On Tue, 11 Apr 1995, Anthony F. Beavers wrote:
> But I didn't say that truth is "just found in statements," only that
> statements had a revelatory nature needed to let the thing be manifested
> "as". I agree that the openness of comportment must be prior. To return
> to my original question: what is comporting itself toward what? You have
> only asserted that there is a relationship between Dasein and the thing,
> (actually this is difficult for me since Dasein is not even written in to
> this passage.) The passage once again is:
>
> "The relation of the presentative statement to the thing is the
> accomplishment of that *bearing* which originally and always comes to
> prevail as a comportment. But all comportment is distinguished by the
> fact that, standing in the open region, it adheres to something opened up
> *as such*. What is thus opened up, solely in this strict sense, was
> experienced early in Western thinking as "what is present" and for a long
> time has been named "being."" (1977, 124).
I believe that the fact that the comportment is one of man/Dasein is
taken for granted here. It is of course made explicit by the passage
"Every open relatedness is a comportment. Man's open stance . . . etc."
If it were not taken for granted, this sentence would be a wrenching
change of topic. More evidence that man/Dasein is intended all along is
given by the passage preceding the long quotation above: "Disregarding
all "psychological" preconceptions as well as those of any "theory of
consciousness" . . . ."
I think your problem with the passage in question
might stem in part from an insistence on seeing the comportment in terms
of *relation*. All talk of relation (of correspondence or whatever) is
*subsequent* to the original openness. This is why Heidegger writes in
the sentence prior to your quotation: "This appearing of the thing in
traversing a field of opposedness takes place within an open region, the
openness of which is not first created by the presenting but rather is
only entered into and taken over *as a domain of relatedness*." (my emphasis)
>
>So far, no mention of human beings, but Heidegger has said "The relation
> of the presentative statement to the thing...always comes to prevail as
> comportment." However, the next lines seem to complicate things.
> "Comportment stands open to beings. Every open relatedness is a
>comportment. Man's open stance varies depending on the kind of beings and
> the way of comportment."
> Now man is brought back into the picture. Three terms are apparent in the
>passage, man, the presentative statement, and the thing. What I am having
> difficulty determining is the precise relationship between them.
I think the best way of answering this is to say that on the
basis of Dasein's open comportment to the thing, there arises the
*possibility* of relating to the thing by means of a presentative
statement.
As to: "All working and achieving, all action and calculation,
keep within an open region within which beings, with regard to what they
are and how they are, can properly taken their stand and become capable
of being said. *This* can occur, etc." I think the problem you have
here might be that you are assuming that the "this" has a much broader
referent than it does. I believe it refers *only* to "become capable of
being said". If this is true, then it makes perfect sense that *this*
depends on beings presenting themselves along with the presentative
statement. Reading a broader referent creates the codependency problem
that I have rejecting. I hope all this addresses your problem directly.
Martin
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