To be there
The term Dasein is often used synonymously with existence in philosophy . This term received a special twist through existentialism and related philosophical directions. Here, existence as a more fundamental term is preferred to the term " human being ", which has already been interpreted and categorized many times over .
The existence with Hegel
In his dialectical logic, Hegel unfolds his conception of finitude-infinity with the term Dasein. In his encyclopedia, Hegel defines Dasein as a certain being (quality), as “the unity of being and nothing in which the immediacy of these determinations and thus their contradiction in their relationship has disappeared - a unity in which they are only moments " . Dasein is subject to becoming , arising and passing away and is to be viewed as something changeable. But in such a way that it is posited in the form of simple unity with itself as one of the moments of becoming, of being . In Hegel's dialectical logic it is the basic determination of every something. A something posited in this way is what it is for him only because of its limit to other things. However, he points out that he does not mean the quantitative, but the qualitative limit. "Let's consider z. B. a piece of land that is three acres in size, this is its quantitative limit. Furthermore, this property is also a meadow and not a forest or a pond, and this is its qualitative limit. ” In the other of itself, the limit of something becomes objective. That which exists is finite in two respects. On the one hand it is a composite of being and nothing and thus has one leg, so to speak, in non-being. This finite moment constitutes its changeability, its contradiction. Then it conceptually delimits itself to the outside world and is again finite. These moments make up its internal and external negation. For Hegel, the existence of something does not mean that its existence is posited. The existing something is different from the existing something, the so-called thing . The thing is determined by its properties in relation to others. Its essential existence is appearance.
On the meaning of the term “Dasein” in existentialism and related philosophical currents
In existentialism and in Martin Heidegger's fundamental ontology , the concept of Dasein is differentiated from the mere existence: Things are “available”, but “Dasein” ( existence ) is ascribed to humans .
As a term used by Heidegger , Dasein denotes a being that relates to itself and being, as well as to other beings: “Dasein understands itself in some way and expressly in its being. It is characteristic of this being that with and through its being this is opened up to itself ”(p. 11f). Existence is particularly excellent ontically. “Dasein's ontic distinction lies in the fact that it is ontological.” Dasein is not just a passive classification in a given world of things, but has the character of a design with regard to possibilities that arise in a structured context of references (the Heidegger world calls) are open. In particular: "Dasein always understands itself from its existence, a possibility of itself, to be itself or not to be itself." For Heidegger, Dasein is characterized by what he calls "frailty" and "thrown out", for example, provided that the possibilities towards which Dasein projects itself are not only chosen by itself: “Dasein has either chosen these possibilities itself or it has carried it into them or has ever grown up in them”.
For Karl Jaspers , existence is related to the fulfillment of meaning in life. "In Dasein there is only the choice between the tension-free sinking of existence and the tension-filled, never final realization of existence in subjectivity and objectivity" (K. Jaspers, in: Philosophie I, 7, 349).
JP Sartre emphasizes the freedom of the individual and sharply delimits the existentialist concept of freedom from Hegel's conception of freedom as an insight into necessity. According to Sartre, the human being is, so to speak, the creator of his being , who not only can make all his decisions freely, but has to. He was "condemned to freedom".
See also
- Existential philosophy , a philosophical direction that has the existence of man in the broadest sense at the center of its thinking
- Ontological difference , describes in the philosophy of Martin Heidegger the difference between being and being
- Anthropic principle , the primacy of the observed
literature
- Josef Brechtken: Historical transcendence in Heidegger: the hope structure of existence and the godless question of God . Series of publications: monographs on philosophical research . Meisenheim am Glan. Hain, 1972. ISBN 3-445-00954-6 .
- Thomas Raeber: Dasein in the 'philosophy' of Karl Jaspers: an investigation with regard to the unity and reality of the world in existential thinking . (At the same time: dissertation at the University of Freiburg, 1954). Bern, Francke, 1955.
