Date: Fri, 22 Feb 2002 18:10:57 +0100
From: Rene de Bakker <rene.de.bakker-AT-uba.uva.nl>
Subject: Re: Method


At 12:02 21-2-02 -0600, Allen wrote:
>At 1:36 PM +0100 2/21/02, Rene de Bakker wrote:
>>
>>But it is as if one points to the image (Bild) of a painting, but the other
>>sees only his 'object': the paint, one can go through with X-rays.
>>
>>Formal indication has a limit too, it seems.
>
>Rene,
>
>Do you mean to say that the formal indication indicated by the words 
>of the philosopher is similar in its "work" to the image painted by 
>the  painter?

Rather, that when human talk of things is robbed from its metaphysical
dimension, these things, that in their at-hand-ness just seem to remain the
same, are not the same anymore. As we aren't. Only, that we cannot
experience a difference, because the basic difference Sein-Seiendes isn't
open anymore. Not, that WE do not let it in anymore, far from that. It is
taken away. (Heidegger says: Being is the staying-out of Being. So that
what remains, are just beings without Being) But when Nietzsche and,
slightly different, Heidegger indicate this, the ears to hear it aren't
there any more. I don't mean anything negative or arrogant, it belongs to
the indicated.  We're the ones that are addressed, but that is precisely
what we don't want. Again: not because WE don't want it, but because we are
the not-wanted. But even then, there is still Being!!! It's ownmost is to
hide. But as hiding, staying-out, it stays. But (dammit) not for us. Like
the station, that 'is', also when I don't have it in mind.

Heidegger cites what he calls a "terrible word" of Hoelderlin: "The Germans
cannot use me." If there has ever been an indicating, it is Hoelderlin's,
but he was simply forgotten, until his re-discovery just before WW1, at a
time when Heidegger still had to become what he was. And, although knowing
Hoelderlin already early, only received the signs 1933/34, when the
Ereignis came. Only him, who has, can be given.
Of this Hoelderlin, Heidegger says, that while being (dead and) forgotten,
he WAS . as he says of , in the Heraclit seminar, that he still IS

I earlier mentioned the station in Zuerich, in the Zoll. Sem. , and that we
travel to it, without knowing that and what the thing is itself. We really
believe that our notion of it is enough. What the hell, it works, doesn't
it? And like a college said to me: you're thinking about that? But that's
completely crazy! I had to agree with him.
What I didn't say to him is that meanwhile he is no less crazy, because he
cannot prevent going to stations and the like.
There is a passage in "The principle of reason", where H writes: "Why does
this not knock us over?"
If there would be no limit to the power of indication, one could knock over
everybody.

Whether the artist's showing is like the philosopher's or not, is a
question long passe now, because both are not real anymore, no offense eh?
And how can, what is not real, judge about the real and the illusionary,
Sein und Schein? It talks about new beginnings, but it doesn't begin self. 

The thing itself cannot be communicated. But this is nothing negative...
And the end of art and the end of philosophy might be something not merely
negative too. 

Derrida said to Gadamer in Paris: also your will to communicate is a will
to power. That made him angry. Really a feat of Derrida. 
 
>It seems to me that the painter is necessarily involved in a kind of 
>"dissembling" which shows the other "only his object," as you say. It 
>is the nature of paint as a material substance which produces the 
>exigencies which the painter must  manipulate in order to show what 
>he sees.  The philosopher, on the other hand, "reads" the formal 
>indication he forms directly off of the "material" of factic life. 
>Thus the words of the philosopher comprise a formal indication of a 
>formal indication which can be "read back" to the things themselves. 
>Not so with the artist.  As you suggest, when you x-ray the paint, 
>you don't get to the things themselves, but simply to deeper levels 
>of paint.

This was seen, but in a more charming way, by Leibniz. Fuel for the monad.

>Wouldn't the limit of the formal indication be  set by the 
>relationship between word and thing and thus really not a limit at 
>all?
>
>Sorry if this post is a bit convoluted.  I'm on my way to lunch. 
>Perhaps I'll try again later.

Happy digestion,

Rene

ps meanwhile, Allen, the working and talking with (young) people is
important. Yesterday I had a first reading session (Monadology), with
phil students from Leiden. Unique chance to think under some pressure.


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


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