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In the history of western philosophy up until the time of Martin Heidegger (1889-1976), certain assumptions about reality had become axiomatic. Ever since the ancient Greeks, the assumptions underlying words like “soul,” “person,” and so forth that had been rehashed into unintelligibility by subsequent philosophers had nevertheless remained. Indeed, even foundational assumptions about the nature of time and our place within the world and within the “flow” of time had been unquestioned. Heidegger was the first not to merely set aside the preconceived notions of which he was aware, but to question their foundations and what lay behind them—the metaphilosophy involving awareness and assumptions about being and time, which was the title of his first book (Sein und Zeit, published 1927).

Particularly, Heidegger set out to challenge Cartesian solipsism and the assumptions underlying the ego cogito which, Heidegger believed, were so difficult to overcome for modern philosophers between Descartes and himself precisely because they had gone unchallenged since the Greeks up through the medieval Scholastics. René Descartes (1596-1650) had split man into two practically irreconcilable parts, and his ontological conception of the world was split, as well: there was thought, and there was extension, and nothing in between. Heidegger challenges the assumption that there is an “ego” in the first place, insisting that we are historical beings which necessarily take our “place” wherever we are (Groden & Kreiswerth, 1997). Thus shifting the focus from the concept of “self” or “identity,” Heidegger focuses on our historical “fit” and relation to the world, as we find ourselves within it, re-naming the theretofore ego as “Dasein,” or “there-being.” That is to say, the individual as such is conceptualized as being-in-the-world, and it is only by understanding the Dasein’s relation to the world that we can follow Heidegger through a routing of Cartesian dualism and the implication of thinking of individuals as historical there-beings. Heidegger uses four distinct definitions for the one word, “world,” and their implications for philosophical inquiry are manifold, both insofar as they relate to a grasp of Heidegger’s work and insofar as the history of philosophy is concerned.

The first of these meanings of world is described as “an ontical concept,” that is, describing all of that which has actual existence—what we commonly think of as the tangible “world,” and all of the things (or Things, in Heiddegerian notation) in it. Secondly, world is defined as an ontological concept that describes the Being, or the metaphysical actualization, of any one of those Things described in the first denotation of world. Furthermore, included in this second definition of world is the way we talk about the realm of expertise or specialized objects of a particular field, e.g., the “world” of a plumber including pipes and wrenches, or the “world” of a philosopher containing books and ideas. The third and potentially the most important of these definitions of world is similar to the first, in that it denotes that which has actual existence, but in a very specialized sense: namely, this third sense of world describes that span wherein a “factical Dasein as such can be said to ‘live’” (Moran & Mooney, 2004). That is to say, while the Dasein exists as such, that part of the spatio-temporal continuum in which it lives is referred to in this very special sense as its “world.” This world, too, has different contextual connotations: it may refer to the “public” world at large, or the private world of the individual Dasein. The fourth meaning of world is that of what Heidegger calls worldhood, the particular state of being a “world” that any of the former three meanings might have at any given time (Moran & Mooney, 2004). These are the different ways in which Heidegger uses world throughout Being and Time, and specifically throughout sections fourteen through eighteen in his description of “The Worldhood of the World.”

These distinctions in the various ways in which the word world is employed enable Heidegger to undermine Descartes’ assumptions in a number of ways. By positing the individual not as an ego sitting atop the knife-blade of the present but as a Dasein inhabiting the world as a historical being, necessarily interacting with it and giving it meaning during its time (so to speak) within it, Heidegger defeats the idea that we can be certain only of our own thoughts (and only inductively of the extended matter of the “world” in Cartesian terminology). In his distinction between the ontic world and the “pre-ontological existentielle” significance of the world in which the Dasein has its Being, Heidegger both acknowledges that the world actually exists and that its existence is inconsequential relative to the Dasein’s involvement with it (Moran & Mooney, 2004).

Specifically, the Dasein relates to the world through apprehending its Things which are ready-at-hand, as Heidegger says. The importance of the world in all its senses is, for Heidegger, not so much the Kantian things-in-themselves or the actual (ontical) entities; rather, it is the significance of these Things insofar as they are beneficial to the Dasein’s Being-in-the-world. If a tool (even in the broad sense, such that rooms and buildings are also considered “tools”) is employed, for example, it is employed for a purpose whose ultimate goal is to benefit the Being of the Dasein; and if a tool is broken, it is conspicuous in its brokenness precisely because its ability to affect the Dasein in a positive way is “broken.” Thus, through this careful use of language, Heidegger avoids some of the most basic assumptions of the moderns, the Scholastics, and the Greeks, while opening up an entirely new world (as it were) of inquiry into the nature of Being-in-the-world.

Groden, M., & M. Kreiswirth (1997). “Heidegger, Martin”. The Johns Hopkins guide to literary theory & criticism. <http://www.press.jhu.edu/books/hopkins_guide_to_literary_theory/martin_heidegger.html> Accessed 19 October 2005.

Moran, D., & T. Mooney. (2004). “Part VI: Martin Heidegger”. The phenomenology reader. pp. 288-307. New York: Routledge.

In the history of western philosophy up until the time of Martin Heidegger (1889-1976), certain assumptions about reality had become axiomatic. Ever since the ancient Greeks, the assumptions underlying words like “soul,” “person,” and so forth that had been rehashed into unintelligibility by subsequent philosophers had nevertheless remained. Indeed, even foundational assumptions about the nature of time and our place within the world and within the “flow” of time had been unquestioned. Heidegger was the first not to merely set aside the preconceived notions of which he was aware, but to question their foundations and what lay behind them—the metaphilosophy involving awareness and assumptions about being and time, which was the title of his first book (Sein und Zeit, published 1927).

Particularly, Heidegger set out to challenge Cartesian solipsism and the assumptions underlying the ego cogito which, Heidegger believed, were so difficult to overcome for modern philosophers between Descartes and himself precisely because they had gone unchallenged since the Greeks up through the medieval Scholastics. René Descartes (1596-1650) had split man into two practically irreconcilable parts, and his ontological conception of the world was split, as well: there was thought, and there was extension, and nothing in between. Heidegger challenges the assumption that there is an “ego” in the first place, insisting that we are historical beings which necessarily take our “place” wherever we are (Groden & Kreiswerth, 1997). Thus shifting the focus from the concept of “self” or “identity,” Heidegger focuses on our historical “fit” and relation to the world, as we find ourselves within it, re-naming the theretofore ego as “Dasein,” or “there-being.” That is to say, the individual as such is conceptualized as being-in-the-world, and it is only by understanding the Dasein’s relation to the world that we can follow Heidegger through a routing of Cartesian dualism and the implication of thinking of individuals as historical there-beings. Heidegger uses four distinct definitions for the one word, “world,” and their implications for philosophical inquiry are manifold, both insofar as they relate to a grasp of Heidegger’s work and insofar as the history of philosophy is concerned.

The first of these meanings of world is described as “an ontical concept,” that is, describing all of that which has actual existence—what we commonly think of as the tangible “world,” and all of the things (or Things, in Heiddegerian notation) in it. Secondly, world is defined as an ontological concept that describes the Being, or the metaphysical actualization, of any one of those Things described in the first denotation of world. Furthermore, included in this second definition of world is the way we talk about the realm of expertise or specialized objects of a particular field, e.g., the “world” of a plumber including pipes and wrenches, or the “world” of a philosopher containing books and ideas. The third and potentially the most important of these definitions of world is similar to the first, in that it denotes that which has actual existence, but in a very specialized sense: namely, this third sense of world describes that span wherein a “factical Dasein as such can be said to ‘live’” (Moran & Mooney, 2004). That is to say, while the Dasein exists as such, that part of the spatio-temporal continuum in which it lives is referred to in this very special sense as its “world.” This world, too, has different contextual connotations: it may refer to the “public” world at large, or the private world of the individual Dasein. The fourth meaning of world is that of what Heidegger calls worldhood, the particular state of being a “world” that any of the former three meanings might have at any given time (Moran & Mooney, 2004). These are the different ways in which Heidegger uses world throughout Being and Time, and specifically throughout sections fourteen through eighteen in his description of “The Worldhood of the World.”

These distinctions in the various ways in which the word world is employed enable Heidegger to undermine Descartes’ assumptions in a number of ways. By positing the individual not as an ego sitting atop the knife-blade of the present but as a Dasein inhabiting the world as a historical being, necessarily interacting with it and giving it meaning during its time (so to speak) within it, Heidegger defeats the idea that we can be certain only of our own thoughts (and only inductively of the extended matter of the “world” in Cartesian terminology). In his distinction between the ontic world and the “pre-ontological existentielle” significance of the world in which the Dasein has its Being, Heidegger both acknowledges that the world actually exists and that its existence is inconsequential relative to the Dasein’s involvement with it (Moran & Mooney, 2004).

Specifically, the Dasein relates to the world through apprehending its Things which are ready-at-hand, as Heidegger says. The importance of the world in all its senses is, for Heidegger, not so much the Kantian things-in-themselves or the actual (ontical) entities; rather, it is the significance of these Things insofar as they are beneficial to the Dasein’s Being-in-the-world. If a tool (even in the broad sense, such that rooms and buildings are also considered “tools”) is employed, for example, it is employed for a purpose whose ultimate goal is to benefit the Being of the Dasein; and if a tool is broken, it is conspicuous in its brokenness precisely because its ability to affect the Dasein in a positive way is “broken.” Thus, through this careful use of language, Heidegger avoids some of the most basic assumptions of the moderns, the Scholastics, and the Greeks, while opening up an entirely new world (as it were) of inquiry into the nature of Being-in-the-world.

Groden, M., & M. Kreiswirth (1997). “Heidegger, Martin”. The Johns Hopkins guide to literary theory & criticism. <http://www.press.jhu.edu/books/hopkins_guide_to_literary_theory/martin_heidegger.html> Accessed 19 October 2005.

Moran, D., & T. Mooney. (2004). “Part VI: Martin Heidegger”. The phenomenology reader. pp. 288-307. New York: Routledge.