Phenomenology of the World

The paper examines the limitation of the ontology and of the question of Being in Heidegger’s writings of the late Twenties. I shall analyze, in particular, the distinctions between Fundamental Ontology and Metontology (discussed in the lecture course of 1928 Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Logik) and between Problem of the Being and Problem of the World (in the lecture course of 1928-29 Einleitung in die Philosophie): in both the cases appears a complex and circular relationship between the two distinguished poles, which is also a sign of a tension in Heidegger’s thought. In the final part of the paper I will focus on the ambiguous presence/absence of the cosmological question in Heidegger’s work.

Transcendental Illusion and Phenomenological Originality – The World-Experience in Husserl and Fink:
This paper holds that the philosophical relation between Husserl’s and Fink’s phenomenological philosophies can be characterized in terms of proximity and distance. We proceed by focusing on the philosophical foundation of their projects and, in particular, on the Kantian notion of “transcendental illusion,” which they use, though in different manners, as a way of determining purely philosophical illusions – a preliminary task to found transcendental phenomenology proper. We select this Kantian notion as a central theme inasmuch as it concerns the metaphysical problematic of the world. Our analysis shows that Fink defends the Husserlian thesis that the world is not merely an “idea of pure reason”(Kant), but an experience. In effect, the world is necessarily pregiven to us, though anonymously, in an intentional experience; in other words, intentional experience without the pregiven world is, according to the late Husserl, unthinkable. Fink’s characterization of world-experience is radically different from Husserl’s. This difference or distance comes from Fink’s conception of “enworlding” [Verweltlichung], i.e., the self-actualization of constituting subjectivity in the world-actualization. Fink’s very idea of this type of correlation has two specific enabling functions: (1) the world’s originally enframing function [die ursprünglich einrahmende Funktion] of the entity into the world itself and (2) the event-like character of the “intruding” [Eindringen] of the subject into the world. Therefore, we conclude that Fink’s phenomenological contribution to philosophy consists not only in his genuine reflection on, and analysis of, the phenomenological conception of correlation at the deep level of world-experience, but also in his metaphysical reformulation of the traditional concept of the world.
Keywords: transcendental illusion, transcendental idealism, intentional correlation, world-experience, origin of the world, access to time-horizons, event.

La questione del mondo è stata una delle poste in gioco fondamentali della fenomenologia e del suo tentativo di ripensare l’esperienza. Che cosa implica il progetto di quella che si può chiamare una «cosmologia fenomenologica»? Quali sono le sue condizioni e le sue conseguenze? Se Heidegger ha dato un contribuito decisivo allo sviluppo di questo filone «cosmologico» che percorre la corrente fenomenologica, in che misura i suoi testi permettono di realizzare un simile progetto? Sono queste le domande che si trovano al centro del presente saggio: anche attraverso un costante dialogo con altri autori, vengono analizzate le possibilità e i limiti di una cosmologia fenomenologica nei testi del primo Heidegger. Questi appariranno allora percorsi da una tensione fondamentale. Se da un lato essi permettono di pensare un primato del mondo sull’io come vero “luogo” del trascendentale e della manifestatività, dall’altro lato l’impostazione heideggeriana incontra dei limiti essenziali, che si rivelano essere due veri e propri “punti ciechi” del suo pensiero: il primato assoluto della questione dell’essere e l’omissione della questione della genesi.

El mundo es un concepto de difícil interpretación en la fenomenología de Husserl. Por un lado, dicho concepto es caracterizado como el mundo de la vida o el mundo de la cultura en su sentido más pleno (Husserl, 2008a, 288; HUA VI, 191). Este mundo puede ser pensado en el plural aunque, sin embargo, exhibe al mismo tiempo tanto un modo de ser que es de carácter horizóntico, como otro de carácter apriórico, los que, en suma, lo hacen poseer una progresión y unidad ante las cuales "el plural carece de sentido" (Husserl, 2008a, 185; HUA VI, 146). Por otro lado, el mundo también es caracterizado como siendo una adquisición subjetiva y, por consiguiente, implica un red de constitución dinámica que llega a ser lo que es a partir de la progresión desde un premundo [Vorwelt] a un mundo [Welt] (Walton, 2015; Bower, 2015). De tal manera, el mundo en Husserl aparece bajo distintas determinaciones que, incluso, pueden parecer contradictorias (Carr, 1970). En este trabajo, utilizando una diferenciación que realiza Walton (2015) entre los órdenes de la constitución y la dación, propondré que es posible reconstruir el concepto de mundo y, de este modo, aclarar su "problematicidad" (Carr, 1970). De esta manera, mostraré que tal problematicidad surge debido a una indiferenciación de los diversos estratos de la constitución del mundo, los que se articulan en investigaciones genéticas y generativas que expresan distintos niveles del análisis de dicho concepto. Concluiré que sin esta distinción que conduce a distintos niveles de análisis, se obtiene una comprensión insuficiente del concepto tal como es desarrollado por Husserl en las distintas etapas de su obra. Palabras Clave: Mundo, mundo de la vida, horizonticidad, a priori del mundo, consistencia, progresión.

By becoming aware of awareness we can experience the innermost sense or the felt sense of spaciousness and self-illumination. Within this state of open awareness, the openness of spacious luminous awareness, we can enter the experience of the radiance of light as energy through the sublime, luminous vibrations. The experience of the unfolding of sublime awareness and the corresponding energetic manifestation of the self-arising of primordial awareness is self-liberation. These experiences of the sublime manifestation of luminous energy was described by the 14 th century Dzogchen master Longchenpa in his text Precious Treasury of The Genuine Meaning. This meditative experience often arises spontaneously in Dzogchen meditation practice. This experience of translucent energetic manifestation is also described in Chan Buddhism, Hindu Kashmir Shavism, and Yan Xin Qi Gong. This experience of energetic manifestation can be experienced within subtle forms of respiration. Sometimes the ongoing sense of subtle luminous respiration can be experienced even as there is a profound sense of breathlessness. Breathlessness used here means no breath or minimal breath. This experience of the ongoing sense of respiration without breath is very powerful and empowering. In this experience of vast stillness there is no breath and yet there arises from deep within, a most subtle respiration within the breathlessness. During this respiration of stillness, the body seems to breathe and be breathed by most subtle inner wind. The inner sense of stillness expands and extends throughout the entire body and beyond the body's boundaries. This stillness opens us into the dimension of potential space, the dharmakaya and pure awareness.

L’article se concentre sur la pensée heideggérienne du monde des années Trente, pour essayer d’en cerner la nouveauté et les enjeux. Il s’agit en effet pour Heidegger d’opérer une « double détranscendantalisation » du monde : non seulement l’affranchissement de celui-ci vis-à-vis du sujet moderne et du projet existential, mais aussi le dépassement des couples a priori/a posteriori, condition/conditionné, transcendantal/empirique. D’où la prolifération d’un lexique de l’institution, instauration, fondation (Einrichtung, Stiftung, Gründung) : il s’agit de penser l’institution du monde à partir d’une chose singulière, selon le modèle exemplaire de l’œuvre d’art. Mais le cas de l’œuvre d’art renvoie à l’idée plus générale d’une mise à l’abri (Bergung) de l’être dans les différents types d’étant et dans les différents types correspondants de l’agir de l’homme : c’est dans cette institution du monde dans chaque agir et dans chaque chose, dans l’ordinaire quotidien de toutes nos pratiques et des choses auxquelles nous nous rapportons, institution qui se fait avec nous et au-delà de nous, que l’on peut voir la perspective ouverte par ces réflexions de Heidegger. Cette mise à l’abri se montre aussi inséparable du voilement constitutif de la terre et donc d’un manque de fondation, ce qui nous conduit enfin à mettre en question le privilège heideggérien de certaines modalités "extra-ordinaires" de la mise à l’abri et la surenchère de l’originaire qui s’y exprime.

Ueda writes in his 'Reading Nishida Kitarō' ('Nishida Kitarō o yomu') that to compare Heidegger’s entire thinking up to his last period with Nishida’s thought also up to his last period, including their multiple turns, would be “one of the most valuable paths to investigating the significance, potential, and problematics of Nishidian philosophy.”  In this paper I examine the philosophy of Ueda Shizuteru through the juxtaposition of those two thinkers, of West and of East, who prove to be significant for the creative unfolding of his thought: Martin Heidegger who had inspired much of phenomenology and Continental philosophy, and Nishida Kitarō who had inspired the development of Kyoto School philosophy and much of contemporary Japanese philosophy.  The Heideggerian and Nishidian streams of thought, in their “placial turns”—Nishida’s “logic of place” and Heidegger’s “topology of beyng”—meet in Ueda as he reads each in light of the other’s terminology and concepts.  Through his readings and appropriations that underscore their commonalities and differences, Ueda thus develops a compelling philosophy of place, world, and horizon, a thinking of being-in-the-twofold-world.  The chapter thus examines the meeting of Nishida and Heidegger in Ueda.

This is a chapter in the forthcoming book, Tetsugaku Companion to Ueda Shizuteru--Thoughts About Experience, Language, and Zen, edited by Racquel Bouso, Ralf Müller, and Adam Loughnane; and published by Springer.

In this talk, we show that the thesis of the multiplicity of the world in enactivism can be complemented by phenomenology, especially from the reflections on the concept of world and life in Edmund Husserl and Helmuth Plessner. There are two problems we want to elaborate on: a) the interrelation between different worlds is problematic if each living being enacts a world of its own. In other words, if each living being develops a realm of cognition relative to its own lived body, then it is a challenge to determine how these realms interact with each other. We will call this Uexküll’s problem for enactivism; b) the problem of determining the status of existence of the external world. Suppose we accept the evolutionary phylogenetic progression of living beings in terms of their adaptation (Anpassung) to changing environments. In that case, the world cannot be solely a being relative to the lived bodily experience of living beings. As Plessner points out, it is necessary to identify a component of autonomy that can be thought of from the very interrelation of living beings and the world. We will call this the Plessnerian challenge to the subjective world. Thus, we will indicate a corresponding answer to each problem. First, we will briefly show that in Husserl, two structures give unity to the world of experience. For that reason, we can venture the thesis that the world is unitary from the beginning and subsequently diversifies into different forms of subjectivity.  Secondly, we will reflect on the idea that to determine a sphere of certain autonomy to the world, it is necessary to develop a phenomenology that does not leave the original correlative sphere in which living beings and the world meet from the beginning.

The study focuses, first, on Heidegger's understanding of the world as a closed interconnection of "relationally" defined elements and as a horizon of ecstatic situatedness, and second, on the different ways of "inhabiting" and sharing the world in both the authentic and the inauthentic existence. It is divided into four parts. In the first part basic concepts of Being and Time are expounded that are essential for performing the research and for the clarity of its exposition. The second part is a detailed interpretation of Heidegger's analysis of the surrounding world. The third part thematizes some concepts crucial to differentiate between authentic and inauthentic way of being-in-theworld. In the fourth and main part, an attempt is made to show that, first, the surrounding world, which is shared with others in its "meaningful" explication, is an "organically" articulated horizon of a "typical" and enduring ecstatic situatedness, and second, that both the authentic and the inauthentic existence are simultaneously different modes of the complete structure of existence and moments of this structure which belong to each other and "invert" one another.