Gatherings. the heidegger circle annual

Transcription

1 Gatherings the heidegger circle annual 2018

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3 Gatherings the heidegger circle annual volume 8, 2018 Gatherings is a publication of the Heidegger Circle, a group of scholars who have been meeting annually in North America since 1966 to discuss the work of Martin Heidegger. issn print / issn online

4 Gatherings: The Heidegger Circle Annual editor Richard Polt Department of Philosophy, Xavier University 3800 Victory Parkway, Cincinnati, oh usa associate editors Daniel O. Dahlstrom, Boston University Julia Ireland, Whitman College Andrew J. Mitchell, Emory University book review editor Christopher Merwin, Emory University editorial board Robert Bernasconi, Pennsylvania State University; Walter Brogan, Villanova University; Peg Birmingham, DePaul University; Scott Campbell, Nazareth College; Richard Capobianco, Stonehill College; Robert Crease, Stony Brook University; Bret Davis, Loyola University Maryland; Gregory Fried, Suffolk University; Rex Gilliland, Southern Connecticut State University; Charles Guignon, University of South Florida; Catriona Hanley, Loyola University Maryland; Lawrence Hatab, Old Dominion University; Theodore Kisiel Northern Illinois University; William McNeill, DePaul University; Eric Nelson, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology; David Pettigrew, Southern Connecticut State University; Jeffrey Powell, Marshall University; François Raffoul, Louisiana State University; Robert Scharff, University of New Hampshire; Thomas Sheehan, Stanford University; Daniela Vallega-Neu, University of Oregon; Pol Vandevelde, Marquette University; Holger Zaborowski, Philosophisch-Theologische Hochschule Vallendar submission guidelines All submissions other than letters and brief responses to articles (under 1000 words) should be formatted for blind review and include a title page with paper title, author name, and affiliation (if applicable). Papers should be submitted single space, Times New Roman font, 12 point, under one of the following file formats: pdf, rtf, doc, or docx. Any Greek words or text should be entered as Unicode characters. Papers should adhere to The Chicago Manual of Style and follow the citation scheme provided at the end of each issue. The same paper may be submitted to the yearly meeting of the Heidegger Circle and to Gatherings. All papers should be sent in attachment to polt@xavier.edu, with subject Gatherings. design by a jm

5 gatherings volume 8, 2018 letter from the editor Richard Polt v Being and Time 18: A Paraphrastic Translation 1 Thomas Sheehan Redescribing the Zuhanden-Vorhanden Relation 21 Lawrence J. Hatab The Critique of Biology Implied by Fundamental Concepts 36 of Metaphysics Dimitri Ginev Report on the Meßkirch Heidegger Archive 81 Ian Moore book reviews Robert Scharff, How History Matters to Philosophy 85 Daniel O. Dahlstrom Richard Capobianco, Heidegger s Way of Being 97 Katherine Davies Katherine Withy, Heidegger on Being Uncanny 109 Emily Gillcrist Geoffrey Bennington, Scatter Rodrigo Therezo Texts of Heidegger cited and abbreviations used 130

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7 Letter from the Editor Richard Polt As I begin my term as editor of Gatherings, I think it is time to take stock of the origins of this journal and its prospects. The Heidegger Circle originated in conferences held in 1964 and 1966, and held its first official meeting in A history of the association by Theodore Kisiel can be found on our website, heidegger-circle.org. At our 2010 meeting we resolved to found a journal, and in 2011, the first issue of Gatherings: The Heidegger Circle Annual was published, with a dedication to Prof. Kisiel and to William J. Richardson, s.j., two of the most prominent founding members of the Circle. Daniel O. Dahlstrom served as the inaugural editor of Gatherings. Andrew J. Mitchell proposed the journal s title, and designed its layout and cover. From its inception, the editorial board of Gatherings has included a wide range of Heidegger Circle members who are proven scholars. We agreed at the 2011 meeting that conveners of yearly Circle meetings should be invited to join the board. In 2012, we agreed that the journal s editor can select members of the board, and in turn, the board will elect a new editor every three years, considering nominations from Heidegger Circle members. Dan Dahlstrom served as editor through our 2014 issue. Andrew Mitchell served from 2015 to 2017, and edited a special issue on the Black Notebooks in He began a relationship with the Philosophy Documentation Center, and we recently accepted the pdc s offer to help us publicize and disseminate the journal. The pdc offers libraries the opportunity to subscribe to Gatherings in connection with other philosophical journals, which should increase our visibility. The journal will also continue to be freely available on our website. Gatherings: The Heidegger Circle Annual 8 (2018): v vi.

8 letter from the editor Articles submitted to Gatherings are normally double-blind reviewed, although the editor may also solicit contributions. Authors need not be members of the Circle, and papers need not have been presented at our yearly conference. Christopher Merwin is now our book review editor. Interested authors, publishers, and reviewers can reach him at gmail.com. But is there a need for scholarship on Heidegger anymore? Or does his work already belong to history (ga 2: 500/sz 378) discredited, obsolete, and benighted, as his harshest critics would have it? As I see it, Heidegger s thought remains stimulating and pertinent, despite or even because of the need to reflect critically on its limitations. Perhaps even my errors still have a power to provoke in a time overloaded with correctnesses that have long lacked truth (ga 94: 404/ 295, tm). The twenty-first century is hardly lacking in urgent practical issues and theoretical problems. How can Heidegger help us address them, either as inspiration or as an opponent? What unfamiliar ideas, turns of thought, and linguistic experiments can we discover in the many volumes of notes, journals, and verses that have appeared in his Gesamtausgabe in recent years? How might they serve to enrich or provoke our own thinking? As long as we read Heidegger in more than an antiquarian spirit, retrieving his thought and unthought for the sake of what we ourselves can think and do, his work will belong to history in the most genuine sense, where history is not irrelevant to the present but first gives the present its scope and meaning. I would also like to invite the readers of Gatherings to submit letters on any issues of concern to Heidegger scholars, and brief replies (up to 1000 words) to any article that appears in the journal. Against the spirit of our times, I propose that a year s delay is not too long for a philosophical response; perhaps it is barely long enough. vi

9 Sein und Zeit 18: A Paraphrastic Translation Thomas Sheehan Sein und Zeit 18, a key section of Division One, is entitled Bewandtnis und Bedeutsamkeit; die Weltlichkeit der Welt. The title accurately summarizes the argument of the whole section, namely, that examining Bewandtnis will reveal that die Weltlichkeit der Welt consists in Bedeutsamkeit. That is: 1. Bewandtnis: The structural relation that obtains between tools and tasks, i.e., between the useful and what it is used for, 2. Weltlichkeit: shows that the essential structure of the every day worlds of praxis that we are and sustain 3. Bedeutsamkeit: is meaningfulness, understood as meaninggiving. It lets the useful have its meaning, that is, what and how it currently is for us. But while the bare-bones outline of the argument may be clear, some of the key terms used in Sein und Zeit 18 pose knotty problems for translation, particularly but not exclusively Bewandtnis and bewenden lassen. In the first stage of the argument, Heidegger offers two co-equal names for the structural relation between tools and tasks: Verweisung and Bewandtnis. Verweisung might be rendered as referral or even referredness, in the sense that tool-x is referred to task-y. But what about Bewandtnis? In an effort to spell out what he means by that term, Gatherings: The Heidegger Circle Annual 8 (2018): 1 20.

10 sein und zeit 18 Heidegger offers four consecutive sentences (ga 2: /sz ) that present significant problems for translators. (I have supplied the bracketed words.) 1. Es hat mit ihm [X, the tool] bei etwas [Y, the task] sein Bewenden. 2. Der Seinscharakter des Zuhandenen ist die Bewandtnis. 3. In Bewandtnis liegt: bewenden lassen mit etwas [= X, i.e., the tool] bei etwas [= Y, i.e., the task]. 4. Der Bezug des mit [X]... bei [Y]... soll durch den Terminus Verweisung angezeigt werden. The difficulty of this passage may be illustrated by the wide-ranging set of terms that translators have employed to interpret these sentences. 1 sz M-R S-S Bewandtnis Es hat mit X bei Y sein Bewenden. bewenden lassen mit X bei Y involvement With X there is an involvement in Y. to let X be involved in Y relevance X is relevant together with Y. to let X be together with Y Martineau tournure Avec X, il retourne de Y. laisser retourner de Y avec X Vezin Gaos conjointure Il ha, joint à X, de se conjoindre après Y. 2 laisser X se joindre après Y conformidad Uno se conforma con X en Y. conformarse con X en Y Rivera condición respectiva 3 Pasa con X que tiene su cumplimento en Y. dejar que X quede vuelto hacia Y 2

11 Sheehan Schuback conjuntura 4 X tem com se [= X] algo [= Y] junto. X se deixa e faz junto a Y. Tzavara σύμπλεξη 5 Σε X ὑπάρχει μία σύμπλεξη μέ Y. σε X μία ἄδεια σύμπλεξη μέ Y. Chiodi appagatività 6 X ha con sé presso Y il suo appagamento. appagamento con X presso Y Marini opportunità 7 Vi é in X l opportunità di Y. lasciar emergere e trovare in X l opportunità di Y. What is at stake in the terms bewenden lassen mit... bei... and Bewandtnis is a means-to-end relation, the connection of X-as-the-means to Y-as-the-end. In a lecture course in 1926, Heidegger had already connected Bewandtnis with Aristotelian δύναμις in the sense of the ability-to, the appropriateness for, suitability, 8 and in interpreting 18 in ga 24 (the course he gave just months after publishing sz), he glossed Bewandtnis in terms of the um-zu relation of means employed to achieve an end. 9 Hence, Macquarrie and Robinson s all-too-general translation of Bewandtnis as the involvement of X with Y, and Stambaugh and Schmidt s even thinner rendering it as the relevance of X to Y, need to be specified and clarified in terms of a means-to-end relation. 10 What follows is part of a larger work-in-progress that aims at a paragraph-by-paragraph condensation and paraphrastic translation of sz. The goal is to make the arguments of the book more accessible to students, both undergraduate and graduate, without compromising the book s nuanced complexity. Throughout some five decades of teaching the text, I ve noted that for students who do not read German the two current English translations their vocabulary, syntax, and rhetoric present needless obstacles to simply discovering the arguments of the book, not to mention evaluating their coherence and judging their worth. 3

12 sein und zeit 18 The text that follows, like the whole work-in-progress, is very much a pedagogical project: the target audience is students. And yet I have found that, for myself, the process of poring over sz sentence by sentence, paragraph by paragraph, and working out as accurate a paraphrase as possible, has taught me a lot that I didn t know or had overlooked even after years spent with the text. I submit this excerpt to my colleagues for any criticisms, comments, or improvements they might want to share, so that, looking forward, I can decide whether the results are worth the grind. some rubrics 1. Among the interpretations and translations I propose for sz section 18 are: Bewandtnis a means-to-end relation Dasein ex-sistence (here usually translated as we or us ) existential structural (i.e., regarding a structure of ex-sistence) existentiell personal (i.e., of or pertaining to a personal element of ex-sistence) existieren ex-sist (when it refers to Dasein) In-der-Welt-sein engagement-with-meaning 11 Sinn intelligibility der Sinn von Sein how being is intelligible Umsicht practical foresight (τέχνη) 12 vorhanden just there Vorhandenheit just-there-ness Welt the world of meaning; the meaninggiving world zuhanden useful das Zuhandene something useful; a tool 2. In keeping with Friedrich-Wilhelm von Herrmann s commentary on Sein und Zeit, I number the paragraphs of

13 Sheehan 3. Before each paragraph, at the right-hand margin I indicate the corresponding page numbers and the paragraphs in Gesamtausgabe vol. 2 (ga 2), Sein und Zeit (sz), Macquarrie-Robinson (m-r), and Stambaugh-Schmidt (s-s). Example: ga 2: 111b sz 83b m-r 114c s-s 81c. The numbers refer to the pages in the four texts. The letters indicate the paragraphs on the page, counting from the very top of the page, even if the first line of a given page begins in the middle of a paragraph. 14 Thus, the example above refers to: ga 2, p. 111, 2nd sz, p. 83, 2nd m-r, p. 114, 3rd s-s, p. 81, 3rd. outline of sei n u n d zeit sec tion 18 introduction Review of 15 and 16 1 The task of 18 the means-to-end relation tools, tasks, and final purpose 2 Ontological referredness vs. ontic appropriateness we are the final purpose of all such tasks 3 Referredness is for the sake of the final purpose: ourselves. The concatenation The whole ensemble of means-end relations The final purpose Preliminary conclusion letting something be a means to an end 4 Two levels of such letting: 4 5

14 sein und zeit 18 Ontic Ontological Regarding the a priori perfect 5 Two levels of prior familiarity: 6 With the practical context of the useful 6 With our engagement-with-meaning 7 the essential structure of the world of meaning the essential structure of the world 8 of meaning Preparing the question 8 By way of review A new question Our structural aheadness Conclusion: The essence of the world of meaning Coda: This is the basis of fundamental ontology 9 Answering the question 10 Introduction 10 How we make sense of things 11 The relations that constitute meaningfulness Meaningfulness as the essence of the world Conclusion Meanings, words, language 12 Summation 13 an objection and a response 14 The objection 14 The response 15 Keeping distinct the categorial and existential Mathematical functionalization of concepts Flattens out meaningfulness Applies only to substances transition 16 6

15 Sheehan 18. the means-to-ends rel ation, and meaningfulness introduc tion as the struc ture of the world ga 2: 111b sz 83b m-r 114c s-s 81c 1. Review of 15 and 16. We encounter useful things within a specific world of practical meaning, such that their being, which is usefulness, has an ontological relation to that world and to the essence of world in general. Whenever we encounter something useful, the meaninggiving world has always already been opened up. We may not be thematically aware of that fact, but the world of meaning can light up for us when we deal with it in certain ways. The task of 18. We have said that the useful gets its usefulness from the world of meaning. But how exactly does that world of meaning let us encounter something as useful? We ve shown that whenever we encounter something within the world of meaning, the thing is already intelligible, such that our practical foresight i.e., τέχνη as calculative rationality can deal with the thing in terms of its being. But what do we mean by this prior intelligibility of the useful? and how is this prior intelligibility a structural feature of the world of meaning? In short, what problems does that world pose for us? the means-to-end rel ation tools, tasks, and the final purpose ga 2: 111c sz 83c m-r 114d s-s 82b 2. Tools are referred to tasks. We have said that the structure of a tool consists in its referredness to a task. But how does the world of meaning let us understand the being of a tool as referredness? And why is it that the first things we encounter are the useful? Ontological referredness vs. ontic appropriateness. A tool s referredness to a task its usefulness, serviceability, and so on is determined and 7

16 sein und zeit 18 concretized by the job to be done, what I have called the tool s Wozu or Wofür, the what-it s-for. However, a hammer s usefulness for hammering, and a sign s usefulness for indicating directions, are not ontic properties of the hammer or the sign, built-in, as it were. In fact, usefulness and serviceability are not properties at all, if by property we mean an underlying ontological constituent of something. At best, a tool is appropriate or not for the task [e.g., this hammer may be appropriate because of its weight], but this is only an ontic factor. The so-called properties of the tool are really only elements bound up with this ontic appropriateness (not unlike the way an unusable tool s just-there-ness is bound up with its usefulness). The tool s reference to a specific task its serviceability and usefulness is not identical with its ontic appropriateness [e.g., its weight] but rather is an ontological matter. The reference to a task comes first, and in terms of that we decide whether or not a tool is appropriate. What does it mean to say a tool has the character of referredness to a task? It means we understand the thing, in its very way of being, as referred to a goal. It is referred as means-x to end-y. The being of something useful is its Bewandtnis, its relation as a means to an end. Such a means-end relation entails that X has been allowed to be related to Y. This means-to-end relation is what I mean by a tool s referredness. we are the final purpose of all such tasks ga 2: 112b sz 84b m-r 116a s-s 82c 3. Referredness is for the sake of the final purpose: ourselves. The meansto-end relatedness is the being of the useful tool, i.e., that as which the tool is already intelligible from the start. The useful always has such a relatedness. But in saying that it is already related as a means to an end, I am not making an ontic statement but rather giving an ontological determination of the being of the tool. The concatenation. The end to which this tool is a means is what the tool can serve for, what it can be employed to do. But such an end can, in turn, be the means to yet a further end in a kind of concatenation: 8

17 Sheehan for example, this hammer is a means to hammer in nails, which is a means to fasten boards together, which is a means to providing shelter against the elements. But all of this is for the sake of some final purpose, a possibility of ourselves (which in this case is our need for shelter). The whole ensemble of means-to-end relations. The kind of means-to-end relation that a particular tool might have is prescribed by the whole set of such relations [die Bewandtnisganzheit]. Whether it be in a carpenter shop, on a farm, or in an iphone factory, the whole set of means-to-end relations is prior with regard to the means-to-end relation of any single tool. The final purpose. But the whole ensemble is referred to an ultimate purpose that has no further relatedness to an end beyond itself. The ensemble is ultimately referred to us, and we are not a means to any further end. Rather, our very way of being is engagement-with-meaning, which is what I mean by saying that the structure of our ex-sistence is worldliness. As such, we have no further referredness to a possible goal beyond ourselves. We are the ultimate goal, the final purpose [of the concatenation of referrals]. This final purpose is intrinsic to our very way of being as ex-sistence, ever concerned, as we always are, about our ex-sistence. Preliminary conclusion. We have argued that the structure of meansto-ends relations ultimately refers ahead to ex-sistence as the final, authentic, and singular purpose of it all. We will not pursue the matter any further at this point but instead will explain what it means to let something serve as a means to an end. That will let us determine the structure of the world and then formulate some further problems relating to it. 9

18 sein und zeit 18 letting something be a means to an end ga 2: 113b sz 84c m-r 117b s-s 83b 4. Two levels of such letting. Letting something be a means to an end can have either an ontic or an ontological sense. As an ontic term, letting something be a means to an end simply means letting an already existing thing be useful by using it. [For example, I let a rock serve as a hammer by using it as a hammer]. As an ontological term, letting a tool be useful does not mean bringing the tool into existence by producing it. Rather, it refers to the fact that a thing has already been made available as useful and that it is understandable as such. This prior fact is ontological: it pertains to the being of the tool and how we encounter it. It is the ontological condition that lets us deal with any tool ontically [i.e., actually use it as a means to an end], and that condition obtains regardless of whether or not we actually do use this tool to achieve an end. (And when I do take up something as useful for a task, I don t just let it remain as I found it. Rather, I deal with it, work on it, improve it even if I eventually break it.) ga 2: 114b sz 85b m-r 117c s-s 83c 5. Regarding the a priori perfect. This ontological sense of letting something be a means to an end comes with the very structure of our ex-sistence and has to do with what I call the a priori perfect [see Appendix]. Within our practical concern, the end to be achieved lets us see the means that shows up as useful so that we can understand it and can take it up as such. Things do not first of all show up as just some stuff out there in the world. two levels of prior familiarity ga 2: 114c sz 85c m-r 118b s-s 84b 6. Prior familiarity with the practical context of useful things. We understand the means-to-end relation (i.e., the being) of something only insofar as we have already understood a whole set of such relations. 10

19 Sheehan In understanding a single tool as a means to an end, we have already understood the tool s relation to the world of meaning what I call the tool s world-character. The already understood set of means-to-end relations inherently entails an ontological relation to a world of meaning. To antecedently let anything be related as a means to an end is to understand the useful in terms of the whole set of means-to-ends relations; and this entails that we have already understood that whole set, which is the current world of meaning. But the world of meaning is not a thing with the same kind of being as a useful tool. Thus we cannot make sense of that world in the same way we make sense of non-existential things like tools. ga 2: 115b sz 85d m-r 118c s-s 84c 7. Prior familiarity with our engagement-with-meaning. When we understand something as a means to an end, we do so in light of the whole world of meaning within which the thing is found. But what does it mean to have a prior familiarity with that world? Ex-sistence is the act of understanding the being of things. It is likewise both an engagement with the world of meaning and an understanding of that engagement. The useful thing we encounter becomes intelligible in terms of the whole set of means-ends relations. Our prior understanding of that whole set of relations is our understanding of the current world of meaning the world to which we ourselves always already stand in relation. the essential struc ture of the world of meaning preparing the question ga 2: 115c sz 86b m-r 118d s-s 84d 8. By way of review: We can refer something as a means to an end only because we are already structurally familiar with letting things be so related. This entails that we already understand a whole ensemble of relations, including the elements of what-something-is-for and the final purpose of something. 11

20 sein und zeit A new question: But what is the X in terms of which we understand ourselves, even if that is usually implicit? 8.2 Our structural aheadness. The fact that we understand the aforementioned ensemble of relations shows that, consciously or not, we ourselves are structurally referred ahead to the purposes and possibilities that we live for, including the possibility of ex-sisting authentically or inauthentically. That is: (1) Our purposes delineate certain tasks to which they are correlative. (2) In turn some things are determined to be suitable means to perform those tasks, and others not. (3) That is, structurally speaking, our ability to have purposes prefigures and is correlative to a whole set of means-to-end relations for achieving our purposes. (4) And this entire means-to-end structure is what lets us encounter anything at all as useful. In short, there s a structural connection between: a) our ability-to-have purposes, and b) a concatenation of means-to-end relations. 8.3 Conclusion: The essence of the world of meaning. Structurally I am, and understand myself as, living ahead in purposes, and that aheadness-in-purposes is what lets things serve as the means for achieving a goal. That structural connection between my purposeful aheadness and what things are useful for is the world of practical meaning. The structure of ex-sistence as final purpose constitutes the essence of the world of meaning. ga 2: 116b sz 86c m-r 119b s-s 85b 9. Coda: This is the basis of fundamental ontology. We are already familiar with both (1) the world of meaning in terms of which we understand ourselves, and (2) the relations that make up that world, even if this understanding is not always explicit or theoretical. This familiarity is the basis for working out an explicit ontology of the world of meaning, one that would shoulder the task of interpreting ex-sistence and its possibilities and, further, of asking how being is intelligible at all. 12

21 Sheehan answering the question ga 2: 116c sz 86d m-r 120a s-s 85c 10. Introduction. So far we have merely laid out the field within which we can ask about the world of meaning and its structure. But in order to answer that question we first have to explain what it means to refer ourselves to a possibility or a purpose. ga 2: 116d sz 87b m-r 120b s-s 85d 11. How we make sense of things. In the present context, I am using the verb verstehen to refer to the personal-existentiel activity of understanding something. (The existential structure of understanding will be discussed in 31.) The relations that constitute meaningfulness. Understanding something is based on our prior structural familiarity with the relations and references that constitute meaningfulness. We hold these relations in front of us, so to speak, as the structure within which our purposiveness operates and in terms of which we understand ourselves. These relations are what let us make sense of anything at all [be-deuten]. Likewise, our familiarity with these relations lets us make sense of ourselves. In and through these relations we understand our ex-sistence and our engagement-with-meaning as what is ours-to-become. Meaningfulness as the essence of the world. Our goals (1) generate purposes (2) that give rise to tasks (3) that determine the relation of certain things as means to an end. These relations form an a priori interconnected whole of sense-making (Be-deuten). They are the relations in and through which we structurally understand ourselves as engagementwith-meaning. This whole ensemble whereby we make sense of ourselves and other things is what I call meaningfulness-as-such. It is the structure of the world of meaning, in and as which we ourselves always already ex-sist. 13

22 sein und zeit 18 Conclusion. Ontically we are those unique entities who understand meaningfulness-as-such. This accounts for how and why we can make sense of i.e., understand the being of the particular things we find to be useful within a practical world of meaning that lets them show up as they are in themselves. This is what and how we are: our very ex-sistence entails (1) that an ensemble of useful things is always already understood and operative and (2) that we are always already referred to things within that ensemble. Our ex-sistence is intrinsically such a referredness. ga 2: 117b sz 87c m-r 121b s-s 86b 12. Meanings, words, language. Our a priori familiarity with meaningfulness-as-such is what makes us able to interpret and understand things in terms of their specific meanings. These in turn are the basis of words and language. 15 ga 2: 117c sz 87d m-r 121c s-s 86c 13. Summation. Our ex-sistential structure as engagement-with-meaning is the opening up of meaningfulness-as-such. In turn, this ontic uniqueness of ours makes possible the disclosure and understanding of sets of suitable means for achieving our ends. an objection and a response ga 2: 117d sz 87e m-r 121d s-s 86d 14. A possible objection. We have established that both the being of tools (their relatedness as means to an end) and the essence of the world of meaning is a set of relations. But does that mean we have dissolved the substantial being of things into nothing but a system of relations? And since relations exist in thought, have we dissolved the being of things into mere thinking? ga 2: 117e sz 88b m-r 121e s-s 86e 15. Response. Our study keeps three things distinct: a) usefulness as the being of the things we initially meet 14

23 Sheehan b) just-there-ness as the being of the things we can encounter and determine by going through the useful that we initially meet c) ex-sistence as our kind of being and as the essence of the world of meaning. We are the entities that make it possible for things to be meaningful at all. The first two are categorial, i.e., they pertain to things that do not have ex-sistence. The third is ex-sistential and determines our nature as engagement-with-meaning. Yes, it is possible to understand the referrals that constitute the essence of the world (i.e., meaningfulness-as-such) as a mere system of relations but such a formalization flattens them out and misses their real experiential content. These supposedly simple relations and their relata (means-to-end, in-order-to, and the like) in fact constitute meaningfulness. Their experienced content resists mathematical functionalization, and they are not just ideas posited in thinking. Rather, these relations are where practical foresight actually lives and sustains itself. Thus, we do not volatilize the substantial being of the useful. On the contrary we provide the basis for understanding these things substantively, that is, in themselves. Only because things can be encountered as useful can they also be met up with as just worldly stuff in the form of substances. If one were to take things as just there, one could determine their properties mathematically in functional concepts. But such concepts have an ontological application only to things whose being is taken as substantiality. Such functional concepts are formalized concepts that apply always and only to substances. tr ansition ga 2: 119a sz 88c m-r 122b s-s 87b 16. Transition. In the sections that immediately follow we present a polar opposite interpretation of world, that of Descartes. 15

24 sein und zeit 18 appendix ga 2: 114, note a: Im selben Absatz ist die Rede von der vorgängigen Freigabe nämlich (allgemein gesprochen) des Seins fu r die mögliche Offenbarkeit von Seiendem. Vorgängig in diesem ontologischen Sinne heißt lat. a priori, griechisch πρότερον τῇ ϕύσει, Aristot., Physik, A 1; noch deutlicher: Metaphysik, E 1025 b 29 τὸ τί ἦν εἶναι das was schon war sein, das jeweils schon voraus Wesende, das Gewesen, das Perfekt. Das griechische Verbum εἶναι kennt keine Perfektform; dieses wird hier im ἦν εἶναι genannt. Nicht ein ontisch Vergangenes, sondern das jeweils Fru here, auf das wir zuru ckverwiesen werden bei der Frage nach dem Seienden als solchen; statt apriorisches Perfekt könnte es auch heißen: ontologisches oder transzendentales Perfekt (vgl. Kants Lehre vom Schematismus). In this paragraph [ga 2: 114b sz 85b m-r 117c s-s 83c] we speak of always already having opened something up. That refers to the fact that the being of something has always already been freed up so that the thing can be understood. Always already in this ontological sense is called a priori in Latin, and πρότερον τῇ ϕύσει in Greek (Aristotle, Physics, A 1). 16 More clearly in Metaphysics E 1, 1025b28 29 it is called τὸ τί ἦν εἶναι, that is: a) what it (always already) was to be this-or-that b) that which is always priorly operative c) that which (always) has been d) the so-called perfect. The Greek verb εἶναι has no perfect tense, and so Aristotle expressed the perfect by ἦν εἶναι [ what it was to be this or that thing ]. But this is not something ontically past [or something that has been and still is operative, e.g., your status as a high school graduate]. Rather, it refers to that which is always prior. 16

25 Sheehan When we ask about the being of things, we are referred back to this τὸ τί ἦν εἶναι, i.e., the element that is always prior in the thing. Instead of a priori perfect we could also call it the ontological perfect or the transcendental perfect (cf. Kant s doctrine of the schematism). notes 1 The translations of Sein und Zeit are abbreviated as follows, with the page numbers corresponding to sz 84: M-R: Being and Time, trans. James Macquarrie and Edward Robinson (New York: Harper and Row, 1962), 115. S-S: Being and Time: A Translation of Being and Time, trans. Joan Stambaugh, rev. Dennis J. Schmidt (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2010), 82. Martineau: Être et Temps, trans. Emmanuel Martineau (Paris: Authentica, 1985), 81. (Also: Édition numérique horscommerce, available at _etre_et_temps.pdf.) Vezin : Être et Temps, trans. François Vezin, with Rudolf Boehm and Alphonse de Waelhens (for Div. 1) and Jean Lauxerois and Claude Roëls (for Div. 2) (Paris: Gallimard, 1986, 2007),

26 sein und zeit 18 Gaos: El ser y el tiempo, trans. José Gaos (Mexico City: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1951, revised 2010), 98. Rivera: Ser y Tiempo, trans. Jorge Eduardo Rivera (Madrid: Trotta, 2003), 105. Schuback: Ser e Tempo, trans. Marcia Sá Cavalcante Schuback (Petrópolis, Brazil: Editora Voces, 2006), 134. Tzavara: Εἶναι καί χρόνος, trans. Gianni Tzavara (Athens: Dodoni Publications, 1978), Chiodi: Essere e tempo, trans. Pietro Chiodi, rev. Franco Volpi, (Milan: Longanesi, 2005), 113. Marini: Essere e tempo, trans. Alfredo Marini (Milan: Arnoldo Mondadori, 2011), The French here presents its own difficulties. Heidegger s sentence Im Bewandtnis liegt comes out as: Dans conjointure il y a : s en tenir avec quelque chose [= X] à la [= X] laisser se joindre après quelque chose [= Y]. It might be read as: dealing with something [X] by letting it [i.e., X] be connected with Y. 3 condition of relation It is the case with X that it has its complement in Y to let X remain turned towards Y. 4 A conjoining X has something [= Y] conjoined with itself X is allowed and done together with Y (?). 5 Engagement In X there is an engagement with Y in X an engagement is allowed [interpreting the adjective verbally] with Y. 6 Completion/fulfillment X has its completion/fulfillment in Y the completion/fulfillment of X with Y. 7 Marini (note at p. 1463) bases this choice on the etymology of the Latin opportunus (ob-portunus: literally before the port ); cf. ventus ob portum veniens: a favorable wind that pushes [a boat] towards a port. 8 ga 22: , with Heidegger s emphasis: Das Vermögen [with a footnote referencing Meta. Δ 12], Geeignetheit zu, Bewandtnis, Bereitheit, with reference to ga 22: ga 24: / Likewise, at ga 23: 21.9: Bewandtnis um-zu. Cf. also ga 21: /121.3 (a blackboard for 18

27 Sheehan writing on). Theodore Kisiel translates Bewandtnis in ga 20 both as a tool s deployment for a purpose and as something s standing in relation to someone or something: ga 20: 231.2/171.12; / ; / The Chinese translation presents its own problems. For Bewandtnis Chen and Wang use 因缘 (yīn yuán), two characters both of which, when taken separately as they are here, express the notions of reason for, due to, and the like. (If taken as a single term which is not the case here they express the Buddhist notion of karma.) In a footnote to their translation of sz , Chen and Wang explain that they translate bewenden lassen mit etwas bei etwas in terms of letting something have its finality (or be settled : 了结, liăojié) in something else: 存在与时间, (Cúnzài yŭ shíjiān). Being and Time, trans. Chen Jiaying and Wang Qingjie (Taipei: Guiguan Tushu, 1990), I have argued for this interpretation in Making Sense of Heidegger, (New York: Roman and Littlefield, 2015), Heidegger employs Umsicht as an interpretative translation of both of the Aristotelian practical virtues of ϕρόνησις and τέχνη. These two are cognitive in the practical order and have to do with envisioning and knowing the desired outcome of a practical activity, whether that activity be πρᾶξις (regarding human affairs) or ποίησις (regarding productive activity). In Latin ϕρόνησις comes out as prudentia, a contraction of pro-videntia (cf. pro-videre): know-how as seeing ahead (pro-) to a desired goal. Likewise, τέχνη is practical envisioning and knowing of the εἶδος προαιρετόν, the projected or desired goal of an act of production. Both ϕρόνησις and τέχνη are a matter of looking ahead and not looking around as in circum-spection. In 18 the practical foresight in question corresponds to τέχνη rather than ϕρόνησις. 13 Friedrich-Wilhelm von Herrmann, Hermeneutische Phänomenologie des Daseins. Ein Kommentar zu Sein und Zeit, 3 vols. (to date) (Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, ). 19

28 sein und zeit I borrow this practice from William J. Richardson, who employed it in his seminars at Fordham in the 1960s. 15 Heidegger s marginal note at ga 2: /sz 87.31: Not true. Language is not built on top of words and language. Rather, it is the original unfolding of disclosure as the site of meaning. That is: language understood as λόγος-1 aka ἀλήθεια-1 is the basic characteristic of ex-sistence as the clearing. Such λόγος is the very possibility and necessity of making sense of things. 16 Actually, πρότερον τῇ ϕύσει does not appear in Physics A, 1. (Heidegger may have confused that with σαϕέστερα τῇ ϕύσει at 184a17 and 184a20.) Aristotle discusses πρότερον τῇ ϕύσει at Posterior Analytics I 2, 71b34 72a4. and most notably at Metaphysics V 11, 1019a1 14. under the rubric of πρότερον κατὰ ϕύσιν καὶ οὐσίαν. 20

29 Redescribing the Zuhanden-Vorhanden Relation Lawrence J. Hatab This article stems from a larger project, which experiments with a new vocabulary for Heidegger s early phenomenology, particularly in Division I of Being and Time. 1 Here I will focus on the zuhanden-vorhanden dynamic. What I hope to contribute is the following: 1) a clarification and further articulation of this dynamic, which can draw out elements that are unexplored, muted, or underdeveloped in Heidegger s account, and improve upon some typical readings; and 2) an attempt to show how this dynamic is the essential opening for Heidegger s phenomenology, not only as a starting-point but as a germination that resonates throughout the entire analysis of being-in-the-world. I emphasize that this is my hermeneutical project, which may not fully accord with Heidegger s specific interests and intentions (or how some Heidegger scholars read Being and Time), but I still believe my account is an apt extension of what his phenomenology opens up. The preliminary aim of Being and Time is to challenge the modern subject-object binary and traditional ontologies that confine being to notions of presence, extant objects, universality, generality, or mere grammatical function. Heidegger begins with everyday involvement in the world, which will build a sense of being that is enacted, meaningladen, temporal, and finite. Heidegger does not reject notions of objectivity, thing-hood, presence, and such, only their ontological priority, because they emerge out of, and are derived from, engaged practices in factical life (ga 2: 198/sz 149). This reorientation is first accomplished in the zuhanden-vorhanden relation where Zuhandenheit is illustrated Gatherings: The Heidegger Circle Annual 8 (2018):

30 zuhanden-vorhanden relation by tool use, which is not a reflective transaction between a knowing subject and an external object, but a field-phenomenon of engaged performance. A breakdown or disruption of this practice-field generates the vorhanden viewpoint of regarding the tool or environment in the more objective sense of things and properties that call for examination because of the disturbance (ga 2: 102/sz 76). It is this vorhanden perspective that makes possible and animates traditional models of being, but its derived character undermines the sufficiency of such models. The priority of Zuhandenheit is such that Vorhandenheit is a veiling of Zuhandenheit (ga 2: 99/sz 74). The zuhanden-vorhanden dynamic can be read as simply the gateway for overcoming presentism and objectivism, as a starting-point that counter-poses practical usage to theoretical examination, wherein usage opens up different and more original philosophical concepts. While pertinent, such a reading misses a richer account that even Heidegger s discussion could have done more to articulate, and that can be seen to resound throughout the course of Being and Time, with respect to core concepts of meaning, Mitsein, care, temporality, finitude, even authenticity. To this end, I offer the following concepts to reorient the zuhanden-vorhanden relation: immersion, contravention, and exposition. What is at work here is an attempt to find a vocabulary that evokes the dynamic environmental conditions in the background of this relation, which can broaden analysis beyond an emphasis on practical and theoretical entities. Immersion is not restricted to something like tool use or practical tasks, because it covers any form of pre-reflective engagement that shows itself in factical life (a conversation, for instance, could count). In explicating Zuhandenheit, Heidegger talks of concernful absorption (besorgenden Aufgehen) at ga 2: 95 96/sz 71 72, among other places which I take to be central to what Zuhandenheit is meant to open up and which is indicated in my concept of immersion. Zuhandenheit cannot be captured simply by the notion of usage because it is the actual using that matters first (ga 2: 93/sz 69); so, one must consider what it is like to be engaged in using something. When immersed in writing, 22

31 Hatab I am not attending specifically to the pen, paper, or my hand per se, each of which recedes in favor of the smooth, automatic performance of writing indeed even the notion of writing recedes. Heidegger says that the authentic sense of Zuhandenheit requires such a recession (zurückziehen), even of the notion of Zuhandenheit itself, because it is the working activity as such that counts (ga 2: 94/sz 69). Accordingly, a phenomenological understanding of immersion is not issued by the immersed activity itself, but by an indicative recognition of the difference between immersed activity and reflective consideration. In this way, the field-character of being-in-the-world is first given in the preconceptual experience of immersion. Heidegger usually talks of Zuhandenheit in terms of entities (ga 2: 117/sz 88), and here tools certainly apply. But his own concept of absorption is something distinct from entities per se. I am trying to draw out implications in Heidegger s analysis that he could have done more to articulate. Zuhandenheit as a concept functions in my reading as a formal indication, which for Heidegger is drawn from, and points back to, actual performance in life (ga 60: 8 9, 62 63/6 7, 43; ga 29/30: 425/293). As such a concept, it cannot be restricted to entities because it covers an experiential environment (just as the game of football is so much more than a football). I find it useful to apply Heidegger s ecstatic understanding of existence to this discussion. In Being and Time, specific mention of an ecstatic sense was restricted to the extended character of temporality (ga 2: 435/sz 329). Yet in later writings, ruminations on the Greek sense of ekstasis took a more comprehensive turn. In Greek, ekstasis literally means standing outside and carries a sense of absorbed captivation. For Heidegger, the ecstatic character of existence came to gather central notions of care, dwelling, and Dasein s openness to being (ga 9: /283 84). Dasein is out-standing as an ecstatic standing-inthe-out, which is to say, not the inside of an interior consciousness, and not the outside as what is external to consciousness, but dwelling in what is outside. For me, the notion of immersion drawn from Zuhandenheit is the first immediate sense of an ecstatic ontology, which in the most everyday examples shows why a subject-object relation falls 23

32 zuhanden-vorhanden short. In immersed writing, I am-in-the-writing, not a self cognizing an object, but dwelling in a meaning-saturated environment (see ga 20: /191). The notion of meaningful immersion can open up a richer sense of Zuhandenheit that Heidegger s emphasis on tool use tends to conceal. The focal concept of Zeug, translated as equipment (Macquarrie-Robinson) or useful things (Stambaugh), is not sufficient, in my view, to evoke enough of what Heidegger meant by Zuhandenheit. In his own discussion of writing, in addition to pen and paper, Heidegger includes the room wherein one writes, and calls it a Wohnzeug, translated as equipment for residing (Macquarrie-Robinson) or useful for living (Stambaugh). Yet the room wherein one writes is much less useful equipment than a meaningful habitat. I prefer to focus on the dwelling reference (Wohnen), which can apply to the richer sense of immersion I am exploring. Zeug can refer to tools, but also things, stuff, and material, which Heidegger wants to associate with what the Greeks called pragmata (ga 2: 92/sz 68) which, however, is more nominally indicative of an active relation than is Zeug (because pragma names something done or a deed). At times Heidegger s account of Zuhandenheit goes well beyond mere tool use and practical tasks. He includes aspects of nature in Zuhandenheit, not only as an environment of material for human products, but also the nature which stirs and strives and enthralls us as landscape (ga 2: 95/sz 70). Also included is the public world, along with roads, bridges, and buildings, with which an environing nature is implicitly engaged, as weather and terrain, for instance (ga 2: 95/sz 71). In Basic Problems of Phenomenology, Zuhandenheit extends to the whole milieu of concernful dealings, including things like house and yard, forest, sun, light, and heat (ga 24: 153/108, / ). It seems to me that engaged immersion better extends to such phenomena as modes of pre-reflective dwelling than does the sense of practical usage that I believe is overemphasized in Heidegger s discussion of Zeug and Zuhandenheit. Our ordinary experience of nature is not a matter of natural entities as distinct from artifacts (a common interpretation 24

33 Hatab of Vorhandenheit) because we first and foremost experience the natural environment (Umwelt) as a meaning-laden habitat: weather, seasons, daylight, nightfall, food, resources, recreation, wilderness, and so on. My offering also applies to occasions where Heidegger mentions the zuhanden character of language and signs (ga 2: 110, 214, 296/sz 82, 161, 224). Ecstatic immersion is able to capture what I think is meant here, namely the immediate disclosive power of language, rather than a representational relation. In this respect, the idea of language as a useful tool would surely be inappropriate. Here Dasein is immersed in what language calls forth. 2 Against a mere practical reading of Zuhandenheit, Heidegger claims that his purpose was not to demonstrate that the essence of man consists in the fact that he knows how to handle knives and forks or use the tram. It was meant to open up the phenomenon of world, which requires a very broad and wide-ranging perspective (ga 29/30: 263/177). Heidegger s ultimate aim with the concept of Da-sein was to render with the da a non-subjective, non-objective openness to being. This is why he objected to the translation of da as there, favoring openness (to and for being), in order to get past any origin in subjectivity or consciousness. 3 Yet from a phenomenological standpoint, the there can be apt in expressing how engaged immersion is more there in an environment than a psychological state. In any case, Zuhandenheit understood as ecstatic immersion is best able to launch a phenomenology of being-in-the-world that is much more than mere practical usage. Heidegger then moves to show how the vorhanden perspective emerges out of Zuhandenheit by way of possible breaks (Brüche) in the immersed practice, which are first characterized as modes of Unzuhandenheit (ga 2: 98/sz 73), in terms of malfunctions, obstacles, or absences. Here a host of tacit elements and meanings now become explicit (ausdrücklich) (ga 2: 100/sz 74). With a broken tool, its thing-hood and properties now come to attention, as something to regard rather than use. But much more is going on here than simply zuhanden and vorhanden entities. Our disturbance or annoyance at such breaks (ga 2: 100/sz 74) shows 25

34 zuhanden-vorhanden the intrinsically meaningful character of the immersed practice, that it was planned and purposeful (a robot running into an obstacle would not be annoyed). The movement from Zuhandenheit to Vorhandenheit not only opens up aspects of the world to our regard, but also Dasein s being in terms of its concerns, involvements, and needs that become explicit in disturbances the towards-which (wozu) and for the sake of which (worum-willen) implicit in a practice that now come into view (ga 2: 112/ sz 84). In short, it is Dasein s very potentiality-for-being (Seinkönnen) that is disclosed in this dynamic, the first pathway for a phenomenological sense of world (ga 2: 116/sz 86). I offer the concept of contravention for what happens in unzuhanden conditions something that comes (venire) to counter a circumstance because it zeros in on an essential feature of the zuhanden-vorhanden dynamic: that some negative element is implicated in disclosiveness, where a not opens up a positive phenomenal meaning (ga 2: 110/sz 82). As Heidegger says in another text, everything positive becomes particularly clear when seen from the side of the privative (ga 24: 439/309). Such a notion, I maintain, extends all the way to the structural relation between being and anxiety in Being and Time and What is Metaphysics? The concept of contravention gives more focal attention to this element of Heidegger s thought. What contravention and potentiality for being also open up is the central role of temporality in fundamental ontology: an obstacle draws explicit attention to the temporal structure of a planned purpose that has been thwarted which is a figure-eight temporal structure wherein the future, present, and past circulate together as anticipation, attention, and recollection. I submit the concept of exposition to indicate the multifaceted forms of disclosure arising out of contravention in the zuhandenvorhanden dynamic. The word ex-position can carry a sense of positioning a thing apart from the self and the engaged activity, as well as aspects of the thing pertinent to the contravening disturbance. Exposition can also involve the meanings, purposes, and interests disclosed in this process. Here exposition carries its familiar sense of 26