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01-06-2015 | Theoretical / Philosophical Paper

Intersubjectivity of Dasein in Heidegger’s Being and Time: How Authenticity is a Return to Community

Author: K. M. Stroh

Published in: Human Studies | Issue 2/2015

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Abstract

This essay discusses an alternative interpretation of the term “Dasein” as Heidegger uses it in Being and Time and, in particular, the possibility that Dasein is meant to contain an inherent form of intersubjectivity to which we must “return” in order to achieve authenticity. In doing so, I build on the work of John Haugeland and his interpretation of Dasein as a mass term, while exploring the implications such an interpretation has on Heidegger’s conception of “authenticity”. Ultimately, this paper aims to take seriously Heidegger’s claim to be moving past the isolated Cartesian subject and towards a view of authentic human existence that is cognizant of the way our identities are always formed within a pre-existing community. In addition, since many interpretations of Heidegger have argued that “the Anyone” (Das Man) is representative of all possible forms of community, I consider how this alternative understanding of Dasein as intersubjective can shed new light on critical remarks Heidegger makes about “the Anyone”. Thus, I argue that by reinterpreting Dasein as community, we can find more coherence between Heidegger’s otherwise conflicting conceptions of authenticity and “the Anyone”.

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Fred Dallmayr makes strong arguments for using the term “intersubjective” in this context but also warns that “the term appears to prejudge the intended theme in the sense of a relationship between individuals” (Dallmayr 1980: 221). Therefore, though my use of “intersubjective” is meant to represent a collective way of co-being, this should not lead one to infer that such a collective is necessarily composed of independently existing individuals.

For a further discussion of the way scholars have interpreted Heidegger’s conception of authenticity as having subjectivist leanings in Being and Time, see Taylor Carman’s Heidegger’s Analytic: Interpretation, Discourse, and Authenticity in Being and Time. In particular, Carman points to Charles Taylor’s willingness to place the ideas of Being and Time within an “expressivist” trend that characteristically uses the revised—but still present—subjectivism running through Hegel, Marx, and Kierkegaard. As Carman states about those who would interpret Heidegger as partaking in this trend, “Taylor himself, for one, reads Heidegger in this way and, as we shall see, Charles Guignon offers an interpretation of authenticity that places Heidegger squarely among the expressivist thinkers who undoubtedly influenced him” (Carman 2003: 265).

In particular, I will be focusing on Haugeland’s account of Dasein as it appears in Dasein Disclosed.

As Dallmayr points out, “Heidegger’s critique of subjectivity has tended to be ignored or sharply de-emphasized by reviewers of Being and Time” (Dallmayr 1980: 235).

To clarify, while my account of Dasein is heavily influenced by Haugeland’s works, many details of my definition were not specifically discussed by Haugeland. As a result, I am not claiming that my definition of Dasein is the same as Haugeland’s, or one that he was advocating, though I have adopted a number of his basic assumptions (as well as his useful terminology) regarding Dasein.

Although outside the scope of this paper, this type of a complete ending of intelligible worlds may actually be closer to Iain Thompson’s reading of the term “demise” (Thompson 2013). Regardless, there does not appear to be any essential barrier preventing linguistic or epistemic communities from experiencing “death” as it is distinguished from “demise” in Thompson’s interpretation.

For instance, Francis Raffoul begins with Heidegger’s definition of Dasein as that which we “in each case are” to conclude that “from the outset, the problematic of Dasein combines the question of the meaning of being with the most extreme individuation” (Raffoul 2013: 275).

My focus on explaining the ability to maintain “mineness” within an understanding of Dasein as community is due, in part, to Hubert Dreyfus’ brief objection to Haugeland’s interpretation of Dasein as a mass term. As Dreyfus argues, “Haugeland’s interpretation runs up against many passages that make it clear that for Heidegger Dasein designates exclusively entities like each of us, that is, individual persons” (Dreyfus 1991: 14). To support this claim, Dreyfus cites a passage from Being and Time where Heidegger states that “because Dasein has in each case mineness one must always use a personal pronoun when one addresses it: ‘I am,’ ‘you are’” (Heidegger 1962: 68/42). However, as I have shown, advocates of Haugeland’s interpretation can reply by showing how “we” is also a personal pronoun and one whose use to address Dasein would eliminate the essential individuality that Dreyfus and others have attributed to it.

To avoid a confusion of terms, I will hereafter refer to the “collective Dasein”—from which individual “cases of Dasein” emerge—as “community”. However, it is important to remember that this term is being used to reference my interpretation of “Dasein”.

Steven Crowell also argues that such breakdowns lead to an emergence of an authentic first-person perspective from the resulting “call of conscience” (Crowell 2005: 126–128). However, unlike Crowell, I do not see this as an emergence of a singular first-person perspective but, instead, the uncovering of a collective first-person perspective where “cases of Dasein” become capable of identifying with their intersubjectivity.

Though not within Being and Time, Heidegger indicates in History of the Concept of Time that the self-sufficient Subject and absorption in “the Anyone” coincide when he states that “The ‘ego,’ the ‘self,’ is nothing other than the who of this being, the very being which as the Anyone has the possibility of being of the ‘ego’ itself” (Heidegger 1985: 248).

For my purposes, the term “non-authentic” is meant to refer to any modes of existence other than “authentic,” including both “inauthentic” and “undifferentiated” modes.

I use the term “being-a-community” as a way of expressing an essential aspect of our “ownmost potentiality-for-Being” when Dasein is understood as having inherent intersubjective characteristics.

Again, “integration” should not be taken too literally since people are always already a community and could not fail to integrate, though how they integrate does not have to be predetermined.

To clarify, this “embracing” of our collective first-person perspective should be understood as a way of living rather than an “inner” realization. In this sense, we “recognize” ourselves as community by acting as participants, rather than subjects. Thus, to adopt what Charles Guignon writes about Selfhood, being-a-community “is something we have to do rather than something we find” (Guignon 2004: 125).

Blattner, W. (2013). Authenticity and resoluteness. In M. Wrathall (Ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Heidegger’s Being and Time (pp. 320–337). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRef

Carman, T. (2003). Heidegger’s analytic: Interpretation, discourse, and authenticity in Being and Time. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRef

Crowell, S. (2005). Subjectivity: Locating the first-person in Being and Time. In R. Polt (Ed.), Heidegger’s Being and Time: Critical Essays (pp. 117–139). Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.

Dallmayr, F. R. (1980). Heidegger on intersubjectivity. Human Studies, 3(3), 221–246.CrossRef

Dreyfus, H. L. (1991). Being-in-the-World. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Dreyfus, H. L. (2005). Can there be a better source of meaning than everyday practices? Reinterpreting Division I of Being and Time in the Light of Division II. In R. Polt (Ed.), Heidegger’s Being and Time: Critical Essays (pp. 141–154). Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.

Dreyfus, H. L. (2013). Being-with-others. In M. Wrathall (Ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Heidegger’s Being and Time (pp. 145–156). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRef

Figal, G. (2005). Being-with, Dasein-with, and the ‘They’ as the Basic Concept of Unfreedom, from Martin Heidegger: Phanomonolegie der Freiheit. In R. Polt (Ed.), Heidegger’s Being and Time: Critical Essays (pp. 105–116). Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.

Guignon, C. (2004). Becoming a self: The role of authenticity in Being and Time. In C. Guignon (Ed.), The existentialists (pp. 119–132). Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.

Haugeland, J. (2013). Dasein disclosed. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.CrossRef

Heidegger, M. (1962). Being and Time. Tr. J. Macquarrie & E. Robinson. New York: Harper & Row Publishers.

Heidegger, M. (1985). History of the concept of time. Tr. T. Kisiel. New York: Harper & Row Publishers.

Raffoul, F. (2013). Dasein. In E. Raffoul & E. Nelson (Eds.), The Bloomsbury Companion to Heidegger (pp. 275–281). New York: Bloomsbury Academic.

Thompson, I. (2013). Death and demise in Being and Time. In M. Wrathall (Ed.), The Cambridge companion to Heidegger’s Being and Time (pp. 260–290). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRef

Title: Intersubjectivity of Dasein in Heidegger’s Being and Time: How Authenticity is a Return to Community
Author: K. M. Stroh
Publication date: 01-06-2015
Publisher: Springer Netherlands
Published in: Human Studies / Issue 2/2015
Print ISSN: 0163-8548
Electronic ISSN: 1572-851X
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10746-015-9341-9

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