Ironic

It is ironic, unreal and bewildering to read certain passages from the diaries of the German philosopher Heidegger, also known as the Black Notebooks, especially in these days when land and military action are at stake in the Middle East. The passages are presented as follows by the philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy in his book The Banality of Heidegger:

► Uprootedness and therefore Bodenlosigkeit (lack of soil of one’s own) is a distinguishing feature of Judaism. The lack of ground consists in – or leads to – “being bound to nothing, making everything serviceable for itself (Judaism).” (Quote from Heidegger in this sentence: from‘Überlegungen VII-XI’, Schwartze Hefte 1938/39, p. 97).

► Because of this lack of a country of its own, Judaism writes itself out of human history because “groundlessness excludes itself”. (Quote from Heidegger in this sentence: from ‘Überlegungen VII-XI’ , Schwartze Hefte 1938/39, p. 97). Did Heidegger think, Nancy wonders, that Judaism could be helped in this self-destruction, for example by the anti-Semitic Nuremberg laws?

► The contempt for the (then) lack of their own land is reinforced in Heidegger as, because of that lack, Jews do not know what it is to fight: “World Jewry(…)does not need to participate in military action, whereas we have to sacrifice the best blood of the best of our people” (Quote from Heidegger in this sentence: from ‘Überlegungen XII-XV’, Schwartze Hefte 1939-1941, p. 262).

Heidegger would probably not have minded saying exactly the opposite in today’s situation. A bit like in the last century the anti-Semitic communists detested the Jews because of ‘their’ capitalism, and the anti-Semitic capitalists because they were all communists. 

Also see Heidegger and the Jews

If you would like to see or give comments: click on Ironic and scroll down.

Levinas and Bergson

The biggest difference between the philosophers Henri Bergson and Emmanuel Levinas may well be situated in the cult status enjoyed by Bergson in his time as a philosopher. In Paris he invariably drew full houses, and in the US his books went by the hundreds of thousands over the counter when Bergson visited New York soon after 1900. That definitely can not be said about Levinas. He was listened to, but he was not a public philosopher.

As an outward feature the two have, whether partial or not, a Jewish descent in common. Levinas came from a Lithuanian Jewish family, Bergson was born of a Jewish father and a Catholic mother.

More substantively, there is – at least initially – quite some shared territory. Or rather, there  is common ground between Bergson and Edmund Husserl, who is considered the great teacher of Levinas. You can say that Bergson and Husserl had one great concern in common. And that, with both, their thinking can be seen as attempts to answer that concern. Their problem was the materialistic spirit of the second half of the 19th century, the period in which Bergson and Husserl grew up and started their careers.

Husserl formulated his objections as follows: science, including psychology, hardly values what things mean to people. It is only interested in the existence of things. That has to be researched, proven and measured. What they mean for a human being is disregarded.

Bergson’s objection to the spirit of the times was that something, in the eyes of the then serious scientists, qualified as ‘real’ if it was measurable. With them, things – literally –counted only when they were demarcated and cut up and could be made manageable.

He illustrated this thesis on the basis of our dealing with the phenomenon of time. It was according to Bergson no coincidence that in 1884 the International Standard Time was introduced, and that seconds, minutes and hours from now were the same all over the world. What is lost in it, he said, is the inner experience of time. Thereby he was referring  for example to the phenomenon that for us a minute may seem an hour and vice versa. In the words of Husserl Bergson’s point can be expressed as follows: the deepest sense of time escapes us.

Both Bergson and Husserl found that the hierarchy should be reversed: not the flat-materialistic world was to be considered the real world, but the territory of the subjective meanings was the real reality.

Now back to Levinas. He starts, as I said, as a student of Husserl and follows him first in his quest for meaning as something primarily to be found beyond the material, everyday life. But soon Levinas becomes impressed by another student of Husserl, namely Heidegger. His exhortation to precisely recognize our lived, material existence – with its everyday concerns, labor, tools – as a wellspring of meanings, hits Levinas full in the face.

In the same way as this idea marked for Heidegger the point at which he took distance from Husserl, so it did for Levinas. From about 1930 he left Husserl’s, late 19th century triggered, thinking behind. Therewith also Bergson and Levinas had driven apart in their orientations.

Also see Sartre, Levinas and the Café and Why Heidegger doesn't bring us any further

Heidegger and the Jews

There can be no doubt any longer. Peter Trawny, the director of the Heidegger Institute in Wuppertal now publishes Heidegger’s Schwartze Heften, the notebooks with his diary entries from the thirties to seventies. They show that the philosopher from the Black Forest suspects Judaism of being bent on world domination. From the notebooks emanates, according to Trawny, a “Being-historical anti-Semitism” which infuses Heidegger’s thought through all its pores.

Actually, doubt there has been for many years indeed whether Heidegger was anti-Semitic. Most writers agreed that his wife Elfriede was, because she spoke out in an overt anti-Semitic way. But Heidegger himself did not. Of course there was his membership of the Nazi Party and his statement about the inner truth and greatness of the Hitler movement. But that could be explained by the circumstances in which Heidegger as rector of a university had to do his job.

It is not unlikely that this relativizing by heideggerians of Heidegger’s Nazi period was motivated by a great admiration for the philosopher’s work. Someone with such fascinating and profound thoughts, he impossibly could have been an anti-Semite?

Or yet, perhaps the reverse? With this question, the case begins to get interesting. Could there possibly be an inner connection between the deep (according to some: quasi-deep) thinking about the history of Being and anti-Semitism ?

Some will say: better don’t search for such a connection. For Heidegger's work is quite opaque and anti-Semitism is an elusive phenomenon, so only in a shared confusion a connection could possibly be found, but that clarifies nothing.

Then things remain as vague as the insecurity that Levinas in the thirties already experienced in the philosophy of Heidegger (so, apart from Heidegger’s political positions). In the preface of Existence and Existents Levinas tells that his thinking is at the same time determined by Heidegger’s philosophical innovations, and “governed by the profound need to leave the climate of that philosophy”.

But it does not necessarily have to remain that vague. Indeed, Levinas did not let it remain that vague. Because in his later philosophical work, especially in Totality and Infinity he makes very clear that in fact Heidegger’s thinking is totalitarian in nature. Heidegger does not know how to deal with the idea of radical otherness, and that has much to do with his adoration of Being.

Personally I try, on the basis of the comments of Levinas, to get it clear what happens when Heidegger’s thinking on Being is applied to something like management and organization. In that case, the idea of Being in which we all participate is complemented by the idea that we also share our lifeworlds through a shared Mitsein. Authentic Mitsein would generate a kind of spontaneous and taken-for-granted cooperation and communication on the basis of which a healthy organization can flourish.

That’s a nice thought, but also somewhat romantic and unrealistic and, as to me, only half the story. In many cases, an individual’s specific identity will in fact lead to tensions and fractures with others with whom he shares a world. And not always with the prospect of bridging the gaps because people may réally differ from each other. Then it takes more than an ethics which relies on a shared world. Then dealing with differences is just as crucial.

Heidegger’s problem with that could very well have to do with his anti-Semitism.

Also see Ironic, Why Heidegger doesn't bring us any further and Wonder or Bewilderment

Wonder or bewilderment

Does philosophy start with wonder or with bewilderment?

It is quite accepted and respected to view philosophy as starting in wonder. The wonder for example which is expressed in Leibniz’s and Heidegger’s question which asks "Why is there something rather than nothing?" Or in Kant's awe at the starry sky above him and the moral law within him.

In this wonder easily a kind of adoration and affirmation slips in. How fantastically orderly it's all created, isn’t the world amazingly pretty alltogether! An echo of this traditional appreciation of wonder we heard recently with the award of a prestigious Dutch cultural award to Charlotte Mutsaers: it was the reward for the wonder, the enchantment, the candour, the enthusiasm.

I never liked that cliché, I think it is not critical enough and it does too little justice to the chaos and indifference of the world around us, including creation in its primeval purity. And that may explain why a lot of philosophy felt to me as not being relevant, although I may be a quite philosophical mind.

I feel more akin to Theodore de Boer, when he says thinking emerges from bewilderment, or discomfort. The world around us hardly justifies the pious wonder and praise many traditional philosophies and, of course, traditional religions tribute to the intelligent design of the cosmos. I associate that wonder and praise mostly with people in a luxury position. With people who, at a safe distance from the noise of the street and the hectic world can surrender to contemplation which creates its own fascination and beauty.

Actually, it does not have to be either/or. Intermediate positions between bewilderment and wonder are possible. Thus the philosopher Daan Roovers affirms that philosophy begins with wonder. But with her this wonder is not the romantic adoration about the skies. She refers to the amazement about the many opinions she encounters. These arouse astonishment and make her wonder: could I be mad? How do I get the ideas I have, do others have them too, are they true because of that or do we live in a collective illusion? That really sounds a lot more critical than breathless admiration.

And then there is the intermediate position of Wislawa Szymborska. It seems as if in her poem ‘Inattention’ she opts for the sweet romantic approach, namely the one of the decent wonder about everyting existing: "I've lived a whole day without amazement". But on closer inspection there appears to be rather question of bewilderment: "The world could pass for an insane world, but I only used it for everyday use”.

Lately I catched myself in having, beside bewilderment, more wonder about some things than I've always thought I could have. For example I may be fascinated by the sound of a tone, or by a sunbeam. That such things exist! Perhaps these are signs that I become a bit calmer, or more balanced? Could be. If only it will not take the form of decent, uncritical, almost Catholic "assentment to all that exists".

Why Heidegger doesn't bring us any further

It is very understandable that reflexive managementauthors like Weick, Winograd and Flores look for inspiration towards Heidegger. If you want to stop the thinking about organizations in terms of schemes and diagrams, Heidegger offers a liberating perspective.

Heidegger holds that “knowledge lies in the being that situates us in the world”. That’s to say: we do not learn by taking a distance and by observing phenomena from the outside, but by being actively engaged in the world via work and relations. Heidegger prioritizes praxis and being in the world. By doing so he breaks through the deceit which originates from models and structures. Knowledge always is embedded in an acting way of being which precedes everything.

At the same time it is possible, in relation to the Heidegger oriented managementauthors, to identify two blind spots. The first concerns the unwillingness to communicate, which people - and not just in organizations - at times display. The authors seem not to be acquainted with this phenomenon. The spontaneous active being which they talk about in their writings, for them automatically coïncides with a permanent readiness to communicate.

The second blind spot concerns the difference one person can make with regard to another person. That people may disagree fundamentally about the direction and the goal of their acting is not a theme in the works of the above mentioned authors.

I tend so see a connection between those two blind spots. That connection, in my view, stems from the way in which Heidegger uses the concept of Mitsein. Namely, as a reference to a shared reality in which we humans collectively participate. We share Mitsein as a part of our active being-in-the-world. Communication arises from there almost automatically.

It is certainly true that Heidegger leaves room for individuals to conceive of primary being, where acting finds place, in their own, original way. But by the position he allocates to Mitsein there is a shift in the balance: the portion of collectivity weighs much more heavily than the portion of individual originality. Being is foremost one and collective, even if there is a multitude of personal insights in being.

This explains why plurality of thinking and profound differences between people get so little attention from authors who orientate themselves towards Heidegger. It is as Safranski says: the true nature of political thinking will be exposed by Hannah Arendt – as part of her answer to Martin Heidegger. Such really political thought derives from living communally our differences.

I would like to add that, for an elaboration of the radical difference between the one human person and the other, we can fruitfully turn to Levinas.

Also see Heidegger, Wittgenstein and traffic and Is the world sound?

Heidegger, Wittgenstein and traffic

Organizational scientists who become philosophical should be cherished. They probably will allow a bit more space for manoeuvre and depth in their reasoning than those who are trained only in management. Nevertheless I want to make a warning remark concerning organizational scientists who orientate themselves towards Heidegger and the later Wittgenstein. What a number of followers of those two philosophers have in common – and that’s what I want to talk about – is the use of the metaphore of car-traffic for human communication in organizations. I find that irritating. For in my view that metaphore is not really adequate.

What can one say about traffic? Car-traffic consists in a unequivocal, uniform reality and this reality is based upon a set of (almost) generally accepted rules. Those among us who drive their car to the wrong side of the road or park it across the lane form a small minority. Of course the respective destinations of the road-users can diverge a lot but that’s not relevant for their quality of road-user. Their reality is being defined by the two white lines they have to respect, the arrows they have to follow and the trafficlights that come to their path. As far as their participation in traffic is concerned, all drivers have one and the same preprogrammed rationality in common, which allows only very limited space for interpretation.

The moment you start applying traffic as a metaphore for human behaviour in organizations a kind of alienating effect sets in. Take for example John Shotter, who is inspired by Wittgenstein. Shotter considers social action as ‘to know how to go on’ and for his explanation of this expression he takes recourse to the metaphore of car-traffic: “Just as in driving down a multi-lane interstate highway, we sense those cars here as near, and those there as far away, this one as requiring us to move away as it is moving too close, and we possess a synoptic grasp of how ‘to go on’ in a skilful way in many other spheres of our lives”.

Managementauthors Winograd and Flores, who orientate themselves towards Heidegger, also use car-driving as an image for communication and language in organizations. They speak about a kind of natural interhuman communication and compatibility by which things just go as they have to go and people, somehow, know what they have to do. Of course misunderstandings between people can arrise, in the same way in which collisions take place in traffic. And also in organizations one can find non-communicative people, as there are yokels in traffic. So, apparently, also traffic is not that unequivocal. But those situations are – according to the mentioned authors – exceptions, on the organization floor as in traffic, which are to be redressed or to be deplored. In the last resort they do not affect the clarity of the rules and the uniformity of reality. In principle human interaction functions, as does car-traffic, automatically.

I think this conception of human interaction is alienating because it does not match the experienced reality. The conception leans heavily on the presumption that people are permanently prepared to communicate. I find that a naïve, romantic thought. The day-to-day practice in organizations shows too many examples of the opposite. I have in mind people’s refuse to talk to others, the largescale use of language which in fact does not clarify but mystifies, and the energy it takes, not so much to redress misunderstandings, but to get people to talk with one another at all.

On a better look, it is possible to give some explanations for the discrepancy between the relatively unproblematic functioning of road-traffic and the laboriousness of human interaction. One can point to the fact that, opposite the unequivocal rationality and limited space for interpretation of trafficrules, in the domain of worldinterpretations and human acting many divergent rationalities can be found. And opposite the total freedom for each cardriver to choose his own destination, in organizations there is a hierarchy by which some workers (managers) tell other workers what to do. Conflicts on the road are usually restricted to teasing, while in organizations they often have to do with imposing, legitimately or not, one’s will on others.

These differences touch certain aspects of organizations which make communication in organizations so difficult but also interesting. Organizational scientists like Shotter, Winograd and Flores, who are orientated towards Heidegger and Wittgenstein, seem to miss exactly those points. They end up with a simplistic and technocratic caricature of interhuman communication. One may wonder whether something essential is lacking in the philosophical oeuvres of Heidegger and Wittgenstein because of which their organizational adepts arrive at that caricature?

Things and People

Enjoying my holiday in the Dordogne, reading a book, brings me each year again into a contemplative mood. Old churches, the silence of a monasterial garden, a scorching afternoon sun and chirping crickets lead me unavoidably to meditative atmospheres.

In this attentive presence in the world around me I should look – that’s what my book tells me – for the ultimate assurance against the thoughtless hurrying and activism which haunt our lives.

But why then is this contemplative tradition slowly disappearing from our Western culture? And does that disappearance say something about its credibility for our time? Could it perhaps be that the values of the vita contemplativa are not as timeless as they want to appear? Or should we, very pedantically, say that people nowadays do not know anymore what is important?

In my opinion contemplativity contains an important manco: it is, in first instance, not interested in people. It does, to be sure, engage into relationships, but primarily so with things and only in second instance with other people. Certainly the Christian tradition, in which contemplation plays a main role, knows also a social philosophy. But this social philosophy is emphatically placed at the second level, behind the contemplative attention for creation as a whole of divinely created things. That’s why this attention is called prima philosophia: the first philosophy, which is significant enough.

The book I read situates itself clearly within this tradition. It attributes a fundamental role to contemplativity for reflection on a world that gets stuck in its vita activa. It suggests that we perhaps could escape the coupling of technocratic observation and acting “just by reflection on that connection and thus to dwell with an emptied mind upon the things themselves”. In this thought the author is supported by Heidegger and Nietzsche.

Honestly, I think that the spirituality of the monastery doesn’t fit us anymore.
The problem is not so much that that spirituality is too much withdrawn from the world and does not engage with it. For that withdrawal is rather relative. The contribution to society of the early monks by way of bringing waste land under cultivation was enormous. They worked actively in the care for the sick and the poor. And the accumulation of wealth in the monasteries and later by the ascetic-protestant capitalism made the economy flower.

The actual difficulty is that that spirituality, in line with the definition of contemplativity as prima philosophia, proceeds primarily via things. The dwelling upon creation and things belongs to the heart of the vita contemplativa. Paradoxically enough this stilled attention for things is best expressed in the frugal soberness of Cistercian monasteries. There buildings and objects have been reduced to their essential simplicity.

But exactly that primary attention for things does not suffice anymore. It suffices most of all in a world which lies at your feet to be cultivated. But our world ís cultivated, people are being overloaded with things. Now it are relations which count, communication is primary. In such a situation a spirituality of things is less appropriate than a spirituality of human relations.

One could say, with Levinas, that our conception of prima philosophia should be revised. According to him not the attention for the essence of things is fundamental but reflection on the ethical relation.

But rather I would let go the whole idea that there is a more and a less fundamental philosophy. The first person (where contemplativity departs) and the third person (the source of ethical transcendence) alternate continually as the central focus for human beings. By placing them on an equal level we keep space for surprises. And at the same time we dump a bit more of our hierarchies.

See also Order