Date: Tue, 19 Feb 2002 17:47:48 +0000
Subject: Re: Martin Heidegger the intellectual mentor of the left
From: "Michael Pennamacoor" <pennamacoor-AT-enterprise.net>


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Allen, just now:

Michael,

For whatever reason, some of us insist on trying to do something with the Cat's not
altogether grating meows,yet it often gets us someplace.  In this case, the place shows us
something about the license we give ourselves to use a kind of Kabbalistic  jibberish to
indicate the way of thinking that's closest to our hearts. Resorting to such language
makes us extremely vulnerable, so as you suggest, Michael, what is then required is a kind
of decorum on the part of the other to enable one to continue-- to continue to make sense
out of language which can so easily be made to appear foolish.

The question is, to what jibberish do you care to lend credence, the support of decorum?
What jibberish do you leave alone as just uninteresting, and what jibberish do you choose
to "expose" publicly?  The choice here is crucial to philosophy, especially of the
Heideggerian sort.

Allen

Allen, firstly, thanks for this courteous and thoughtful reminder; and thus, secondly, I
must apologize to you and Cat (sorry, Jud, sorry, GEVANS613 :-)) for flying off the handle
and losing my kool: bad hair(less) day. But this has raised an interesting, as you say,
point concerning the displays of language within a philosophic milieu, especially within a
Heideggerian discourse.

In the attempt to think through in language something (some-think?) that precisely evades,
slips away as one tries to 'grasp' it, that embraces oneself as one tries to make it stand
still at that distance required by ordinary language for its 'topic'... in this attempt,
one might be required to do a certain violence to ordinary (and technical...) language and
the tangle of commonsense understandings that contextualize and situate it for the very
understandings it is meant to convey. One might need to push language to certain extremes,
not in a willful manner, necessarily, but because one 'feels' pushed by the very
thought-provoking matter that one is, in a way, subject to; one then belongs to the
matter-to-hand, or rather, the matter-not-to-hand, and language then becomes not a simple
(or complex) medium for the expression of one's thinking, but more the very site for the
thinking to take place. Thus, as you say, such a display of language in this strenuous
attempt to think (being), can make one vulnerable to potential ridicule or accusations of
pretentiousness and such. But, perhaps more importantly, maybe it should be so, the
vulnerability, that we risk the venture with language, that such a venture might enable us
to hear the klang, the call, of language itself, the housing, the dwelling-place, of
being...?

Again, thanks, Allen, for the re-minding; and sorry, Jud, for the spleen.

michaelP

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HTML VERSION:

Allen, just now:

Michael,

For whatever reason, some of us insist on trying to do something with the Cat's not altogether grating meows,yet it often gets us someplace.  In this case, the place shows us something about the license we give ourselves to use a kind of Kabbalistic  jibberish to indicate the way of thinking that's closest to our hearts. Resorting to such language makes us extremely vulnerable, so as you suggest, Michael, what is then required is a kind of decorum on the part of the other to enable one to continue-- to continue to make sense out of language which can so easily be made to appear foolish.

The question is, to what jibberish do you care to lend credence, the support of decorum? What jibberish do you leave alone as just uninteresting, and what jibberish do you choose to "expose" publicly?  The choice here is crucial to philosophy, especially of the Heideggerian sort.

Allen

Allen, firstly, thanks for this courteous and thoughtful reminder; and thus, secondly, I must apologize to you and Cat (sorry, Jud, sorry, GEVANS613 :-)) for flying off the handle and losing my kool: bad hair(less) day. But this has raised an interesting, as you say, point concerning the displays of language within a philosophic milieu, especially within a Heideggerian discourse.

In the attempt to think through in language something (some-think?) that precisely evades, slips away as one tries to 'grasp' it, that embraces oneself as one tries to make it stand still at that distance required by ordinary language for its 'topic'... in this attempt, one might be required to do a certain violence to ordinary (and technical...) language and the tangle of commonsense understandings that contextualize and situate it for the very understandings it is meant to convey. One might need to push language to certain extremes, not in a willful manner, necessarily, but because one 'feels' pushed by the very thought-provoking matter that one is, in a way, subject to; one then belongs to the matter-to-hand, or rather, the matter-not-to-hand, and language then becomes not a simple (or complex) medium for the expression of one's thinking, but more the very site for the thinking to take place. Thus, as you say, such a display of language in this strenuous attempt to think (being), can make one vulnerable to potential ridicule or accusations of pretentiousness and such. But, perhaps more importantly, maybe it should be so, the vulnerability, that we risk the venture with language, that such a venture might enable us to hear the klang, the call, of language itself, the housing, the dwelling-place, of being...?

Again, thanks, Allen, for the re-minding; and sorry, Jud, for the spleen.

michaelP