Transcript for:
Heidegger's Philosophy of Death

if you learn that you're going to die tomorrow what would you do knock some things off your bucket list spend some time with your family watch the rest of this topical video the question despite becoming a bit of a cliche points towards something important it reveals how our understanding of death and the resulting orientation towards it determines the way that we structure our lives martin heidegger renowned philosopher took up these deathly matters while occupied with a different question in his best known work being and time so throughout this video i'd like to explore heidegger's philosophy of death and the philosophy of life informed by it through a close textual analysis before addressing a critique from french existentialist jean-paul sartre this is heidegger towards death [Music] martin heidegger was a german philosopher who wrote throughout the majority of the 20th century his magnum opus being and time was published in 1927 a year before he took husserl's seat at the university of freiburg and six years before he joined the nazi party despite the question concerning heidegger's politics and philosophy being an important one it won't be covered here instead our focus will be on being in time and in particular his discussion on being towards death that takes place at the beginning of division two some general knowledge will be needed before picking up the task of death in the middle of the book so allow me to introduce just enough in order to make his discussion of death semi-intelligible heidegger's central concern throughout being in time is the question of the meaning of being the history of philosophy has been occupied with questions about beings says heidegger they ask does a book exist does the color red exist does the number one exist yet each time they ask they presuppose an understanding of what it is to exist or to be this is what heidegger is interested in not in beings but in what being is capitalized not to mark some ultimate being but rather to distinguish it from plain old beings seeking an answer to the question of the meaning of being heidegger takes on a phenomenological approach that is based on experience rather than theory inspects docine which is rendered as being there when translated if anything will shed light on the meaning of being it'll be the one asking the question us docine is not the biological human nor the person as an individual static thing but the distinctive kind of entity that human beings as such are as docine things are meaningful to us we have concern for ourselves others the world and being itself thus dassain's state of being is care while the conventional meaning is implied heidegger gives a more technical or jargony meaning to care that will come in handy later heidegger defines care and dossier's state of being as ahead of itself being already in the world as being alongside entities encountered within the world divided into three temporal descriptions these characteristics define that kind of entity that we are first docile is being in the world none choose whether born who they're born to when they were born nor a number of defining attributes instead we are thrown into this world and our experience where we find ourselves who we find ourselves with and when we find ourselves is subsequently conditioned and limited second dosan is being alongside entities and others we live in constant use of tools and things around us we live alongside others or with others as the structures through which we attribute meaning are commonly those we adopt from others wherever we find ourselves there are certain habitual and intellectual norms determined by that they and invoked at times whenever it said that's just what one does or that isn't what one does insofar as docine gives into these expectations dasan is fallen and adopts an unauthentic they-self but we'll see an example of this shortly third and finally dasan is ahead of itself we are constantly projecting at all times a number of possibilities lay before us only some of these possibilities will become actualities but insofar as we are some of those possibilities will become actualities thus dossin always has a number of possibilities and although not an infinite number they each shape what dossan gives meaning and does these three components make up the state of being of dossier yet as presented they are all distinct this is the challenge heidegger faces at the beginning of division two dassain as the questioner of the meaning of being must be revealed if we're to have any luck in answering the question of the meaning of being but as it is dasan has only been unconcealed in parts so now heidegger would like to bring it all together and reveal the whole of dassain thus we begin division two not with death in the mind but on a quest for the whole of dossine heidegger's existential analysis of docine up till now cannot lay claim to primordiality to lay claim to primordiality first requires docine to be revealed as it is as dal sign in its wholeness but where is the whole of docine to be found well as we'll see it could be found in no other place than dos signs end but we need to start off with what we have thus far docile's state of being and that which forms the totality of dossin's structural whole is care having defined care earlier we're aware that one characteristic of dossine is that it's always ahead of itself that is docile's being includes projection the multitudes of possibilities and actualities that docine is continually propelled towards dossine as always ahead of itself always has something still outstanding dossine so long as it is cannot be without possibilities some of which are to be actualized as i'm writing this video essay it's still outstanding whether or not i'll finish it once i do it'll still be outstanding whether or not i upload it and once i do it will still be outstanding whether or not i make another and so on there's still more than i'm to do as long as dassain is it has possibilities but so long as dosline has possibilities it is not yet whole hence wholeness cannot be found in dossine so long as it is conversely no longer being there in which dosline has no more possibilities is whole only in the end is wholeness found but once in the end dossine is no longer this poses a serious problem as to how to discover dostine's wholeness through heideggerian phenomenology where can we find this wholeness if it cannot be found in our own end one answer that heidegger entertains only to reject is in the experiencing of the death of others the end of others appears at first to be objectively accessible as a shift of modes from being there to no longer being there and this sounds exactly like what heidegger was looking for yet such an analysis doesn't satisfy heidegger dawson after its death is not a lifeless material thing like any rock paperclip or piece of paper they are unalive alternatively the deceased who still remain behind in sorts can still be the subject of concern and being with despite being utterly incapable of reciprocating incapable of sharing the deaths of others but rather experiencing it as a loss the dying of others is not something which we experience in a genuine sense at most we are always just there alongside therefore the experience of the death of another is not sufficient to uncover the wholeness of docine because it tells nothing of dawson's death only those of others but before entirely dismissing the experience of the death of others as a means to finding dostine's wholeness heidegger refutes the argument that one could experience the death of another through representation theoretically if i were to travel back in time to take rob spears place at the guillotine i could die as his representative in this case i would die for robs pierre but i wouldn't die for rob's pierre my life would be exchanged for his but he wouldn't attain immortality he would still face a death which is solely his and which i as in other could have no effect on what this describes is the first of three initial defining factors of the heideggerian death heidegger explains by its very essence death is in every case mine insofar as it is at all and adjacent to this mindness of death is the refutation of dying as an empirical event instead death is to be understood as an existential phenomenon if heidegger is to have any hope in making death have sense as the end of dawsyn seeking things which have analogous wholeness in their ends through the phenomenological approach heidegger has a look in his kitchen he considers the ripening of a fruit which is of a similar kind of being of not yet just like dausein but he finds one major difference the ripeness that constitutes the not yet of the fruit is equivalent to the fruit's fulfillment when the fruit ripens it is fulfilled hence the fruit goes towards ripening as fulfillment dacine goes towards death but death is more often unfulfilling as dallasian has ripened far earlier or not yet in both cases at dawson's death doston has fulfilled its course but not fulfilled itself common conceptions of ending like that of the fruit the road or the rain are all incapable of explaining the ending of dawson they describe endings of inert objects that which is without experience concern or projection seeing as the ending of that which we are with others and that which we are alongside things are both unable to explain the death of dossine heidegger takes a leap the ending which we have in view when we speak of death does not signify dassain's being at an end but a being towards the end of this entity death is a way to be which dosten takes over as soon as it is as soon as man comes to life he is at once old enough to die this shift from being at an end to being towards the end holds hope for heidegger's task of determining the totality of docine heidegger is quick to distinguish the existential death the end of being in the world from two other kinds of death perishing originally introduced a couple of pages earlier is that end which is faced by all living things including animals and plants while demise is the non-biological end studied by the social and natural sciences both perishing and demise are secondary to the ontology of death as they presuppose it dying is also clearly defined as that way of being in which docine is towards its death as mortal docine is necessarily dying rather than some static thing docile is continually projecting towards its own death as an inevitable possibility heidegger quickly addresses topics of religious beliefs about death and the metaphysics of death in both cases he withholds any judgment in his phenomenological approach the reality post-death or otherworldly doesn't matter it is beyond experience and experience is the only ground on which heidegger's analysis stands but to both heidegger also states it to be necessary to recognize his ontological interpretation as presupposed and possessing of absolute presidents heidegger's analysis throughout being in time uncovers the primordial grounds on which our experience is built as matters conditioned by our experience in this world religious and metaphysical beliefs follow heidegger's ontology next heidegger sets out to make sense of death as being towards the end in light of care docile's basic state as dalsyn's basic state care is ahead of itself being already in the world as being alongside entities encountered within the world the three characteristics introduced earlier here heidegger places a test for death to measure up to if indeed death belongs in a distinctive sense to the being of dossine then death must be defined in terms of these characteristics can death disclose all three attributes of care throneness fallenness and projection before this question is addressed heidegger articulates the third characteristic of death as he says death is something distinctively impending this status of being impending in general is not unique to death there are plenty of impending things my impending completion of this essay the impending upload and so on yet death manages to stand before and stand out as it is a possibility of the end of no longer being able to be there death also cannot be outstripped by anything since it is undeniably impending there is no case in which death is not on dossine it can't be passed off onto any other neither can anything be it practice or elixir defeat death and guarantee immortality hence heidegger writes death is the possibility of the absolute impossibility of docine thus death reveals itself as that possibility which is one's own most which is non-relational and which is not to be outstripped with these features uncovered we may return to ask the question does dosline satisfy the three characteristics of hidagarian care a short sketch of authentic being towards death may be given here so as to answer the question in the affirmative death is already the subject towards which one is ahead of themselves that is projection above death is also the target which every doc sign is thrown towards along with this throneness comes phactical knowledge or ignorance and it is also from being thrown that death reveals the mood of anxiety wherein one stands in the face of death finally falling from the face of death which results due to a feeling of uncanniness the feeling of not being at home is avoided by understanding the reality of death as provided here by heidegger for these reasons heidegger answers the question of care saying as regards its ontological possibility dying is grounded in care if being towards death is essential to docine then average everydayness will demonstrate it in an inauthentic manner and this is precisely what they do unlike facing the above existential depiction of death average everydayness demonstrates an alternative being towards death their idle talk exhibits their understanding they say one of these days one will die too in the end but right now it has nothing to do with us this suggests that they don't take death as a threat for death lies far off in the distance furthermore it is not my death that is the subject of the rhetoric of the they the they speaks of one's death that they actively conceal the attributes just previously described of death and then they go on to preach escape from death and return to tranquilized everydayness and they has dictated average every day being towards death so well that it is already a matter of public acceptance that thinking about death is a cowardly fear a sign of insecurity on the part of docine and a somber way of fleeing the world the they does not permit us the courage for anxiety in the face of death that they alter the mood of anxiety into a loathed cowardly fear and then advise indifferent tranquility to quell that fear this is the alienation of docine and is characteristic of falling or fleeing in the face of death hence although a poor being towards death average everydayness does demonstrate heidegger's prior analysis of death through exhibiting the three dimensions of care each in an inauthentic way the vae takes their throneness towards death as a matter of fear as though one were to have a case of death the they exhibits their state of being fallen by recognizing death as an impersonal empirical phenomena for which idle talk explains simply that one dies and that they exhibits their inauthentic projection towards death through expectation idly waiting around for death to arrive as though it were in uber eats order it is precisely the untroubled indifference which the they takes towards death that sets their treatment of it apart but there is one thing that average everydayness managed to unintentionally disclose about death this certainty of death only the certainty of death from the they was inauthentic and that death was treated as an empirical phenomenon however death as being towards death isn't available as an empirical phenomenon instead what they had achieved certainty of was demise and perishing they took death as demise and perishing and determined it to be certain as if a statistic furthermore that they claims that death is certain while negating its immediate threat by suggesting death to be far off saying everyone dies eventually to do so according to heidegger is contradictory because it is death's very certainty that it is possible at any moment along with the certainty of death goes the indefiniteness of its when when indefiniteness is concealed so too is certainty certainty and indefiniteness combined together to be the last fundamental characteristic of the heideggerian death to return to heidegger's original endeavor dawson's wholeness has now become available being a whole need not be found in demise perishing or being at an end after the exploration of being towards death dawson has shown that it's not yet is already included in its being thus through being towards death being a whole can be found before discussing authentic being towards death i'd like to entertain one criticism that criticism offered by sartre in being and nothingness the mid 20th century existentialist jean-paul sartre mounts a critique of heidegger's being towards death for some context sartre argued that all people had the freedom to make their own choices along with the responsibility not to forget it through conforming to social expectations to sartra heidegger appears as the philosophical form of a broader trend intended on the humanization of death disarming death from its default status as the wall of life in particular sartre criticizes heidegger's interiorization of death of death as something that is in every case mine doing this is a sleight of hand because for sartre death is neither mine nor a possibility he writes death is not my possibility of no longer realizing a presence in the world but rather an always possible annihilation of my possibilities which is outside of my possibilities rather than a possibility itself death is annihilation when all possibilities are revoked furthermore death cannot be my own because through death one loses control of themselves and hands it off to the other sartre himself is no longer able to determine his existence instead he lives on in the perceptions and judgments of the living who now have full control over who sartre was if this critique is to hold not only does heidegger's account of being towards death fall through but so do the foundations for the answer to the question of the meaning of being so what might be heidegger's response it would appear to me that heidegger would make the argument that sartre misunderstood the death spoken about by heidegger and even confused it for that which heidegger termed demise thus a heideggerian response may attack the basis on which sartre's argument stands his understanding of the heideggerian death the primary distinction can be noted between sartre's reevaluation of the possibility that is death to place them face to face heidegger said death is the possibility of the absolute impossibility of docine osapra revises it to be death is an always possible annihilation of my possibilities which is outside of my possibilities death for sartre stands outside of one's possibilities as annihilation but for heidegger death is not an event first and therefore a possibility sometime down the road in fact death isn't even an event it is precisely the possibility of no longer being able to be there demise is the event at which the human being's life ceases but death is a way to be and that way of being that docine as mortal always is hence why as we'll see authentic dying is a way of living not reserved for the moments of one's death as sartre himself suggested average everyday being towards death was inauthentic and its evasion from the face of death as docine is most commonly average every dayness it tends also to be inauthentic being towards death yet this isn't absolutely unchangeable authentic being towards death can be found in the disclosing of how deaf truly is and then the facing of that with anxiety and all to be authentic one must recognize death as having the attributes heidegger has unconcealed from it and then to comport themselves towards it in such a way that they don't flee from it this isn't to be confused with the actualization of death like in suicide death for heidegger is chiefly a possibility to hasten your death is to deprive yourself of the very grounding that being towards death is nor is authentic being towards death analogous with dwelling on death as in thinking about it and calculating its arrival and nor is it to be found in the expecting of death to do so would be to take death out of the possible and wait for it as an actual thereby revoking death of its genuine characteristics rather than actualizing it dwelling on it or expecting it heidegger suggests that authentic being towards death is to run ahead towards death translated less literally running ahead is anticipation wherein one faces death as the possibility that it is with its five-fold characteristics rather than as it is told by the they each characteristic of death that docine comports itself towards informs a shift in dassain's orientation in life first acknowledging death as your own most possibility reveals how your death is entirely on you others despite their talk can't face death for you to realize this is to be wrenched from the they and to subsequently realize everyday docine's lostness in the understandings and habits of the they the second acknowledging death as non-relational individualizes docile down to itself not only can others not face your own death for you everything others and the world fail you and death having realized dossin's lostness the non-relationality of death forces you to direct yourself towards your own most possibility individually rejecting the possibilities suggested by the they self third acknowledging death as that possibility which is not to be outstripped dispels any worry that docine might be outstripped by others death is the ultimate possibility the possibility of absolute impossibility seeing this all other possibilities are lit up disclosed by that possibility which is inescapable there is nothing beyond the end seeing this is to account for the whole of dossine and for the totality of your possibilities fourth acknowledging death is certain reveals death to be something other than an empirical event or statistic death turns out to be primordially certain accounted for in the most primordial whole of docine i or consciousness stand atop this primordial totality of dosain as mortal being towards death precedes and frames all conceptions and abstractions thus to anticipate death is to see beyond the shallow fictions offered by the they self and to reach for a more fundamental primordial reality fifth and finally acknowledging death is indefinite with regards to its when reveals the constant threat of the end which looms over you the when of death is unknown it could be far off or it could be soon you are always at risk whether in a car at a restaurant or at home on the couch the resulting state of mind when you stand face to face with death rather than fleeing from it is anxiety and only through this anxiety is there any self-understanding as dausan finally understands itself as mortal and as being towards death only in finding comfort and a cowardly fear of death espoused by the they does one avoid this to run towards this anxiety is the only way for docine to be authentic being towards death to live your life in a way that is your own that reveals the whole of your possibilities that reaches the primordial and that rejects conventional promises of security heidegger concludes his discussion of being towards death summarizing anticipation reveals to doc science lostness in the they self and brings it face to face with the possibility of being itself primarily unsupported by concernful solicitude but of being itself rather in an impassioned freedom towards death a freedom which has been released from the illusions of the they and which is factical certain of itself and anxious he had been dying for the 86 years prior but on the 26th of may in 1976 martin heidegger perished from an unidentified infection now we stand being alongside his thought of being towards death and we could return to the question i presented at the very beginning to see how it measures up what would you do if you learned that you were going to die tomorrow without any long-term interests or social expectations your answer displays a freedom towards death of sorts you become free to do exactly what you care about the most hence it shares the own mostness of heidegarian death yet i think heidegger would find the question ultimately unsatisfactory by setting a date for the death there's room for comfort in a determined when you could plan out your last day doing what you want to do the most and then graciously meet death once the clock strikes zero but this is nothing like reality because in reality death is possible at any moment to play it off as otherwise is to flee from the face of death to hide inside away from uncanniness and to return to the tranquility of the they self that alienates dalsyn thus one could imagine heidegger posing a better question what would you do if instead of hiding in fear and shying away from it you embraced the anxiety of your own mortality and lived running ahead towards death that's all i've got to talk about today thank you for watching the video if you enjoyed it leave a like and subscribe and if not or you thought i got anything wrong please let me know what and why down below and until next time you