Sunday, February 22, 2009
Productive weekend?
Last night I went to Applebee's for the reduced price appetizers. Turns out that a pretty good deal and I would certainly go back. Then, today my one roommate, Steve, made onion soup which was delicious. Now I actually have to get to doing work which is what I was hopping to do most of this weekend. However, plans seem to change more often then they're made. Oh, and to anyone out there who may read this: check out my friend Geoff's blog. He's been in Italy this entire academic year and he is keeping a very interesting record of his adventures over there. Here is the link: http://8mesi.myblog.it/
Friday, February 20, 2009
Heidegger on death
So, I finished my paper on Heidegger and his distincitons between authentic and inauthentic awareness of death. I didn't get to hand it in today though because the professor wasn't able to make class. I'll put it up here, and any criticism is apprechiated as I still have time to correct it and I didn't fully understand the part on anticipatory resoluteness. Here you go, enjoy:
In what is considered to be his masterpiece, Being and Time, Martin Heidegger, a 20th century German Philosopher, discusses the human awareness of death. He first establishes that death is not an experience since a person does not live through it so there is really nothing to be said about it. However, since death is inevitable then it is worth while to talk about the process of dying which Heidegger continues to call death. He then makes two distinctions of one’s awareness of death: authentic and inauthentic. He says that Dasein, a term he uses to refer to a being for which existence or being is a question, should ultimately develop an authentic awareness of its own death. This authentic awareness of death is one in which a person understands death as theirs and as something indescribable. On the other hand, an inauthentic awareness of death is one in which a person goes along with the crowd, or as Heidegger says: the “they”, and understands death as something that happens everyday and is owned by the “they”. Having an authentic awareness of death, Heidegger argues, also leads to something he calls anticipatory resoluteness. This allows a person to see death as a possibility and not to hide the idea of from their minds. Having this view is the key to being because it causes a person to live their life authentically by “taking action”. All of these distinctions can be applied to the world today in order to understand how Heidegger might evaluate concerns about death today.
Heidegger’s explanation of having an authentic awareness towards death means that a person understands death as a possibility, or the possibility of no more possibilities. This view of death would deepen a person and allow them to be more attentive to the world. In fact, Heidegger says that death is what gives life its ultimacy, its passion, and its desire to search for personal meaning. He says that this view of death as a possibility causes anticipation of death. What this means is that one confronts death as a possibility by actively revealing it as such, saying people should hold themselves in “a passionate, anxious, freedom toward death.” This means that death is something that should be known but not dwelled upon. Heidegger then claims that this anticipation of death leads us not only to an authentic awareness of death but also an authentic existence saying, “Anticipation turns out to be the possibility of understanding one’s ownmost and uttermost potentiality-for-Being—that is to say, the possibility of authentic existence.” By saying this Heidegger is claiming that understanding death is what causes a person to work towards things and bring out their potentiality-for-Being. An authentic awareness of death also isolates people since no one can really experience death and can only properly experience the process of dying when they themselves are going through it. This frees a person from the idea of “they” and allows them to realize all of their possibilities. They see these as possibilities that they are free to pursue and are no longer influenced by others. However, the recognition of individual death does not separate us from each other but, instead, forms the basis for authentic human interaction. In seeing the certainty of death people come to confront a certainty that is not objectively present and, hence, are themselves no longer objectively present. This authentic awareness of death is something everyone should strive for as it not only makes one properly aware of death but also develops the proper outlook on life in a person.
In contrast to an authentic awareness towards death, Heidegger also presents the idea of an inauthentic awareness towards death. This view of death is in no way preferable as it deludes people into thinking of death as an event or an experience when it is in fact neither. This view could lead to many behaviors that Heidegger would consider part of an inauthentic existence such as causing people to actively await it as if they were looking forward to it. Likewise, it could also cause people to dread death and waste their time fearing it and have too much anxiety to the point where they are paralyzed. Instead of having the inevitability of their impending death drive them to do things and be productive and active these people let it control them and cripple their efforts to bring out their potentiality-for-Being. At the same time, it is also inauthentic to constantly think of death without the fear for doing this cheapens the phenomenon of death and hence takes all of the ultimacy and passion out of one’s life. Furthermore, the view of death facilitates a believe that death is something a person can experience through others and thus encourages the idea of “they” held by most people which not only gives them a skewed awareness of death but also hold them back from realizing their potentiality. On this Heidegger writes, “In Dasein’s public way of interpreting, it is said that ‘one dies’, because everyone else and oneself can talk himself into saying that ‘in no case is it I myself,’ for this ‘one’ is the ‘nobody.’ ‘Dying’ is leveled off to an occurance which reaches Dasein, to be sure, but belongs to nobody in particular.” With this view of death people are never able to escape from being objectively present and will only understand certain certainties in the world and will be alienated from their ownmost potentiality-for-Being.
Heidegger, in discerning between authentic and inauthentic awareness of death, introduces the concept of anticipatory resoluteness. This comes from a person taking ownership of their death as theirs and only theirs. It spurs a person on to take action and live their life authentically, fully becoming Being-towards-death. Explaining this, Heidegger writes, “Anticipatory resoluteness is not a way of escape, fabricated for the ‘overcoming’ of death; it is rather that understanding which follows the call of conscience and which frees for death the possibility of acquiring power over Dasein’s existence and of basically dispersing all fugitive Self-concealments.” It becomes clear that Heidegger sees anticipatory resoluteness as the key to opening up the question of being since it is what cause people to take action and, as he viewed it, proceed into Being. This is because anticipatory resoluteness not only cause a person to take action, it also causes them to think about their very being which brings them back to Dasein since they are now beings for whom being is a question. This is also what ultimately makes a person a Being-towards-death since it drives one to take action while at the same time having them see death as the possibility of their impossibility. Anticipatory resoluteness, along with an authentic awareness of death lead a person on to lead an authentic life that is free from the “they” and one where they bring out their ownmost potentiality-for-Being. That is the life Heidegger felt people should strive to lead and is the life Dasein, as a Being-towards-death, leads.
Were Heidegger around today he would most likely feel much of the same way as he did when he was alive, that being that most people have an inauthentic awareness of death. In today’s day and age many people still seem caught up in what Heidegger would call the “they”, they barely lead lives of their own and instead follow along with and worry about what everyone else is doing. Heidegger would probably be sickened by those people who follow the tabloids everyday and become so emotionally invested in the lives of celebrities that they feel joyous when one become pregnant and are heartbroken when one dies. These are the kind of people he talks about when he says that those with an inauthentic awareness of death view it as an everyday occurrence. Something else that Heidegger would more than likely dislike is the way society attributes bravery to people who make light of the subject of their death by planning out their funeral, how they want to be buried, and the reception afterwards. These people view death as an event and plan for it accordingly. They must know that they will not live through their own death, but still they plan for what will happen after it, possibly because it seems so far off that they see no need to fear it, but instead as a cause for a party. Both of these views, Heidegger would feel, lead a person to having an inauthentic awareness of death and so leading an inauthentic existence. He would not have condoned of such an awareness of death and, so, would not agree with today’s concerns with death.
No one has ever though about death quite like Heidegger. His distinctions between authentic and inauthentic awareness of death in Being and Time was and still is revolutionary in affecting how people think about death. His explanation of an authentic awareness of death as one in which a person realizes that their death belongs to them alone fits perfectly with his concept of anticipatory resoluteness, which drives people to take action in light of their own inescapable death. Heidegger also explains that inauthentic awareness of death is one in which a person merely follows the “they” and does not see death as belonging to themselves. This awareness of death definitely seems the most prevalent in today’s society as people continue to define themselves by the “they” and attempt to hide from their own deaths. Thus, as influential as Heidegger was, people continue to view death in an inauthentic way and only see it as an everyday occurrence.
In what is considered to be his masterpiece, Being and Time, Martin Heidegger, a 20th century German Philosopher, discusses the human awareness of death. He first establishes that death is not an experience since a person does not live through it so there is really nothing to be said about it. However, since death is inevitable then it is worth while to talk about the process of dying which Heidegger continues to call death. He then makes two distinctions of one’s awareness of death: authentic and inauthentic. He says that Dasein, a term he uses to refer to a being for which existence or being is a question, should ultimately develop an authentic awareness of its own death. This authentic awareness of death is one in which a person understands death as theirs and as something indescribable. On the other hand, an inauthentic awareness of death is one in which a person goes along with the crowd, or as Heidegger says: the “they”, and understands death as something that happens everyday and is owned by the “they”. Having an authentic awareness of death, Heidegger argues, also leads to something he calls anticipatory resoluteness. This allows a person to see death as a possibility and not to hide the idea of from their minds. Having this view is the key to being because it causes a person to live their life authentically by “taking action”. All of these distinctions can be applied to the world today in order to understand how Heidegger might evaluate concerns about death today.
Heidegger’s explanation of having an authentic awareness towards death means that a person understands death as a possibility, or the possibility of no more possibilities. This view of death would deepen a person and allow them to be more attentive to the world. In fact, Heidegger says that death is what gives life its ultimacy, its passion, and its desire to search for personal meaning. He says that this view of death as a possibility causes anticipation of death. What this means is that one confronts death as a possibility by actively revealing it as such, saying people should hold themselves in “a passionate, anxious, freedom toward death.” This means that death is something that should be known but not dwelled upon. Heidegger then claims that this anticipation of death leads us not only to an authentic awareness of death but also an authentic existence saying, “Anticipation turns out to be the possibility of understanding one’s ownmost and uttermost potentiality-for-Being—that is to say, the possibility of authentic existence.” By saying this Heidegger is claiming that understanding death is what causes a person to work towards things and bring out their potentiality-for-Being. An authentic awareness of death also isolates people since no one can really experience death and can only properly experience the process of dying when they themselves are going through it. This frees a person from the idea of “they” and allows them to realize all of their possibilities. They see these as possibilities that they are free to pursue and are no longer influenced by others. However, the recognition of individual death does not separate us from each other but, instead, forms the basis for authentic human interaction. In seeing the certainty of death people come to confront a certainty that is not objectively present and, hence, are themselves no longer objectively present. This authentic awareness of death is something everyone should strive for as it not only makes one properly aware of death but also develops the proper outlook on life in a person.
In contrast to an authentic awareness towards death, Heidegger also presents the idea of an inauthentic awareness towards death. This view of death is in no way preferable as it deludes people into thinking of death as an event or an experience when it is in fact neither. This view could lead to many behaviors that Heidegger would consider part of an inauthentic existence such as causing people to actively await it as if they were looking forward to it. Likewise, it could also cause people to dread death and waste their time fearing it and have too much anxiety to the point where they are paralyzed. Instead of having the inevitability of their impending death drive them to do things and be productive and active these people let it control them and cripple their efforts to bring out their potentiality-for-Being. At the same time, it is also inauthentic to constantly think of death without the fear for doing this cheapens the phenomenon of death and hence takes all of the ultimacy and passion out of one’s life. Furthermore, the view of death facilitates a believe that death is something a person can experience through others and thus encourages the idea of “they” held by most people which not only gives them a skewed awareness of death but also hold them back from realizing their potentiality. On this Heidegger writes, “In Dasein’s public way of interpreting, it is said that ‘one dies’, because everyone else and oneself can talk himself into saying that ‘in no case is it I myself,’ for this ‘one’ is the ‘nobody.’ ‘Dying’ is leveled off to an occurance which reaches Dasein, to be sure, but belongs to nobody in particular.” With this view of death people are never able to escape from being objectively present and will only understand certain certainties in the world and will be alienated from their ownmost potentiality-for-Being.
Heidegger, in discerning between authentic and inauthentic awareness of death, introduces the concept of anticipatory resoluteness. This comes from a person taking ownership of their death as theirs and only theirs. It spurs a person on to take action and live their life authentically, fully becoming Being-towards-death. Explaining this, Heidegger writes, “Anticipatory resoluteness is not a way of escape, fabricated for the ‘overcoming’ of death; it is rather that understanding which follows the call of conscience and which frees for death the possibility of acquiring power over Dasein’s existence and of basically dispersing all fugitive Self-concealments.” It becomes clear that Heidegger sees anticipatory resoluteness as the key to opening up the question of being since it is what cause people to take action and, as he viewed it, proceed into Being. This is because anticipatory resoluteness not only cause a person to take action, it also causes them to think about their very being which brings them back to Dasein since they are now beings for whom being is a question. This is also what ultimately makes a person a Being-towards-death since it drives one to take action while at the same time having them see death as the possibility of their impossibility. Anticipatory resoluteness, along with an authentic awareness of death lead a person on to lead an authentic life that is free from the “they” and one where they bring out their ownmost potentiality-for-Being. That is the life Heidegger felt people should strive to lead and is the life Dasein, as a Being-towards-death, leads.
Were Heidegger around today he would most likely feel much of the same way as he did when he was alive, that being that most people have an inauthentic awareness of death. In today’s day and age many people still seem caught up in what Heidegger would call the “they”, they barely lead lives of their own and instead follow along with and worry about what everyone else is doing. Heidegger would probably be sickened by those people who follow the tabloids everyday and become so emotionally invested in the lives of celebrities that they feel joyous when one become pregnant and are heartbroken when one dies. These are the kind of people he talks about when he says that those with an inauthentic awareness of death view it as an everyday occurrence. Something else that Heidegger would more than likely dislike is the way society attributes bravery to people who make light of the subject of their death by planning out their funeral, how they want to be buried, and the reception afterwards. These people view death as an event and plan for it accordingly. They must know that they will not live through their own death, but still they plan for what will happen after it, possibly because it seems so far off that they see no need to fear it, but instead as a cause for a party. Both of these views, Heidegger would feel, lead a person to having an inauthentic awareness of death and so leading an inauthentic existence. He would not have condoned of such an awareness of death and, so, would not agree with today’s concerns with death.
No one has ever though about death quite like Heidegger. His distinctions between authentic and inauthentic awareness of death in Being and Time was and still is revolutionary in affecting how people think about death. His explanation of an authentic awareness of death as one in which a person realizes that their death belongs to them alone fits perfectly with his concept of anticipatory resoluteness, which drives people to take action in light of their own inescapable death. Heidegger also explains that inauthentic awareness of death is one in which a person merely follows the “they” and does not see death as belonging to themselves. This awareness of death definitely seems the most prevalent in today’s society as people continue to define themselves by the “they” and attempt to hide from their own deaths. Thus, as influential as Heidegger was, people continue to view death in an inauthentic way and only see it as an everyday occurrence.
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
And so it was. . .
Well, for reasons unbeknownst to even myself I have decided to start this blog. This is not my first attempt at something like this but hopefully it shall be my last as I shall keep to it this time. No idea what is to follow but I'll update soon. And, by the way, I swear I'm not a narcissist.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)