This paper provides an analysis of the key term aidagara ('betweenness') in the philosophical ethics of Watsuji Tetsurō (1889-1960), in response to and in light of the recent movement in Japanese Buddhist studies known as 'Critical Buddhism'. The Critical Buddhist call for a turn away from 'topical' or intuitionist thinking and towards (properly Buddhist) 'critical' thinking, while problematic in its bipolarity, raises the important issue of the place of 'reason' vs 'intuition' in Japanese Buddhist ethics. In this paper, a comparison (...) of Watsuji's 'ontological quest' with that of Martin Heidegger (1889-1976), Watsuji's primary Western source and foil, is followed by an evaluation of a corresponding search for an 'ontology of social existence' undertaken by Tanabe Hajime (1885-1962). Ultimately, the philosophico-religious writings of Watsuji Tetsurō allow for the 'return' of aesthesis as a modality of social being that is truly dimensionalized, and thus falls prey neither to the verticality of topicalism nor the limiting objectivity of criticalism. (shrink)

This paper contrasts the notion of “willing” in Heidegger’s politics with the notion of “dawning” in Heidegger’s philosophy. It argues that, in the political text, the attunement of Dasein to what-is is centred in the notion of Dasein’s “willing” of what-is, while in the philosophical text it is centred in the notion of what-is “dawning” on Dasein. It maintains that the attitude to anxiety essential to a “dawning” of what-is is not reached in Heidegger’s “The Self-Assertion of the German University”. (...) It concludes by maintaining that, rather than being attuned to what-is, the will in the “The Self-Assertion of the German University” is attuned to its own relationship to what is in a narcissistic rather than a philosophical way; that is, it territorializes “dawning” as a relation to “what is”, and makes “dawning” of “what-is” its “own” in the same way as any nationalism makes a culture, a language or a geographical region its own. In contrast to the narcissism of nationalism, philosophy, as outlined by Heidegger in the essay “What Is Metaphysics?”, is the experience of allowing what-is to “dawn” on Dasein rather than a preoccupation with “willing” of “dawning” as one’s own relation to Being. (shrink)

In this paper, we explore a rationalistic orientation in Western society. We suggest that this orientation is one of the predominant ways in which Western society tends to frame, understand and deal with a majority of problems and questions – namely in terms of mathematical analysis, calculation and quantification, relying on logic, numbers, and statistics. Our main goal in this paper is to uncover the affective structure of this rationalistic orientation. In doing so, we illustrate how this orientation structures the (...) way not only individuals but society as a whole frames and solves problems. We firstly point towards some exemplary instances of the rationalistic orientation, specifically regarding science, society, and lifeworld practice. Crucially, we argue that the rationalistic orientation is not merely based on a set of beliefs we could easily correct; but rather, that it is an affective condition tacitly shaping our engagement with the world in an encompassing way. Relating to the work of Martin Heidegger, we argue that what we have called an orientation in the beginning is in fact a rationalistic attunement. This attunement fundamentally shapes the pre-reflective level of how individuals approach the world. We elaborate this claim by showing how the rationalistic attunement concretely manifests in tangible socio-material affect dynamics. In the end, we motivate a critical stance towards this attunement, providing the ability to reflect upon and question instances where this way of framing and solving problems is counterproductive. (shrink)

German philosopher Martin Heidegger stirred educators when in 1951 he claimed teaching is more difficult than learning because teachers must ‘learn to let learn’. However in the main he left the aphorism unexplained as part of a brief four-paragraph, less than two-page set of observations concerning the relationship of teaching to learning; and concluded at the end of those observations that to become a teacher is an ‘exalted matter’. This paper investigates both of Heidegger's claims, interpreting letting learn in the (...) context of Heidegger's larger philosophical project, and suggesting why in light of that project to become a teacher is an exalted concern. The methodology guiding the inquiry is largely hermeneutic, the purpose of the essay to interpret teaching from a Heideggerian perspective: its nature and general method. (shrink)

Heidegger distinguishes between things that are present-at-hand and things that are ready-to-hand. I argue that, in Heidegger, this distinction is between two sets of entities rather than between two ways of considering one and the same set of entities. I argue that Heidegger ascribes distinct temporal, essential, and phenomenological properties to these two different kinds of entities.

This article examines the relationship between reflecting and making in the context of the new institutional connection between research and art/design. The article argues that while this new dispensation offers exciting possibilities for fruitful cross- and interdisciplinary development, caution is necessary to ensure that the artistic domain retains a level of autonomy within the broader university. For elucidation, the article initially looks to the early history of education in our fields and to Pierre Bourdieu's account of the "early moments of (...) the autonomization of the artistic field," in his critique of the "scholastic disposition." Bourdieu recognises "a repression of the material determinations of symbolic practices" within those early developments: in effect, a repression of those embodied, situated, and practical aspects of art and design production. He regards such repression as a trait of the broader academy, both then and in subsequent and recent periods. The article argues that this attitude still provides the impetus for what James Elkins refers to as "the incommensurability of studio art production and university life." The article further argues that a parity of esteem between reflecting and making is vital not only for the sake of the stability of the fields of art and design but for the ongoing development of the broader university. In this argument the article looks to the work of John Dewey, Martin Heidegger, and Hans-Georg Gadamer. (shrink)