What is Dasein?

Appreciate if you will shut out the vulgarity to avoid unnecessary tit-for-tats.

You talk much about Dasein which is generally and essentially referred to Heidegger’s but you do not seem to understand Dasein thoroughly as in BT, that is the reason for the very superficial ‘fire-fighting’ questions you raised above.

To get to the ‘good’ things in BT is not easy where one need to grasp the whole complex system.
To give you an idea, I suggest you get familiar with Anticipatory Resoluteness,
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/heidegger/#AntRes
This is digging very deep below the ‘everydayness’ you are entangled in [being-in-the-world] and spouting about above.

Your problem is you understand very little of existentialism [Heidegger’s and others] to the extreme that you [like many others] are swayed/seduced by the incomplete part which happened to very negative and pessimistic, thus digging that very big and deep whole for yourself. It is very pitiful.

It is much better to do as Prism does: insult the other person without vulgarities. This miraculously does not lead to tit for tats. It leads to elegant ad homs and insults. For example paragraphs filled with implicit and explicit condescension, as in the post above mine, is a nice way to skirt the rules, while getting smaller, but many more in total, moments of catharsis. That’s right, you can subtly display dominance behavior, enjoy that, but when you avoid vulgarities, the moderators can’t do much, you appear not to have lost your cool - which might damage your self-image as purely rational and not guided by emotions like, say, theists are - and it gives you yet another arena in which to indicate your superiority. You not only know Heidegger better, you not only are not guided, like other, by emotions, you are not only right about the topic, but you ALSO have the best approach to insulting others and satisfying the emotions you judge so much in others.

One more category of reproach and superiority.

It’s a win win approach.

Well, for the person using it.

Cake and eat it too. Dasein as denial.

One good analogy of the situation you are in and being lost is that of the lotus flower in a pool of dirty mud and sewage.

In BT and Dasein terms you are stuck in the mud and sewage without the understanding of the potentiality of being of the lotus flower that has the potential to rise above the dirty mud & sewage to bloom to its full potential

We’re just going around in circles. No, I don’t thoroughly understand what Heidegger meant to convey by Dasein.

As I have noted before with regard to Heidegger:

[b]I use the term dasein because I was struck by Heidegger’s conjecture regarding “thrownness”. We are each and everyone of us “thrown” adventitiously into a particular world at birth – historically, culturally, experientially. Being “here” and not “there”, being “now” and not “before” or “later”.

Thus: to what extent is that relevant or irrelevant relating to the manner in which we come to acquire a particular identity, a particular moral and political narrative?

What [using the tools of philosophy] can be determined as [essentially] true here for all of us objectively and what becomes considerably more intertwined [existentially] in a set of personal opinions/prejudices. [/b]

Unless and until you are willing to situate this intellectual contraption out in a particular world in which you construe behaviors in an actual context as either being or not being “progressive”, I’m really not interested.

Call this “the problem” if you will and move on to others.

You just can’t help it, can you? You dump these “general descriptions” on me and then refuse to note how [existentially] you are not in that hole yourself.

By, say, becoming a Nazi?

In this particular case, you should not use the term ‘Dasein’ and ‘thrownness’ without understanding the complete picture within BT.

In BT terms, ‘Dasein’ and ‘thrownness’ are very specific with its related intentions and should never be used by themselves individually but should be dealt within a system which include a way out of that ‘quagmire’ and dilemma.

Your problem is you used the terms and concepts of ‘Dasein’ and ‘thrownness’ in a half-cooked manner and is stuck with them in a deep shit hole.

I believe this is what those [existentialists] who are very pessimistic and depress are doing when they feast on and are attune to those depressive concepts that suit their existing psychological state but ignore the optimistic side where whatever is existentially problematic can be modulated [not get rid of]. Note the confirmation bias in this case.

This is like the evil prone believers who feast merely on the evil laden elements within religious texts and ignoring [blind] to those 'good-laden elements.

Note you are the one who asked for the good things within BT. This is why your problem lies, i.e. refusal to even understand the clue I have introduced.

Your expectations in going into specific situations in this particular case is not a wise philosophical move, i.e. you are expecting to be fed with fishes all the time by others instead of learning how to fish yourself.

I have always asserted ALL humans has the potential to be caught in an existential dilemma or crisis. This potential is expressed in various degrees within different people.
Note Buddha’s generic “Life IS Suffering” [applicable to ALL people] but the Buddha provided a way to modulate [not get rid] of this inherent problem within human life.

Existentially, all humans are faced with a fundamental and all sorts of problems of various degrees BUT there is no way I need to surrender in being stuck in a deep shit hole like the one you are in and whining about.

Note there is a big difference between ‘knowing and doing,’ and between ‘theory and practice.’ Surely you are well aware of this point. Why you did not take this into account in your above response?

It is SO common there are many super coaches who had developed trainees of the highest caliber but they themselves are not necessary the best performers. The coach who taught Usain Bolt how to run is not able to run at the speed Bolt was doing in setting his records.

There are many good books on self-development which has benefited many but that did not guarantee the authors were good in practicing in what they wrote about.

It is the same with Heidegger and his philosophy. So Heidegger came up with good philosophical theories but he could not practice them personally holistically.

On reading BT I note Heidegger provided a good system of philosophy [theoretical] from raising the question and the problem of existence, and theorizing the solutions to them but he did not go into the details of how to practice to get effective results.

Heidegger mentioned [among others] ‘resoluteness’ and even ‘equanimity’ [which I suggested to you earlier] but he did not provide methods to be practiced to develop these good qualities within the brain of the person.
This is in contrast to Buddha’s holistic set and system of theories and extensive practices to achieve the intended results.

So I am not surprised at all that Heidegger joined the Nazi Party given his mental and social circumstances during his time.

I believe the typical resorting to the ‘Nazi’ excuse to condemn Heidegger’s philosophy is not a wise philosophical move, rather it reflect philosophical immaturity especially in a philosophical discussion.

In the literal sense you Great Mind. We love that type of energy to combat logic with logic. [Understanding With Understanding.] You out of all these ‘Philosophers’ know better than most. Not everything can be explained to the simplest of notions. Yet, My take on Dasein…? Well, It is as Prismatic567 clearly explained. That which determines such significance towards actual attention. For Example (THE BIG BIRD.) Have it not be the little bird. Which was more out of the ordinary? More ‘ambiguous’? <— lol a little play on words/usernames. But to be honest it really is just exemplifying something to have more of a defining and clearly visible or understood; obviously lucid distinction. To be blunt about it. Yet, mind you this is only my take on ‘Dasein’. Have it be more scientific? It takes on an extremely important part of physics. You should read up on it. Iambigious was throwing links to you guys.

Yes, so you keep telling me. But until you and others eager to claim that they have come to undertand Heidegger’s points in BT, are willing to integrate this academic understanding into a context involving actual conflicting goods, out in a particular world, I’ll pass.

Do that or, by all means, go looking for others here more intent on being thought of as a “serious philosopher”.

Those I construe [rightly or wrongly] to be but one more god-awful rendition of Will Durant’s “epistemologists”.

This is just my own personal opinion – clearly an existential contraption – but you truly do strike me as just one objectivist/authoritarian autodidact. An abstractionist ever intent on keeeping the exchange up in the stratosphere of definitions and deductions.

A technical, analytic understanding of dasein/Dasein?

Okay, but then bring it down to earth.

Either show me how you are not yourself in a “quagmire” when your own values come into conflict with others or I’m moving on.

Consider for example this from your post on “Functional Morality” thread:

[b]Note 200 years ago no one would forecast the possibility of legal banning of ‘Chattel Slavery’ in all nations in the World. Whilst this is only pertaining to Laws [not practice], it is a definite ‘moral’ achievement and progress for humanity. Such an evolution is not by natural selection re normal evolution.

What is critical is how can we abstract a sound Framework and System of Morality and System
[with groundings and principles] from the reality of what is within the ongoing progress of morality.[/b]

Chattel slavery again. And [of course] the Capital Letter Words.

You are [to me] the very embodiment of an Intellectual Framework here at ILP.

Unless of course you’re right.

As I have always stated, we must addressed the theory first before we go into the practice. You seem to jump into practice without proper theoretical foundations. Maybe that was the thing to do thousands of years ago but that is not what is with the present. This is why we have Philosophy as the necessary base to optimize life and living.

Point is even when you try to incorporate theory, they are half-baked and bastardized ones.

When one read BT one can sense the arrogance and egoism of Heidegger in brushing off every other ‘Western’ philosophers engaging in the subject-object dichotomy and thus presenting ‘useless’ philosophy. Note Heidegger condemned only Western Philosophy since Plato to Hegel to Bergson but not Eastern Philosophy [which is admire]. Infact he was accused of plagiarizing his main theme from Eastern Philosophy. Note my main approach is from Eastern Philosophy.

Your problem is you have been brainwashed by Heidegger’s supporters, e.g. William Barrett, with the same sense of arrogance and egoism but unfortunately got stuck with his antimonies but not understanding the solutions given by Heidegger to get out of those antimonies.

With false arrogance you set out to condemn others as objectivists with useless intellectual contraptions. Note this is such a simple way out even a child can do that!

Note in modern times the most effective approach to solving whatever problems [personal or otherwise] always starts with theory and analysis then to implement practical solutions. You insist in the opposite and thus is stuck in a very deep hole.

Btw, I have already proposed with theories and supported by practical solutions but your default is whatever is presented by others are merely useless intellectual contraptions.

You seemingly have this drive of OCD i.e. ‘It is My WAY or No Way’ without any proper philosophical justification to support your urge.

Yours remind me of the various case of obese men and women who will eat themselves to death despite all the advice given by doctors, kins and friends, e.g.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3141122/A-pizza-man-key-Carers-brought-junk-food-1-000-month-benefits-65st-Karl-allowed-eat-death-taxpayer.html

Presumably these obese people [driven by Prada-Willi Syndrome] continue to do what their urges drive them to do and treat all advice and warnings by doctors and others as useless ‘intellectual contraption’ re dangers of obesity.
It is the same with religious fundamentalists who will treat whatever that do not fit their doctrine as ‘intellectual contraptions’ i.e. in this case, satanic.

Then we are stuck. To discuss Heidegger’s take on Dasein theoretically without making continuing references to actual living beings interacting out in a particular world, seems rather absurd to me.

The words interact only with other words. They become academic collaborations insisting that others must define the meaning of their words in precisely the same way.

Meanwhile out in the world existentially folks continue to come into conflict when they can’t make the words that they define theoretically one way, fit into the technical narratives of others.

Basically, it seems that you arguing that “in the future” if everyone shares your own theoretical understanding of the foundation for “progressive behavior”, then chattel slavery and smoking cigarettes will have been demonstrated philosophically to be necessarily evil.

And then much further into the future the same will have been accomplished in regard to more vexing issues like abortion, animal rights, gun control and human sexuality.

Practical solutions in what sense? Suppose others don’t share your solutions? How do you demonstrate to them that their own theoretical foundation is necessarily flawed? And wouldn’t this demonstration revolve largely around insisting that since your own theoretical understanding necessarily leads to progressive behaviors, theirs must be wrong? By definition.

And look where Heidegger’s own theoretical understanding of Dasein took him.

Where did he go wrong?

If, in fact, he was?

You missed my point again where I explained there is a load of difference between knowing and doing, e.g. a sport coach who knows a lot and teaches his trainees to be world’s best is not necessary good in the sport himself.
It is the same with religious authorities who teach others to be good spiritually but they themselves could be pedophiles, rapist, murders and other evil person.
It is the same with Heidegger who introduced a novel view with good ideas on ‘Being’ which has benefited many.

As I had said somewhere, do not rely on such immature view to counter Heidegger’s philosophy. So keep insulting your own philosophical intelligence [basically not much anyway].

Note you are also relying on the theories of Heidegger, e.g. Dasein, thrownness, rival goods, etc. but you has cherry picked merely the negative elements [inauthentic] that Heidegger condemned but ignored the solutions [authentic] he proposed on how to deal with those negatives. That is a kind of sick philosophy you are doing to torture yourself. Rather than dealing with the specific problems you are in, I have suggested you get educated [theory-practical] in the philosophical elements that is relevant.

Why is Theory Critical?
Note the current practice of effective knowledge and practical is the concept of Pure and Applied as in the various Sciences, humanities, Music even in the Arts etc. Do you deny this?

As I had stated my practical solutions are those relating to ‘Teaching one how to fish’ instead of ‘feeding someone fishes all the time’.

The practical solutions I suggested are get into ‘knowing thyself’ ‘get educated’ in the necessary principles on how to deal with problems in life, etc. These are universally accepted principles re practical solutions, only the very useless will ignore such propositions.

As for the specific practical cases you brought up, it is not practical to get involved with antinomies [till the cows come home] in this case.
It would appear that we have to veer into psychological counselling sessions [I got into that a bit with you] to deal with how to get out of the hole you have dug for yourself. It is impossible to do a proper one within a forum like this and in case I do not want to be involved in such matters.

It depend on the topic. This has to be dealt on a case by case basis in various appropriate threads.
Note my example of ‘chattel slavery’ is merely an example, albeit a good one - there are tons of examples I could introduce to support my points re ‘progress’ within humanity re the philosophy of moral and ethics.

Okay, let’s go here:

1] How would you reconcile his “good ideas” on Being with his choice to remain in the Nazi Party until the end of the war?
2] How has your own understanding of his understanding of Being benefited you in your interactions with others?

Me? Fascism [in the is/ought world] is a historical, cultural and experiential contraption rooted in dasein, conflicting goods and political economy. And Being/being is a complex intertwining of the ontic and the ontological. A particular existing man or woman out in a particular world understanding it from a particular point of view. As that is situated [embedded] in the manner in which Existence itself can be wholly understood metaphysically.

My own rendition of “sick philosophy” revolves around “general descriptions” such as this.

Let’s go here:

If Heidegger were confronted with this…

If I am always of the opinion that 1] my own values are rooted in dasein and 2] that there are no objective values “I” can reach, then every time I make one particular moral/political leap, I am admitting that I might have gone in the other direction…or that I might just as well have gone in the other direction. Then “I” begins to fracture and fragment to the point there is nothing able to actually keep it all together. At least not with respect to choosing sides morally and politically.

…how do you imagine he would react to it insofar as his own “I” does not fracture and fragment in defending his membership in the Nazi Party?

Edit:

Here there appear to be two schools of thought:

Critics, such as Günther Anders, Jürgen Habermas, Theodor Adorno, Hans Jonas, Karl Löwith, Pierre Bourdieu, Maurice Blanchot, Emmanuel Levinas, Luc Ferry and Alain Renaut claim that Heidegger’s affiliation with the Nazi Party revealed flaws inherent in his philosophical conceptions. His supporters, such as Hannah Arendt, Otto Pöggeler, Jan Patocka, Silvio Vietta, Jacques Derrida, Jean Beaufret, Jean-Michel Palmier, Richard Rorty, Marcel Conche, Julian Young and François Fédier, see his involvement with Nazism as a personal “error” – a word which Arendt placed in quotation marks when referring to Heidegger’s Nazi-era politics– that is irrelevant to his philosophy.

But then [for you] it is straight back up into the clouds of “general description”:

What on earth are you conveying here as it might be translated into a discussion/debate about/over a conflicted good most here will be familiar with?

Stem cell research, capital punishment, immigration, conscription, animal rights, the role of government, affirmative action — how would one differentiate progressive from regressive behaviors here as it relates to the distinction you make between “‘Teaching one how to fish’ instead of ‘feeding someone fishes all the time’”.

In other words, given how you claim “there are tons of examples I could introduce to support my points re ‘progress’ within humanity re the philosophy of moral and ethics.”

Let’s get started.

FYI…

Just received the latest issue of Philosophy Now.

The cover story is on Heidegger.

[b]Andrew Royle from his article “Heidegger’s Ways of Being”:

Heidegger gives two core characteristics of Dasein:
(i) Dasein exists : “the essence of Dasein lies in its existence” (p.42).
(ii) Dasein is mine : “the Being, whose analysis our task is, is always mine” (p.42).
The first, seemingly obvious point, is that Dasein, the Being that is concerned about its Being, can only be first of all if it exists: it is essential that it is.[/b]

This certainly seems reasonable. Jane exists. And, once she does, she can, as a conscious human being, speak of “mine”. But what can she then describe and encompass objectively?

In other words, so that others are able to confirm that what she does claim as “mine” is in fact hers.

She may claim to be pregnant. It is “my” baby growing inside me.

She may decide to abort the baby. It was “my” abortion.

She may say that it was moral to abort this baby. This is “my” opinion.

How then are we to understand Heidegger’s “two characteristics of Dasein” as it relates to each “mine” here.

The baby and the abortion can be demonstrated to in fact exist. But how would Heidegger reflect on Jane’s opinion as “mine” with respect to the morality of killing it?

Is it in fact moral to kill it? The pregnancy and the abortion are true for all of us. But the moral judgment is embedded in what I construe to be dasein and conflicting goods out in a particular political economy where legal prescriptions and proscriptions revolve around those with the power to both enact behavioral norms and to enforce them.

This is the distinction I always come back to. You either exist or you do not. You either behave in one way or another.

But than others may well [in fact] have conflicting opinions regarding the rightness or the wrongness of that behavior. How then using your understanding of Heidegger’s understanding of Dasein, would you yourself react to this distinction?

[b]“Heidegger’s Ways of Being”
Andrew Royle

Let us remain with our workman in his workshop, and now imagine that the workman reaches out for a hammer and finds instead an empty space. In now looking for his hammer, the workman starts to notice his workshop, which has been there, surrounding him, all the time. He casts an eye over the shelves, seeing dust; he spies a cracked window; becomes aware of a spider moving across the ceiling; he notices the detritus of uncompleted tasks and worries about deadlines. Heidegger says, in this ‘looking around’, the referential context of Being is ‘lit up’ (p.74). By virtue of the space of the missing hammer it’s as if a light switches on and Dasein sees the world that has been there all along.

The important point is that this light is not switched on ‘out there’ in the world; rather, Dasein switches on a light for him/herself, in the doing, in his/her interaction with the world. Generally, the world is categorized and created for the workman in the context of his particular concerns: he ‘sees’ a missed deadline in a half-finished barrel, or he ‘hears’ his boss’s rebuke through the space of the missing hammer. The empty space becomes a disclosing ground for Dasein to conjure and create the world. In doing this, Heidegger describes Dasein as a ‘ Lumen Naturale’ (a natural light), which lights up its Being-in-the-world “in such a way as to be its [own] there” (p.129).[/b]

This is basically how Dasein seems to be situated out in the world here. A world of things. A world in which things are understood in relationship to each other as either this or that. A hammer, a workshop, a cracked window, a spider.

A workman surrounded by factual entities in a world in which these objective “things”/“relationships” are true for everyone.

But what if, instead, the workman picks up the hammer and uses it to kill someone; and is then able to rationalize/justify it “in his head” as “the right thing to do”?

This is the part where his take on Dasein most intrigues me. The fact of his killing a perceived enemy/threat can be established.*

But how is it established that this behavior is either moral or immoral? That all rational men and women are obligated to construe it as either one or the other?

How does that not revolve around a particular context understood in particular [and often conflicting] ways by particular individuals who have come upon their own moral narrative existentially given the sequence of actual experiences they have come to encompass/embody in a particular life?

If, instead of a workman using a hammer to kill an adversary, it is a soldier using a rifle to kill a Jew – “out in a world” that Heidegger himself inhabited – how are philosophers able to establish either behavior as either necessarily right or necessarily wrong?

In a No God world?

Thus it is my contention that the moral objectivist may well be concerned more with acquiring [subconsciously?] a soothing psychological serenity that comes with believing that this can be accomplished, then in actually demonstrating that his or her own moral narrative does in fact necessarily reflect the optimal point of view.

*Though in a No God world it may never be established.

It’s also your contention that :

  • the “moral objectivist” out to be concerned with that “his or her own moral narrative does in fact necessarily reflect the optimal point of view.”

  • the “moral objectivist” ought to spend his time demonstrating it

  • the “moral objectivist” ought to demonstrate it for ALL men and women

  • the “moral objectivist” ought to demonstrate it to the point that becomes an obligation for them ALL to follow.

:-k Which seem to be a preposterous set of demands that you are putting on the “moral objectivist”.

Perhaps you have designed it so that the “moral objectivist” always fails.

On the other hand, it is also my contention that the moral objectivist may well not be concerned with these things.

And that is wrapped up in the manner in which I construe the meaning of dasein on this thread: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=176529

The point then is to make a distinction between what we are in fact able to demonstrate as true for all rational men and women, and that which seems more embedded [to me] in one or another subjective/subjunctive “existential contraption”.

Like this one for example:

[b]But what if, instead, the workman picks up the hammer and uses it to kill someone; and is then able to rationalize/justify it “in his head” as “the right thing to do”?

This is the part where [Heidegger’s] take on Dasein most intrigues me. The fact of his killing a perceived enemy/threat can be established.

But how is it established that this behavior is either moral or immoral? That all rational men and women are obligated to construe it as either one or the other?

How does that not revolve around a particular context understood in particular [and often conflicting] ways by particular individuals who have come upon their own moral narrative existentially given the sequence of actual experiences they have come to encompass/embody in a particular life?

If, instead of a workman using a hammer to kill an adversary, it is a soldier using a rifle to kill a Jew – “out in a world” that Heidegger himself inhabited – how are philosophers able to establish either behavior as either necessarily right or necessarily wrong?

In a No God world?[/b]

On the other hand, in a manner I still do not fully understand, your own narrative seems to unfold in a God world.

Using this example or one of your own, lets explore our respective narratives regarding the interaction between value judgments and identity out in a particular context.

Well, if a “moral objectivist” does not insist that ALL men and women are obligated to think as he does, then his only “flaw” would appear to be that he thinks that he can make a right and wrong decision about morals. And unless a person is curled up, paralyzed, in a fetal position, everyone thinks that he can make a right and wrong decision about morals.

For all practical purposes, what’s the difference between a moral objectivist,a relativist and a subjectivist?

I can’t help that … God either exists or God does not exist … either/or.

You call it a “flaw”, I don’t. After all, there is always the possibility that the moral objectivist’s frame of mind is not flawed at all.

Besides, how can a “flaw” be grappled with realistically in an is/ought world construed by me as an exchange of existential contraptions?

Mine being no less one. I am providing folks with my own understanding of objectivism. Here and now. And I am inviting them to explore this out in the world of actual conflicting human behaviors derived from conflicting goods derived from conflicting assessments of God and religion.

Dasein is merely a component of that for me.

I do know this: that for many years I was certainly one of them. Just not anymore.

My point here is that whether there either is or is not an objective morality, if men and women choose to interact socially, politically and/or economically, one or another set of rules must be established.

Intertwined in a profoundly complex amalgamation of genes and memes, and based on customs or traditions or folkways or mores or laws, certain behaviors will be rewarded while others will be punished. But, sans God, how are folks like philosophers able to establish moral obligations here?

What…theoretically? conceptually? analytically?

In other words, for all practical puroposes, let’s yank these narratives – embedded in any number of “general descriptions” – down out of the epistemological clouds and situate them out in the world of actual flesh and blood conflagrations.

Pick one.

Okay, but how are our individual narratives here not also embodied in the manner in which I construe the meaning of dasein?

How does your own “transcend” it?