Date: Wed, 27 Feb 2002 17:26:34 +0100
From: Rene de Bakker <rene.de.bakker-AT-uba.uva.nl>
Subject: Re: Martin Heidegger the intellectual mentor of the left -


At 23:02 26-2-02 +0100, Jan wrote:
>Stuart,
>
>thanks for this interesting quotation, alas i lack time at the moment
>to think a little deeper and respond to this and your previous post
>(will come), but allow me one superficial observation; in your quote
>Heidegger says:
>
>>"The question concerning the demand for world change leads back to a much
>>quoted sentence of Karl Marx, taken from the 'Theses on Feuerbach'.
>>I will quote him precisely by reading aloud: 'The philosophers have merely
>>_interpreted_ the world in different ways; now the task is to _change_ it'.
>>By quoting this sentence _and_ by adhering to these thoughts, one overlooks
>>the fact that a world change presupposes a change of _world idea_ and that a
>>world idea is only to be obtained by sufficient _interpretation_ of the
>>world.
>>That means, Marx rests on a specific interpretation of the world in order to
>>claim his 'change' and thereby he shows that this statement is not
>>established. He gives the impression that he has decidedly spoken against
>>philosophy, while, in the second part of the statement, the unspoken demand
>>for a philosophy is tacitly assumed".
>
>and yet, today Rene offered the following:
>
>>In a critical GA-comment to this same Introduction to metaphysics
>>Heidegger says: "The road that is chosen in the beginning of the lecture,
>>is wrong: there is no way from Seinsverstaendnis (understanding of
>>Being) to Being itself. And one better skips over the first 15 pages.
>>One has to begin with the beginning, and that is Being, and only then
>>its understanding.
>
>to me it seems these two quotes stand someway in contradiction; viz.
>in the first Heidegger is critiquing Marx in that "interpretation" (i.e.
>the demand for philosophy) is prior to "change" (of the world[idea]),
>yet in the second he asserting that it is "Being" (Sein) that is proir to
>the "understanding" of it (Seinsverstaendnis).
>
>so my question is here: "is interpretation prior to change, or vice versa ?"
>or philosophically rephrased "is the epistemic order prior to the ontic, or
>v.v.?"

Jan,

Marx says: no more theory, now praxis. Theory only valuable with regard
to praxis. Otherwise theory itself a self-deludung expression of praxis. 

Heidegger: this reasoning, or interpreting, looses itself out of sight,
because what
it turns to as the place of its actualization - the 'real' world - is only
the result
of a specific speculating. Feuerbach, Wagner, Schopenhauer, Kierkegaard,
all make this same move to something Hegel would have overlooked: the
sensuous 
man, for Wagner on stage, individual existence. 

But there is no real world - Nietzsche sees sharper. If you think there is,
it is
one that is thought, interpreted by someone else. Power is the only
reality, and
it is either thinking or being thought. And all but one become victims 
in "the struggle of fundamental philosophical doctrines for the dominion of
the
earth", because this other one just beat you. So inferring this battle on
the basis
of perceived injustice, as Marx did, is, in the eyes of Nietzsche, a naivity.
Nietzsche states bluntly: taking away from some people their serviceability, 
might leave them with nothing. 
Just look at a car with someone in it: see?

Nietzsche's Herrenmoral more 'human' than Marx' communism?
Yes it is. It assumes responsability for everyone.

As to the - 'epistemic' - question:

I think one can say, that the critics of Marx and the self-critics vis-a-vis
"Introduction to metaphysics" are comparable.
BT: Fundamental ontology = grounding of Dasein (Seinsverstaendnis)
This is done by way of contrast against the notion of subject (critics of
Descartes)
He later said: there is no other way, but it makes Dasein dependent on its
contrast
with subject. But when Dasein is 'earlier' than subject, it should be
comprehended
out of itself. But then it would be precisely the old subject, because the
subject of
Descartes a.o. founds itself on itself!! Like Marx says, when he says, that
the root of
man is man. As long as Heidegger is searching, with Kant, for a
'metaphysics of
metaphysics', he remains hopelessly confused in metaphysics, i.e.
subjectivity.
Later he explicitly denies this possibility, there is no way out. Meanwhile
he HAS
said in BT, that Dasein is 'rueckbezogen', re-flected, into something else
than it
is itself, Being, but when it comes to saying what this means, it cannot be
reached.
Caught, if you want, in 'interpretation'. This leads him, in GA 26, to the
claim of a 
turning, without being able to perform it. The grounding of Dasein must be
done in
what is itself not Dasein! And this is, what he DIRECTLY begins with in the
Contr.
(in contrast to the criticised indirect and 'spoiling' way or method in
"Introd. to metaph.)

Nietzsche speaks in strange words about the arriving of Zarathustra.
The big question here is: what can one possibly be waiting for?
And only when one has an idea of that, can one maybe say that one
understands a
little bit of BT. It is not a book.

rene
















rene



-----------------------------------
drs. René de Bakker
Universiteitsbibliotheek Amsterdam
Afdeling Catalogisering 
tel. 020-5252309              


     --- from list heidegger-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---