>Dear Richard and Gregory,
>
>The book sounds great, and definitely much needed.
>
>I have a question that I'm sure other readers of this list share,
>and wonder if you wouldn't mind tipping your hand the slightest bit
>to answer it. The question is this:
> When did Heidegger write the infamous line about the "der
>inneren Wahrheit und Groesse" of the National Socialist 'movement'?
>And when did he insert the parenthetical 'explanation' ("naemlich
>mit der Begegnung de planetarisch bestimmten Technik und des
>neuzeitlichen Menschen")?
The most obvious time would be when he edited the lecture for publication
in 1953, but given that he revised his writings fairly regularly, it could
be anytime.
The page of the manuscript where this line would be found is missing
according to the person who edited the Gesamtausgabe edition of it.
Convenient or just one of those things?
According to some of the students in attendance, he said "the Movement" and
did not say the parathetical expression. Now since he sometimes did not
say everything he wrote, this really proves nothing, although it lends
credence to the accusation that he altered the line at a later date.
The last scholarly consensus I saw was that the parathetical qualification
was added later. The use of "planetary" in particular would support that
because it did not really enter his working vocabulary until after 1940,
although the source is Nietzsche and Juenger, both of which he had
encountered before 1935.
IMHO, the philogical debate has concealed the substative issue. What is
the nature of this "qualification"? Are we supposed to say, "Oh, well, in
that case, I guess NS had something going for it?" Because Heidegger
returns to this in the Spiegel interview (1966) and implies something like
this, we are left to wonder at what was the connection between the inner
truth and greatness of the movement and modern technology that Heidegger
saw even in 1966. If what I am suggesting is true, the qualification adds
to and does not repudiate that which it qualifies. It follows that those
who see Heidegger's later thinking on technology as a repudiation of Nazism
(Silvio Vietta would be the most obvious example, but Poeggeler and
Lacoue-Labarthe in their different ways also advocate this position) have
not thought through Heidegger's continuing belief that National Socialism
was the best means to encounter modern technology.
Chris
--- from list heidegger@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ---
>
>The book sounds great, and definitely much needed.
>
>I have a question that I'm sure other readers of this list share,
>and wonder if you wouldn't mind tipping your hand the slightest bit
>to answer it. The question is this:
> When did Heidegger write the infamous line about the "der
>inneren Wahrheit und Groesse" of the National Socialist 'movement'?
>And when did he insert the parenthetical 'explanation' ("naemlich
>mit der Begegnung de planetarisch bestimmten Technik und des
>neuzeitlichen Menschen")?
The most obvious time would be when he edited the lecture for publication
in 1953, but given that he revised his writings fairly regularly, it could
be anytime.
The page of the manuscript where this line would be found is missing
according to the person who edited the Gesamtausgabe edition of it.
Convenient or just one of those things?
According to some of the students in attendance, he said "the Movement" and
did not say the parathetical expression. Now since he sometimes did not
say everything he wrote, this really proves nothing, although it lends
credence to the accusation that he altered the line at a later date.
The last scholarly consensus I saw was that the parathetical qualification
was added later. The use of "planetary" in particular would support that
because it did not really enter his working vocabulary until after 1940,
although the source is Nietzsche and Juenger, both of which he had
encountered before 1935.
IMHO, the philogical debate has concealed the substative issue. What is
the nature of this "qualification"? Are we supposed to say, "Oh, well, in
that case, I guess NS had something going for it?" Because Heidegger
returns to this in the Spiegel interview (1966) and implies something like
this, we are left to wonder at what was the connection between the inner
truth and greatness of the movement and modern technology that Heidegger
saw even in 1966. If what I am suggesting is true, the qualification adds
to and does not repudiate that which it qualifies. It follows that those
who see Heidegger's later thinking on technology as a repudiation of Nazism
(Silvio Vietta would be the most obvious example, but Poeggeler and
Lacoue-Labarthe in their different ways also advocate this position) have
not thought through Heidegger's continuing belief that National Socialism
was the best means to encounter modern technology.
Chris
--- from list heidegger@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ---