation of Aristotl e: Dynomis and Energeia", p. 292. 12 GA 29/3 0, p. 483. 13 GA 24, p. 170: " Die Artikulati on des Sei ns variiert Ill it der jeweil igen Weise des Seins eines Seienden."
69

certainly require a separate sludy77 Here J will only attempl to state

74 l bid: "D iese kann nihl aul' Vorhand ense in und Wirklichkeit der Trad ition eingeschrankt \Verden. Die Frage nach der Seins und damt zugle ich die nach der Einheil des Degriffes von Sem uberhaupl \\l rd brennend." iS GA 24 , p. 399 . "SZ, pp. 323-32 4. . . . . . Il be 77 The rol e of Ar istotle in Heidegge r's investigations 1I1to nas. recen y ' en 1 'ed by T Chanter "Heidegger's Understanding of the Anstotehan Concept of uncl J. Aristot le, and T ime in Basic Problems 19", bath of

218

2 19

more clearly what has bce n impli cit in this study 1.1 11 il long, name ly Ihat Heidegger 's understandin g of logos and kin esis is bas cd upon his understanding oftime. Wc have seen earl ier that Heidegger's verdict on Aristotle ' s ontology is that Aristotle in his inquiry into kines is - as weil as into logos - eventually is led to conclude that kinesis presupposes a " prod ucer" whose mod e o f bei ng is that of enlelecheia, fini shed presence . In Ihi s w ay, the qu esti on concernin g \Vhat it means to be is fi nall y answered in tenn s of an absolute origin that is itsel f an enti ty or being. Broadly speakin g, H cidegge r's response to thi s is to rema in in kinesis in th e sense uf nul pos itin g a furth er ground or bas is. Instead, he attempts to clarify kines is by reveal in g ilS temporal stru cture. On this v iew, temporality is thus that "single nature" to w hic h aIl se nses of being are to be relatcd. This is the onl y ground or basis that Ihere is. Acco rdin g to He id egger 's charac teri sali on of te mpo ralit y, temporality is " Ihe unified phenomenon of a future which makes present in the process o fh av ing been".7K Il e continues:
fouture, the characler or having bcen and present make man irest the phenomena l character of the "towards oneself', the "back to", the "Ieuing oneself be encounlered by". The phenomena of towards ... , 10 ... , al ... , reveallempora lity as Ihe ekslalikol/ pure and simp le. Temporalily ;5 the primordial "oulside of ilself" in
alldlor il5eJf79

However, to be outs id c itself \Vas precise ly th e bas ic character of kinesis . In olher wonls, what Heidegger here is descri bing as the temporal ity of human existence and its logos is a temporality that is implied already in Aristotle's concept of kines is, though not sufficiently conceptualised or articulated 80 For as we have seen on a number o f occas ions, a bei ng that is kinelon is present in its transition, in its being
whom try to question the rather comfllon idea that Heidegger WOllld sim ply wan! 10 overome Aristollc 's un de rslandi ng of lime; an idea Ihat no doubt tends 10 bec ome domin at ing in Heidegge r's own lexIs. 78 S2, p. 326: "gewesend-gegenwartigende Zukunft". 79 S2, pp, 328-329: "Z ukunft, Gewesenhei l, Gege nwart zeigen die phanomenale n Charaktere des ' Auf-sich-zu ' , des ZurOck aur, des 'Begegnenlasscns von'. Die Phiinomene des zu ... , auf ... , bei ... offenbaren die Ze it lichkei l aIs das KomnKov sc hlechth in. Zeitfichkeil S( dos ursprngliche 'AujJer-sicll ' ail undfiir sicll selbst." 80 That Heidegger in Sein und Zeil work s out his concept of lemporali ly on Ihe basis of his unde rstanding of is also suggesled by T. Sheehan, " Heidegger's Interpretati on of Ari sloll c: DYllamis and Energeia, p. J07.

on the way lOw{ mJs 11 11 C li O. nnd this "dy namic" presence invo lves at the sa me li me il n.:lati on to th e past, namely th at which thi s being already was, its ente/echeia. As far as logos is concerned, thi s is to say that logos is able to add ress an objeet because it projects itself towards an end (a possibility for itself), and this proj ection is simultaneollsly a reacti vation o f what il already was, namely a possi bil ity or dunamis for add ressing thin gs in d ifferenl ways. Accord ingly. w h en c1ari fy in g the nature of kinesis, the analys is of temporality sinlUltaneously reveals th e dynamic nature of logos, th at is, it shows that Ihe bc ing o f logos is dunamis or incomplete move ment. However, Heidegger thinks thal hi s ontol ogical project involves yet another step: in order to be able to give an answer to th e question of the mCaJ'lin g o f being, it is not eno ugh to poi nt ta th e lemporality (Ze itlichkeit) of logos or Dasein, but il requires that we work out the 81 temporality ( Temporalitti t) of being itself The ai m of the proj eet of fundamental ontology is thus not restricted to fonnulating a concept of bein g on the basis of an inves ti gation of logos, i.e. of the phenomenon of meanin g and its as-structure. For the idea is that logos itself together w ith its te mporal nature w ill be sufficientl y understood onl y when we have ac hieved an appropriate concept of being and ilS temp orali ty.82 Aceordingly, in Grllndproblell1e, Heidegger states that even though we must sin gle ou t our o\V n being, the being o f our logos, over aga in st other modes of being whi ch pertain to beings di ffere nt from us, we must

nevertheless seek to understand it in tenns of the unit y of the original concept of being 83 This ori ginal concept of be in g is thus to be ac hieved by means of an analysis of the temporality of being. Exactl y how He idegger conceives of the relation between the Temporaiittit of bei ng and the Ze itlichkeit of Dasein is no doubt a di ffi cult qu esti on, since it seems that il is precise ly in connecti o n \Vith the attempt to work out the l'ormer that he realises the limitations of his projeet, possibly because he sees that in spite of his attempt to introduce a more basic level o f re fl ection than that of Dasein 's temporality, the question of be in g is not hing but precisely a question concernin g its mea nin g, conceived of as a proj ection of D asei n. ln Grundprobleme.
"S2, p. 19. "cr. GA 19. p. 571. "G/124. p. 2 19.

220

22 1

( 11\ 1' 1111 1IVI'

logos is subjected ta a temporal analysis, for ta con ce ive of logos on the basis of kines is is to approac h it as a vehicle o rthe temporal interpla y of past, present and future such as this has been outlined above. Hence if logos is that towa rds which cvery expl ication of being is pointin g, logos is itself pointing lOwa rds kinesis as its " meanin g" or hen. Or, one could perhap s say, at this stage, Heidegger's proj ect centres upon an attempt ta rcad Ari stotle's dc finition of lime in the Physics as the measur e of movement as a " "formai indication". Thal is ta say, granted that logos in virtue of its kinetic nature poi nts beyond itself. it is important to affirm that Aristotl e's own logos on the relati on betwee n time and movem ent (00 points beyond itself. F or wh en explica tin g time as the measur e of
84 GA 24, p. 324: "Er meint die Zcitlichkeit, so fern sie se lbst Zllm Them a gern ach t sit ais Bedingung der Moglichk eit des Sein sversttind niss es und der Ont olog ie ais sol

essenti ally the samc thin g as 10 explicate th e nature of logos, th e fou ndation o f the as-stru cture of our understanding . And as we have seen throughoul Ihis th es is, in order 10 revea l the nature o f logos, il is necessa ry to analy se it w ith respect to ils mo vemc nt or change ) regardin g it as a forlll of kinesis. It is th us \Vith this determillation that

ontology as such."" Accordin gly, on the bas is of a thematisation o f the tempor ality of our existen ce, it should be possibl e to revea l the conditi ons of our underst anding of being, so that it bec ornes clear what it means to understand being temporall y, and therewith, the tempor ality [Te m porali ld l ] o f other modes o f being, suc h as availab ility, Vorhan denhei! , elc. , could also be clarili ed. But as already ind icated, the latter task of workin g out the Tempar a/itiil of being is onl y parti y fullilled , and the focus remain s on the temporal constitution of Oasein. If Heidegger 's project o f a ph ilosoph y o f li fe and its logos can be sai d la make at Icast a tempor ary hait atthis poi nt, al the analysis of the tempora lity of our underslanding, the consequ ence is that one must also say that it is logos that remain s the basic phenomenon to Heideg ger. Ta pose the questio n of the meanin g o f being is at th is stage of his thin king

conditi on o f th e possibi l ty o f the unde rstan din g of be in g and of

He id egger charac ler ises lhe relalio n b lwe"n Te lllp ora /il l and Zeit/ichkeil in the fo llow ing way : " II [Telllpora /iltil i means tempor alily [Zeitlichkeit] il1sofar as tem poralit y itsclr is made inl D a thcm c as th e

.or," 111 ovc m l.: l1 1 wilh I CloI p\.' ' Il) Ill e pt'jo l' und the posterl

rcached o ut ln l UI end. n:nue ly the uni !ied tempor ality of logos and kinesis whieh he eoult! not exhaus! or eompletely articulate, but whleh enab led him to frame what in Heideg ger' s view were hlS most importa nt concepts: lgos and kinesis.

A' -n

sto e

tl

cher. "

8$ See

p. 173.

noIe

83 .

222

223

( 't .NVI.l ISION

CONCLUSION

This study began with a qu otation From Soph istical Refu/ation s concern ing the nature o f phi losophica l beginnings. After hav in g assessed the diffi cullies that necessaril y acco mpany every attempt at finding the proper beginnin g, Aristotl e go es on to circum scribe the basic traits ofsuch work that foll ows upon the initial, foundational stage of philosophy:
When the beginning has bccn discovered, il is easier to add '.Vhat is missi ng and to enlarge il. This is what has happened in rhetoric
and in nearly all other disciplines. Wh ercas thase who discovcred
the begin ni ng \Ve re only able 10 advane il qut c a little bit , thase who are now ramo ll s - having inhcri led the beginning frorn

centre on tll e lin 'N l ioll cOll ccrnin g th e nature of human reason, and to takc as il S gui(\;n g cl ue !\r istotlc 's c lass ica l detinition of man as a "rational animai": ZoiO Jl lagon echan . But as has become clear in th e course of th is stu dy, Heidegger is convinced that the concept o f logos pravides us \V ith the key ta Aristotle's philosophy as a whole, not onl y to hi s und erstanding of rationalit y. Thus one could say that in Heidegger's assessment of Aristotle's thought, the concept of logos is regarded as a kind of pri sm in whic h Aristotle's other concepts are

several prcdccesso rs who, succeed ing o lle another, 50 to spcak,

have gradually developed il - have been able to make il grow. 1

When read as a pre diction o f the actual course of the history of phi losophy, Heidegger could certai nly subscribe to th is statement. On his view, philosophy has tended precisely to merel y fil! in what was sti l! missing in the Aristotelian beginning, while sil ently assuming it as a basis. ln this way, one has been ab le to develop this beginning and thus to carry the philoso phical tradition forward , but only at the co st of a blindness regarding th e rea l power or dunamis of Aristotle's thou ght. For to trul y make the Aristotelian legacy grow req ui res it to be confronted and reconsidered as sueh . ln this study, 1 have followed Heidegger's attempt to begin anew w ith Aristotl e, rcgarded as an integral part of his attempt to begin anew wit h phi losophy as such. In itia ll y, Heidegger's project was said to
J Soph. El. "W\l'tllS 0' EUPllJ..lVllS pqov 't'o rrpocr' 8vca Kal cruvavEl v n tO ,O l1tv ecrn \" orrEp Ka l Trept -cOS PlltOp l KO ayou oxeoov 5 Iwl 1tepl t dUa c mcra txva. al )..lev yp -c cipx EUpOVTE rtaVtEw rtl )..ll KPV 'Tl ai of: "v EOQ), qlOV'tE, rtapaapoVTE rtop 1torov olov K OlOoox1.s !(at !-lpOS rtpaayayoVtUlV, otUl

reflected as different aspects of one and the same basic issue. One way to descri be the motives bchind Heidegger's encoun ler with the Ari stotelian logos is to point to his ambition to redeline the discipline of logic - with the help of the father of logic himself. We have seen that Heidegger takes such a project to require a "destruction" of Aristotle's logic, such as it has been handed down to us, and in particu lar of the noti on of logos apophantikos, the supposedly basic element in Aristotle 's logie. This des tru ction , whi ch should revea l th e basic ex pcriences that make up th e foundati on of Ar istotle's teaching of logos, has here been di v ided in to two main stages. First, we have seen how Hcidegger argues that the notion of logos apophal1tikos as the superior mode of logos, and in fact Aristotle 's conception of theory and logic in general , ma y ultimately be traced back to the experience of speech as the basic tra it of li fe. Morcover, this experience \Vas shawn ta be rooted in everyday, Greek life itself, since already at this level, logos is unclerstood to be marked by a ca pacity for di stinguishing between dilIerent things, which Aristotle has affi rmed and developed with hi s concep ts o f slll1thesis and d ihairesis . Second ly, Ar istotle 's understanding of logos was shown to go hand in hand with his vicw of the "natura l" world as chan geab le, as characteri sed by kinesis, which makes Heidegger convinced that he can rightfully c1aim that Aristotle ' s inquiry into logos is moti vated by the will to do justice to being as kinoumenon. Thus, if Aristotle's logic, his teachi ng of logos, is founded up on his experience of speech as the basic trait of li fe, which grants to life its various possibilities of addressing and articulating the world such as it is first of ail "thcre", name ly as a changeab le, kinetic wodd , then Aristotle's logic is in fact essentially a logic of li fe. However, a basic assumption ofthis study has been that Heidegger's attempt to trace Aristotle's logic and his views on theoretical knowledge

224

225

'ONl'I ,IIS IO N 0 and articulation back to il s lo undalion in life and praxis docs not a irn 1 reduce the theoretica l to th e practical, nor to di stin guish a separate philosophy of life or praxis which Aristotle would ha ve belrayed when framing his conception of theory. By contras t, my idea has been thal Heidegger thinks that, to the extent that there is a conllict in Aristotle 's thought, this is a conllict between phenomenology and metaphys ics, which cuts right through the distinction between the theoretical and the practica!. More specifically, 1 have tried to show that Heidegger thinks that th e discovery of life and praxis as the basis of Aristotle's ph il osophy gcts its full signification only wh en it is applied to Aristotle's understanding oftheory and onto logy. 1 have been guided by the idea that the rcasan why Heidegger tri es to reconsider Aristotle's conception of phi losophy as theOl'Y or /heoria in the light of an inlerpretation of Aristotle's analysis of life is th at he wants not only to eventually rehabilitate the traditional vie\V of Aristotle as a proponent of the primacy oflheory, but also to be able for his oIVn part to establish such a primacy. When seen in this \Vay, one could say that Heidegger's interpretation of the Aristotelian logos is equally an attempt to help philosophy to a cerlain kind of seltcretlecti on, which should make it possible ta retrieve a genuinc sense ortheoretical research by reminding philosophy of how it initially understood itself: as the suprerne forrn of

II Nt '1 I IS ltlN

of a relutloll ht.'!wCI: I1 Il (clicher and !li s stud cnt , where the one is
cffec tin g and th e olher is uffcClcd, 50 that the actuali sation, or to use

Heidegger ' , \Vord , the presence of the teacher and the student belongs to one and the same mo ve ment.' To teach, Heidegger says, is to speak IVith another person, so tht he who listens is ab le to go along in the speech. In the dialogue between Heide gger and Aristotle, however, each of them must be said to occupy both the position of listener and that of the speaker: each of them is effectin g as weil as being affected. Thi s is also in line with Heidegger 's notion of authentic Mitsein in philosophy: logos as an Auseinandersetzung or as a relation betwecn address and response, in whic h the differences between the Iwo interloculors are preserved, in that the "teacher" does 110t aitn to take the "student's" place but to grant to him his oIVn proper possibilities. ln the preface to the first ed itio n of his Frhe Schriften, written late in life, Heidegger reca lls that "Iready in hi s carli est works, the 19 12 dissertation and the 191 5 habil itation thesis, he was actually trying to come to grips \Vith the question concerni ng the relation between
language and being, though without yel reali sing either the scope or

nature of such an cndeavour. 3 This question would continue to fasci nate

prax;s.
ln this study, the role of Aristotle in Heidegger's project has been approached from severa l perspectives. It has been shown that Heidegger
not only reads Aristot!e's works from a phenoll1enological perspective,

Heidegger throughout hi s writings, though eventuall y, he would look to other thinkers th an Aristotle for help in this pursui!. More specifically , Heidegger would later entertain the idea of a more "original, prel11etaphysical logic" that supposedly wou ld be present in pre-Socratic thought, notably in Heraelitus' At this stage, Heidegger also begins to
opcrale w ith the notion of "another" beginn ing of philosophy, whose possibilities were if Ilot betrayed then at Jeast reduced in AristoLle. ln

but also can look upon Aristotle as a phenolllcnologicai thinker in his oIVn right. Morcover, on the basis of this approach, Heidegger is able to turn Arislotle against Aristotle himsel f in order to come to grips with his metaphysieal assurnptions, insofar as they in lile end deprived Aristotle of the poss ibilily of affirmi ng kinesis as the being of world and life and led him in stead to pose the perfect mode of being peculiar to en/elecheia as Ihe reality or essence of kinesis. However, Heidegger's interpretation of Aristotle could to Sorne extent be regarded as an instance or perhaps even as a confirmation of the theme of logos and kinesis itself, and Heidegger also seems to have entertained this idea himself. At the end of Grundbegriffe der aristotelischen Philosophie, Heidegger points to Aristotle's own chara cterisntioll or kine,\' i,y in !Cllll S

accordance with his changcd attitude towards Aristot le, Heidegger also re-evaluates his own earlier interpretations of Aristotle. From there on, Aristotle is defll1 itely tied to the not ion of the primacy of assertoric speech.

2 GA 18, p. 327. Aristotle's di scuss ion ofthis Is round in Phys . 202b4fT. ) Frhe Schriftell, (GA 1), p. 55.

For Ibis distinction between a metaphysical and a pre.metaphysical 1agie,' see e.g. J-Jeraklit . Der At/fang des abendlandischell Dellkens/Logik. Heraklits Lellre vom Logos (GA 55), pp. 270-279.

226

227

CONCI, I ISION

The motives behind lI e idegger's re-eva lu ation of Aristot lc 's achievements in the lie ld of logic and language are eertainly comp lex. To circumscribe the position that Aristotlc wi ll later occupy in
Heidegger's thought would n ot only require an in ves tiga ti o n nto I-Je idegger' s later reflections on language an d logos, but it would also have to involvc an assess ment of Heidegger's reinterpretation of hi s

LIST OF WORKS CITED

Works by Heidegger
1. Works publ ished in the Gesamltlllsgabe (Kloslcrl11ann: Frank rurt a m Ma in)

own philosophical project as a whole, and th at belongs to another study-' The present stud y has been conlined to Heidegger's early rcsponse to the question of logos , such as il was once posed by A ristotl e. Even thollgh Ihi s attemp t onl y represents one way, as
Heidegge r him sel f wou ld put it, il was a way he had to
gO.6

As th e

father of logie, Aristotl e confronted Heidegger as th at philosopher wh am no one can ignore who sets out to address anew the question of logos. ln one of his earl y courses, Heidegger claims that the basic princip le
ofhenncneutics is that one must bcgill with that w hich is clear and from

GA 1 UA 5 GA 9
GA t 7

GA 18 GA 19
GA 21

Frhe Schriften, cd. F.-W. von Herrmann, 1978 , Holzwege, ed. F.- W. vo n Hernnann, 1977, Wegmarken , cd. F.-W. von I-lc.:;rrmanl1. 1976, EinJihrung ill die phnvmcnologische Forscl1!/IIg, cd. F.-W. von I-Ierrrnann, 1994, Gnmdbegriffe der arislOlelischcn Philosophie, cd. M. Michalsk i,

there on proceed ta that which is obscure.' At this stage, it is Plato who is regarded as th e obscure philosopher who is on ly accessible via Aristotle. However, this principle could a lso be sa id to gove rn Heidegger's oIVn philosophieal development. Il was onl y on the basis of his early encounter wi th Aristotle's clear and seienti lic elaboration of logos that Heidegger eventually got to the point where he was able to tum to anothcr, more obscure or hidden beginning ofp hilosophy in preSocratic th ought, where the question or logos could be ra ised anew.

GA 24
GA 27

2002, Platoll: Saphi,-"s, ed. 1. Sch nl er, 199 1, Logik. Die Frage nach der Wahrheit, ed. W. Biemel, 197611995 (2 nd J'ev. ed.), Die Grundprob/eme der Phnomen%gie, ed. F.-W. von
Herrmann , 1975, Einleilung in die Philosophie , eds. O. Saame & I. Saamc-

GA 29/30
GA 31

GA 33 GA 45
GA 55

GA 56/57
GA 58 GA 59 GA 60

The di fference between the early and the later Heid egger's undcrsta nd ing of language has recently becn explored by J.-F. Courtine, "The Destruction or Logic: From Logos to Language", who describes the change in He id egger on thi s point in terms of a turn from Aristot le to the pre-Socral ics. 6 See SZ, p. 427. 7 GA 19, p. 11: "vom Hell en in s Dunklc".
5

Speidel, 1996, Die Gnmdbegriffe der Metaphys ik . We/t - Elld/ichkeit Einsamkeif , cd. vonl-lerrmann , 1983, Vom Wesen der menschlichel1 Freihei1. fin/ei/ung in die Philosophie , ed. H. l'ietjen, 198211994 (2'" rev. ed.), Aristote/es: Metaphysik e 1-3. Von Wesen und Wirklichkeit der Krafl,ed. H. Hni , 1981, GnmdFagen der Philosophie. AusgeIViih/te "Prob/eme" der "Logik ", ed. C.-W. von Herrmann, 198411992 (2'd ed.), Heraklil. Der Anfang des abendlischen Denkens/ Logik. [-leraklils Lehre vom Logos, ed . M. S. Springs, 1979, Zur BeSfimm1ll1f{ der Philosophie, cd. B. Heimbchel, 198711999 (2'" rev. ed.), Gnmdprob/ellle der l'hdnomeno/ogie, ed. I-I.-J-I. Gander, 1993, Phanomenologie der Anschauung und des Ausdrucks. Theorie der pltilosophischen Begriffsbildung, ed. C. Strube, 1993 , Phiinomenologie des religisen Lebens, eds. M. J ung , T. Regehly & C. Strube, 1995,

22X

229

1 IS'I ' OF WOI(KS C I 11' 1)

1 IS 1 <W WORKS C ITE])

GA 61

PhtinomenologJsche

}I/Jerprelmiouel1 ZII

Aristote/es. li illfil!Jrllllg

2. Othel cditiolls

GA 63
GA 79

il1 die phtinomellulog isc:he FursclulIIg, cds. W. Brocker & K . 13rocker-Oltmanns, 1985, Ontologie (Hermen e lltik der Faklizill, cd. K. Brock cr-

Oltmanns, 198 8, Breme,. und Fl'eiburger VOrfrdge, ed. P. Jaeger, 1994.

De Anima, ed. R. D. Hicks (Hildesheim: Olms Verlag, 1990, based upon the Cambridge ed. 1907).

Works by other authors

2. Othe .. work, by Heidegger

GA 62*

SZ

Phnomen%gische Interprefationen zu Aristote/es. Ontolog;e und Logik, unpub lished leelure course lrom 1922, Sein IInd Zeit (Tbi ngen: Niemeyer, 1927/1993 1t hed.),
Vor/rge und Au/s/ze (Pfullingcn: Neske, 1954), Gelassellheit (Pfu ll ingen: Neske, 1959), ZUI" Sache des Denkens (Tbingen: Niemeyer, 1969),

PA

"Plillomeno!ogische Interprctati onen Zli Ari stoteles. Anze ige

der hermeneutisehen Situation" , Dilthey-Jahrbuch 6 (J 989): 237-269, "Wil helm Dilthey s FOt'schungsa rbe it und der gegenwartige Kampf um cine histori sc he Weltanschauung", Di/lh ey-Jahrbuch 8 ( 1992/1993), pp. 143- 177.

Works by Aristotle
1. Works published in Oxford Classical Texts (Oxford: Oxford University Press)

E.N. CaU De /11/. Phys. DeAn. Met . Pol. Top.! Soph. E.I. Rhet.

E.thica Nieoll/aehea, cd. L. Bywater, 1894, Categoriae el Liber de Interpretatione. cd. L. MinioPal uello, 1949, Physica, ed. W. D. Ross, 1950, De Anima, cd. W. D. Ross, 1956, Metaphysica, ed. W. Jaeger, 1957, Polilica, ed. W. D. Ross, 1957, Topiea el Sophislici E.Ienchi, ed. W. D. Ross, 195811984 (6 th rev. ed.), Ars Rhetorica, ed. W. D. Ross, 1959.

Arendt, H., The Hl/man C ondition (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1958). Austin, J. L., How ra do Things lI'ilh Words (London: Clarendon, 1962), Bcrnasconi, R., "J -Ieideggcr's Destruct ion of Phronesis", The Southern Jal/mal of l'hilosophy 28 ( 1989) : 127- 147, Heidegger ill Quesliol1. 7le Art of Existing (New Jersey: Humanities Press, 1993). Boehm, R. , Dos Gl'llIullegende und das Wesentlich e: Zu Aris /ol e/es' Abiwndlllng "be r das Sein und das Seiellde" (Melaphysik Z) (The Hague: Nij hoff, 1965). Brentano, F., Von den mannigfchen Bedeutung des Seienden Iltlch AriSloleles (Hildesheim: Olms Verlag, 1862) Broadie, S. , Ethies with Arisrotle (New York/Oxford : Oxford Uni ve rsity Press, 1991) Brogan, W. , UA Response to Robert Bemasconi 's 'Hc idegger's Destruction or Phronesis''', The SOl/them Jal/mal of Philosophy 28 (1989): 149- 153 , "Heidegger and Aristotle: Dasein and the Question of Practical Lire", Crises in Continental Philosophy, eds. A. B. Dallery & C. E. Scott (A lbany: State Univers ity of New York Press, 1990), pp. 137-1 46, "The Place of Ari s toile in the Development of Heidegger', Phenomenology", Reading Heidegger fro111 the Starl. Essays in !-lis Earliesf Thollght , eds. T. Kisiel & J. van Buren (Albany: State Unive rsity of)Jew York Press, 1994), pp. 213-227, "Heidegger's Interpretation of Aristot le on lhe Pri vative Character of Force and the Twofoldness of Being", fmerrogaling the Tradition. J-fel'mefleutics and rhe Hisrory of Philosophy, cds. C. E. Scott & J. Sallis (A lbany: State Un ivers ity or New York Press, 2000), pp. I II -1 30. Brockcr, W. , Aristote/es (Frankfurt am Main: KlostermHnl1, 1935). Caputo, J. D. , Radical /lermene ulics. Repetition, Deconstruclion. and the Hermenewic Projecl (Bloomi ngton & India napolis: Indiana University Press, 1987).

230

23 1

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1 tS 1 () l ' WORI<S urE I)

Gachllll cr, II. -lI ., IJ!(lI!,.ltcit /lnd Me/hode . Gnmdziige einer philosophischen /-Iermenculik , (iesQm mel/e Werke 1 ( rbingen: Mohr Siebeck,

Cassin. B., Aristolle el le logos. COllfes de la phnomnologie ordinaire

(Paris: PUF, 1997).
Chanter, T., "H eidegger's Understandillg of the Ari slotel ian Concept of Time", /Ilterrogating the Tradition. I-lermenel.llics and the His/ory of Philosophy, eds. C. E. Scott & J. Sallis (Albany: State Uni versi ty orNcw

York Press, 2000), pp. 131-157. Charles, D., Aristotle 's Philosophy of Action (!thaca: Cornell Uni versity Press, 1984). Cooper, J: M., Reasol1 and Humtm Good in Aristolle (Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 1975). Courtine , J. F., "Les 'recherches logiques' de Martin Heidegger, de la thori e du ta de l 't re", Heidegge r 1919-1 929. De l 'hermneutique de la fact icit la mtaphysique du Oasein, cd. J.-F. Co urtine (Pari s: Vrin, 1996), pp. 7-31. "The Destruction of Logic: from Logos to Language", Th Presoeraties ajier Heidegger, ed. D. C. Jacobs, (Albany: State University of New York Press), pp. 25-53. Dreyfus, H. L., Being-in-the-World A Commentary on Heidegger's Being and Time, Division J (Cambridge: M Il' Press, 1991). Dring, 1., Aristoteles. Darstellllng lInd Interpretat ion seines Denkens (Heidelberg: Wi nter Un iversitatsve rlag, 1966). Elli s, J., "Hei degge r, Ar isto tl e, and lIme in Basic Problems 19" , Interrogall1g the Tradilion. Hermeneulics and Ihe History of Philosophy,

1960/1 990,6'" rev. ed.), "Prakti sches Wissen", Gesammelle Werke 5 (Tbingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1985/1 999), pp. 230-248, "Die Marbu rger Theo logie", Gesammel/e Werke 3 (Tb ingen: Mo hr Siebeck, 1987/1999), pp. 197-208, " Heideggers 'theologische' JlIgendschrirt", Dilthey-Jahrbllch 6 (1989): 228-234. Gre isch, J. , "La 'tapisserie de la vie', le phnomene de la v ie et ses interprtations dans les Grundproblellle der Phtinomenologie (1919/ 1920) de Martin Heidegger", Heidegger 19/9 /929. De l'hermneutique de la fac ticit la mtaphysique du Dasein , cd. J.MF. Courtine (Paris : Vrin,
M

J 996), pp. 13 1-152. Han ley, c., Beil1g al1d God il1 Aristotle Cllld Heidegger: the Role ofMethod in Thinkil1g the Il1finite (Lanham: Ro\Vm an & Liule field Publishers, 2000). Husserl, E., Ideen ZII einer reinen Phdnomenologie und phiil1omenologischen

Philosophie (Tbingen: Niemeyer, 1922). nd Logische UnlersucJwngell ll/ l (Tb ingen: N icmeyer, 1900/ 1913, 2 rev.

ed.) Logische Untersllchlll1gel1 1112 (Tbingen: Niemeyer, 19011192 1,2" rev. ed.) Hyde, M., & Smi th, c., "Ari sto tle and Heidegge r on Emotion and Rheloric .
Quest ions of Ti me and Space", The Crit ical 1'1//"11. Rlt e/or ie and Philosophy in Post/1/odcrn Discol/rse, eds. r Angus & L. Langsdo rf (Carbondale: Southern Illinoi s Un iversity Press, 1993), pp. 68-99. Kahn , C., "Aristotle on Thinkin g", Essays 011 Aris/otle 's De Anima, eds. M. Nlissbali m & A. Rorty (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992), pp. 359-

eds. C. E. Scott & .1 . Sall is (A lbany: State Uni versity of New York Press, 2000), pp. 159-/78. Fay, l'A., Heidegger: The Criliqlle o(Logic (The Hagu e: Nijhoff: 1977). Fe il , 1. P., "The Fam il iar and the Strange: on the Limits of Praxis in the early Heidegger", The SOll thern JOIIl"l1ol of Philosophy 28 (1989): 23-41. Figal, G., Marlin Heidegger zur Eilifh/"lll1g (Hamburg: Junius, 1992/1999,
2 nd rev. cd.), "Rcfraining from Dialectic. He idegger's Int erprctation of Plato in the Sophist Lectures (1924/25), Interrog{lIing .the Tradilion. Hermeneutics and the HistOly of Philosophy, eds. C. E. Scott & J. Sallis (A lbany: State University of New Yo rk Press, 2000), pp. 95 -1 09. Frede, M., "On Ar istotl e's Conceptio n of the Soul", Essays on Aristotle 's De An ima, cds. M. Nussbaum & A. Rorty (Ox ford : Oxford Un iversity Press, 1992), "Introduction", Rationality in Greek Thollght , ed. M. Frede & G. Stri ker (Oxford : Clarendon Press, 1996), pp. 1-28.

79. Kant , 1., Kritik der reinen Vernunft (Ham burg: Meiner, 1993). Kelly, T. A., Language and Transcendence. A Study in the Phi/osophy of Mar/in Heidegger and Kat/MOflo Apel (Bern : Lang, 1994). KeBier. A., Aristoteles LeJue von der Einheil de r Definition (M nc hen: Berchmans Verlag, 1976). Kisie l, T., The Gellesis of Heidegger 's Being & Time (Berkeley: University ofCalifornia Press, 1993), "L'ind ication formelle de la fact ic it: sa ge nse et sa transformat ion", H eidegge r 19/9 1929. De l'hermneutique de la facticit la lIItaphysique du Dase in, ed. J.-F. Cou rtine (Par is: Vrin, 1996), pp. 205M

2 19.

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Press of America, 1985),

lIml Sclc nce (Wnshinglon D, ',; Uni versity

Kre ll , D. F., Daimon Lif Heidegger and L!le-Philosophy (B loom inglon & e.

"'J'hinki ng in Ruin s - lire, Dcath and Destruction in Heidcgger's Early Writings", unpubl ished manuscript. Sadler, l'., Heidegger and Arislotle. J'lle Question of Being (London &
Atlantic Hi ghlands: Athlone, 1996). Schuhmann, K. , "Die Entwicklun g der Sprechakttheorie in der Mnchener Phiil1o menologie" Spraehe, Wirkliehkeil, BelVuj3lsei/l, ed. E. W. Orth (Fre iburgIMnchen: Alber, 1988), pp. 133-167. Seidl , H., Der Begrij! des Intel/ekts (no us) bei Aristote/es (Mei senheim am Glan: Hain, 1971). Shcchan, T., "Heidegger, Aristotl e and Phcnomeno logy", Philosophy Today 19 (1975): 87-94, "Hcid egger's Int erpreta tio n of Aris tot le: Dynamis and Ereigl1is", Philosophy Research Archives 4 ( 1978): 278-3 14, "1-/ ermcneia and Apophallsis: Tbe carly Heidegger on Ar istotle", Heidegger cil 'ide de /a phll olll ello!ogie, cd. r. Volp i et al. (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publi shers, 1988), pp. 67-80. Smith , P. C ., The Hermcnelllics of Original Argllmcfll. Demonstration, Dia/eelie, RhelO,.ie (Evanston: North westcrn University Press, 1988). Sta rr, D. E., Entily and Existence. Ali OJ1tological Investigation of Heidegger al1d Arislot!e (New York: Franklin & Co. lne., 1975) Tami niaux, J., Lectures de l 'ontologie fOlldam e/ltale . Essais s ur Heidegger (Grenob le: Millon, 1989), Le Ihfre des philosophes (G renoble: M illon, 199 5) . Tugendhat, E., Tl KATA TINOS. Eine Untersll chung Zll Struktur und Ursprung aristotelisehe,. Grlllldbegriffe (Fre iburg/Mnc hen: Albe r, 1958). De,. Wahrheilsbegriff bei Husserlllnd Heidegger (Berlin: de Orny ter & Co., 1967). Tzavaras- Dimou, A., Pllaf/omenalogie der Aussage. Eine Untersuclllll1g Zll Heidegger 's exislenzial-ol1fo!ogischer Il1terpretation der Aris!Otelischen logos apophantikos (Freiburg, 1992). van Buren, 1. , "The Young Heidegger, Ari stotle , Ethics", Ethics and Dal1ger. Essay s on Heidegger and Continental Thoug ht, eds. A. B. Da ll ery & C. E. Scott (A lbany: State Uni versity o f Ncw York Press, 1992), p p. 16918S . Vigo, A. G. , "Wahrheit, Logos und Prax is. D ie Transformat ion der aristotelischen Wabrheit skonzeption durch H eidegger", Internationale Zeitschrififr Philosophie 1 (1994): 73-95, Zeit und Praxis bei AristOieles. Die Nikomachische Ethik und die zeitonlologischen Voraussetzlll1gen des vernullftsgesteuerlen Handelns (Freiburg/Mnchen: Albe r, 1996).

Indianapolis: Indiana Uni versity Press, 1992). Makkree l, R., "The genes is of I-Ieidegger' s phenomcnologicaI hermenculics and the rediseovered 'Aristotle introduction' of 1922", Man and World
23 (1990): 305-320. Marx, W., He idegger und die Tradition (Hamburg: Me iner, 19611 1980,2'" rev. cd.). MeNei ll , W., The Glance oflhe Eye. Heidegger, Arislotle, and Ihe Ends of TheO/y (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1999), "A 'scarce ly pondered word'. The place oftragedy: Heidegger, Arstotle , Sophocles", Philosophy and Tragedy, cds. M. De Beistegui & S. Sparks (London/New York: Routled ge, 2000), pp. 169-189. Mortl ey, R., From Ward to Silence 1. The rise and fall of logos (Bonn: Han ste in, 1986).
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Praxis, ed. E. W. Orth (rreiburglMnehen: Alber, 1976), pp. 7- 16. P lato, Platon ;s Opera l , ed. 1 Burnet, Oxford Classiea/ Texls (Oxfo rd University Press: Oxford, 1900/ 1953). Plum, 1'., Wahrhei l und Wirksamkeit des Logos. Aristote/es ber Sprache, Sprechen und das Schreiben berzeugender Texte fr den Gebrauch in der Scillde, i/11 Theater u/ld auf de", Markp/alz (Bo nn: FriedrichWilhelms-Universital Bonn, 1985). Richter, E., Heideggers Frage nach dem Gel,vhrenden und die exakten W;ssenschaflen (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1992), Risser, J. , "Philosophical Hermeneul ics and th e Question of Community", Imerrogaling the Tradition. J-lermeneutics and the Hisf01y of Philosophy, eds. C. E. Scott & J. Sai lis (A lbany: State Un iversity of New York Press, 2000), pp. 19-35. Ross, W. D., Ar;stotle (London: Metheue n & Co., 1923/ 1937 (third rev. ed.). Rugge lli ni, M., "La l niwde de l'existence et la question de la v rit: H eidegger 1925 - 1929", Heidegger 1919-1 929. De l 'hermnelltiqlle de la facticit la mtaphysique du Dasein, cd. J. -F. Courtin e (Paris: Vrin , 1996), pp. 153-177. RUn, H ., Enigmatic Origins. Traeing the Th eme of Hisloricity throllgh Heidegger 's Works (S tockholm: Almqvi st & Wik se ll Internationa l, 1994).

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l'III W ll 1

'f lUhJ a l1i

Publishers, 1988), pp. 1-4 1. " Being and Time: A ' Translation' of the Nicomachelll1 Elhics?", Reading Heidegger ji'OJll the Starl. Essays in His Earlies f Thouglll, cds. T. Ki siel & J. va n Buren (Albany : State Uni ve rsity of New York Press, 1994), pp. 195-211, " La question du logos dan s l' arti culati on de la facticit chez le jeune Heidegger, lecteur d ' Aristo te", Heidegger 1919-1929. De l 'hermneutique de la jclicit la mtaphysique du Dasein, cd. J .-F .
CUlirline (Par is: Vrin, 1996), pp. 33-65. The Chain of Chang e. A Sludy of Aristotle 's Phys ics Vil (C ambridge: Cambridge University Press, , 1990). Wcidemann , H., Ivfe/aphy.sik /lnd Sprache. Ein e sprachphilosophische UnJerslIchung ZII Thomas von Aquin IInd ;Iris/ote/es (fr eiburg/Mnchen:

10 Ihe: aut! onJcrs for sing le volumes should be addressed to any international bool-.s dlt.:r or diJ'cClly to the publishers: ALmqvist & Wiksell International, P.o. Box 4627;S-116 91 Stockholm, Sweden. Universities, Iibraries. learned societies and publishers of periodicals may obtain the volumes of the series and other publications. Inquiries should be addressed to Stockholms Universitetsbibliotek, 5-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden.

1. 2.

Stig Kanger. Provability in Logic. Stockholm 1957. Pp. 47. Jan Berg. Bolzano'.\' Lug;c. Stockholm 1962. Pp. 2 14.

Wardy, R"

3.
4.

Dag Prawitz. Nalural Deduction. A Proof-Theorelical Study. Stockholm

1965. Pp. 113.

Lars Bergslrom. The Alternatives and Consequences of Actions. An essay on somefundame11lal notions in teleoloKica/ ethies. Stockholm 1966. Pp. 141.

Alber, 1975).
Wi plinger, F., Physis und Logos: 211111 K6rpel'phn0111en in seiner Bec/e l/Jung Iii,. den Urspnmg der Melflphysik bel Aristote/es ( Fre ib urg: Alber 197 1).

5.
6.

Torbjrn Tannsjo. The Relevanee of Metaethies 10 Ethic:.... Stockholm 1976. Pp. 226. Lars 0 Ericsson. Justice in the Distribution of Ecol/omie Resources. A critical and normative study. Stockholm 1976. Pp. 150. Per-Erik Malmnas. From Qualitative 10 Quantitative Probability. Stockholm 1981. Pp. 73.

7.

8.
9.

Gunnar Svensson. On Doubting th e Reality of Reality. Moore and Willgen stein on scep/lca/ doubts. Stockholm 1981. Pp. 120.

Torkel Franzn. Provability and Tru/h. Stockholm 1987. Pp. 81.

JO. Fredrik Stjernberg. The Public Na/ure of Memling. Stockholm 1991. Pp. 173.
11. Lars-Geran Johansson. Understanding Quantum Mechanies. A realisl interpretation WithOllt Izidden variables. Stockholm 1992. Pp. 177.
12. Claudio Marcello Tamburrini. Crime and Punishmenf? Stockholm 1992. Pp. 293.

13. Markku Leppakoski. The Trallscendema/ How. Kan!'s transcendentaJ deductioli of objective cognition. Stockholm 1993. Pp. 280.
1 Folke TeTsman. Rejieclive Equilibrium . An Essoy in Moral EpislemoJogy. 4.

Stockholm 1993. Pp. 144.

IS. Hans Ruin. Enigmatic Origins. TraCng the theme oJhistoricity Ihrough Heidegger 's works. Stockholm 1994. Pp. 304.
16. Bjbrn Eriksson. Heavy Dury. On th e demands on consequentialism. Stock-

holm 1994. Pp. 2iD.

17. Cesare Cozzo. Meaning and Argument. A Iheory ofmeaning eenlred on mmedime argumenta! raIe. Stockholm 1994. Pp. 216.
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18. Sbrcn J Hip,gq vist. Thou/::ht Expe r1I('1I1.\ in Philo.\"OfJhy. Stockh o lm 1996. Pp. "206

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