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The Concept of Time

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The `Concept Of Time' is a lecture Heidegger delivered to the Marburg Theological Society in July of 1924. Heidegger introduces his `ontological' way of asking the question `what is time?' Heidegger's way of asking and answering the question of time is not physical `clock-time', theological or cognitive. Rather, time is rendered intelligible through existence - Dasein. Heidegger distinguishes between authentic time as running back from the future and the inauthentic spatialization of time as a now point `t' next to spatial coordinates `x,y,z'.

Many readers are highly intimidated by Heidegger's masterwork `Being and Time' because of its lenghth, breadth of thought and fusion of language. `The Concept of Time' is a very short and clear piece and makes an excellent primer for `Being and Time' and his thought in general.

Highly recommended for the beginner and any serious scholar who ignored it in the past.

Warning: this pre-dates "Being and Time," Heidegger's masterwork, and, by extension, late Heidegger ("Introduction to Metaphysics," "Identity and Difference"). So please don't think of this book as giving you the whole - or even a decent part - of Heidegger's thought.

What it does give are some thoughts on time, being, and another way of looking at history that are invaluable to a student of philosophy. It is a good introduction to learning how to think like a philosopher (not that I'm any good at it, but still). Heidegger in this lecture explains how time should be thought of in the context of our death (the possibility of 'not-being' causes 'being' to think about time seriously in the first place). With that in mind, 'being' at a particular time can be thought of as future-looking, even though to look at the future such 'being' must work through the past - such a 'working through,' of course, creating the present.

There's far more than that in the product, and I would encourage you to get a copy. It is a quick read, but Heidegger's reasoning is memorable, and his notion of what "Dasein" is, why time should not be thought of in the context of eternity, and how history should be looked at are all important for those of us who want to learn about how to think through such issues.

I read this book for a graduate seminar on philosophy. In one of the most influential philosophical books of the twentieth century, Martin Heidegger's "The Concept of Time," he deconstructs phenomenology. Heidegger's kind of phenomenology has to do with the idea of phenomenon, which means something that appears and shows itself. His criticism of traditional philosophy is that it gets started with categories, concepts, and notions, departing from the way human comprehension of this world first shows itself. This is Aristotelian and Aristotle is an enormous influence on Heidegger.

Another way to understand Heidegger is a wonderful analysis of the idea that the word "being" has become a noun in philosophy, like first things of beings, or things that are. Yet Heidegger says in the Greek language and other western languages this idea of "being" grammatically in language is derived from a verb, the primary verb "to be." Moreover, as a verb it is tensed which means it has to do with time. All verbs are tensed, even Aristotle said, "That is the difference between a verb and a noun." The difference between a verb and a noun, a verb is something that has to do with time, not just action, but time. That is why all verbs are tensed as future, and past. The very fact that time is another perfect indication of negativity, because time is ever changing, ever moving, and when we are in the present, the past is time of negativity it is no longer. When we are in the present, the future is kind of negative it is not yet. Yet we understand these negatives as meaningful, that is why we can get upset about the past that it is not happening anymore, and why we can become excited about the future even though it hasn't happened yet, they have meaning to us.

I recommend this work for anyone interested in philosophy, epistemology, and ontology.

Heidegger's 1924 lecture on the Concept of time is an unusually clear enunciation of many of the central concepts bearing on the phenomenology of temporality. Much of this lecture would later be elaborated and developed in his celebrated Being and Time, and indeed, The Concept of Time is often called the Ur-form to Being and Time. You will find many of the fundamental concepts that constitute the ecstatic horizon of temporality, particularly the temporal individuation of Dasein. This is an essential text both for new and seasoned readers of Heidegger.

I enjoyed pondering the book and discussing the ideas with friends. I just wanted to share one of my favorite quotes from the book: "The clock shows us the now, but no clock ever shows teh future or has ever shown the past."