[lit-ideas] Re: Heil Heidegger?
- From: Robert Paul <rpaul@xxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 02 Nov 2009 16:25:06 -0800
Lawrence,
No, I wasn't referring to you. (Maybe I was confusing 'defenses' of
Heidegger in the discussion of the Romano review with comments on this
list. Who knows?)
That wasn't my objection, if you were referring to me. Romano & Faye did
indeed assert that there was a connection between Heidegger's philosophy and
his politics. However, they neglect to say what it was -- and the sort of
assertive rant they engage in doesn't inspire confidence --that is, I am not
willing to take them at their word. On the face of it, I can't
reconcile what little I know about Heidegger's philosophy with what I know
about National Socialism. I don't see the relationship, nor has anything
I've read here demonstrated one.
Yes, one would need evidence, and I doubt that any of us has access to
the body of correspondence, notes, personal recollections, and the
like that would provide it. I'm an agnostic here, and I also have no
dog in this hunt (as Clinton or LBJ might have put it).
And, if there is no correlation between Heidegger's philosophy and his
politics, then surely we can invoke the Monica Lewinski explanation: What
goes on in the privacy of the President's mind and the oval office does not
necessarily correlate to his decisions as Commander in Chief. And that is
all I'm asking for here. If there is a correlation, what is it?
I don't think that even those who voted for impeachment would have
argued that Clinton's dalliance with Ms. Lewinski had anything even
remotely to do with his foreign policy, e.g. I doubt that few would
have argued that; yet many did though argue that a man of such
depraved morals could not be trusted to lead the nation. Something
like that.
What I suggested earlier was that those who believed that the
transgressions of a great or talented person did not undercut the
worth of his or her achievements (the bad people can write good poetry
argument) could not put this forward as defense of Heidegger, in this
case, for the Romano/Faye argument did not have the form 'on the one
hand this, on the other hand that,' it had the form 'this and that are
inextricably bound up, and you can't have the one without the other.'
Robert Paul,
still thinking about Wittgenstein and 'method'
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