“Heidegger in 90 Minutes” by Paul Strathern is a brief introduction to philosophy of Heidegger. Main content ‘Heidegger’s Life and Works’ comments Heidegger’s life with and his philosophy from mainly his masterpiece “Being and Time”. First, this content describes Heidegger’s catholic background, and his abandon of theology and conversion to philosophy. Next it explains phenomenology and psychologism of his master Edmund Husserl, and Heidegger’s rebellion to Husserl’s philosophy. And he writes experiments of the World War Ⅰ and the great depression as political chaos and cultural chaos. This political cultural chaos and miserable condition made Heidegger criticized to traditional philosophy from Athens (Plato and Asistotle) to the Neo Kantian or the Hegelian, reevaluated the fundamental concept of being by pre-Socratic philosophers equal to Nietzche.
Then Strathern comments Heidegger’s chief work “Being and Time” by explanation of its principal concepts “Being (Sein)”, “being-in-the-world (In-Der-Welt-Sein)”, “Dasein”, “disclosedness”, “aletheia”, “essence of man” and the anticipation of death.
Heidegger thought philosophy focus on study of “being” itself. The central conception is “Dasein” which means the entirely “human existence”. Understanding Dasein is understanding own being, and it understands the being of beings at the same time. The core of Dasein is be in the actual world, it’s called “being-in-the-world” which is “specificity of our being” where “we ourselves are”. Being is not a mysterious thing, it’s everyday thing as “being-in-the-world”. So we understand it by “discloseness” of it. Heidegger’s an ancient Greek word “aletheia (truth)” means unconcealment. The unconcealment disclose our being and its possibilities, yet simultaneously we conceal all other possibilities. To choose one disclosure, beings cut away the other possible disclosure. Thus Heidegger arrived at the concept “essence of man”. “This could be done only by elimination the accidental and the trivial as we concentrate on the core of human being. Only by the anticipation of death is every accidental and ‘provisional’ possibility driven out. By grasping the ‘finitude of one’s existence,’ one frees oneself from the shallow ‘multiplicity of possibilities’ that life presents us.”
The commentary of this book on Heidegger, Strathern take notice of only main theories of Being on Heidegger’s major work “Being and Time” and background of the book. Strathern use German history, atmosphere and situation of the era, history of philosophy and biological description of Heidegger as for solely explain theories of “Being and Time”. The commentary on “Being and Time” is plain and short but essential, excellent and to the point. But it’s regrettable Strathern disregard Heidegger’s later philosophy, I think the thought has possibilities to beyond humanism, nihilism, problems of modern civilization (such as excessive advanced culture, technology and science), metaphysics and philosophy and human thought themselves.
This book is a only introduction to Heidegger’s complicated and tough philosophy. Its essence and overall characteristics in this small book. So I recommend this book to complete beginners to Heidegger.
“Comments and Criticisms” contains Heidegger’s writings and comments to Heidegger’s philosophy.
Heidegger in 90 Minutes (Philosophers in 90 Minutes Series)
Paul Strathern
Ivan R. Dee, Chicago, 9 April 2002
96 pages $7.95
ISBN: 978-1-56663-438-0
Contents:
Introduction
Heidegger’s Life and Works
Comments and Criticisms
Chronology of Significant Philosophical Dates
Chronology of Heidegger’s Life and Times
Recommended Reading
Index