Well, that is about it, isn't it? Anti-science, anti-enlightenment, an irrational view of language which has no connection to what we do know. If you want to read a bunch of half-truths framed for an ideological purpose then go ahead and read Heidegger's "Modern Science, Metaphysics, and Mathematics." It is ridiculous. "The Letter on Humanism"? "The Origin of the Work of Art"? This kind of stuff is can only become a religion for the intellectuals. It is not clear, interesting, or unique. Anyone can find much more to think about by reading Augustine or Thomas Aquinas, to choose two of my favorite pre-enlightenment thinkers.
Those of you who think Heidegger actually says something.... anything worth saying, about "language" or "science" or "being" are simply engaging in the intellectual version of creationism. Heidegger is not even wrong. He is simply non-sense. And when he is not making non-sense he's a fascist apologist.
I hear a lot of contempt for the thinking of fundamentalist Christian's from most of my fellow intellectuals, but nothing can match the wilful stupidity of those who actually think that Heidegger has anything at all to contribute to intellectual culture. He is a symbol of an attempt to destroy the intellectual foundations of clear thinking and enlightenment.
Chris, Andie, please give me some of your favorite Heidegger passages and I will give you some of mine.
Self-crit: Perhaps it is my own bitterness. I now look at the hours spent reading Heidegger as a monumental waste of time. I could have spent the time trying to catch up on physics or learning more about higher mathematics, or learning something about genetics, or reading history, even trying to learn the labyrinth of the Poisoned Pawn Variation of the Sicilian Najdorf would have been less of a waste of time.
I leave you with one of my lousy poems.
*Heidegger - Back from Syracuse* - a Poem
Here I see the translucent, disappearing hands, Of the philosopher polishing his mirror. In Nosferatu's German twilight all is unclear Except for the ravenous glass-breaking bands Of men who rape even memory's ghost. But there he sits dreaming dreary overwords Of being to disinter all that undergirds Untimely thoughts of meaning. Ungrateful host Of his own mind, language itself limits the form The world can bear, making nonsense of all We hear. It was not for him to heed the call - Screams in the street are merely history's storm Which cannot penetrate a Philosopher's walls. The fading grasp of being always falls Into that mirror which is his mask; What question is ultimate enough for him to ask?
Jerry Monaco New York City
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