July 23, 2009
INTERVIEW WITH SANTIAGO ZABALA, AUTHOR OF THE REMAINS OF BEING: HERMENEUTIC ONTOLOGY AFTER METAPHYSICS
From the Columbia University Press website:
Question: Your last book, The Hermeneutic Nature of Analytic Philosophy: A Study of Ernst Tugendhat, centered on the German philosopher in order to dismiss the division of philosophy into the analytic and continental schools, while in this new book you seem to engage in a strictly ontological issue: “What remains of Being after the deconstruction of metaphysics?” What is the difference between both books? What is the goal now?
S
antiago Zabala: I don’t think there is a big difference since they both engage in what has become the most important problem for philosophy since Heidegger: how can metaphysics be overcome? While in the first book I gave an answer through the postmetaphysical thought of Tugendhat, in this new book I confront the problem at its root, that is, through the concept of Being. Although in this new book I include a whole section on Tugendhat (as well as sections on Jacques Derrida, Reiner Schürmann, Jean-Luc Nancy, Hans-Georg Gadamer, and Gianni Vattimo), its purpose to expose the remnants of Being in Tugendhat’s philosophy, which shows the continuity between both investigations. In sum, the goal of this book is to expose the remains of Being after Heidegger’s destruction of metaphysics in contemporary philosophy. The greatest achievements of this destruction are, first, the revelation that Being has always been described as a present object in its presentness and, second, the realization that it is not possible to definitively overcome this objective interpretation without falling back into another descriptive interpretation. In this condition, where metaphysics cannot be “überwinden,” (overcome, meaning a complete abandonment of the problem) but can only be “verwinden” (surpassed, alluding to the way one surpasses a major disappointment not by forgetting it but by coming to terms with it) it is necessary to start interpreting Being through its remains, which is a concept that maintains metaphysics in such a way to also overcome it.
More here.
Posted by S. Abbas Raza at 05:59 PM | Permalink
Comments
What's strange is that the author claims to overcome the analytic/continental distinction when he in fact etches it stone. Contemporary metaphysics is alive and well in analytic philosophy and would be surprised to hear that its death was told by Heidegger or that it had to think much about Being with a capital B. Take a look at Kit Fine, Ted Sider, Peter van Inwagen, to name just a few.
Posted by: Jonathan | Jul 23, 2009 8:56:14 PM
Very interesting and promising. Thanks Abbas. Just pre-ordered this on Amazon.
Jonathan: I don't think Zabala is saying that Heidegger said that metaphysics is dead (I searched for "death" in the interview and didn't find it). He refers to Heidegger's work as a kind of "destruction," which is distinct from death, and which he does not really define in this interview. One clue is:
Posted by: Namit | Jul 24, 2009 12:01:25 AM
Thanks, great article.
Posted by: Daniel | Jul 24, 2009 3:38:49 AM
Zabala may have "dismissed the division of philosophy into analytic and continental schools", but speaking as one trained in the analytic school, reading (or trying to read) this sort of stuff only makes me more determined than ever to keep the firewall intact.
Posted by: Nick | Jul 24, 2009 5:38:20 AM
Wow. I'm glad I studied philosophy at an American university, because that was just pure obscurantism.
Posted by: Michael | Jul 24, 2009 11:11:44 AM
After raking my poor brain for 30 minutes trying to understand being, or at less being's remnants,I find myself longing for nothingness. Is this an ontological mistake?
Posted by: J. H. | Jul 24, 2009 11:19:55 AM
At least.
Posted by: J. H. | Jul 24, 2009 11:20:51 AM
I hear you Nick! What's amazing is that one who asks "what remains of metaphysics" seems either ignorant of or uninterested actual metaphysics as it is practiced in contemporary philosophy. Again, it's a lively field, whose major topics aren't even addressed here.
Posted by: Jonathan | Jul 24, 2009 1:08:31 PM
I find it quite simply amazing that one would say that the following claim contains a clue to understanding another claim:
"The greatest achievements of this destruction are, first, the revelation that Being has always been described as a present object in its presentness and, second, the realization that it is not possible to definitively overcome this objective interpretation without falling back into another descriptive interpretation."
This is a travesty of careful philosophical thinking. I am surprised and disappointed to see this interview posted on this blog.
Posted by: MRM | Jul 24, 2009 2:06:51 PM
Opinions on this piece will vary of course, and that's fair enough; people come to it from different vantage points and preparation (mine is quite inadequate). But with all this suspicion of continental philosophy and self-congratulation on studying in American universities, people might soon begin talking about a tribalistic turn in philosophy.
(And some links for bedtime reading: one, two, three.)
Posted by: Namit | Jul 24, 2009 4:35:29 PM
Namit's comment about tribalism is exactly right and is a good explanation for the occurrence of phrases like "Being has always been described as a present object in its presentness" in some philosophical writing. That is, such obscurantism exists because folks who write this way are members of an insular community that allows them to get away with it without challenge.
There is absolutely nothing self-congratulatory about demanding clarity in thought and expression, nor does it imply an expression of suspicion of continental philosophy. I am sure I am not alone in my complete willingness to endorse Julian Young's statement (as quoted by Leiter at the end of his remarks to which Namit links):
"The Continental tradition contains most of the great, truly synoptic, European thought of the past 200 years. That is why…whereas analytic philosophy has proved of little or no interest to the humanities other than itself, the impact of Continental philosophy has been enormous. But there is also a great deal of (mostly French) humbug in the Continental tradition. This is why there is a powerful need for philosophers equipped with analytic methodology to work within…the Continental tradition—to sort the gold from the humbug."
I must confess that it strikes me as a bit strange to include a link to an article that includes this line in a post whose general drift is in the direction of supporting Zabala.
Posted by: MRM | Jul 24, 2009 5:14:59 PM
Leiter's comments are spot on, more analytic philosophers " to sort the gold from the humbug" is definately needed. What's not needed is more people making "humbug" like Zabala seems to have done. If he's intentionally unclear then that's just irresponsible scholarship. If he can't be clear on what he means then perhaps he should consider a different career or at the very least take more time before publishing.
Posted by: Michael | Jul 24, 2009 6:19:32 PM
MRM: I agree that clarity is always a worthy goal to aspire to, and a whole lot of pieces on both side of the pond can benefit from it. But what is not reasonable, and which I sense on this thread, is a kind of petulance that demands that every academic philosopher immediately make complete sense to all educated people in general, no matter how short his piece or who his target audience is. We don't expect this from lawyers, do we?
Take your example. If you have done Heidegger 101, the phrase "Being has always been described as a present object in its presentness" will not strike you as obscure at all. The way I read this is as follows: Being does not exist in absolute, Cartesian terms but contextually, much as life is defined in its living; a hammer is understood thorough the skill and experience of hammering; and so on.
Heidegger had to define a whole new set of words and phrases ("ready-to-hand", "present-at-hand", etc.) in his ontological investigation, in order to avoid using words with imprecise or multifarious historical meanings (for e.g., "existence", "awareness", etc.). Until my grappling with Heidegger, I had a rather dismissive stance toward him and his phrases (colored too by his political blunders). His language may appeal more to "insiders" but his ideas certainly have no such limitation. My experience tells me that sometimes it requires patient engagement and immersion in a philosophical work's terminology, history, and methods, before the light bulb goes on. Not that this always happens—I'm not claiming a lightbulb experience yet, just that Zabala's book is promising.
Posted by: Namit | Jul 24, 2009 7:14:52 PM
Namit,
No one here is saying that philosophers need to write in ways that are understandable to the layperson. The common thread is that philosophers need to be engaging in arguments, with clearly defined terms and methods. Shared terms of art are one thing; obscure cultism is another. Your paraphrase of Heidegger while less painful than Zabala's original still strikes me as ultimately meaningless. What do you mean by "absolute Cartesian terms"? Really, what part of Descartes? How are these terms Cartesian as opposed to Aristotelian, say, or Kantian? Who would ever say that a hammer could be understood without reference to hammering? One wants a clearly laid out sense of the project, its questions, the philosophical tradition it belongs to, the current state of play in field. Misty talk about Being (a word that strikes me, again, as effectively meaningless) or the destruction of metaphysics gets us nowhere.
Posted by: Jonathan | Jul 24, 2009 8:13:17 PM
Jonathan,
> One wants a clearly laid out sense of the project, its questions, the philosophical tradition it belongs to, the current state of play in field. Misty talk about Being (a word that strikes me, again, as effectively meaningless) or the destruction of metaphysics gets us nowhere.
It's pretty clear that in his interview and this book on ontology, Zabala takes for granted a fair bit of familiarity with the Heideggerean project, its terms, and the tradition (which have been around for 70+ years) and tries to move forward via the work of six others. With all due respect, your remark above suggests a total lack of familiarity with the themes of Heidegger's Being and Time, and if I may say so, a certain anti-intellectualism (though I don't get that sense from your other comments on 3QD). Really, how much effort did you put into discovering the meaning of these terms in the Heideggerean context before calling them meaningless and "obscure cultism"? I know of several decent books and professors in US universities who tackle Heidegger, and there is nothing misty about it. I'm afraid that given your remark above, you are not Zabala's audience.
Posted by: Namit | Jul 24, 2009 11:41:27 PM
Ad hominem attacks don't really support your point much. Neither does dismissing as anti-intellectual a series of comments that simply asked for some clarity around core concepts. I'm still waiting to hear, mind you, what you meant by defining being in "absolute Cartesian terms." I could say your refusal to define that throw away bit of jargon was just ignorant. But I won't. Anyhow, if you scroll up, you might notice that I began with a curiosity about the so-called destruction of metaphysics in light of the relatively healthy academic discipline of metaphysics. Not much anti-intellectual about that; rather pro intellectual I'd say.
Posted by: Jonathan | Jul 25, 2009 12:10:07 AM
I would just love this to be translated into terms that were plain enough to understand, and I strongly suspect that it couldn't be.
Because this is worse than the worst art writing. Reading the word "presentness" makes me ache. While I am not an intellectual, I am not anti-intellectual, either. Those who would divide the world into those two camps are forgetting that they too lack special knowledge of many fields that thinkers and writers trouble to make intelligible to them.
Yes, I know -- this kind of philosophy is written to be understood only by others who would write it themselves. May it always be so.
Posted by: Elatia Harris | Jul 25, 2009 1:00:34 AM
Jonathan,
I take my ad hominem attacks seriously—avoiding them, i.e. Let's not get too hypersensitive here. Saying that a remark suggests lack of familiarity (or ignorance, as you "could say" for mine)—or that a brusque dismissal of a major philosophical tradition suggests anti-intellectualism—is hardly ad hominem. No more than your calling Zabala's words misty, meaningless, and obscure cultist.
To clarify what I meant by "absolute, Cartesian terms," while also illustrating its Heideggerean vantage point, I can scarcely do better than direct you to an article I wrote for 3QD a month or so ago, The Dearth of Artificial Intelligence. In it I also tried to make intelligible, as best as I could, some of the core Heideggerean concepts and their implications for AI. If you saw it before, you didn't comment on it and I am curious what you think of it now.
Posted by: Namit | Jul 25, 2009 2:20:01 AM
Let's remember (1) that we're not referencing a work of written philosophy but a spoken interview conducted in the moment (2) by a non-native speaker of English. "Present object in its presentness" makes me cringe too, but some slack, please, for style.
Jonathan,
You may not care for it but "Being" and "Becoming" are major concepts in Western philosophy dating back to he Presocratics. The fact that most metaphysics has been done in languages other than English, which render the concepts differently, makes it extremely tricky. You do need a scorecard to tell the difference between to on and to ti en einai or Sein and Seiende. (It might take longer than the "30 minutes" J.H. devoted to it). Even philosophers whose cup of tea Heidegger is not will readily concede he is not just yammering. In this context to say that "Being" is a meaningless concept is to dismiss not just Heidegger but virtually all historical attempts to come to grips with metaphysics from Aristotle, though Leibniz, Kant, Peirce, Sartre, into present-day conversations by (for example) Habermas and Rorty. Such a dismissal gives the appearance anti-intellectualism though I agree with Namit that your comments here are generally probing and informed.
Citations of recent (and, to be fair, minor) analytic philosophers notwithstanding, the fact remains that one of the main projects of analytic philosophy for most of the 20th century was getting out from under the burden of metaphysical questions. That project is now beginning to be seen as a failure but it typifies much of what lies, historically, beneath the analytic-synthetic split.
Posted by: Chris Schoen | Jul 25, 2009 2:28:46 AM
Allow me to clarify and to pay my respects to the concept of Being over the past two thousand years of western philosophy. My point was that the jargon one sees in this interview is pretty close to meaningless, and yes that this jargon does grow out of certain bad tendencies in Heidegger. And Chris I simply don't know what you mean by "minor" analytic philosophers. Saul Kripke? David Lewis? Metaphysicians and fine ones at that, though they don't talk much about "being." Namit, I'll read your piece tomorrow.
Posted by: Jonathan | Jul 25, 2009 3:01:43 AM
"This is worse than the worst art writing"
Elatia, I'm with you. It doesn't take 30 minutes to realize this is nothing but intellectual masturbation. Where does it come from? My guess is medieval theology, where they argued about how many angels could dance on the head of a pin. It's been a long time since I could be impressed by clouds of meaningless words. If that makes me "anti-intellectual", I will gladly accept the charge and go back to the people who really respect the meaning and use of words, like Shakespeare.
Posted by: J. H. | Jul 25, 2009 9:30:30 AM
Jonathan,
You didn't cite Kripke and Lewis, you cited Fine, Sider, and Inwagen--each of whom surely has a more distinguished mind than I, though they seemed unsual choices to vindicate a long and storied philosophical tradition dating back to Russell and Frege.
My point is just that metaphysics is inherently unanalytical; in fact it's the opposite of analysis. This is what made metaphysics a very unwelcome topic during the first 50 - 75 years of anglophone philosophy which largely desired to discuss things it could only know with mathematical certainty. The present generation of analytic philosophers is making amends for this, which would seem to lend at least partial grounds for Zabala's proposed re-unification of continental and analytic philosophy.
Posted by: Chris Schoen | Jul 25, 2009 11:52:26 AM
Elatia,
Would you reserve the same critique for Kant, also a notoriously abysmal stylist? Kant had things to say to ages; Heidegger too, though Zabala perhaps has only footnotes to add.
I appeal again to the fact that this piece is an extemporaneous conversation, dubiously transcribed, though I grant that Zabala is no poet. (The typos are hardly his fault, though--does Columbia still have a J-school?)
You have every right to refuse engagement with the ideas in this interview with your honor intact; I'm only nominally interested in them myself and the poor ratio of ore to gemstones is part of why. But I think you'd be surprised at what an able and tenacious writer could do to make this discussion resonate with you.
Posted by: Chris Schoen | Jul 25, 2009 12:11:51 PM
In addition to what Chris notes, let's also not forget that we are probably listening in on a conversation between two academics. It appears on a university press website, not Salon.com. I think he is not trying to reach the masses, and therefore has no obligation to appeal to laypeople. Academic papers and books in other fields do this all the time. Elatia's statement, "This is worse than the worst art writing," can apply to any number of professionals writing or talking to each other: corporate marketing execs, pharmacists, programmers, etc. They may strike outsiders as entirely "jargon filled" and worse, even though they are making sense to each other. The audience is important! As in other disciplines, sometimes "philosophy is written to be understood only by others who would write it themselves." This does not mean no significant ideas are contained in it, just that, as Chris said, sometimes it takes others to make them consumable for laypeople.
Really, I am flummoxed by the dominant response to this piece. If I don't know much about an area of academic philosophy (and there are plenty of those), if I am not familiar with its project, terms, and history, and if I don't see it clarified in an interview by the author for other academics, I would either silently switch to Shakespeare (as JH would do), or bloody well try and learn more. Spewing knee-jerk vitriol on a public site, thereby exposing my ignorance of its terminology—as well as intolerance for a whole philosophical tradition—is the last thing I will consider doing.
Posted by: Namit | Jul 25, 2009 12:51:38 PM
Chris,
I cited Fine, Sider, and van Inwagen because they are analytic philosophers currently doing important and influential work in metaphysics. My point was just to show how metaphysics is a live discipline, even if has a very different kind of idiom from what you find in this interview. They are minor only in the scale of Kant and Russell you've been invoking, quite major when it comes to the humdrum life of working academics. But I realize I slipped quickly to Kripke and Lewis, and that's the trouble of arguing in this sort of medium. My point was just that analytic philosophy found its way back to metaphysics on it own, without a reconciliation with the "continental" tradition as it is described here. As you know, the Kripkean moment—40 years ago!—purported to solve Quine's critique of analysis by turning to modality and possible world semantics. This was a turn to metaphysics that hasn't really gone away.
The difference between philosophers like Kripke and Fine and philosophers like Zabala isn't about metaphysics, really, or even about continental versus analytic, if the former is taken to include Frege and Kant and Nietzche. It's about style and method of argument. I'll take the former any day.
Posted by: Jonathan | Jul 25, 2009 1:13:56 PM
interesting slip, i meant "latter" obviously
Posted by: Jonathan | Jul 25, 2009 1:16:04 PM
Namit,
I read your interesting piece on AI. I do think that the account of the "western philosophical tradition" from Descartes onward as a kind of blinkered dualism approaches caricature but I now have a fuller sense of what you mean. The concept of the affordance that Blattner uses is from J.J. Gibson by the way. There's a return to this sort of stuff in for example the idea of extended mind (in Clarke) and enactive, machine learning in AI. I know some about EM, very little about AI.
In defense of Elatia, I don't think this is just overheard talk between two academics: first of all, it's an interview on the Press website, presumably to publicize their book for an audience that might include an educated lay reader, and second, because even as a conversation among academics its obscure and jargon-ridden. Most philosophy is difficult to pick up and read without some training, but all philosophy should be able to be translated into language people care about and use. You do that in your piece. I just don't think this interview, for what it's worth, could be. And I agree, it does sound like the kind of pretentious gobblygook you see far too often at exhibitions and openings these days.
Posted by: Jonathan | Jul 25, 2009 1:44:03 PM
Namit and Chris,
Thank you for clarifying the ontological fardel of this discussion.
Posted by: Louise Gordon | Jul 25, 2009 2:14:51 PM
Analytic philosphers certainly use terminology that a layperson wouldn't understand on a quick reading. Take "qualia" for instance- it's a generally accepted term in the philosophy of mind yet I doubt that a layperson picking up a journal article about consciousness would know what qualia stood for, viz. raw feels and sensations. But the difference between qualia and "presentness", "Being", or whatever else is that qualia can be explicated, whereas the other terms are vague at the very least, meaningless at the worst.
Posted by: Michael | Jul 25, 2009 3:27:05 PM
At this point, I just have a few general observations, directed at no one in particular. I think the real undercurrent I see here is a wide, deep-seated distrust of the continental philosophical tradition of Heidegger, with his "bad tendencies", jargon, obfuscation, etc. Believe me, I can understand why so many feel this way. What I am insisting here is that with the right effort, patience and open mind, one can gain some really precious insights in Heidegger. Consider this: if one has taken a strong dislike to the external form of the Chinese opera, preferring Shakespeare in the Park instead, one will miss out on the rich stories the former tells. The style, exposition, terms, and methods of French and German metaphysicians can be different and more laborious—but without an open mind and perseverance, it will similarly strike us as irritating or gibberish, and we will miss the nuggets.
Writing about how art has changed in our times, Czeslaw Milosz observed, ‘we have become indifferent to content, and react, not even to form, but to technique, to technical efficiency itself.’ Sign of the times, he implied. A version of this can be extended to the style of philosophy many prefer today. A disproportionate obsession with clarity, efficiency, and near mathematical logic of propositions often makes them forgot that philosophy is fundamentally about a way of seeing, and which can be invoked in a variety of ways, some more circuitous than others. As Leiter notes, they "miss the forest for the trees, and they often let dialectical ingenuity trump good sense..."
Metaphysics, as Chris notes, is inherently unanalytical. Even in the West, some of the best work on it has not been done in English. Cultures and languages also encode ways of seeing, and there can be major barriers to their adoption by outsiders. To make it worse, translators often insert themselves (Macquarrie and Robinson turned "being" in German to "Being" with a capital B, making it a bit pompous out of the bag).
The journey with Heidegger and many in his tradition (most notably Foucault) is like a trip to the Serengeti. You might have to endure a long flight, a bad hotel in Dar es Salaam, a train ride with clogged toilets and no water, etc. But then comes a beautiful day and you find yourself in an open jeep on the savanna, encountering a pride of lions. And it all seems worthwhile. To chiefly criticize the rude discomfort of the journey and avoiding it on those grounds certainly means you don't have to face the inconvenience. But there is no savanna and no pride of lions either.
Posted by: Namit | Jul 25, 2009 3:41:54 PM
Namit,
I'd rather face a pride of lions, a troop of baboons or an ambush of tigers than have to read this jargon. If some find it interesting, then human diversity is a wonderful thing.
Posted by: J. H. | Jul 25, 2009 4:01:37 PM
"Metaphysics is inherently unanalytical" is a proposition, and its truth or falsity will depend on how you define "metaphysics" and "analytical," neither of which you've done here (nor has Chris). I strongly suspect that were you to do so the proposition would turn out to be false.
Posted by: Jonathan | Jul 25, 2009 4:12:17 PM
If stuff does not take hold of our emotions from the outset even if we do not comprehend the full meaning of it, we likely will not spend the time to probe it deeper. I used to have strong opinions that people don't appear to give Heidegger's philosophy the requisite time to sit through and understand it fully, before dismissing it. But I am not sure of that anymore. That Serengeti example is a curious one, but I am not sure if it holds. With Serengeti you already have an expectation of what you are going to see, you are locked in emotionally. It is a deliberate giving-in to "the rude discomfort of the journey," because you are able to discern the difference between the rude discomfort and the experience of the savanna.
But what if we do not experience that emotional sway? How long are we willing to put up with words, notions and concepts that we do not relate to - in a human way - before giving up? Not only with Heidegger, but I am sure there are some among the 3QD readers who feel this way with Shakespeare too. And perhaps even Richard Feynman. Speaking like this one can say, "that is the true test of an important work: whether it appeals to the most stubborn mind or not," but that's not fair either. How many of us truly felt a connection to a work of philosophy or of literature or whatever... in a language that still remained strange and unrelatable even after we believe that we accomplished such a connection? Not many or none would be my answer. A lot of times it is the critic who helps us get over this emotional disconnect. Or the interpreter. Secondary literature is very good at being a witness, albeit with a somewhat arrogant detachment. My point is...I guess I don't have a point.
Regards, Crazyfinger
Posted by: Crazyfinger | Jul 25, 2009 5:53:08 PM
I don't typically comment, but I have to agree with Namit and Chris. The problem is simply an unfamiliarity with Heidegger.
I'm only an undergraduate at an American University and some, though not all, of the information in the article was perplexing to me, though only because I have just begun studying Heidegger this past Spring. That being said, the language used was not all that foreign because of my familiarity with Being and Time. J.H. and Jonathan, please go out and purchase a copy. I mean no disrespect, I simply think you will enjoy it in the end. Of course, going through the book alone is not advisable and Hubert Dreyfus has posted his Berkeley lectures as free podcasts on iTunes (they are extremely helpful). And if you don't use iTunes, you can get them here:
http://webcast.berkeley.edu/course_details.php?seriesid=1906978475
There's even a great interview with Dreyfus on YouTube that serves to give a good idea of what you'll be reading (I hope you'll watch all 5 parts):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aaGk6S1qhz0
Posted by: Daniel | Jul 25, 2009 6:29:49 PM
Crazyfinger,
I'm with you on the matter of emotional appeal. Philosophy, no less than other disciplines, has to seduce to some extent, has to hold out some promise of gain, before we invest anything in it. As I've said above, it is perfectly fine for people to not want to read Heidegger or his acolytes. He is not for everyone. What I am objecting to is a willful dissing before one has done even the minimal homework. Why not gracefully stay away? We do it with so many unappealing topics all the time.
I hear you on Serengeti. I'd say that for me the "expectation of what you are going to see" (though not exactly which animals when, so to speak) had been built up by good introductory material, by teachers like Dreyfus (whose Heidegger course at Berkeley is always heavily oversubscribed) and Bill Blattner. I see that Daniel beat me to it—I was going to post some of the same introductory links on Heidegger. There is also a basic BBC documentary on him (in 6 parts on YouTube).
Posted by: Namit | Jul 25, 2009 7:26:03 PM
Chris, Namit, Jonathan and others,
I appreciate that the diction here is awkward, although it is more precise than my diction would be in any of the several foreign languages that I have learned and, betimes, spoken. So I am sympathetic to that idea, as well as to the argument that this is neither a formal academic paper nor a work of popularized philosophy nor a conversation meant for the general listener. Namit, I do indeed "gracefully stay away" from topics where I have done no reading -- Continental philosophy is not one of them. Disagreement with your point of view is not the same as the state of being unlettered, or even particularly poorly prepared.
Yes, Chris -- Kant is a slog. While I like to read what is well written, not everything I like to read is well written. It couldn't be. If it were, I'd be like Sylvia Marlowe's husband -- permanently rereading _Madame Bovary_ because nothing else made the cut. I am not talking about being inarticulate, or lacking le mot juste, but about a whole way of communicating that sheds no light. Sometimes, that simply is academic discourse, meant for the 17 other people who truly understand. But -- Daniel -- my root problem here is not "unfamiliarity with Heidegger." Has anyone suggested you have either not read enough, or, have read too much, simply because you are deeply sympathetic to the ideas presented here? On the contrary, I congratulate you for being able to find them.
I would like for this thread not to turn into a round-robin about the personal limitations of people who have spoken up, or about their presumed lack of reading. Occasionally one comes to a subject adequately prepared to engage with it and yet finds that one can't engage with it. What does this set off? Not "knee jerk vitriol," actually, but a self-educational process familiar to any reader -- comparing and contrasting what one does know with what one does not yet know, so that clarification may begin to take place. Well -- I wish!
Maybe the people who truly understand what is being said by Zalbala can put it into words he might have used had he been communication-minded. Instead of taking up for him, and pointing out all manner of extenuating circumstances, perhaps paraphrasing him would do his ideas the greatest service. I have tried to cast his words into language that would serve his ideas, and, though I have many deficits, I do not generally search far for a vocabulary and a grammar. I hope you will ponder the possibility that Zalbala's language already perfectly serves his ideas -- that's the whole problem. As Jonathan suggests, it would be very difficult to craft seaworthy language for this thinking. But try it! Perhaps you won't find you're shipping water.
Posted by: Elatia Harris | Jul 25, 2009 9:19:21 PM
Elatia,
First, I have nowhere said or implied that disagreement with my point of view is the "same as the state of being unlettered, or even particularly poorly prepared." That would be very crude, and I am puzzling why you framed it so. What I have said is that calling concepts like Being and "destruction of metaphysics" (akin to Derrida's "deconstruction") meaningless and misty talk suggests a lack of familiarity with a tradition where they're quite integral. If one declared to a Buddhist monk that the concepts of impermanence and no-self are meaningless or pure jargon, it is not the monk who needs to shape up. Stop me now if you do not see these two positions as different.
Second, a good deal in blog exchanges have to do with style (which I know is close to your heart). For such rarefied stuff at any rate, it is one thing to say, "I don't understand this at all", or "It makes no sense to me whatsoever", or like you said—"I would just love this to be translated into terms that were plain enough to understand". But it is quite another thing to dismiss it outright (which some extended to the entire tradition it belongs to) with demands for a firewall, self-congratulation for studying in an American university, declaring it pure obscurantism, obscure cultism, or intellectual masturbation. So I ask: Does this strike you as "knee jerk vitriol" or setting-off what you call a "self-educational process familiar to any reader"? I know you'll be fair.
Third, I'm not a specialist and I haven't even said that I understand all of the philosophical issues that Zabala raises or takes for granted in this interview. But I see no grounds for dismissing him. I relate to quite a few terms, several core themes, and many key problems he raises (such as how to understand being—a definition of being is "that which understands entities as entities", and "that in terms of which entities are already understood as entities"—in light of deconstruction; what remains of being after Heidegger's deconstruction of it; why it is to be understood hermeneutically, i.e., via historical interpretation; how and if we can move past decontruction by "coming to terms with it"), while other issues seem either suggestively interesting, or challenging, or are Greek to me—why I expressed an interest in reading the book. If time permits and I feel brave, I'll attempt a review.
Posted by: Namit | Jul 26, 2009 2:53:05 AM
Elatia,
I'm in the position of not finding Zabala's ideas (to the extent I understand them; like Namit I'm not an expert or specialist) quite fascinating enough to passionately defend, or "translate." On the other hand I know the concepts and traditions he references are not mere jargon and nonsense. You know this too, being not entirely unacquainted with Continental philosophy.
So whether Heidegger, Derrida and Gadamer may deserve someone with something more original to say in their defense, and with a more golden tongue to say it, is not really the point. The comments Namit originally responded to were not to the effect that Zabala was ruining continental philosophy, but that continental philosophy was tosh in the first place. Remember that in the passage that most offends (Being is present in its presentness) Zabala is essentially paraphrasing, however clumsily, a position of Heidegger's. What differentiates your response from the ones by Nick, Michael, J.H. and Jonathan, is that you don't (I think) consider Heidegger a big fat phony.
So it's to them and not you that I ask: is it not possible to simply say "I don't understand what Heidegger means by Being, or "authenticity," or "being-there" (Dasein)." Does the Emperor have to be naked every time something seems "vague" or problematic? (However correct Michael is to tag Being as "vague at best," is he prepared to throw out all of ontology, of which Being is the subject, on the basis of this vagueness?)
In the end, as Namit has been diplomatically trying to observe, this thread seems to come down to ego. It sometimes seems there a default philosophy among educated Anglo-Americans to the effect that "everything I don't understand is nonsensical." If we could let go of that for five minutes, we might have some fun. Heidegger explicitly asks his readers to start from scratch. Perhaps he succeeds and perhaps he fails but jumping in the middle and pointing out he isn't playing by the rules is besides the point in a major way.
Posted by: Chris Schoen | Jul 26, 2009 12:02:07 PM
Jonathan wrote:
"Metaphysics is inherently unanalytical" is a proposition, and its truth or falsity will depend on how you define "metaphysics" and "analytical," neither of which you've done here (nor has Chris).
I don't have private definitions of either term, but I will put it like this. Analysis requires priors for its results to be meaningful. If we subject those priors to analysis (as sometimes we can) we need others to give their analysis meaning. (So for example, the content of a metaphysics [e.g. atomism] may be subject to analysis, but to become so it ceases for the duration to fulfill a metaphysical function.)
The act of analysis requires two roles to be occupied: that of what is being analyzed, and that of what the analyzed thing is being related to. Otherwise analysis is just pure destruction.
I call that latter role metaphysics and I am not original or unique in doing do. It is, by definition, unanalytical, and without which analysis has no meaning.
Posted by: Chris Schoen | Jul 26, 2009 12:18:00 PM
Chris,
Your response is really quite cryptic, so it's hard for me to say what I make of it. Let me review: you said earlier that metaphysics was unanalytic and this is what has made it unappealing for analytic philosophers-- a claim I dispute post-Kripke. Namit then cited you to the effect that metaphysics is better done on the Continent than in Anglophone philosophy.
My response from the beginning has boiled down to this: there are a class of metaphysical questions (concerning for example free will, mind and body, time, composition, and especially modality) that are subject to analysis in the sense of rigorous, logical, argument. If you would not call this analysis but rather something else, then fine (just please not destruction). Nevertheless, there is in fact a lively sub-field of contemporary "analytic" philosophy where these kinds of questions are pursued. I cited some names above. None of this is terribly new; in fact the metaphysical turn in analytic philosophy dates to Kripke's response to Quine more than 40 years ago.
So my point has two parts, neither of which you folks have addressed.
1) Taking up metaphysical questions is an important part of contemporary analytic philosophy. While it is true that the ordinary language philosophy of the mid-twentieth century was hostile to metaphysical topics and concentrated on the analysis of concepts, philosophy post-Kripke has in large part embraced metaphysics.
2) The turn away from the analysis of concepts to modality, possible worlds and the like opened the door not just to metaphysical topics and questions but for a kind of *analysis* that was in fact "metaphysical" in the sense that it was engaged in questions of possibility, contingency, necessity, and like rather than in the meaning of words (per ordinary language prior to Quine).
Let me say in closing that I thank you all for the recommendations to read Heidegger. I have indeed done so, though not for a while and probably not as well as I could. There really is only so much time in the day. My point is not to traduce the authority of sacred texts, just to say that some of the use made of them is quite empty, viz for example Zabala's comments on science in the second question, and that metaphysics is not exhausted by questions of Being, becoming, and the like.
Posted by: Jonathan | Jul 26, 2009 1:19:50 PM
Namit, I'll read your review! I approached this article with the wish to understand what was in it, not to make fun of a philosopher who was talking over my head. I was related to one of the latter, so I can differentiate "trying, but failing, to get it" and "Asshole! Come down off the mountain!" Zabala has put many obstacles in my way, yet I do not accuse him of nonsense on that account, but of impenetrability. And not only the kind that rests on terminology I may find inconvenient. And, you're right! I do admire a good prose style. I've also noticed that plenty of people who have one lack for more important equipment -- a real message, for instance. Between a flashy delivery system for nothing much, and a message that is awkwardly phrased but original, there's no contest.
Chris, you know me well enough to know I don't belittle as nonsense what I fail to understand. I just don't commit the related error of taking my failure to understand someone as a sign that person is really, really smart. I am perfectly content to be baffled by this material -- until such a time as Namit reviews it, and I do not understand the review!
Posted by: Elatia Harris | Jul 26, 2009 1:51:51 PM
Jonathan,
Here are my thoughts on why I think metaphysics is inherently not analytical. As I see it, if a question does not fall in the domain of science and be revealed as "what-is", it is a metaphysical question (for e.g., Why is there something instead of nothing?). I'm sure you'll agree that the realm of metaphysical questions is vast (covering ideas like change, purpose, meaning, mind-body, etc.) and, unlike scientific questions, they are seemingly untethered to reality. As Wittgenstein might have said, they are free floating language games without a final answer.
But must this be so? The crux of our debate I think is this: Can logic step in and "rescue" (at least some fraction of) metaphysics by grounding it in an essential way to reality, making the frame of the questioner irrelevant? I doubt it. An articulate statement on this was provided by Michael Heim (1984) in his introduction to "The Metaphysical Foundations of Logic" by Heidegger. The title of the book is revealing, eh? Your favorite German word "Destruktion" comes to mind. :)
Do you know of a direct refutation of this position by a so-called analytical metaphysician? Btw, thanks for reading and commenting on my AI piece.
Posted by: Namit | Jul 26, 2009 7:21:47 PM
Can't believe this is still on one page...
(Oddly, Being is Present in its Presentness seems to make perfect sense to me. I must be tired)
Posted by: Carlos | Jul 26, 2009 7:33:45 PM
Namit,
The short answer is yes, Wittgenstein's quarrel with metaphysics was answered by Quine and then Kripke. Whether it was refuted is a matter of opinion. Even so, there is a strong tradition of analytic philosophy devoted to nothing other than thinking about metaphysical questions. The status of metaphysics as such--meta-metaphyics, as it's called-- is very trendy; see the recent collection with that title edited by Chalmers et al for Oxford University Press.
I think you're confusing science with logic. They're not the same thing.
Posted by: Jonathan | Jul 26, 2009 8:52:36 PM
Jonathan,
I can see why you think that. The question I raised in my previous comment expects logic to serve a function similar to science. What is the point of analytical metaphysics if not to use logic to render the frame of the questioner irrelevant? Otherwise, it's continental metaphysics adapted to include a different technique to arrive at no "better" answers. Which is fine with me. But all we then have is the pleasing sensation of a "rational metaphysics" with still no grounding beneath. As Heim asks, "Does the modern logical system have implications for describing what is ultimately real? Or can languages be developed, both natural and artificial, which have no more ontological commitment than is required for internal self-consistency?" He mentions Quine and then argues for the contrary position, adding:
This also sounds like Wittgenstein. I'll look up Chalmers' book to see if it addresses such topics...
Posted by: Namit | Jul 26, 2009 10:58:00 PM
Namit,
This may help:
MetaMeta
Chalmers
Posted by: Louise Gordon | Jul 27, 2009 12:29:08 AM
They should punish these people by confining them to Twitter.
Posted by: aguy109 | Jul 27, 2009 1:45:27 AM
Namit's defense of Zabala and attack on those who have criticized Zabala's language consists of invoking Heidegger: Zabala knows his Heidegger (Namit does too!) and is deliberately working in his wake; his critics are ignorant of Heidegger, which explains the self-congratulatory, anti-intellectual, petulant, knee jerk vitriol of such lay people.
Along the way to this conclusion, Namit directs us to Dreyfus and Blattner, who certainly know their Heidegger as well. Namit clearly doesn't realize that invoking them doesn't help his defense of Zabala and in fact completely supports those petulant anti-intellectuals who have criticized his language as obscurantist. Here's why. Dreyfus and Blattner, along with fellow Heidegger scholars like John Haugeland, Sean Kelly, Mark Wrathall, Mark Okrent, Taylor Carman, and a host of others form the core of the International Society for Phenomenological Studies. This society and their brand of Heidegger (sometimes called California Phenomenology of West Coast Heidegger) are a deliberate attempt to get away from the way Heidegger is discussed by folks like Zabala and by people in the Society for Phenomenology and Existentialist Philosophy. You won't find the language that some here have criticized in their work because they fervently believe that good careful philosophy doesn't rely on such jargon.
So the very people to which Namit points those of us who have had the temerity to challenge Zabala's language (which, mind you, is all that's been challenged by at least the more obviously thoughtful of Zabala's critics here) feel exactly the same way!
The existence of ISPS and their rift with SPEP is not common knowledge outside of professional philosophy, so it would probably be rude and unfair to dismiss Namit as being intellectually lazy here, no? In fact, it's probably uncharitable as hell to make accusations like that without really good evidence.
Posted by: MRM | Jul 29, 2009 12:41:16 PM
MRM:
SPEP, which you claim is marred by obscurantism, is "The second largest American philosophical society, devoted to supporting philosophy inspired by Continental European traditions." It has over 2500 members. It is one of 180+ global societies and organizations dedicated to phenomenology, across Argentina, Bulgaria, Hong Kong, India, 7 in Japan, and more. There is another one on the West Coast, in Seattle. ISPS is yet another, formed in 2005.
There are all kinds of reasons for setting up a new group: easier manageability, travel time, pet themes, focus, greater intimacy, prestige, professional egos of the big stars, etc. To say that ISPS was set up to get away from SPEP due to the obscurantism practiced by 2500 academics strikes me as plain ludicrous (can you provide citations please?). It certainly is not in keeping with the attitude of Blattner, director of ISPS, who is reluctant to even give credence to any meaningful differences between Analytic and Continental philosophy.
Let me say again that I'm not defending Zabala here, only opposing the grounds for rejecting him. Even Being and Time is a notoriously difficult slog. It does not mean there is nothing significant in it. An open mind and familiarity with basic terms (Being, destruction of metaphysics, facticity, etc.) are necessary when engaging with some academic output. By the way, did you notice that many American academics have already praised his book, including one who associates with ISPS?!
Posted by: Namit | Jul 29, 2009 4:13:47 PM
Namit,
Oddly enough, your own article on AI is much more like the Dreyfus, Noe, "California" Heidegger than the dreary, leaden, lit-crit Heidegger of Derrida and the like. So your interest in defending the Zabalas of the world strikes me as curious. The quotation from Blattner again is in keeping with MRM's point. You can find similar statements about the nullity of the Continental-Analytic divide by Brian Leiter, for example, perhaps the fiercest critic of SPEP out there.
Posted by: Jonathan | Jul 29, 2009 4:23:23 PM
Page 2, here we come!
Jonathan,
Mixing sunshine with Heidegger always makes a headier brew! But my AI article was done by a non-specialist for other non-specialists. My role was like that of a science journalist vs. academic science. Dreyfus is one of those rare ones who is both a good academic and a good teacher and writer for non-specialists. Heidegger himself wouldn't have scored high on his pedagogical skills, and many other able academics don't either, though they do perfectly good work. It's fine to say their style is not what one prefers or finds accessible, but we really need something more to say there is no substance in it, that it's "pretentious gobblygook". (I'm really repeating myself now.)
Not sure how Blattner's quote supports MRM's point, which is that ISPS was formed to escape the obscurantism of 2500 academics in SPEP (I'm waiting for reasonable support for this claim). In rejecting even the supposedly sharper stylistic differences between Continental and Analytic philosophy, I was hoping to show that Blatter is unlikely to have helped setup ISPS due only to stylistic differences in phenomenological prose. Again, this is how he ends his response to Leiter.
Posted by: Namit | Jul 29, 2009 7:04:49 PM
There is an increasing awareness, advanced by Zabala, of a need to fuse thought of many sorts and science of many sorts into a movement to preserve the human species.
Ecocosmology is also toward that end / beginning.
Posted by: Dredd | Sep 29, 2009 11:08:57 AM
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