Ontology and Existence: On the Way to Practice

The turn from the theory of Being in Being and Time to political practice did not occur immediately, although it was also not long in coming. Since important thinkers do not always realize the implications of their ideas, and Heidegger was an important thinker, it is possible that he was not immediately aware of the political implications of his study of ontology. Nevertheless, he quickly turned to practice and to politics on the basis of his thought. The initial step out of the ivory tower and into the real world occurred in his discussion of the crisis faced within Germany in the latter part of the Weimar Republic. Since Heidegger was officially concerned only with the problem of Being, he has often been portrayed as an unpolitical person, as uninterested in or unaware of the surrounding world, as the fictional absentminded professor.^[103] On the contrary, Heidegger was deeply aware of and interested in contemporary events, as witness numerous references in his lecture courses to happenings of the day. He was specifically disturbed by the general

cultural mood prevalent in the later period of the Weimar Republic. His analysis of this existential situation is doubly interesting: as a phase in the transition from fundamental ontology to National Socialism through an initial political turning, and as an effort to confront the contemporary political malaise through his theory of Being.

The significance of Heidegger's remarks on cultural criticism, besides their intrinsic interest, lies in his concern to apply his theory of Being to the analysis of the current existential malaise at a point late in the Weimar Republic, as the incipient economic depression is spreading throughout the world, when all concerned are aware that the experiment in democratic liberalism in the Weimar Republic is in deep trouble, when powerful forces are emerging to challenge both liberalism and communism through a conservative revolution from the right.

Heidegger turns to contemporary society in his lecture course of 1929/ 30, at a point located between the publication of Being and Time and prior to the rectoral speech, shortly before his private turning to National Socialism in 1931.^[104] The analysis of Being in Being and Time offers a theoretical reason for the link of fundamental ontology to politics, which is only mandated theoretically but is not yet carried out. It is in abeyance, waiting to happen so to speak. A transition from theory to practice, but not yet to politics, in effect a practical intermezzo, occurs in Heidegger's analysis of the contemporary political situation in his lecture course. Here, we see Heidegger's effort to come to grips with the really existing social world, in this case the current social situation, from the perspective of his philosophical theory.

Heidegger's attempt to confront the existential situation through an analysis of mood is an application of his fundamental ontology. For Heidegger, everyone always has a mood of some kind, and he understands mood as the actually existing manifestation of the potential for state-of-mind.^[105] Heidegger insists that one's state-of-mind, or potential for a given mood, is significant not only to disclose a person as what he or she is but also as an indication of how an individual comes into contact with its world.^[106] For this reason, he regards the state-of-mind in general as providing an important clue for existential analysis. In Being and Time , Heidegger employs his conception of state-of-mind as a basic clue to elucidate fear and anxiety. In his lecture course, Heidegger switches his attention from fear and anxiety to boredom. In his analysis of the present situation, Heidegger insists that the basic mood of the present is boredom induced by the failure to be an authentic person, which he interprets as a clue to a deeper problem: the problem of Being. In his reading of the contemporary situation, in his diagnosis of the contemporary dependence on slogans, Heidegger maintains that no one is really the master of "the inner greatness" (der inneren Grösse ) of Dasein.^[107]

Heidegger maintains that the deep boredom characteristic of current social life is ontologically significant. The discussion comes to a head in the final paragraph of the first part (§ 38), which bears the significant, but rather clumsy title: "Essential need in general, the missing (self-denial) of the essential distress of our contemporary Dasein as the left-emptiness of the particularly deep boredom." Heidegger leaves no doubt about his bleak view of the contemporary situation, including the decline of the Weimar Republic and worldwide economic depression:

Everywhere there are deep shakings [Erschütterungen], crises, catastrophes, needs [Nöte]: contemporary social misery, political confusion, the powerlessness of science, the emptiness [Aushöhlung] of art, the ungroundedness of philosophy, the incapacity of religion. Certainly, there are needs everywhere.^[108]

In this connection, Heidegger makes five points, each of which contributes to an analysis of the contemporary social crisis and an identification of the role for philosophy in the practical social sphere.

1. The hidden basic mood of the current situation is deep boredom (tiefe Langeweile ).^[109] This is his basic diagnosis of the contemporary social crisis through the application of the conceptions of mood and state-of-mind developed in his fundamental ontology.

2. Everyone is aware of the situation. But others have so far failed to grasp the real nature of the problem since they invariably tend to focus on types of need to the neglect of need as such.^[110] Examples of this failure are provided by psychology, including depth psychology and psychoanalysis. Heidegger here offers a methodological critique of other approaches to the understanding of contemporary society through an application of his canonical ontological difference, roughly the difference between the ontological and ontical dimensions.

3. Merely to ask the proper question—more precisely, to raise the question of the basic mood (Grundstimmung )—is to perform a crucial service. This questioning does not justify or deal with contemporary human being as human, but rather frees human being's specifically human capacity as Dasein.

To question concerning this basic mood does not mean to justify and to carry on with the present humanness of human beings [Menschheit des Menschen], but to free the humanness in human being, the humanness of human being, that is, to free the essence of human being, to permit Dasein in him essentially to become.^[111]

4. Heidegger specifies what Dasein can become by drawing attention to the link between his concern with the present time of need and the

question of the meaning of Being raised in his fundamental ontology. To free human being by enabling it to become Dasein is not to place it in an arbitrary situation. It is rather to divest it of its specific burden and, accordingly, to free it. "The freeing of Dasein in human being does not mean to put him into an arbitrary situation [Willkür], but to remove from him his ownmost [eigenste] burden. Only one who can truly give oneself a burden is free."^[112]

5. Heidegger understands the proposed questioning as practically important. The proper questioning, which is parenthetically only possible from the perspective of fundamental ontology, is intended to lead us in two directions: to action and to being (zum Handeln und zum Sein ).^[113]

Heidegger's conception of how to minister to the malady of the present day provides insight into his view of human being, including its role in his philosopical theory. His concern is manifest here on two levels, in respect to (1) the dreadful disintegration of contemporary Germany, and (2) his reading of the deeper significance of the present mood. It is, then, significant that, despite his linguistic tip of the hat to the gravity of the momentary situation, his concern is finally not with human being but with Being. Others are obviously shocked by the grave social situation present in the declining phase of the Weimar Republic because of an abiding interest in human being. But here and elsewhere, this more usual humane concern is wholly absent in Heidegger's personal and philosophical perspectives. From a strictly philosophical point of view, it is fair to say that he fastens on the practical situation in order to further fundamental ontology.

Since Dasein is that being concerned with Being, in a word the Seinsfrage , to bring about the fulfillment of Dasein is to create the real possibility to grasp Being. For human being to realize itself has nothing to do with its present distress, but everything to do with being an authentic human being, namely that being essentially concerned with Being. It follows that the problem of Being, the center of theoretical concern in his fundamental ontology, is also doubly implicated in his analysis of the present-day situation of Germany: as the conceptual framework of the analysis, and as the problem toward which the contemporary situation points. In short, in rather transparent fashion Heidegger here substitutes his own philosophical concerns for the existential concerns created by the world economic collapse and the decline of the Weimar Republic.

The result of this discussion is to point to a clear dualism in Heidegger's analysis of Being. His fundamental ontology is clearly circular, since the analysis of Being leads to a conception of human being, which is either inauthentic or authentic. An authentic grasp of Being depends on an authentic human being. The interest in human being is, then, twofold: perhaps or at least possibly for the sake of human beings, but

finally and most basically for the sake of the understanding of Being. To put the same point in other words, Heidegger's main concern is with Being, not human being; he turns to human being as the way into the problem of Being. Even in his most concrete moments, such as in his application of his theoretical framework to the analysis of contemporary society, his main interest lies in the understanding of Being. This same overriding concern is the main thread of his turn in the rectoral address to Nazism.