The tipping point in Mauss, it seems to me, comes on page 46, where he says (italics omitted for technical reasons):
"If one gives things and returns them, it is because one is giving 'respects' [i.e.: paying respects?] -- we still say 'courtesies'. Yet it is also because by giving one is giving oneself, and if one gives oneself, it is because one 'owes' oneself -- one's person and one's goods -- to others."
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Bridges to Autonomy; Paradoxes in Teaching and Learning, by Matt Silliman and David Kenneth Johnson (click on book for more information)
Plato's Dialogues
Welcome to Matt Silliman's Skeptiblog
Though all posts are open to all visitors, this semester's posts will mostly pertain to my Plato's Dialogues course.
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Bridges to Autonomy; Paradoxes in Teaching and Learning, by Matt Silliman and David Kenneth Johnson (click on book for more information)
7 comments:
I agree, Mauss’s suggestion that we owe something of ourselves to others is of paramount relevance; and might be the one concept that crosses all cultural boundaries and time. This claim seems as important as Bentham’s view that security is ‘the pre-eminent object’ in society. Humans are completely dependent upon others for many years of their lives (if not all); and, I think it is vital that we recognize our gifts, bring them to fruition, and share them, or give them to others.
The concept of "The Gift," in its practice, is a way to recognize the imperative of right: "Be a person and respect others as persons" (Hegel). This may be a way to encourage honor among men and women, but this would be a romantic interpretation of human nature. Martin Heidegger claims we need to view human nature transparently.
It's not clear to me that this is a romanticized notion at all. As Mauss details, it seems rather to be a historical, ethological, and moral fact that we owe what we are and have to each other. We might craft a community that emphasizes and reminds us of that, or we might craft one that tries (at its peril) to ignore it.
A Hobbesian (or Heideggerian -- here his enthusiastic embrace of Nazism seems relevant to his philosophy) cynicism about human nature is not transparency or realism.
I assumed Heidegger would view honor or other moral capacities as romantic expressions of being. I did not mean to sound cynical by this assumption. Honor and morality are the fundamentals of community; and Heidegger encouraged community in his philosophy.
Furthermore, Heidegger's association with the Nazis is very conflicting for me because -- although I don't think he was a good person - he was brilliant. Many of his friends (including Husserl) and his wife were taken aback by his decision to join the Nazi regime. His reasons are not ethically supported; but he saw the Nazi regime as a return to a sense of community.
Heidegger had a "primitive side to him" according to many of his friends. This aspect of his personality seems to be responsible for his immoral affiliation with the Nazis, but also his brilliance.
I quite agree that we must answer the hermaneutic challenge of Heidegger's thought, whether brilliant or merely obscurantist, without dismissing him ad hominem on the basis of his political associations. One thing that does seem to incline him to Nazism, however, is precisely his championing of honor, and a particular sort of human community...
in heidegger's primitive side, are you referring to his focus on the "tool at hand" where we focus on small scope tasks to assure their success out of the fear of death that is an opportunity that can occur at any time? i'm not convinced there is a contradiction in his brilliance and involvement with nazism (not to justify his choices). perhaps he thought the countercultures pin pointed by the nazi regime promoted the inauthentic life?
it isn't clear he was even antisemitic; both his mentor (husserl) and his adulteress were jewish, but he turned them in to the nazi's (and never apologized).
i think heidegger would say that we owe our happiness to ourselves and the intrinsic value shared between those we touch is a gift in itself. not very romantic, phenomenology wouldn't be very successful if he were sensitive.
I guess I have a different idea of Romanticism. Sure, it has a "sensitive" connotation, but I see it as an accurate yet exaggerated translation of human expression. This is kind of a paradoxical definition, but, to me, morality is an elegant or Romantic expression of reason. I recall Matt talking about Mathematics and how it has an underlying elegance to it. A lot of mathematicians I know are not what you would call, "sensitive," but there is an art to their work.
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