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Article 1581 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: smoliar@hilbert.iss.nus.sg (stephen smoliar)
Subject: Re: Heidegger (really Husserl)
Message-ID: <1991Nov25.133605.26843@nuscc.nus.sg>
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Organization: Institute of Systems Science, NUS, Singapore
References: <1991Nov22.210528.10844@msuinfo.cl.msu.edu> <1991Nov24.005252.24389@nuscc.nus.sg> <gtm_vX@engin.umich.edu>
Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1991 13:36:05 GMT

In article <gtm_vX@engin.umich.edu> rcj@caen.engin.umich.edu (R o d Johnson)
writes:
>In article <1991Nov24.005252.24389@nuscc.nus.sg> smoliar@hilbert.iss.nus.sg
>(stephen smoliar) writes:
>>What Heidegger has to
>>contribute to artificial intelligence seems to be largely based on his own
>>attempts to explain Husserl, 
>
>I'm not sure what you mean here.  Where did Heidegger attept to
>"explain" Husserl?  His (allegedly) great early work, Being and Time",
>was written as he claimed his intellectual independence from Husserl,
>but I see little attempt to follow Husserl there.  If anything, it was
>a reaction *against* the transcendental move in Husserl's "middle"
>period.
>
Before BEING AND TIME there was BASIC PROBLEMS OF PHENOMENOLOGY, already cited
by Ron McClamrock.  This lays the ground-work for BEING AND TIME, but it also
seems to be trying to get a grip of where Husserl had already been.  Note that
BASIC PROBLEMS OF PHENOMENOLOGY dates from approximately the same time as
Heidegger's edition of Husserl's THE PHENOMENOLOGY OF INTERNAL
TIME-CONSCIOUSNESS.

>>most of whose writings are ALSO impenetrable
>>and tend to have a very hard time of it when renedered in the English
>>language.
>
>Husserl's not that bad!  The "transcendental" period ("Ideas" and
>"Cartesian Meditations") is rough going, but both earlier and later
>writing is easier.  Much of "Logical Investigations", especially the
>Third and Fourth Investigations, are relatively easy to read (and
>critical sources of much of later linguistic work, btw, though largely
>unacknowledged as such).  Among the later work, "Crisis" is
>well-written, but so is much of "Formal and Transcendental Logic".
>
>  (Do I
>sound peeved?  I am.  I think Husserl's alleged impenetrability is
>used as an excuse not to read him; when I hear that complaint from
>people who claim to have read Heidegger, or Kant, or De Man, or
>Aristotle, it's irritating.  *Every* philosopher presents exegetical
>difficulties.  If he's worth it, you do the work.  If he's not worth
>it, it's not because it's hard to read.)
>
I would not agree with this whole-heartedly, although I certainly sympathize.
When one comes to a new source of ideas, the APPROACH is very important.  I
would decidedly NOT recommend jumping feet first into CARTESIAN MEDITATIONS
for a first taste of Husserl (and I would definitely not wish on anyone my
own first experience of trying to hack my way through Ortega y Gasset's
PHENOMENOLOGY AND ART . . . at least not as Philip Silver translated it).
For what it is worth, I first read CRISIS shortly after having worked my
way through THE SOCIETY OF MIND;  and, in some funny way, the two resonated
with each other.  (I am sure there is a paper to write about this here, but
I am not sure when I am going to be able to set aside the time to work on it.)
The point is that once you have some place to establish your first grip,
previously impenetrable material becomes more accessible;  but if you do
not have that first grip, all the hard work in the world may not leave you
any the wiser.
-- 
Stephen W. Smoliar; Institute of Systems Science
National University of Singapore; Heng Mui Keng Terrace
Kent Ridge, SINGAPORE 0511
Internet:  smoliar@iss.nus.sg


