What Is a Thing? (English and German Edition)

By Martin Heidegger

Book Overview

Die Schrift bringt den Text einer Vorlesung, die im Wintersemester 1935/36 unter dem Titel ?Grundfragen der Metaphysik? an der Universit?t Freiburg/Br. gehalten wurde. Sie ist zu einem wesentlichen... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0895269791
• ISBN13: 9780895269799
• Release Date: January 1968
• Publisher: Gateway Editions
• Weight: 0.72 lbs.

Customer Reviews

A good marriage

Kant never effectively addressed the question of the independent reality of "things" (thing in itself). He supplied an outline of the epistemologic structure of human thinking that, based as it was on forms and concepts that were transcendental i.e. universal and necessary and therefore a priori, gave as close as he believed we could get to objective "truth". Because we are hardwired to apply the pure forms of intuition (space and time) and the schematized pure concepts of the understanding (rules by which we make judgments, in conjunction with the pure forms of intuition and empiric intuitions and concepts from sensibility) to "experience" our world, we are able to engage in a meaningful discourse with others of our type who share the same hard wiring. This means that space and time and the schematized pure concepts, such as cause and effect, may have no independent reality. We can never know since we can never travel beyond the limitations our minds impose upon us. Of course this means that "things", as they really are, are closed off to knowing. So how does Heidegger make use of Kant to come to what is a "thing"? In fact Heidegger would be much like a transcendental idealist if he were concerned with the term. It is his orientation that is different. For Heidegger the issue is not the epistemic makeup of humans but the ontological structure of human Being (Dasein). If Kant is simply turned upside down he is the perfect compliment. Kant is describing the structure of Dasein's knowing, and is saying that we have access to this, through logic and the necessary character of the transcendental forms and concepts, that we can never have to the external world (one can argue whether the pure forms of intuition and the pure concepts of the understanding are really "things" in themselves and if so why can we know them). Kant is therefore describing an aspect of Dasein's ontologic structure. This same privileged access to self knowledge is what Heidegger would like to say about Dasein's exploration of its Being. We have an immediate access to it that we cannot necessarily have to other things. The "things" of the world take their importance and relevance, for us, from their relationships to Dasein's projects. Their independent reality is not as important or is not knowable. The importance of "things in themselves" lies in their importance to Dasein- not in their reality independent of Dasein. This finishes the circle then. Kant says we can know the truth of the basic epistemic structure of human Being (one of its ontologic characteristics) but not the truth of other beings. Heidegger says we can know other ontologic aspects of human Being and that the importance of other beings is settled in what they say about Dasein and not in themselves. This book gives a fair picture of Kant's basic theory from the Critique of Pure Reason, but through a Heideggerian lens. I personally would not read it to understand Kant, it is at once too simplified and

Great Title, tough text

The best guide to this book is the contents, pages iii-iv, which have topic titles for every few pages that probably won't mean a thing the first time you read them. If you are serious about this book, you will pay attention to those titles. Unless you speak German or Latin, or have a fantastic memory of why an expert like Heidegger would mention conglomerating thinkers like Hegel, the titles in the Contents will be the best guide you will have to figuring out what you are already supposed to know, when it finally matters. You won't get such help again, when you finally reach long sections on judgment (pp. 153-181), synthetic judgments (pp. 181-184), and the final section of:II. The Question About the Thing in Kant's Main Work . . .7. Systematic representation of all the synthetic principles of pure understanding (pp. 184-244).If there was ever a question that Martin Heidegger could use to demonstrate his knowledge of philosophy as a distinctly human outlook on what anyone might encounter, the book WHAT IS A THING? puts that question in the title. Most of the book is a discussion of Kant's philosophical project, as seen from a far more modern perspective. A short Preface by Martin Heidegger, dated April, 1962, states:This work presents the text of a lecture which was held in the winter semester, 1935-36, at the University of Freiburg. The lecture was entitled "Basic Questions of Metaphysics."The English translation by W. B. Barton, Jr. and Vera Deutsch is followed by an analysis by Eugene T. Gendlin of the University of Chicago, as published in 1967. The Contents has detailed titles for the sections at the beginning of the book, including 12 items and an enumerated "13. Summary" on "A. Various Ways of Questioning About the Thing" before getting to the main topic, "B. Kant's Manner of Asking About the Thing." I was puzzled by the opening remarks, but the Analysis points out, "Although written as a simple common-sense discussion, it contains all of Heidegger's major points." (p. 247). Most of the Analysis sticks to English, but four pages are referred to as supporting the idea, "An object in German is a Gegenstand, literally a standing-against." (p.260). There is an index of German Terms in which ten pages of Heidegger's lecture are listed for the term Gegenstand, one page for Gegenheit, another page for Gegenstandlichkeit, another for Gegenstehen, a few for Gegenstehenlassen, and even one for Gegen-uns-stehenden. (p. 302). I don't know German well enough to know if this is getting too personal for you, but something bipolar seems to be an aspect of WHAT IS A THING?The indices are of Names, German Terms, Latin Terms, and Greek Terms. The topics listed in the Contents manage to be in English for Part A., but the first word in B. I. 4. is in Greek characters, which I believe can be transliterated as Logos. Heidegger is close to the ancient Greek beginnings of philosophy, the problems encountered in Plato and the attempt at scienti

Great intro to Kant

Why is this out of print? That it is, and has been for a long time, is a lamentable shame. In this relatively short book (the translation could do with a bit of revision) Heidegger provides one of the best and clearest introductions to Kant's First Critique available in any language. Almost nothing in the English-language secondary literature on Kant makes clear what Kant means by "synthetic judgment", and since the stated theme of the First Critique is "how are synthetic judgments a priori possible?", this makes for a lot of useless English language secondary literature. Much of the fault for this situation lies with Norman Kemp-Smith, whose translation of Kant's text was the one used by most English-speaking readers for a long time. Interstingly, the structure of synthetic judgements, fudged and rendered incoherent by Kemp-Smith, is the first thing Heidegger zeroes in on in explaining what Kant's about. I would steer anyone who wants to read Kant first to this book, for an explanation of the basic terms of the First Critique, and then to Deleuze's little book on Kant, to get an overview, taking in all three of the Critiques, of Kant's philosophy in general.As a further bonus, this book's introductory sections provide a very enlightening and provocative discussion of the theme of mathesis in early modern philosophy and science.