Being and Time discussion

Hubert Dreyfus is considered to be one of the world authorities on Heidegger. Check out his podcast,

http://webcast.berkeley.edu/course_de...

It's better than trying to trudge through that lame English translation all-by-your-Dasien.

Cheers-

The faces of wisdom-
The feces of wisdom;
Yes!

hahaha, "all-by-your-Dasien"

'A Commentary on Heidegger's Being and Time' by Michael Gelven follows and comments on the text section by section. You can follow the text.

Being and Time are brother and sister. At a certain Time you can be at a certaint place only.no way you can be at two places a time.Being and Time

Not sure if this is a comment on Heidegger? Not sure whether modern physics would even agree!

America is a society which detests and runs from, any talk of philosophy or metaphysics. Almost all our movies and hit tv shows are sci-fi these days. Science, instead of philosophy--is publicized and promoted in every way. With an almost frantic sense of insecurity; perhaps because people need something to give their attention to in lieu of religion.

But all the nonstop science-hoopla doesn't mean modern physics 'has all the answers'--in fact, its still very much a fumbling and feeble endeavor. It has lots of questions but very few answers.

Internet-saturated society these days is simply technology-obsessed... every news outlet always has a cheap 'science feature article' section for 'popular science'. Soft, easy-to-swallow science which "everyday joes" can digest.

What people tend to forget that physics is lame. It merely seeks to describe a portion of reality: the visible part. Its the most conventional and juvenile approach; and it approaches only the part of the universe which doesn't really matter.

Heidegger talks about the part that does matter; how reality feels to us as humans. Physics has nothing to say about that.

I'm not sure what all my good American philosopher friends would say to this comment. Put 'USA philosophy' into your search engine and see what happens. Physics is not so much lame and doing its thing. Heidegger has a great deal to say about science and technology and the way it interlinks with thinking. Strange this!

I found the Gelven most helpful as a direct crib but the Safranski is good as biog. Don't read Hugo Ott. I have real difficulties with the Nazi angle.

David wrote: "I'm not sure what all my good American philosopher friends would say to this comment."

Which comment? I made several. Do you mean my statement about how the United States in general, does not regard the field of philosophy very highly? Well, your friends (whether they work in philosophy or not) would have to agree with me on that because its simply a truism.

America has made a modest contribution to philosophy. Almost any country in Europe can boast a finer tradition. That's of course not the crux of the matter. The difference is in how countries in Europe vs the US embrace philosophical ideas; how they appreciate the entire branch of academia.

In Europe, respect is attached to philosophers. They're not afraid of these men, but but proud of them. In America, philosophy is regarded with scorn and skepticism. Professional philosophers have long been decried as pointless, ineffectual, and irrelevant, ivory-tower academics. Outright xenophobia is attached to 'foreign' ideas.

Having a few friends who took philosophy as their major, having a few friends who perhaps teach philosophy in university--would not make us able to characterize the USA as a society which is thoughtful or attentive towards philosophy; it does not enable us to say that philosophy is popular or widely-known here.

For instance, the field is never mentioned in our mainstream culture; never given any respect by news-media, or by our political leaders, never touched upon in our K-12 education system, never even found referenced in any of our entertainment or arts. The very word, 'philosophy' is shunned by the industry which makes our cinema and television. [This is a practice which goes back decades. At some point it was noticed that any movie which featured even a philosopher character, or contained philosophical dialog, turned American viewers away. Thus, even "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" was renamed for American movie theaters.]

David wrote: "Put 'USA philosophy' into your search engine and see what happens. "

Google tells one how many internet web pages might contain a particular phrase or word. This is not a valid, cogent, or robust argument.

David wrote: "Physics is not so much lame and doing its thing"

I agree with you that its certainly 'doing its thing'. However, you had previously implied that physics can ultimately determine whether ideas like that of Heidegger are valid or not. My reply was that this is not so; and that philosophy is the more powerful discipline.

David wrote: "Heidegger has a great deal to say about science and technology and the way it interlinks with thinking."

Precisely my point. Not only Heidegger but many other philosophers have plenty to say about science and technology; whereas physicists have very little to say about philosophy and how their discoveries affect the human condition. Quantum physicists frequently talk about multiple dimensions but they remain one-dimensional as far as human experience is concerned. Philosophy trumps physics in every way except perhaps, instrumentality and government funding. Physics deals with a set of premises which it avers to be 'fact'--but philosophy deals with what sets of facts may 'mean'.

David wrote: "Strange this! "

Again, what is strange? In America, everyone knows the name Albert Einstein--he is a hero and a celebrity--how many Americans know the name Bertrand Russell or Ludwig Wittgenstein? Your 'American philosopher friends' do, but not our society at large.

By the by, this thread is great. I'm glad to see it on Goodreads--readers mentioning their favorite version or edition of Heidegger. Wonderful! Heidegger is my favorite philosopher, I'm glad to observe all these comments about this-or-that-translation of his works.

Richard wrote: "Being and Time are brother and sister. At a certain Time you can be at a certain place only. No way you can be at two places a time.

I actually very much disagree with this! Sure, noumena has been a part of the backbone of western philosophy since Thales; and I don't necessarily think that modern physics (at least, the 'Star Trek theorizing' type of physics) frees us from the rigor with which we should regard the principle of "an object can't be two things at one time". But when you take the best ideas from Sartre, Heidegger, Kant..you come away feeling there's all sorts of ways to consider the aspect of objects-in-time and perhaps that this is too limiting a premise.

Richard wrote: "Being and Time are brother and sister. At a certain Time you can be at a certaint place only.no way you can be at two places a time.Being and Time"

There's apart of that which is related to Heidegger's 'turn' Joan Stambaugh's commentary on the shorter 'Time and Being' talks about this in her translation of it.