Graduate 131: BT 05: Sec. 03, Part 2

Introduction, Chapter 1. The Necessity, Structure, and Priority of the Question of Being
Section 03. The Ontological Priority of the Question of Being

In the course of trying to make detailed summaries, it is easier then one might at first suspect to dig at the details without actually getting the point. I fear that I have done that with regard to Sec. 03 of the Introduction. What I said in my last entry about Heidegger's view of the progress of science and the development of the various sciences is, I think, basically correct. However, I did not bring that treatment back around to illuminate the question of being. Before moving on to sec. 04, I would like to do just that.

Heidegger writes, "Basic concepts determine the way in which we get an understanding beforehand of the area of subject-matter underlying all the objects a science takes as its theme, and all positive investigation is guided by this understanding." (BT 30/10) This basic understanding forms the foundation of ordinary science. "Laying the foundations, as we have described it, is... a productive logic--in the sense that it leaps ahead, as it were, into some area of Being, discloses it for the first time in the constitution of its Being, and, after thus arriving at the structures within it, makes these available to the positive sciences as transparent assignments for their inquiry." (BT 30/10)

Hopefully this helps us to understand just what is meant by "being." Being has to do with that which makes entities appear to us as entities--particularly as entities capable of being studied, where the sciences are concerned. Heidegger uses the example of "historiology". He writes, "To give an example, what is philosophically primary is neither a theory of the concept-formation of historiology nor the theory of historiological knowledge, nor yet the theory of history as the Object of historiology; what is primary is rather the Interpretation of authentically historical entities as regards their historicality." (BT 31/10) We will not unpack, here, what Heidegger understands by historiology, but I think we can still get an idea of what he considers to be basic to that discipline. It is not some complicated set of theoretical concepts and models; neither is it a collected body of facts; neither is it "history" itself, understood as the proper object of historiological study. Rather, what is basic to historiology is our ability to identify certain entities as "historical" at all. What is that thing in virtue of which we recognize an object as "historical"? We may not be able to answer that question at this stage; however, we must still acknowledge that the existence of the discipline of "historiology" presupposes our ability to recognize objects as "historical" and as bearing a family resemblance around which a scientific discipline could be constructed.

That may still seem very abstract. Consider this analogy; perhaps it will help. Imagine that you are in a room looking at a blank wall. The wall is plain and white and flat--nothing particularly interesting to report. However, if you were to walk very close to the wall, you would probably begin to recognize imperfections in the wall. It would no longer present itself as flat or plain. Instead, you would begin to recognize irregularities, bumps, and shades of coloring. At the same time, the wall would still appear to be solid, opaque, and impenetrable. But suppose you were to move in still closer--say, with a microscope. Imagine if you had a microscope that would allow you to examine the wall at the molecular level. At that level, you would recognize that the wall is not solid and not impenetrable. You would see that it is a mass of discrete particles--atoms--and, with the appropriate equipment, you would "see" that it is constantly being penetrated by particles and by various forms of radiant energy.

At each level, one uses a different set of basic concepts to grasp and understand the wall. Scientists will analyze the wall in an attempt to grasp the most basic and fundamental particles that compose the wall. They will likely construe the being of the wall in terms of those most basic particles. Certain philosophers might try to grasp the wall in terms of discrete parts and wholes. They might construe the being of the wall in terms of some basic substratum. Heidegger takes us one step further. He does not construe being in terms of basic particles or substances but in terms of those most basic "features" in virtue of which the wall shows up to the scientist or the philosopher as something that can be studied--that can be the object of an investigation.

He writes, "The question of Being aims therefore at ascertaining the a priori conditions not only for the possibility of the sciences which examine entities as entities of such and such a type, and, in so doing, already operate with an understanding of Being, but also for the possibility of those ontologies themselves which are prior to the ontical sciences and which provide their foundations." (BT 31/11)

[I think that in the background of Heidegger's investigation is a disillusionment with traditional science which just assumes that atoms or other physical particles form the basic constituents of the world, as well as with traditional philosophy which has also bought into this basic materialism. He points out that both these operating theses are assumptions that are, themselves, open to being questioned. So he is trying to question those assumptions. But that is not enough for him. It won't do for him to just propound another set of operating assumptions. He wants to know that his set of operating assumptions is correct and therefore must call into question and investigate the very method of his questioning of those operating assumptions. Now there is a danger of regress lurking in this investigation. Forestalling that regress must, I expect, be an important part of this project.]

I'm not sure whether that helps anyone else, but I think it helps me. So we can now move on to the next section.

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God is in this place,
And that reality, seen and understood by the grace of God in Christ Jesus through the work of the Holy Spirit, makes all the difference in the world.