File spoon-archives/heidegger.archive/heidegger_1998/heidegger.9803, message 162


Date: Sun, 22 Mar 1998 04:33:30 +0800
From: Malcolm Riddoch <riddoch-AT-central.murdoch.edu.au>
Subject: Re: Heidegger,  Husserl , perception...


>Cologne, 16 March 1998


>Das
>schlichte, sinnliche Vernehmen is _aisthaesis_, which is to be distinguished
>from =93pure _noein_=94, i.e. =93schlichtem hinsehenden Vernehmen=94(SuZ:33). Neither
>the one nor the other, however, are phenomenological, because neither
>depend on
>the _logos_.

I don't agree at all with this distinction, it seems quite clear to me in
this passage that Heidegger is talking about straightforward perceptions
(or in other words pure noein) as a more primordial phenomenological locus
of truth than mere judgements. Truth as the simple disclosedness of things
as opposed to correspondence theory runs through the entire problematic and
I think you are confusing the issue here a bit. The 'hinsehenden' refers to
merely seeing without reflecting on the thing, without first taking the
thing as a physical object as in scientific regard. But to say that this
'simple or straightforward seeing' is free of the logos is also a bit
misleading because of course it is already a mode of understanding things...

"The fact that when we look at something (schlichten Hinsehen), the
explicitness of assertion can be absent, does not justify our denying that
there is any Articulative interpretation in such mere seeing (schlichten
Sehen), and hence that there is any as-structure in it. When we have to do
with anything, the mere seeing of the Things which are closest to us bears
in itself the structure of interpretation, and in so primordial a manner
that just to grasp something free, as it were, of the "as", requires a
certain readjustment. When we merely stare at something, our
just-having-it-before-us lies before us as a failure to understand it any
more. This grasping which is free of the "as", is a privation of the kind
of seeing in which one merely understands. It is not more primordial than
that kind of seeing, but is derived from it" (B&T, p. 190/149).

Heidegger of course wants to make some assertions about the phenomena
themselves, about the way in which the things themselves give themselves,
so he has to make the distinction between logos as assertive judgement and
the existential understanding belonging to the phenomena - he wants to "let
that which shows itself be seen from itself in the very way in which it
shows itself from itself" (p. 58/34). It's this 'way of showing' that
'belongs essentially' to the things themselves that lies hidden and must be
disclosed. And so the existential structures of understanding become the
phenomena to be disclosed, as you yourself point out:

>Obviously that which
>precisely does _not_ show itself at first and for the most part; i.e. that
>which, compared with that which shows itself at first and for the most part
>[i.e. das schlichte sinnliche und reine Vernehmen! ME], is _hidden_, but
>at the
>same time is something that belongs essentially to that which shows itself at
>first and for the most part...=94 (p. 59/35)

"...and it belongs to it so essentially as to constitute its meaning (Sinn)
and its ground" (ibid)

And so straightforward perceptions, as pure noein or simple seeing, are
already meaningful...this much is obvious even in Husserl. It's this
meaningfulness that is in question here; or the 'hidden' non-thematic way
in which the things are already understood as what they are.

>So we are now at some remove from =93schlichtem Vernehmen=94, are we not?

Not really, cos this is what I have been arguing for all along...it is the
way in which straightforward perceptions of things are constantly given
that is the object of the existential analytic. It's in this sense that I
find the flux of perceptions to be at the very heart of the question of
_Being and Time_. And no, we don't find the answers in perception or
consciousness itself, as Husserl supposed when he posited his
transcendental ego as the ultimate controlling intentionality. We find the
answers 'outside' of ourself in the world. But does this mean then that the
notion of perception has nothing to do with Dasein? Of course not, because
the existential structures belong to nothing other than straightforward
perceptions...you have more or less said so yourself Michael. And so yes,
Heidegger's emphasis remains with Vernehmen, and by that I mean with its
'meaningfulness' and its openness to a world that already sets it up. This
is what I have been arguing for all along.

So how do perceptions meaningfully give themselves? There is the
practical/historical context of course, and this undermines Husserl's
neo-Cartesianism. But what about that pre-Ideen analysis of the
non-thematic intentionality of straightforward perception? The things
themselves as a perceptual flux (and their existential meaningfulness) are
obviously given temporally; the 'way of giving' has a temporal structure
and it's this temporalizing temporality that is closest to the problem of
das _Sein_ des Seienden. And Husserl has much to say on the structure of
Zeitlichkeit that, as in _Being and Time_, centres on *the way* perceptions
are given as well as on the temporal structure of the self. Originary
temporality is 'pre-egological' and in this sense it is something 'outside'
of an ego's conscious self-representations. And yet Zeitlichkeit is also a
structure that 'belongs essentially' to straightforward perceptions...which
is something you are perhaps missing in your description of that hammer:

>I took perception to mean sensual perception (_aisthaesis_), and this sensual
>perception of the hammer e.g. that it has a smooth, brown wooden handle and a
>silvery grey, metal head with a curved claw at the back, and a flat
>surface for
>hitting at the front, i.e. all these sensual observations are precisely _not_
>the disclosure of the hammer in its being. The openness of the hammer in its
>being is Dasein understanding the hammer as something that is good for
>hammering, whether Dasein makes use of this possibility or not; i.e. the
>=91deeper
>truth=92 of the hammer which Dasein takes for granted is not =91perceptual=92,
>but a
>possibility of its own being.

Yes, except the 'openness of the hammer in its being' is primarily a
temporal relation...and as I have been saying, it is precisely at this
point that Husserl's analysis of time complicates matters in the
existential analytic. How does the meaningfulness of the hammer give
itself? The practical context constantly sets up our seeing, and in that
sense the flux of straightforward sensible perception is always falling
into the 'situation', into the work at hand. But in order to do so I
presume that these perceptions are implicitly perceptions of the 'same'
thing and that I am the 'same' one for whom the work is meaningful? And in
Husserl this inexplicit sameness belongs to the flux of perceptions that
are themselves first given within an ultimate intentionality which must be,
as Heidegger shows, our existential understanding of being...and so:

>the hammer is heavy, and its heaviness is a
>sensual property, but its being too heavy for hammering a panel pin into a
>picture frame is already a transformation into an Um-zu, an in-order-to... On
>the other hand, the hammer is =91too light=92 for being used to knock a hole
>in the
>wall, although its sensually perceived weight remains the same. The hammer=92s
>sensual weight is thus a truncation or reduction of its weight in the
>context of
>an in-order-to..., i.e. weight itself does not say anything about the
>hammer=92s
>being.

Yes and no...you say yourself 'its sensually perceived weight remains the
same' and for pre-Ideen Husserl that sameness is constituted intentionally
in the flux of originary temporality. I take it then you would admit that
in order to see that the hammer is too light or too heavy (or just right
for the job) the hammer itself would first have to have given itself as an
objectively constituted perception of that same hammer. And not in a
representational sense, but purely in a straightforward perception of it, a
perception with an intentionally structured temporally 'objective being'.
Perhaps then what first throws us into the 'situation' is the in-order-to
and its practical context. These set up our perceptions of things, so in a
sense the hammer can be heavy because I am first thrown into using it, but
then its ongoing use in the moment is inextricably tied up with its
temporally articulated sensible perceptions.

>Perhaps you would like to follow up the lead provided by the last of the late
>=93Four Seminars=94 in Zaehringen 1973 (Heidegger is now 84) in order to deal
>with
>the question of the =93encapsulation=94 of the subject. The question that has
>to be
>asked here is: Is Husserl=92s consciousness ek-static? And along with that:
>Does
>Husserl=92s conception of temporality permit an ek-static interpretation.
>Heidegger says a clear No! to the former question.

In that ek-stasis in part refers to the way in which the temporality of
straightforward perceptions (ie the actual hammers 'bodily presence'
constituted in Zeitlichkeit) is already open to the world then no, the
early Husserl's notion of temporality cannot be ecstatic. There is no a
priori practical dimension here, no care-structure. But if Heidegger says a
clear No! to the former question then what does he say about the latter?
=46rom what I have seen of the ITC I would argue that Husserl's conception of
temporality is precisely what Heidegger interprets ecstatically in the
existential analytic. The temporality of the self, which is constituted
along with straightforward perceptions in the flux of Zeitlichkeit, must be
shown to be open to the world...this seems to me to be something of what
Heidegger attempts, in a very general sense, in the existential analytic.

>=93No matter what it is I am conscious of, it is present to me -- which
>means: it
>is _in_ subjectivity, _in_ my consciousness. ...

So long as the 'in' is not posited in some sort of naive reified sense but
rather in terms of the temporal process belonging to straightforward
perceptions of the things themselves, then yes, I'm with you so far...

>In SuZ, by contrast, the
>=91thing=92 no longer has its place in consciousness, but _in the world_
>(which is
>in turn itself not immanent to consciousness).

As we have already agreed, the world is transcendent to being conscious of
things as they give themselves, it sets our perceptions up...but
nonetheless the way in which the thing gives itself (its existential sense)
still 'belongs essentially' to straightforward perception.

>Thus Husserl remains, despite
>intentionality, enclosed in immanence -- Husserl
>saves the object, but only by inserting it into the immanence of
>consciousness.

Again the metaphor of enclosure...there is no 'inside', there are only the
things themselves as given in straightforward perceptions. But yes Husserl
remains with consciousness as a problem and his neo-Cartesianism is a
consequence of this initial exclusively intuitive emphasis - an emphasis
that grounds the presupposition that the ultimate controlling
intentionality remains a question of the ego and its representations. And
so yes:

>The region of consciousness is not put into question at all in Husserl=92s
>thinking, let alone breaking out of it. ...

And so for you:

>Heidegger=92s starting point is
>completely different; at first sight it could even appear to be less precise:
>when I look at the inkwell, he says, I grasp it itself in my gaze, the
>inkwell
>itself without any reference to hyletic data or categories. Everything
>depends
>on having a fundamental experience with the thing itself. If one proceeds
>from
>consciousness, this experience cannot be had at all. To go through (Vollzug)
>this experience, a region other than consciousness is necessary. This other
>region is what is called Da-sein.=94 (GA15:382f)
>
>What do you make of this, Malcolm? Do you want to make a case for Husserl=92s
>Zeitlichkeit not being immanent to consciousness?

What would this immanence mean? Zeitlichkeit constitutes the unity of
consciousness and so it is nothing immanent 'within' consciousness if by
this you mean an effect of an ego's conscious sense making. In another
sense, as the originary source it is something 'outside' of consciousness,
a natural phenomenon of sorts, no different from say the nuclear
regularities that callibrate our most accurate clocks. No different that is
except that Zeitlichkeit first constitutes the unity of experience such
that something like empirical subatomic processes can give themselves to
human perception...and so as for the inkwell, if you grasp it with your
gaze doesn't this grasping have a duration? And in this duration isn't
there a flux of straightforward sensible perceptions of the thing? But this
perceptual flux has a double unity, the inkwell endures as what it is, and
for Husserl that means the unity of consciousness non-thematically grasps
the 'objective being' of the thing. This grasping is in no sense an ego's
representation of or 'reference to hyletic data or categories', which seems
to me to belong to the neo-Cartesian Husserl while eliding his temporal
problematic. If one proceeds from the temporality of perception as given in
ITC then something of the fundamental experience might be had, that is if
the temporal structure of 'simple seeing' has anything to do with the being
of beings...but then Heidegger is of course, as always, also merely correct
in that Husserl remains with consciousness and as such completely misses
out on the ecstatic (as in practical openness) nature of Dasein.

And yet what of the temporal structure of ec-stasis as the way in which
'what shows itself is seen from itself in the very way in which it shows
itself from itself'? I think early Husserl is there in a restricted
non-practical sense...

regards,

Malcolm Riddoch.










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