Thursday, November 20, 2008

The Other

Introduction:
Despite nominal differences, that is, differences of name, repetition is at play within the works of Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger and Deleuze. The notion of the Other, be it ‘the crowd,’ ‘the herd,’ or ‘das man,’ converges in the divergent works. The subject exists in the collectivity, it is singular, yet at the same time resides in the world alongside others. We find ourselves ‘there,’ already in the world, dealing with the herd of man. Perhaps, we come to see ourselves as part of the crowd; the powerful gatekeepers of objective truth. We remain, at all times, that singularity, or the possibility of being singular for being a self authentically. The question, therefore, becomes, ‘how’ can I exist my specificity, authentically, yet at the same time be located in the world with the crowd? The enigmatic statements, “to become what I already am[1]” and “to become those we are,”[2]or, “proximally and for the most part, Dasein is not itself,”[3] take on a supreme relevance if what I am concerned with is becoming the individual, which is always a possibility of my being. It would seem that this possibility remains hidden from me so long as I adhere to the whims of the crowd. It is, therefore, the case that what is reflexively referred to as “I,” namely a singular relation to one’s self, is not itself properly, but rather is the Heideggerian “They self” of everydayness. The examination that follows will illuminate the role of others in the works discussed. Furthermore, it will examine the movement from the universal to the particular, the differentiation, or process of individuation, which the authors see as the necessary movement in the task of becoming a self. This movement necessitates that we pose the question of ‘how,’ as a manner of existing oneself as a singular individual and not simply running with the herd; the herd, or crowd, must, therefore, be overcome by the existing subject. While the authors propose divergent programs, there is a large degree of convergence, which will be our topic of discussion. Repetition is this point of convergence; it is the ‘how’ of maintaining oneself within the process of becoming what we already are.
“The Crowd,” “The Herd,” “Das Man” and The Everyday:
“For a ‘crowd’ is untruth.”[4] Truth, in the Kierkegaardian sense, is found in subjectivity; the task therefore, of every existing subject, is to become subjective. The existing subject is always the self’s relation to itself.[5] However, the self’s self-relation is caught in a dialectical paradox between the eternal (God) and the temporal. The crowd is, therefore, a manifestation of the seductive temporal, its ways being that of objectivity; the crowd takes the self’s relation away from the eternal; alienating it from the subjective truth. For Kierkegaard, the crowd is but a mere abstraction, the crowd is nothing more than a congregation of individuals each one possessing the means of becoming one such individual self in passionate inwardness. Becoming an individual is the highest task placed before the existing subject; the crowd is always concerned with the general, with world historical significance. The crowd exerts anonymous control; it is every individual, but no single individual, because every individual is a something general with no special significance for the crowd. The crowd gives the impression of power, but it is merely a terrestrial power; one which alleviates the burden of responsibility from the self, however, “Only one attains the goal.”[6] The crowd, in fact, hides the truth in a false temporal truth; a truth which can only end in despair; the real truth, the truth of the eternal, is only for the single individual. As we shall see for Kierkegaard the process of individuation resides in the ‘how’ of repetition, such that the existing subjects self relation can maintain itself as freedom.
Nietzsche is similarly concerned with the task of becoming an individual and the affirmation of life. For Nietzsche, therefore, the task is to undermine, to remove the ground from that which denies life; that which denies the creative force which resides in the individual as such. The herd, is one such denial of life, the will to power of the herd, undermines the will to power of the individual in favour of all that is average and unspectacular. It posits truth, where there are only errors and illusion. This truth is the will to power; within the herd will to power is the will to preservation of the species, such that, “ The species is everything, and one is always none.”[7] Morality, as a major informant of action, is nothing more than the manifestation of the herd’s will to preservation in the existing individual. Morality, as a creation of the herd’s will to power, makes the individual a mere function of the herd, as a means to the ends of the herd. [8] Morality, as the law of the herd, pronounces its “thou shalt,” as a great equalizer of that which is not equal; posits sameness where there is difference, and values the individual only in terms of the whole.[9] The herd instinct is ingrained within every existing subject, such that consciousness, that which sees itself as a unity in the I am I proposition, is nothing more than the herd manifesting itself in the individual. For Nietzsche, consciousness is but an emergent faculty, which satisfies the need for communication.[10] The individual who trusts the valuations of consciousness, therefore, trusts the valuations of the herd. Nietzsche, however, is not so trusting; the task he gives us is “to become those we are,” as such, we must overcome the will to power of the herd and strive through our own will to power to make our own truths and create our own values. Repetition, is once again the how this can be accomplished; through Eternal recurrence we can overcome the crowd, with a newly informed sense of time, and project our “retroactive force” into the future.
Heidegger, is concerned with uncovering Being through an ontological ‘existential analytic’ of Dasein. Dasein find itself, as throwness, already in the world amongst other Dasein and entities not of the character of Dasein. As such, Dasein, which is my specificity, is forced to deal with its world and the others located therein. Although the “I” is given, and seems to impart with a notion of specificity, it is nonetheless the case that “proximally and for the most part, Dasein is not itself in everydayness.” Pre-ontologically, Dasein find itself in a world already interpreted by the Dasein of others, and thus find in itself not the “I” of Dasein specificity, but rather the they-self (Das Man) of everyone and no one. Therefore, Dasein, as a requisite of its existence, has the presuppositions of the they-self as given.[11] In everydayness, or pre-ontologically, Dasein understands itself and the world in terms of the Das Man. So long as Dasein remains in this state, it remains in authentic and falling away from itself. The clock is a creation of Das man:
“Then time is already interpreted as present, past is interpreted as no longer present, future as indeterminate not yet present: pas is irretrievable, future indeterminate.”[12]
Time, lived in this fashion, is marked by its irreversibility and the primacy of the present as the space of homogenization. Time, lived in this manner, is in-authentic and Dasein living time in this manner concerns itself with questions of ‘when’ and ‘what.’ The task, for the authentic, singular, Dasein concerned with individuating itself, concerned with maintaining itself as possibility, involves a reconception of time grounded in the most extreme possibility of its being. The most extreme possibility of Dasein is its death and in death the specificity of Dasein is manifest; this possibility necessarily involves the question of ‘how’ time is to be existed.
Repetition As the ‘How’ of individuation:
Deleuze’s account in “Difference and Repetition,” seems to be an ideal starting point in order to explain the notion of repetition as it is employed by the various authors. Firstly, Deleuze posits various levels of repetition, a general, external, bare repetition, and an internal ideational repetition.[13] Repetition is the ‘how’ which all the authors’ employ, once individuated, it allows the subject to maintain itself as freedom as a singular difference which defies representation.
“Repetition must be understood in the pronominal; we must first find the self of repetition, the singularity within that which repeats. For there is no repetition without a repeater, nothing repeated without a repetitious soul.”[14]
The singularity, which avoids identity, which defies representation, is the true repetition for which Kierkegaard, Nietzsche and Heidegger seek to repeat. It is a creative act which creates a new space and time, it is an affirmation of life it is the difference which animates action.
Kierkegaard’s task, that of becoming subjective, is theological in nature. Kierkegaard is primarily informed by his relationship to God. Becoming subject is, therefore, the cultivation of this relation to God.[15] Kierkegaard’s subject is individuated by faith in God and the ability to think death in every moment. The crowd offers security, anonymity, and irresponsibility; cowardess would have us choose to remain part of the crowd. Courage and passion allow the existing individual think its own death and “attend to this thought at every moment.”[16] The uncertainty of death requires an inward movement toward the truth in subjectivity. Becoming subjecting allows us to become the self which we already are. Repetition is the ‘how’ this can be done; without the possibility of repetition the subject would lose its self in the crowd as actualized by it. Freedom, which is always the self’s self-relation, must seek to actualize itself as freedom. Repetition[17] is the task of freedom, for maintaining oneself as possibility in the moment as the intersection between the eternal and the temporal. Repetition of this sort is the second type of repetition of which Deleuze mentioned, namely, it is internal repetition; it allows the subject to exist the eternal temporal paradox, while at the same time taking the past up into itself and existing it forward as freedom; as freedom’s possibility.
Nietzsche finds in the eternal recurrence the means of undermining the valuations of the herd, and of “becoming those we are.” For both Kierkegaard and Nietzsche, courage lies on the side of becoming the self; further for Nietzsche, courage lies in willing the eternal recurrence. “Courage, however, is the best slayer--courage which attacks: which slays even death itself, for it says, ‘was that life? Well then! Once more!”[18] Eternal recurrence, as a repetition of all that is in every moment, undermines the notions of the herd. Eternal recurrence undermines the Christian notions of origins, of judgement, of another world beyond our own. In the recurrence there is only the moment, which repeats eternally, a moment, which has never begun, nor will it cease, to repeat. Eternal becoming is the result, as a sort of (non) being, not as a negation of being but as the affirmation of being as becoming. There is repetition of sameness, which affirms the moment as an eternally important one:
“This life as you now live it and have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more; and there will be nothing new in it, but every pain and every joy and every thought and sigh and everything utterably small or great in your life will have to return to you, all in the same succession and sequence-even this spider and this moonlight between the trees, and even this moment and I myself.”[19]
The eternal recurrence is an internal repetition, regardless of whether it is so in actuality; it is a manner of living, which affirms life and affirms the creative force of becoming a self. The eternal recurrence brings with it a new conception of time, allowing every existing individual to assert its retroactive force, making the past a possibility. It allows the individual to take up the whole of history, as a creative force, and repeat it in the eternally repeating moment.[20] The whole of history, in the single individual, lived as possibility in the moment;[21] the moment, which has never begun and shall never cease to become. Nietzsche makes the ultimate affirmation of life; the life of the singular existing individual thus takes on the “greatest weight,” the greatest significance, and shall be the source of all our joy.
In everydayness, Dasein is not itself, but rather the they-self of everyone and no one. Dasein individuates itself only through the notion of its own death. As throwness, into the pre-interpreted world, Dasein comes to live itself in everydayness as the they-self, as the One. However, death, as specifically my death, cannot be interpreted by the they-self, for my death is mine specifically and I cannot come to know it through the death of other Dasein. Dasein, therefore, must interpret for itself the most extreme possibility of its being its own death.[22] The ability to see this futural uncertainty undermines the they-self, that Dasein is pre-ontologically and in everydayness; this undermines Dasein conception of itself, allowing Dasein seek to create itself based upon the indeterminate certainty of its own death. Being-towards-death frees Dasein from its everyday conception of time as the present, a conception informed by the they-self, such that Dasein becomes futural; the future being the most fundamental phenomenon of time. The specificity of Dasein’s own death, grounds Dasein as the fundamental possibility of its being, or ceasing to be. In running ahead to this most extreme possibility Dasein is thrust back upon itself in everydayness, but with something more, as a ‘how.’ Being-futural, Dasein is running ahead to its past, a past which it now has; a past which it uses to cultivate the present; the past, is now possibility, which is repeated in ‘how’ it is lived.[23]
“In so doing, it becomes manifest that the original way of dealing with time is not a measuring. Coming back in running ahead is itself the ‘how’ of that concern in which I am precisely tarrying.”[24]
Authentically Dasein is time; running ahead to the past, allows for a repetition of the past yet a repetition which is concerned with ‘how’ this past is existed.
Conclusion:
While a conclusion seems out of place, it is nonetheless expedient as a summation of what has been illuminated thus far. The individual must become that which it already is; that which remains hidden from it by the crowd. The movement, which individuates the subject, is an existential one, one which must allow itself to be subject to repetition. Although it would seem, reflexively, that we are a particular within the universal, the truth of the matter is that we must become this particular. This task, which is specifically our own, should take up the whole of our lifetime. Courage, creativity, passion and repetition are the prerequisites in the task of becoming and maintaining oneself as a singularity. The ‘how’ of repetition is the manner of existing as a particular individual. The repetition which allows us to remain possible at all times in moment, must be the object of the will, such that repetition is not a something outside of us, but rather, a manner of existing a task we gives ourselves which informs all of our actions



















Bibliography

Deleuze, Gilles. Difference and Repetition. Trans. Paul Patton. New York: Colombia University Press, (1993.)

Heidegger, Martin. Being and Time. Trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson. New York: Harper & Row, (1962.)

Heidegger, Martin. The Concept of Time. Trans. William McNeil. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, (1992.)

Kierkegaard, Soren. Fear and Trembling/Repetition. Trans. Howard V. Hong & Edna H. Hong. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, (1983.)

Kierkegaard, Soren. The Concept of Anxiety: A Simple Deliberation on the Dogmatic Issue of Hereditary Sin. Trans. Reidar Thomte. Princeton: University of Princeton Press, (1980.)

Kierkegaard, Soren. The Point of View For My Work As An Author: A Report To History and Related Writings. Trans. Walter Lowrie. New York: Harper & Row, (1959.)

Nietzsche, Frederich. The Gay Science. Trans. Walter Kaufmann. New York: Vintage Books, (1974.)

Nietzsche, Frederich. Thus spoke Zarathustra: a Book For None and For All. Trans. Walter Kaufmann. New York: Penguin Books, (1978.)

Nietzsche, Frederich. The Will To Power. Trans. Walter Kaufmann & R.J. Hollindale. New York: Vintage Books, (1967.)
Swenson, David F.. Trans. Kierkegaard’s Concluding Unscientific Postscript. Princeton: Princeton University Press, (1944.)
[1] David F. Swenson. Trans. Kierkegaard’s Concluding Unscientific Postscript. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1944. p. 116.
[2] Frederich Nietzsche. The Gay Science. Trans. Walter Kaufmann. New York: Vintage Books, 1974. p. 266.
[3] Dasein is utilized by Heidegger so as not to import the presuppositions of the philosophical tradition; literally translated as “being there,” what is signified is the threefold structure of the being of an existing subject. Being-in-the-world, as its spatial location; Being-with, as its intersubjectivity, signifying that the space, wherein Dasein finds itself, is shared with others. Finally, Dasein is specificity, as a relation of the self to the self. Martin Heidegger. Being and Time. Trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson. New York: Harper & Row, 1962. p 151.
[4] Soren Kierkegaard. The Point of View For My Work As An Author: A Report To History and Related Writings. Trans. Walter Lowrie. New York: Harper & Row, 1959. p 110.
[5] The self is a synthesis of psyche and body, achieved when spirit is posited as the third term. The self is also a synthesis of the eternal and the temporal, which can only be synthesized in the moment where time reflects eternity. Soren Kierkegaard. The Concept of Anxiety: A Simple Deliberation on the Dogmatic Issue of Hereditary Sin. Trans. Reidar Thomte. Princeton: University of Princeton Press, 1980. p. 85-86.
[6] Kierkegaard. The Point of View For My Work As An Author. p 111.
[7] Nietzsche. The Gay Science. p 74.
[8] Ibid., p. 174-175.
[9] It must be held firmly in mind that the notion of morality is based on the notion of the divine laws of God. Morality, furthermore, functions in consciousness in terms of what seems to be a unified self. However, Nietzsche proclaimed the Death of God and denies the existence of a unity in consciousness. Frederich Nietzsche. The Will To Power. Trans. Walter Kaufmann & R.J. Hollindale. New York: Vintage Books, 1967. p 156-157.
[10] Nietzsche. The Gay Science. p 299.
[11] This is what is meant by throwness into the world; it a sort of abandonment into a world already interpreted by the-they to which we are thrown.
[12] Martin Heidegger. The Concept of Time. Trans. William McNeil. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1992. p. 17E.
[13] The external repetition is one of difference between objects represented by the same concept. The internal repetition is the pure unmediated movement of an idea, as a creative accentuation, or moreness. The internal repetition is always masked by the external repetition, such that they are intimately interlinked. Gilles Deleuze. Difference and Repetition. Trans. Paul Patton. New York: Colombia University Press, 1993. p 24.
[14] Deleuze. Difference and Repetition. p. 23.
[15] “The truth can neither be communicated nor be received except as it were under God’s eyes, not without God’s help, not without God’s being involved as the middle term, He himself being the Truth. It can therefore only be communicated by and received by the ‘individual’ which as a matter of fact can be every living man.” Kierkegaard. The Point of View For My Work As An Author. p. 117.
[16] Swenson. Trans. Kierkegaard’s Concluding Unscientific Postscript. p. 151.
[17] Kierkegaard lists three stages in the history of repetition in the sphere of individual freedom. The first is freedom as desire, which leads to despair; freedom as sagacity, which in turn leads to despair; freedom as freedom, which is the highest repetition and leads to atonement. Soren Kierkegaard. Fear and Trembling/Repetition. Trans. Howard V. Hong & Edna H. Hong. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1983. p. 288.
[18] Frederich Nietzsche, Thus spoke Zarathustra: a Book For None and For All. Trans. Walter Kaufmann. New York: Penguin Books, 1978. p. 157.
[19] Nietzsche. The Gay Science. p. 273.
[20] Ibid., p. 104.
[21] Ibid., p 268.
[22] Heidegger. Being and Time. p. 296.
[23] Heidegger. The Concept of Time. p. 14E.
[24] Ibid., p. 14E

The Understanding

Beginning as a completely separate endeavour, the paper that follows has taken shape in terms of the task I originally gave myself. In the process of dealing with the critique of the enlightenment and modernity, it became apparent to me that the notion of subjectivity, itself, had been radically altered in the process of the critique. The critique of modernity seems to have altered the landscape of how we think of our selves and the world we live in. Once the “I’ proclamation is undermined, it seems that man comes to occupy a new space. No longer are we simply given over to ourselves as was previously held to be the case. Is objectivity possible, without the presence of a subject? Was objectivity possible in modernity, when we thought of ourselves as something like a subject? The narrative of the self seems to have undergone some radical retooling. When “man” is no longer the centre, or origin, of meaning, where does meaning dwell? How does understanding function in this world without determinate Being. In the examination that follows I hope to provide some of these questions.
Beginning with the deconstruction of the subject, and the removal of Being as a something determinate in the “I,” a new space opens up in the work of Heidegger. While simply a new narrative of existence it nonetheless seems to unfold a new paradigm of possible examination. In the examination that follows I will deal with the concept of understanding as it unfolds within this novel space. Furthermore I will deal with the concept of understanding as it appears in the hermeneutics of Hans-Georg Gadamer.
The analytic of Dasein should be understood as a critique of what Heidegger believed to be the problem of the ethos, or weltanschauung of the Enlightenment project. As such the narrative of Dasein is offered as a possible way out of the totalitarian effects of man left to the power of subjective reason. If the Enlightenment could be characterized as a loss of self- the task of the existing Dasein can be interpreted as a manner of engaging with, and finding, itself as it is constituted in a ‘world.’ Finally, through this examination I hope to demonstrate ‘how’ the analytic of Dasein can be seen as opening the space, or making possible, some of the principle themes in the philosophy of the social sciences. I will engage with concepts like the importance of meaning, the interaction between understanding and interpretation, the concept of moods in psychology, language, and finally the role of metaphor in understanding.
I. Uncovering the Metaphysical.
Being and Time posits that the fundamental error of the entire western tradition has been the posing of the question such that an entity ‘is’ has been sought as an answer. What is Being? What is being asked, therefore, is that Being take on the character of definability which is, in fact, an impossibility. However, at the same time, by the sheer fact of existing one is already acquainted with Being, therefore, one always already lives in an understanding of Being.[1] It cannot be the case, therefore, that the subiectum, or the Hypokeimenon, “the word names that-which-lies-before, which, as ground gathers everything unto itself,” can be found within the “I” proclamation of man.[2] Rather, what has been sought by the western tradition has been the being of beings. The question of Being, of uncovering Being in-itself, is more fundamental.
“With the ‘cogito sum’ Descartes had claimed to be putting philosophy on a new and firm footing… has revealed itself as the implementation of a baleful prejudice, which has kept later generations from making any thematic ontological analytic of the ‘mind’…”[3]
In order to investigate Being, Heidegger imports the concept of Dasein as that entity for which Being is an issue. Dasein, as ‘being there,’ is encountered in its ‘there; the ‘there’ imparts with a notion of spatiality as a location wherein Dasein comes to encounter itself. Dasein, as such, has a three-fold structure, an ‘is’ as existence, or being, and a ‘there’ as a location in a “world,” and a relation of self to itself. It is impossible, therefore, to have Dasein without also having a “world.” Therefore, hidden within the “I” proclamation of Dasein, there necessarily lurks “world.” Thus, while Dasein is necessarily my specificity; it is also my being-in-the-world; as being-in-the-world, my Dasein is necessarily being-with the Dasein of others. As such it becomes apparent that the subject object distinction breaks down; “man,” as subject, is made manifest as a metaphysical presupposition.
II. ‘Where’ and ‘How’ We Are.
Dasein finds itself always already given over to the “there” as throwness, in its Being-there as such.[4] In this space Dasein has two constitutive ways of being, firstly, it finds itself in a mood, or state of mind. Secondly, it finds itself always already in understanding. Understanding is derived from a totality of involvements; Dasein is such that it is always being-with in a ‘world’ as the totality of possible involvements. Dasein, as being-in-the-world, as dwelling spatially, is that entity which, in concernful situatedness, circumspectively de-severs.[5] Therefore, although Dasein proclaims the ‘I’ as a reflexive representation of itself, existentially the ‘I’ remains furthest from Dasein in everydayness. Rather, what becomes most proximate is the phenomenon of ‘world,’ as the totality of involvements; as the wherein of Dasein’s understanding; as that in-terms-of-which the fore-structure of understanding is derived and the into-which the understanding is projected. [6] Dasein encounters itself proximally as already existing, as being there amongst entities, as already involved with the world of ‘significance[7], in doing what Dasein does. Hence, Dasein encounters itself in those entities with which it is concerned environmentally. Others are not encountered as something ready-to-hand, or as a present-at-hand[8] for contemplation; rather others are encountered environmentally, in terms of the world of Dasein’s concern. The environment, however, is encountered in everydayness as ready-to-hand; as such, in concern Dasein encounters the products of others circumspectively. Thus it becomes apparent that being alongside the Dasein of others has the character of togetherness, as being one Dasein amongst many, in concernful situatedness, within an environment.
The hermeneutic circle is decisive in placing hermeneutics itself on ontological grounding, an endeavour which Hans-Georg Gadamer made his own. At this point in the examination it seems necessary to illuminate this circle. It seems clear that understanding is a structure, a totality of involvements, which, Dasein as “throwness,” projects into the world. Interpretation, grounded in the fore-conception of understanding, makes understanding manifest in the ‘as’ structure. In essence, interpretation, interprets what the understanding has already understood in an assertion. As Heidegger states it:
“Whenever something is interpreted as something, the interpretation will be founded essentially upon fore-having, fore-sight, and fore-conception. An interpretation is never presuppositionless apprehending of something presented to us.”[9]
Meaning is that upon-which of the projected fore-structure and in ‘terms of which’ something becomes intelligible. Meaning is ontological in that it is an essential property of Dasein itself. I have, thus far, been merely delineating and illuminating the territory in an attempt to demonstrate ‘where’ we are and ‘how’ we exist there.
III. The Historical, Metaphorical and Linguistic Horizon.
Gadamer, in Truth and Method, engages with hermeneutics upon its ontological grounding and proceeds to critique the epistemological presuppositions of the tradition, whereby, it was assumed that the subject had some privileged access to the historical. Rather, as Gadamer states:
“In fact history does not belong to us; we belong to it. Long before we understand ourselves through the process of self-examination, we understand ourselves in a self-evident way in the family, in society, and state in which we live. The focus of subjectivity is a distorting mirror. The self-awareness of the individual is only a flickering in the closed circuits of historical life. That is why the prejudices of the individual, far more than his judgements, constitute the historical reality of his being.”[10]
These prejudices, to which Gadamer makes allusions, can only be those present in the fore-structure of understanding. Thus, it is no doubt true that these prejudices predetermine if anything can have meaning for Dasein in the interaction with texts. Gadamer insists that the prejudices of the understanding are necessarily historical effects, of which we may or may not be aware. No methodological statement, or presupposition, can truly eliminate the affect of history upon understanding. It is, therefore, never the case that one can begin from a clean slate, even via the Cartesian method of doubt.[11] Wherever Dasein finds itself it necessary carries along with it the effects of history, or its historicity, and must therefore see itself as necessarily incomplete, or within an unfinished process.
It is necessary to bring into our purview the important concept of ‘horizon,’ as it is explicatedby Gadamer. In order to do so we must return to the constitution of Dasein itself, more specifically in terms of its temporal structure. Every particular moment has its limitations, in the sense of what can possibly be viewed from within the moment. For Gadamer, the term ‘horizon’ is the boundary, or the limit, of what can possibly be viewed in the moment. The ‘horizon,’ is not a static or fixed condition of the being of Dasein, but rather, is a limit within which Dasein moves and, is in turn moved by Dasein.
“To acquire a horizon means that one learns to look beyond what is close at hand-not in order to look away from it but to see it better, within a larger whole and in truer proportions.” [12]
The ‘horizon,’ therefore is required by the understanding in order to contextualize, or gain the proper perspective from which meaning can be grasped. It is therefore the case that the ‘horizon’ is shaped by the prejudices of understanding. However, as a process, or historically constituted, Dasein’s understanding is not simply rooted in the present, but is formed of its past, present, and projected into the future. Thus, it can be said that the ‘horizon’ of Dasein, which is historically constituted, can be transposed, and thus becomes fused within a horizon with others, in a kind of trans-temporal alienation from itself, returns to itself, having put its prejudices to the test.[13] The ‘horizon’ can therefore be seen as a process of dialogic mediation, which is not stuck in the present but rather trans-temporal. In the process understanding has, therefore, altered having discarded, or taken on new prejudices.
For Gadamer, along with world and historicity, our mode of being is fundamentally linguistic. Gadamer, furthermore, alludes to “the fundamental metaphoricity of language.”[14] As such, “language is the universal medium in which understanding occurs.”[15] It is therefore the case that “understanding occurs in interpretation,” which necessarily requires a kind of translation into the language within which Dasein finds itself. For Gadamer language is the medium where “I” and “world” meet.[16] Language is, therefore, both where Dasein finds itself and how Dasein lives itself. All experience of world, therefore, is essentially linguistic. Language, therefore, as Dasein’s mode of being-in-the-world is both a manner of existing and a space wherein common meanings can emerge. Language expresses both the infinite and finite
“Every word causes the whole of the language to which it belongs to resonate and the whole world view that underlies it to appear. Thus every word, as the event of a moment, carries with it the unsaid, to which it is related by responding and summoning.”[17]
Finally, for Gadamer, “Being that can be understood is language.”[18]
IV. Understanding, Metaphor and Meaning.
Dasein is understandingly situated in a ‘world’ and a language; both carry with them certain predilections and prejudices. In what sense therefore is objectivity to be thought of an ideal to be sought after? Rather, it would seem that the task of science itself requires a subject-object relation. In the narrative of Dasein, the subject-object distinction is lost, there is in fact only Dasein and the world of involvements which understanding always already understands pre-reflexively. If understanding takes place in a linguistic medium, which is fundamentally metaphorical, then interpretation is forced to interpret what is already understood and express something as something. The ‘as’ structure of interpretation, seems to leave open the possibility for metaphoricity of the understanding itself. Finally, it would seem that we are indeed prisoners of meaning, as meaning itself becomes a property of Dasein which can be said to exist in a meaningful way. Everything starts with meaning in terms of which the understanding is able to grasp anything at all.
What began as an attempt to engage with the critique of enlightenment; has somehow transformed, mutated, if you will into an altogether different enterprise. Yet, somehow, what is offered here is intimately related to the initial failure. Firstly, I attempted to deal with the presupposition of man as subject, as source, or logos of meaning. Understanding the enlightenment, as did Kant, in terms of a process, or a movement toward Enlightenment[19]; I sought to demonstrate ‘how’ the critique, or undermining, of the ‘cogito’ in effect served to uncover and deconstruct the fundamental grounding of the enlightenment project as such. Secondly, I turned to Heidegger’s The Question Concerning Technology; in the process of engaging with the text it seemed apparent that what was being alluded to was a kind of mediation of human understanding. If the subject, as the sole determinant of what is an object, can give itself over to technology, and in effect mediate its understanding technologically, how does understanding function such that it can be given over to, unconsciously I might add, something other than the subject itself? I decided to set aside my question and continued onward into an engagement with another Heidegger text The Age of the World Picture. This engagement left me with a further question which finally compelled me to set aside my initial project altogether; how does understanding function such that it might come to understand the world in terms of a picture? It became apparent to me, in both cases, that the understanding was functioning in terms of something else. If such is true than is this not further evidence that understanding is essentially metaphorical? In the process of asking these questions the current examination underwent a drastic transformation into the form that exists presently.















Bibliography

Gadamer, Hans-Georg. Truth and Method. New York: Continuum, 2004.
Heidegger, Martin . Being and Time. Trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson. New York: Harper & Row, 1962.

Heidegger, Martin. The Age of the World Picture. in The Question Concerning Technology: and Other Essays. New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1977.

Kant, Immanuel, Was ist Aufklarung? in The Enlightenment. Ed Frank E. Manuel, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1965.


[1] Martin Heidegger. Being and Time. Trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson. New York: Harper & Row, 1962. p. 23.
[2] Martin Heidegger. The Age of the World Picture. in The Question Concerning Technology: and Other Essays. New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1977. p 128.
[3] Heidegger. Being and Time, 46.
[4] Heidegger. Being and Time. p 172.
[5] De-severing; as a binging close of that which is at a distance, or as eliminating distance, such that that which is most proximate distantially might be furthest away from Dasein circumspectively.
[6] Heidegger. Being and Time. 190-194.
[7] Significance is the structural totality of world, as that which can be signified.
[8] A clarification of what is meant by the ready-to-hand and the present-at-hand would seem to be necessary at this point. The-Ready-to-hand withdraws in circumspection in Dasein’s concernful absorption with it. The Ready-to-hand is not something for contemplation; rather, it becomes transparent in its use. The Present-at-hand, is that which is open to contemplation. The Ready-to-hand is possible, as that which was once Present-at-hand. Dasein encounters these entities, not of the character of Dasein, in its concern with them.
[9] Heidegger. Being and Time. 191.
[10] Hans-Georg Gadamer. Truth and Method. New York: Continuum, 2004. p 276-277.
[11] Gadamer. Truth and Method. 301.
[12] Ibid., 302
[13] Gadamer. Truth and Method. 307.
[14] Gadamer. Truth and Method. 431.
[15] Ibid., 389.
[16] Ibid., 474.
[17] Ibid., 458.
[18] Ibid., 474.
[19] Immanuel Kant, Was ist Aufklarung? in The Enlightenment. Ed Frank E. Manuel, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1965. p 34.

Hegel: What of Lordship and Bondage?

“A self-consciousness exists for a self-consciousness. Only so is it in fact self-consciousness; for only in this way does the unity of itself in its otherness become explicit for it. The ‘I’ which is the object of its Notion is in fact not ‘object’; the object of Desire, however, is only independent, for it is the universal indestructible substance, the fluid self-identical essence. A self-consciousness, in being an object, is just as much ‘I’ as ‘object’. With this, we already have before us the Notion of Spirit. What still lies ahead for consciousness is the experience of what Spirit is—this absolute substance which is the unity of the different independent self-consciousness which in their opposition enjoy perfect freedom and independence: ‘I’ that is ‘We’ and ‘We’ that is ‘I’.”[1]

How are we to make sense of the notion of Hegelian freedom? How is it that freedom finally emerges in the Hegelian account as “enmeshed in servitude”?[2] What has Hegel given us in “Lordship and Bondage”? If we attend to the quote above we are struck by its density, furthermore, if we attend to it carefully we might find the announcement of a departure, a properly Hegelian account of the status of self-knowledge. This departure is radical in the sense that we are no longer faced with an account of consciousness as the passive apprehension of the world. Rather, it is an account of the activity of self-consciousness, not as an epistemological subject, but as an active agent in the world populated by a multiplicity of agents, that is an individual subject acting within a social totality. We have shifted away from an account of the knowing subject to an account of intersubjectivity. Is this not what is meant by the Notion of Spirit, “a self-consciousness, in being an object, is just as much ‘I’ as ‘object’.”[3] Are we not faced with a structure, which seems to have structured Hegel’s account from the beginning? The structure, which holds together the moments of independence and dependence, necessity and contingency, being-for-self and being-for-another, or even, the fictional perfection of “the ‘I’ that is ‘We’ and ‘We’ that is ‘I’.”[4] Perhaps, without going any further, in a wholly naïve way, we have already answered our initial question of how freedom might develop from out of slavery; how this structure, this Notion of Spirit, somehow maintains the contradiction in a more or less balanced way, perhaps always falling short of perfection.
The following essay began as an attempt to perhaps say what it is that Hegel gives us in the section on “Lordship and Bondage.” It has since become increasingly evident that this is not the proper way to proceed if we are to attend to anything of relevance when we attend to the section on “Lordship and Bondage.” As such, the following examination will take the position that, with the dialectic of “Lordship and Bondage,” we are presented with a structure of recognition, although falling far short of the Notion of recognition,[5] enables the subject to overcome the presence of Nature from within itself and the Natural world from without. As such, from a purely historical perspective we are presented with the first truly social institution, or of the first instance of human institutionality as such. In “Lordship and Bondage,” Hegel, is furthermore, giving us an account of the structure of self-consciousness, which is at once both historical and psychological, which, without establishing it, brings about the necessity for an objective point of view. As such the “Lordship and Bondage” dialectic is a primitive moment in the overcoming of Nature towards the development of Spirit.
What therefore, does the account of “Lordship and Bondage” seek to accomplish? The tendency, in many cases, has been to take the section out of its context, that is, to remove it from the larger context of self-consciousness in general and see it as an end in itself rather than a moment in the movement of Spirit. Let us turn then toward the notion of self-consciousness in order to provide us with a trajectory.
“The notion of self-consciousness is only completed in these three moments: (a) the pure undifferentiated ‘I’ as its first immediate object. (b) But this immediacy is itself an absolute mediation, it is only as a supersession of the independent object, in other words, it is Desire. The satisfaction of Desire is, it is true, the reflection of self-consciousness into itself, or the certainty that has become truth. (c) But the truth of this certainty is really a double reflection, the duplication of self-consciousness.[6]
It seems clear, therefore, if we are attentive to the three moments of self-consciousness, that the structure encountered in the dialectic of “Lordship and Bondage” must bring together these three moments. Perhaps, stated otherwise, it must bring together the for-itself of Life, the organic totality, which maintains its sameness in difference. Life is the immediate undifferentiated ‘I,’ a relation to the world that excludes all otherness, it is the passive moment of pure apprehension. Desire is essential to the movement, “self-consciousness is Desire”[7] and it will be the failure to satisfy Desire that pushes the dialectic forward. The structure of Desire is explicated with particular salience by Alexandre Kojève:
“In contrast to the knowledge that keeps man in a passive quietude, Desire dis-quiets him and moves him to action. Born of Desire action tends to satisfy it, and can do so only by the “negation,” the destruction, or at least transformation, of the desired object: to satisfy hunger, for example, food must be destroyed or, in any case, transformed.[8]
The negative structure of Desire is such that it eliminates, or negates otherness, all action, therefore, reduces, or consumes otherness and reduces it to sameness. Desire, however, is a negative structure as such it can only negate and cannot overcome the negated other, as such it must reproduce both the object and the other repeatedly. Self-consciousness can be certain of itself only through the overcoming of an independent life. If we follow the structure, Desire can only be satisfied by an object which in turn is capable of negating itself, that is Desire can only be satisfied by another self-consciousness. It is therefore the case that the failure to satisfy Desire has led us to its possible satisfaction in the Notion of Recognition. The account of “Lordship and Bondage,” must bring together these three moments in the establishment of a genuinely social context.
The Notion of recognition allows for the satisfaction of Desire, that is it allows Desire to establish its self-certainty as truth. Recognition, therefore, must allow for the doubling of self-consciousness, that is only an action that is equal and by another self-consciousness can bring about the Desired result, which is mutual recognition of an other as equal and independent, the recognition of the other in its freedom. As such Hegel presents us with a normative example of recognition.
Each [self-consciousness] is for the other the middle term, through which each mediates itself with itself and unites with itself; and each is for itself and for the other, an immediate being on its own, which at the same time is such only through mediation. They recognize themselves as mutually recognizing one another.[9]
Having set up this normative example of mutual recognition, a kind of paradigmatic case of recognition as such; Hegel turns to examine levels of mis-recognition, or the various failures of Desire. Self-consciousness, as a negative structure, cannot come back to itself, that is it cannot realize its freedom, but rather is mediated by the object, or the other of it experience, which is at the same time nothing more than itself duplicated. Only a recognitive structure can successfully allow Desire to satisfy itself, thereby establishing its self-certainty as freedom. As such Hegel undertakes a phenomenological analysis of “the struggle to the death,” which emerges as a result of the initial encounter between two Desiring beings.
“They must engage in this struggle, [struggle to the death] for they must raise their certainty of being for themselves to truth, both in the case of the other and in their own case. And it is only through staking one’s life that freedom is won; only thus is it proved that for self-consciousness, its essential being is not [just] being, not it the immediate form in which it appears, not in its submergence in the expanse of life, but rather that there is nothing present in it which could not be regarded as a vanishing moment, that it is only pure being-for-self. The individual who has not risked his life may well be recognized as a person, but he has not attained to the truth of this recognition as an independent self-consciousness.”[10]
As such, if we are attentive to the quote we see that only through staking one’s Life on the line, that is through the willingness to sacrifice the inner Nature, the immediate unity of being-for-self which maintains itself throughout difference, can freedom be won. It is therefore the case that the struggle to the death does not realize the normative goal of mutual recognition, rather, as a result recognition becomes impossible. As such, this particular structure fails in that it establishes no institution in its wake, there is no properly social moment therefore it does not maintain the three moments of self-consciousness.
The third moment of self-consciousness has been established phenomenologically, or at least its structure has been uncovered.
“For just as life is the natural setting of consciousness, independence without absolute negativity, so death is the natural negation of consciousness, negation without independence, which thus remains without the required significance of recognition.”[11]
As such the lesson it learns is that Life is as essential as self-consciousness itself. We have, as it were, returned to an earlier moment of the Phenomenology. If we turn back toward the earlier shapes, or forms of consciousness we were faced with a natural subject, whose purely negative relation to the object, was such that in order to incorporate the point of view the other must be annihilated. This is what Hegel terms an abstract negation, which retains nothing of the negation, the negated is simply reduced to nothing. This encounter cannot succeed as a matter of course, that is, its Desire cannot be satisfied and recognition cannot be achieved through its completion, rather:
“At first, it will exhibit the side of the inequality of the two, or the splitting up of the middle term into the extremes which, as extremes, are opposed to one another, one being only recognized, the other only recognizing.”[12]
With this diremption, this splitting up, or doubling, of self-consciousness into recognized and recognizing extremes we have allowed for the third moment of self-consciousness, although falling short of the Notion of recognition, as a failure it manages to contribute to the development of Spirit; making the contingency of the previous failures, necessary.
“Lordship and Bondage,” despite being a failure of Desire, that is, despite falling short of the perfect recognitive structure, contributes to the movement of the dialectic in the form of an unequal recognition, which takes place all the same. It should be noted that the movement of history itself is the movement of these failures, or mis-recognitions, which are always brought about by the trace of their possible accomplishment in the present. As such the dialectic lays the ground for the possibility of freedom through the development of a truly social institution. If we remain faithful to the structure, which has guided Hegel throughout, that is the structure of independence and dependence, sameness, or identity, in change, or difference, them we cannot help but notice that the notion of freedom is impossible without the notion of dependence. This is, furthermore, why the struggle to the death did not realize freedom, because no one was left in a position of dependence in order to recognize the freedom of the victor. The dialectic of “Lordship and Bondage” is a truly Spiritual moment of mis-recognition.
In the first place, the movement, which Hegel gives us in “Lordship and Bondage,” is a moment in the development of every self-consciousness, as such it is a properly psychological metaphor which applies to the development of the acting subjects of intersubjectivity. The Lord, or Master, is independent consciousness, absolute identity with itself, in many ways a reversion back to the animal Desire, which characterized the earliest forms of consciousness. As recognized the lord exists as absolute negativity for the Bondsman, or Slave, the lord represents the negation of the bondsman to the bondsman.
“The lord relates himself mediately to the bondman through the being of [a thing] that is independent, for it is just this which holds the bondsman in bondage; it is his chain from which he could not break free in the struggle, thus proving himself to be dependent, to possess his independence in thinghood.[13]
As such the independent aspect of the object is given over to the bondsman, who acts in the view of the Desire of the lord. Therefore, the Desire of the lord can be satisfied, as he has mediated his Desire through The bondsman. The lord, as independent consciousness, is however, static, there is no mobility in the lord’s position, rather, the status of the lord depends upon the bondsman whom he does not recognize.
The bondsman, having failed to give up his chain, or having failed to place his life on the line, becomes dependent consciousness and can only recognize the lord. The lord is absolute negation, or the fear of death, as an object for the bondsman. In true psychological jargon the lord embodies both the ego-ideal and the super-ego; that is to say that the lord, is both an independent consciousness that the bondsman can strive to become and that which causes the bondsman to repress its own Desire in the form of work. The bondsman, without being able to negate the object for its own enjoyment, works on the object for the lord’s enjoyment. “Work, on the other hand, is desire held in check…”[14] the bondsman has learned to rationalize his individual desire and replace it with the Desire of the lord. As such, the bondsman has overcome the chain, which bound it to the lord, that is through work, which takes place upon the threat of death; the bondsman has managed to overcome his animal desire for a Spiritual desire. It therefore, becomes apparent that through its work the bondsman is able to overcome the chains which bind him and now, having an actual context of freedom and repression can strive to accomplish the task of freedom.
We have demonstrated how it is that “Lordship and Bondage” manages to substitute Spirit for Nature. Or, how the slavish, or bonded, consciousness is able to overcome its purely natural Desire for a Spiritual one. The movement, also establishes an unequal social institution between acting agents in the world, one which enables the development of further historical movement, as such, it is also a material historical structure, which actually existed. It becomes apparent, when viewed in this way, that what is true for the individual is also true for the historical development of the totality. Although Slavery, might be lamentable, and regrettable. In hindsight, perhaps viewed from our historical situatedness as an institution, perhaps the first institution, it was necessary in order that we might come to understand that we could transform our natural limits through work. Furthermore, it necessitates the development of an objective sphere between the lord and the bondman, wherein the Desire of the lord can be articulated and understood by the bondsman.
Have we come to a better understanding of the Hegelian notion of freedom and the departure undertaken in the chapter on self-consciousness? This work became far more expository and exegetical than was initially anticipated; perhaps the trajectory itself was a necessary one. The movement seems necessary, that is in order to truly grasp what has transpired in Hegel one must actually go through the movements oneself. That being said, I have attempted to offer a reading, an attempt to make sense of the work, which in turn has contributed a great deal to my own understanding. For that I am grateful, and if nothing else about this paper is true it has at least been a valuable journey.
















[1] G.W.F Hegel. Phenomenology of Spirit. Trans A.V. Miller. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977. § 177.
[2] Ibid., § 196.
[3] Ibid., § 177.
[4] Ibid., § 177.
[5] “They recognize themselves as mutually recognizing one another.” Ibid., § 184.
[6] Ibid., § 176.
[7] Ibid., § 174.
[8] Alexandre Kojève. Introduction To The Reading Of Hegel: Lectures On The Phenomenology of Spirit. Ed. Allan Bloom, trans. James H. Nichols, Jr. New York: Basic Books, 1969. p. 4.
[9] Hegel. Phenomenology of Spirit. § 184.
[10] Ibid., §. 187.
[11] Ibid., §. 188.
[12] Ibid., §. 185.
[13] Ibid., §. 190.

[14]Ibid., §. 195.

Hegel and Sense Certainty.

“Because of its concrete content, sense-certainty immediately appears as the richest kind of knowledge, indeed a knowledge of infinite wealth for which no bounds can be found, either when we reach out into space and time in which it is dispersed or when we take a bit of this wealth, and by division enter into it. Moreover, sense-certainty appears to be the truest knowledge; for it has not yet omitted anything from the object, but has the object before it in its perfect entirety. But, in the event, this very certainty proves itself to be the most abstract and poorest truth. All that it says about what it knows is just that it is; and its truth contains nothing but the sheer being of the thing [Sache].[1]
Why begin the Phenomenology with sense-certainty? Is sense-certainty really a beginning, or rather is it merely part of a beginning; perhaps, a movement toward a beginning we might wish to make? Is it possible that by beginning with sense-certainty we are dealing with a kind of history of our beginning, a history of the beginning that we must make? Are we in the process of forcing sense-certainty to make claims it would, or could not make by itself? Does Hegel’s beginning somehow justify itself in view of the end, or goal toward which our project advances? Perhaps, even further, we might ask just who is this ‘we’ who attempts to make a beginning of this kind at all? ‘We’ cannot help but begin from when and where ‘we’ are, as such, the object, ‘we’ will take, as our object of examination, will have its own when and where. If we, at the start, or immediately, take knowledge to be our primary object, as Hegel proposes we do,[2] it would seem necessary, or at least helpful, to be able to say what ‘we,’ and this knowledge, are. ‘We’ taking this ‘knowledge’ to be our object, suggests a duality, which would be our duality, or rather a duality which could only be apparent to us, the duality of our own starting point, and the starting point of sense-certainty itself. We must always keep in mind this duality, that of ‘our’ object, or the object of observing, or philosophical, consciousness, in this instance sense-certainty as the form of consciousness that we are examining; and the object as it appears for this form of consciousness itself, or the movement as it is undergone by ordinary consciousness. In the examination that follows we will attempt to answer firstly, why Hegel begins the phenomenology with sense-certainty; secondly, how sense-certainty can be viewed phenomenologically, or as a phenomenon of sense-certainty; thirdly, how examining sense-certainty in this way, proceeding, as it were, dialectically its contradictions can be made to manifest itself, from within itself, and in turn be resolved by positing a new object. Finally, it will be maintained, that ‘we,’ readers of Hegel, engaged in this immanent critique of sense-certainty, do so already from the point of view of self-consciousness as our own necessary starting point.
How seriously can we take the claim of sense-certainty? If we attend to the quote above, we are faced, at the onset, with a strong epistemological claim. Sense-certainty, as both an immediate, that is without mediation, and a certain, content of experience. Sense-certainty therefore comes first because it purports to have the simplest, or least complex object. As such, sense-certainty appears to be a kind of passive apprehension, one, which adds nothing of itself to the objects it apprehends, allowing the object to unfold its own richness. However, if we are attentive to the claim of sense-certainty we are thereby doing that which sense-certainty itself cannot, we are actively taking up the claim of certainty, the claim to possess a certain knowledge of the world, and offering it up to a reflective glance. We are, as it were, taking sense-certainty at its word and attempting to determine whether or not it is capable of fulfilling its word. It is ‘we’ who take this knowledge as our object; in this instance ‘we’ take sense-certainty to be the form of knowledge which beholds the simplest object. The object of sense-certainty, that is the object it claims as its own, pretends to be the most complete and at the same time the simplest object possible. ‘We’ take sense-certainty as the object for us, while sense-certainty claims this complete determinate object for-itself. It is phenomenology that allows us to engage in this movement in a kind of immanent critique, such that ‘we’ are capable of seeing how sense-certainty must treat its apprehended objects. It is precisely phenomenology, therefore, which allows us to take seriously the claim of sense certainty.
We have demonstrated how it is that ‘we’ are able to take sense-certainty at its word and it is the case, as Hegel states it, that “Consciousness provides its own criterion from within itself.” [3] The word of sense-certainty is therefore made manifest in the movement of sense-certainty, in spite of, or perhaps despite the knowledge it may, or may not have of it. The claim of course, as we have said, is a strong epistemological claim to possess, or have access to particular instances of objects, to be able to immediately apprehend particular objects in their determinate particularity. However, if we attend once again to the quote provided at the beginning of this examination we see that sense-certainty is only capable of imparting with the being of its apprehension, so rather than expressing something determinate, a particular content of experience, it is only capable of expressing the universal fact of existence. The ‘this,’ which consciousness conveys is what Hegel terms “pure being”[4] or what we might call pure presence as such. However, at the same time as consciousness posits the object of sense-certainty, that is the essence of a sense-certain apprehension as the being of the thing, it posits an inessential knowing in the ‘I’ which knows the object only in the sense that the object is. Therefore the object appears as a kind of positive content for the passivity of sense-certainty to apprehend, while the activity in the ‘I’ remains inessential. For ‘us,’ however, this movement, namely the movement between the passive and the active is ‘our’ movement,[5] or perhaps as Hegel puts it in the introduction:
“Consciousness simultaneously distinguishes itself from something, and at the same time relates itself to it, or, as it is said, this something exists for consciousness; and the determinate aspect of this relating, or of the being of something for a consciousness, is knowing.”[6]
‘We’ must, as it were, suspend, or put aside this movement if we are to ask, “What is the This?”[7] Taken phenomenologically, these two moments, which are required in order for consciousness to know anything at all are maintained as separate moments and must be treated as such in order for sense-certainty to fail to meat its claim.
The ‘This’ therefore appears, in its immediacy as both ‘Here’ and ‘Now,’ that is as situated both spatially and temporally, but even with these apparent determinations the ‘This’ appears as a kind of being in general, or a universal. However, as we stated early on in this exposition, sense-certainty wants to claim that it has content, which is both determinate and particular, and therefore in every instance consciousness intends the particular. It is however, as Hegel puts it in section 97:
“But language, as we see, is the more truthful; in it, we ourselves directly refute what we mean to say, and since the universal is the true [content] of sense-certainty and language expresses the true [content] alone, it is just not possible for us ever to say, or express in words, a sensuous being that we mean.”[8]
Sense-certainty, therefore, intends, or means to utter the particular as the determinate immediate content of consciousness, however, language is “the more truthful” in that it does not allow sense certainty to say what it intends but rather what it actually has, namely, the universal. However, is it not the case that sense-certainty makes no claim to be active, we are not, as it were, dealing with a reflective consciousness, that is this shape of consciousness might remain as a passive apprehension without mediation and never need to cross into the active expression of the determinate content it claims to uncover?[9] As such, this failure to mean what it intends places the burden of determinacy in the intentionality of the ‘I’ as the other moment, or what was previously the inessential moment. The dialectical movement has, through the uncovering of the contradiction, lead to a reversal of the previous position that is the object has become inessential and the fate of sense-certainty has come to rest in the ‘I.’ The ‘I’ itself however, is not something that comes to a rest, but rather remains in flux, the ‘I,’ once again intends itself as a determinate particular, as ‘This’ ‘I,’ ‘Here,’ ‘Now.’ However, the intending once again hits the universal, language remaining truer than the claim of sense-certainty. The intentional ‘I,’ therefore has no content, neither does it have anything determinate, but rather is left with the vacuous universals, which are never what they are in the moment they are invoked, but rather as invoked are negations of what was intended. Sense-certainty, therefore, far from being the richest form, or shape of consciousness finds its moment of truth in the universal.
Sense-certainty, therefore, is nothing other than this movement, it can no longer be understood as two distinct moments but rather, as a history of this loss of determinacy. Initially the loss of determinacy resides in the object, a failure in the ability to fix a determinate content upon the object apprehended. Secondly, when the ‘I’ tries to invoke itself in the moment of apprehension finds that it is not itself, but something else, a negation of self, and hence experiences the loss of self in the very moment when it attempts to determine itself. The history, or movement, as a totality uncovers that the truth of sense-certainty is a series of indeterminate moments, or rather that the proposed truth of sense-certainty was an illusion. The dialectic has, thereby, moved and as a result posits a new form of consciousness, which alters the nature of the object itself. No longer does sense-certainty search for the illusion of the particular in the universal, but perception, the new form of consciousness, is able to fulfill the truth of sense –certainty, in that it is able to take the universal as a perception rather than a certainty. The dialectic has moved by positing a new form, which addresses the contradiction inherent in the initial form, or stated otherwise the new form of consciousness contains the determinate negation of the former.
Sense-certainty negates the possibility that there are moments of mediation between itself and the objects it apprehends. This is, at once, the reason Hegel begins with it as the simplest possible form of consciousness, and the source of its contradiction. Proceeding phenomenologically, Hegel is able to undertake an immanent critique of sense-certainty, and thereby take sense-certainty at its word. The contradiction between what sense-certainty claims and what it actually makes manifest sets the dialectic in motion. From the phenomenological perspective each move, or transition appears as a kind of gamble, or wager. Hegel’s critique, however, also takes place from the perspective of the ‘we’ who already have access to absolute knowledge, as such; it already presupposes the goal towards which it moves. As such, from the point of view of philosophical consciousness each transition appears as a necessary transition, necessary in the sense that it brings us closer to knowing absolutely. It is perhaps true, therefore, that each transition seems to bring us closer to the possibility of beginning, which is at the same time the end.
[1] G.W.F Hegel. Phenomenology of Spirit. Trans A.V. Miller. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977. § 91.
[2] Ibid., § 90.
[3] Ibid., § 84.
[4] Ibid., § 91.
[5] For Hegel knowledge appears to be both passive in the sense of a kind of apprehension, but also the positive creation of an active consciousness. As such this seems to point to the fact that sense-certainty is an earlier form of consciousness than the actual starting consciousness of Hegel’s methodology.
[6] Ibid., § 82.
[7] Ibid., § 95.
[8] Ibid., § 97.
[9] It seems to me that sense-certainty must fail in its own terms, namely, that it must not have access to the particular determinate content it intends. Language, or expression merely makes manifest this lack, or the absence of determinate content but is not the source of the lack of determinacy.

Nietzsche and The Birth of Tragedy.

We open upon a question, or perhaps we question upon an opening, a space between two works, a space of conflicting tendencies; of convergences and divergences; of affinities and animosities; of joyous celebration and the most profound suffering. We are, as it were, at the site of a profound reckoning; at the site, or the opening, of an incredible closeness, a seeming overlap of projects and terminologies; and yet at the same time, we are faced with a gap and an insurmountable distance. The Birth of Tragedy, “it might be said” gives voice to Nietzsche’s ‘ambivalence’ toward Schopenhauer’s The World as Will and Representation or perhaps it might be said, along with Zarathustra: “too slowly runs all speech for me: into your chariot I leap, storm!”[1] If we are attentive to the work undertaken in the Birth of Tragedy we encounter an honest reckoning with the problematic established in the work of Schopenhauer, as such, it articulates itself in terms of, and indeed borrows from the Schopenhauerian framework. Schopenhauer’s problematic is ultimately insufficient, or runs “too slowly” for the trajectory of Nietzsche’s argument, however, by conducting a kind of ‘internal criticism’ Nietzsche can overcome the failures of The World as Will and Representation.[2] This overcoming will make manifest the shortcoming of Schopenhauer’s work leading Nietzsche to lament in his “Attempt at Self-Criticism:”
That I appended hopes where there was no ground for hope, where everything pointed all too plainly to an end.[3]
As such the Birth of Tragedy is in many ways a response to the Schopenhauerian hope for an ultimate satisfaction, or an end. It is an explicit aversion to the Schopenhauerian plunge into the ‘naïve’ illusion of knowledge as the only possible deliverance from life, which is constantly changing, and into the security of faith,[4] which is the denial of the will. For Schopenhauer our suffering resides in the contradiction between the endless striving of singular will and its endless appearances, the endless becoming of individuation, which is only terminated in death. Schopenhauer, unable to locate being, unable to arrest the flow of becoming as such, denies the will as the only way to resolve the tension, bringing willing to an end through a kind of resignation, which puts an end to suffering. It therefore becomes apparent that Nietzsche’s engagement with the Greeks is not a disinterested one, but rather an attempt to demarcate a metaphysics of affirmation, a way of affirming life in its ‘here’ and ‘now.’ Nietzsche is not concerned with resolving the tension, with putting an end to the contradiction, but rather to affirm it. We are, as it were, at the site of an invitation to dance, or perhaps to sing, in the face of our miseries and sufferings and affirm life.
The Dionysian and Apollonian dualism, which is central to The Birth of Tragedy, is part of Nietzsche’s inheritance from Schopenhauer, that is to say that the dualism is a definite re-appropriation of the Schopenhauerian distinction between ‘Will’ and ‘representation.’ The gap, however, which manifests itself between Nietzsche and Schopenhauer resides, both in the character, and the treatment of the duality. The way of the world ‘as will,’ if we are attentive to Schopenhauer’s formulation, is different from its phenomena, different from its objectification, from its representation. The will,[5] as such, is singular, however, in its appearance, according to the principle of sufficient reason, manifests as a plurality; the will, however, as it is in itself, contains no such plurality. Rather the will is simply an aimless, blind striving, and a force, which manifests itself through recourse to pockets of matter.
For all striving spring from want or deficiency, from dissatisfaction with one’s own state or condition, and is therefore suffering so long as it is not satisfied. No satisfaction, however, is lasting; on the contrary, it is always merely the starting-point of a fresh striving. We see striving everywhere impeded in many ways, everywhere struggling and fighting, and hence always suffering. Thus that there is no ultimate aim of striving means that there is no measure or end of suffering.[6]
That there is no end to the striving of the singular will means that there is no way of truly satisfying the will, or rather there is no way to synthesize the will with its appearance in space and time. There is no end to the suffering of the movement of life, however, Schopenhauer, through recourse to his Ideas,[7] which are open to a kind of aesthetic perception, grants access to the realm of permanence, in a kind of absolute passivity of the pure will-less subject of knowledge.[8]
For Nietzsche the dualism of the Dionysian and the Apollonian are two opposed artistic energies, or forces, “involving perpetual strife with only periodically intervening reconciliations.”[9] As such, if we attend to these forces, alongside Nietzsche we see that the Dionysian is seemingly close to the Schopenhauerian conception of the ‘will’ as the basis upon which the Apollonian, or representations, in the Schopenhauerian sense, are formed. As such Nietzsche’s “beautiful illusion”[10] that is the artistic creation of the Apollonian energy is a restatement of the Schopenhauerian conception of the veil of Maya. In The World as Will and Representation, suffering seems to reside in the necessity of individuation, while the momentary satisfaction of the endlessly striving Will occurs when, through the aesthetic perception the subject becomes a kind of absolute perception. For Nietzsche the Apollonian is the individuating force: “Apollo himself is the glorious divine image of the principium individuationis, through whose gestures and eyes all the joy and wisdom of ‘illusion’ together with its beauty speak to us.”[11] Conversely, the Dionysian, which is a kind of self-forgetting, is the energy, which in this forgetting affirms the oneness of man, or the affinity of man with other men. These energies play off one another and culminate or find their most perfect balance in the Attic tragedies of Greece. Both Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, however, give to music an extremely special status:
“As what does music appear in the mirror of images and concepts?” It appears as will, taking the term in the Schopenhauer’s sense, i.e, as the opposite of the aesthetic, purely contemplative, and passive frame of mind.[12]
There is an immanence to music which is readily recognized by both Nietzsche and Schopenhauer, such that music appears as a kind of Dionysian articulation of the will.
Nietzsche’s account of Greek tragedy is an attempt to locate and find a way out of the Schopenhauerian resignation, a way to speak about life differently than both Silenus and Schopenhauer.
…Oh, wretched ephemeral race, children of chance and misery, why do you compel me to tell you what it would be most expedient for you not to hear? What is best of all is utterly beyond your reach: not to be born, not to be, to be nothing. But the second best for you is-to die soon.[13]
Nietzsche locates in the attic tragedies a movement, a synthesis of the warring energies, a kind of symbiosis of the Dionysian and the Apollonian, one which is brought about through the development of the chorus. Just as in Schopenhauer where it is the will which is represented, similarly in Nietzsche, it is always Dionysus who is depicted as suffering; it is the Dionysian which gets symbolized through the Apollonian. While Nietzsche’s account agrees in many ways with the account of Schopenhauer it differs in the type of metaphysical comfort that Nietzsche sees flowing from the tragic Chorus:
The metaphysical comfort—with which, I am suggesting even now, every true tragedy leaves us— that life is at the bottom of things despite all the changes of appearances, indestructibly powerful and pleasurable…
With this chorus the profound Hellene, uniquely susceptible to the tenderest and deepest suffering, comforts himself, having looked boldly right into the terrible destructiveness of so-called world history as well as the cruelty of nature, and being in danger of longing for Buddhistic negation of the will. Art saves him through art—life.[14]
Art saves, or rather maintains the tension between the opposing forces, art lays bare the absurdity of existence and manifests the power of the Dionysian through Apollonian images. The real is presented in its rawness to a public, which is no passive spectator but an active participant in the rhythmic dance, in the play of reality. We can see in this movement that there is no resolution, or satisfaction, nor is there a striving to satisfy, but rather an affirmation of life as such.

We have pointed towards the gap, the difference, or space which separates Nietzsche from Schopenhauer. The space which animates, the difference between the search for ends and the affirmation of trajectories. The relation between The World as Will and Representation and The Birth of Tragedy, is the difference between being and becoming, the difference between the denial and the affirmation of life. In many ways the Nietzschean critique of Socrates, which is a novel development of The Birth of Tragedy, is simultaneously a critique of Schopenhauer. Socrates, the origin of the profound illusion, the faith that being can be sought in the world of illusion; this seeking for truth can be nothing other than a denial of life and therefore a kind of nihilism. Schopenhauer betrays himself by seeking to arrest the flux, by failing to recognize the possible affirmation of becoming. “Our Schopenhauer was such a Dürer Knight; he lacked all hope, but he desired truth. He has no peers.”[15]








[1] Friedrich Nietzsche. Thus Spoke Zarathustra: A Book For All and For None. Trans. Walter Kaufmann. New York: Penguin Books, 1978. pp. 84.
[2] Paramount amongst its failures, at least for Nietzsche, resided in its pessimistic conclusion, or more specifically in the conclusion that ultimately the only salvation from the suffering of the world is to deny the will altogether. Arthur Schopenhauer. The World As Will and Representation, trans E.F.J. Payne. New York: Dover Publications, 1966. pp. 405.
[3] Friedrich Nietzsche. The Birth of Tragedy and The Case of Wagner. Trans. Walter Kaufmann. New York: Vintage Books, 1967. pp. 24.
[4] Schopenhauer makes the proximity of this faith to the Christian faith, explicit, this fact alone seems to point to the fact that the critique of Schopenhauer and Socrates, made by Nietzsche, also holds as a critique of Christianity. (World 407)
[5] Schopenhauer is both an ontological monist, that is his Will is singular, and an epistemological dualist.
[6] Schopenhauer. The World As Will and Representation. pp. 309.
[7] Nietzsche seems to avoid the Ideas altogether perhaps he refers to this when he claims that “he (Schopenhauer) had found a way out on which, however, I cannot follow him.” (Birth 51.)
[8] Schopenhauer. The World As Will and Representation. pp. 195.
[9] Nietzsche. The Birth of Tragedy. pp. 33.
[10] Nietzsche. The Birth of Tragedy. pp. 34.
[11] Ibid., pp. 36.
[12] Ibid., pp. 55.
[13] Nietzsche. The Birth of Tragedy. pp. 42.
[14] Ibid., pp.59.
[15] Nietzsche. The Birth of Tragedy. pp. 123.