Being & Metaphor offers a multi-layered approach to questions in philosophy, and specifically con... more Being & Metaphor offers a multi-layered approach to questions in philosophy, and specifically continental philosophy. Using a new structure to the book format—allowing for both a linear and a more sectional, layered approach to reading—Being & Metaphor guides the reader through a transformative project of reimagining and re-experiencing their self, group, world, and others around them. Drawing on Martin Heidegger’s concept of “world,” Being & Metaphor develops a notion of the multiplicity of worlds: other human, non-human animal, plant, and even thingly worlds. The book draws on Jan Zwicky’s concept of “metaphor” to posit a metaphoric ontology: i.e., a way that overlapping worlds exist together. Worlds have aspects in common while nonetheless retaining their irreducible difference. At the heart of Being & Metaphor is the question of how to live a good life and the answer lies in practices and politics of sensitive responsivity to beings around us.
Being & Metaphor offers a multi-layered approach to questions in philosophy, and specifically con... more Being & Metaphor offers a multi-layered approach to questions in philosophy, and specifically continental philosophy. Using a new structure to the book format—allowing for both a linear and a more sectional, layered approach to reading—Being & Metaphor guides the reader through a transformative project of reimagining and re-experiencing their self, group, world, and others around them. Drawing on Martin Heidegger’s concept of “world,” Being & Metaphor develops a notion of the multiplicity of worlds: other human, non-human animal, plant, and even thingly worlds. The book draws on Jan Zwicky’s concept of “metaphor” to posit a metaphoric ontology: i.e., a way that overlapping worlds exist together. Worlds have aspects in common while nonetheless retaining their irreducible difference. At the heart of Being & Metaphor is the question of how to live a good life and the answer lies in practices and politics of sensitive responsivity to beings around us.
I draw on Heidegger and Zwicky to challenge the notion that underlying divergent perspectives of ... more I draw on Heidegger and Zwicky to challenge the notion that underlying divergent perspectives of an entity there must be something that is ‘the same’; instead, sameness is disclosed within particular world-disclosures. I focus on Heidegger's concepts of world and truth as foundation for thinking about different human worlds. I introduce Zwicky's work on gestalts, internal relations, truth as asymptotic limit, and metaphors; the concept of metaphoricity of Being helps us think through how it is that no thing underlies the different perspectives of a phenomenon, and yet that there are limits for disclosures.
There is much debate on how to understand Kant’s transcendental idealism in the context of the Cr... more There is much debate on how to understand Kant’s transcendental idealism in the context of the Critique of Pure Reason. Heidegger’s Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics offers an innovative reading of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, but is often overlooked due to the violence it allegedly does in its interpretation. This paper offers a Heideggerian-inspired phenomenological or ontological interpretation of transcendental idealism by drawing on Heidegger’s interpretation of the Critique. First, I draw a connection between the two uses of noumena in the Critique (boundary-concepts and regulative ideas) and, in doing so, draw attention to how the noumena relies on a concept of the proper which gains its meaning from outside the system. I then bring together Kant and Heidegger on the question of the place of truth and the role of the noumena. I claim not only that the ‘noumena’ reveals a ‘shrinking back’ from the ontological (onto-ethical) release of aletheia; but also, and as a consequence, that the ‘noumena’ does not represent ‘another world,’ but rather is the grounds of the constitution of the phenomenal world itself. Thus, I argue that the noumena is the being of the phenomena, and I do so through looking at objects, faculties, and ethics in the Critique. Finally, I claim that the understanding and reason must both be receptive: even the self-given is ultimately being given.
This paper questions Heidegger’s interpretation of animals in his 1929-1930 seminar, The Fundamental Concepts of Metaphysics: World, Finitude, Solitude. Heidegger denies that animals have access to the ‘as such,’ to beings as such, and yet it must be asked if he can maintain this. His course is open to two interpretations: either we deny that the binding, encountering, struggling, and adapting that Heidegger attributes to animals are possibilities for animals, and we thereby make the animal what I call ‘the impossible’—and I provide additional reasons against this option by arguing against Heidegger’s interpretation of the central bee experiments—or we retain binding, encountering, struggling and adapting in line with my argument and thereby see animals as diversified: each kind of animal has different drives/disinhibitions, and so each is in a different kind of ‘world.’ To make this argument, Derrida’s later work on this seminar is drawn upon. Derrida’s particular deconstructive strategy of asking whether the human actually has what it attributes to itself is not pursued here; however, a related deconstructive strategy, concerning questioning the purity of the animal realm, is deployed. Making the animal realm pure is the result of an operation of a sacrificial structure: animals are sacrificed to maintain the abyssal difference of the human. This sacrifice, and the suffering it allows, is enabled by the denial that animals are open to beings ‘as such.’
This thesis stages an encounter between two philosophers who, through their unique takes on both ... more This thesis stages an encounter between two philosophers who, through their unique takes on both truth and language, turn to poetry as a philosophically important endeavour. Martin Heidegger and Jan Zwicky are brought together to help articulate the conviction that an important place for future thought is to be found in the site of, what Heidegger calls, the clearing. Within an encounter of a thinking of Being and lyric philosophy, intricately connected with metaphoricity, this thesis shows connections between language, truth, poetry, and the clearing. Through looking at the ontological and ethical dimensions of the clearing with a hermeneutic, epochal approach, I show how the nature of the clearing affects other dimensions, such as the political, the perceptual, the human and the animal. I argue that a theorization of the clearing is intimately tied to the practice of listening and to what it is that constitutes a 'voice.'
Being & Metaphor offers a multi-layered approach to questions in philosophy, and specifically con... more Being & Metaphor offers a multi-layered approach to questions in philosophy, and specifically continental philosophy. Using a new structure to the book format—allowing for both a linear and a more sectional, layered approach to reading—Being & Metaphor guides the reader through a transformative project of reimagining and re-experiencing their self, group, world, and others around them. Drawing on Martin Heidegger’s concept of “world,” Being & Metaphor develops a notion of the multiplicity of worlds: other human, non-human animal, plant, and even thingly worlds. The book draws on Jan Zwicky’s concept of “metaphor” to posit a metaphoric ontology: i.e., a way that overlapping worlds exist together. Worlds have aspects in common while nonetheless retaining their irreducible difference. At the heart of Being & Metaphor is the question of how to live a good life and the answer lies in practices and politics of sensitive responsivity to beings around us.
Being & Metaphor offers a multi-layered approach to questions in philosophy, and specifically con... more Being & Metaphor offers a multi-layered approach to questions in philosophy, and specifically continental philosophy. Using a new structure to the book format—allowing for both a linear and a more sectional, layered approach to reading—Being & Metaphor guides the reader through a transformative project of reimagining and re-experiencing their self, group, world, and others around them. Drawing on Martin Heidegger’s concept of “world,” Being & Metaphor develops a notion of the multiplicity of worlds: other human, non-human animal, plant, and even thingly worlds. The book draws on Jan Zwicky’s concept of “metaphor” to posit a metaphoric ontology: i.e., a way that overlapping worlds exist together. Worlds have aspects in common while nonetheless retaining their irreducible difference. At the heart of Being & Metaphor is the question of how to live a good life and the answer lies in practices and politics of sensitive responsivity to beings around us.
I draw on Heidegger and Zwicky to challenge the notion that underlying divergent perspectives of ... more I draw on Heidegger and Zwicky to challenge the notion that underlying divergent perspectives of an entity there must be something that is ‘the same’; instead, sameness is disclosed within particular world-disclosures. I focus on Heidegger's concepts of world and truth as foundation for thinking about different human worlds. I introduce Zwicky's work on gestalts, internal relations, truth as asymptotic limit, and metaphors; the concept of metaphoricity of Being helps us think through how it is that no thing underlies the different perspectives of a phenomenon, and yet that there are limits for disclosures.
There is much debate on how to understand Kant’s transcendental idealism in the context of the Cr... more There is much debate on how to understand Kant’s transcendental idealism in the context of the Critique of Pure Reason. Heidegger’s Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics offers an innovative reading of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, but is often overlooked due to the violence it allegedly does in its interpretation. This paper offers a Heideggerian-inspired phenomenological or ontological interpretation of transcendental idealism by drawing on Heidegger’s interpretation of the Critique. First, I draw a connection between the two uses of noumena in the Critique (boundary-concepts and regulative ideas) and, in doing so, draw attention to how the noumena relies on a concept of the proper which gains its meaning from outside the system. I then bring together Kant and Heidegger on the question of the place of truth and the role of the noumena. I claim not only that the ‘noumena’ reveals a ‘shrinking back’ from the ontological (onto-ethical) release of aletheia; but also, and as a consequence, that the ‘noumena’ does not represent ‘another world,’ but rather is the grounds of the constitution of the phenomenal world itself. Thus, I argue that the noumena is the being of the phenomena, and I do so through looking at objects, faculties, and ethics in the Critique. Finally, I claim that the understanding and reason must both be receptive: even the self-given is ultimately being given.
This paper questions Heidegger’s interpretation of animals in his 1929-1930 seminar, The Fundamental Concepts of Metaphysics: World, Finitude, Solitude. Heidegger denies that animals have access to the ‘as such,’ to beings as such, and yet it must be asked if he can maintain this. His course is open to two interpretations: either we deny that the binding, encountering, struggling, and adapting that Heidegger attributes to animals are possibilities for animals, and we thereby make the animal what I call ‘the impossible’—and I provide additional reasons against this option by arguing against Heidegger’s interpretation of the central bee experiments—or we retain binding, encountering, struggling and adapting in line with my argument and thereby see animals as diversified: each kind of animal has different drives/disinhibitions, and so each is in a different kind of ‘world.’ To make this argument, Derrida’s later work on this seminar is drawn upon. Derrida’s particular deconstructive strategy of asking whether the human actually has what it attributes to itself is not pursued here; however, a related deconstructive strategy, concerning questioning the purity of the animal realm, is deployed. Making the animal realm pure is the result of an operation of a sacrificial structure: animals are sacrificed to maintain the abyssal difference of the human. This sacrifice, and the suffering it allows, is enabled by the denial that animals are open to beings ‘as such.’
This thesis stages an encounter between two philosophers who, through their unique takes on both ... more This thesis stages an encounter between two philosophers who, through their unique takes on both truth and language, turn to poetry as a philosophically important endeavour. Martin Heidegger and Jan Zwicky are brought together to help articulate the conviction that an important place for future thought is to be found in the site of, what Heidegger calls, the clearing. Within an encounter of a thinking of Being and lyric philosophy, intricately connected with metaphoricity, this thesis shows connections between language, truth, poetry, and the clearing. Through looking at the ontological and ethical dimensions of the clearing with a hermeneutic, epochal approach, I show how the nature of the clearing affects other dimensions, such as the political, the perceptual, the human and the animal. I argue that a theorization of the clearing is intimately tied to the practice of listening and to what it is that constitutes a 'voice.'
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This paper questions Heidegger’s interpretation of animals in his 1929-1930 seminar, The Fundamental Concepts of Metaphysics: World, Finitude, Solitude. Heidegger denies that animals have access to the ‘as such,’ to beings as such, and yet it must be asked if he can maintain this. His course is open to two interpretations: either we deny that the binding, encountering, struggling, and adapting that Heidegger attributes to animals are possibilities for animals, and we thereby make the animal what I call ‘the impossible’—and I provide additional reasons against this option by arguing against Heidegger’s interpretation of the central bee experiments—or we retain binding, encountering, struggling and adapting in line with my argument and thereby see animals as diversified: each kind of animal has different drives/disinhibitions, and so each is in a different kind of ‘world.’ To make this argument, Derrida’s later work on this seminar is drawn upon. Derrida’s particular deconstructive strategy of asking whether the human actually has what it attributes to itself is not pursued here; however, a related deconstructive strategy, concerning questioning the purity of the animal realm, is deployed. Making the animal realm pure is the result of an operation of a sacrificial structure: animals are sacrificed to maintain the abyssal difference of the human. This sacrifice, and the suffering it allows, is enabled by the denial that animals are open to beings ‘as such.’
This paper questions Heidegger’s interpretation of animals in his 1929-1930 seminar, The Fundamental Concepts of Metaphysics: World, Finitude, Solitude. Heidegger denies that animals have access to the ‘as such,’ to beings as such, and yet it must be asked if he can maintain this. His course is open to two interpretations: either we deny that the binding, encountering, struggling, and adapting that Heidegger attributes to animals are possibilities for animals, and we thereby make the animal what I call ‘the impossible’—and I provide additional reasons against this option by arguing against Heidegger’s interpretation of the central bee experiments—or we retain binding, encountering, struggling and adapting in line with my argument and thereby see animals as diversified: each kind of animal has different drives/disinhibitions, and so each is in a different kind of ‘world.’ To make this argument, Derrida’s later work on this seminar is drawn upon. Derrida’s particular deconstructive strategy of asking whether the human actually has what it attributes to itself is not pursued here; however, a related deconstructive strategy, concerning questioning the purity of the animal realm, is deployed. Making the animal realm pure is the result of an operation of a sacrificial structure: animals are sacrificed to maintain the abyssal difference of the human. This sacrifice, and the suffering it allows, is enabled by the denial that animals are open to beings ‘as such.’