Heidegger's Ecological Turn

Community and Practice for Future Generations

Frank Schalow

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000433449
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Phenomenology in Philosophy

This book makes explicit the ecological implications of Martin Heidegger. It examines how the trajectory of Heidegger's thinking harbors an "ecological turn, " which comes to the forefront in his attempt to anticipate the impending crisis precipitated by modern technology.

Schalow's emphasis on such key motifs as stewardship, dwelling, and "letting be" ( Gelassenheit ) serves to coalesce the problem of freedom in a new and innovative way, in order to expand the interpretive or hermeneutic horizon for re-examining Heidegger's philosophy. By prioritizing a response to today's environmental crisis and the possible impact upon future generations, the author traverses a divide within Heidegger scholarship by developing a deeper, critical outlook on his philosophy—without either reiterating standard interpretations or rejecting them wholesale. He develops a trans-human approach to ethics, which, by prioritizing the welfare of the earth, nature, and animals, counters the anthropocentric bias and destructive premise of modern technology.

Heidegger's Ecological Turn will be of interest to Heidegger scholars and researchers working in phenomenology, hermeneutics, continental philosophy, and environmental philosophy.

1 Seeking New Guidelines for Interpretation

DOI: 10.4324/9781003195139-2

Throughout the course of the philosophical tradition, the matter of thinking, the phenomenon, the “thing itself,” or, in Heidegger’s terms, “being” (Sein) simultaneously reveals and conceals itself. Unlike in the case of his mentor, Edmund Husserl, Heidegger’s phenomenology is inherently historical, that is, is explicitly predicated upon a critical encounter (Auseinandersetzung) with the tradition or refracted through the lens of his conversation with its greatest thinkers, from Aristotle to Kant, Plato to Nietzsche. Whatever path we choose to initiate philosophical inquiry, the measure of originality for any point of departure stands in relationship to: 1) the historical manifestation of being; and 2) the potential to return to and reconnect with the origin(s) of the tradition, despite the withdrawal thereof. Mindful of the elusive character of these origins, and thus the need to outline a circular (rather than a linear) path to address them, Heidegger unites phenomenology with hermeneutics in order to reformulate the question of being (die Seinsfrage) in an explicitly historical manner. A hermeneutic phenomenology proceeds from the premise that the phenomena to be investigated may themselves not appear, and our access to them through their appearance within a historical setting of philosophical investigation may instead be blocked. In mirroring what is first and foremost in question, or being, the paths of inquiry may also recede or be covered over, potentially to be reopened and forged anew—if only to be widened and carved out in an alternative direction.

These various pathways double back and recede toward a common origin, which, however, is never simply given, but instead is masked in the starts and stops, the twists and turns of the enactment of thinking. While there is no linear path, the need for philosophical inquiry to double back and return to its origins betrays junctures and crossroads, which determine how thinking can advance and be determined by its matter (Sache). In Heidegger’s case, it is possible to highlight specific crossroads that emerge in the course of pioneering his method to re-ask the question of being. In developing hermeneutic phenomenology immediately after the publication of his magnum opus, Being and Time, Heidegger appeals to one thinker in particular to outline the historical trajectory of the question of being, namely, Immanuel Kant. Heidegger’s dialogue with Kant will set the precedent for all subsequent encounters with the greatest thinkers of the philosophical tradition.

Heidegger’s dialogue with Kant extends over several decades and exhibits twists and turns that parallel the overall development and transformation of hermeneutic phenomenology. These twists and turns comprise Holzwege in their own right, not merely in a metaphorical sense, but rather as endemic to and as indicative of the matter of thinking. With a retrospective glance in his “Seminar in Le Thor 1969,” Heidegger invokes his description of “Holzwege” to describe his thinking of the ontological difference “from 1927 to 1936” as a “necessary impasse” (emphasis on “necessary’).¹ In this regard, the closing of and re-opening of pathways means that Heidegger’s exchange with Kant must unfold on multiple fronts, rather than in a linear and uniform way. Yet, the diverse pathways of Heidegger’s dialogue with Kant are not simply “about” or reducible to a single theme, but instead revolve within an orbit of questioning that pre-directs the entire philosophical tradition and from which all other questions derive their significance. One such instance, which marks an important juncture in Heidegger’s dialogue with Kant, arises in the former’s lecture course from the Summer Semester, 1928. In that lecture course, Heidegger embarks upon a pathway that opens up briefly, only to be covered over in the years prior to his assuming the position of rector of the University of Freiburg in the 1930s. Here Heidegger makes one of the few allusions to the possibility of developing ethics by unraveling the presuppositions of his inquiry into being—i.e., fundamental ontology. Metontology arises from and initiates the “overturning” (Umschlag) of fundamental ontology,² in order to address our potential for freedom (and our power to act or human praxis) on an ontological footing). To be sure, metontology may not lead to developing ethics as a normative discipline. On the contrary, the suspension of ethics per se, in favor of an inquiry into its possibility, has the counter effect of expanding the scope of the initial hermeneutic situation and uncovering its presuppositions (as we will discover in the next chapter).

We can trace the curvature of metontology by identifying a specific instance in Heidegger’s undertaking a second stage of his dismantling the philosophical tradition, namely, by transposing the focus of Heidegger’s dialogue with Kant. Rather than downplaying the importance of practical reason in his destructive-retrieval of transcendental philosophy, as he did in the Kant-book (1929), Heidegger instead appeals to what appears through the lens of practicality, or the problematic of freedom, to develop a deeper ground on which to recast the question of being. In this chapter, I will show how a new topography of inquiry takes shape by outlining a nexus of motifs implicit in metontology. Conversely, by prioritizing this practical side of the question of being, we arrive at a new springboard to bring the political itself into question, that is, as endemic to a phenomenon that initially withdraws from thought or does not show itself.

In this way, the concern for the political doubles as a problem that marks a fault line traversing Heidegger’s entire thinking. Keeping this in mind, we must approach his thinking self-critically, although this does not mean according to a “monological reductionism”³ that falsely equates his philosophy with Nazi ideology. To proceed critically, we must develop hermeneutic guidelines in order to map out this de-constructive trajectory of his thinking, drawing upon its own impetus and momentum for transformation, rather than arbitrarily reducing his philosophy to a univocal rendering of specific key concepts, e.g., resoluteness, the “people” to a fascist ideology.

I will divide this chapter into three sections. I will begin (I) by exploring the frequently overlooked, methodological side of Heidegger’s destructive-retrieval of transcendental philosophy.⁴ I will then show (II) how Heidegger’s inquiry into the phenomenon of world, as an unthought dimension of Kant’s Critical enterprise, suggests a new orbit of philosophical inquiry: in which the wider birth of our capacity to act, or the potential for “world-citizenship,” contains the problem of human praxis. Having traced this inroad into Kant’s practical philosophy, I will then uncover the hermeneutic thread unifying Kant’s three Critiques. At the close of this section, we will discover that the intersection of the concerns of praxis with poiesis (art is in the broadest and most original sense) yields a new space of investigation to address our capacity to dwell on the earth. For Heidegger, this inquiry will provide the counter pole to the Enlightenment notion of the self as a “citizen of the world”). In the final section of this chapter, I will then trace (III) the doubling back of a pathway, which expands Heidegger’s initial hermeneutic situation to include the problem of freedom. In this way, a new axis of philosophical inquiry arises, which revolves around being’s disclosure to Da-sein and establishes a more radical point of departure to examine the “practical” side of being-in-the-world.

I Temporality and the Origin of Praxis: Reinterpreting Kant

At the end of the 1920s, Heidegger’s Kant-book stood out not only as an epic philosophical achievement, but also as harboring important methodological implications for the advancement and radicalization of his overall project. The prospect of unifying Kant’s critical enterprise around a new center of human finitude, or imagination, would mirror Heidegger’s own attempt to extend the ellipsis of hermeneutic inquiry. Insofar as Heidegger sets the precedent for his exchange with predecessors through his destructive-retrieval of transcendental philosophy, then it is equally the case that the hermeneutic direction of his study remains veiled. This methodological gap has inhibited attempts to understand Heidegger’s pivotal work, Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics (1929),⁵ as first seen in Ernst Cassirer’s review (1931).⁶ Heidegger recognized this difficulty when he appealed to what is “unsaid” in the Critique of Pure Reason, while defending the “violence” of his interpretation.⁷

First, in order to give precedence to what is “unsaid,” Heidegger employs his own hermeneutic method to reinterpret Kant’s seminal text, the Critique of Pure Reason, that is, by recasting its key, epistemic motifs in ontological terms. In this reinterpretation, Heidegger employs a hermeneutic guideline to transpose the priorities of Kant’s enterprise by developing a new context in which the latent concern for “being” can be brought to the forefront, and, conversely, the key terms of the Critical philosophy can be “translated” into a vocabulary conversant with the language of fundamental ontology.⁸ Decades later, in his seminar on Heraclitus (Summer Semester of 1943), Heidegger summarizes this herme...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Endorsement Page
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: Seeking New Guidelines for Interpretation
• Chapter 2: A New Leaping-Off Place for Ethical Inquiry
• Chapter 3: The Global Stage of Politics and the Return to the Earth
• Chapter 4: Temporality, Freedom, and Place
• Chapter 5: The Turn Toward Stewardship: Is a Socio-Biotic Community Possible?
• References
• Index