Re: Restored (and a final story for Luke and Daniel)

Gasp, I actually agree with Robbie on this one; specifically, I agree
that John's summary of history is incorrect (more people have been
killed to establish Marxism somewhere in the last 100 years than have
been killed in the name of Christ in the last 2000).

There have been a few genuinely religious wars, but I suspect in most
wars religion was a pretext at best.

I'm really interested in Heidegger, though. Heidegger did undergo a
"turn" during the mid 1930s, which resulted in his affiliation with the
Nazi Party. What motivated this turn has been widely debated. Theodor
Adorno in _The Jargon of Authenticity_ and in the opening chapter or so
of _Negative Dialectics_ describes this turn in terms of Heidegger's
existentialism, using some of the language John uses.

Heidegger wasn't "in" with the Nazis for very long, though. He retained
his presidency of his university for maybe two or three years, if I
remember right, then was demoted, and by 1941 was out digging ditches.

Some argue that his lectures on Nietzche were subtle criticisms of
National Socialism, but the fact remains that he never apologized for
the things he said and did during the time of his affiliation with
National Socialism.

To this day I don't understand how a person who described the They-self
of _Being and Time_ could possibly become a Nazi, unless motivated by
compelling personal desires. In my opinion Heidegger's turn was
motivated largely by dreams of self aggrandizement, and the
aggrandizement of philosophy in German society, rather than it being a
natural outgrowth of his philosophy, however he conceived it.

It should be remembered that many people who believed in absolute truths
opposed National Socialism as well -- because of this belief.

I would also like to argue that it's not all that clear to me that
Heidegger wasn't involved in a project that sought an all-encompassing
Truth even during the 1920s. Rorty's reading of Heidegger denies this,
and to be honest it annoys me to no end. In _The Fundamental Concepts
of Metaphysics_ (from a 1929-30 lecture series) Heidegger argues that
"Truth is innermost confrontation of the essence of man with the whole
of beings themselves" (29).

He emphasizes that this confrontation proceeds by comprehensive
questioning rather than by "proving propositions at the writing desk,"
but the point here is that he's seeking a comprehensive line of
questioning, one that draws in the questioner as part of the reality
questioned -- not questioned in the sense of doubted, though, but
questioned in the sense of "inquired into."

I would say that while he wasn't fond of the elaboration of
propositional truths, this did not entail a rejection of the idea of an
absolute, attainable truth.

Jim

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Received on Wed Jul 16 23:20:13 2003