Heidegger on Thinking

Let's talk about the later Heidegger, shall we? As you will see, this is impossible. But we'll try.

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I

When trying to explain the later Heidegger to us, my existentialism professor couldn’t quite come up with a succinct and effective way to put what exactly it is that Heidegger was doing. This makes sense, since Heidegger himself didn’t really seem to make it clear. “He isn’t doing philosophy anymore,” my professor said of Heidegger talking of himself, “just thinking.” Well, that’s nice. Not necessarily all that productive, though. A person can think about a lot of things. People often think about what they have to do later on. I am thinking about what I had for breakfast (Raisin Bran. I’m getting really tired of the stuff.). Sometimes I think about homework, or about a friend, or about cheese (and other assorted food products). It’s great that Heidegger’s thinking and all. I’d prefer that someone be thinking rather than not. But, personally, it seems to me that philosophy sounds a bit more important than just thinking.

Of course, however, we have to remember that this is Heidegger. Thus, I am wrong. Heidegger doesn’t just think, oh no, for, according to Heidegger, thinking is not, in fact, what we know as thinking. My thinking about breakfast, and you’re thinking about what you’re going to do later, is in fact not thinking at all. So, what is thinking, then? This is a central question in the thought of Heidegger in his post-war writing. What I will be drawing from is works which date from the mid-40s (the first draft of the conversation on thinking which composes the second part of Heidegger’s Discourse on Thinking (Harper & Row, 1966, trans. John M. Anderson and E. Hans Freund)), through Heidegger’s 1951 lectures called What is Called Thinking? (Harper & Row, 1968, trans. Fred D. Wieck and J. Glenn Gray), the 1955 Memorial Address (the first part of the Discourse), and the publishing of the combined Discourse in 1959. Thus the problem of thinking took up a substantial portion of Heidegger’s, well, thought for over a decade. Let’s see what conclusions he reached.

II

Let’s just start bluntly, shall we? “Most thought-provoking is that we are still not thinking – not even yet, although the state of the world is becoming constantly more thought-provoking.” (What is Called Thinking? 4) Now, knowing Heidegger, I suppose something like this should not be entirely unexpected, but really? One would think (or I guess not) that this was going a bit far. What the hell is thinking, if our thought processes, our reasoning, and the basic progress of life are all not thinking?

But wait, there’s more! “[M]an today is in flight from thinking.” (Discourse on Thinking 45) Not only do we not think, apparently the human species is actively avoiding thinking, as though it were some contagious disease. So all the scientific work today, all the research and development, all the political cunning, even contemporary philosophy, represents a flight from thinking. This seems doubtful. Of course, this is Heidegger we’re talking about. Of course humanity would deny that it doesn’t think! “[P]art of this flight is that man will neither see nor admit it. Man today will even flatly deny this flight from thinking. He will assert the opposite. He will say – and quite rightly – that there were at no time such far-reaching plans, so many inquiries in so many areas, research carried on as passionately as today. Of course.” (Discourse on Thinking 45)

Indeed, such is the argument. For thought as we know it is not some enigma that happens through pixies and magic. Thought is the mind working to solve problems. Thought is the mind analyzing what the senses bring in and acting upon it. Thought is understanding circumstances or the premises of a situation and reasoning out conclusions, actions to be taken. This is thinking, working through from A to B in a situation. Thoughts are representations of the world (real or not doesn’t matter, only the mind’s action does), or considerations about claims or representations, and the conclusions that are made. Perhaps we can’t put it in exact words, but we know nevertheless exactly what thought it, because it’s what we do. And, last of all, being a part of us, thinking is certainly not something we can fly from.

This, of course, is wrong according to Heidegger, at least in a certain sense. It is true that “[s]uch thought remains indispensible. But – it also remains true that it is thinking of a special kind.” (Discourse on Thinking 45) That is, reasoning, rationalization, analysis by concept, logical operation are all part of a particular form of thought, one with presuppositions and operational rules. It is not, however, a universal way of thought. Nor is it the oldest means of thought; man was not born with the gift of syllogism, but rather man (Aristotle, specifically) had to invent it after reaching certain conclusions about the world and human nature. This is not particularly difficult to accept. What Heidegger is saying, however, is something else. The thesis is that reasoning is not what thought really is. It is not the core operation that defines thought. This is not to say that scientific thought is faulty, as Heidegger reiterates again and again. “The significance of science here is ranked higher here than in the traditional views which see in science merely a phenomenon of human civilization.” (What is Called Thinking? 22) What it’s saying is that thinking itself is something else, something which is not only ignored but avoided today.

In the Memorial Address of the Discourse Heidegger distinguishes from the traditional concept of thought (what he calls calculative thinking) a second sort of thinking, meditative thinking. Commonly thought of, meditative thinking is “floating unaware above reality. It loses touch. It is worthless for dealing with current business. It profits nothing in carrying out practical affairs.” (Discourse on Thinking 46) Thus meditative thinking is probably something like thinking d e e p t h o u g h t s while being stoned out of your mind. If that’s thinking, we have better things to do, or so goes ordinary thought.

So what should we really do? We reason. We use science to create new things. Heidegger himself was standing at this time in the middle of the nuclear age and at the height of the atomic; he should have known better than he seemed to what humanity could do. And he certainly did see. But what he saw did not please him. What he saw is a different age, much like we see. It is the age of reason and of science, propositions he does not deny. But, he adds, it is also the age of technology. “From this arises a completely new relation of man to the world and his place in it.” (Discourse on Thinking 50) “The age of technology” does not refer to the fact of technology’s existence, but rather what that fact means for the state of man. Technology essentially takes control of man’s functions. “These forces, which everywhere and every minute claim, enchain, drag along, press and impose upon man under the form of some technical contrivance or other – these forces, since man has not made them, have moved long since beyond his will and have outgrown his capacity for decision.” (Discourse on Thinking 51) Here Heidegger’ is more or less correct. At this juncture in human history we have essentially become chained to our technology. “Basic living” is now something that requires the microwave, the car, the television, and now the internet. There seems to be a threshold where a technological convenience ceases to become a “convenience” and instead becomes a “necessity,” and we seem to be crossing this line with increasing speed as time goes on. Technology has indeed enslaved us and our thought; we think through the technological-scientific way of thinking.

III

But, the slave of science responds, so what? If the other option is to live in a world where sanitary water is a rarity, communication with the next town over is a week-long endeavor, and toilets are a pleasant fiction, it seems that technology is a considerable improvement. And, getting back to the point, this has yet to explain the problem, that of thinking. For why isn’t reasoning, thinking in the technological age (for, Heidegger will say, our current thinking is shaped by technology), not merely an evolution of thinking, rather than a flight from it? With communication and improved standards of living we are given new means and possibilities to think, yes? If not, then just what the hell is thinking?

If we, as we are here and now, will not be taken in by empty talk, we must retort that everything said so far is an unbroken chain of hollow assertions, and state besides that what has been presented here has nothing to do with scientific knowledge. (What is Called Thinking? 7)

This passage sounds the exact same in its original context, at least in the context that Heidegger will allow it. This is the challenge of scientific thought to Heidegger, that whatever he thinks thinking is nonsense in the literal sense, nothing but empty claims about phantoms. “What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence.” Or at least, whatever makes no logical sense. Heidegger, however, will shoot right back: “This situation is grounded in the fact that science itself does not think, and cannot think – which is its good fortune, here meaning the assurance of its own appointed course.” (What is Called Thinking? 8)

Well, not exactly, as we’ve already seen. Science is a very specific type of thinking, one that is basically separate from actual thinking itself. It is reasoning, or logic. For Heidegger the difference is put on display (as well as can be, which is not very well, as we’ll see) in the metaphor of the cabinet-maker’s apprentice. A cabinet-maker, in the old (pre-technological, which is important) sense of the word, is not someone who just builds stuff.

His learning is not mere practice, to gain facility in the use of tools. Nor does he merely gather knowledge about the customary forms of the things he is about to build. If he is to become a true cabinetmaker, he makes himself answer and respond above all to the different kinds of wood and to the shames slumbering within the wood – to wood as it enters into man’s dwelling with all the hidden riches of its nature. (What is Called Thinking? 14)

This isn’t to say that one can’t just shape the wood according to plans and make a thing called a cabinet. Such cabinet-making Heidegger calls “busywork,” and it’s perfectly legitimate, if not cabinet-making. Here it can be noted that this busywork is exactly the kind of work that is done today, with the advent of technological production of cabinets (a point not lost on Heidegger). In fact, most work in general is done in this way, be it manufacturing or scientific study or public service. The job is essentially a task, a point A to point B, where a role is accomplished by meeting certain requirements. And nothing else.

Perhaps it starts to appear at this point what kind of place technology has in the question of thinking. Likely not. Let’s make it clearer then. Why, one may ask, is one who takes parts and assembles cabinets from them not a cabinet maker? Why can we not define that as cabinet-making? “We shall never learn what ‘is called’ swimming, for example, or what it ‘calls for,’ by reading a treatise on swimming. Only the leap into the river tells us what is called swimming. The question ‘What is called thinking?’ can never be answered by proposing a definition of the concept thinking, and then diligently explaining what is contained in that definition.” (What is Called Thinking? 20) “Thinking,” for Heidegger, like cabinet-making and like swimming, is not merely a process, a way of going from A to B. Once again, scientific thinking is only one way, one very specific way, of thinking. The problem that has arisen is that scientific thought presents itself as metaphysics; that is, it presents itself as a one and only way of describing things (this is not to say it is the one true way: rather, it is to say that it is the best way, that others are missing something or cannot achieve what science describes). Under the perspective of “objectivity,” a way of viewing things many-sidedly, scientific reasoning presents itself as the best way of understanding things. “But that many-sidedness may expand to such proportions that the one-sidedness on which it is based no longer catches our eye.” (What is Called Thinking? 33) The problem with that is that, even though science doesn’t necessarily claim to treat of everything in every way, it acts as though it does, and comes to believe it. And yet, “there is another side in every science which that science as such can never reach: the essential nature and origin of its sphere, the essence and essential origin of the manner of knowing which it cultivates, and other things besides.” (What is Called Thinking? 34) This something else is what can only be reached by thinking.

IV

All this time wasted and we haven’t actually even gotten to what thinking is. For the most part we’ve just rambled on and griped about technology and science without explaining just what exactly the problem is. We’ve said there is a problem, but what is it? That it misses the big picture? Well, the question forces itself, if reason cannot get to the big picture, then what can?

The answer is thinking. Here we must bring together the piecemeal observations from before and come up with some sort of conception of thinking, one that explains what thinking is and explains why what we think of as thinking is not. So then, Heidegger, what is thinking?

In the actual discourse in Discourse on Thinking, the conventional view of perception is what Heidegger (and not Heidegger alone) calls representational. Representation “places before us what is typical of a tree, of a pitcher, of a bowl . . . as that view into which we look when one thing confronts us in the appearance of a tree, another thing in . . . .” (Discourse on Thinking 63) Objects are there, they are perceived and recorded, and we act accordingly. This is a very simple and, if you will, very mechanical view of thinking. It fits well with the conventional materialistic psychological views of thought, where brain impulses lead to action by cause and effect. Heidegger does not think of perception in this manner. Heidegger also includes something called horizon, which is, in keeping with the definition, the horizon of that which we perceive. Objects are within a horizon, but we do not place them there; rather they “come out of this (openness of the horizon) to meet us.” (Discourse on Thinking 64) It is here that I will most likely lose anyone that hasn’t read Heidegger, for the point made here sounds not only illogical but, if true, then trite. So what if objects aren’t placed in space by us? They are still represented by the senses. And further, there’s no point in objectifying this “horizon,” which is just a concept. This is where only Heidegger can truly speak for himself (whether that attests to the difficult of his concepts and the depth to which he mines them, or to his incoherence, is a matter for another time), and my own ability is limited, unless I simply quote his entire books. What I can say, based upon this small portion of the dialogue, is this: rather than actively search out objects to represent, or passively allowing things to enter into our sense experience, Heidegger believes that we have a sort of “active reception,” where that which is present “comes out to meet us.” The proper state towards that which is perceived is called “releasement,” and, to take it the full mile, thinking is “in-dwelling in releasement to that-which-regions.” (Discourse on Thinking 82)

Let’s clarify some terms in that definition. First discussed in the text is releasement. “Releasement” is the opposite of willing, in a sense, but not really: “So far as we can wean ourselves from willing, we contribute to the awakening of releasement.” (Discourse on Thinking 60) They are not opposites; rather, releasement is a sort of state where the will is not forcing things. Think back to what is traditionally evoked in the term meditative thinking and it becomes clearer. “That-which-regions” is a difficult translation of a difficult (in the Heideggerian sense) term. “That-which-regions is an abiding expanse which, gathering all, opens itself, so that in it openness is halted and held, letting everything emerge in its own resting.” (Discourse on Thinking 66) (I think you can see by this point how impossible it actually is to represent Heidegger’s later thought without giving a full summary of every word he says.) Openness, in a quick and dirty sense, refers to a revealing of what is in a sort of natural sense, in that what is revealed is revealed in its true nature. Thus, in “regioning,” that which is is allowed to appear as it is (as it is “at rest,” that is, in its natural state) to us. So that-which-regions is a term which refers to the whole of what is, released in its own natural state. Finally, “in-dwelling” is a relatively uncomplicated term. Beyond the normal sense evoked by dwelling, it refers to “this steadfastedness of a belonging to that-which-regions which rests in itself.” (Discourse on Thinking 81)

So there you go. I could have just included that definition at the start and not bothered to use up all my time writing this long essay about thinking. Just so long as the terms are defined, the definition of thinking and thus thinking itself becomes clear.

All of this is, of course, horribly wrong to Heidegger. Hopefully it is recalled that “[t]he question ‘What is called thinking?’ can never be answered by proposing a definition of the concept thinking, and then diligently explaining what is contained in that definition.” In other words, to just take Heidegger’s definition of thinking and explicate it is not only wrong; it represents everything Heidegger is trying to resist in his definition. In explicating a definition of thinking, what we have done is apply the scientific, rationalistic method of thinking in order to discover the nature of thinking itself. This is what people always do, and it is the sign of our age. It is also, as has been said, wrong. The protagonists in his dialogue remark frequently about the difficulty of their discussion, and the fact that their terms are never really certain. These admonitions are not to be taken lightly, and accordingly, the dialogue is not an easy one. I don’t claim to be an expert, or to actually be making any sense of it.

IV

So this is starting to get a bit frustrating. What the hell is thinking? Or, as Heidegger himself puts it, “What is called thinking?” Let us go back to the definition presented in the Discourse. “[I]n-dwelling in releasement to that-which-regions.” At the very least, we can say that thinking is supposed to be some sort of state, a way of existing. Thinking, as Heidegger envisions it, is obviously not just scanning the senses for information to put together. While we can’t just use strict definitions of terms to get our answer, perhaps we can use vague ones to get started (vague answers are, after all, statistically more likely to be correct). We are “released” in some sense to what is there. We continue to exist in that state. It is not representation, as we discovered, so we are not separated by some sort of mind-body wall from that-which-regions. We can also infer that, whatever our involvement in thinking is, that-which-regions has a part at least as important, if not more so (and it is more so). “[T]he nature of thinking is not determined through thinking . . . but through the other-than-itself, that is, through that-which-regions which as regioning first brings forth this nature.” (Discourse on Thinking 74) In What is Called Thinking? this idea is extended: the question “What is called thinking” becomes the question “What calls for thinking?” Call here is understood in a special sense; it is something that calls to us. In other words, the question is asking, “What is it that enjoins us to think?” This question is the one to reveal the true nature of thinking for Heidegger. What is it, he asks, that reaches into us to bring up thinking, to bring us into a new state that is called thinking? This question . . . I am not going to answer here. First of all, I’m not being paid to do this, and I will only go so far for free. But second of all, the answer wouldn’t mean much on its own anyway. For, once again, giving an answer, a definition of thinking, fails on the most essential point: it gives thinking in exactly the wrong sense, the one that the modern age clings to desperately to. If it seems like I’m just cutting things off because I have nothing more to say, that may be right; I can only go so far without simply telling you to read Heidegger for yourself and figure out what he’s saying. Thinking is not easy, he tell us. Thus, it can be inferred that understanding the nature of thinking is not easy either. All a teacher can do is show you the way. Fortunately, that does not require giving a definition of thinking, but only leading one on the path to the action itself.

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Next up is a damn break. That was a lot, and it was hard, and it's still not near what could be called good, as the conclusion obviously indicates (though I could continue upon request, that is, if you hate me). Now of course, by "break" I mean I'll be reading, just not writing on it. Specifically, "The Way of Zen" by Alan Watts. Next semester I'm studying Nishitani's Religion and Nothingness, and so I need to brush up on my Buddhism. Then, Foucault. And Hegel. Because I hate myself.