Original scientific paper
How Relevant to the Present Is Heidegger‘s Letter on Humanism?
Georg Stenger
; Institute of Philosophy, University of Würzburg
Abstract
Contrary to many attempts to place Heidegger‘s thought back in the tradition of antihumanism, the author points out with particular reference to the Letter on Humanism that Heidegger, by passing through the classical concepts of humanism, hinted at a new and more profound understanding of humanism. In spite of having been subjected to a lot of critical questioning and criticism, the additional lure of Heidegger‘s thought-path – shown herein with reference to the indicated outstanding points – with its philosophical diction lies in the fact that it opened the space for thought beyond the dichotomies of theory and practice, cognition and action, logic and ethics, thought and experience, which is becoming increasingly relevant for the present time, but which primarily because of the normatively induced and/or descriptively established thought style in most cases misses the dimension opened by Heidegger. The question still remains as to whether by way of Heidegger‘s thought‘s attempt one can arrive at a “conversation between worlds”, which is about the future of human encounter and consequently about the “interculturally anchored humanism”. Heidegger must have arrived at the boundaries of east-Asian thought, but he did not believe that a “fruitful interface” between west-European and (east) Asian thought – one that would not entail only an understanding of “fundamental words” but primarily of “fundamental experiences” – was possible yet.
Keywords
Appropriative event; con-creative event; East Asia; global thinking; Heidegger; humanism; Nishida; phenomenology; thought and action; trans-lating
Hrčak ID:
38854
URI
Publication date:
30.6.2009.
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