In Aeon, Charles Leadbeater on being at home in the world.

Had Heidegger ever come up with a saying to sum up his philosophy it would have been: ‘I dwell, therefore I am.’ For him, identity is bound up with being in the world, which in turn means having a place in it. We don’t live in the abstract space favoured by philosophers, but in a particular place, with specific features and history. We arrive already entangled with the world, not detached from it. Our identity is not secured just in our heads but through our bodies too, how we feel and how we are moved, literally and emotionally. Instead of presenting it as a puzzle to be solved, Heidegger’s world is one we should immerse ourselves in and care for: it is part of the larger ‘being’ where we all belong.

  ¶ 1:51 PM 0 comments

  The Architects Newspaper on Alex Hartley's new exhibit.

With A Gentle Collapsing II, Hartley references Plato’s notion of artifacts being in a “state of becoming.” In this instance, by making the audience explicitly aware of the building’s natural demise, viewers become all the more appreciative of its presence and its obviously finite existence. This too is a nod to another philosopher—Martin Heidegger—who said “mortals nurse and nurture things that grow and specifically construct things that do not grow.”

The quote's from "BDT", in Poetry Language Thought p. 151.

Wasn't it Aristotle's notion of becoming?   ¶ 7:49 PM 0 comments

  The News, Karachi, on philosophy in Pakistan.

Among the different reasons for the lack of philosophy here is the tendency to find refuge in the security of comfort – whether economic, social or intellectual. Unlike other disciplines, philosophy seeks to disrupt normal habits of thinking about life by forcing one to search for answers to questions that may not be answered in his lifetime. This makes philosophical thinking incongruent with time and space. That is why Martin Heidegger deems that “all essential philosophical questioning is necessarily untimely”. Only by becoming untimely does philosophy become timeless, and the questions it raises remain intact beyond time and space. However, for a complacent mind it is easy to become timely than untimely, for the latter entails an excruciating excursion into realms that are mentally demanding and may cause alienation from mainstream society.

The quote's from Introduction to Metaphysics p. 9.  ¶ 8:02 AM 0 comments

  Word of advice from Wittgenstein:

We can say that the word ['truth'] has at least three different meanings; but it is mistaken to assume that any one of these theories can give the whole grammar of how we use the word, or endeavour to fit into a single theory cases which do not seem to agree with it.

P. 322

  ¶ 8:29 PM 0 comments

  Counter currents on the clearing of beyng.

The German philosopher Heidegger describes our experience of being alive (“being” or “sein” in German) with a metaphor. It is as if each of us exists in a clearing ( of a forest) – Die Lichtung des Seins. The idea to be conveyed with the metaphor is that what any person knows is “inside their clearing” but, beyond the edge of the clearing, “the forest” is an area of darkness or, more accurately, of unknowing. The idea of unknowing here does not carry any moral or ethical connotations – it is not necessarily a personal or group failing – though it might be. After all there is no way in which each of us can know about everything. While one can create a “bigger clearing to live in” – by research, study, learning – as well as more generally by being open minded – there will always be a limit to what one can get to know in a lifetime.

  ¶ 2:19 AM 0 comments

  In the Shanghai Daily, the Holzwege exhibition in ShanghART’s new gallery.

The term holzwege was coined by the philosopher Heidegger. It describes an overgrown forest path recognizable only to woodsmen. It may seem to be a path that leads nowhere, but finding oneself in the middle of woods and uncertain which course to take can open the door to unexpected experiences. In effect, there are many paths one can choose to explore.

  ¶ 9:18 AM 0 comments

  In Ophen, George Webster reviews Derrida's Heidegger: The Question of Being and History.

In his final session, Derrida explicates Heidegger’s derivation of world history (Welt-Geschichte) and historical science from the historicity of Dasein. This involves a digress through Nietzsche and his relation to Hegel. Derrida then makes some conclusory remarks. He indicates the direction of Heidegger’s later thought and further emphasises the role of metaphor, suggesting again that, for Heidegger, the gradual deconstruction of metaphoricity will instigate a new language through which we could come into direct contact with being and in which the designation ‘being’ would itself be obsolete. Finally, in a comment that presages his own subsequent work, Derrida claims that the ultimate problematic for Heidegger will be that of difference.

  ¶ 8:21 PM 0 comments

  Graham Harman chooses rivers.

[T]he German poet Hölderlin has been the dominant literary of recnt continental philosophy. This is largely Heidegger's doing, since it was he who repeatedly gave lecture courses on Hölderlin's hymns and treated him as a figure of staggering significance for philosophy.

...

I am not making the Heideggerian claim that Lovecraft writes stories about the essence of writing stories, but the even more extreme claim that Lovecraft writes stories about the essence of philosophy. Lovecraft is the model writer of ontography, with its multiple polarizations in the heart of real and sensual objects. For this reason, as I wrote in the 2008 article: "In symbolic terms, Great Cthulhu should replace Minerva as the patron spirit of Philosophers, and the Miskatonic must dwarf the Rhine and the Ister as our river of choice. Since Heidegger's treatment of Hölderlin resulted mostly in pious, dreary readings, philosophy needs a new literary hero."

Pp. 33-4

"I looked upon the Miskatonic and praised the abyss beneath it."

"Roll on, Miskatonic, roll on.
Your uncanniness hides the truth of beyng."

Apologies to Langston Hughes and Woody Guthrie.   ¶ 12:36 PM 1 comments