The Question of Heidegger

a critical review of the literature

What follows is a critical review and bibliography of the literature on
Heidegger and technology. It covers primarily works in English and
ranges roughly over the last decade and a half Though not exhaustive, it
indicates the major problems and main currents of discussion during this
period with some reference to earlier and non-English literature. It also
examines translations and relates the issue of technology to the Heidegger
corpus as a whole.
Exhaustive coverage would have been difficult for more than one
reason. First, the philosophy of technology as found in Heidegger and else-
where touches on at least four distinct but interrelated philosophical con-
cerns: science and politics along one axis, art and religion along another.
In each case there is no easy way of deciding how far to venture into these
often independently examined concerns although some venturing is man-
ifestly necessary. Second, Heidegger's thought is beginning to influence
more systematic work in the philosophy of technology as well as in the
four related areas just mentioned. But it is not always easy to say where
Heidegger's influence is explicit enough to merit review under present cir-
cumstances.
Oversights and limitations of access and diligence aside, the direction
of this review has been determined by a desire to illuminate in what ways
Heidegger's work can advance a philosophical understanding of technol-
ogy within the scholarly community. Questions thus broached are of two
sorts: (l)What is Heidegger's understanding of technology and how does
that understanding figure in his thought as a whole? (2)How much of what
Heidegger says is true, or how can it help guide our own thought and ac-
tion within a manifestly technological but nonetheless uncertain world?
Clearly it is through an engagement with such questions that Heidegger
will come to exercise an influence within the scholarly community. Just as
clearly it is only through such scholarly influence that Heidegger's
thought may one day have a general social or cultural impact.
To attempt a survey which serves these intentions while remaining
within reasonable bounds frequently requires graceless presentation and
peremptory argument. On other occasions many of our judgments would
need to be more carefully nuanced or given detailed support. While regret-
ting such specific debilities in the present instance, we nevertheless have
often embraced the virtue of brevity, given the volume of material to be
detailed, hoping that this approach will be justified by the larger argu-

PHILOSOPHY TODAY SUMMER 1987

and Technology #
by Albert Borgmann
with the assistance of Carl Mitcham

ment thus made possible. A further shortcoming of this review is the un-
even depth of scrutiny. Occasionally minor efforts get more attention than
substantial and penetrating works. Here too contingencies of access and
attention have played a role; and again our overriding concern was to pro-
vide a coherent and illuminating account of Heidegger's thought on tech-
nology and of the wider response to his thought.
The present study has also involved some division of labor, although
each author has read and contributed to the whole. Borgmann was respon-
sible for the initial draft of Part One, Division A, dealing with technology
as it comes into focus between science and politics and as it explicitly ap-
pears in Heidegger's work; Mitcham for developing the original idea of
Part One, Division B, on technology as contrasted with art and religion.
Borgmann has, however, done the major share of the whole text while
Mitcham has concentrated on the bibliography.
Full documentation for works directly relevant to themes of this re-
view can be found in the bibliography, including a few works not discussed
directly in the text. To maintain the unity of this bibliography and its abil-
ity to serve as an independent guide to the literature, incidental references
are documented by endnotes.

Part One
REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE
A. Technology Between Science and Politics

Although technology is a primary Heidegger and science before turning

theme in the work of Heidegger
more so than in any other major philos-
opher it is not always discussed as
such. Heidegger himself at times sub-
sumes it under a discussion of modern
natural science. His critics often dis-
cuss it in association with politics. Ac-
cordingly, we will begin with remarks
on the literature that deals with
to work that bears explicitly on Heideg-
ger and technology. This will lead to a
consideration of discussions concerning
Heidegger and politics.
1. Heidegger and Natural Science
No one disputes the close tie be-
tween modern science and technology.
But precisely how a person under-

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

99
Stands the connection depends on prior
conceptions of each. It is thus helpful to
distinguish provisionally three senses
of science: (l)science as a human ac-
tivity or enterprise, (2)science as a col-
lection of laws and theories, and (3)sci-
ence as the application of laws and
theories to practical endeavors. What
most divides the scholarly community
with regard to the philosophy of natural
science is a question concerning the
status of science in its second or central
sense: Are scientific laws and theories
general, though not exclusively reveal-
ing, descriptions of the way the natural
world really is? Or are they merely
useful fictions or instruments that
allow us to predict and control physical
events? The answers determine
whether one adopts an (inclusive)
realism or some kind of instrumen-
talism in the interpretation of science.
Although this may appear to be a
fairly academic question, in fact it is
debated passionately with working
scientists and philosophers of science
often committed to a realist interpreta-
tion of scientific knowledge and
humanists prone to adopt some version
of instrumentalism. Gerald Holton has
given a vivid picture of the heat of this
controversy in "On Being Caught Be-
tween Dionysians and ApoUonians."'
The controversy has since been overta-
ken by the current of deconstruc-
tionism, hermeneutics, and post-
modernism that threatens to inundate
the proponents of the scientific method
and of rigorous, analytic philosophy.^
The new divide does not entirely line up
with the Dionysian/ApoUonian split nor
with the instrumentalism/realism dis-
tinction. Alliances often cross the re-
cent divide. Quine's thought, e.g., flows
in both directions.
But the crucial issue of the status of
science in the modern world remains.
"Instrumentalism" and "realism" re-
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
main helpful terms to locate this issue
generally and in Heidegger's thought
though "realism" has been used both
more narrowly and more broadly in the
philosophical literature than it is being
employed here. What is at stake, at any
rate, is the kind of claim science can
make on and about the human world.
As Robert Pirsig has written in his
philosophical novel, Zen and the Art of
Motorcycle Maintenance, "The scien-
tific point of view has wiped out every
other view to a point where they all
seem primitive, so that if a person
today talks about ghosts or spirits he is
considered ignorant or maybe nutty."^
But did this dominance of science come
about because human beings were im-
pressed by the knowledge of reality of-
fered by science (realism), or did
human beings commit themselves to
science because of the power it could
provide (instrumentalism)?
If scientific knowledge tells us
something real and crucial about the
world, then such knowledge cannot
readily be abandoned without also giv-
ing up on the ideal of homo sapiens;
whereas if scientific knowledge is
merely an instrumental construct, ef-
fective in achieving some limited prac-
tical purpose, one is free to limit or re-
ject the claims of science at will. Once
the illusion of the innocence or innocu-
ousness of scientific knowledge is aban-
doned,^ the easiest way of limiting the
force of science appears to be in-
strumentalism.
In this light, the question of the
epistemological status of scientific
knowledge has deep implications for
the character of our time and for the
science-technology relationship within
it. And if Heidegger's thought is as
comprehensive and provocative in
these regards as is frequently held,
Heidegger's work ought to have some-
thing important to say about the ques-
tion of science. But is Heidegger any-
thing like a philosopher of science? "On
the longest day he ever lived," answers
William J . Richardson, "Heidegger
could never be called a philosopher of
science" (1968, p. 511; cf. p. 535). Cer-
tainly this is true in the sense that
Heidegger is not at all interested in log-
ical reconstructionist projects or
analyses of the internal structure of sci-
entific explanations. Nevertheless,
Joseph Kockelmans (1970a and b, 1984
[chapter 10], and 1985), Theodore
Kisiel (1970a, 1973, and 1977), Kockel-
mans and Kisiel together (1970), and
Hans Seigfried (1978) all directly chal-
lenge this contention.
Kockelmans admits that "Heideg-
ger has never developed a systematic
philosophy of science" (1970b, p. 184;
cf. Kockelmans and Kisiel, eds., 1970,
p. 146) but also maintains that Heideg-
ger had "a rather sophisticated knowl-
edge of the sciences" and "as a philoso-
pher . . . concerned himself regularly
with the meaning of modern science"
(1984, p. 209). Kockelmans' Heidegger
and Science (1985) recycles, systemati-
cally restates, and extends twenty
years worth of study on this topic.
Kockelmans stresses Heidegger's gen-
eral and externalist approach to sci-
ence, places it in its historical and
philosophical background, and deals
especially with the status of the histori-
cal and social sciences. He is sugges-
tive on the relation between what
Heidegger calls the historical sciences
and what in the Anglo-American tradi-
tion are called the social sciences. Yet
on the whole his book remains above
the fray and might well be described as
an eminent scholar's dissertation
exhibiting both the strengths and weak-
nesses of that genre.
According to Kisiel (1973), Heideg-
ger's thought about science has gone
through three stages. In the first, the
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
concern with science was explicit
enough to merit the appellation of a
philosophy of science. In this phase
Heidegger (1916) made "an attempt to
apply Husserl's general programme of
logic as theory of science to particular
problems" (Kisiel, 1973, p. 225), viz., to
an analysis of the different concepts of
time operative in the sciences of phys-
ics and of history. In Being and Time
(1927), however, Heidegger moved
away from a logical conception of sci-
ence to an existential one. In this sec-
ond phase of Heidegger's analysis of
science, the origin and foundation of
science is explicated as a mode of
human being-in-the-world (Kisiel, 1973,
pp. 227-230). Seigfried even goes so far
as to claim "that the prime purpose of
the elaboration of the Being question in
Being and Time is the radical and ulti-
mate foundation of the sciences" (1978,
p. 327). This is an extravagant thesis,
argued at length only to be taken
back in a footnote (p. 331, note 14).
In fact Being and Time, in its radi-
cal ambition, means to probe the foun-
dations of human existence so deeply
that science, conceived as a human en-
terprise, is illuminated and determined
in its fundaments along with all other
aspects of the human. At the core of
human reality lies the hermeneutic or
interpreting activity, as primordially
present in practical engagements. Sci-
entific theory is derived from practice;
it is but one aspect of the hermeneutic
sphere. "Scientific research," says
Heidegger, "is not the only manner of
Being which this entity [Dasein or
human being] can have, nor is it the
one which lies closest" (1927, p. 11).
The existential conception of science
thus indicated is fleshed out in What is
a Thing? (lectures from 1935-1936) by
delineating the a priori structure
(called "mathematical") which pre-
determines the modern scientific ap-
101
proach to reality and its possible find-
ings. With its goals of objectification
and control, this structure is said to re-
veal the close kinship between science
and modern technology. And yet, as
Heidegger himself concludes already
near the end of Being and Time, "a
fully adequate existential interpreta-
tion of science cannot be carried out
until the meaning of Being and the 'con-
nection' between Being and truth have
been clarified in terms of the temporal-
ity of existence" (p. 408 [357], italics in
original).
The last remark points toward
what Kisiel calls the third stage of
Heidegger's examination of science, in
which science becomes not simply one
existential possibility of being-in-the-
world, but a temporally or historically
given actuality that rules the present
age. The scientific character of reality
is now no longer the result of an ap-
proach that human beings are merely
able to take, but one that they are des-
tined to pursue, an epochal feature of
the history of Being. "This history ulti-
mately grounds itself not in the ground-
ing project of Dasein but in an epochal
movement that takes its course beyond
human control" (Kisiel, 1973, p. 232).'
Kisiel's distinctions are crucial for
clarifying the relation of science to
technology in Heidegger's thought.
Heidegger's philosophy of technology
comes to the fore in the third of Kisiel's
stages (in the 1950s), and hence it is the
epochal sense of natural science in re-
lation to which Heidegger speaks of
technology as "manifesting the initially
hidden character of modern science"
(Kisiel, 1970, p. 179). Accordingly, com-
mentators such as Patrick Heelan (par-
ticularly 1972a), John Macquarrie
(1975), and Francis F . Seeburger (1976)
acknowledge the historical framework
to which the later Heidegger subordi-
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
nates the existential-hermeneutic con-
ception of science.
Nevertheless, many explicators of
and commentators on Heidegger's phi-
losophy of technology continue to repre-
sent Heidegger as holding solely an
existential conception, albeit in a
mathematical version, i.e., Joseph
Kockelmans (1966), Richardson (1968),
Edward Ballard (1970), John Sallis
(1970), Magda King (1973), Michael
Zimmerman (1977a and b), and Harold
Alderman (1978). This is all the more
remarkable because Kisiel's major dis-
tinctions have been available since 1962
in Karlfried Grnder's less complete
and more opinionated version.
European studies have perhaps
been less guilty of neglecting the epoch-
al character of science (and technol-
ogy). Consider, for instance, Jean-
Frangois Jobin (1975) and Massimo De
Carolis (1978) two analyses which
recognize the historical cast of modern
science (and technology). In English,
however, the lone notable exception
until recently has been the Dutch-
American Andrew G. Van Melsen's
early (1961), ambitious attempt to inte-
grate Heidegger's mathematical and
epochal characterizations of modern
science and technology into a neo-
Thomist framework. But like much
neo-Thomist philosophy of science this
effort has been largely ignored by the
secular academic community and vi-
tiated by its own optimistic belief in an
easy resolution of the tensions between
science and politics.
What are the epistemological impli-
cations of the interpretation of natural
science as a mode of being-in-the-world
which is also a "historically evolving
context-dependent articulation of multi-
ple horizons" (to use Heelan's descrip-
tive phrase)? Heidegger himself does
not provide an unambiguous answer.
Indeed, perhaps the chief reason for the
prevalence of existential interpreta-
tions is an ambiguity in Heidegger's
final view of science (and technology).
In Being and Time Heidegger ar-
gued that "only as long as Dasein is . . .
'is there' Being" so that "Being (not en-
tities) is dependent upon the under-
standing of Being ; that is to say Reality
(not the Real) is dependent upon care"
(p. 255 [212]). Such a view of the recip-
rocal interdependence of the structure
of consciousness and reality as deter-
mined by the practical interests or con-
cern (Sorge) of Dasein readily lends it-
self to an instrumentalist epistemology.
This, for instance, is the interpretation
of Joseph Rouse (1981), who uses
Heidegger's Dasein-analysis to provide
a theoretical foundation for Thomas
Kuhn's avowedly anti-realist theory of
the structure of scientific revolutions.
(Kisiel [1977] has argued the same
point about the compatibility of Heideg-
ger's view of science and that of the
historical structuralists, although in a
more sophisticated form.) Rouse sees
in Heidegger's ideal of authentic exis-
tence, in the appreciation of contigency
which comes to the fore only during
crisis situations, a more general ver-
sion of Kuhn's idea of the tensions be-
tween revolutionary and normal sci-
ence.
Rouse's contribution is competent
and original in placing scientific prac-
tice in the richly developed context of
Heidegger's Dasein-analysis. But his
achievement suffers from three de-
ficiencies. (l)Rouse has paid little at-
tention to the explicit remarks in Being
and Time on the philosophical founda-
tions of science. (2)The existential ex-
plication of science that Rouse provides
assimilates science so fully into Da-
sein's ways of being in the world that
the distinctiveness of scientific practice
disappears. (3)Finally his position suf-
fers from the general ailment of holism
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
regarding the question of realism.
Holism does well in showing how a dog-
matic and ahistorical ("metaphysical"
or external) realism comes to grief
through an infinite regress in its at-
tempt at stating conditions of reality.
But holism is in turn threatened by sub-
jectivism unless it admits an internal
realism, i.e., a way of distinguishing
within a praxis or interpretive context
what is real and what illusory. But in
Rouse's essay, as in any orthodox
holism, this distinction is subjectively
grounded, or vague, or begged.
A contrary position is that of Albert
Hofstadter' as reaffirmed by Bernd
Magnus,' which argues that Heidegger
is at bottom a realist. Indeed, following
the celebrated "turn" in his thinking,
Heidegger offers a self-interpretation of
the Being and Time passage quoted
above which points in this direction. In
the Letter on Humanism Heidegger
maintains that what he was trying to
say was that Being itself gives Dasein
its (Being's) own reality, thus laying
the basis for a realist epistemology.
"The sentence does not mean that the
Dasein of man in the traditional sense
of existentia . . . is that being through
which Being is first fashioned . . . does
not say that Being is the product of
man" (1947, p. 216). Interestingly
enough, in his first published article on
"The Problem of Reality in Modern
Philosophy" (1912) Heidegger also re-
fers favorably to the critical realism of
a contemporary author and to that
"Aristotelian-scholastic philosophy,
which has always thought realistically"
(p. 70). At the same time, even if
Heidegger is ultimately realist in his
aspirations, it is also clear that he feels
compelled to reject the realist claims of
science.
Thus along with his development of
the epochal conception of science as a
historical given, Heidegger remains
103
critical of the claims and views of sci-
ence. "Science does not think" is his
overquoted remark (1954, p. 8). (For a
good explication of this statement, see
Kisiel, 1970a, pp. 173ff.) This critical
attitude is uncritically accepted by too
many Heidegger scholars when they
envision their work as opposed to that
of Anglo-American mainstream philos-
ophers who generally hold science in
high regard. An instrumentalist view
permits the quickest and easiest attack
on the overly expansive claims of sci-
ence, and that view is conveniently
akin to elements in Heidegger's exis-
tential and mathematical interpreta-
tion of natural science.
Though critics of science and tech-
nology are glad to repeat Heidegger's
warning that science is not reflective, it
remains doubtful whether the critique
of objective knowledge as eventuating
necessarily in scientific technology is
always conscious of its own reflective
limitations. "I am convinced," writes
one of the great Heidegger followers,
that Heidegger's discovery will
later become a part of the com-
mon knowledge of humanity, for
we see with increasing clarity
today as he has taught us to see
that Greek metaphysics is the
beginning of modern technology.
Concept formation, born of West-
ern philosophy, has held through a
long history, that mastery is the
fundamental experience of reality
(Hans-Georg Gadamer, 1975,
p. 494).
Is it true that all concept formation
must be equated with domination? Is it
not possible for science to arise existen-
tially from a manifold of practical en-
gagements without promoting the
dominating possibilities of such engage-
ments especially since Heidegger
later emphasizes precisely the non-
dominating aspects of crafts and art,
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
t Ayl
which are embedded in the primordial
level of practical being-in-the-world?
As Roger Waterhouse argues (1981,
pp. 164ff.), Heidegger's phenome-
nological description of our practical
engagements is unnecessarily thin, and
the abstraction of the (scientific) pre-
sent-at-hand wholly from the (practi-
cal) ready-to-hand is based on an
overly simplified dichotomy. Primor-
dial encounters with the world are mul-
tiform and various, and derivative or
founded ones can be derived or founded
in more than one way.^
At another place, Gadamer (1977)
elaborates the need for humanistic
(and hermeneutic) self-knowledge
called forth by the conquest of nature
achieved through science and technol-
ogy. But is Gadamer's attempt to make
aesthetic (hermeneutic) knowledge the
critical judge of natural science not
just as invidious as the rejection of the
humanities by scientism or technicism?
As Waterhouse says, perhaps too
crudely: "Natural scientific knowledge
does exist, and it is in some sense cor-
rect or true a sense which it is in-
cumbent upon Heidegger to explicate
before he can establish that it is in-
ferior to or false in the face of his
higher sense of truth" (p. 154).
The truth is that a pluralist histori-
cism of science is just as compatible
with a temporally structured (or even
progressively developing), multifa-
ceted realism as with strict historicist
instrumentalism as Kisiel (1977) in fact
shows very well. And Heidegger's her-
meneutic principle which construes
human participation as one constitutive
element of being-in-the-world can be
argued to imply a critical realism over
any nominalist instrumentalism. After
all, Heidegger never argues that Da-
sein is the sole constitutive element.
Certainly Charles Hartshorne's conten-
tion from 1937 that Heidegger's
phenomenology does not adequately ac-
count for "the conception of the world
order, so clearly independent of man as
that order seems to be," can be an-
swered only on such a basis.'
Carl Friedrich von Weizscker
(1982), who traces the changes in
Heidegger's view of natural science in
ways similar to Kisiel, emphasizes that
the later Heidegger no longer attempts
to raise a Maginot line against the force
of the sciences (pp. 90-92). Heidegger
acknowledges the power and the unique
status of natural science. But, Weiz-
scker argues, Heidegger is unable to
recognize what in the sciences gives
them their privileged rank, just how
scientific truth is related to other kinds
of truth, and to what extent scientific
truth bears on our total view of the
world (pp. 92-96). Natural science,
especially in the paradigmatic form of
physics, is concerned "to discover ulti-
mate fundamental laws" (pp. 93-94);
this concern (a) establishes natural sci-
ence as continuous with philosophy, (b)
makes impossible the delimitation of
science as a regional ontology, i.e., as
one approach to reality that is coordi-
nate with others, and (c) encompasses
humans in the study of nature and
makes untenable the distinction be-
tween the philosophical a priori and the
scientific a posteriori investigation of
human existence (pp. 95-96). "I am jus-
tifying here only," concludes Weiz-
scker, "what has been occurring for a
long time in today's science, against
untenable philosophical defensive posi-
tions" (pp. 95-96).
The status of science in contempo-
rary philosophy and culture is deeply
controversial today and it is so in a
positive way. The controversy has led
to a breaking of the mortal rigor that
had increasingly paralyzed the cultural
openness and influence of modern phi-
losophy. Except for Kisiel, Heidegger
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
scholars until recently have not con-
tributed much to this salutary con-
troversy. Within the last eight years,
however, two substantial contributions
to this issue have appeared, both
deeply influenced by Heidegger.
The first is Richard Rorty's Philos-
ophy and the Mirror of Nature (1979). It
is a radical critique of modern philoso-
phy, inspired by "the three most impor-
tant philosophers of our century
Wittgenstein, Heidegger, and Dewey"
(p. 5). In the context of our discussion
we might say Rorty is concerned to
show that philosophers in the modern
period have typically emulated the co-
gency and universality of claims that a
proponent of an exclusive and dogmatic
realism would ascribe to the sciences.
In the case of the sciences, that rigid
and narrow view has impoverished our
culture by devaluing the poetical and
religious understanding of the world. In
philosophy, however, we find the worst
of two worlds, pseudoscientific rigidity
and cultural impotence. Philosophers
achieved rigor by inventing their own
peculiar problems and procedures and
so creating a distinctive profession. But
in doing so they excluded themselves
from the conversation of humanity and
forfeited the possibility of contributing
to that conversation.
Rorty tries to show that this self-
imposed exile from the common cul-
ture is coming to an end through de-
velopments within and without
mainstream philosophy; within profes-
sional philosophy through the dawning
realization that the traditional tasks
are not solvable nor worth solving; out-
side professional philosophy through
the great outsiders who are recom-
mending new ways of reflection and
discourse. Rorty gives his case a fine
historical sweep and presses it through
detailed, painstaking analyses. One
105
should certainly hope that his book will A book that speaks both in a
have its intended liberating effect. liberating and in a fruitful way about
Heidegger, science, and contemporary
And yet Rorty's accomplishment
culture is Patrick Heelan's Space Per-
suffers from its own formalism and pal-
ception and the Philosophy of Science
lor. He finally urges philosophers to
(1983). Here, at last, we have a master-
join again the conversation of human-
ful and definitive synthesis of
ity, and he believes that the health of
phenomenology, Heideggerian her-
that conversation requires openness,
meneutics, and Anglo-American philos-
pluralism, and interesting novelty. But
ophy of science. The Heideggerian in-
must one not reply that this conversa-
spiration comes mainly from the her-
tion is no less ahistorically conceived
meneutic forestructure that is sketched
and no more worthy of our engagement
in Being and Time which corresponds
than modern professional philosophy?
to the existential notion of science men-
And as regards Heidegger particularly,
tioned above. But here, as in so many
is not John Caputo right in complaining
other regards. Being and Time is rich
that Rorty has entirely missed or mis-
and open to the point of ambiguity.
understood the urgency and profound
Heelen repeatedly (pp. 194 and 266)
realism of the later Heidegger's
quotes Heidegger's important addition
thought?^^
to his hermeneutic project which
What has been lost in and through should have forestalled a subjectivist
Rorty's "critique of philosophy" (the or instrumentalist interpretation of his
apt subtitle of the German translation view of science the remark, i.e.,
of The Mirror of Nature) is the deep no- where Heidegger insists that the fore-
tion of experience. In professional phi- structure must be worked out "in terms
losophy experience is the staging area of the things themselves." At the same
for the manoeuvres that are to put phi- time Heelan criticizes the later Heideg-
losophy in sole possession of the foun- ger's confusion of science with its mod-
dations of reality. Rorty's critical dis- ern cultural practice, a confusion that
solution of this sort of philosophical im- moves science too close to technology
perialism at the same time discredits (pp. 17-19, 217, 223). Accordingly,
the concept of experience. The loss of Heelan gives science a realist place
experience in turn prevents the in- within his encompassing and cir-
tended recovery of history. Experience cumspect realism; he calls it "hori-
is our capacity for the unforethinkable zonal" or "hermeneutical" realism.
things and events that constitute the Science within horizonal realism is not
substance of history. Without experi- a threat to our appreciation of reality
ence, history shrinks to the inconse- but an extension and enrichment of our
quential commerce of human subjects, world appreciation.
to the anemic if busy conversation of The real openness and fertility of
humanity that Rorty envisages. In this Heelan's theory of science lies in its
way, sterility threatens to overtake the historical sensitivity though there are,
powerfully liberating movement of at least in Heelan's parlances, traces or
Rorty's book. Not surprisingly, what admixtures of subjectivism and essen-
Rorty has to say (p. 359) about contem- tialism. Reading this text from the his-
porary culture and technology is, torical viewpoint, at any rate, one can
though pointing in the right direction, perceive the outlines of the history of
miniscule and indirect. technology in a way which is consonant

PHILOSOPHY TODAY
with Heidegger's understanding of the
history of Being and yet discloses im-
portant new vistas and provides needed
corrections. Roughly speaking Heelan's
account of science and of space percep-
tion outlines and proposes a sequence
of pretechnological, technological, and
metatechnological spaces and ways of
being in the world. Given the project of
the book, Heelan could not go very far
in tracing the implications of his views
for technology. The crucial thing is that
he opens up fruitful possibilities for the
philosophy of technology, possibilities
that no longer suffer from a fatally
facile and shallow vision of science and
history.
Another remarkably sensitive and
clear-headed analysis of Heidegger's
view of science which correctly iden-
tifies the weakness of Rorty's position
(see his note 6) and expresses sym-
pathy with Heelan's (see his note 18) is
David A. Kolb's brief but powerful
"Heidegger on the Limits of Science"
(1983). Kolb, like Heelan, steers a
course between instrumentalism and
reductive scientific realism toward
what he terms a "limited scientific
realism." Not only does Kolb provide
many helpful contrasts between this
and more standard views as well as di-
rect suggestions about how to think a
limited scientific realism in an authen-
tically Heideggerian manner, but he is
also explicitly aware that "the limits of
science are bound up with the larger
problem of technicity, under whose call
science is both done and interpreted"
(p. 53), although he does not investi-
gate this larger issue at any length.
Of course, it was not possible or
even desirable for the scholarly com-
munity to await the clarification of
Heidegger's view of science before
turning directly to Heidegger's concern
with technology. And there has been a
steady steam of expositions and discus-
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
sions of Heidegger on technology. We
now turn to this body of scholarship.
2. On Technology: Translation and Exposition
Beginning in the 1930s Heidegger's
thought focuses more and more on
technology as the phenomenon that is
distinctive of our era and crucial to its
destiny. In his inaugural lecture, "What
is Metaphysics?" (1929), science and
technology are first explicitly linked
and criticized as a way of knowing. The
Introduction to Metaphysics, from 1935
(but not published until 1953), considers
technology a central cause of mass so-
ciety and planetary exploitation. In the
two Nietzsche volumes, based on lec-
tures from the late 1930s and early
1940s, technology is prominently as-
sociated with the will to power and
nihilism. The Letter on Humanism
(1947) conceives technology as "in its
essence a destiny within the history of
Being" and more specifically as
"grounded in the history of
metaphysics" (p. 220). Holzwege
(1950), the first post-war collection of
essays (all originally composed in the
1930s and 1940s) relates technology to
modern mathematical science and con-
trasts it with art and poetry. The sec-
ond post-war collection, Vortrge und
Aufstze (1954), contains the key essay
"The Question Concerning Technology"
and others, again linking technology to
metaphysics while contrasting it with
art, poetry, and non-discursive thought.
In virtually all subsequent publications
What is Called Thinking? (1954), The
Question of Being (1955), Der Satz vom
Grund (1957), Identity and Difference
(1957), Discourse on Thinking (1959a),
On the Way to Language (1959b), etc.
these themes remain prominent. And
Heidegger's last reported composition
(1977b) asks a conference on his work
to address the issue of technology.
107
 Thus, although only two essays,
viz., "The Question Concerning Tech-
nology" and "The Turning" (meaning
away from technology), are explicitly
devoted to it, technology is a primary
issue in all of Heidegger's work sub-
sequent to 1930. Yet in Heidegger schol-
arship technology figures as only one
among many topics, and a rather inci-
dental one. In the two major studies of
Heidegger's thought as a whole Wil-
liam J . Richardson's Heidegger:
Through Phenomenology to Thought
and J . L . Mehta's Martin Heidegger:
The Way and the Vision'^ technology
is conspicuous by its absence. In intro-
ductions to Heidegger, Thomas Langan
(1959), W. B. Macomber (1967), Werner
Marx (1971), Walter Biemel (1976),
Winfried Krnzen (1976), and George
Steiner (1979), technology is given
some mention though its treatment re-
mains perfunctory. More typical are
Marjorie Grene's complete ignoring of
technology in her article on Heidegger
in the Encyclopedia of Philosophy
(1967) and Arne Naess' (1979) similar
treatment in The Biographical Supple-
ment to the International Encyclopedia
of the Social Sciences. Of three impor-
tant and representative Heidegger an-
thologies that have appeared here and
in Germany, Otto Pggeler's contains
no contribution on technology at all,'^
while the two others (Michael Murray,
ed., 1978 and Thomas Sheehan, ed.,
1981), contain only single essays de-
voted in part to technology and in an
expository manner at that. The newly
founded annual Heidegger Studies con-
tains one article on technology in the
first of the two volumes published so
far, Friedrich-Wilhelm von Herrmann's
(1985) "Kunst and Technik." This too is
an expository piece. Monograph excep-
tions to this kind of oversight are quite
recent primarily John Loscerbo's
Being and Technology (1981) and
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
Wolfgang Schirmacher's Technik und
Gelassenheit (1983). But in such neglect
Heidegger scholars have been doing no
more than reflecting the larger
philosophical community; the philoso-
phy of technology is only now develop-
ing into a vigorous discipline.
In the U.S.A. work on Heidegger's
philosophy of technology has no doubt
been further hampered by a lack of
translations. One important document,
"The Age of the World View," has been
available since 1951. Another, "The
Principle of Ground," appeared in part
in 1974. But a translation of the two es-
says explicitly devoted to technology
did not appear until 1977 at least
partly because of a churlish refusal by
Heidegger's English executors to allow
anyone other than the inner circle
rights to translation. Yet it is really
only in light of these two texts that the
numerous allusions to technology in
most of Heidegger's late (and even
early) work can be adequately ap-
preciated.
A translation of The Question Con-
cerning Technology and [four] Other
[closely related] Essays was finally
brought to completion by William
Lovitt. This translation project had
been in the works at least since the late
1960s when it was in the hands of Bernd
Magnus. Lovitt is exceptionally well-
versed in the Heidegger corpus and its
historical background and he is fully
aware of the poetic character of
Heidegger's language and of the prob-
lems that therefore arise for the trans-
lator. Heidegger is extremely sensitive
to the literary connotations of words.
He reawakens diverse relationships
through etymological analysis at the
same time that he creates new allu-
sions and linguistic denotations through
stipulation and the morphological mod-
ification of common words. All this is
done in part with a pedagogical intent.
viz., to embody thought in a rich net- its cognates are used to render the
work of meaning. many related forms of stellen, the root
However, the connotative networks of Gestell, for which they then suggest
of words do not coincide from one lan- "Set" (with a capital S) as a colloquial
guage to another. Thus relative to the and suitably allusive possibility. In a
networks that Heidegger has carefully subsequent translation, in fact,
worked out for the key terms Gestell Mitcham and Jim Grote adopt "setting-
and Bestand any English word will be up" for Gestell (see Andre Malet, 1984,
much impoverished in some significa- in section B, 2 of the bibliography).
tions while possessing a wealth of Similar points could also be made with
others that are unwanted. A translator regard to Bestand, for which "re-
has to choose between a fairly common sources" is a readily available English
word which, being part of our lives, has equivalent.
many helpful connotations along with Lovitt's approach, by contrast, puts
quite a few misleading ones, and a re- artificial roadblocks on the path to a
condite or neologistic word which is un- wider reception of Heidegger's thought
tainted by inappropriate meanings, but on technology, making him appear
also sterile. Lovitt, in translating Ges- more arcane than he really is. (Lovitt's
tell as "enframing" and Bestand as translation is nevertheless preferable
"standing-reserve," follows the latter to the much more outrageous artificial-
course. ity of rendering Gestell by "composi-
This is unfortunate. It is not faithful tion" on the basis of construing "Ge"
to Heidegger, who uses emphatically as "com" and ''steir as "position"
common words in his analysis of tech- which is found in Joseph Fell [1979],
nology, even when he was not always pp. 247ff.) Otherwise the translation is
happy with his own choices. Of Gestell well done. It reflects Heidegger's lapi-
he admits that it is "an expression dary style. Generally it preserves the
which has often been laughed at and is natural flow of his reasoning, although
perhaps somewhat clumsy" (1967a, p. inappropriate reverence toward
278). But the fault, if there is one, lies Heidegger's wording sometimes leads
in the fact that Gestell is too common to awkwardness.'' And it is generous
and homey a word. "Framework" is a with German parentheses and helpful
ready and appropriate word adopted by notes.
Joan Stambaugh (Heidegger, 1957b, pp. Because the translation of "Die
35ff.) and Albert Hofstadter (Heideg- Frage nach der Technik" has been so
ger, 1971, pp. 64 and 84ff.) in translating long in coming and because Heideg-
two other works in which Gestell fig- ger's thought as a whole is alien to the
ures prominently. (For some reason philosophical temperament in the
Stambaugh later abandons this render- United States, it is understandable that
ing in favor of "enframing" [Heideg- many felt called upon to provide
ger, 1973, p. 66].) Carl Mitcham and straightforward expositions of Heideg-
Robert Mackey independently made ger's analysis of technology. Along with
the same suggestion, while drawing at- those to be found in books (see the Lan-
tention to the English phrase gan to Steiner list given above), Magda
"framework of thought" (1972, p. 26). King (1973), Lovitt (1973), and Harold
See also, in this regard, note 14 of the Alderman (1978) all concentrate on
Mitcham-Mackey-CarroU translation of "The Question Concerning Technol-
Simon Moser (1971), where "set" and ogy," providing little more than an En-

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

109
glish paraphrase with a few glosses.
Six articles draw on a larger collection
of sources or on some lesser known
essay of Heidegger's, but remain
mostly expository; these are John Sal-
lis (1970), Michael Zimmerman (1975,
1977a and b), John Loscerbo (1977),
Lovitt (1980), and Parvis Emad (1981).
These expositions are careful and
generally faithful, but one still has to
wonder what purpose is served by
scholarship at the level of Diogenes
Laertius. All the same, the availability
of some Diogenes Laertius
Heideggerianus might have helped
Friedrich Dessauer (1956) avoid his
more blatant misinterpretations of
Heidegger. And it is still true that
Heidegger's thought is not easily under-
stood and is forbidding in its elaborate
situating of technology in the history of
Being. Heidegger's actual analyses of
technology moreover are radical, prog-
rammatic, and provocative; and while
including brief and telling illustrations
drawn from the concrete everyday
world, they fail to place technology in
the contemporary social and political
setting. But paraphrases, summaries,
and synopses do not overcome the
genuine limitations of Heidegger's
work. Instead, they tend to provide a
pale and muted version of Heidegger
which, if anything, encourages the sec-
tarianism that still plagues his recep-
tion in America. Explication must be
coupled with adaptation and applica-
tion if this is to be avoided.
The strengths and limitations of the
conventional expositions are once more
demonstrated in Loscerbo's monograph
on Being and Technology (1981). One
strength of his book is that, as the title
readily implies, it situates technology
at the heart of Heidegger's thought.
Loscerbo divides his study into three
parts. Part one, "Preparation for the
Question Concerning Modern Technol-
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
ogy," recapitulates Heidegger's analy-
sis of the physis-techne relation, that is
techne as a response to Being as phys-
is. It then continues with a discussion of
the beginnings of modern technology in
Descartes and its philosophical con-
summation with Nietzsche.
Part two, a "First Approach To-
ward the Question of the Essence of
Modern Technology," contains Los-
cerbo's analysis of roughly the first
two-thirds of "The Question Concerning
Technology" (up through paragraph 61,
or the first half of p. 24 in Heidegger,
1977a). Loscerbo defers his discussion
of the latter third of Heidegger's essay,
which deals with technology as a histor-
ical destiny and "the danger" and "sav-
ing power" present in this destiny for
part three, a "Second Approach To-
ward the Question of the Essence of
Modern Technology." (It is not clear
why Loscerbo refuses to follow Heideg-
ger's own break in his essay at para-
graph 59, p. 23 in Heidegger, 1977a.)
In both of these discussions of "The
Question Concerning Technology" Los-
cerbo brings in related texts. Two ex-
amples of his creative use of otherwise
overlooked texts in this area: "What
are Poets for?" (from 1946; included in
Heidegger, 1971), and "On the Essence
of Truth" (1943; included in David Far-
rell Krell, ed., 1977).
Despite its promise and Loscerbo's
obvious, thorough acquaintance with
the Heidegger corpus, his book is ulti-
mately disappointing. It ends abruptly,
without any real insight, with a boring
and overbearing emphasis that technol-
ogy must be recognized as Ereignis
(event, happening) a term which,
like most others, Loscerbo refuses to
translate. (Loscerbo likewise has a
pedantic propensity for always using
German instead of English titles.) For
all those texts it consults, it limits itself
largely to paraphrase, and it discusses
the issues only at the most rarefield
level of "Being." It refuses to engage
the wide range of theoretical and prac-
tical issues called forth by Heidegger's
technology analysis, and confirms the
worst fears about the in-bred character
of much of Heidegger scholarship.
With regard to the historical back-
ground of Heidegger's concern with
technology, more work is needed. Con-
sider Heidegger's explicit acknowledg-
ment that his turn toward technology in
the 1930s was influenced by Ernst
Jnger's Der Arbeiter: Herrschaft und
Gestalt (1932). In the winter term of
1939-1940 he devoted a university semi-
nar to this work. And in a contribution
to a Jnger Festschrift he wrote that
"'Die Frage nach der Technik' owes
enduring advancement to the descrip-
tions in Der Arbeiter'' (Heidegger,
1955, p. 45; cf. also pp. 43 and 61 and
Heidegger, 1973, p. 85). Although occa-
sionally remarked, this decisive influ-
ence has gone largely unstudied ex-
cept for two related and somewhat
ideologically oriented works, Jean-
Michel Palmier (1968) and John Orr
(1974).The only available English
translation from Der Arbeiter is of the
key sections 44-57 on "Technology as
the Mobilization of the World Through
the Gestalt of the Worker" in Mitcham-
Mackey, eds., (1972). What is needed in
this area is the kind of in-depth study of
Heidegger's philosophical background
such as has been provided by David
Farrell Krell with regard to the Heideg-
ger-Jaspers relationship, by Hermann
Mrchen on the Heidegger-Adorno re-
lationship,'' and in an unsympathetic
Marxist vein by parts I and III of
Roger Waterhouse's A Heidegger
Critique (1981).
Turning finally to the task of adap-
tation and application, Heidegger's
thought is beginning to gain some re-
spect from prominent philosophers in
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
the Anglo-American tradition.But his
analysis of technology continues to be
ignored in these beginnings despite all
the expositions. Merely expository
work, moreover, courts the danger of
providing unwitting and simplistic re-
solutions of the ambiguities in Heideg-
ger's position. Surely the way to make
Heidegger's thought on technology ef-
fective and fruitful in the English-
speaking world is first to deal with
scholarly or social issues that are felt
to be crucial in their own right, and
then to show in detail how they are il-
luminated and advanced when Heideg-
ger's insights are brought to bear on
them. Theodore Kisiel (1977) has ven-
tured efforts in this direction, as have
Albert Borgmann (1971, 1972, 1978a,
1980a, and 1984) and the best of those,
such as Michael Zimmerman, who are
dealing with ecological issues (see his
1983a and 1983b, the latter of which is
discussed in section 3 below). Another
case in point would be the Canadian
conservative political philosopher G.
Grant who, when defending a tradi-
tional conception of justice against the
ultimate challenge of modern technol-
ogy, acknowledges the need to rely on
Heidegger's understanding of technol-
ogy as "the deepest account of moder-
nity" (Grant, 1974, p. 88). If such en-
deavors are successful, readers will on
their own return to the original Heideg-
gerian texts. If such exercises are not
possible, Heidegger's thought is incon-
sequential at least for now.
3. Heidegger Studies in the Philosophy of
Technology and Environmental Ethics
As suggested above, Heidegger's
thought requires the test and enrich-
ment of independent concerns and ex-
periences if it is to gain a wider influ-
ence. The encounter with nature in its
wildness has been a formative experi-
ence in the self-understanding of this
111
country. The second half of this en-
counter has taken the shape of the tech-
nological domination and despoliation
of the natural environment. Philoso-
phers of ecology and environmental
ethics in this country have vigorously
responded to these developments. Ac-
cordingly one would expect ecology and
environmental ethics to be fruitful
fields of exchange between American
philosophy and Heidegger's thought on
technology.
George Seidel (1971) is among
those who have made a start on this ex-
change. His essay contains the usual
anemic though competent summary
and exposition of Heidegger's thought,
but only the most tentative application
to ecology. More incisive is Joseph
Grange (1974) who considers magic
and sees its supposedly unobtrusive
and careful connection with the proces-
ses of nature as a counterforce to tech-
nology. Magic is viewed as akin to
Heidegger's notions of letting-things-be
and of care. But for this suggestion to
be persuasive a more carefully cir-
cumscribed notion of magic would be
required. One might, after all, take
magic d la Francis Bacon as a primi-
tive and misguided version of technol-
ogy. Furthermore, the Heideggerian
notion of care (Sorge) does not have the
uniformly benevolent connotations
some commentators too quickly attri-
bute to it; often it means something
more like worried concern.
In a later article Grange (1977)
brings Heidegger's thought to bear
more sharply on the problem of ecol-
ogy. His distinction between dividend
(anthropocentric) and foundational (re-
spectful) ecology is crucial to an analy-
sis of ecological concern. The distinc-
tion has been drawn elsewhere, how-
ever, and in a more provocative, con-
crete, and circumspect manner e.g.,
by Arne Naess in "The Shallow and the
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
-I -I o
Deep, Long-Range Ecology Movement"
and by Christopher Stone in Should
Trees Have Standing?'^ Heidegger's
thought would be most helpful where
Stone, for instance, is most perplexed,
when he stresses how the anthropocen-
tric position is both ethically unsatis-
factory and practically overpowering.'^
Heidegger's thought allows us to see
human imperialism within the long his-
tory of subjectivism and in the
framework of technology with its re-
duction of all natural forces to re-
sources.
Stone's essay shows how unfortu-
nate is the inability of the many ex-
positors of Heidegger to make his
thought part of the national conversa-
tion. Jurisprudence, the area of Stone's
concern, is an effective social force in
this country; it is open to philosophical
reflection and so should be an appropri-
ate channel for Heidegger's influence.
Laurence Tribe (1974), an important
writer in this field as it relates to ecol-
ogy and technology assessment, is in
fact aware of Heidegger (p. 1334) al-
though he makes but limited use of his
thought.
Another point of contact between
Heidegger and ecology is the problem
of how to inhabit the earth, an issue
that environmentalists sometimes dis-
cuss under the heading of "reinhabiting
America.'"' Here Heidegger's remarks
on dwelling (1971, pp. 143-161) are perti-
nent. Hwa Yol Jung (1972 and 1974) has
made helpful use of Heidegger along
this line. In a later plea written with his
wife (Hwa Yol Jung and Pette Jung,
1975), his work has become excessively
preachy though this is less true of a
subsequent coathored work (1976)
which attempts to draw political impli-
cations. Heidegger's words on dwelling
have also evoked a forceful response in
John Caputo (1971) and Paul Colaizzi
(1978), with Wolfgang Schirmacher hope that Heidegger's thought will now
(1982b) following suit. become part of a wider conversation.
Given that Heidegger counts for lit- 4. Further Interpretations of
tle in the general intellectual communi- Heidegger's View of Techology
ty of this country, a consequential dis- In addition to the discussions of
cussion of Heidegger and ecology must Heidegger that have been inspired by
attain at least the level of current dis- an ecological concern, there is a vari-
cussions on the foundations of ecology ety of more or less substantial, histori-
before striving to advance the issue. It cal and systematic critiques and de-
is remarkable, for instance, that the velopments of his thought. The variety
customary treatments of Heidegger indicates that Heidegger is becoming a
have failed to impress the Co-Evolution ferment in contemporary thought on
Quarterly (now Whole Earth Review) technology. But the lack of a common
and The Whole Earth Catalog (and its direction in this variety and of well ar-
updates), the most vigorous and well- ticulated and substantial conclusions
read publications in the area of alterna- shows that the reception of Heidegger
tive technology, despite Mitcham's ef- is still in an early phase or that there is
forts to draw Heidegger to the attention no profound and powerful thrust to
of Stewart Brand, the editor and found- Heidegger's view of technology.
ing genius of these enterprises.
Beginning with slender efforts,
Nevertheless, as in the discussion there is A.F. Lingis's proposal (1968) to
of Heidegger's thought on science, explore an approach to technology that
there is now, if not a treatise, a survey differs from Heidegger's. After a spir-
and review that may at last move the ited exposition of Heidegger's view, he
discussion fruitfully forward. Zimmer- points to the "alterity of the other"
man (1983b) in a lengthy article in En- (p. 136) as a phenomenon which resists
vironmental Ethics has provided a technological reduction and may afford
thoughtful, nearly complete account of a point of departure for a more reflec-
the themes and the development of tive discourse about technology. An at-
Heidegger's thought on nature, nature's tempt by Robert Goff (1968) to relate
fate, and on the place of animals and Heidegger and Wittgenstein by means
humans in nature. Drawing on a larger of a philosophical anlaysis of tools fails
study (1981) discussed below, Zimmer- to engage issues in the philosophy of
man shows how Heidegger overcomes technology in any fruitful manner.
the subjective and voluntaristic Dean Franks (1971) uses the distinction
liabilities of his early thought and between the assertorical and prob-
deepens his insight into the mutual be- lematical to illuminate Heidegger's
longing of the natural environment and (1954 and 1966) remarks on technology.
humankind. He defends the later Though the distinction recalls Kant's
Heidegger against the major misun- two types of hypothetical imperative,
derstandings, and although his discus- Frank employs it in an everyday sense.
sion of the literature does not go very Technology is said to be assertorical in
far, he has marked and properly placed pretending to precision, unity, and con-
most of it through footnotes. The scope sistency, thereby hiding its deeply
and quality of Zimmerman's review as questionable or problematical charac-
well as the prominent and appropriate ter. But Frank's muddled and poorly
place of its publication permit one to formulated remarks throw little light

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

113
on this issue. Borgmann's (1975) point,
influenced by Heidegger, about the im-
portance of an experience of "the depth
of things" is little more than a sugges-
tion. Henning Ottmann (1980) goes
further in these respects by developing
a concept of praxis as an alternative to
technology.
Thomas Fay (1977) attempts a
more substantial expansion of Heideg-
ger in his study of the Heideggerian
critique of logic, which he also presents
as a critique of technology.
Thus, linguistic analysis, the de-
velopment of metalinguistics, and
symbolic logic are all a part of the
more general movement of the
metaphysics of the 'Will to Will,'
which has produced modern tech-
nology. As Heidegger notes,
'metalanguage and the sputnik,
metalinguistics and rocket tech-
nology are really the same thing.'
It is the Ge-Stell, the drive toward
domination, of technicity (Tech-
nik) which impels it to develop a
language which will be pure in-
strument, that is, formalized lan-
guage (pp. 88-89).
Fay's book is not quite as oracular as
this passage makes it sound. Indeed,
the problem is just the opposite; it re-
mains almost wholly at the level of ex-
position, and again (from the present
perspective) neglects the potentials for
engagement with the philosophy of
technology. Borgmann (1978b) concen-
trates on symbolic logic as a topic in
Heidegger's work, claims it to be a
focus of Heidegger's thought on tech-
nology, and attempts to set this focus in
wider scholarly and everyday contexts.
A major work with substantial in-
tentions is Egbert Schuurman's Tech-
nology and the Future (1980). Schuur-
man is a Dutch engineer, philosopher,
and now senator who was also a student
of the neo-Calvinist philosophy of Her-
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
man Dooyeweerd and did his disserta-
tion under Hendrik van Riessen, whose
Filosophie en Techniek (1949)^''remains
a basic achievement. Schuurman be-
gins with a philosophical analysis of
technology which sticks close to en-
gineering experience and perceptions,
and then moves to consider the inter-
pretations of this experience by those
he styles transcendentalists (Friedrich
Georg Jnger, Heidegger, Jacques
Ellul, Hermann Meyer) and positivists
(Norbert Wiener, Karl Steinbuch,
Georg Klaus). Finding both approaches
wanting, he offers his own, religiously
affiliated "liberating perspective."
With Loscerbo (1980), Schuurman
argues that "Heidegger's view of tech-
nology cannot be understood in isola-
tion from his entire philosophy of
Being" (p. 80). Like Loscerbo, he there-
fore undertakes to situate Heidegger's
analysis of technology within his
framework of ontological concerns.
And in this, Schuurman is at least more
limpid than Loscerbo although it
does not take much to exceed Loscerbo
on this score. However, whereas Los-
cerbo refuses to venture any criticism
of the master, Schuurman is perhaps
too quick to do so. At the same time, in
fairness, some of his points are sound:
Heidegger's weakness on the history of
science and technology, his lack of ap-
preciation of the benefits of technology,
and the impotence of his responses.
Overall, however, because of the limi-
tations of his particular framework, it
is not clear that Schuurman in any sig-
nificant way advances the integration
of Heidegger into a larger conversa-
tion.
Another, quite different effort in
this direction can be found in Carl
Mitcham's state-of-the-art overview of
"The Philosophy of Technology" (1980)
and a subsequent related essay entitled
"What is the Philosophy of Technol-
ogy?" (1985). Mitcham's more descrip- Feeling the world and fucking the
tive placing and counter-posing of world is the only preparation for
Heidegger's analyses to other tradi- death. Authentic embodied exis-
tence is making love to the world
tions in the philosophy of technology . . . Ecstasy, self-transcendence,
aims to defend the basic legitimacy of love-making they all go to-
the hermeneutic and questioning ap- gether. This way of going is our al-
proach. But the actual substantive ternative to bad faith, technology
achievement of this effort remains and death-evasion (p. 92).
slight.
William Barrett (1978) has underta- In the end Colaizzi's book winds up as
ken an extended study of the problems abstract in its heat as more pedestrian
of freedom and technology in contem- expositions in their blandness and as
porary society, and Heidegger's some of the political analyses, yet to be
thought is clearly in evidence. From considered, in their superciliousness.
the reviews, it is also apparent that Webster Hood (1972) sets off
Barrett's work commands attention.'' Heidegger's conception of technology
His analyses are ambitious, often con- against that of Aristotle, to whom he
crete, and sometimes witty. But the credits the traditional idea of technol-
final gains are slim because of the fre- ogy as neutral instrument. This is a
quently cavalier and distracted way in confusing move. In "The Question Con-
which Barrett proceeds. cerning Technology" Heidegger begins
by affirming the correctness of the defi-
Colaizzi's book-length analysis of nition of technology as neutral instru-
technology and dwelling is likewise ment, and then provides an elaborate
strongly influenced by Heidegger. Al- interpretation and illustration of Aristo-
though Colaizzi defines technology tle's fourfold causality in order to ex-
(with Ellul) as "that attitude 'which plore the nature of instrumentality. The
most efficiently effects efficiency in result is precisely to undercut the shal-
some activity'" (p. 8), he attributes its low and conventional understanding of
origin (adapting Heidegger) to "that what an instrument is, and to reveal
endeavor which in bad faith seeks to technology as a kind of substantive
surmount death" (p. 10). Colaizzi then truth. Hood's comparison also errone-
criticizes the common repression of our ously assumes that Heidegger is inter-
awareness of death in a relentless and ested in technology taken in the broad
bitter attack on the establishment of anthropological sense which covers all
psychologists, scientists, professional making and using of artifacts. But tech-
philosophers, politicians, and corporate nology for Heidegger is always modern
executives. In its fervor and its con- technology, and it is pointless to ask
crete illustrations the study clearly how Aristotle understood that.
stands out from among more lackluster With regard to the issue of tech-
scholarly efforts. But the very barrage nological instrumentality, Simon Moser
of accusations is so furious that no (1971, pp. 144-146) has disputed the
energy remains for sustaining the con- adequacy of Heidegger's analysis, but
tentions or penetrating to viable alter- his refutation is little more than a reit-
natives. And his attempt, in the second eration of the conventional wisdom
half, to sketch ways of "dwelling" in Heidegger is calling into question.
the same areas of psychology, philoso- Something similar goes for Dessauer
phy, etc. sounds like a parody: (1956) who, as the founding "philoso-

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

115
pher of technology," was nevertheless
the first to isolate Heidegger's analysis
of technology for special treatment.
Given Hood's assumptions, how-
ever, it is consistent that in his elabora-
tion of Heidegger's theory of technol-
ogy he should turn to the categories of
Being and Time which are conceived as
timeless a priori structures and thus
consonant at least in principle with
Hood's largely ahistorical approach.
The elaboration first sketches five ontic
(or surface) characteristics: ''technics
(tools, implements, apparatus,
machines), products (consumer and
nonconsumer goods), nature (material
and power), theory (the role of sci-
ence), and intersubjectivity (the social
organization of labor)" (p. 354). To be
sure, these circumscribe a fair re-
search program, but Hood does not ad-
vance it beyond the confines of Being
and Time and tentative considerations.
He rightly sees that the ontic structures
require an ontological (or depth)
grounding. Guided again by Being and
Time he takes such grounding in an
existential sense to be the freeing of en-
tities for their being by humans. And
the later Heidegger does in fact use a
similar formula to suggest a way for
dealing with technology: to let things of
technology be in a spirit of detachment
(1959a, pp. 53-55). But Hood ignores,
first, that Heidegger's grounding of
technology has sharply divided diag-
nostic and therapeutic aspects and, sec-
ond, as regards therapy, that there is
much variety and uncertainty in
Heidegger as we shall see below.
In Edward Ballard's Man and
Technology (1978), Heidegger's influ-
ence is strong though it remains in the
background. The greater part of the
book consists of the development of an
ontology to guide us "toward the mea-
surement of a culture," as the subtitle
indicates. The ontology is a forceful
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
ii
and original synthesis and elaboration
of two Heideggerian themes the self,
seen in light of the analysis of Dasein in
Being and Time, and the epochal char-
acter of Being and its truth. The appli-
cation of this ontology to modern tech-
nology suffers from the Heideggerian
confusion of science and technology
and from the austerity of Ballard's per-
spective and concepts. It does high-
light, however, the impoverishment
and violent imbalance of the technolog-
ical culture. "Technism" is Ballard's
title for the pure and extreme danger
that our age faces, and what Ballard
has to say about technism can be read
as commentary on Heidegger's
framework, one that shows more con-
cretely and in detail how the
framework constitutes the ultimate
peril to human existence.
But there is also a significant dis-
agreement between Ballard and
Heidegger on the danger of technology.
Like most critics of technology, Ballard
adds to his presentations of the subtle
and concealed liabilities of technology
a trumpet call of warning that requires
little reflection and subtlety to be
heard. It proclaims the physically self-
destructive tendency of technology
(pp. 228-233). This is a difficult and
dubious issue for philosophers for two
reasons. First, it is embedded in
numerous empirical questions that few
philosophers take the time to consider,
far less to answer. Second, the plain
urgency or factual straightforwardness
of this point, if such it is, often seems to
be invoked from a diffidence as regards
the clarity and force of the more com-
plex and reflective arguments. Heideg-
ger, at any rate, sees the danger of
technology not in overt self-destruction
but in its subtly subversive force,
coupled with outward stability and an
indefinitely long reign (1973, pp. 95-96).
Accordingly, Heidegger considers the
danger of the atom bomb to be secon- intemperate style and peremptory post-
dary (1966, pp. 55-56; 1977a, p.28). ure tend to confirm the worst suspi-
This same problem is at the center cions of Heidegger's critics.
of Wolfang Schirmacher's Technik und And yet the larger program of
Gelassenheit (1983), which is revised Schirmacher's project is eminently
from the second part of his 1980 disser- reasonable and appropriate. His book,
tation with a new introduction and con- as the subtitle says, proposes a "Zeit
clusion. The main body of the text kritik nach Heidegger," a critique of
(pp. 116-230) is an analysis of the basic our times after and according to
principles of Greek and medieval Heidegger. The idea is to be guided by
metaphysics being, time, non-con- Heidegger and to pass beyond his in-
tradition, identity, etc. designed to sights (pp. 11-15). What we are to take
provide the basis for a new approach. from Heidegger is the radicality of his
The force and quite often the heat of his critique of metaphysics and technology,
argument spring from Schirmacher's his attention to the possibility of a turn
conviction that technology has become of affairs, and his recommendation of
lethal or suicidal (pp. 7-36). This simplicity and detachment. But we
danger, he concludes, requires extraor- must go beyond Heidegger in being
dinary radicality of thought. The only more alive to the urgency of our im-
thinkers who come close to such tren- mediate situation and in coming to
chancy are Spinoza, Schopenhauer, and positive terms with technology, in seek-
especially Heidegger. All other at- ing a "technology of life" (pp. 231-261).
tempts, however well-intentioned or In contrast to Schirmacher's fiery
novel (Hans Jonas' among them tract, Phillip Fandozzi provides a
[pp. 236-237]), are waved aside as treatise about and beyond Heidegger
naive, futile, or discredited. But both that is less ambitious and yet spirited,
the beginning and the end of Schir- circumspect, and instructive. In
macher's reasoning are weak. A page Nihilism and Technology: A Heidegge-
of anecdotal evidence (p. 232) and an rian Investigation (1982), Fandozzi con-
occasional reference (p. 14, n. 11) is all fronts Heidegger's position with more
that is adduced to demonstrate the im- or less independent evidence regarding
pending catastrophe. And the final pro- the character of our time, evidence that
posals of reform seem vague or un- is drawn from literature, philosophy,
realistic (pp. 257-259) as has also been and social science. Fandozzi ably
noted by Friedrich Rapp (1984). Should shows that Heidegger's view of the
one object, however, that his proposals modern period as issuing at once in
are not politically feasible, Schir- nihilism and technology is widely trace-
macher is ready with the reply that able and shared. Heidegger's thought,
"the criterion of 'political feasibility' according to Fandozzi, surpasses the
can only be removed, not fulfilled" insights of his contemporaries and pre-
(p. 237; cf. p. 242). By squaring radical- decessors in radicality and comprehen-
ity, Schirmacher renders his position siveness. But it fails to attend
immune to all empirical tests and adequately to features of our time that
reasonable objections. Thus in the de- are evident in the work of others i.e.,
tails of execution, he rejects what the attractiveness of technology and
Heidegger's thought on technology the experience of meaninglessness.
most needs careful testing, elabora- Especially the former of these traits is
tion, and development. Schirmacher's an obvious datum that needs

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

117
philosophical attention, and almost all
scholars have overlooked Heidegger's
oversight on this point.
The most important work on tech-
nology of Heideggerian inspiration in
this country is assembled in Don Ihde's
Technics and Praxis (1979). It is, as the
author indicates (pp. xxvi-xxviii), a
tentative study. It is also a slim vol-
ume, excessively repetitious, and un-
settled in its final orientation. And al-
though it alludes to much scholarship,
it actually makes use of very little. But
unlike comparable efforts, it is cos-
mopolitan in its large views while
showing care and imagination in detail.
Ihde traces through the history of
philosophy a division between a preoc-
cupation with mind, theory, and sci-
ence, on the one hand, and with body,
perception, and praxis, on the other
(pp. xviii-xxii). He attributes the ne-
glect of technology as a philosophical
problem to the dominance of the
former concern, and places Heidegger
and his interest with technology
squarely on the latter side of this
hiatus. Ihde suggests that praxis, the
embodied concern with one's world,
may be irreducible to theory and at the
same time provide the appropriate
basis for an understanding of technol-
ogy. In a subsequent study on "The His-
torical-Ontological Priority of Technol-
ogy," included in Existential Technics
(1983), a second collection of essays on
these same themes, Ihde argues this
issue in still greater detail
Ihde thus shares with Hubert
Dreyfus (1980) the view of Heidegger
as a proponent of what Dreyfus calls
"practical holism." According to prac-
tical holism, human being-in-the-world
is structured by a background of prac-
tices which cannot be translated into a
set of beliefs, and is therefore not sub-
sumable under a theory. The pivotal
phenomenon is skill which, Dreyfus
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
11Q
holds, is not explainable as rule appli-
cation.
In his own detailed analyses, Ihde
examines the import of technological
instruments on our being-in-the-world,
particularly of instruments which serve
investigation and information-gather-
ing purposes. These examinations are
inspired by Heidegger's tool analysis,
and the most pervasive feature they
discover is an amplification-reduction
structure. Instruments tend to bring
one side of a phenomenon sharply and
closely into focus at the expense of
other sides and of the fullness of experi-
ence. This is a significant result that
could be radicalized, generalized, and
clarified as to its substantive signifi-
cance. Ihde stresses that the import of
technological instruments is "non-neu-
tral"; they effect "significant transfor-
mations" (1979, pp. 54 and 66). At this
level the point may be true but trivial,
and he leaves matters with this vague
suggestion. In spite of such reserve,
Ihde's investigations point up a direc-
tion of concreteness, patience, and orig-
inality that future research must follow
to test and elaborate Heidegger's
views. And indeed, Ihde (1983) himself
has already begun to do precisely this.^'
Hans Jonas' work may also be
mentioned in this context because his
contributions to the philosophy of tech-
nology are substantial, and he is well
acquainted with Heidegger. Although
the Festschrift for his 75th birthday^'
does not contain an essay devoted to
the philosophy of technology, it is clear
from his intellectual autobiography
(1974, pp. xi-xviii) that Jonas conceives
an "ethics of technology" as the culmi-
nation of his life's work. His thought
has moved from a hermeneutics of
early Christian theology and gnosticism
to the philosophy of biology and finally
to facing "the moral challenges of mod-
ern technology." Moreover, not only
are Jonas' early historico-theological
studies undertaken under the decisive
influence of Heidegger, but his later
movement from a philosophy of biology
to a concern with technology in signifi-
cant ways mirrors Heidegger's transi-
tion from the Being and Time analysis
of the life-world to "The Question Con-
cerning Technology."
In those essays which bear most di-
rectly on technology, however, Jonas
acknowledges no debt to Heidegger.
And in a 1964 essay on Heidegger (see
Jonas, 1964, in section B, 2 of the biblio-
graphy), apart from specifying the
early influence of Being and Time, he
presents a sharp nd impassioned
critique of Heidegger's fundamental
position, seeing it as devoid of norms
and thus an easy prey to Nazism a
contention which remains to be touched
on below. Yet as has been suggested
about a 1959 essay, Jonas' analyses of
the nature of technology "may be read
initially as giving historical content to
this [i.e. to what Heidegger calls the]
technological attitude toward the
world" (IVIitcham and Mackey, 1972,
p. 26; cf. p. 27). In his more metaphysi-
cally oriented analyses (1959, the first
and third essays of 1974, and 1979), the
development of modern science is des-
cribed, in historical particulars, as dis-
solving the order and firmness of the
world, thus initiating and serving the
boundless technological manipulation
of reality. Jonas brilliantly provides de-
tail and substance to Heidegger's thesis
on the rise of the technological
framework in the modern era, some-
thing that Heidegger himself had un-
dertaken in the lecture course What is a
Thing? (1962).
Jonas' magnum opus on The Im-
perative of Responsibility: In Search of
an Ethics for the Technological Age fi-
nally appeared in Germany in 1979 and
in a shorter English translation five
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
years later. It contains four previously
published essays in the context of a sys-
tematic inquiry, and it begins with a
commentary on some lines from Sopho-
cles' Antigone that recalls a commen-
tary made by Heidegger four decades
earlier (Heidegger, 1953 [written 1935],
pp. 123-138). Further, in his ethics of
technology, with its stress on the con-
scious exercise of human responsibility
in the face of awesome powers, one can
detect echoes of Heidegger's proto-ethi-
cal notion of resoluteness (see espe-
cially p. 35). Similarly, the derivation
of purposiveness from an analysis of a
tool (a hammer) is reminiscent of
Being and Time (pp. 52-53). And, fi-
nally, Jonas' radical concept of history
shows Heidegger's abiding influence.
On the whole, however, Jonas goes
his own way, and it is a more tradi-
tional and conservative one than
Heidegger's and that of the early
Jonas. Jonas does stress the unpre-
cedented nature of our situation in his
great book. But the novelty is a factual
or empirical one; it is the givenness of
the immense physical and perhaps to-
tally destructive power that humans
have acquired through science and
technology. As mentioned earlier, this
overt danger seems secondary to
Heidegger. To be sure, Jonas implicitly
agrees with Heidegger that technology,
at least when taken to Utopian ex-
tremes, suffers from a decisive instrin-
sic debility. Jonas shows this in his
critique of Karl Marx's and especially
Ernst Bloch's Utopia of a life free from
labor (pp. 193-198).
Though Jonas' analysis is impor-
tant and striking, it unduly restricts the
critical examination of technology and
makes it appear as though a technologi-
cal life where labor is still common and
necessary would remain protected
from the most quesionable force of
technology. In fact the critical edge of
119
Jonas' concept of technology is dulled
in this book. Though he refers in pas-
sing to technology in the spirit of his
third essay from 1974 as a revolution-
ary and irresistible force (pp. 127-128),
his hopeful ethics for technology
clearly requires a more restricted
status for technology, and such a re-
striction of discovery and knowledge,
needs no fervent hope. And Jonas ap-
propriately draws such consequences
(pp. 166-169). But at the end he is left
with a rather bland statement regard-
ing the impact of technology on our
lives (p. 169).
One would have to conclude that
Jonas' book is less radical in its analy-
sis and less concrete in its proposals
than Heidegger's work, though the lat-
ter is in turn much more programmatic
and sketchy than Jonas' considerations.
Moreover, The Imperative of Responsi-
bility is truly a masterwork; it is a
book of obvious warmth, wit, and wis-
dom, characteristics one would hesitate
to ascribe to Heidegger's writings.
5. Being and Time and Technology
Not so long ago it was a com-
monplace of Heidegger scholarship that
the thought of the later Heidegger,
after he had taken the celebrated turn
in his thought during the thirties, con-
stituted his crucial and lasting achieve-
ment. His discussion of technology is
part of this mature period. But lately
Being and Time has returned to the
center of scholarly attention, and those
who have been impressed with Heideg-
ger's discussion of technology have
begun to link it with the early master-
piece.
To be sure, of two major English
commentators on Being and Time, only
Richard Schmitt (1969) gives technol-
ogy much attention and this in a dis-
cussion of the relation betwen tools and
things.^ Don Ihde, however, makes a
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
ion
signal contribution not only to the ex-
tension of Heidegger's thought on tech-
nology but also, in an essay on "Heideg-
ger's Philosophy of Technology" (1979,
pp. 103-129), to our understanding of its
origin in Being and Time. He does so by
examining the connection between
Being and Time and "The Question
Concerning Technology." Technology is
not a thematic concern of Being and
Time; SO it is remarkable that writers
such as Grange, Barrett, Colaizzi, and
Hood have drawn such extensive inspi-
ration primarily from this early mag-
num opus. Their critical tools are taken
mainly from Heidegger's analysis of
"the they," his title for levelled-down,
everyday existence. Positive orienta-
tion in the face of the distractions of
technology is taken from Heidegger's
notions of authenticity and resolute-
ness. As Arne Naess (1979) notes, these
are also the Heideggerian categories
which have been most influential on the
social science analysis of industrial so-
ciety.
But whereas the significance of
Being and Time for an understanding
of technology remains largely implicit
in the analyses mentioned above, Ihde
broaches the issue directly. The sec-
tions of Being and Time he considers
most relevant center on the tool analy-
sis, which he rightly admires as a
model of phenomenological examina-
tion. There is an obvious connection be-
tween technology and the handling of
tools, certainly just as obvious as that
between "the they" and industrial mass
society. Ihde elaborates this connection
by showing how the phenomenological
distinction between noesis and noema
(roughly, attitude and object) is main-
tained from Being and Time to the
essay on technology. This is a striking
demonstration of how much continuity
there is in the craft of Heidegger's
thinking throughout the profound de-
velopments of insight. There are, as
Ihde notes, also differences. The tone of
wholeness and approval in the tool
analysis yields to a sharply critical
view of technology; and the distinction
between contemplative science and cir-
cumspective praxis in Being and Time
is collapsed in the Gestell which is the
origin of both science and technology.
Ihde perhaps overestimates the
radicality of the early science/praxis
distinction. Both approaches to reality
are, after all, grounded in human exis-
tence. More important, Ihde seems to
misalign the insights of Being and Time
with those of the later Heidegger. The
later analyses of technology are truly
anticipated in Being and Time with the
analysis of "the they" an everyday
existence which exhibits the levelling
down, the restlessness, and the aggres-
siveness of modern technology. It is
precisely this affinity which accounts
for the guidance other authors have
found in the they-analysis. The analysis
of the handling of tools looks at an em-
phatically premodern technological set-
ting, and thus anticipates the "thing"
analysis (in 1971, pp. 145-182). Like the
thing, a hand tool is the inconspicuous
focus of a world. Jug and bridge, two
things Heidegger examines at length,
as well as horse, bull, plow, and clasp
all mentioned as examples of emi-
nent things (1971, p. 182) surely
evoke the same world as that of the
shoemaker in Being and Time (1927,
p. 95-102 [67-72]).
As in other regards. Being and
Time is ambiguous here. Illustrations
are drawn from both the pretechnologi-
cal workshop and the railway station.
At one point Heidegger says with ap-
parent approval that for circumspec-
tive concern "the wood is a forest of
timber, the mountain a quarry of rock;
the river is water-power . . . " (p. 100
[70]). Nowadays, environmentalists an-
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
grily characterize the attitudes of the
timber and mining interests or the
Army Corps of Engineers in precisely
such terms. But to what extent is na-
ture equally disclosed as resource in
both craft and modern technology?
Especially does this become a question
when Heidegger immediately observes
that "the botanist's plants are not the
flowers of the hedgerow; the 'source'
which the geographer establishes for a
river is not the 'springhead in the
dale'" (ibid,).
Ihde claims (pp. 109-110) that the
later Heidegger plays down the differ-
ences "between scientific technology
and the older handwork technology."
But he does so only at the highest level
of thought. Both the silversmith's work
and that of the electrical engineer are
modes of disclosing reality albeit
very different ones. Already in 1935
Heidegger spoke of "modern,
mathematically structured technology,
which is something essentially different
from every other hitherto known use of
tools" (1953, p. 162; Heidegger's
italics). Wolfgang Schirmacher (1973)
has it that Heidegger regarded his
analysis of the "craftsman society" in
Being and Time as "intentionally ana-
chronistic" (p. 387, n. 3). He refers to
the then unpublished Spiegel interview.
The published version has no such re-
mark, although we know from a sample
page, reproduced in Der Spiegel (May
31, 1967, p. 3), that Heidegger heavily
revised the transcript of the interview
for publication.
A more sophisticated and sensitive
analysis of what Being and Time has to
say about technology is from Hubert
Dreyfus (1984). Dreyfus begins by lay-
ing out the arguments for and against
the idea that Being and Time promoted
technology in the distinctly modern
sense. In response, his own hypothesis
is that "the analysis of equipment . . .
121
is neither pre-technological nor fully Like Ihde, Zimmerman identifies
technological, but rather, that Being two major strands in Western philoso-
and Time plays a transitional role in phy: one theoretical-ontplogical,
the history of the being of equipment" another practical-dramatic. The idea of
(p. 25). authenticity, Zimmerman argues, u
Dreyfus substantiates this thesis by nites these. Heidegger's understanding
constructing from Heidegger's hints a of this concept, which Zimmerman pre-
three-stage history of the being of sents as continuous with others in the
equipment loosely coordinate with the Western philosophical tradition,
epochs in the history of Being. These nevertheless undergoes a deepening
are: (l)the period of craftsmanship ex- and development sometime around
pressed in the Greek notion of techne, 1936. Partly as an outgrowth of his mis-
(2)industrialization and its attitude of taken involvement with Nazism and his
pragmatism, and (3)cybernetic control studies of Nietzsche, Heidegger seeks
articulated in systems theory. Each to purge residual elements of subjec-
period is characterized by a different tivism from his earlier conception of
conception of nature as physis, raw authenticity. Earlier works identify au-
material, and Bestand, respectively thenticity with a willed resoluteness,
as well as different ideals of human use later ones with a detached waiting or
fitting response, needs satisfaction, non-willing. In Being and Time the in-
and exploitation. Read in light of this authentic world of "the they," and
epochal history of Being, ''Being and thereby mass industrial society, seems
Time appears in the history of the to be constituted by an individual re-
being of equipment not just as a transi- fusal of self-knowledge. In the more
tion but as the decisive step towards mature works Heidegger seems to say
techno-logy, (A step Heidegger later "that people are inauthentic because
tries, unconvincingly, to read back into they live in a world where authenticity
Nietzsche)" (p. 32). has become nearly impossible. Inau-
thenticity has become destiny, not
Another important study bearing something elected. In a modern indus-
on the relationship between Being and trial world where everything is under-
Time and technology is Michael Zim- stood to be a commodity, individuals
merman's Eclipse of the Self (1981). treat themselves and others as objects"
This is not just an academic work, but (p. xxv). In making this argument,
one which has grown out of and contrib- Zimmerman, again with Ihde, also
uted to a serious personal search for demonstrates the strong continuity
authenticity. It is also a well-re- within Heidegger's development.
searched analysis of the concept of au- So does Fandozzi, who also sees in
thenticity as it develops in Heidegger. the inauthenticity of "the they" the fea-
As such it renews and explicitly formu- tures of technological everyday exis-
lates the issue of the relevance of the tence (1982, pp. 74-79) which is charac-
they-analysis to the understanding of terized by a superficiality that oscil-
the technological society. Ironically, lates between tranquillity and busy-
Zimmerman's conclusion implies that ness. But if we see the phenomenon of
Heidegger's later conception of inau- technology as it emerges in Being and
thenticity may be more adequate for Time together with the rise of nihilism
grasping the character of technological as pictured in non-Heideggerian ac-
life than that found in Being and Time. counts, it appears, so Fandozzi argues.

PHILOSOPHY TODAY

199
that Heidegger's notion of inauthentic-
ity fails to account for the attractive-
ness of technology, and it also becomes
evident that the authenticity of anxiety
and resoluteness is not the only possible
countermove to inauthenticity (pp. 117
121). Fandozzi goes on to explicate
from the interstices of the arguments in
Being and Time a mode of inauthentic-
ity which revels in the procurement
and gratification of unlimited pos-
sibilities and a counterexperience of
meaninglessness in which the futility
and vacuity of technology begin to an-
nounce themselves (pp. 121-129).
6. Heidegger, Marcuse, and Marx
Work on Heidegger and Herbert
Marcuse stands at the borderline of
problems of technology and politics.
What Heidegger's and Marcuse's inves-
tigations have in common is a recogni-
tion of technology as a fundamental
philosophical problem. But Marcuse's
decided and widely discussed political
views inevitably link reflections on
technology to those of politics. In his
most patently political book Marcuse,
following the Frankfurt School of social
theory, criticizes social science
positivism in a fashion which exhibits
many similarities to Heidegger's criti-
cisms of metaphysical thinking. At one
point, in fact, he quotes Heidegger with
approval (1964, pp. 153-154) although
the Frankfurt School thinks little of the
later Heidegger and less of his politics,
early or late.'' Yet as Rolf Ahlers (1971,
p. 585), Michael Zimmerman (1979a,
p. 246), and Roger Waterhouse (1981,
pp. 115ff.) all remind us, at one point
Marcuse considered Heidegger the
most fundamental influence on his own
position (cf. also Marcuse, 1977a and
1977b, pp. 28 and 37). And Zimmerman
at least sees a continued dependence of
Marcuse on Heidegger.
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
Reinhart Maurer picks up Gnter
Rohrmoser's (1969) idea of Marcuse as
"the applied Heidegger" (1970, pp. 239
240) in the sense that Marcuse provides
a parallel in social philosophy to
Heidegger's philosophical theory. By
way of agreement, Modesto Berciano
(1980) presents Marcuse as "the pre-
mier Marxist Heideggerian" who has
nevertheless overlooked Heideggerian
notions which could be of use to Marx-
ism. Heidegger and Marcuse agree in
their analysis of modern technology as
an eroding and levelling force. But,
Maurer contends, Heidegger leaves his
proposals for reform at the level of an
individualistic ethics (pp. 242 and 243)
whereas Marcuse presses for social
transformation, calling for a new sci-
ence and technology (pp. 243-245). It re-
mains unclear, however, whether this
means merely a redirection of present
science and technology or a basic re-
structuring; and if the latter, it is even
less clear how such a stupendous enter-
prise could be initiated other than by a
more personal alteration in thought and
attitude.
Theodore Kisiel (1970b) provides
the best outline of this arguement be-
tween hermeneutic philosophy (in the
tradition of Husserl-Heidegger-
Gadamer) and critical social theory
(Marx-Marcuse-Habermas-Apel). Is
the real way out of modern scientific-
technological domination some recon-
struction of theory, or is it social
praxis? "It seems that phenomenology
stands or falls on its commitment to the
priority of receptivity, which strikes
Marcuse as 'quietistic indifference'"
(Kisiel, 1970b, p. 159). Be that as it
may, Maurer shows that Marcuse has
been uncertain and unpersuasive in de-
limiting the social classes or groups
who could initiate reform.
Paul Piccone and Alexander Delfini
(1970) likewise see a dependence of
123
Marcuse on Heidegger, but in entirely
negative terms. For them Being and
Time is an apology for bourgeois soci-
ety, influenced by and aimed at the
early Georg Lukacs (p. 39). The first
part of this thesis goes back to Lukacs
himself and the initial attempt by a
Marxist to develop a comprehensive
critique of Heidegger.'^ The second part
is left unsubstantiated. Piccone and
Delfini's portrayal of Heidegger's view
is one-sided and marred by serious er-
rors, which has earned them the con-
tempt of Zimmerman (1979a, p. 262,
n. 42) though he makes no attempt to
discuss their substantive issues. In
their view, Marcuse's One-Dimensional
Man recapitulates Heidegger's analysis
of "the they," and in seeking to under-
cut the material basis of society, Mar-
cuse loses the foundation of a genuine
and penetrating dialectical analysis.
Along this same line one should cite
Valentino Gerratana (1977), who di-
rectly compares Heidegger and Marx
by means of a sarcastic castigation of
Heidegger as a romantic, reactionary
critic of capitalism and technology.
Maurer's circumspective essay
should have laid the foundations for
more advanced and systematic assess-
ments of the common concerns of
Heidegger and Marcuse; Piccone and
Delfini's article, perhaps just because
of its breezy and facile one-sidedness,
might have served as a stimulus to
such developments. The creative ele-
ment, however, has been all on the side
of Marcuse scholarship. Jrgen Haber-
mas, for instance, in "Technology and
Science as 'Ideology'" (1970) has
shown incisively and in a helpfully
elaborate historical context how Mar-
cuse wavers between a radical concept
of technology as incorporating a specif-
ic form of political domination and
technology as a neutral means which
can serve whatever political purposes.
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
194
Marcuse's student, William Leiss, ar-
gues that despite "certain inconsisten-
cies in Marcuse's work" he comes
down finally in favor of an instrumental
view of technology, contemporary prob-
lems being the result of a corruption of
historically specific social structures.'^
Patrick Murray (1982), however, main-
tains that Marcuse's most fundamental
insight concerns the need for a qualita-
tively new science and technology, one
which transcends the limitations of En-
lightenment conceptions of rationality.
In a comparison of the Frankfurt
School's critique of instrumental reason
with Heidegger's critique of science
and technology, Murray points up sig-
nificant similarities: both identify sci-
ence with technology, conclude that sci-
ence is inherently dominating, and find
seeds of the technological attitude to-
ward the world in Greek philosophy. He
could also have noted that the "level-
ling" of the world by "subjective" or in-
strumental reason as analyzed by the
founders of the Frankfurt School'^ re-
sembles Heidegger's Bestand as
grounded in the Gestell; that "objec-
tive" reason or Kantian Vernunft ap-
pealed to by Horkheimer-Adorno is
functionally parallel to Heidegger's
Denken; and that in the end Hor-
kheimer, Adorno, Marcuse, and
Heidegger (like Kant before them) all
turn for salvation to art and the aesthe-
tic experience.
These points have now been sub-
stantiated in great depth and detail as
regards the relationship of Heidegger
and Adorno in a 1980 study by Hermann
Mrchen which traces the theme of
power and domination through the writ-
ings of the two thinkers. In a second
book, published in 1981,'^ Mrchen at-
tempts posthumously to engage Adorno
and Heidegger in the dialogue they had
in different ways refused to enter (see
Schirmacher 1982a, pp. 387-391). The
convergence of thought that underUes
Adorno's polemics and Heidegger's
total silence shows that Marcuse's oc-
casional abandonment of the Enlighten-
ment commitment to the instrumental
neutrality of science and technology is
not without parallel in the Frankfurt
School, and the complaint of Hans-Die-
ter Bahr that it is all the fault of
Heidegger's influence is not accurate.^^
In this area as in others, then,
Heidegger scholarship has remained on
a provincial or expository level, except-
ing the work of Mrchen who wrote his
dissertation under Heidegger in 1928
(Schirmacher, 1982a, p. 389). On the
specific topic of Heidegger and Mar-
cuse, Ahlers' article continues as a
pioneering effort, supporting Maurer's
findings, which have become the ac-
cepted view of the matter. Yet although
Ahlers discusses Heidegger's critique
of science and the limitations of his
political views, he fails to take up the
extensive and helpful prior work of
Karlfried Grnder (1962) and Alexan-
der Schwan (1965). Hans Sachsse (1973)
presents another brief and balanced ex-
position of Heidegger and Marcuse on
technology which is of interest for its
emphasis on Marcuse's persistent be-
lief in the perfectibility of technology
(p. 375), a point made before by Mauer
(1970, p. 242). Efraim Shmueli (1975)
advances against both Heidegger and
Marcuse the charge that they fail to ap-
preciate the real achievements of tech-
nology how it strengthens philosophi-
cal reflection by making it at once
more possible and necessary. In fact,
this is a persisitent theme directed by
more vulgar Marxist and other critics
against Heidegger as well as against
anyone else who questions technology.
Finally, Zimmerman's exposition
(1979a) draws on more primary
sources than some previous work, and
acknowledges much of the secondary
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
material in footnotes. As Zimmerman
himself modestly admits (p. 246), it
nevertheless remains "not . . . much
more than an introduction," although
perhaps one of the best.
The idea, alluded to above, that
Being and Time is a response to
Lukacs' History and Class Conscious-
ness (1923) requires further considera-
tion. This is a possibility considered
and questioned by Kostas Axelos (1966,
pp. 9-10, n. 6) and touched on by Zim-
merman (1979b, p. 259, n. 10). But its
most detailed support is to be found in
Lucien Goldmann (1977), who specifies
three places in Being and Time where
he thinks Heidegger has referred to
Lukacs' History and Class Conscious-
ness. There is no independent evidence
that Heidegger had read Lukacs at that
time. But certainly it is true that there
are remarkable similarities in the at-
tempts of both philosophers to over-
come the subject/object dichotomy in-
herited from Cartesianism Lukacs
by an appeal to social praxis, Heideg-
ger to practical engagements with
things. For Lukacs the encounter be-
tween human beings and social entities
(from economic goods to institutions
and cultures) is different in kind from
that between human beings and natural
objects; it is also phenomenologically
richer and more primary than Zuhan-
denheit. Social entities are reified per-
sonality while humans themselves are
historical creatures from the moment
of their birth-encounters with their par-
ents (and the parental histories).
Knowing subject and object known are
moments of a social history and thus
dialectically interrelated.
Goldmann's own sympathy with
Lukacs and his criticism of Heidegger
for lacking any true conception of so-
cial encounter or action ignore Lukacs'
repudiation of his own early work. It
fails to take seriously Marx's own occa-
125
sional statements in support of the pri-
macy of technopraxis.^' And it neglects
to show how the practical engagements
with things or the theoretical encounter
with natural objects can be grounded in
socio-praxis. The critical issue is car-
ried forward, however, by Waterhouse,
who points to a lack of symmetry in
Heidegger when he provides for "no
genuine initial relationship to people,
corresponding to the ready-to-hand re-
lationship to things" (1981, p. 174). For
Waterhouse,
The shift from practical, engaged
involvement with things to disin-
terested, unengaged, manipulation
is an aspect of a fundamental so-
cial change the penetration of a
precapitalist economy by a value
system based only on cash. The
shift is not due, as Heidegger be-
lieves, to some moral decline
caused by the corrupt ideology of
science, but to economic factors
which Heidegger does not begin to
understand (pp. 172-173).
Goldmann and Waterhouse thus con-
firm the primacy of Marxist scholar-
ship in the area of the Heidegger/Marx
relationship. There simply is no
Heideggerian critique of Capital com-
parable to Waterhouse's critique of
Being and Time unless one stretches
things and counts Jean-Paul Sartre's
Critique of Dialectical Reason.^^ This
undercuts Richard T. DeGeorge's ear-
lier (1965) complaint about the inade-
quacy of the Marxist response to
Heidegger although it remains true
that Soviet and East European criti-
cisms are "shallow, polemical, beside
the point, and poor Marxism" (p. 294).
This remark leads us, finally, to the re-
lation of Heidegger's thought on tech-
nology to Marx himself.
Kostas Axelos in the lead essay
(1966, pp. 3-42) of his collection on
Marx and Heidegger assembles the
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
19
short, pithy, and appreciative state-
ments Heidegger has made about
Marx. For Heidegger, Marx is one of
the most perceptive witnesses of the
modern era, but one who fails to pene-
trate and understand what he sees.
Axelos draws from the Marxist corpus
to illustrate the kinship of Heidegger's
and Marx's concern with the alienating
force of technology. Axelos' own specu-
lations throughout the book move at the
highest level of Heidegger's thought,
where the history and destiny of Being
are at issue; his reflections are also
elegant and witty in an intellectual
vein. But one is much reminded of
Kant's strictures against dogmatic
thought which indulges in great claims
without regard to possible experience.
Axelos is cautious in his own way, to be
sure. His thesis, if there is one, is that
the essence of technology and the des-
tiny of Being are yet to be thought.
Still, Heideggerian exercises of this
sublime sort readily deteriorate into a
game whose principal rule is one-up-
manship, an implicit contempt of those
who are ignorant of the distinction be-
tween Being and beings; who plan, or-
ganize, and do research; who believe in
scientifically ascertainable truth and a
transcendent good.
No one, of course, has been bolder
than Heidegger in the endeavor to
penetrate the highest and most
abstract matters of Being, time, and
thought. But Heidegger was always an
explorer. He never simply put the lan-
guage of Being through its rhetorical
paces. Many of his explorations ended
in failure, no doubt. Moreover, the en-
terprise remained for him questiona-
ble. He was always determined to face
up to concrete reality, to gain "Insight
into That Which Is," as he entitled the
series of his most important lectures on
technology (1977, p. ix). In the seminar
on Heraclitus conducted with Eugen
Fink in his last years, it is the old
Heidegger, not Fink or the students,
who insists on immediacy and con-
creteness and a regard for the scien-
tific and technological world (Heideg-
ger and Fink, 1979, pp. 12-14, 71-73, 87
88, 109, 127, 137 ff., 158 ff.). The refer-
ences to concrete phenomena are never
more than exemplary and provocative,
but they are crucial elements in
Heidegger's thought.
Like his essay on Heidegger and
Marcuse, Zimmerman's (1979b) article
on Marx and Heidegger is as sober as
Axelos' book is flighty. Its virtue is that
it does remain close to the ground. For
one who is uninformed in either Marx,
Heidegger, or modern technology it
provides an initial orientation, sketch-
ing the positions of the two thinkers,
drawing together apposite quotations,
and alluding to many of the pertinent
secondary sources (though not, for
some reason, to Axelos' contribution).
But scholars who are conversant with
any of the three foci will not be aided in
their area of expertise. Such expository
work continues to be justified only by
the current primitive state of relevant
scholarship. In a later article evi-
dently part of a series on the relation
between Heidegger and Marx or the
neo-Marxists Zimmerman (1984)
examines the work of Karel Kosik and
his appropriation of certain themes
from Heidegger. Zimmerman's deft ex-
position once again confirms the
superior creativity of Marxists over
Heideggerian scholarship in this area.
The two central and related issues
between Heidegger and Marx the
relative primacy of techno-praxis ver-
sus socio-praxis, and technology as
Gestell versus technology as economic
formations remain to be addressed
in depth from a Heideggerian perspec-
tive. It can be noted in passing, how-
ever, that the sociological studies of
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
Jacques Ellul can be read as support-
ing Heidegger's thesis on both points,
and that Ellul has given the Marxists a
much more serious reading than they
have given him.^ The Marxist treat-
ment of Ellul is nothing short of a scan-
dal of scholarship that continues to go
unreported, and one to which followers
of Heidegger would do well to call at-
tention.
7. Technology and Politics
For many, Heidegger's involve-
ment with the Nazi movement in 1933
1934 is the focus for judging both his
philosophy and his politics. Discussion
of this issue surfaced in France im-
mediately after World War II,"' no
doubt partly because it was the French
who occupied southern Germany and
thus supervised and ratified the de
Nazification proceedings which tempo-
rarily deprived Heidegger of his right
to teach.^' Discussion revived in the late
1960s,at which time it was also taken
up again in the United States.
Some of Heidegger's critics have
taken his brief foray into politics to be
incontrovertible evidence for the va-
cuity at best and fraudulence at worst
of his work. Alexander Schawn (1974,
p. 151, note 15) and Reiner Schrmann
(1978, pp. 193-194, notes 4 and 5) pro-
vide ready references to and brief dis-
cussions of this school of thought
which has been strongly restated by
Henry Pachter (1976), Stephen Eric
Bronner (1977), and Roger Kimball
(1985). This position has been wreathed
with unintentional irony by Stanley
Rosen (1969 in section B, 2 of the biblio-
graphy, especially p. 119) who argues
the prominent influence of the anti-Nazi
nihilist Ernst Jnger, and Leo Strauss
(1971, p. 2) who implies a comparison
between Heidegger's political involve-
ments and Husserl's conversion to
Christianity.
127
 Pachter's more popular "Heideg-
ger and Hitler: The Incompatability
[sic] of Geist and Politics" (1976) re-
minds us of the deeply corrupting force
that the Nazi ideology had on German
culture and literature and of the dis-
tressing lack of judgment or integrity
among many of the writers and artists
of the time. Pachter also shows that the
murky and contemptuous spirit of the
Nazis did not come from nowhere. And
surely Heidegger's thought and ways of
speaking were not immune to these de-
plorable tendencies of the intellectual
life of Germany. But Pachter goes
much further and tries to show that the
work of the early and middle Heidegger
drew its central inspiration from this
unenlightened, misanthropic, ir-
rationalism and vigorously promoted it.
To substantiate this Pachter must re-
sort to clearly mistaken and tenden-
tious readings of Heidegger. Thus
Heidegger's analysis of "the they" is
denounced as contempt for common
people (pp. 52-53). In light of the
critique of contemporary culture to be
mentioned below, as well as in the con-
text of Heidegger's own later writing,
Pachter's interpretation appears en-
tirely one-sided. Similarly, when one
considers the work of thinkers such as
Roberto IVlangabeira Unger, Alasdaii
]V[acIntjn:-e,'' and Richard Rorty (1979),
one would hesitate to join Pachter in
thinking (pp. 52 and 54) that a critique
of the Enlightenment and its concept of
reason and humanism must be insidi-
ous on its face.
Bronner (1977) urges much the
same claims as Pachter though with
greater attention to Heidegger's writ-
ings and less familiarity with their cul-
tural context. He properly emphasizes
Heidegger's petty-bourgeois back-
ground which, as Heidegger's student
and friend IVEax IVIller agrees (1986,
pp. 16-17), has influenced Heidegger's
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
128
political sensibility. Bronner is also
right in scoring Heidegger's and his fol-
lowers' tendency to skip needed clarifi-
cations through a retreat to a misty and
occasionally haughty mysticism.
But so far, nothing of consequence
has been decided. And on the substan-
tive points, Bronner is as likely mista-
ken as Pachter. Brenner's distinctive
claim that Heidegger in the face of a
troubling social and political world re-
treated to an ahistorical and transcen-
dent concept of Being (1977, pp. 155-57,
162) is extraordinarily wrong-headed.
How does this claim accord with
Heidegger's thought on modern tech-
nology? Bronner (1977, p. 157) replies
with a single passage from Heidegger's
essay "Gelassenheit" (1959a).
This is typical of Brenner's selec-
tive and disjointed reading of Heideg
ger. Brenner's scholarship is really de-
plorable. But again he is right (1979) in
replying to Thomas Sheehan's (1979)
dissections and vitriolics that his thesis
cannot be dismissed on technical
points. How then is a controversy like
this to be settled? Surely no knock-
down drag-out resolution is possible,
far less desirable. The emphasis must
shift from whether Heidegger is right
or wrong to what matters as regards
our time and its well-being. Dispute
should yield to conversation, and
Heidegger should be brought into the
latter as one from whom we have learn-
ed or whose harmful influence we
should guard against.
The possibility of harm seems neg-
ligible when we consider Heidegger's
standing in the conversation of human-
ity. He is simply not heard in any
forum that really matters. This is cer-
tainly to the detriment of the universe
of political discourse. Provided he is
ever to be heard in that universe, his
contribution will be received more
clearly and readily if the nature and
circumstances of his entry into the
political arena in 1933-1934 are fully un-
derstood.
Undoubtedly Heidegger's reception
in the scholarly community of this
country was so late and slow because of
lack of information and because of mis-
information about his involvement with
the Nazi regime. The relevant facts
continue to be ascertained and ap-
praised. Beda Allemann's paper (1969)
presents a summary and review of
what was known by the late sixties. In
1972 Karl A. Moehling in his disserta-
tion reviewed and reproduced hitherto
unknown documents from official files
and from Heidegger's pen. A summary
of the dissertation appears in Sheehan's
anthology of 1981 (pp. 31-43). In 1976,
Der Spiegel published an interview of
Heidegger's given in 1966, in which
Heidegger once more defended his in-
volvement with the Nazis. In 1981 Jas-
pers' opinion of this affair came to
light.'' An earlier written defense of
Heidegger's from 1945-1946 along with
his inaugural address as rector of the
University of Freiburg in 1933 was pub-
lished in 1983 by his son Hermann (see
Heidegger, 1933 for details). The most
painstaking work is being done by Hugo
Ott who has been uncovering material
to this day (and has lately announced a
book on the subject); and there is fi-
nally a measured and insightful apprai-
sal of the evidence by Otto Pggeler.'^
Ott's research should move both
the friends and the foes of Heidegger to
revise their standard position. The
former have followed Heidegger in
claiming that he reluctantly and on the
entreaties of Nazi opponents took on the
burden of the rectorate to save what
could be saved. In fact, however,
Heidegger intended to use the Nazis'
rise to power as a vehicle to reform the
German university system and German
culture itself. Contrary to his critics.
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
however, Heidegger did not promote
the Nazis' party program. His own plan
was inspired by the misgivings and as-
pirations that he later worked out in his
critique of technology and suggestions
for reform. But at the time his project
was vague and fraught with am-
biguities. It appears to have left little if
any impression on the reshaping of the
German universities under Hitler.*^
Still, to the Nazi authorities it was suffi-
ciently puzzling or troubling to lead to
Heidegger's isolation and to his break
with the Nazis in 1934. Ott's account is
gaining wide acceptance in Germany
but appears to be slow in finding its
way into this country.'^
On the personal side, it is difficult
to be just in one's appraisal. With nota-
ble exceptions, Heidegger does not
seem to have been mean-spirited, vin-
dictive, or antisemitic during his al-
liance with the Nazis. Neither did he
show good judgment or moral courage
(Mller, 1986, p. 28). He was naive to
the point of being culpable and at a cru-
cial moment lent his influence to a per-
nicious movement. Yet finally, as G.
Steiner (1978, pp. 166ff.) points out,
what is most distressing is not the in-
volvement with the Nazis, but Heideg-
ger's failure later to denounce the at-
rocities of the Third Reich. Carl Fried-
rich von Weizcker, Max Mller, and
Ute Guzzoni similarly have deplored
Heidegger's refusal to recognize his
error and to apologize for it.^^ Others in
his position, Albert Speer, e.g.,^' have
admitted their mistakes. But Heidegger
to the end wavered between aloof si-
lence and defensive statements that
contain self-serving inaccuracies.
Inevitably the personal failures
shade over into philosophical ones. For
Kimball (1985) Heidegger's "sub-
sequent withdrawal from political ac-
tivity is even more questionable than
his brief period of political engage-
129
ment" (p. 17) and reveals Heidegger's
despair at being unable to influence
technology politically. But even if with
Heidegger one were to insist on the
priority and dignity of thought over
against political activism, there would
remain the need to consider reflec-
tively the significance of the Nazi reign
of terror within the history of Being and
technology. After all, Heidegger in the
Nietzsche volumes (1961) devoted hun-
dreds of pages to the analysis of
nihilism and the will to power. And he
has adverted to concrete phenomena
such as the atom bomb (1971, p. 166),
cybernetics (1966, p. 58), and rocket
bases (1976a, p. 277) as manifestations
of the calamity of technology. In fact,
there are passing remarks of Heideg-
ger's on the connection between Nazi
ideology and technology (1953, p. 166;
1976a, p. 280; 1977a, p. 152). But the
thinker who has so often scored the
forgetfulness of the Western tradition
appears to have been entirely oblivious
to the holocaust, an event that has sha-
ken the foundations of hope and reason
in the 20th century.'^
Those who defend Heidegger's ac-
tions as a limited or inconsequential
mistake^' argue that his philosophical
work at this time was either politically
neutral or should have suggested a dif-
ferent political course. Heidegger him-
self is on record as proclaiming the
apolitical nature not only of his own
thought but of all philosophy. Schwan
rejects such arguments (1974, pp. 150
151). His earlier book (1965) has the
general merit of establishing that, con-
trary to initial appearances, there is
something like a pervasive political
philosophy in Heidegger's thought.
More specifically, it has shown that
Heidegger thinks of traditional politics
as the working out of truth; the deci-
sive political deed of a great leader or
statesman defines the character of an
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
epoch as does the work of the great
thinker or of the artist. And Schwan
further shows that Heidegger sees the
present era as incapable of great politi-
cal work just as it is unable to create a
great, i.e., epochal, work of art.
Schwan's analysis has two interre-
lated shortcomings: he pays little at-
tention to Being and Time and does not
give technology its due. In the chapter
which summarizes Heidegger's apprai-
sal of the contemporary political situa-
tion (1965, pp. 126-145), Schwan stresses
the pointless and hopeless uniformity
that Heidegger sees beneath the varied,
well-intentioned, and apparently con-
trary political currents. Technology is
examined later and more incidentally
(pp. 146-150). Schwan sees this unifor-
mity in the context of the history of
Being as the final result of
metaphysics, of the restless will to will
and its calculative thinking. But as em-
phasized earlier, Heidegger also turns
directly to an analysis of the character
of our time, and though that investiga-
tion is informed by his view of the his-
tory of Being, it has its own dignity and
terminology.
As Pggeler (1972, p. 45) stresses,
Heidegger's sole question, the question
of Being, is for the modern era the
question of technology. This question,
as Heidegger (1976a, p. 279) implies,
requires its own approach: "The tradi-
tional metaphysical mode of thinking,
which terminated with Nietzsche, no
longer offers any possibility for ex-
periencing in a thoughtful way the fun-
damental traits of the technological
age, an age which is just beginning."
Pggeler (p. 45) rightly holds that the
idiosyncrasy of the task allows us in
some degree to disengage the analysis
of technology from the review of the
history of Being. Schwan doubts this
(1974, p. 160); but even if Schwan is
correct, it remains true that Heideg-
ger's critique of the modern age, seen
only from the viewpoint of
metaphysics, must appear peremptory
and one-sided. It becomes provocative
and instructive only when his reflec-
tions on technology are given proper at-
tention.
When this is done, one can also
begin to see some political relevance in
Being and Time. Heidegger's early
book is deeply ambiguous, and had he
published nothing more, we would be
hopelessly puzzled about Heidegger's
judgment of the contemporary world.
To draw out the political import of
Being and Time without reference to
the later Heidegger may yield an inter-
pretation which agrees with the text
and provides something like an expla-
nation of why Heidegger supported the
Nazis. But if it is at odds with the later
Heidegger's thought, such an interpre-
tation certainly fails to be faithful to
Heidegger's philosophy as a whole. The
problem is, of course, not just one of
consistency and scholarship. If the
later Heidegger's thought casts impor-
tant light on the character of our time,
then those interpretations of Being and
Time which are consonant with the
later thought are more likely to do the
same.
By contrast, Richard Schmitt's
(1969) reading of the social import of
Being and Time takes no guidance
from the later Heidegger. He recog-
nizes that Being and Time addresses
social phenomena in the analysis of
"the they" and of being-with. But such
social phenomena, Schmitt argues, are
always seen as more or less degenerate
modes of individual existence. Heideg-
ger fails to see the distinction between
social practices (which, we might say,
afford a possibility space) and the use
an individual makes of them (the ac-
tualization of a particular location with-
in the possibility space) (pp. 245 and
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
251-252). If we recognize "Heidegger's
blindness to the peculiar features of so-
cial phenomena" (p. 252), we can un-
derstand his turn to the Nazi move-
ment. Its totalitarianism is just the de-
nial of a social realm of freedom, and
Heidegger, calling the people to reso-
luteness, treats society as if it were one
individual (pp. 251-252).
Michael Zimmerman, though
deeply sympathetic to Heidegger's phi-
losophy, sees an analogous susceptibil-
ity of Being and Time to Nazi ideology
(1974).
At one point. National Socialism
might have seemed to offer to re-
solute, owned Dasein a vision into
the authentic destiny of Germany.
That this was emphatically not the
case came only gradually to be
evident in his 1930's; to have sup-
posed it to have been the case in
the early 1930's can only mean
that owned Dasein can make mis-
takes (p. 104).
Although Schmitt's view of the re-
lation between individual existence and
"the they" can be supported textually,
other readings are also available. In a
sense, "the they" is prior to the indi-
vidual. The individual exists first, most
of all, and often forever in the mode of
"the they" (1927, p. 167 [129]). And
though the analysis of "the they" is
sharply critical in its tone, Heidegger
insists, as he has done throughout his
career, that his purpose is reflection,
not evaluation. Inauthenticity, he says
(and "the they" is a mode of it), is not
a lesser or lower kind of being (1927,
p. 68 [43]).
It is not enough, however, to show
that Schmitt's interpretation is one-
sided. We must determine why this is
so. One reason, to be sure, is that it al-
lows Schmitt to undercut an anarchist
reading of Being and Time which, he
131
admits (p. 250), is at first sight much
more consonant with the analysis of au-
thentic individual existence, but would
throw no light at all on Heidegger's
political involvement of 1933. More im-
portant, what appears to guide
Schmitt's critique is the liberal demo-
cratic notion of the state.^^ In this view
the state is to provide the means (a
possibility space) for the good life, but
is not to prejudge in any way the indi-
vidual ends to be served by those
means. The good life is a matter of in-
dividual choice, of how one decides to
actualize the opportunities afforded by
the state. Such is also Schwan's orien-
tation, and it comes clearly to the sur-
face in his list of the central problems
of a practical (i.e., moral, social, and
political) philosophy (1974, p. 171). Both
Schmitt and Schwan correctly sense
that Heidegger, early and late, has re-
servations about this conception of the
state, and those doubts are radically
formulated but only implicitly sup-
ported in Heidegger's thought.
One can criticize liberal democracy
either because it fails to live up to its
own standards, or because it is al-
together mistaken. Criticism and prati-
cal reforms at the former level may be
urgent and worthy of our best efforts.
But Heidegger dismisses them one and
all, to which Schwan reacts with indig-
nation and also with a certain glee be-
cause he takes Heidegger's dismissal
as evidence of the political and social
barrenness of his thought. Heidegger
throughout his career has used the
dubious pedagogical device of exasper-
ation, the provocative use of terms and
phrases to goad his readers into radical
reflection. But this Socratic approach
may well offend as many as it awak-
ens. Heidegger's radical critique of lib-
eral democracy which, as Schwan well
shows (1965, pp. 126-145), includes all
presently notable political systems and
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
132
currents, is surely designed to move
critical reflection to a deeper level.
This call to radical criticism will
seem vacuous, however, if not arro-
gant^ unless one remembers that under
the title of technology Heidegger has
given an instructive, concrete outline of
how to proceed. Pggeler urges this
point (1972, pp. 44-45 and 59-60), though
without helpful elaboration and there-
fore, perhaps, unconvincingly. Schwan,
at any rate and not surprisingly, sees in
the question of technology merely an
aspect of the question of Being.
Wolfgang Schirmacher (1973), by con-
trast, has energetically pleaded the so-
cial relevance of Heidegger's critique
of technology. But neither here nor in
Schirmacher's later book (1983a) is
there a hint of how Heidegger's propo-
sal is to be elaborated; far less is there
any indication of how it could lead to
the "design for social action" which
Schirmacher announced in 1973.
We can connect Heidegger's analy-
sis of technology more specifically with
the concept of liberal democracy by
saying that the latter has been sub-
verted or perhaps specified by technol-
ogy (in Heidegger's sense), and as such
the liberal state is far from neutral as
regards the good life (as if, indeed, any
state could ever exhibit such neutral-
ity). Rather, contemporary liberalism
promotes and all but enforces a novel
and peculiar way of living. The they
analysis in Being and Time, as seen
above, traces important and still
noteworthy features of the resulting so-
ciety. Dreyfus (1980) makes this point
and also shows that to this social diag-
nosis there belongs in Being and Time a
negative and unhelpful therapy: The in-
dividual in the resolute experience of
anxiety has the ability to extricate him-
self or herself from this society. But
once freed, he or she has nowhere to
turn (p. 21).
 This pivotal if helpless position of
the individual is obvious and widely ac-
knowledged, e.g., by Schmitt (1969),
Pggeler (1972, pp. 16-17), and Karsten
Harries (1978). Both Pggeler and Har-
ries see beginnings of an orientation for
the solitary individual in Being and
Time. Pggeler refers (1972, p. 17) to
the concept of the people and its destiny
which Being and Time abruptly intro-
duces as a context of individual exis-
tence. Harries takes up this theme and
shows in detail how Heidegger's inau-
gural address as rector at the Univer-
sity of Freiburg serves as a bridge be-
tween these political suggestions of
Being and Time and the later view of
politics of which Schwan has made so
much, where politics is the work of
truth that institutes an entire epoch.
Harries claims that among the found-
ing deeds of thinkers, poets, and politi-
cians, "the work of the statesman is
given a privileged place" by Heidegger
(p. 316). And he concludes that Heideg-
ger unhappily applied the notion of the
political leader, whose fundamental
truth all others must follow, to Hitler
(pp. 319-320).
This thesis is vehemently attacked
by Gregory Schufreider (1981), who
shows that Harries' point is not sup-
ported by Heidegger's text. Schuf reider
contends that Heidegger distinguishes
between the modern state and the polls
and that the latter is never the creation
of an individual but arises out of the
struggle of many founders. Though
Schufreider is correct on these points,
the vehemence and insistence of his at-
tack give a narrow and unbalanced ac-
count of Harries' position, not-
withstanding Schufreider's disclaimer
that he did not want to discuss "the
whole of Professor Harries' interpreta-
tion, some of which is useful and in-
sightful" (p. 25). More important,
Schufreider's own picture of Heideg-
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
ger's political philosophy is unhelpfully
austere and abstract. A reading of
Heidegger's position which is confined
to textual analysis reduces Heidegger's
thought to dogmatic rigor. Here, as al-
ways, the radical and suggestive force
of Heidegger's thought comes to frui-
tion only through a dialogue between
Heidegger and strong, independent con-
temporaries. Schufreider is not one of
them, nor is he a spokesman for any of
them.
But whatever the truth regarding
the founders of political communities in
the past. Harries (like Schwan, 1965,
pp. 126-45) stresses that the later
Heidegger considered the modern era
incapable of establishing the epochal
work of truth, politically or artistically
(pp. 324-325). Harries also recognizes
that this incapacity is only the reverse
side, in Heidegger's view, of the reign
of technology (p. 323). But he takes this
view of Heidegger's to be a "retreat
from politics" (p. 323). Like Schmitt,
he implicitly urges against Heidegger
the liberal democractic "separation of
the ethical and the political" and ac-
cuses him of an anti-pluralistic bias
(p. 327).
But merely to state a thesis is not
to establish it. Has Heidegger overesti-
mated the power of technology? At the
very least he is not alone in his posi-
tion. Langdon Winner's Autonomous
Technology (1977) substantiates the
fact both that radical analyses of tech-
nology are by no means apolitical and
that the theme of technology as an all-
overpowering force has a rich litera-
ture in political thought. Though
Heidegger is only a peripheral figure in
Winner's study (Ellul, if anyone, is the
hero), the book is an important, indi-
rect contribution to Heidegger scholar-
ship because it sets Heidegger's reflec-
tions in the context of modern political
thought as a whole. It thus overcomes
133
the provincial isolation of so much ex-
pository work and prepares the ground
for a more penetrating view of Heideg-
ger's thought and of the phenomena at
issue. Along the same line, there is also
much criticism of the technological cul-
ture by men like John Kenneth Gal-
braith, Staffan Linder, Daniel Boorstin,
Tiber Scitovsky, and Fred Hirsch that
chronicles the erosion of traditional
forces and the levelling of distinctions.^^
Finally, there are many empirical
studies on the habits of consumption
and time allocation in this country. All
this and the details of Heidegger's anal-
ysis of technology would have to be con-
sidered before one could say confi-
dently of Heidegger's view, as Harries
does, that "our world is too varied to be
understood in this simple manner"
(p. 328). Endless variety is all too com-
patible with fundamental uniformity
(For more on these issues, see
Borgmann, 1984).
Strong claims for the political po-
tency of Heidegger's thought are made
by Reiner Schr mann (1978) and Ber-
nard Dauenhauer (1976). Schrmann
contends that the political implications
of (the later) Heidegger's thought must
be developed from "his fundamental
philosophical project" by way of a mid-
dle term between the thought of Being
and political thought (p. 195). This mid-
dle term can be obtained by conceiving
the ontological difference between
Being and beings, with its simultaneous
disclosure and concealment of the
world, as the symbolic difference. A
symbol is a paradigm of the manifest
and the hidden. Moreover and deci-
sively, it is located in a practice and,
more precisely, in an "irreducibly
polymorphous" practice (p. 199). Tak-
ing the ontological difference as the
symbolic difference, one no longer at-
tempts to establish beings on the abso-
lute ground of Being but allows Being
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
in its various disclosures to call upon
human existence in a subversion of all
grounds and fundaments. Practically
this amounts to a playful and anarchist
subversion of teleology and accounta-
bility. A less abstract, but ultimately no
more persuasive, argument for Heideg-
ger as anarchist is found in Graeme
Nicholson (1971).
What allows Schrmann to arrive
at this intrinsically pluralistic and
anarchist interpretation of Heidegger's
political views are nimble and cerebral
constructions clothed in fine
etymologies and supported by a selec-
tive reading of Heidegger's writings.
What Schrmann disregards is the call
for concreteness and immediacy in
Heidegger's thought, its profound sense
of seriousness and, sometimes, of dis-
tress. John Caputo has carefully sub-
stantiated this point in his critique of
R o r t y w h o also gives a playful read-
ing of Heidegger. The urgent aspects of
Heidegger's work are centered around
technology, of which Schr mann takes
little concrete notice. The unreal tone
of his essay is apparent when he says of
Utopian constructions, of central au-
thority, and of other underlying static
ideals, that such "ideals, together with
extrinsic legitimations of power, have
been destroyed by Heidegger's
phenomenology" (p. 214). Or when he
asserts: "What indeed is a more power-
ful challenge to the merry-go-round of
reason in the calculi that have usurped
the title of philosophy, particularly in
the Anglo-Saxon world, than to say no
to philosophy's unconditional surrender
to technology?" (pp. 220-221). If these
are so powerful, why is no one con-
cerned about such destructions and
challenges?
In a later essay (1981), Schrmann
gives his anarchical reading of Heideg-
ger a sense of greater urgency by argu-
ing that at the point of transition be-
tween epochs, the origin (understood as
arche) and principles of the waning
epoch lose their force, and the time of
transition appears to be precarious and
perhaps harmful as does the thinking
which attends to the unsurpassable ori-
gin (in the sense of Ursprung) of the
new epoch (pp. 246-247). This point is
given empirical color and life only
through direct and indirect references
to Foucault (pp.249 and 254, n. 8).
Otherwise Schrmann moves along the
historical and terminological paths that
Heidegger has opened up. The latter
Schrmann extends through
etymologizing of his own which gives
his essay a hermetic quality and all but
hermetically seals it off from the wider
contemporary conversation in social
and political philosophy. It should be
noted, however, that a fuller and more
final critique of Schrmann's views
would have to consider his recently
(1986) translated book on Heidegger
and politics.
As Schr mann acknowledges (1978,
p. 200), Dauenhauer already em-
phasized that in Heidegger's (and Mer-
leau-Ponty's) thought politics is essen-
tially historical, and political philoso-
phy must be based on a historical ontol-
ogy. Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty
have, Dauenhauer says, "destroyed, in
Heidegger's sense, the metaphysical
base which has dominated political
thought since Plato." And positively
speaking, "they have provided insights
into and clues pointing toward elements
which any defensible politics must em-
body" (1976, p. 626). The latter can be
thought of as necessary conditions for
sensible modern politics.
Necessary conditions often border
on the trivial. Dauenhauer claims that
the delimitation afforded by his set of
conditions "is by no means trivial."
The first says: "Revolution, in the
sense of a radical rupture with a
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
people's past, owing nothing of its own
resources to possibilities opened up for
it as a political enterprise by positive
accomplishments of that past, is politi-
cal nonsense" (p. 640). One can give
different weights to the key terms and
so obtain different readings of this
proposition, but all would face the di-
lemma of "true but trivial" vs. "inter-
esting but false." The three conditions
that stress the (ironically) universal
historical character of politics overlook
the possibility that a political move-
ment may misunderstand itself ahistor-
ically in ways which are both legiti-
mate and fruitful. As a fourth condition
Dauenhauer states that a "defensible
politics for today and the foreseeable
future must take into account the his-
torical collapse of liberalism under the
impact, on the one hand, of Marxian
criticism and, on the other, of the
growth of technique" (p. 640). He ac-
knowledges the need for the develop-
ment of this point but seems to con-
ceive of such a project along the thin
speculative lines which provide little
orientation within contemporary politi-
cal perplexity.
Mark Blitz, in Heidegger's ''Being
and Time" and the Possibility of Politi-
cal Philosophy (1981), begins with a
more pointed awareness of the contem-
porary perplexity than found in either
Schrmann or Dauenhauer and then
proceeds with an analysis that neither
belittles Heidegger's work by co-opting
it for ideologies nor leaves it un-
criticized behind a veil of humble
exegesis. Blitz further explicitly ac-
knowledges the issue of technology in
relation to politics both in general and
in Heidegger while rejecting any argu-
ment from indignation with regard to
the particulars of Heidegger's life.
The distinctly modern political di-
lemma is precisely the result of science
and technology, the success of which
135
both makes poUtical guidance all the
more crucial and undermines its tradi-
tional vitality. "Who now claims confi-
dently that more technically 'rational'
control of men and affairs is appropri-
ate when technology takes the lead both
in shattering traditional mores and
threatening ungodly destruction ?"
(p. 14). The situation calls for a "return
to the original phenomena from which
the meaning of politics, philosophy, and
science are first understood" (p. 15). A
number of possible scholarly efforts
could be made in this direction from
Leo Strauss' explorations of "the origin
of . . . political philosophy in the
Greeks" to Heidegger's "radical ques-
tioning of what and how things are"
(p. 15). The uniqueness of Blitz's pur-
suit of the latter approach is that he
has been influenced by the former. "In
general, I will explore the possibility
that Plato and Aristotle's understand-
ing of man, rethought in light of the is-
sues raised by Heidegger, properly ac-
counts for the phenomena he dismisses
while illuminating areas he leaves in
the dark" (p. 17).
The essential thrust of Blitz's care-
ful and balanced analysis is that
Heidegger's phenomenology of Dasein
already presumes the primacy of a
technological world and thus fails to ap-
preciate the reality of political things,
especially justice. It is true that
Heidegger implicitly criticizes modern
political philosophers such as Hobbes
and Locke. "What occurs among mod-
ern political philsophers, from the per-
spective of Being and Time, is that
human life is considered as a business
enterprise, ultimately rooted in self-ac-
quisition and self-promotion, but the
readiness-to-hand of utilities is not
grasped properly, enabling the results
of natural technology to come to appear
paradigmatic for all efforts" (p. 66).
But it is not at all clear, says Blitz, that
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
136
Heidegger's alternative is all that
much better, that "locating the useful
in readiness-to-hand, and therefore
more properly understanding the Being
of technology, would lead to a new sci-
ence of, say, economics, or to a new
economic practice" (p. 67). In sum,
"Heidegger's analysis . . . mistakes the
decisive political things for ready-to-
hand things" (p. 147). (Blitz's argu-
ments at this point might profitably be
deepened by utilizing Dreyfus [1984] on
the stages of the being of equipment.)
Blitz further carries his analysis
into what is among the most measured
assessments of Heidegger's involve-
ment with National Socialism. On the
one hand, "Heidegger's activities
hardly demonstrate that his under-
standing of Being necessarily leads to
Nazism, because the depth and extent
of his support for the regime was not
sufficient to sustain this claim"
(p. 212). On the other, Heidegger's fail-
ure to grasp political things in their
true reality left him vulnerable to just
the kind of defective judgment he in
fact exercised. The attractiveness of
political things such as justice derives
from a possible perfection which is at
once beyond human capacity and capa-
ble of serving as a guide toward the his-
torical exercise of that capacity. "In-
sofar as what attracts man can be for
its own sake or can be for a god,
Heidegger fails to clarify the status of
these possibilities." As a result,
"Heidegger's analysis of man's pos-
sibilities, and, especially, of the pos-
sibilities that come to light as the vir-
tues of statemen and citizens, is imper-
fect" (pp. 253-254).
For all its sensitivity and modera-
tion. Blitz's book contains a strong and
dogmatic assumption. The critical stan-
dard that remains in the background
and yet determines the evaluation of
Being and Time is a Platonist view of
politics. It is astonishing how an author
who is so alive to the limitations of
theory and science can be so naively
confident of metaphysical and trans-
cendent norms. There is an analogy be-
tween Heidegger and Blitz on the one
side and Michael Walzer and Ronald
Dworkin on the other that throws some
light on Blitz's blind spot.'' Both
Heidegger and Walzer are resolutely
open to the concretness of the world
and the uniqueness of history. But such
an orientation must seem inconclusive
and even helpless in its openness when
compared with the unequivocal rigor of
the general and abstract norms Blitz
and Dworkin claim for their side. The
power of these norms is greater the
more they remain in the background
and are vaguely appealed to. But the
thrust of much of the present feminist
and communitarian critique of
liberalism is that such norms, once
fully drawn into the foreground, turn
out to be oppressive when definitive
and vacuous when tolerant. Here the
problem of technology becomes urgent.
Oppressive norms in a contemporary
setting come to be uniquely specified
by technology while vacuous norms
serve to disguise the rule of technology.
These problems remain concealed to
Blitz and Dworkin.
In a kind of postscript to Blitz and
related discussions, Fred Dallmayr's
"Ontology of Freedom" (1984) rejects
placing any emphasis on Heidegger's
Nazi mistake for illuminating either his
philosophy as a whole or the place of
politics in his thought. After a review of
the discussion of freedom in current
Heidegger interpretations which in-
cludes helpful commentary on
Pggeler, Schwan, and others not men-
tioned in the present survey
Dallmayr turns to Heidegger's own
texts on freedom. In both cases there is
cursory mention of technology.
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
Dallmayr is certainly correct in
holding that Heidegger's ontology of
freedom is an attempt to illuminate
freedom beyond the dilemma of arbi-
trary choice and submissive fatalism.
Dallmayr speaks from a subtle and
comprehensive understanding of
Heidegger's thought. But his presenta-
tion remains airy and inconclusive. The
concluding section of his essay begins
with this claim: "The implications of
Heidegger's conception of freedom for
contemporary political and social
theory are numerous and, I believe,
far-reaching" (p. 227). But is such a
contention at all credible when the dis-
tinctive and tangible, i.e., technological
setting of our social and political en-
deavors, is almost entirely ignored?
Dallmayr's nearly exclusive concentra-
tion on the lofty and abstract issues of
the history of Being and on the bookish
philosophy that is congenial to such
concentration illustrates once more the
melancholy truth that the fertility and
radicality of Heidegger's thought are
for the most part still lying fallow.
Reinhart Maurer, in addition to his
essay on Marcuse and Heidegger, has
also provided a comprehensive and bal-
anced account of the practical (i.e.,
moral) relevance of Heidegger's
thought. Like Schrmann, Dauenhauer,
and Dallmayr he notes that Heideg-
ger's apparently theoretical philosophy
contains "throughout a practical and
ethical claim" (1972, p. 434). What
Maurer sees more clearly than most
are two complex and decisive issues in
Heidegger's view of technology. One is
the question of human freedom in light
of the destiny of technology; the other,
closely related, is the question of the re-
form of technology. In concluding divi-
sion A, let us try to answer the first of
these questions and at the same time
draw together some of the strands of
the foregoing discussion. The second
137
question will take us into division B of
this review.
8. Destiny and Freedom Under Technology
Technology, Heidegger insists, is
not an instrument at our disposal but
the last phase of the destiny of Being.
At the same time, technology consti-
tutes the gravest danger to humanity.
In technology we demean ourselves by
becoming procurers of everything, pro-
curing even ourselves as a resource
(1977a, pp. 26-27). From considerations
such as these Simon Moser concludes
that "the situation of man becomes
tragic, for ultimately Being itself pro-
vokes man to provoke nature and he
cannot extricate himself from this situ-
ation under his own power" (1971, p.
148).
But this is a one-sided reading of
Heidegger. Almost all critics and com-
mentators acknowledge that for
Heidegger the destiny of technology
does not fatefully overpower humanity;
rather we are involved in the original
issue of technology. Being needs hu-
manity, as Heidegger says. Yet few
scholars have paid attention to the diffi-
culty of the issue. Normally we cast it
in the disjunction of libertarianism vs.
determinism. But Heidegger clearly in-
tends a third position, as Biemel (1976,
p. 148) and Dallmayr (1984) have
pointed out.
What concepts are appropriate to
this third position, and what kinds of
experiences bear on it? Maurer (1972,
p. 432) approvingly quotes Lwith's
term of "a circle-like dialectic" as an
expression of the human relation to
Being and claims that the relation so
understood is a mediation which one
can appropriate or enact for oneself.
Maurer (p. 441) goes on to speak of "a
certain partnership" between Being
and humans. But in an unpublished let-
ter of August 3, 1977, to Maurer'' in
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
IQfi
reply to his essay, Heidegger emphati-
cally rejects the notions of partner,
cooperation and dialectical relation as
apposite to the relation between Being
and humanity. These are categories, he
says, that are applied to the problem
from without and occlude the task or
thought by using customary and seem-
ingly obvious schemata of thinking.
These remarks are typical of the
ambiguous challenge that Heidegger
extends to contemporary thought. On
the one hand, a person can respond to
the challenge (as many have done) in
the hermetic way, by cultivating an
esoteric vocabulary and mode of dis-
course, by sealing the portals of the
Heideggerian sanctuary against the
spirits of ordinary thinking, and thus
secluding Heidegger's thought. On the
other, there is the response which takes
Heidegger seriously when he says that
we are involved in the destiny of Being
and in the issue of technology, and con-
cludes that hence we are entitled and
enabled to consult our experiences.
This is how we ought to begin to clarify
the destiny of technology not through
another dialectical sally or conceptual
construction which would only conceal
what is so deeply perplexing.
To make a beginning with this ap-
proach we must disengage the problem
of science from that of technology. For
Heidegger, modern science comes out
of the destiny of technology. Hence he
often speaks and is as often taken as a
scientific instrumentalist. But insofar
as this may be true, he is nevertheless
no common instrumentalist since sci-
ence is a manifestation of Being
hence ultimate and not subject to the
guidance of higher ends, as instrumen-
talists would have it. As witnesses of
our time we must take the kind of qual-
ified realist view of science that Weiz-
scker and Heelan urge against
Heidegger. This must, of course, be es-
tablished on its own merits.
Supposing this can be done, we
must then square soft scientific realism
with Heidegger's thinking of Being.
This can be attempted in various ways.
One might take scientific realism as
historical in that both its way of seeing
and what is seen are taken historically,
as constituting (part of) an epoch of
Being. But since the physico-chemical
laws, at least, are applicable to all
prior epochs of Being, we must assume
that the vision which our epoch affords
transforms and perhaps distorts all
prior epochs. But this is a gratuitous,
since vacuously true, thesis. It seems
better to propose, along lines first laid
out by Oskar Becker (1969), that below
or above the historical there are endur-
ing structures such as logic, mathema-
tics, and the natural sciences. There
are in these disciplines new ways of
seeing, but what comes into view at a
certain time shows itself to have or to
approximate an enduring sameness.
What may have prevented Heideg-
ger from accepting this view (apart
from his phenomenological orientation,
for which science in all senses is some-
thing constituted rather than simply
given) is the concern that modern sci-
ence, far from enduring within history,
is arrogating and dissolving historical
forces that we experience as significant
and dear to us in their own right. The
specter of such reductionism is pre-
sumably the spring of Ihde's tentative
and Dreyfus' determined efforts to de-
limit practice against rather than with-
in science. But Dreyfus' endeavor
shows that such a move may be both
impossible and unnecessary. He formu-
lates his argument as one against
theoretical holism. The latter holds that
our understanding of the world has
been or could be translated into the
form of posits or beliefs. But our inter-
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
pretation of the world, Dreyfus argues
with the Heidegger of Being and Time,
proceeds within a context of practices
which are not reducible to a theory be-
cause they involve skills. A fully and
competently exercised skill, though it
may have arisen from the application
of rules, transcends those rules as it
embodies "a single unified, flexible,
purposive pattern of behavior" (1980, p.
9).
Let us assume that skills are in-
deed not reducible to theory in the
sense of a system of rules or of for-
malized procedures; then the question
remains whether a skill such as skiing
is exercised within the theory of phys-
ico-chemical lawfulness. And if this is
the case, there is the further question
whether, in principle, it is the case
without remainder. How could a nega-
tive answer be given? Such questions
are controversial, to be sure, and fi-
nally belong to the controversy over the
mind-body identity thesis. While we
cannot enter that area here, it is worth
pointing out a common misunderstand-
ing of reductionism.'' It is often thought
that once the possibility of reduction to
scientific laws is granted, the execution
of a reduction is, in principle, a "scien-
tific" and "mechanical" if not trivial
matter. But the determination of the
conditions or explananda which con-
strain laws to the explanation of
phenomena is in regard to the most im-
portant matters of life a poetical or
philosophical task rather than a ques-
tion of scientific knowledge, if by the
latter we mean knowledge of laws and
theories. Thus the reducibility of
phenomena to science leaves the
philosophical task of characterizing
phenomena like practice and technol-
ogy intact and unsolved.
Such a view of science meets the
charge that Heidegger underrates "the
theoretical character of knowledge in
139
physics" (Moser, 1971, p. 149) or the
more tentative point that the later
Heidegger eliminates the possibility "of
any purely contemplative science"
(Ihde, 1979, p. 128). More important, it
frees us from the fatalistic interpreta-
tion of the destiny of technology which
is apparent in Jonas' earlier work
where he essentially, if not doxographi-
cally, accepts the view that modern sci-
ence and technology both issue from
the Gestell. Modern science is in the
end cogent not as a social institution or
in its technological application but in
its central sense as a body of laws and
theories, where it not only commands
devotion and gratitude (both of which
could be withdrawn), but makes truth
claims which exact assent and to which
instrumentalism is a futile protest.
If one takes science as an essen-
tially destructive and dominating force,
then the critical implication of this
view should lead one to propose a new
B. Technology Between Art and Religion
Heidegger's thought on technology
as it extends between science and poli-
tics is radically critical. But scattered
throughout his writings there are sug-
gestions that a salutary turn from, or
perhaps through, technology to a new
epoch of Being may come about. Art
and divinity are the powers Heidegger
most often mentions as guides or cen-
ters for another kind of thought and
life. A well-rounded review of the
Heidegger literature on technology re-
quires therefore a consideration of
what work has been done on Heideg-
ger's thought where it deals with art
and borders on religious concerns. It is
not our intention to provide an exhaus-
tive or even comprehensive survey but
to give a sense of the extent to which
work in this area has uncovered begin-
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
140
science. This is what Marcuse did at
least at one point though, as Habermas
points out 1970, pp. 85-89), uncertainly
even then. Indeed, when one con-
templates the task of reconstituting
philosophically the sciences in their
central sense, one may well yield to
fatalism. But on the realist view of sci-
ence sketched above one is relieved of
this impossible burden and can turn
one's attention either to delimiting sci-
entific practice on political grounds be-
cause it is demanding too much capital
investment or is politically destabiliz-
ing (nuclear weapons), or to the pos-
sibilities of reforming technology or
both (since they may well be related).
The more profound of these pos-
sibilities lies in the vicinity of that axis
which connects Heidegger's reflections
on art with the problem of religion in
his thinking. And so we come to the sec-
ond division of this review.
nings of a reform of technology which
would consistently and fruitfully cor-
respond to Heidegger's examination of
technology. And the brevity and
lacunae of this part will be forgivable if
the systematic end of this review is
properly served, the concern, i.e., to il-
luminate our time and to make room in
it for a more graceful life.
1. The Turn from Technology to
Art and Divinity
When in interviews Heidegger was
asked whether from his thought con-
structive proposals could be derived,
his answers were emphatically nega-
tive (Wisser, 1970, pp. 68-69; Heidegger,
1976a, pp. 276-84). But in less guarded
moments he has been more venture-
some. At one point he thought of the
poet as one who might reach through
the destitution of our time and make
room for the advent of divinity (1971,
pp. 91-142). Heidegger put this point
more generally in the concluding part
of his first essay on technology where
he suggests that in art another revela-
tion of Being might come about that
could save us from the danger of tech-
nology (1977a, pp. 34-35), a suggestion
that Ihde takes up in urging artistic
practice as a counterforce to technol-
ogy (1979, p. 129).
At another time Heidegger sur-
mised that in rural, traditional areas
the powers of home and history may be
reawakened, a suggestion later re-
tracted, as Pggeler points out (1972, p.
35). Then there is the proposal, em-
phasized by Hood (1972, p. 362) and
Grange (1977, p. 147), that we take an
attitude of detachment toward the
things of technology, that we use them
as far as appropriate, but refuse them
in their exclusive claim, a proposal that
Marcuse raised to the gesture of the
Great Refusal (Piccone and Delfini,
1970, p. 44; Ahlers, 1971, p. 588). Finally
there is the brief remark in the first
essay on technology, elaborated by
Dreyfus (1980), that we can foster the
saving power "here and now and in lit-
tle things" (1977a, p. 33), a point more
often and forcefully made in the second
essay on technology (1977a, pp. 43, 45
and 49) where Heidegger explains that
in those simple focal things the fourfold
of earth and sky, mortals and divinities
and thus a richer and deeper world is
gathered and disclosed.
How helpful are these proposals in
light of our perplexity and complex
technological situation? Even
Pggeler, whom Schwan (1974), pp. 153
and 159) accuses of being all too solici-
tous of Heidegger's thought, feels
moved to admit that Heidegger "lacks
even the beginnings of an explicit politi-
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
cal analysis of the situation as it is
created by world civilization" (1972, pp.
35-36). Schwan himself at one time
agreed with Heidegger that the fourfold
of earth and sky, of mortals and di-
vinities might provide the dimensions
of a political renewal (1965, pp. 172-75).
Later he found the fourfold too arbi-
trary and abstract to be helpful (1974,
pp. 166-71). "For a sufficiently con-
crete, complex and problem-conscious
practical philosophy" one that he
says includes "a fundamental clarifica-
tion of the relation, viz., of the correla-
tion and difference, of thinking and act-
ing, i.e., a philosophy of praxis
Heidegger's thought provides no basis
(nor a 'concrete Utopia')" (1974, p. 171).
Harries, again, sees in the fourfold a
more hopeful opening for political re-
form than in Heidegger's view of tech-
nology which provides a "one-dimen-
sional interpretation of the modern
world," and is "only a caricature of our
world" (1978, p. 328). Pggeler, in spite
of the scepticism quoted above, holds
out the possibility that concrete
analyses, which orient themselves by
the constellation of Being as it even-
tuates in the framework and in the
fourfold can yield "obligations which
are not to be ignored" (1972, p. 49; cf.
pp. 50 and 64).
It is clear from Heidegger's re-
marks and from those of his critics that
the concern with art and divinity is a
crucial if poorly articulated counter-
part to the analysis of technology.
Heidegger scholarship on art and reli-
gion has done little to clarify and elabo-
rate the relation between these counter-
parts.
2. Art and Technology
Heidegger's concern with art and
his essays on art originate, as William
Bossart (1968) and Christopher Nwodo
(1977) have pointed out, in that decisive
141
period 1935-1937 in which a turn in
Heidegger's thought took place and the
reflections on technology were ini-
tiated. The failure of the Heidegger lit-
erature to consider the art-technology
relation emphatically and trenchantly
may in part be due to Heidegger's deci-
sion to publish the art and the technol-
ogy essays in different collections in
Holzwege (1950) for the former, Vor^
trge und Aufstze (1961) for the latter,
a pattern repeated with slightly differ-
ent combinations in the English Poetry,
Language, Thought (1971) and The
Question Concerning Technology and
Other Essays (1977), respectively. It is
also true that the major art essay
achieved something like final form
more than a decade before the basic
technology essay. Nevertheless, as
Heidegger has often said, difference
and sameness go together so that in
this case too there are connections to be
noticed and considered.
Heidegger himself, as pointed out
above, indicates the significance of
these connections. In fact, the structure
of the two primary essays is remark-
ably similar. The art essay begins by
considering art-work as a thing in
terms of the four causes (Heidegger,
1971, pp. 26 ff.) but moves on to de-
scribe art as a disclosure of truth. The
technology essay begins by referring to
technology as a kind of means and
again considers this in terms of the four
causes (Heidegger, 1977a, p. 6 ff) but
proceeds to describe it as challenging
and revealing. At the conclusion of the
technology essay, Heidegger says that
the decisive confrontation with
[technology] must happen in a
realm that is, on the one hand,
akin to the essence of technology
and, on the other, fundamentally
different from it. Such a realm is
art (Heidegger, 1977a, p. 35).
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
1/19
In the "Addendum" to the art essay
Heidegger likewise directs attention to
this sameness and difference when he
notes that his use of Gestell,
framework, in the discussion of art and
truth (Heidegger, 1971, p. 64) is the
foundation for that which "we used in
later writings as the explicit key ex-
pression for the nature of modern tech-
nology" (p. 84).
If Heidegger's thought on art has
done little to inspire the literature on
Heidegger and technology, neither has
it, taken by itself, had much impact on
aesthetics and art criticism. Excep-
tions are Albert Hofstadter and
Richard Kuhns' anthology Philosophies
of Art and Beauty that contains the
first (and later much revised) transla-
tion of Heidegger's seminal essay on
"The Origin of the Work of Art" and
Hofstadter's later treatise on Truth and
Art where Heidegger's thought pro-
vides a crucial impetus if not the finally
decisive position.'' Though Heidegger's
thought strongly informed Karsten
Harries' The Meaning of Modern Art,
the explicit discussion of Heidegger is
very limited.'' Heidegger's conception
of art, along with the hermeneutics of
Being and Time, was also one of the
guiding insights of Hans-Georg
Gadamer's Truth and Method (1975).
Though Gadamer's book has been
widely influential of late, it is its her-
meneutic message, the linguistic and
social constitution of truth, that was so
eagerly accepted, and much at the ex-
pense of the thesis that Gadamer had
taken from Heidegger's thought on art,
i.e., the recognition that there is some-
thing like substantive epochal truth
that is disclosed to us in unforethinka-
ble ways. It is precisely the ignoring of
this latter point that gives deconstruc-
tionism its peculiarly vapid and fash-
ionable playfulness. Henry Sen-
daydiego (1976) makes a direct attempt
to use Heidegger to reform public policy
about funding for the arts. And Walter
Biemel, while on the American univer-
sity lecture circuit in 1978, developed
the Heideggerian notion that "painting
is not only a pure representation but a
representation which presents itself"
(Biemel, 1979, p. 278), referring to
works by Velazquez and Picasso.
As in the case of technology,
Heidegger's philosophy of art has had
its expositors and for the most part has
been poorly served by them. Hans
Jaeger (1958) is an early, competent
paraphrase of "The Origin of the Work
of Art." E . F . Kaelin (1967) presents a
more lively and helpful exposition
which is remarkable to this day for the
way it sets off Heidegger's essay
against Merleau-Ponty's work. Yet
Kaelin can be faulted for unquestion-
ingly placing Heidegger's essay in the
narrow and traditional framework of
aesthetics when it is clear not only
from the thrust of Heidegger's reflec-
tions but from explicit remarks (1971,
pp. 79-81; 1977a, pp. 34 and 35; all avail-
able in German at the time of Kaolin's
writing) that Heidegger rejected and
sought to break through the aesthetic
categories.
The same charge must be brought
against William H. Bossart (1968). He
begins by outlining as a backdrop those
passages in Being and Time that ex-
plain how humans take up with the
world and then turns to one of the Hl-
derlin interpretations as the transition
piece to "The Origin of the Work of
Art." The exposition of the latter essay
is followed by an inquiry which at-
tempts to determine whether Heideg-
ger's aesthetics covers all important
views of art. Here Bossart finds
Heidegger limited by "metaphysical
prejudices" (p. 63), unable to account
for the art of the great eccentrics and
for those free creative acts which give
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
for those free creative acts which give
a work a self-sufficiency apart from
"the world of a particular historical
people" (p. 65).
If nothing else, Calvin 0. Schrg
(1973) and Christopher Nwodo (1977)
are correct on this point (as was
Hofstadter in his introduction to
Heidegger, 1971, pp. xv-xvi), pointing
out emphatically that Heidegger's in-
terpretation of art is fundamentally in
service to his thinking of Being. In
Schrag's words, Heidegger's project for
"overcoming the inquiry standpoint of
traditional aesthetics" is "of the same
cloth as . . . his 'destruction' of the his-
tory of Western metaphysics" (pp. 109
110). Schrg plays down, however,
Heidegger's positive intentions and ig-
nores the unique status he grants to art.
For Nwodo, equally dramatically,
Heidegger's analysis is not meant to
"produce any new theory of art" (1977,
p. 294). In an analysis which superfi-
cially parallels Theodore Kisiel's (1973)
distinction between Heidegger's logi-
cal, existential, and epochal concep-
tions of science, Nwodo names "three
phases in Heidegger's thought-path to-
wards Being" (p. 295) as stages for his
reflections on art: (l)the existential
analytic of Dasein, (2)the revelation of
the ontological difference, (3)the Ereig-
nis or the event of appropriation.
The problem with this analysis (as
with Bossart's) is that the distinction
between the first two stages is unhelp-
ful for a discussion of art in Heidegger.
Art (Kunst) is conspicuous by its ab-
sence in Being and Time, and poetry
(Dichtung) is only referred to once in
passing as a kind of communication
which can be "a disclosing of exis-
tence" because the communication . . .
of one's state-of-mind [has] become an
aim in itself" (p. 205 [162]). Nwodo has
to conscript "The Origin of the Work of
Art" for service in the first phase of
143
Heidegger's thought, ignoring the fact
that the Introduction to Metaphysics,
which stands for the second phase, was
composed at the same time as the
essay on art and makes essentially the
same points as that essay. In particu-
lar, the art essay explicitly formulates
what Nwodo calls the later ontological
difference conception of art (1971, p.
39).
The weakness of Nwodo's first two
distinctions is highlighted by Edward
Lawry (1978), who points out that as
discussed in "The Origin of the Work of
Art" the work of art fits into none of the
types of beings distinguished in Being
and Time. Art is neither something
ready to hand nor present at hand, and
it is certainly not Dasein. "A work of
art is neither thing nor equipment." It
is "in some mysterious way between
them." It is "like equipment because it
has a function;" but unlike equipment
"art works flaunt their material" (p.
190). The art work, as Harold Alder-
man (1973) earlier notes in a perceptive
analysis that moves from thing to art to
poetry, is "the most thingly of things"
(p. 157).
At the same time, it does make
sense to attend expressly, as Nwodo
does, to Heidegger's consideration of
Being as the event of appropriation.
This consideration constitutes the
thought of the later and last Heidegger
where he speaks with the greatest clar-
ity and force about our historical situa-
tion. Nwodo sketches this period in the
narrowly Heideggerian discourse that
characterizes both this and his earlier
(1976) essay. When he finally places art
in this third stage of Heidegger's
thought, he does so by quoting a re-
mark of Heidegger's (1971, p. 86) that
Heidegger had intended as a clarifica-
tion of the essay that Nwodo had used
to illustrate the status of art in the first
phase.
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
One wonders what is more regret-
table, such outright lapses of scholar-
ship or the general failure of cir-
cumspection and incisiveness that
speaks from Nwodo's remark: "We
have tended to avoid controversies and
have concentrated upon portraying
Heidegger's thinking as we understand
it" (1971, p. 303). At the same time, a
meticulous and critical approach can
just as surely lead to unhappy and un-
helpful results, as is evident in Sandra
Lee Bartky's "Heidegger's Philosophy
of Art" (1981). The critical basis of her
examination is the mainstream analy-
tic philosophy of the late 1950s and
early 1960s and the metaphysical tradi-
tion generally. Hence as a matter of
course she employs concepts and as-
cribes to Heidegger views that he has
radically criticized and vigorously re-
jected. Like Kaelin and Bossart, she
unhesitatingly puts Heidegger in the
framework of traditional aesthetics
(pp. 257 and 273) and invokes among
others the notion of the Romantic and
modern artist (pp. 272-73) to, of all
things, commend Heidegger for "an ac-
count of the artwork which grants
legitimacy to the conception of the art-
ist as seer and prophet," totally una-
ware of how such praise clashes with
Heidegger's critique of modern subjec-
tivism and his misgivings about art
since at least Hegel's time (1971, pp. 79
81). In the same unquestioning spirit
Bartky attributes to Heidegger a
search for the (metaphysical) essence
of art (pp. 257 and 267) and the employ-
ment of a naive phenomenology to-
gether with blindness to the hermeneu-
tic circle of interpretation (p. 272 and p.
274 note 12). This is like taking Einstein
to task for failing to recognize the rela-
tivity of motion.
In the first English monograph to
address Heidegger's philosophy of art,
Joseph Kockelmans (1985) continues to
exhibit the weaknesses of the exposit-
ory tradition though with redeeming
features. Part one of this book (pp. 3
68) again insists on situating Heideg-
ger's analysis of art against the back-
ground of traditional aesthetics. More
thorough than previous discussions,
Kockelmans does have the merit of ad-
verting to Heidegger's various criti-
cisms of this tradition. It would have
been useful, however, to have a discus-
sion of the failure of Heidegger's ideas
to have much impact on subsequent
aesthetics and art criticism, except in-
sofar as deconstructionism can be read
as an airy and often aimless offspring
of Heideggerian radicalism.
In part two of his monograph (pp.
71-210), Kockelmans provides a de-
tailed analysis of "The Origin of the
Work of Art" along lines laid down ear-
lier in German by Friedrich-Wilhelm
von Herrmann (1980). Here Heideg-
ger's essay is carefully dissected, and
not just into its three major sections
with "Epilogue" and "Addendum."
"The Thing and the Work," "Art Work
and Truth," and "Truth and Art" are
each subdivided, sub-subdivided, and
paraphrased, with a generous commen-
tary that makes abundant references to
related essays by Heidegger, particu-
larly on poetry and the poets. But one
cannot help but wonder whether all this
scholarship is put to noble ends when
all it yields is the conclusion that what
Heidegger has to say about art "is cer-
tainly provisional, incomplete, and in
many respects still ambiguous" (p.
210).
Kockelmans, as if in response to
the implicit challenge from Heidegger
to address the art-technology differ-
ence, drops into his analysis of the art
essay numerous scattered references to
technology (or, as he prefers, "technic-
ity"). He also calls attention, in the
end, to Heidegger's final claim that his
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
inquiry "into the nature of art" is "the
preliminary and therefore indispensa-
ble preparation for the becoming of
art" (Heidegger, 1971, p. 78) and how
this is brought into question by the con-
tinuing predominance of modern tech-
nology. Kockelmans rightly notes
Heidegger's own explicit doubts in an
untranslated lecture on art delivered at
Athens in 1967 (Heidegger, 1983). But
Kockelmans' many comments add up
to very little substantive insight.
Kathleen Wright's (1984) "The
Place of the Work of Art in the Age of
Technology" has the distinction of ad-
dressing directly the topic that was
found to be neglected so regularly. It
has been followed by Friedrich-
Wilhelm von Herrmann's (1985) "Kunst
und Technik," another of the punctih-
ous and antiseptic expositions one has
come to expect from this author.
Wright's is clearly the superior piece.
It is distinguished by superior scholar-
ship, viz., by a subtle grasp of the origi-
nal German texts, by clarity of reason-
ing and the readiness to confront
Heidegger's reflections with eminent
predecessors (Descartes and Kant) and
contemporaries (Valery and Benja-
min). Finally, her thesis is intriguing
and profoundly hopeful. "I shall
argue," she says,
that for Heidegger it is within and
out of the displacement of the
work of art in the age of technol-
ogy that an alternative to place as
cult site or exhibition setting
emerges, an alternative which
exemplifies what is for Heidegger
the saving power of art (1984, p.
566).
More specifically, Wright en-
deavors to show that works of art,
sculpture in "Art and Space" (1969b),
and the peasant's shoes and the temple
in "The Origin of the Work of Art,"
145
open up a dwelling place that differs
fundamentally from scientific and tech-
nological space. Yet the result is in the
end disappointing.
Wright's and Heidegger's three ex-
amples are essentially pretechnologi-
cal; and in a pretechnological setting,
to be sure, they did or would establish a
nontechnological dwelling place. But
nothing in Wright's account would indi-
cate how these art works could assert
their orienting power within, against,
or after technology. For the saving
power to grow in our time, the relation
between art and technology must go
beyond mere otherness toward some
sort of affirmative interplay. Wright
has failed to answer convincingly
Heidegger's fearful question (1971, p.
80), "is art still an essential and neces-
sary way in which that truth happens
which is decisive for our historical exis-
tence, or is art no longer of this charac-
ter?" Like Heidegger, she is unable to
show that art may again be of this
character, and so her essay remains at
the level of higher exposition.
What most of the expository work
on art in Heidegger shows is that the
framework of technology has a close
analogue in the framework of scholar-
ship which like its technological ar-
chetype is largely concealed, well en-
trenched, and threatens to occlude the
saving power of things that might be
the occasion for a turn of affairs. More
particularly, that expository work
shows once more how the fertility of
Heidegger's thought requires, as
Heidegger himself recognized (1971, p.
5), adversaries, thinkers who challenge
Heidegger's insight from a position of
their own.
Beginnings of such a challenge can
be found in Harries (1968) whose
critique of modern art reflects Heideg-
ger's critique of modern subjectivity, of
the shallowness of technological exis-
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
14
tence, and Heidegger's looking forward
to a Jiew simplicity. But Harries goes
beyond Heidegger in his larger appreci-
ation of modern philosophy, of people
like Schopenhauer, Freud, Lukacs and
Sartre, and in his acquaintance with
the varieties of modern art. Much the
same can be said of Fandozzi's essays
(1979 and 1982) which in addition show
a keen eye for the corrupting force of
the consumer culture and boldness of
conjecture in contemplating the future
of technological art. David Hallibur-
ton's (1981) "From Poetic Thinking to
Concrete Interpretation" directs
Heidegger's reflections on technology,
the fourfold, and on the equipment
structure in Being and Time toward a
poem of Wordsworth's and discloses
how in the poem the centering force of
rural life is threatened by the emerging
technological framework and yet af-
firmed and entrusted to the future.
Halliburton quotes (p. 76) among
others from Heidegger's essay, "Build-
ing, Dwelling, Thinking" (1971, pp. 143
61). It contains an important and
largely neglected link between Heideg-
ger's thought on technology and on art
and between the diagnosis of technol-
ogy and the healing power of things.
The fruitfulness of those connections
appears in the possibility of finding
one's way from the terse and recondite
proposals of Heidegger to the rich, de-
tailed and hopeful work of Kent C.
Bloomer and Charles W. Moore in
Body, Memory, and Architecture and
of David P. Billington in The Tower and
the Bridge: The New Art of Structural
Engineering.^'' Here too the despair of
Schwan and Harries as regards the
centering force of art for the common
welfare, mentioned in section A, 7 of
this review, is answered in a quietly
constructive manner. And here, finally,
one may glimpse the outlines of the
new dwelling place for which Kathleen
Wright has been searching. These
hopes for a turn of technology will oc-
cupy us once more at the conclusion of
this review.
3. Mysticism and the East
Heidegger has not only thought
about the question of what may consti-
tute a genuine counterforce to technol-
ogy and bring about a turn of our des-
tiny. He has also practiced a kind of
thinking which may be taken as a radi-
cal alternative to technology, a kind of
thinking that Heidegger himself has
called meditative thinking (1966, p. 46).
It has a certain kinship with mysticism,
and the latter term has served as a
nodal point for critical and supportive
views of Heidegger's thought. These
contentions bear on our review inas-
much as mysticism is counterposed to
technology. The complexity of the issue
is heightened by Heidegger who, on the
one hand, rejects the term mysticism
for his thinking (1969a, p. 53). In an un-
published letter to Reinhart Maurer he
says pointedly: "Only those deal in the
'mysticism of Being' who are not able
to enact the thinking of Being, of its dis-
closing essence according to the on-
tological difference of Being and be-
ings." On the other hand, he acknowl-
edges that "to genuine and great mysti-
cism there belongs the utmost acute-
ness and profoundness of thinking as
well" (1957a, German edition, p. 71).
Moreover there is Heidegger's well-
known affection for the great Meister
Eckhart and his deep respect for East-
ern thought.
Regarding mysticism particularly,
the writers who use this term to charge
Heidegger with obscurantism and eva-
siveness more or less had the field to
themselves until the publication of John
D. Caputo's The Mystical Element in
Heidegger's Thought in 1978. His book
does much to clarify and advance the
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
discussion of Heidegger and mysticism.
First, it shows that the chief critics of
Heidegger's mysticism, Paul Hhner-
feld, Karl Lwith, and Laszlo Versenyi,
rely on a very tentative or even mista-
ken notion of mysticism. Caputo fur-
nishes constructive proof of this claim
by giving a careful exposition of Eck-
hart's mysticism (pp. 97-139). That ex-
position further allows for a detailed
distinction between mysticism proper
and Heidegger's thinking which,
Caputo says, is not truly mystical but
does contain a mystical element (pp.
222-40). Like mysticism, Heidegger's
thinking is the experience of a power
that we cannot and do not want to con-
trol and capture through conceptual
systems. Yet Heidegger's thinking has
a much higher and more explicit re-
gard for language than does mysticism.
It is more radically historical and
therefore more critical of metaphysics.
And it moves at so fundamental a level
that, unlike mysticism, it neither
nourishes nor seems to depend on the
moral conduct at the surface of every-
day life.
Caputo is keenly aware that the
mystical element in Heidegger in its re-
flective and receptive calmness is an-
tipodal to the aggressive busyness of
that technology and that technology is
always the implicit theme of medita-
tive thinking. He is, moreover, critical
of the austerity and reserve of Heideg-
ger's thought which seems to drive us
into the unhappy dilemma of the practi-
cally ineffective piety of thought vs. the
barren and suppressive practice of
cybernetics (1978, p. 257). As
documented earlier, Caputo's criticism
can be supported by explicit remarks of
Heidegger's. But it overlooks many
other, more constructive and helpful,
suggestions that Heidegger has made.
Caputo throughout his book calls
for a fruitfully adversarial relationship
147
with Heidegger's thought and rightly
rejects the epigones who dismiss every
criticism of Heidegger as a misun-
derstanding. But Caputo's own counter-
position to Heidegger is not rich and ar-
ticulate enough to nurture the seeds of
reform that lie concealed in Heideg-
ger's mystical element. Yet one should
not blame Caputo for doing first things
first. In regards to mysticism too,
Heidegger scholarship has been in a
primitive and deplorable state. Caputo
has brought clarity and order into this
neglected area. He has done so with
fairness toward his opponents, critical
sympathy toward Heidegger, with care-
ful scholarship, and in an engaging,
though occasionally expansive, style.
Western mysticism has a well-
known kinship with Eastern thought,
particularly with Zen Buddhism, and so
provides a link between Heidegger and
the East. Caputo considers this tie suc-
cinctly (1978, pp. 203-27) and illustrates
and elaborates relations that have pre-
viously emerged in a conference on
"Heidegger and Eastern Thought," or-
ganized in 1969 by Borgmann, Eliot
Deutsch, and others at the University
of Hawaii. (The proceedings were pub-
lished in Philosophy East and West 20,
no. 3 [July 1970].) The outcome of this
symposium was to document both
Heidegger's explicit interest in Oriental
thinking and various parallels between
Heideggerian and East Asian themes.
But the symposium also highlighted im-
portant differences, among them the
following. First, Buddhism'^ stress is
ethical, grounded in dealing with the
problem of suffering, whereas Heideg-
ger's is ontological, concerned with the
theme of Being. Second, for Buddhism
Being is not essentially historical, as it
is for Heidegger.
These considerations suggest that it
is perhaps instructive to examine in
more detail the relation between
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
148
Heidegger and one particular Asian
culture, namely the Japanese, stressing
more specifically one aspect of that cul-
ture, namely Zen Buddhism. Japanese
culture did not participate in the long
development of metaphysics that has
culminated in technology as Heidegger
has it. Rather, it has been strongly in-
formed by Zen Buddhism which, as ap-
pears from remarks above, is opposed
to technology. And the Japanese did in
fact provide one of the very few in-
stances where a community rejected a
technological innovation, in this case
firearms, for reasons that are conso-
nant with Heidegger's critique of tech-
nology."' But this was at the very begin-
ning of the modern era, and by now
Japan is perhaps the technologically
most accomplished country in the
world.
The limitation of what follows to
Zen Buddhism is justified on a number
of counts. From the side of Heidegger,
the most obvious is the importance of
Shuzo Kuki in the dialogue of On the
Way to Language (1971, pp. 1-54). (As it
happens, Kuki was also the man who
introduced Sartre to Heidegger. As a
student, after studying with Heidegger
in Freiburg, Kuki went to Paris. Sartre,
also a student, answered Kuki's adver-
tisement for a French tutor.) Kuki's in-
fluential The Structure of "IkV' (1930,
followed by numerous reprints) is a
phenomenological description of iki, of
that aesthetic way of life peculiar to the
Japanese. Based on stumi (taste or ele-
gance), it cannot easily be discussed,
but must be lived, an argument evi-
dently influenced by Heidegger's analy-
sis of the primordial character of Da-
sein ' s practical being-in-the-world.
Then there is the fact that Zen Bud-
dhism, like Heidegger's later thought,
seems to involve some kind of uniting
of art and mysticism. Finally, there is
William Barrett's unsubstantiated gos-
sip about Heidegger and Zen.''
From the side of Japan the justifi-
cation is even stronger. Not only has
Being and Time been translated into
Japanese more times (five) than into
any other language, Japanese commen-
tators have done a number of impor-
tant studies and adaptations of Heideg-
ger, work that has been summarized by
Hoshihiro Nitta, Hirotaka Tatematsu
and Eiichi Shimomisse in
"Phenomenology and Philosophy in
Japan.'"' More recently Akira Ishida
(1975) and Aritsune Yonezawa (1975)
have dealt directly with Heidegger's
philosophy of art and Shoichi Omori
(1972) has examined the relation be-
tween art and technology. Finally, at
the popular level, the Neo-Shintoist
Chikao Fijisawa appeals to Heidegger
in his critique of contemporary culture
and goes so far as to identify Das Sein
with the Kami (gods or divine forces in
Shinto).'^ This last example reminds us,
too, that the World War H alliance of
Germany and Japan should not be dis-
counted.
Despite such mutual and well-es-
tablished influences, however,
Japanese culture poses a number of
critical questions for Heidegger. At an
implicit level there is the sociological
fact that it was Japan, a country evi-
dently under the sway of decidedly non-
Western ways of thinking, that has
nevertheless, as mentioned above, been
the most adroit at adopting Western
technology. Surely this raises problems
for Heidegger's reading of modern
technology as dependent on Western
metaphysics.
At a more explicit level is the ex-
ample of Kitaro Nishida (1870-1945), the
greatest of Japanese philosophers.
Nishida was well acquainted with and
respectful of the work of Husserl and
Heidegger, besides being a man im-
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
bued with Buddhism, one who in fact
retired from teaching at the University
of Kyoto to die in a Zen monastery.
Robert Schinzinger, in an introduction
to his translation of Nishida's Intelligi-
hility and the Philosophy of Nothing-
ness, remarks on a number of compari-
sons between Nishida and Heidegger
and, indeed, more could have been ob-
served.'' Yet all such comparisons fade
beside Nishida's own criticisms of
Heidegger, which can be summarized
as two: (1) Heidegger has not gotten
hold of the concrete practical world in
his phenomenological description of
Dasein. His history is still a concept;
his "world" is not a real world which
determines human action but remains
a world of understanding.^ (2) Con-
sciousness in Husserl and Heidegger
has not been truly purged of individual-
ity and subjectivity. The transcendence
and objectivity of consciousness has not
been recognized. (This second argu-
ment, while not specifically applied
against Heidegger, occurs again and
again throughout Fundamental Prob-
lems and other works.)
There remain of course two strong
parallels between Zen Buddhism and
Heidegger, one from the later Heideg-
ger and one from the early. Both
Buddhism and the later Heidegger
teach that the highest human possibil-
ity is reached in a spirit of detachment
and receptivity, the counter-position to
self-love or subjectivism. It was
reached by Eugen Herrigel, as his ac-
count in Zen in the Art of Archery tells
us, when he ceased in his endeavors to
master his shot and let "It" shoot
(Caputo, 1978, pp. 208-9).'^ The other
parallel comes from Heidegger's 1929
lecture What is Metaphysics? where he,
much like the Buddhist tradition,
speaks about the Nothing as the
groundless ground of all there is
(Caputo, 1978, pp. 212-13). But on this
149
 point there is not only a parallel but a
divergence of views as well, i.e., a con-
troversy on whether Heidegger had
grasped the Nothing with sufficient
radicality (Nakaoka, 1985).
Before we turn to concluding re-
marks on the light that the relation of
Heidegger and the East sheds on tech-
nology, an aside on Heidegger and the
Nothing is required. Critics of Heideg-
ger have pounced on his reflection on
the Nothing to accuse him of nihilism.
That Heidegger should be stigmatized
as a nihilist especially by someone such
as Stanley Rosen (1969) is passing
strange. Rosen is a student of Leo
Strauss, a proponent of two principles
which should guard against such a pre-
cipitous and rhetorical judgment: the
idea that one must be very careful
about claiming to understand a philoso-
pher better than he understands him-
self; and a careful distinction between
opinion and knowledge, exoteric and
esoteric teachings. Heidegger perhaps
_more than any other contemporary
philsopher has claimed to be trying to
overcome that nihilism which he sees
as the culmination of the Western
philosophical tradition. With regard to
the alleged nihilistic character of
Heidegger's teaching, the refutation by
David A. White (1975) is persuasive.
Heidegger's own defense against
the charge of nihilism is readily avail-
able in The Question of Being (1956). In
its original form the essay was ad-
dressed to Ernst Jnger in a
Festschrift for his sixtieth birthday in
response to one from Jnger com-
memorating Heidegger's own sixtieth
anniversary six years previously.
Jnger's contribution was entitled
"ber die Linie," understood by Jnger
as "across" or "over the line" (of
nihilism), i.e., as an attempt at moving
beyond nihilism. In reply, Heidegger
urges that nihilism as the end phase of
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
150
metaphysics and as technology is too
well entrenched to yield to a quick and
determined move. Hence he proposes
that we read ber as "concerning" and
engage in a reflection "Concerning the
Line" of nihilism, a suggestion that
Fandozzi has taken up in his essay
Nihilism and Technology (1982).
Heidegger in The Question of Being
(1956) is less than sanguine about the
prospect of a deeper understanding of
nihilism. In fact the facile concept and
charge of nihilism at times enters into
an unholy alliance with a shallow no-
tion of myticism. Their putative eva-
siveness and obscurantism are seen by
Rosen as the reason for Heidegger's
political imprudence. In a similar
spirit, Strauss says of Heidegger's
thought: "There is no room for political
philosophy in Heidegger's work, and
this may well be due to the fact that the
room in question is occupied by gods or
the gods" (1971, p. 2).
Yet however misdirected these ob-
jections, they do raise an important
question of long standing, the question,
i.e., of whether personal mysticism
does not have a fatal inclination toward
practical imprudence and political
nihilism. In the present context we can
formulate the question more cautiously
and ask, in conclusion, whether the
mystical element in Heidegger and the
kindred movements in Eastern thought
have helped us to see technology more
clearly and hopefully.
To begin with the East, the com-
plex of issues involving technology, its
reform, and the Japanese experience is
of great philosophical and current in-
terest. Its present prominence in this
country is due to the fact that the con-
ception that Americans have of their
place in the world and in history is
strongly informed by the technological
power and prowess of the United
States. But this claim to world histori-
cal significance is now being chal-
lenged by Japan which in productivity
and increasingly in research is overtak-
ing the United States. This has led, as
Murray Sayle and Ian Buruma have
shown in different ways, to anger and
incomprehension on the American side
and to searching and troubling debates
among the Japanese.''
The philosophically challenging
issue unhappily falls between the horns
of the dilemma that Caputo has de-
plored (1978, p. 257). The American
reaction and the Japanese responses
that Sayle considers are firmly within
the framework of the calculating think-
ing of technology. At the same time or-
thodox Eastern and comparative phi-
losophy as well as the usual Heidegger
scholarship timidly cling to the high
and highest ground of philosophical
abstraction and tradition. At a confer-
ence on "The Critique of the Times
after Heidegger" which was held at the
University of Augsburg (West Ger-
many), scholars from West Germany,
France, Italy, the United States, and
Japan were in attendance.'' Though it
was in many ways a stimulating and
rewarding affair and proceeded under
an appropriately ambiguous and pro-
vocative title, there was little consid-
eration of the concrete circumstances
under which technology is taking its
course around the globe. If there was
an undercurrent of vital interest, it was
furnished by the playfulness of recent
French philosophy.
Buruma, however, believes to have
discovered a philosophical force in
Japanese politics that is critical of
technology and has practical though
limited significance. He names Takeshi
Umehara as the leader of a racist and
chauvinist school of philosophy
(Heidegger's name comes up in this
context) whose members, so Buruma
says, proclaim traditional Japanese
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
culture as the world's sole salvation
and have met regularly with Prime
Minister Nakasone to discuss Japan's
national identity.
At the Honolulu conference, Umeh-
ara (1970) read a paper acknowledging
his debt to Heidegger (p. 273), denounc-
ing the technological culture of "mate-
rial goods and sex" (p. 272; cf p. 278),
and calling for a "continuing dialogue
between thinkers of the East and the
West" about the global destiny of
humankind (p. 281). Whether Umehara
has in fact moved on to an intolerant
and repressive position is impossible to
establish from the direct quotations,
but his account is a warning to those
who would criticize the technologically
specified liberal state that they make
themselves clear on the indispensable
value of tolerance and civil liberty.
Is there any hope of drawing from
the sources of mysticism and Eastern
thought to irrigate in a liberal and to-
lerant way the barren ground that lies
between the technological enterprise
and philosophical meditation? As re-
gards the East, there may be such cul-
tivation going on now, and we are ig-
norant of it due to the fact, remarked
by Heidegger in his letter to the Hon-
olulu conference, "that with few excep-
tions there is no command of the East-
ern languages either in Europe or in
the United States" (1970, p. 221). As re-
gards myticism and the mystical ele-
ment in Heidegger, it will be a matter
of first recovering that tradition in the
fuller and perhaps more vital setting of
religion and Christianity.
4. Relgion and Christianity
In the Spiegel interview Heidegger
was asked whether the individual or
philosophy could influence the constric-
tive network of the absolute technologi-
cal state. Heidegger denied that possi-
bility and gave his by now celebrated
151
 answer: "Only a god can save us"
(1976a, p. 277). The significance of this
answer is underlined not only by the
fact that Heidegger once more brought
up "the arrival or the absence of the
god" when the question of reform arose
again a little later in the interview; the
answer also hearkens back to the close
of Heidegger's major essay on technol-
ogy where, taking guidance from Hl-
derlin, he asserts that at the height of
the danger of technology the saving
power would grow as well (1977, p. 28).
Is God then the one to whom
Heidegger instructs us to turn for sal-
vation in the face of the danger of tech-
nology? Not really, for Heidegger
speaks of a god or the god; "god" is not
a proper name for him. This seemingly
fine point of linguistic usage is a clue to
the complex relation Heidegger had
throughout his life to religion and
Christianity. And the broader context
in which this point has its place also
contains a complex relation between
-technology and Christianity in Heideg-
ger's thought. These complexities must
be outlined and if possible clarified to
provide a fuller context for the review
of work on Heidegger and technology.
The point is to round out this context
rather than furnish a review of the lit-
erature on Heidegger, religion, Christ-
ianity, and theology, a literature that is
extensive and requires a survey in its
own right.
Heidegger grew up in simple,
rural, and intensely Roman Catholic
circumstances. For a gifted boy4xi such
a setting an academic career meant
studying for the priesthood. People like
Heidegger's parents would otherwise
neither have had the courage to aim so
high for their son nor would they have
mustered the resolve to take on the nec-
essary economic burdens.'^ In the brief
autobiographical sketch that Heidegger
has left us he appears to remember his
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
152
time of Catholic education without re-
sentment; in fact, he singles out two of
his clerical mentors with obvious affec-
tion (1958, pp. 3-4). Similarly, he wrote
about the religious life of his boyhood
with unreserved warmth.'^ And when
he felt his death approaching, he asked
a Catholic priest, Bernhard Welte, that
he "say a few words in his memory at
the burial" (Welte, 1982, p. 86).
And yet Caputo, surely a well-in-
formed and sensible reader of Heideg-
ger, says of his thought that it is "radi-
cally worldly and secular" (1978,
p. 252). The standard argument in sup-
port of this view has been assembled by
James L. Perotti in Heidegger on the
Divine (1974). Perotti follows Heideg-
ger's development to show how his
questions became increasingly radical
and broke through the established ways
of thinking and speaking, including
those that one follows to reflect and
talk about God. These are now seen to
be restricted and superficial. Tradi-
tional theology is discredited. But this
is not to deny God. At the deeper level
of thought that Heidegger attains a new
experience of God becomes possible.
Perotti is concerned to present
Heidegger's views of the divine and
God within the over-all movement of
Heidegger's thought, and much of his
book is devoted to tracing this move-
ment. What mars this laudable inten-
tion is the triumphalist tone of Perotti's
account in which the power and tren-
chancy of Heidegger effortlessly pre-
vail over all traditions and objections.
Perotti's ambitious preoccupation
moreover disburdens him from a more
modest but desirable achievement, viz.,
a careful historical-doxographical ac-
count of the periodic emergence and
submersion of the religious theme in
Heidegger's work. Finally Perotti
seems unsure of his conclusion, both of
its substance and of its radicality. As
regards his substantive finding, he first
asserts: "The word about god will
come forth from Heidegger only as a
response to the presence or absence of
god" (p. 118). But then he has Heideg-
ger disavow any experience of God and
defer to the "unique prerogative of the
poet" on this point. "Heidegger,"
Perotti says, "has selected and com-
mitted his thinking to the poet Hlder-
lin" (p. 119).
Concerning the radicality of
Heidegger's position Perotti seems una-
ware of the crucial question, what bear-
ing the thinking of Being will finally
have on God and the divine. The tenor
of Perotti's book suggests that the
superior and in fact supreme radicality
of Heidegger's thinking and of its
theme. Being, will provide a radically
new ground or space for the appear-
ance of God. In this case, God would no
longer be the supreme power but
merely a moment within the history of
Being. At the same time, Perotti's
explicit conclusions, considered just
now, both intimate a more limited role
for Being and its thinking, one that
would finally be in the service of God's
epiphany. On this question one might
not agree with Caputo; but one must
certainly acknowledge the forthright-
ness and clarity of his answer which
embraces the former of the alterna-
tives above. "I do not mean that there
is no place for God in the later Heideg-
ger," he says, "but that Heidegger's
God is not the Lord of history. He does
not govern the missions of Being with
loving care. Rather His own appear-
ance in history is subject to the move-
ments of the world-play" (1978, p. 254).
The religious view of Heidegger's
thought is taken by Heidegger's great
fellow townsman, Bernhard Welte.
Being, Welte points out, is never a de-
finitive theme or power in Heidegger's
thought. It is at first "only a formal and
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
tentative indication of a goal" (1982,
p. 88; our translation from the origi-
nal). And toward the end of Heideg-
ger's career, the word "Being" re-
mains behind and no longer needs to be
mentioned (1982, pp.95, 97, and 98).
Caputo would so far agree with Welte.
But Welte sees the early Heidegger's
reflections on the oblivion of Being and
on the simultaneous disclosure and con-
cealment of Being as stages on the way
toward Heidegger's experience of the
absence of God. And Heidegger, so
Welte continues, not only gives expres-
sion to this absence but takes steps to-
ward a positive appreciation of this ab-
sence so that in that absence first hints
of the presence of the All-High begin to
appear.
Welte presents his case with sub-
tlety and insight. And its seems sub-
stantially right. But it is also narrow,
both systematically and in point of
Heidegger's intellectual biography. To
begin with the latter, here as in many
other respects, scholars have allowed
the old Heidegger to set the tone for the
interpretation of the younger Heideg-
ger's work. In this way, a harmony and
consistency appear in the development
of Heidegger's relation to God and reli-
gion that did not in fact obtain. It is not
the case that Heidegger began from a
religious position and then moved on to
a searching examination of Being
which led him beyond a vital faith in
God (Caputo) or to a profound experi-
ence of the absence of God (Perotti)
and of intimation of a new ephiphany
(Welte). It is apparent from the scat-
tered references to God, Christianity,
and faith in Being and Time that
Heidegger at the height of his first
great accomplishment did not just re-
flect more deeply and dispassionately
on his religious position but was con-
cerned to put a great critical distance
between his work and religion.''
153
 In the year of the pubUcation of our question, but he cannot really
Being and Time, he gave a lecture on question without ceasing to be a
"Phenomenology and Theology" believer and taking all the conse-
(1976b, pp. 3-21), a document which has quences of such a step. He will
only be able to act 'as i f . . . (1953,
been available in German since 1970
p. 6).
and which both Perotti and Welte have
ignored. There he tried to work out, in As he often does, Heidegger goes on to
light of Being and Time, a principled soften and qualify this categorical
relationship between philosophy and statement on a crucial issue and re-
theology, one that would give each dis- marks that such unquestioning faith is
cipline its due. Roughly, philosophy is really no faith at all but rather conveni-
taken by Heidegger as the reflection on ence and indifference.
the basic modes of Being that can be Still, Heidegger comes at least very
undertaken without envisaging the spe- close to saying that the Christian can-
cific Christian mode of being in the not be a philosopher. Both in 1927 and
world. Theology by contrast, is based in 1935 he dismisses Christian philoso-
on the philosophically unsurpassable gi- phy as "a wooden iron" (1976b, p. 21,
venness of faith. Theology, therefore, where the translator has "square cir-
cannot take its direction from philoso- cle"; 1953, p. 6; the translator has
phy. As a scholarly enterprise, how- "round square"). One might suppose
ever, it must draw in a complementary that the venturesome resoluteness that
and preliminary way on the philosophi- Heidegger thinks to be closed off to the
cal illumination of the basic modes of believer is of a piece with the subjec-
human existence. Heidegger tries to tive and voluntaristic authenticity of
capture this result by saying that, al- the early Heidegger that, in the later
though philosophy cannot give direction Heidegger, as Zimmerman has shown
to theology, it does provide correction. (1981), yields to detachment and open-
Philosophy could well exist without act- ness as the authentic mode of human
ing as a theological corrective. Simi- being. And the latter attitude is much
larly faith, though not the scholarly dis- closer to faith as is evident from the
cipline of theology, can exist without proximity of Heidegger and Meister
philosophy. Eckhart, considered in the previous
But just when Heidegger has ar- section. Yet as late as 1954, in a conver-
rived at this adjudication of the various sation with Protestant philosophers and
claims and territories, he goes on to theologians, Heidegger if anything saw
say that faith as a mode of existence is an even deeper chasm dividing theol-
the mortal enemy of the mode of exis- ogy and philosophy (1976b, pp. 59-71).
tence that belongs to philosophy (1976b, It is this dualistic and sometimes
p. 20). The reason is only hinted at. angry view of the relationship of the
Faith is contrasted with the philoso- philosopher to the believer that is omit-
phers' free appropriation of their own ted by Perotti and Welte. We should
total existence. Eight years later, in In- spell out at this point what is implicit in
troduction to Metaphysics, Heidegger the preceding sections. Even at his
spells out what is at issue in this con- most critical, Heidegger would never
trast: join in the criticism of Christianity that
has gained currency under the name of
One who holds to such faith can in the "Lynn White Thesis," according to
a way participate in the asking of which Christianity, by despiritualizing

PHILOSOPHY TODAY

154
nature, provides a tabula rasa for tech-
nology and abettes the ecological
crisis.'' For Heidegger, the metaphysi-
cal origins of technology arise much
earlier, viz., with Plato. And they come
to a tangible fruition much later,
namely toward the middle and end of
the modern period. It should also be
noted that one who grew up in a setting
that was shaped in the Middle Ages and
where many a medieval practice was
still alive would be immune to the
seductive simplicity of White's thesis.
Side by side with the critical and
separatist view of Christianity, faith,
and theology we do find the other view
which is very nearly the received one
and from which the philosopher's work
is seen as the replacement of theology
or at least as a new preparation for
theology and perhaps even faith. The
preparatory view is first given pro-
grammatically in the Letter on
Humanism, written in 1946, where
Heidegger says:
Only from the truth of Being can
the essence of the holy be thought.
Only from the essence of the holy
is the essence of divinity to be
thought. Only in the light of the es-
sence of divinity can it be thought
or said what the word "God" is to
signify (1947, p. 230; see also
p. 218).
In "The Onto-Theo-Logical Consititu-
tion of Metaphysics" of 1957, Heidegger
not only proposes such a program but
appears to claim it as his own. He
suggests that his refusal to talk about
God is due to the fact that he has ex-
perienced theology in its genuine
rootedness, "both the theology of Chris-
tian faith and that of philosophy"
(1957b, pp. 54-55). And he submits that
his "god-less thinking which must
abandon the god of philosophy, god as
causa sui, is thus perhaps closer to the
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
divine God" (1957b, p. 72). Closer than
the mainstream believers and theolo-
gians? This is what Heidegger in his
rustic sort of cunning implies but then
explicitly denies when he continues:
"Here this means only: god-less think-
ing is more open to Him than onto-theo-
logic would like to admit" (ibid.).'''
What are we to make of the fact
that in Heidegger's thought a dismis-
sive and dualistic and a concernful and
preparatory view of faith and theology
are vying with one another? Setting
aside narrowly biographical considera-
tions and returning to the question of
technology, we can see that what the
two views have in common is a deep
concern for the difficulty and signifi-
cance of the task of thought. In the
dualistic position, which is essentially
the earlier one, we can see a concern to
face up to the difficulty of philosophical
reflection and to keep premature and
pat answers at bay. The difficulty at
first occupies Heidegger more than the
significance of thought since the early
radical resolve of his work was still
ambiguous and without firm guidance,
as suggested many times in the forego-
ing pages. But as Heidegger settled
more and more clearly on the destiny
of technology as the crucially signifi-
cant issue of thought, his attitude to-
ward faith and theology became more
conciliatory and congenial.
Yet Heidegger remained worried
that the clearing he was trying to open
up for a new advent of divinity would
be overgrown by the facile and ineffec-
tive pronouncements of the established
ways of thinking. This is especially evi-
dent in Heidegger's epistolary reply to
Welte's article (Welte, 1975, p. 85). He
gently reminds Welte of two things:
first, that his concern with the question
of God cannot be separated from his re-
flections on the modern history of
Being, i.e., on technology and science;
155
and second, that he has come to no con-
clusions, that he is still "on the path of
inquiry."
Heidegger's assertion that only a
god can save us from the danger of
technology is not just a flourish or
rhetoric of despair. His thought on tech-
nology cannot be fully grasped without
attention to his reflections on divinity
and God. But neither should one as-
sume that there is a theological answer
to Heidegger's philosophical question.
The radically new epoch of Being in
which we are implicated requires us to
rethink from the ground up what we
mean by faith and how we experience
the divine. More specifically we must
clarify the religious and theological sig-
nificance of our practical and reflective
experience of science and technology.
Such a proposal, of course, would be
anathema to Protestant theologians,
such as Karl Barth, who reject as an
expression of human arrogance any re-
flection that is even tentatively inde-
pendent of and antecendent to faith.
Catholic theologians, such as Welte and
Karl Rahner, nevertheless work in a
tradition that has long practiced such
procursive reflection under the heading
of fundamental theology.
Heidegger's thought is consensual
with Catholicism not only along this
traditional theological line but also
through Heidegger's sacramental con-
ception of reality that is so evident in
his reflections on the fourfold. The Ger-
man word for fourfold, Vierung, is in
fact the technical term for the crossing
of nave and transept in a medieval
church. The cathedral in Freiburg
where Heidegger lived for most of his
life has a powerful Romanesque cross-
ing, concealed under the roof of the
nave, as a point of balance between the
austere Gothic nave, the magnificient
late Gothic choir, and the late
Romanesque transept. That Heidegger
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
156
throughout his life accepted the cul-
tural embodiment of Catholic Christian-
ity in his native environment is evident
from scattered remarks in his formal
essays and from various addresses he
gave in his hometown of Messkirch
(Mller, 1986, p. 30).
There are, to be sure, many other
theological currents that may fruitfully
converge with Heidegger's thought,
notably process theology which shares
important parts of Heidegger's critique
of metaphysics and of a metaphysically
structured theology. The problem of the
relationship between technology and
theology in Heidegger is only beginning
to receive attention, and this is true of
the general field of technology and
theology. A beginning has been made in
Carl Mitcham and Jim Crete's anthol-
ogy. Theology and Technology.'^^ It
shows how inadequate are our tradi-
tional categories of history and philoso-
phy, of cause and effect, of power and
grace, of failure and wholeness, of the
sacred and the profane, and how diffi-
cult it is to rethink these matters in
light of the challenge of Heidegger's
thought and of our experience of tech-
nology and faith.
5. The Overcoming of Technology
We have clustered the works under
review around thematic points. But
running through those clusters is a pro-
gressive movement of scholarship with
three discernible stages. The first is the
stage of translation and exposition. The
translations clearly were necessary to
acquaint a larger audience with
Heidegger's thought: the larger the au-
dience to be reached, the more formi-
dable the obstacle of linguistic compla-
cency. The expositions were intended to
help Anglo-American readers over-
come the idiosyncrasies of Heidegger's
style and to spell out those assumptions
of Heidegger's that could not be taken
for granted in these parts. Whether the
expository work has in fact made a sig-
nificant contribution to the Heidegger
reception in the EngUsh speaking world
is uncertain. At any rate, it is time for
this phase to come to an end.
The next stage is that of a dialogue
where Heidegger's thought on technol-
ogy is drawn into a serious conversa-
tion with the best minds of modern and
contemporary thought. This has been
done for the philosophy of science by
Patrick A. Heelan and for environmen-
talism by Michael Zimmerman. The
task is yet to be accomplished in a sub-
stantial way for social and political phi-
losophy, for the philosophy of art, and
for theology. One can expect that in this
country important contributions to this
stage of development will be forthcom-
ing. There is, so one may hope, a happy
convergence of two currents that will
advance this enterprise. One is the
growing realization in social and politi-
cal philosophy that a less formalistic
and pedantic, a more substantive and
lively approach is needed, that philoso-
phy must join again the conversation of
humanity and respond to the concrete
apprehensions and aspirations of the
human family. The other current is the
growing interest in Heidegger's con-
cerns on the part of Anglo-American
philosophers who command profes-
sional attention and some attention in
the culture at large.
The third stage is one of explora-
tion and development. It consists of at-
tempts to build on Heidegger's work or
to work under Heidegger's inspiration
in exploring issues that have been neg-
lected or mistaken by Heidegger and in
articulating a vision of our world which
is different from Heidegger's, perhaps
less ambiguous or more hopeful than
his. This stage is exemplified in its ex-
ploratory side by Don Ihde's work and
in its developmental aspect by the
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
books of Edward G. Ballard and Wil-
liam Barrett. Such work surely repre-
sents the most important stage and
fruit of Heidegger scholarship. As re-
marked at the beginning of this review,
if Heidegger's thought finally matters,
it will be through work of this kind, as-
suming that such work in turn will at
long last inform our social and cultural
practices.
Work of this kind, as admitted at
the beginning, exceeds the limits of the
present review. An example is Hubert
Dreyfus' powerful critique of the pre-
tensions of artificial intelligence and
his endeavor to work out a conception
of human practice and intelligence
which would be a fruitful and more ap-
propriate alternative to the one that
guides workers in computer science.''
The Heideggerian inspiration of What
Computers Can't Do and the later Mind
over Machine is obvious and acknowl-
edged. But one would not call this a
book on Heidegger and technology.
Is it possible to say something
more about the tasks and prospects of
work on technology that departs from
Heidegger? Dreyfus has provided a
helpful sketch for a program. He calls
for "a two-stage strategy," the first
stage of which is the deconstruction of
theoretical holism (1980, p. 22). This, as
suggested above, should not take the
form envisaged by Dreyfus of refuting
(some of) the explanatory claims of
(scientific) theories, but of showing
their limits and of disentangling the
problem of modern science from that of
modern technology.
The second stage in turn has two
parts. First "one must give an interpre-
tation of our current cultural situation
by finding a cultural paradigm, . . .
which focuses our dominant practices
. . . " (1980, p. 22). Such a paradigm
would have to incorporate what Heideg-
ger has to say about the framework, re-
157
sources, and procuring, and it would
allow a testing of his insights against
the phenomena and the literature of so-
cial reality. It might allow a sharper
delimitation of technology. We could
then see more clearly what measures
of reform would be mere variants and
promotions of technology and which
would be genuine and fruitful counter-
forces.
As regards the latter, Dreyfus de-
parts from Heidegger's remark that we
should seek the saving power "here and
now and in little things." Dreyfus takes
this as a call to attend to pretechnologi-
cal micropractices. The latter term,
taken from Foucault, may at first seem
out of place. What does Heidegger's
cryptic remark mean? "In little
things" is "im Geringen" in German.
Gering means poor, inconspicuous,
simple. In Heidegger's essay, the term
surely hearkens back to the passage in
"The Thing" where he says:
Nestling, malleable, pliant, com-
pliant, nimble in Old German
these are called ring and gering.
The mirror-play of the worlding
world, as the ringing of the ring,
wrests free the united four into
their own compliancy, the circling
compliancy of their presence. Out
of the ringing mirror-play the
thinging of the thing takes place
(1971, p. 180).
In the second essay on technology, the
counter-position of the thing in which a
world appears to the framework of
technology is made explicit (1977a,
pp. 433 and 446).
Dreyfus only mentions literary and
historical examples of micropractices
(1980, p. 22). But he insists that we
must assemble "all the evidence in our
micropractices and this of course in-
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
158
cludes our linguistic practices that
an alternative understanding of human
beings once existed and still continues,
although drowned out by our everyday
busy concerns" (1980, pp. 22-23).
Heidegger points to things and hardly
to the practices in which they exist. But
once we can recognize the simple
things, we can see the micropractices
as well: the celebration of meals,
games, plays, and prayers, thoughtful
and communal reading, hiking in the
wilderness, work that engages us, and
more. Such practices will seem
hopelessly idyllic and impotent unless
we see them in the balance that Heideg-
ger and Dreyfus emphasize, counter-
weighted by an incisive critique of tech-
nology which exposes the pointlessness
of its present reign.
I think We can take still further
steps. The world will remain largely
and permanently technological. But we
can and must make it generous to
things and to the practices in which
they prevail. We must, moreover, re-
flect on the fact that focal ("thinging")
things will have a new character in the
widely technological universe. Corres-
pondingly the surrounding practices
cannot in the long run just be revivals
or continuations of pretechnological
customs.
As both Heidegger and Dreyfus in-
dicate, final success lies beyond our
willing. To acknowledge this and to act
on that acknowledgment is anything
but passive. Yet while the strategy just
outlined seems to us radical and conse-
quential, it provides only a start. Most
philosophy either drifts along with
something that has become deeply
questionable, or it exhausts itself in
perplexity. What is needed is the cour-
age of a simple and insightful begin-
ning.
 ENDNOTES
1. Gerald Holton, "On Being Caught Between
Dionysians and Apollonians," Daedalus 103, no.
3, (Summer 1974): 65-81.
2. A minor monument to the violence of this clash
can be found in John R. Searle's review of
Jonathan Culler's book on deconstruction, 'The
World Turned Upside Down," New York Review
of Books 30, no. 16 (October 27, 1983): 74-79
and in a subsequent exchange of letters between
Louis H. Mackey and Searle, ibid 31, no. 1
(February 2, 1984): 47-48. A balanced account of
the general controversy has been given by Gary
Gutting, "Paradigms and Hermeneutics: A
Dialogue on Kuhn, Rorty and the Social Sci-
ences," American Philosophical Quarteriy 21, no.
1 Qanuary 1984): 1-15.
3. Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle
Maintenance (New York: Morrow, 1974), p. 40.
4. See, e.g., Jerome Ravetz, Scientific Knowledge
and Its Social Consequences (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1971).
5. For more on this history of Being within which
Heidegger situates the issue of technology, see
Bernd Magnus, Heidegger's Metahistory of Phi-
losophy: Amor Fati, Being and Truth (The
Hague: Nijhoff, 1970); Werner Marx (1971);
Sandra Lee Bartky (1979, in section B, 2 of the
bibliography); the "Heidegger and the History of
Philosophy" theme issue of The Monist 64, no. 4
(October 1981), with articles by Hans-Georg
Gadamer, Bernd Magnus, David Farrell Krell,
David A. Kolb, Mark B. Okrent, David A. White
and Thomas Sheehan; and Michael Allen Gilles-
pie, Hegel Heidegger, and the Ground of His-
tory (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1984). The last volume is the best.
6. Albert Hofstadter, Truth and Art (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1965), p. 157.
Hofstadter's position is actually more influenced
by Heidegger than the few explicit references
would indicate. After all, Hofstadter takes as his
own the title of the last section of Heidegger's art
essay.
7. Bernd Magnus, Heidegger's Metahistory of Phi-
losophy, op. cit note 5, p. 91.
8. For a provocative appreciation of the relationship
between practical engagements and science con-
tained in the work of two other philosophers who
can help throw light on what is at issue here, see
Edith Wyschograd, "The Logic of Artifactual
Existents: John Dewey and Claude Levi-
Strauss," Man and World 14, no. 3 (1981): 235
250.
9. Charles Hartshome, Beyond Humanism: Essays
in the Philosophy of Nature (Lincoln: University
of Nebraska Press, 1968), p. 305. For two
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
Heidegger-influenced approaches to understand-
ing the historically conditioned conceptions of na-
ture which are nevertheless quite compatible
with a critical-realistic stance, see Wolfgang
Schadewaldt's "The Concepts of Nature and
Technique According to the Greeks" and Jacob
Klein's "The Nature of Nature," both in Research
in Philosophy and Technology, vol. 2 (1979), pp.
159-171 and 173-188, respectively.
10. John Caputo, "The Thought of Being and the
Conversation of Mankind: The Case of Heidegger
and Rorty," Review of Metaphysics 36, no. 3,
whole no. 143 (March 1983): 661-685.
11. William J. Richardson, Heidegger: Through
Phenomenology to Thought (The Hague: Nijhoff,
1967); and J.L. Mehta, Martin Heidegger: The
Way and the Vision, revised edition (Honolulu:
University of Hawaii Press, 1976).
12. Otto Pggeler, ed., Heidegger: Perspektiven zur
Deutung seines Werks (Cologne: Kiepenheuer
and Witsch, 1969).
13. It is worth noting that according to Karl Jaspers,
Heidegger was quite critical of Jaspers' own style
with its overlong sentences. See the section of
Jaspers' philosophical autobiography on "Heideg-
ger," in Paul Arthur Schilpp, ed.. The Philosophy
of Karl Jaspers: Augmented Edition (LaSalle, IL:
Open Court, 1981), pp. 75/1-75/16. Although
written in the 1950s, Jaspers would not allow
these pages to be published until after both his
and Heidegger's deaths. It is thus spliced in be-
tween pages 75 and 76 in this new edition of the
Schilpp volume. For good commentary on the
Heidegger-Jaspers relationship see two articles
by David Farrell Krell: "Toward Sein und Zeit:
Heidegger's Early Review (1919-1920) of Jas-
pers' Psychologie der Weltanschaungen, " Journal
of the British Society for Phenomenology 6, no. 3
(October 1975): 147-156; and "The Heidegger-
Jaspers Relationship," ibid. 9, no. 2 (May 1978):
126-129.
14. As an aside, it should also be noted that Egbert
Schuurman's argument for Heidegger's depen-
dence on Friedrich Georg Jnger, Ernst's
younger brother, has no substantive basis
(Schuurman, 1980, pp. 100-102). To suggest that
Heidegger adopted the term "total mobilization"
from Friedrich Jnger's Die Perfection der Tech-
nik (written in 1939, but not published in full until
1946), when this phrase occurs as the title of a
volume by Ernst Jnger in 1931, betrays an un-
fortunate lapse of scholarship. Strangely enough,
even Joseph Kockelmans (1984, pp. 228-229) ac-
cepts Schuurman's unsubstantiated claim.
15. For Krell's articles, see note 13. Hermann Mr-
chen's studies can be found in the relatively brief
159
 (2 pages) Macht und Herrschaft in Denken von
Adorno und Heidegger (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta,
1980) and the much longer (over 700 pages)
Adorno und Heidegger: Versuch zu einer philoso-
phischen Kommunika tions Verweigerung
(Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1981).
16. See, e.g., Richard Rorty, "Overcoming the Trad-
ition: Heidegger and Dewey," in Michael Murray,
ed. (1978), as well as his (1979); and P. F. Straw-
son's review of George Steiner (1979), "Take the
B Train," New York Review of Books 26, no. 6
(April 19, 1979): 35-37.
17. Arne Naess, "The Shallow and the Deep, Long
Range Ecology: A Summary," Inquiry 16, no. 1
(Spring 1973): 95-100; and Christopher Stone,
Should Trees Have Standing? (Los Altos, CA:
Kaufmann, 1974).
18. Stone, Trees, op. cit. note 17, pp. 42-54.
19. See, e.g., Gary Snyder, "Re-inhabitation," in his
The Old Ways (San Francisco: City Lights
Books, 1977), pp. 57-66, based on a talk given at
the "Reinhabitation Conference" supported by
the California Council on the Humanities and held
at the North San Juan School in August 1976.
20. Hendrik van Riessen, Filosophie en Techniek
(Kampen: Kok, 1949). This huge (over 700
pages) historico-philosophical study of the precur-
sors of the philosophy of technology remains de-
finitive to this date.
21. A spectrum of reviews: The lead-offs were James
Atlas, "Pursuit of the Really Real," Tinie (Sep-
tember 4, 1978): 76 and 79; and Richard Boeth,
"The End of Reason," Newsweek (October 2,
1978): 98; followed by Marjorie Grene, untitled
review. New Republic 179, no. 16 (October 14,
1978) : 28-30; and John Murray Cuddihy, "Philos-
opher Home Free," New York Times Book Re-
view (December 24, 1978): 5. Eventually came
Jane Larkin Grain, "A Leap of Faith," National
Review 31, no. 1 (March 2, 1979): 304 and 306;
Peter Singer, "Human Prospecting," New York
Review of Books 26, no. 4 (March 22, 1979): 30
32; and Louis Dupre, "Being and tllt^ Will to
Prayer," Commonweal 106, no. 11 Oune 8,
1979) : 343-344. See also Borgmann, 1980b.
22. See, along these same lines, some suggestions
regarding the phenomenological differences be-
tween tool and machine interactions with the
human world and the need for a more thorough
delineation of Heidegger's Zeug phenomenology,
in Carl Mitcham, "Types of Technology," Re-
sarch in Philosophy and Technology, vol. 1
(1978), pp. 238-239.
23. Stuart F. Spicker, ed., Organism, Medicine, and
Metaphysics: Essays in Honor of Hans Jonas on
his 75th Birthday (Boston: Reidel, 1978).
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
160
24. The other commentary, Michael Gelven's A
Commentary on Heidegger's "Being and Time"
(New York: Harper Torchbook, 1970) is, how-
ever, a better general study.
25. See, e.g., Theodor Adorno, The Jargon of Au-
thenticity (Evanston, IL: Northwestern Univer-
sity Press, 1973; German publication, 1964);
Marcuse (1977b); and the studies by Hermann
Mrchen cited in note 15.
26. See Georg Lukacs. Existentialisme ou Mar-
xismen trans. E. Keleman (Paris: Nagel, 1948);
and "Existentialism," in R.W. Sellars, V.J.
McGill, and M . Frber, eds.. Philosophy for the
Future (New York: Macmillan, 1949), pp. 571
590.
27. William Leiss, "Technological Rationality: Mar-
cuse and His Critics," in his The Domination of
Nature (New York: Braziller, 1972), pp. 199-212.
28. See especially Max Horkheimer, Eclipse of
Reason (New York: Seabury, 1974; first pub-
lished, 1947); and Max Horkheimer and Theodor
Adorno, Dialectic of Enlightenment, trans. John
Cumming (New York: Seabury, 1972; German
original, 1947).
29. See note 15 for both books.
30. Hans-Dieter Bahr, Kritik der ''Politischen Tech-
nologie" (Frankfurt: Europische Verlagsanstalt,
1970).
31. For some references see, e.g., William H. Shaw,
"The Handmill Gives You the Feudal Lord:'
Marx's Technological Determinism," History and
Theory 18, no. 1 (1979): 155-176.
32. Jean-Paul Sartre, Critique of Dialectical Reason,
trans. Alan Sheridan-Smith (New York: Schoc-
ken, 1976; French publication, 1960).
33. See, e.g., Jacques Ellul, Metamorphose du
bourgeois (Paris: Calmann-Levy, 1967); and The
Technological System, trans. Joachim Neugros-
chel (New York: Seabury, 1980).
34. For the initial unfolding of the discussion, see:
Maurice de Gandillac and Alfred de Towamicki,
"Deux documents sur Heidegger," Les Temps
Modernes 1, whole no. 4 (1946): 713-724 (the
first document, "Entretien avec Martin Heideg-
ger," is by Gandillac; the second, "Visite Mar-
tin Heidegger," is by Towamicki); Karl Lwith,
"Les implications politiques de la philosophie de
I'existence chez Heidegger," Les Temps Mod-
ernes 2, whole no. 14 (November 1946): 343
360; and Eric Weil, "Le cas Heidegger," Les
Temps Modernes 3, whole no. 22 Quly 1947):
128-138.
35. See Hugo Ott, "Martin Heidegger und die Uni-
versitt Freiburg nach 1945," Historisches
Jahrbuch 105, no. 1 (1985): 95-128.
36. See, e.g., Frangois Fedier, "Trois attaques con-
tre Heidegger," Critique 22, whole no. 234
 (November 1966): 883-904 a defense of
Heidegger by way of a review of Guido
Schneeberger's Nachlese zu Heidegger (privately
published: Hochfeldstrasse 88, Bern, Switzer-
land, 1962), Theodor Adomo's Jargon der
Eigentlichkeit (Frankfurt, Suhrkamp, 1964), and
Paul Hhnerfeld's In Sachen Heidegger (Munich:
List-Bcher, 1961). Three responses attacking
Fedier's defense are contained in "A propos de
Heidegger," Critique 23, whole no. 237 (Feb-
ruary 1967): 284-297. These responses are
"Language et Nazisme" by Robert Minder, "La
lecture et I'enonce" by Jean Pierre Faye, and
"Serait-ce une querelle d'Allemand?" by Aime
Patri. Fedier's reply, "Une lecture denoncee" is
published under the same general heading ("A
propos de Heidegger") in Critique 24, whole no.
242 Ouly 1967): 672-686. See also Jean-Michel
Palmier (1968).
37. See, e.g., Roberto Mangabeira Unger, Knowl-
edge and Politics (New York: Free Press, 1975);
and Alasdair Maclntyre, After Virtue (Notre
Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press,
1981).
38. See Jaspers, "Heidegger," op. cit. note 13.
39. See Hugo Ott, "Martin Heidegger als Rektor der
Universitt Freiburg i. Br. 1933/34," Zeitschrift
des Breisgau-Geschichtsvereins 102 (1983): 121
136; and 103 (1984): 107-130. The second part,
with some brief but important additions, has been
published once more in "Martin Heidegger als
Rektor der Universitt Freiburg 1933/34,"
Zeitschrift fr die Geschichte des Oberrheins 132
(1984): 343-358. Otto Pggeler, "Den Fhrer
fhren? Heidegger und kein Ende," Philoso-
phische Rundschau 32, nos. 1-2 (1985): 26-67.
Ott announced his book in "Der Habilitand Martin
Heidegger und das von Schaezler'sche Stipen-
dium," Freiburger Dizesan-Archiv 106 (1986):
note to the subtitle.
40. See Bernd Martin, "Heidegger und die Reform
der deutschen Universitt 1933," Freiburger Uni-
versittsbltter 25, whole no. 92 Qune 1986): 49 48. See note 10.
69.
41. See Martin in the preceding note and Mller
(1986) in the bibliography; further: Gerhart
Schmitt, "Heideggers philosophische Politik,"
Freiburger Universittsbltter 25, whole no. 92
Gune 1986): 83-90; Pggeler (note 39 above);
and finally Rudolf Ringguth, "Fhrer der Fhrer,"
Der Spiegel 40, no. 34 (August 18, 1986): 164
169. The outdated standard view of the Heideg-
ger supporters is once more presented by How-
ard Eiland in "Heidegger's Political Engagement,"
Salmagundi, whole nos. 70-71 (Spring-Summer
1986): 267-284.
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
42. Carl Friedrich von Weizscker, "Begegnungen in
vier Jahrzehnten," Erinnerung an Martin Heideg-
ger, in Gnther Neske, ed., (Pfullingen: Neske,
1977), p. 245; Mller (1986), p. 19; Ute Guzzoni,
"Bemerkungen zu Heidegger 1933," Ereiburger
Universittsbltter 25, whole no. 92 Gune 1986):
77.
43. Albert Speer, Spandau: The Secret Diaries (New
York: Macmillan, 1976), entries for March 11 and
December 1, 1963; and for August 9, 1964.
44. It is worth noting that no major study of the
holocaust considers the influence of technology
and yet it was precisely trains, telecommuni-
cations, and synthetic chemicals which allowed
the destruction of Jews and others to be pursued
on such a massive scale.
45. Hannah Arendt, "Martin Heidegger at Eighty," in
Michael Murray (1978), pp. 293-303, actually ar-
gues that "Heidegger himself corrected his own
'error' more quickly and more radically than many
of those who later sat in judgment over him" and
that "he took considerably greater risks than
were usual in German literary and university life
during that period" (p. 302, note 3). In this re-
gard, see Mildred Bakan, "Hannah Arendt's Ap-
propriation of Heidegger's Thought as Political
Philosophy," in Don Ihde and Hugh J. Silverman,
eds., Descriptions (Albany: State University of
New York Press, 1985).
46. As formulated, e.g., by Ronald Dworkin in
"Liberalism," in Stuart Hampshire ed., Public and
Private Morality (New York: Cambridge Univer-
sity Press, 1978), pp. 114-143.
47. See, e.g., John Kenneth Galbraith, The New In-
dustrial State, 2nd edition (Boston: Houghton
Mifflin, 1972); Staffan B. Under, The Harried
Leisure Class (New York: Columbia University
Press, 1970); Daniel J. Boorstin, Democracy and
Its Discontents (New York: Random House,
1975); Tiber Scitovsky, The Joyless Economy
(New York: Oxford Unviersity Press, 1976); and
Fred Hirsch, Social Limits to Growth (Cam-
bridge, M A : Harvard University Press, 1976).
49. See Ronald Dworkin, "To Each His Own" a
review of Michael Walzer's Spheres of Justice: A
Defense of Pluralism and Equality, New York
Review of Books 30, no. 6 (April 14, 1983): 4-6;
Dworkin and Michael Walzer, "'Spheres of Jus-
tice:' An Exchange," ibid. 30, no. 12 Guly 21,
1983): 43-46.
50. A partial copy in the authors' possession is due to
Wolfgang Schirmacher.
51. C f Albert Borgmann, "Mind, Body, and World,"
Philosophical Forum 8, no. 1 (Fall, 1976): 68-86.
52. Albert Hofstadter and Richard Kuhns, eds., Phi-
losophies of Art and Beauty (New York: Random
161
 House, 1964); Albert Hofstadter, Truth and Art
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1965).
53. Karsten Harries, The Meaning of Modem Art
(Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press,
1968). See also Harries, The Bavarian Rococo
Church: Between Faith and Aestheticism, (New
Haven: Yale University Press, 1981).
54. Kent C. Bloomer and Charles W. Moore, Body,
Memory, and Architecture (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1977); David P. Billington, The
Tower and the Bridge: The New Art of Struc-
tural Engineering (New York: Basic Books,
1984).
55. See Noel Perrin, Giving Up the Gun: Japan's Re-
version to the Sword (Boston: Godine, 1979).
56. See Zen Buddhism: Selected Writings of D.T.
Suzuki, ed. W. Barrett (Garden City, NY:
Doubleday Anchor Books, 1956), p. xi.
57. Yoshihiro Nitta and Hirotaka Tatematsu,
Japanese Phenomenology. Analecta Husserliana
vol. VIII (Boston: Reidel, 1979).
58. Chikao Fijisawa, Zen and Shinto (New York:
Philosophical Library, 1959; reprint Westport,
CT: Greenwood Press, 1971).
59. Kitaro Nishida, Intelligibility and the Philosophy
of Nothingness, trans. Robert Schinzinger (Hon-
olulu: East-West Center Press, 1958).
60. Kitaro Nishida, Fundamental Problems of Philos-
ophy, trans. David A. Dilwork (Tokyo: Sophia
University, 1970), pp. 40 and 94-95.
61. Eugen Herrigel, Zen in the Art of Archery, trans.
R.F.C. Hull (New York: Random House, 1971),
p. 77.
62. Murray Sayle, "Japan Victorious," New York Re-
view of Books 32, no. 5 (March 28, 1985): 33
40; Ian Buruma, "A New Japanese Nationalism,"
New York Times Magazine (April 12, 1987): 22
29, 38.
63. Some of the proceedings have been published in
Philosophisches Jahrbuch 102, no. 1 (1985): 110
148.
64. On the religious circumstances and influences of
Heidegger's youth and education, see Hugo Ott,
"Der junge Martin Heidegger," Ereiburger
Part Two
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The most extensive index to both primary and secondary materials is Hans-
Martin Sass, Martin Heidegger: Bibliography and Glossary (Bowling Green, OH:
Philosopohy Documentation Center, 1982) a volume with over 6000 unannotated
entries, which extends and updates Sass' earlier
(Meisenheim: Hain, 1968) and Materialien zur Heidegger-Bibliographie
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
162
Dizesan-Archiv 104 (1984): 315-325 and "Der
Habilitand Martin Heidegger and das von
Schaezler'sche Stipendium," ibid. 106 (1986):
141-160; Bernhard Casper, "Martin Heidegger
und die Theologische Fakultt Freiburg, 1909
1923," ibid. 100 (1980): 534-541.
65. Martin Heidegger zum 80. Geburtstag von seiner
Heimatstadt Messkirch (Frankfurt: Klostermann,
1969), pp. 1-15.
66. For references to God, Christianity and faith, see
Hildegard Feick, Index zu Heideggers Sein und
Zeit, " 2nd edition (Tbingen: Niemeyer, 1968),
or Rainer A. Bast and Heinrich P. Delfosse,
Handbuch zum Textstudium von Martin Heideg-
gers "Sein und Zeit" (Stuttgart-Bad Cannstadt:
Holzboog, 1979). For some of the biographical
circumstances that shed light on Heidegger's un-
derstandably troubled relation to the Catholic
Church, see note 64 above and also Mller,
1986, pp. 16 and 30.
67., See Cari Mitcham, "Questions of Christianity and
Technology: A Bibliographic Introduction," Sci-
ence, Technology and Society, whole no. 14
(November 1979): 1-17.
68. On Heidegger's combination of timidity and coun-
try smarts, see Mller, 1986, pp. 22-26 and 28;
Schmitt (see note 41 above), p. 85; and a remark
of Gerhart Ritter quoted by Ott in "Martin
Heidegger als Rektor der Universitt Freiburg i.
Br. 1933/34," Zeitschrift des Breisgau-
Geschichtesvereins 103 (1984): 127, n. 6.
69. For references see note 65 above.
70. Cari Mitcham and Jim Grote, eds.. Theology and
Technology (Lanham, M D : University Press of
America, 1984).
71. Hubert L. Dreyfus, What Computers Can't Do: A
Critique of Artificial Reason, rev. edition (New
York: Harper & Row, 1979). first edition,
1972); and Hubert L. Dreyfus and Stuart E.
Dreyfus, with Tom Athanasiou, Mind Over
Machine: The Power of Human Intuition and Ex-
pertise in the Era of the Computer (New York:
Free Press, 1986).
Heidegger-Bibliographie
1917-1971
physics" (Moser, 1971, p. 149) or the
more tentative point that the later
Heidegger eliminates the possibility "of
any purely contemplative science"
(Ihde, 1979, p. 128). More important, it
frees us from the fatalistic interpreta-
tion of the destiny of technology which
is apparent in Jonas' earlier work
where he essentially, if not doxographi-
cally, accepts the view that modern sci-
ence and technology both issue from
the Gestell. Modern science is in the
end cogent not as a social institution or
in its technological application but in
its central sense as a body of laws and
theories, where it not only commands
devotion and gratitude (both of which
could be withdrawn), but makes truth
claims which exact assent and to which
instrumentalism is a futile protest.
If one takes science as an essen-
tially destructive and dominating force,
then the critical implication of this
view should lead one to propose a new
B. Technology Between Art and Religion
Heidegger's thought on technology
as it extends between science and poli-
tics is radically critical. But scattered
throughout his writings there are sug-
gestions that a salutary turn from, or
perhaps through, technology to a new
epoch of Being may come about. Art
and divinity are the powers Heidegger
most often mentions as guides or cen-
ters for another kind of thought and
life. A well-rounded review of the
Heidegger literature on technology re-
quires therefore a consideration of
what work has been done on Heideg-
ger's thought where it deals with art
and borders on religious concerns. It is
not our intention to provide an exhaus-
tive or even comprehensive survey but
to give a sense of the extent to which
work in this area has uncovered begin-
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
140
science. This is what Marcuse did at
least at one point though, as Habermas
points out 1970, pp. 85-89), uncertainly
even then. Indeed, when one con-
templates the task of reconstituting
philosophically the sciences in their
central sense, one may well yield to
fatalism. But on the realist view of sci-
ence sketched above one is relieved of
this impossible burden and can turn
one's attention either to delimiting sci-
entific practice on political grounds be-
cause it is demanding too much capital
investment or is politically destabiliz-
ing (nuclear weapons), or to the pos-
sibilities of reforming technology or
both (since they may well be related).
The more profound of these pos-
sibilities lies in the vicinity of that axis
which connects Heidegger's reflections
on art with the problem of religion in
his thinking. And so we come to the sec-
ond division of this review.
nings of a reform of technology which
would consistently and fruitfully cor-
respond to Heidegger's examination of
technology. And the brevity and
lacunae of this part will be forgivable if
the systematic end of this review is
properly served, the concern, i.e., to il-
luminate our time and to make room in
it for a more graceful life.
1. The Turn from Technology to
Art and Divinity
When in interviews Heidegger was
asked whether from his thought con-
structive proposals could be derived,
his answers were emphatically nega-
tive (Wisser, 1970, pp. 68-69; Heidegger,
1976a, pp. 276-84). But in less guarded
moments he has been more venture-
some. At one point he thought of the
poet as one who might reach through
the destitution of our time and make
room for the advent of divinity (1971,
pp. 91-142). Heidegger put this point
more generally in the concluding part
of his first essay on technology where
he suggests that in art another revela-
tion of Being might come about that
could save us from the danger of tech-
nology (1977a, pp. 34-35), a suggestion
that Ihde takes up in urging artistic
practice as a counterforce to technol-
ogy (1979, p. 129).
At another time Heidegger sur-
mised that in rural, traditional areas
the powers of home and history may be
reawakened, a suggestion later re-
tracted, as Pggeler points out (1972, p.
35). Then there is the proposal, em-
phasized by Hood (1972, p. 362) and
Grange (1977, p. 147), that we take an
attitude of detachment toward the
things of technology, that we use them
as far as appropriate, but refuse them
in their exclusive claim, a proposal that
Marcuse raised to the gesture of the
Great Refusal (Piccone and Delfini,
1970, p. 44; Ahlers, 1971, p. 588). Finally
there is the brief remark in the first
essay on technology, elaborated by
Dreyfus (1980), that we can foster the
saving power "here and now and in lit-
tle things" (1977a, p. 33), a point more
often and forcefully made in the second
essay on technology (1977a, pp. 43, 45
and 49) where Heidegger explains that
in those simple focal things the fourfold
of earth and sky, mortals and divinities
and thus a richer and deeper world is
gathered and disclosed.
How helpful are these proposals in
light of our perplexity and complex
technological situation? Even
Pggeler, whom Schwan (1974), pp. 153
and 159) accuses of being all too solici-
tous of Heidegger's thought, feels
moved to admit that Heidegger "lacks
even the beginnings of an explicit politi-
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
cal analysis of the situation as it is
created by world civilization" (1972, pp.
35-36). Schwan himself at one time
agreed with Heidegger that the fourfold
of earth and sky, of mortals and di-
vinities might provide the dimensions
of a political renewal (1965, pp. 172-75).
Later he found the fourfold too arbi-
trary and abstract to be helpful (1974,
pp. 166-71). "For a sufficiently con-
crete, complex and problem-conscious
practical philosophy" one that he
says includes "a fundamental clarifica-
tion of the relation, viz., of the correla-
tion and difference, of thinking and act-
ing, i.e., a philosophy of praxis
Heidegger's thought provides no basis
(nor a 'concrete Utopia')" (1974, p. 171).
Harries, again, sees in the fourfold a
more hopeful opening for political re-
form than in Heidegger's view of tech-
nology which provides a "one-dimen-
sional interpretation of the modern
world," and is "only a caricature of our
world" (1978, p. 328). Pggeler, in spite
of the scepticism quoted above, holds
out the possibility that concrete
analyses, which orient themselves by
the constellation of Being as it even-
tuates in the framework and in the
fourfold can yield "obligations which
are not to be ignored" (1972, p. 49; cf.
pp. 50 and 64).
It is clear from Heidegger's re-
marks and from those of his critics that
the concern with art and divinity is a
crucial if poorly articulated counter-
part to the analysis of technology.
Heidegger scholarship on art and reli-
gion has done little to clarify and elabo-
rate the relation between these counter-
parts.
2. Art and Technology
Heidegger's concern with art and
his essays on art originate, as William
Bossart (1968) and Christopher Nwodo
(1977) have pointed out, in that decisive
141
period 1935-1937 in which a turn in
Heidegger's thought took place and the
reflections on technology were ini-
tiated. The failure of the Heidegger lit-
erature to consider the art-technology
relation emphatically and trenchantly
may in part be due to Heidegger's deci-
sion to publish the art and the technol-
ogy essays in different collections in
Holzwege (1950) for the former, Vor^
trge und Aufstze (1961) for the latter,
a pattern repeated with slightly differ-
ent combinations in the English Poetry,
Language, Thought (1971) and The
Question Concerning Technology and
Other Essays (1977), respectively. It is
also true that the major art essay
achieved something like final form
more than a decade before the basic
technology essay. Nevertheless, as
Heidegger has often said, difference
and sameness go together so that in
this case too there are connections to be
noticed and considered.
Heidegger himself, as pointed out
above, indicates the significance of
these connections. In fact, the structure
of the two primary essays is remark-
ably similar. The art essay begins by
considering art-work as a thing in
terms of the four causes (Heidegger,
1971, pp. 26 ff.) but moves on to de-
scribe art as a disclosure of truth. The
technology essay begins by referring to
technology as a kind of means and
again considers this in terms of the four
causes (Heidegger, 1977a, p. 6 ff) but
proceeds to describe it as challenging
and revealing. At the conclusion of the
technology essay, Heidegger says that
the decisive confrontation with
[technology] must happen in a
realm that is, on the one hand,
akin to the essence of technology
and, on the other, fundamentally
different from it. Such a realm is
art (Heidegger, 1977a, p. 35).
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
1/19
In the "Addendum" to the art essay
Heidegger likewise directs attention to
this sameness and difference when he
notes that his use of Gestell,
framework, in the discussion of art and
truth (Heidegger, 1971, p. 64) is the
foundation for that which "we used in
later writings as the explicit key ex-
pression for the nature of modern tech-
nology" (p. 84).
If Heidegger's thought on art has
done little to inspire the literature on
Heidegger and technology, neither has
it, taken by itself, had much impact on
aesthetics and art criticism. Excep-
tions are Albert Hofstadter and
Richard Kuhns' anthology Philosophies
of Art and Beauty that contains the
first (and later much revised) transla-
tion of Heidegger's seminal essay on
"The Origin of the Work of Art" and
Hofstadter's later treatise on Truth and
Art where Heidegger's thought pro-
vides a crucial impetus if not the finally
decisive position.'' Though Heidegger's
thought strongly informed Karsten
Harries' The Meaning of Modern Art,
the explicit discussion of Heidegger is
very limited.'' Heidegger's conception
of art, along with the hermeneutics of
Being and Time, was also one of the
guiding insights of Hans-Georg
Gadamer's Truth and Method (1975).
Though Gadamer's book has been
widely influential of late, it is its her-
meneutic message, the linguistic and
social constitution of truth, that was so
eagerly accepted, and much at the ex-
pense of the thesis that Gadamer had
taken from Heidegger's thought on art,
i.e., the recognition that there is some-
thing like substantive epochal truth
that is disclosed to us in unforethinka-
ble ways. It is precisely the ignoring of
this latter point that gives deconstruc-
tionism its peculiarly vapid and fash-
ionable playfulness. Henry Sen-
daydiego (1976) makes a direct attempt
to use Heidegger to reform public policy
about funding for the arts. And Walter
Biemel, while on the American univer-
sity lecture circuit in 1978, developed
the Heideggerian notion that "painting
is not only a pure representation but a
representation which presents itself"
(Biemel, 1979, p. 278), referring to
works by Velazquez and Picasso.
As in the case of technology,
Heidegger's philosophy of art has had
its expositors and for the most part has
been poorly served by them. Hans
Jaeger (1958) is an early, competent
paraphrase of "The Origin of the Work
of Art." E . F . Kaelin (1967) presents a
more lively and helpful exposition
which is remarkable to this day for the
way it sets off Heidegger's essay
against Merleau-Ponty's work. Yet
Kaelin can be faulted for unquestion-
ingly placing Heidegger's essay in the
narrow and traditional framework of
aesthetics when it is clear not only
from the thrust of Heidegger's reflec-
tions but from explicit remarks (1971,
pp. 79-81; 1977a, pp. 34 and 35; all avail-
able in German at the time of Kaolin's
writing) that Heidegger rejected and
sought to break through the aesthetic
categories.
The same charge must be brought
against William H. Bossart (1968). He
begins by outlining as a backdrop those
passages in Being and Time that ex-
plain how humans take up with the
world and then turns to one of the Hl-
derlin interpretations as the transition
piece to "The Origin of the Work of
Art." The exposition of the latter essay
is followed by an inquiry which at-
tempts to determine whether Heideg-
ger's aesthetics covers all important
views of art. Here Bossart finds
Heidegger limited by "metaphysical
prejudices" (p. 63), unable to account
for the art of the great eccentrics and
for those free creative acts which give
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
for those free creative acts which give
a work a self-sufficiency apart from
"the world of a particular historical
people" (p. 65).
If nothing else, Calvin 0. Schrg
(1973) and Christopher Nwodo (1977)
are correct on this point (as was
Hofstadter in his introduction to
Heidegger, 1971, pp. xv-xvi), pointing
out emphatically that Heidegger's in-
terpretation of art is fundamentally in
service to his thinking of Being. In
Schrag's words, Heidegger's project for
"overcoming the inquiry standpoint of
traditional aesthetics" is "of the same
cloth as . . . his 'destruction' of the his-
tory of Western metaphysics" (pp. 109
110). Schrg plays down, however,
Heidegger's positive intentions and ig-
nores the unique status he grants to art.
For Nwodo, equally dramatically,
Heidegger's analysis is not meant to
"produce any new theory of art" (1977,
p. 294). In an analysis which superfi-
cially parallels Theodore Kisiel's (1973)
distinction between Heidegger's logi-
cal, existential, and epochal concep-
tions of science, Nwodo names "three
phases in Heidegger's thought-path to-
wards Being" (p. 295) as stages for his
reflections on art: (l)the existential
analytic of Dasein, (2)the revelation of
the ontological difference, (3)the Ereig-
nis or the event of appropriation.
The problem with this analysis (as
with Bossart's) is that the distinction
between the first two stages is unhelp-
ful for a discussion of art in Heidegger.
Art (Kunst) is conspicuous by its ab-
sence in Being and Time, and poetry
(Dichtung) is only referred to once in
passing as a kind of communication
which can be "a disclosing of exis-
tence" because the communication . . .
of one's state-of-mind [has] become an
aim in itself" (p. 205 [162]). Nwodo has
to conscript "The Origin of the Work of
Art" for service in the first phase of
143
Heidegger's thought, ignoring the fact
that the Introduction to Metaphysics,
which stands for the second phase, was
composed at the same time as the
essay on art and makes essentially the
same points as that essay. In particu-
lar, the art essay explicitly formulates
what Nwodo calls the later ontological
difference conception of art (1971, p.
39).
The weakness of Nwodo's first two
distinctions is highlighted by Edward
Lawry (1978), who points out that as
discussed in "The Origin of the Work of
Art" the work of art fits into none of the
types of beings distinguished in Being
and Time. Art is neither something
ready to hand nor present at hand, and
it is certainly not Dasein. "A work of
art is neither thing nor equipment." It
is "in some mysterious way between
them." It is "like equipment because it
has a function;" but unlike equipment
"art works flaunt their material" (p.
190). The art work, as Harold Alder-
man (1973) earlier notes in a perceptive
analysis that moves from thing to art to
poetry, is "the most thingly of things"
(p. 157).
At the same time, it does make
sense to attend expressly, as Nwodo
does, to Heidegger's consideration of
Being as the event of appropriation.
This consideration constitutes the
thought of the later and last Heidegger
where he speaks with the greatest clar-
ity and force about our historical situa-
tion. Nwodo sketches this period in the
narrowly Heideggerian discourse that
characterizes both this and his earlier
(1976) essay. When he finally places art
in this third stage of Heidegger's
thought, he does so by quoting a re-
mark of Heidegger's (1971, p. 86) that
Heidegger had intended as a clarifica-
tion of the essay that Nwodo had used
to illustrate the status of art in the first
phase.
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
One wonders what is more regret-
table, such outright lapses of scholar-
ship or the general failure of cir-
cumspection and incisiveness that
speaks from Nwodo's remark: "We
have tended to avoid controversies and
have concentrated upon portraying
Heidegger's thinking as we understand
it" (1971, p. 303). At the same time, a
meticulous and critical approach can
just as surely lead to unhappy and un-
helpful results, as is evident in Sandra
Lee Bartky's "Heidegger's Philosophy
of Art" (1981). The critical basis of her
examination is the mainstream analy-
tic philosophy of the late 1950s and
early 1960s and the metaphysical tradi-
tion generally. Hence as a matter of
course she employs concepts and as-
cribes to Heidegger views that he has
radically criticized and vigorously re-
jected. Like Kaelin and Bossart, she
unhesitatingly puts Heidegger in the
framework of traditional aesthetics
(pp. 257 and 273) and invokes among
others the notion of the Romantic and
modern artist (pp. 272-73) to, of all
things, commend Heidegger for "an ac-
count of the artwork which grants
legitimacy to the conception of the art-
ist as seer and prophet," totally una-
ware of how such praise clashes with
Heidegger's critique of modern subjec-
tivism and his misgivings about art
since at least Hegel's time (1971, pp. 79
81). In the same unquestioning spirit
Bartky attributes to Heidegger a
search for the (metaphysical) essence
of art (pp. 257 and 267) and the employ-
ment of a naive phenomenology to-
gether with blindness to the hermeneu-
tic circle of interpretation (p. 272 and p.
274 note 12). This is like taking Einstein
to task for failing to recognize the rela-
tivity of motion.
In the first English monograph to
address Heidegger's philosophy of art,
Joseph Kockelmans (1985) continues to
exhibit the weaknesses of the exposit-
ory tradition though with redeeming
features. Part one of this book (pp. 3
68) again insists on situating Heideg-
ger's analysis of art against the back-
ground of traditional aesthetics. More
thorough than previous discussions,
Kockelmans does have the merit of ad-
verting to Heidegger's various criti-
cisms of this tradition. It would have
been useful, however, to have a discus-
sion of the failure of Heidegger's ideas
to have much impact on subsequent
aesthetics and art criticism, except in-
sofar as deconstructionism can be read
as an airy and often aimless offspring
of Heideggerian radicalism.
In part two of his monograph (pp.
71-210), Kockelmans provides a de-
tailed analysis of "The Origin of the
Work of Art" along lines laid down ear-
lier in German by Friedrich-Wilhelm
von Herrmann (1980). Here Heideg-
ger's essay is carefully dissected, and
not just into its three major sections
with "Epilogue" and "Addendum."
"The Thing and the Work," "Art Work
and Truth," and "Truth and Art" are
each subdivided, sub-subdivided, and
paraphrased, with a generous commen-
tary that makes abundant references to
related essays by Heidegger, particu-
larly on poetry and the poets. But one
cannot help but wonder whether all this
scholarship is put to noble ends when
all it yields is the conclusion that what
Heidegger has to say about art "is cer-
tainly provisional, incomplete, and in
many respects still ambiguous" (p.
210).
Kockelmans, as if in response to
the implicit challenge from Heidegger
to address the art-technology differ-
ence, drops into his analysis of the art
essay numerous scattered references to
technology (or, as he prefers, "technic-
ity"). He also calls attention, in the
end, to Heidegger's final claim that his
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
inquiry "into the nature of art" is "the
preliminary and therefore indispensa-
ble preparation for the becoming of
art" (Heidegger, 1971, p. 78) and how
this is brought into question by the con-
tinuing predominance of modern tech-
nology. Kockelmans rightly notes
Heidegger's own explicit doubts in an
untranslated lecture on art delivered at
Athens in 1967 (Heidegger, 1983). But
Kockelmans' many comments add up
to very little substantive insight.
Kathleen Wright's (1984) "The
Place of the Work of Art in the Age of
Technology" has the distinction of ad-
dressing directly the topic that was
found to be neglected so regularly. It
has been followed by Friedrich-
Wilhelm von Herrmann's (1985) "Kunst
und Technik," another of the punctih-
ous and antiseptic expositions one has
come to expect from this author.
Wright's is clearly the superior piece.
It is distinguished by superior scholar-
ship, viz., by a subtle grasp of the origi-
nal German texts, by clarity of reason-
ing and the readiness to confront
Heidegger's reflections with eminent
predecessors (Descartes and Kant) and
contemporaries (Valery and Benja-
min). Finally, her thesis is intriguing
and profoundly hopeful. "I shall
argue," she says,
that for Heidegger it is within and
out of the displacement of the
work of art in the age of technol-
ogy that an alternative to place as
cult site or exhibition setting
emerges, an alternative which
exemplifies what is for Heidegger
the saving power of art (1984, p.
566).
More specifically, Wright en-
deavors to show that works of art,
sculpture in "Art and Space" (1969b),
and the peasant's shoes and the temple
in "The Origin of the Work of Art,"
145
open up a dwelling place that differs
fundamentally from scientific and tech-
nological space. Yet the result is in the
end disappointing.
Wright's and Heidegger's three ex-
amples are essentially pretechnologi-
cal; and in a pretechnological setting,
to be sure, they did or would establish a
nontechnological dwelling place. But
nothing in Wright's account would indi-
cate how these art works could assert
their orienting power within, against,
or after technology. For the saving
power to grow in our time, the relation
between art and technology must go
beyond mere otherness toward some
sort of affirmative interplay. Wright
has failed to answer convincingly
Heidegger's fearful question (1971, p.
80), "is art still an essential and neces-
sary way in which that truth happens
which is decisive for our historical exis-
tence, or is art no longer of this charac-
ter?" Like Heidegger, she is unable to
show that art may again be of this
character, and so her essay remains at
the level of higher exposition.
What most of the expository work
on art in Heidegger shows is that the
framework of technology has a close
analogue in the framework of scholar-
ship which like its technological ar-
chetype is largely concealed, well en-
trenched, and threatens to occlude the
saving power of things that might be
the occasion for a turn of affairs. More
particularly, that expository work
shows once more how the fertility of
Heidegger's thought requires, as
Heidegger himself recognized (1971, p.
5), adversaries, thinkers who challenge
Heidegger's insight from a position of
their own.
Beginnings of such a challenge can
be found in Harries (1968) whose
critique of modern art reflects Heideg-
ger's critique of modern subjectivity, of
the shallowness of technological exis-
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
14
tence, and Heidegger's looking forward
to a Jiew simplicity. But Harries goes
beyond Heidegger in his larger appreci-
ation of modern philosophy, of people
like Schopenhauer, Freud, Lukacs and
Sartre, and in his acquaintance with
the varieties of modern art. Much the
same can be said of Fandozzi's essays
(1979 and 1982) which in addition show
a keen eye for the corrupting force of
the consumer culture and boldness of
conjecture in contemplating the future
of technological art. David Hallibur-
ton's (1981) "From Poetic Thinking to
Concrete Interpretation" directs
Heidegger's reflections on technology,
the fourfold, and on the equipment
structure in Being and Time toward a
poem of Wordsworth's and discloses
how in the poem the centering force of
rural life is threatened by the emerging
technological framework and yet af-
firmed and entrusted to the future.
Halliburton quotes (p. 76) among
others from Heidegger's essay, "Build-
ing, Dwelling, Thinking" (1971, pp. 143
61). It contains an important and
largely neglected link between Heideg-
ger's thought on technology and on art
and between the diagnosis of technol-
ogy and the healing power of things.
The fruitfulness of those connections
appears in the possibility of finding
one's way from the terse and recondite
proposals of Heidegger to the rich, de-
tailed and hopeful work of Kent C.
Bloomer and Charles W. Moore in
Body, Memory, and Architecture and
of David P. Billington in The Tower and
the Bridge: The New Art of Structural
Engineering.^'' Here too the despair of
Schwan and Harries as regards the
centering force of art for the common
welfare, mentioned in section A, 7 of
this review, is answered in a quietly
constructive manner. And here, finally,
one may glimpse the outlines of the
new dwelling place for which Kathleen
Wright has been searching. These
hopes for a turn of technology will oc-
cupy us once more at the conclusion of
this review.
3. Mysticism and the East
Heidegger has not only thought
about the question of what may consti-
tute a genuine counterforce to technol-
ogy and bring about a turn of our des-
tiny. He has also practiced a kind of
thinking which may be taken as a radi-
cal alternative to technology, a kind of
thinking that Heidegger himself has
called meditative thinking (1966, p. 46).
It has a certain kinship with mysticism,
and the latter term has served as a
nodal point for critical and supportive
views of Heidegger's thought. These
contentions bear on our review inas-
much as mysticism is counterposed to
technology. The complexity of the issue
is heightened by Heidegger who, on the
one hand, rejects the term mysticism
for his thinking (1969a, p. 53). In an un-
published letter to Reinhart Maurer he
says pointedly: "Only those deal in the
'mysticism of Being' who are not able
to enact the thinking of Being, of its dis-
closing essence according to the on-
tological difference of Being and be-
ings." On the other hand, he acknowl-
edges that "to genuine and great mysti-
cism there belongs the utmost acute-
ness and profoundness of thinking as
well" (1957a, German edition, p. 71).
Moreover there is Heidegger's well-
known affection for the great Meister
Eckhart and his deep respect for East-
ern thought.
Regarding mysticism particularly,
the writers who use this term to charge
Heidegger with obscurantism and eva-
siveness more or less had the field to
themselves until the publication of John
D. Caputo's The Mystical Element in
Heidegger's Thought in 1978. His book
does much to clarify and advance the
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
discussion of Heidegger and mysticism.
First, it shows that the chief critics of
Heidegger's mysticism, Paul Hhner-
feld, Karl Lwith, and Laszlo Versenyi,
rely on a very tentative or even mista-
ken notion of mysticism. Caputo fur-
nishes constructive proof of this claim
by giving a careful exposition of Eck-
hart's mysticism (pp. 97-139). That ex-
position further allows for a detailed
distinction between mysticism proper
and Heidegger's thinking which,
Caputo says, is not truly mystical but
does contain a mystical element (pp.
222-40). Like mysticism, Heidegger's
thinking is the experience of a power
that we cannot and do not want to con-
trol and capture through conceptual
systems. Yet Heidegger's thinking has
a much higher and more explicit re-
gard for language than does mysticism.
It is more radically historical and
therefore more critical of metaphysics.
And it moves at so fundamental a level
that, unlike mysticism, it neither
nourishes nor seems to depend on the
moral conduct at the surface of every-
day life.
Caputo is keenly aware that the
mystical element in Heidegger in its re-
flective and receptive calmness is an-
tipodal to the aggressive busyness of
that technology and that technology is
always the implicit theme of medita-
tive thinking. He is, moreover, critical
of the austerity and reserve of Heideg-
ger's thought which seems to drive us
into the unhappy dilemma of the practi-
cally ineffective piety of thought vs. the
barren and suppressive practice of
cybernetics (1978, p. 257). As
documented earlier, Caputo's criticism
can be supported by explicit remarks of
Heidegger's. But it overlooks many
other, more constructive and helpful,
suggestions that Heidegger has made.
Caputo throughout his book calls
for a fruitfully adversarial relationship
147
with Heidegger's thought and rightly
rejects the epigones who dismiss every
criticism of Heidegger as a misun-
derstanding. But Caputo's own counter-
position to Heidegger is not rich and ar-
ticulate enough to nurture the seeds of
reform that lie concealed in Heideg-
ger's mystical element. Yet one should
not blame Caputo for doing first things
first. In regards to mysticism too,
Heidegger scholarship has been in a
primitive and deplorable state. Caputo
has brought clarity and order into this
neglected area. He has done so with
fairness toward his opponents, critical
sympathy toward Heidegger, with care-
ful scholarship, and in an engaging,
though occasionally expansive, style.
Western mysticism has a well-
known kinship with Eastern thought,
particularly with Zen Buddhism, and so
provides a link between Heidegger and
the East. Caputo considers this tie suc-
cinctly (1978, pp. 203-27) and illustrates
and elaborates relations that have pre-
viously emerged in a conference on
"Heidegger and Eastern Thought," or-
ganized in 1969 by Borgmann, Eliot
Deutsch, and others at the University
of Hawaii. (The proceedings were pub-
lished in Philosophy East and West 20,
no. 3 [July 1970].) The outcome of this
symposium was to document both
Heidegger's explicit interest in Oriental
thinking and various parallels between
Heideggerian and East Asian themes.
But the symposium also highlighted im-
portant differences, among them the
following. First, Buddhism'^ stress is
ethical, grounded in dealing with the
problem of suffering, whereas Heideg-
ger's is ontological, concerned with the
theme of Being. Second, for Buddhism
Being is not essentially historical, as it
is for Heidegger.
These considerations suggest that it
is perhaps instructive to examine in
more detail the relation between
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
148
Heidegger and one particular Asian
culture, namely the Japanese, stressing
more specifically one aspect of that cul-
ture, namely Zen Buddhism. Japanese
culture did not participate in the long
development of metaphysics that has
culminated in technology as Heidegger
has it. Rather, it has been strongly in-
formed by Zen Buddhism which, as ap-
pears from remarks above, is opposed
to technology. And the Japanese did in
fact provide one of the very few in-
stances where a community rejected a
technological innovation, in this case
firearms, for reasons that are conso-
nant with Heidegger's critique of tech-
nology."' But this was at the very begin-
ning of the modern era, and by now
Japan is perhaps the technologically
most accomplished country in the
world.
The limitation of what follows to
Zen Buddhism is justified on a number
of counts. From the side of Heidegger,
the most obvious is the importance of
Shuzo Kuki in the dialogue of On the
Way to Language (1971, pp. 1-54). (As it
happens, Kuki was also the man who
introduced Sartre to Heidegger. As a
student, after studying with Heidegger
in Freiburg, Kuki went to Paris. Sartre,
also a student, answered Kuki's adver-
tisement for a French tutor.) Kuki's in-
fluential The Structure of "IkV' (1930,
followed by numerous reprints) is a
phenomenological description of iki, of
that aesthetic way of life peculiar to the
Japanese. Based on stumi (taste or ele-
gance), it cannot easily be discussed,
but must be lived, an argument evi-
dently influenced by Heidegger's analy-
sis of the primordial character of Da-
sein ' s practical being-in-the-world.
Then there is the fact that Zen Bud-
dhism, like Heidegger's later thought,
seems to involve some kind of uniting
of art and mysticism. Finally, there is
William Barrett's unsubstantiated gos-
sip about Heidegger and Zen.''
From the side of Japan the justifi-
cation is even stronger. Not only has
Being and Time been translated into
Japanese more times (five) than into
any other language, Japanese commen-
tators have done a number of impor-
tant studies and adaptations of Heideg-
ger, work that has been summarized by
Hoshihiro Nitta, Hirotaka Tatematsu
and Eiichi Shimomisse in
"Phenomenology and Philosophy in
Japan.'"' More recently Akira Ishida
(1975) and Aritsune Yonezawa (1975)
have dealt directly with Heidegger's
philosophy of art and Shoichi Omori
(1972) has examined the relation be-
tween art and technology. Finally, at
the popular level, the Neo-Shintoist
Chikao Fijisawa appeals to Heidegger
in his critique of contemporary culture
and goes so far as to identify Das Sein
with the Kami (gods or divine forces in
Shinto).'^ This last example reminds us,
too, that the World War H alliance of
Germany and Japan should not be dis-
counted.
Despite such mutual and well-es-
tablished influences, however,
Japanese culture poses a number of
critical questions for Heidegger. At an
implicit level there is the sociological
fact that it was Japan, a country evi-
dently under the sway of decidedly non-
Western ways of thinking, that has
nevertheless, as mentioned above, been
the most adroit at adopting Western
technology. Surely this raises problems
for Heidegger's reading of modern
technology as dependent on Western
metaphysics.
At a more explicit level is the ex-
ample of Kitaro Nishida (1870-1945), the
greatest of Japanese philosophers.
Nishida was well acquainted with and
respectful of the work of Husserl and
Heidegger, besides being a man im-
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
bued with Buddhism, one who in fact
retired from teaching at the University
of Kyoto to die in a Zen monastery.
Robert Schinzinger, in an introduction
to his translation of Nishida's Intelligi-
hility and the Philosophy of Nothing-
ness, remarks on a number of compari-
sons between Nishida and Heidegger
and, indeed, more could have been ob-
served.'' Yet all such comparisons fade
beside Nishida's own criticisms of
Heidegger, which can be summarized
as two: (1) Heidegger has not gotten
hold of the concrete practical world in
his phenomenological description of
Dasein. His history is still a concept;
his "world" is not a real world which
determines human action but remains
a world of understanding.^ (2) Con-
sciousness in Husserl and Heidegger
has not been truly purged of individual-
ity and subjectivity. The transcendence
and objectivity of consciousness has not
been recognized. (This second argu-
ment, while not specifically applied
against Heidegger, occurs again and
again throughout Fundamental Prob-
lems and other works.)
There remain of course two strong
parallels between Zen Buddhism and
Heidegger, one from the later Heideg-
ger and one from the early. Both
Buddhism and the later Heidegger
teach that the highest human possibil-
ity is reached in a spirit of detachment
and receptivity, the counter-position to
self-love or subjectivism. It was
reached by Eugen Herrigel, as his ac-
count in Zen in the Art of Archery tells
us, when he ceased in his endeavors to
master his shot and let "It" shoot
(Caputo, 1978, pp. 208-9).'^ The other
parallel comes from Heidegger's 1929
lecture What is Metaphysics? where he,
much like the Buddhist tradition,
speaks about the Nothing as the
groundless ground of all there is
(Caputo, 1978, pp. 212-13). But on this
149
 point there is not only a parallel but a
divergence of views as well, i.e., a con-
troversy on whether Heidegger had
grasped the Nothing with sufficient
radicality (Nakaoka, 1985).
Before we turn to concluding re-
marks on the light that the relation of
Heidegger and the East sheds on tech-
nology, an aside on Heidegger and the
Nothing is required. Critics of Heideg-
ger have pounced on his reflection on
the Nothing to accuse him of nihilism.
That Heidegger should be stigmatized
as a nihilist especially by someone such
as Stanley Rosen (1969) is passing
strange. Rosen is a student of Leo
Strauss, a proponent of two principles
which should guard against such a pre-
cipitous and rhetorical judgment: the
idea that one must be very careful
about claiming to understand a philoso-
pher better than he understands him-
self; and a careful distinction between
opinion and knowledge, exoteric and
esoteric teachings. Heidegger perhaps
_more than any other contemporary
philsopher has claimed to be trying to
overcome that nihilism which he sees
as the culmination of the Western
philosophical tradition. With regard to
the alleged nihilistic character of
Heidegger's teaching, the refutation by
David A. White (1975) is persuasive.
Heidegger's own defense against
the charge of nihilism is readily avail-
able in The Question of Being (1956). In
its original form the essay was ad-
dressed to Ernst Jnger in a
Festschrift for his sixtieth birthday in
response to one from Jnger com-
memorating Heidegger's own sixtieth
anniversary six years previously.
Jnger's contribution was entitled
"ber die Linie," understood by Jnger
as "across" or "over the line" (of
nihilism), i.e., as an attempt at moving
beyond nihilism. In reply, Heidegger
urges that nihilism as the end phase of
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
150
metaphysics and as technology is too
well entrenched to yield to a quick and
determined move. Hence he proposes
that we read ber as "concerning" and
engage in a reflection "Concerning the
Line" of nihilism, a suggestion that
Fandozzi has taken up in his essay
Nihilism and Technology (1982).
Heidegger in The Question of Being
(1956) is less than sanguine about the
prospect of a deeper understanding of
nihilism. In fact the facile concept and
charge of nihilism at times enters into
an unholy alliance with a shallow no-
tion of myticism. Their putative eva-
siveness and obscurantism are seen by
Rosen as the reason for Heidegger's
political imprudence. In a similar
spirit, Strauss says of Heidegger's
thought: "There is no room for political
philosophy in Heidegger's work, and
this may well be due to the fact that the
room in question is occupied by gods or
the gods" (1971, p. 2).
Yet however misdirected these ob-
jections, they do raise an important
question of long standing, the question,
i.e., of whether personal mysticism
does not have a fatal inclination toward
practical imprudence and political
nihilism. In the present context we can
formulate the question more cautiously
and ask, in conclusion, whether the
mystical element in Heidegger and the
kindred movements in Eastern thought
have helped us to see technology more
clearly and hopefully.
To begin with the East, the com-
plex of issues involving technology, its
reform, and the Japanese experience is
of great philosophical and current in-
terest. Its present prominence in this
country is due to the fact that the con-
ception that Americans have of their
place in the world and in history is
strongly informed by the technological
power and prowess of the United
States. But this claim to world histori-
cal significance is now being chal-
lenged by Japan which in productivity
and increasingly in research is overtak-
ing the United States. This has led, as
Murray Sayle and Ian Buruma have
shown in different ways, to anger and
incomprehension on the American side
and to searching and troubling debates
among the Japanese.''
The philosophically challenging
issue unhappily falls between the horns
of the dilemma that Caputo has de-
plored (1978, p. 257). The American
reaction and the Japanese responses
that Sayle considers are firmly within
the framework of the calculating think-
ing of technology. At the same time or-
thodox Eastern and comparative phi-
losophy as well as the usual Heidegger
scholarship timidly cling to the high
and highest ground of philosophical
abstraction and tradition. At a confer-
ence on "The Critique of the Times
after Heidegger" which was held at the
University of Augsburg (West Ger-
many), scholars from West Germany,
France, Italy, the United States, and
Japan were in attendance.'' Though it
was in many ways a stimulating and
rewarding affair and proceeded under
an appropriately ambiguous and pro-
vocative title, there was little consid-
eration of the concrete circumstances
under which technology is taking its
course around the globe. If there was
an undercurrent of vital interest, it was
furnished by the playfulness of recent
French philosophy.
Buruma, however, believes to have
discovered a philosophical force in
Japanese politics that is critical of
technology and has practical though
limited significance. He names Takeshi
Umehara as the leader of a racist and
chauvinist school of philosophy
(Heidegger's name comes up in this
context) whose members, so Buruma
says, proclaim traditional Japanese
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
culture as the world's sole salvation
and have met regularly with Prime
Minister Nakasone to discuss Japan's
national identity.
At the Honolulu conference, Umeh-
ara (1970) read a paper acknowledging
his debt to Heidegger (p. 273), denounc-
ing the technological culture of "mate-
rial goods and sex" (p. 272; cf p. 278),
and calling for a "continuing dialogue
between thinkers of the East and the
West" about the global destiny of
humankind (p. 281). Whether Umehara
has in fact moved on to an intolerant
and repressive position is impossible to
establish from the direct quotations,
but his account is a warning to those
who would criticize the technologically
specified liberal state that they make
themselves clear on the indispensable
value of tolerance and civil liberty.
Is there any hope of drawing from
the sources of mysticism and Eastern
thought to irrigate in a liberal and to-
lerant way the barren ground that lies
between the technological enterprise
and philosophical meditation? As re-
gards the East, there may be such cul-
tivation going on now, and we are ig-
norant of it due to the fact, remarked
by Heidegger in his letter to the Hon-
olulu conference, "that with few excep-
tions there is no command of the East-
ern languages either in Europe or in
the United States" (1970, p. 221). As re-
gards myticism and the mystical ele-
ment in Heidegger, it will be a matter
of first recovering that tradition in the
fuller and perhaps more vital setting of
religion and Christianity.
4. Relgion and Christianity
In the Spiegel interview Heidegger
was asked whether the individual or
philosophy could influence the constric-
tive network of the absolute technologi-
cal state. Heidegger denied that possi-
bility and gave his by now celebrated
151
 answer: "Only a god can save us"
(1976a, p. 277). The significance of this
answer is underlined not only by the
fact that Heidegger once more brought
up "the arrival or the absence of the
god" when the question of reform arose
again a little later in the interview; the
answer also hearkens back to the close
of Heidegger's major essay on technol-
ogy where, taking guidance from Hl-
derlin, he asserts that at the height of
the danger of technology the saving
power would grow as well (1977, p. 28).
Is God then the one to whom
Heidegger instructs us to turn for sal-
vation in the face of the danger of tech-
nology? Not really, for Heidegger
speaks of a god or the god; "god" is not
a proper name for him. This seemingly
fine point of linguistic usage is a clue to
the complex relation Heidegger had
throughout his life to religion and
Christianity. And the broader context
in which this point has its place also
contains a complex relation between
-technology and Christianity in Heideg-
ger's thought. These complexities must
be outlined and if possible clarified to
provide a fuller context for the review
of work on Heidegger and technology.
The point is to round out this context
rather than furnish a review of the lit-
erature on Heidegger, religion, Christ-
ianity, and theology, a literature that is
extensive and requires a survey in its
own right.
Heidegger grew up in simple,
rural, and intensely Roman Catholic
circumstances. For a gifted boy4xi such
a setting an academic career meant
studying for the priesthood. People like
Heidegger's parents would otherwise
neither have had the courage to aim so
high for their son nor would they have
mustered the resolve to take on the nec-
essary economic burdens.'^ In the brief
autobiographical sketch that Heidegger
has left us he appears to remember his
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
152
time of Catholic education without re-
sentment; in fact, he singles out two of
his clerical mentors with obvious affec-
tion (1958, pp. 3-4). Similarly, he wrote
about the religious life of his boyhood
with unreserved warmth.'^ And when
he felt his death approaching, he asked
a Catholic priest, Bernhard Welte, that
he "say a few words in his memory at
the burial" (Welte, 1982, p. 86).
And yet Caputo, surely a well-in-
formed and sensible reader of Heideg-
ger, says of his thought that it is "radi-
cally worldly and secular" (1978,
p. 252). The standard argument in sup-
port of this view has been assembled by
James L. Perotti in Heidegger on the
Divine (1974). Perotti follows Heideg-
ger's development to show how his
questions became increasingly radical
and broke through the established ways
of thinking and speaking, including
those that one follows to reflect and
talk about God. These are now seen to
be restricted and superficial. Tradi-
tional theology is discredited. But this
is not to deny God. At the deeper level
of thought that Heidegger attains a new
experience of God becomes possible.
Perotti is concerned to present
Heidegger's views of the divine and
God within the over-all movement of
Heidegger's thought, and much of his
book is devoted to tracing this move-
ment. What mars this laudable inten-
tion is the triumphalist tone of Perotti's
account in which the power and tren-
chancy of Heidegger effortlessly pre-
vail over all traditions and objections.
Perotti's ambitious preoccupation
moreover disburdens him from a more
modest but desirable achievement, viz.,
a careful historical-doxographical ac-
count of the periodic emergence and
submersion of the religious theme in
Heidegger's work. Finally Perotti
seems unsure of his conclusion, both of
its substance and of its radicality. As
regards his substantive finding, he first
asserts: "The word about god will
come forth from Heidegger only as a
response to the presence or absence of
god" (p. 118). But then he has Heideg-
ger disavow any experience of God and
defer to the "unique prerogative of the
poet" on this point. "Heidegger,"
Perotti says, "has selected and com-
mitted his thinking to the poet Hlder-
lin" (p. 119).
Concerning the radicality of
Heidegger's position Perotti seems una-
ware of the crucial question, what bear-
ing the thinking of Being will finally
have on God and the divine. The tenor
of Perotti's book suggests that the
superior and in fact supreme radicality
of Heidegger's thinking and of its
theme. Being, will provide a radically
new ground or space for the appear-
ance of God. In this case, God would no
longer be the supreme power but
merely a moment within the history of
Being. At the same time, Perotti's
explicit conclusions, considered just
now, both intimate a more limited role
for Being and its thinking, one that
would finally be in the service of God's
epiphany. On this question one might
not agree with Caputo; but one must
certainly acknowledge the forthright-
ness and clarity of his answer which
embraces the former of the alterna-
tives above. "I do not mean that there
is no place for God in the later Heideg-
ger," he says, "but that Heidegger's
God is not the Lord of history. He does
not govern the missions of Being with
loving care. Rather His own appear-
ance in history is subject to the move-
ments of the world-play" (1978, p. 254).
The religious view of Heidegger's
thought is taken by Heidegger's great
fellow townsman, Bernhard Welte.
Being, Welte points out, is never a de-
finitive theme or power in Heidegger's
thought. It is at first "only a formal and
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
tentative indication of a goal" (1982,
p. 88; our translation from the origi-
nal). And toward the end of Heideg-
ger's career, the word "Being" re-
mains behind and no longer needs to be
mentioned (1982, pp.95, 97, and 98).
Caputo would so far agree with Welte.
But Welte sees the early Heidegger's
reflections on the oblivion of Being and
on the simultaneous disclosure and con-
cealment of Being as stages on the way
toward Heidegger's experience of the
absence of God. And Heidegger, so
Welte continues, not only gives expres-
sion to this absence but takes steps to-
ward a positive appreciation of this ab-
sence so that in that absence first hints
of the presence of the All-High begin to
appear.
Welte presents his case with sub-
tlety and insight. And its seems sub-
stantially right. But it is also narrow,
both systematically and in point of
Heidegger's intellectual biography. To
begin with the latter, here as in many
other respects, scholars have allowed
the old Heidegger to set the tone for the
interpretation of the younger Heideg-
ger's work. In this way, a harmony and
consistency appear in the development
of Heidegger's relation to God and reli-
gion that did not in fact obtain. It is not
the case that Heidegger began from a
religious position and then moved on to
a searching examination of Being
which led him beyond a vital faith in
God (Caputo) or to a profound experi-
ence of the absence of God (Perotti)
and of intimation of a new ephiphany
(Welte). It is apparent from the scat-
tered references to God, Christianity,
and faith in Being and Time that
Heidegger at the height of his first
great accomplishment did not just re-
flect more deeply and dispassionately
on his religious position but was con-
cerned to put a great critical distance
between his work and religion.''
153
 In the year of the pubUcation of our question, but he cannot really
Being and Time, he gave a lecture on question without ceasing to be a
"Phenomenology and Theology" believer and taking all the conse-
(1976b, pp. 3-21), a document which has quences of such a step. He will
only be able to act 'as i f . . . (1953,
been available in German since 1970
p. 6).
and which both Perotti and Welte have
ignored. There he tried to work out, in As he often does, Heidegger goes on to
light of Being and Time, a principled soften and qualify this categorical
relationship between philosophy and statement on a crucial issue and re-
theology, one that would give each dis- marks that such unquestioning faith is
cipline its due. Roughly, philosophy is really no faith at all but rather conveni-
taken by Heidegger as the reflection on ence and indifference.
the basic modes of Being that can be Still, Heidegger comes at least very
undertaken without envisaging the spe- close to saying that the Christian can-
cific Christian mode of being in the not be a philosopher. Both in 1927 and
world. Theology by contrast, is based in 1935 he dismisses Christian philoso-
on the philosophically unsurpassable gi- phy as "a wooden iron" (1976b, p. 21,
venness of faith. Theology, therefore, where the translator has "square cir-
cannot take its direction from philoso- cle"; 1953, p. 6; the translator has
phy. As a scholarly enterprise, how- "round square"). One might suppose
ever, it must draw in a complementary that the venturesome resoluteness that
and preliminary way on the philosophi- Heidegger thinks to be closed off to the
cal illumination of the basic modes of believer is of a piece with the subjec-
human existence. Heidegger tries to tive and voluntaristic authenticity of
capture this result by saying that, al- the early Heidegger that, in the later
though philosophy cannot give direction Heidegger, as Zimmerman has shown
to theology, it does provide correction. (1981), yields to detachment and open-
Philosophy could well exist without act- ness as the authentic mode of human
ing as a theological corrective. Simi- being. And the latter attitude is much
larly faith, though not the scholarly dis- closer to faith as is evident from the
cipline of theology, can exist without proximity of Heidegger and Meister
philosophy. Eckhart, considered in the previous
But just when Heidegger has ar- section. Yet as late as 1954, in a conver-
rived at this adjudication of the various sation with Protestant philosophers and
claims and territories, he goes on to theologians, Heidegger if anything saw
say that faith as a mode of existence is an even deeper chasm dividing theol-
the mortal enemy of the mode of exis- ogy and philosophy (1976b, pp. 59-71).
tence that belongs to philosophy (1976b, It is this dualistic and sometimes
p. 20). The reason is only hinted at. angry view of the relationship of the
Faith is contrasted with the philoso- philosopher to the believer that is omit-
phers' free appropriation of their own ted by Perotti and Welte. We should
total existence. Eight years later, in In- spell out at this point what is implicit in
troduction to Metaphysics, Heidegger the preceding sections. Even at his
spells out what is at issue in this con- most critical, Heidegger would never
trast: join in the criticism of Christianity that
has gained currency under the name of
One who holds to such faith can in the "Lynn White Thesis," according to
a way participate in the asking of which Christianity, by despiritualizing

PHILOSOPHY TODAY

154
nature, provides a tabula rasa for tech-
nology and abettes the ecological
crisis.'' For Heidegger, the metaphysi-
cal origins of technology arise much
earlier, viz., with Plato. And they come
to a tangible fruition much later,
namely toward the middle and end of
the modern period. It should also be
noted that one who grew up in a setting
that was shaped in the Middle Ages and
where many a medieval practice was
still alive would be immune to the
seductive simplicity of White's thesis.
Side by side with the critical and
separatist view of Christianity, faith,
and theology we do find the other view
which is very nearly the received one
and from which the philosopher's work
is seen as the replacement of theology
or at least as a new preparation for
theology and perhaps even faith. The
preparatory view is first given pro-
grammatically in the Letter on
Humanism, written in 1946, where
Heidegger says:
Only from the truth of Being can
the essence of the holy be thought.
Only from the essence of the holy
is the essence of divinity to be
thought. Only in the light of the es-
sence of divinity can it be thought
or said what the word "God" is to
signify (1947, p. 230; see also
p. 218).
In "The Onto-Theo-Logical Consititu-
tion of Metaphysics" of 1957, Heidegger
not only proposes such a program but
appears to claim it as his own. He
suggests that his refusal to talk about
God is due to the fact that he has ex-
perienced theology in its genuine
rootedness, "both the theology of Chris-
tian faith and that of philosophy"
(1957b, pp. 54-55). And he submits that
his "god-less thinking which must
abandon the god of philosophy, god as
causa sui, is thus perhaps closer to the
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
divine God" (1957b, p. 72). Closer than
the mainstream believers and theolo-
gians? This is what Heidegger in his
rustic sort of cunning implies but then
explicitly denies when he continues:
"Here this means only: god-less think-
ing is more open to Him than onto-theo-
logic would like to admit" (ibid.).'''
What are we to make of the fact
that in Heidegger's thought a dismis-
sive and dualistic and a concernful and
preparatory view of faith and theology
are vying with one another? Setting
aside narrowly biographical considera-
tions and returning to the question of
technology, we can see that what the
two views have in common is a deep
concern for the difficulty and signifi-
cance of the task of thought. In the
dualistic position, which is essentially
the earlier one, we can see a concern to
face up to the difficulty of philosophical
reflection and to keep premature and
pat answers at bay. The difficulty at
first occupies Heidegger more than the
significance of thought since the early
radical resolve of his work was still
ambiguous and without firm guidance,
as suggested many times in the forego-
ing pages. But as Heidegger settled
more and more clearly on the destiny
of technology as the crucially signifi-
cant issue of thought, his attitude to-
ward faith and theology became more
conciliatory and congenial.
Yet Heidegger remained worried
that the clearing he was trying to open
up for a new advent of divinity would
be overgrown by the facile and ineffec-
tive pronouncements of the established
ways of thinking. This is especially evi-
dent in Heidegger's epistolary reply to
Welte's article (Welte, 1975, p. 85). He
gently reminds Welte of two things:
first, that his concern with the question
of God cannot be separated from his re-
flections on the modern history of
Being, i.e., on technology and science;
155
and second, that he has come to no con-
clusions, that he is still "on the path of
inquiry."
Heidegger's assertion that only a
god can save us from the danger of
technology is not just a flourish or
rhetoric of despair. His thought on tech-
nology cannot be fully grasped without
attention to his reflections on divinity
and God. But neither should one as-
sume that there is a theological answer
to Heidegger's philosophical question.
The radically new epoch of Being in
which we are implicated requires us to
rethink from the ground up what we
mean by faith and how we experience
the divine. More specifically we must
clarify the religious and theological sig-
nificance of our practical and reflective
experience of science and technology.
Such a proposal, of course, would be
anathema to Protestant theologians,
such as Karl Barth, who reject as an
expression of human arrogance any re-
flection that is even tentatively inde-
pendent of and antecendent to faith.
Catholic theologians, such as Welte and
Karl Rahner, nevertheless work in a
tradition that has long practiced such
procursive reflection under the heading
of fundamental theology.
Heidegger's thought is consensual
with Catholicism not only along this
traditional theological line but also
through Heidegger's sacramental con-
ception of reality that is so evident in
his reflections on the fourfold. The Ger-
man word for fourfold, Vierung, is in
fact the technical term for the crossing
of nave and transept in a medieval
church. The cathedral in Freiburg
where Heidegger lived for most of his
life has a powerful Romanesque cross-
ing, concealed under the roof of the
nave, as a point of balance between the
austere Gothic nave, the magnificient
late Gothic choir, and the late
Romanesque transept. That Heidegger
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
156
throughout his life accepted the cul-
tural embodiment of Catholic Christian-
ity in his native environment is evident
from scattered remarks in his formal
essays and from various addresses he
gave in his hometown of Messkirch
(Mller, 1986, p. 30).
There are, to be sure, many other
theological currents that may fruitfully
converge with Heidegger's thought,
notably process theology which shares
important parts of Heidegger's critique
of metaphysics and of a metaphysically
structured theology. The problem of the
relationship between technology and
theology in Heidegger is only beginning
to receive attention, and this is true of
the general field of technology and
theology. A beginning has been made in
Carl Mitcham and Jim Crete's anthol-
ogy. Theology and Technology.'^^ It
shows how inadequate are our tradi-
tional categories of history and philoso-
phy, of cause and effect, of power and
grace, of failure and wholeness, of the
sacred and the profane, and how diffi-
cult it is to rethink these matters in
light of the challenge of Heidegger's
thought and of our experience of tech-
nology and faith.
5. The Overcoming of Technology
We have clustered the works under
review around thematic points. But
running through those clusters is a pro-
gressive movement of scholarship with
three discernible stages. The first is the
stage of translation and exposition. The
translations clearly were necessary to
acquaint a larger audience with
Heidegger's thought: the larger the au-
dience to be reached, the more formi-
dable the obstacle of linguistic compla-
cency. The expositions were intended to
help Anglo-American readers over-
come the idiosyncrasies of Heidegger's
style and to spell out those assumptions
of Heidegger's that could not be taken
for granted in these parts. Whether the
expository work has in fact made a sig-
nificant contribution to the Heidegger
reception in the EngUsh speaking world
is uncertain. At any rate, it is time for
this phase to come to an end.
The next stage is that of a dialogue
where Heidegger's thought on technol-
ogy is drawn into a serious conversa-
tion with the best minds of modern and
contemporary thought. This has been
done for the philosophy of science by
Patrick A. Heelan and for environmen-
talism by Michael Zimmerman. The
task is yet to be accomplished in a sub-
stantial way for social and political phi-
losophy, for the philosophy of art, and
for theology. One can expect that in this
country important contributions to this
stage of development will be forthcom-
ing. There is, so one may hope, a happy
convergence of two currents that will
advance this enterprise. One is the
growing realization in social and politi-
cal philosophy that a less formalistic
and pedantic, a more substantive and
lively approach is needed, that philoso-
phy must join again the conversation of
humanity and respond to the concrete
apprehensions and aspirations of the
human family. The other current is the
growing interest in Heidegger's con-
cerns on the part of Anglo-American
philosophers who command profes-
sional attention and some attention in
the culture at large.
The third stage is one of explora-
tion and development. It consists of at-
tempts to build on Heidegger's work or
to work under Heidegger's inspiration
in exploring issues that have been neg-
lected or mistaken by Heidegger and in
articulating a vision of our world which
is different from Heidegger's, perhaps
less ambiguous or more hopeful than
his. This stage is exemplified in its ex-
ploratory side by Don Ihde's work and
in its developmental aspect by the
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
books of Edward G. Ballard and Wil-
liam Barrett. Such work surely repre-
sents the most important stage and
fruit of Heidegger scholarship. As re-
marked at the beginning of this review,
if Heidegger's thought finally matters,
it will be through work of this kind, as-
suming that such work in turn will at
long last inform our social and cultural
practices.
Work of this kind, as admitted at
the beginning, exceeds the limits of the
present review. An example is Hubert
Dreyfus' powerful critique of the pre-
tensions of artificial intelligence and
his endeavor to work out a conception
of human practice and intelligence
which would be a fruitful and more ap-
propriate alternative to the one that
guides workers in computer science.''
The Heideggerian inspiration of What
Computers Can't Do and the later Mind
over Machine is obvious and acknowl-
edged. But one would not call this a
book on Heidegger and technology.
Is it possible to say something
more about the tasks and prospects of
work on technology that departs from
Heidegger? Dreyfus has provided a
helpful sketch for a program. He calls
for "a two-stage strategy," the first
stage of which is the deconstruction of
theoretical holism (1980, p. 22). This, as
suggested above, should not take the
form envisaged by Dreyfus of refuting
(some of) the explanatory claims of
(scientific) theories, but of showing
their limits and of disentangling the
problem of modern science from that of
modern technology.
The second stage in turn has two
parts. First "one must give an interpre-
tation of our current cultural situation
by finding a cultural paradigm, . . .
which focuses our dominant practices
. . . " (1980, p. 22). Such a paradigm
would have to incorporate what Heideg-
ger has to say about the framework, re-
157
sources, and procuring, and it would
allow a testing of his insights against
the phenomena and the literature of so-
cial reality. It might allow a sharper
delimitation of technology. We could
then see more clearly what measures
of reform would be mere variants and
promotions of technology and which
would be genuine and fruitful counter-
forces.
As regards the latter, Dreyfus de-
parts from Heidegger's remark that we
should seek the saving power "here and
now and in little things." Dreyfus takes
this as a call to attend to pretechnologi-
cal micropractices. The latter term,
taken from Foucault, may at first seem
out of place. What does Heidegger's
cryptic remark mean? "In little
things" is "im Geringen" in German.
Gering means poor, inconspicuous,
simple. In Heidegger's essay, the term
surely hearkens back to the passage in
"The Thing" where he says:
Nestling, malleable, pliant, com-
pliant, nimble in Old German
these are called ring and gering.
The mirror-play of the worlding
world, as the ringing of the ring,
wrests free the united four into
their own compliancy, the circling
compliancy of their presence. Out
of the ringing mirror-play the
thinging of the thing takes place
(1971, p. 180).
In the second essay on technology, the
counter-position of the thing in which a
world appears to the framework of
technology is made explicit (1977a,
pp. 433 and 446).
Dreyfus only mentions literary and
historical examples of micropractices
(1980, p. 22). But he insists that we
must assemble "all the evidence in our
micropractices and this of course in-
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
158
cludes our linguistic practices that
an alternative understanding of human
beings once existed and still continues,
although drowned out by our everyday
busy concerns" (1980, pp. 22-23).
Heidegger points to things and hardly
to the practices in which they exist. But
once we can recognize the simple
things, we can see the micropractices
as well: the celebration of meals,
games, plays, and prayers, thoughtful
and communal reading, hiking in the
wilderness, work that engages us, and
more. Such practices will seem
hopelessly idyllic and impotent unless
we see them in the balance that Heideg-
ger and Dreyfus emphasize, counter-
weighted by an incisive critique of tech-
nology which exposes the pointlessness
of its present reign.
I think We can take still further
steps. The world will remain largely
and permanently technological. But we
can and must make it generous to
things and to the practices in which
they prevail. We must, moreover, re-
flect on the fact that focal ("thinging")
things will have a new character in the
widely technological universe. Corres-
pondingly the surrounding practices
cannot in the long run just be revivals
or continuations of pretechnological
customs.
As both Heidegger and Dreyfus in-
dicate, final success lies beyond our
willing. To acknowledge this and to act
on that acknowledgment is anything
but passive. Yet while the strategy just
outlined seems to us radical and conse-
quential, it provides only a start. Most
philosophy either drifts along with
something that has become deeply
questionable, or it exhausts itself in
perplexity. What is needed is the cour-
age of a simple and insightful begin-
ning.
 ENDNOTES
1. Gerald Holton, "On Being Caught Between
Dionysians and Apollonians," Daedalus 103, no.
3, (Summer 1974): 65-81.
2. A minor monument to the violence of this clash
can be found in John R. Searle's review of
Jonathan Culler's book on deconstruction, 'The
World Turned Upside Down," New York Review
of Books 30, no. 16 (October 27, 1983): 74-79
and in a subsequent exchange of letters between
Louis H. Mackey and Searle, ibid 31, no. 1
(February 2, 1984): 47-48. A balanced account of
the general controversy has been given by Gary
Gutting, "Paradigms and Hermeneutics: A
Dialogue on Kuhn, Rorty and the Social Sci-
ences," American Philosophical Quarteriy 21, no.
1 Qanuary 1984): 1-15.
3. Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle
Maintenance (New York: Morrow, 1974), p. 40.
4. See, e.g., Jerome Ravetz, Scientific Knowledge
and Its Social Consequences (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1971).
5. For more on this history of Being within which
Heidegger situates the issue of technology, see
Bernd Magnus, Heidegger's Metahistory of Phi-
losophy: Amor Fati, Being and Truth (The
Hague: Nijhoff, 1970); Werner Marx (1971);
Sandra Lee Bartky (1979, in section B, 2 of the
bibliography); the "Heidegger and the History of
Philosophy" theme issue of The Monist 64, no. 4
(October 1981), with articles by Hans-Georg
Gadamer, Bernd Magnus, David Farrell Krell,
David A. Kolb, Mark B. Okrent, David A. White
and Thomas Sheehan; and Michael Allen Gilles-
pie, Hegel Heidegger, and the Ground of His-
tory (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1984). The last volume is the best.
6. Albert Hofstadter, Truth and Art (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1965), p. 157.
Hofstadter's position is actually more influenced
by Heidegger than the few explicit references
would indicate. After all, Hofstadter takes as his
own the title of the last section of Heidegger's art
essay.
7. Bernd Magnus, Heidegger's Metahistory of Phi-
losophy, op. cit note 5, p. 91.
8. For a provocative appreciation of the relationship
between practical engagements and science con-
tained in the work of two other philosophers who
can help throw light on what is at issue here, see
Edith Wyschograd, "The Logic of Artifactual
Existents: John Dewey and Claude Levi-
Strauss," Man and World 14, no. 3 (1981): 235
250.
9. Charles Hartshome, Beyond Humanism: Essays
in the Philosophy of Nature (Lincoln: University
of Nebraska Press, 1968), p. 305. For two
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
Heidegger-influenced approaches to understand-
ing the historically conditioned conceptions of na-
ture which are nevertheless quite compatible
with a critical-realistic stance, see Wolfgang
Schadewaldt's "The Concepts of Nature and
Technique According to the Greeks" and Jacob
Klein's "The Nature of Nature," both in Research
in Philosophy and Technology, vol. 2 (1979), pp.
159-171 and 173-188, respectively.
10. John Caputo, "The Thought of Being and the
Conversation of Mankind: The Case of Heidegger
and Rorty," Review of Metaphysics 36, no. 3,
whole no. 143 (March 1983): 661-685.
11. William J. Richardson, Heidegger: Through
Phenomenology to Thought (The Hague: Nijhoff,
1967); and J.L. Mehta, Martin Heidegger: The
Way and the Vision, revised edition (Honolulu:
University of Hawaii Press, 1976).
12. Otto Pggeler, ed., Heidegger: Perspektiven zur
Deutung seines Werks (Cologne: Kiepenheuer
and Witsch, 1969).
13. It is worth noting that according to Karl Jaspers,
Heidegger was quite critical of Jaspers' own style
with its overlong sentences. See the section of
Jaspers' philosophical autobiography on "Heideg-
ger," in Paul Arthur Schilpp, ed.. The Philosophy
of Karl Jaspers: Augmented Edition (LaSalle, IL:
Open Court, 1981), pp. 75/1-75/16. Although
written in the 1950s, Jaspers would not allow
these pages to be published until after both his
and Heidegger's deaths. It is thus spliced in be-
tween pages 75 and 76 in this new edition of the
Schilpp volume. For good commentary on the
Heidegger-Jaspers relationship see two articles
by David Farrell Krell: "Toward Sein und Zeit:
Heidegger's Early Review (1919-1920) of Jas-
pers' Psychologie der Weltanschaungen, " Journal
of the British Society for Phenomenology 6, no. 3
(October 1975): 147-156; and "The Heidegger-
Jaspers Relationship," ibid. 9, no. 2 (May 1978):
126-129.
14. As an aside, it should also be noted that Egbert
Schuurman's argument for Heidegger's depen-
dence on Friedrich Georg Jnger, Ernst's
younger brother, has no substantive basis
(Schuurman, 1980, pp. 100-102). To suggest that
Heidegger adopted the term "total mobilization"
from Friedrich Jnger's Die Perfection der Tech-
nik (written in 1939, but not published in full until
1946), when this phrase occurs as the title of a
volume by Ernst Jnger in 1931, betrays an un-
fortunate lapse of scholarship. Strangely enough,
even Joseph Kockelmans (1984, pp. 228-229) ac-
cepts Schuurman's unsubstantiated claim.
15. For Krell's articles, see note 13. Hermann Mr-
chen's studies can be found in the relatively brief
159
 (2 pages) Macht und Herrschaft in Denken von
Adorno und Heidegger (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta,
1980) and the much longer (over 700 pages)
Adorno und Heidegger: Versuch zu einer philoso-
phischen Kommunika tions Verweigerung
(Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1981).
16. See, e.g., Richard Rorty, "Overcoming the Trad-
ition: Heidegger and Dewey," in Michael Murray,
ed. (1978), as well as his (1979); and P. F. Straw-
son's review of George Steiner (1979), "Take the
B Train," New York Review of Books 26, no. 6
(April 19, 1979): 35-37.
17. Arne Naess, "The Shallow and the Deep, Long
Range Ecology: A Summary," Inquiry 16, no. 1
(Spring 1973): 95-100; and Christopher Stone,
Should Trees Have Standing? (Los Altos, CA:
Kaufmann, 1974).
18. Stone, Trees, op. cit. note 17, pp. 42-54.
19. See, e.g., Gary Snyder, "Re-inhabitation," in his
The Old Ways (San Francisco: City Lights
Books, 1977), pp. 57-66, based on a talk given at
the "Reinhabitation Conference" supported by
the California Council on the Humanities and held
at the North San Juan School in August 1976.
20. Hendrik van Riessen, Filosophie en Techniek
(Kampen: Kok, 1949). This huge (over 700
pages) historico-philosophical study of the precur-
sors of the philosophy of technology remains de-
finitive to this date.
21. A spectrum of reviews: The lead-offs were James
Atlas, "Pursuit of the Really Real," Tinie (Sep-
tember 4, 1978): 76 and 79; and Richard Boeth,
"The End of Reason," Newsweek (October 2,
1978): 98; followed by Marjorie Grene, untitled
review. New Republic 179, no. 16 (October 14,
1978) : 28-30; and John Murray Cuddihy, "Philos-
opher Home Free," New York Times Book Re-
view (December 24, 1978): 5. Eventually came
Jane Larkin Grain, "A Leap of Faith," National
Review 31, no. 1 (March 2, 1979): 304 and 306;
Peter Singer, "Human Prospecting," New York
Review of Books 26, no. 4 (March 22, 1979): 30
32; and Louis Dupre, "Being and tllt^ Will to
Prayer," Commonweal 106, no. 11 Oune 8,
1979) : 343-344. See also Borgmann, 1980b.
22. See, along these same lines, some suggestions
regarding the phenomenological differences be-
tween tool and machine interactions with the
human world and the need for a more thorough
delineation of Heidegger's Zeug phenomenology,
in Carl Mitcham, "Types of Technology," Re-
sarch in Philosophy and Technology, vol. 1
(1978), pp. 238-239.
23. Stuart F. Spicker, ed., Organism, Medicine, and
Metaphysics: Essays in Honor of Hans Jonas on
his 75th Birthday (Boston: Reidel, 1978).
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
160
24. The other commentary, Michael Gelven's A
Commentary on Heidegger's "Being and Time"
(New York: Harper Torchbook, 1970) is, how-
ever, a better general study.
25. See, e.g., Theodor Adorno, The Jargon of Au-
thenticity (Evanston, IL: Northwestern Univer-
sity Press, 1973; German publication, 1964);
Marcuse (1977b); and the studies by Hermann
Mrchen cited in note 15.
26. See Georg Lukacs. Existentialisme ou Mar-
xismen trans. E. Keleman (Paris: Nagel, 1948);
and "Existentialism," in R.W. Sellars, V.J.
McGill, and M . Frber, eds.. Philosophy for the
Future (New York: Macmillan, 1949), pp. 571
590.
27. William Leiss, "Technological Rationality: Mar-
cuse and His Critics," in his The Domination of
Nature (New York: Braziller, 1972), pp. 199-212.
28. See especially Max Horkheimer, Eclipse of
Reason (New York: Seabury, 1974; first pub-
lished, 1947); and Max Horkheimer and Theodor
Adorno, Dialectic of Enlightenment, trans. John
Cumming (New York: Seabury, 1972; German
original, 1947).
29. See note 15 for both books.
30. Hans-Dieter Bahr, Kritik der ''Politischen Tech-
nologie" (Frankfurt: Europische Verlagsanstalt,
1970).
31. For some references see, e.g., William H. Shaw,
"The Handmill Gives You the Feudal Lord:'
Marx's Technological Determinism," History and
Theory 18, no. 1 (1979): 155-176.
32. Jean-Paul Sartre, Critique of Dialectical Reason,
trans. Alan Sheridan-Smith (New York: Schoc-
ken, 1976; French publication, 1960).
33. See, e.g., Jacques Ellul, Metamorphose du
bourgeois (Paris: Calmann-Levy, 1967); and The
Technological System, trans. Joachim Neugros-
chel (New York: Seabury, 1980).
34. For the initial unfolding of the discussion, see:
Maurice de Gandillac and Alfred de Towamicki,
"Deux documents sur Heidegger," Les Temps
Modernes 1, whole no. 4 (1946): 713-724 (the
first document, "Entretien avec Martin Heideg-
ger," is by Gandillac; the second, "Visite Mar-
tin Heidegger," is by Towamicki); Karl Lwith,
"Les implications politiques de la philosophie de
I'existence chez Heidegger," Les Temps Mod-
ernes 2, whole no. 14 (November 1946): 343
360; and Eric Weil, "Le cas Heidegger," Les
Temps Modernes 3, whole no. 22 Quly 1947):
128-138.
35. See Hugo Ott, "Martin Heidegger und die Uni-
versitt Freiburg nach 1945," Historisches
Jahrbuch 105, no. 1 (1985): 95-128.
36. See, e.g., Frangois Fedier, "Trois attaques con-
tre Heidegger," Critique 22, whole no. 234
 (November 1966): 883-904 a defense of
Heidegger by way of a review of Guido
Schneeberger's Nachlese zu Heidegger (privately
published: Hochfeldstrasse 88, Bern, Switzer-
land, 1962), Theodor Adomo's Jargon der
Eigentlichkeit (Frankfurt, Suhrkamp, 1964), and
Paul Hhnerfeld's In Sachen Heidegger (Munich:
List-Bcher, 1961). Three responses attacking
Fedier's defense are contained in "A propos de
Heidegger," Critique 23, whole no. 237 (Feb-
ruary 1967): 284-297. These responses are
"Language et Nazisme" by Robert Minder, "La
lecture et I'enonce" by Jean Pierre Faye, and
"Serait-ce une querelle d'Allemand?" by Aime
Patri. Fedier's reply, "Une lecture denoncee" is
published under the same general heading ("A
propos de Heidegger") in Critique 24, whole no.
242 Ouly 1967): 672-686. See also Jean-Michel
Palmier (1968).
37. See, e.g., Roberto Mangabeira Unger, Knowl-
edge and Politics (New York: Free Press, 1975);
and Alasdair Maclntyre, After Virtue (Notre
Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press,
1981).
38. See Jaspers, "Heidegger," op. cit. note 13.
39. See Hugo Ott, "Martin Heidegger als Rektor der
Universitt Freiburg i. Br. 1933/34," Zeitschrift
des Breisgau-Geschichtsvereins 102 (1983): 121
136; and 103 (1984): 107-130. The second part,
with some brief but important additions, has been
published once more in "Martin Heidegger als
Rektor der Universitt Freiburg 1933/34,"
Zeitschrift fr die Geschichte des Oberrheins 132
(1984): 343-358. Otto Pggeler, "Den Fhrer
fhren? Heidegger und kein Ende," Philoso-
phische Rundschau 32, nos. 1-2 (1985): 26-67.
Ott announced his book in "Der Habilitand Martin
Heidegger und das von Schaezler'sche Stipen-
dium," Freiburger Dizesan-Archiv 106 (1986):
note to the subtitle.
40. See Bernd Martin, "Heidegger und die Reform
der deutschen Universitt 1933," Freiburger Uni-
versittsbltter 25, whole no. 92 Qune 1986): 49 48. See note 10.
69.
41. See Martin in the preceding note and Mller
(1986) in the bibliography; further: Gerhart
Schmitt, "Heideggers philosophische Politik,"
Freiburger Universittsbltter 25, whole no. 92
Gune 1986): 83-90; Pggeler (note 39 above);
and finally Rudolf Ringguth, "Fhrer der Fhrer,"
Der Spiegel 40, no. 34 (August 18, 1986): 164
169. The outdated standard view of the Heideg-
ger supporters is once more presented by How-
ard Eiland in "Heidegger's Political Engagement,"
Salmagundi, whole nos. 70-71 (Spring-Summer
1986): 267-284.
HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY
42. Carl Friedrich von Weizscker, "Begegnungen in
vier Jahrzehnten," Erinnerung an Martin Heideg-
ger, in Gnther Neske, ed., (Pfullingen: Neske,
1977), p. 245; Mller (1986), p. 19; Ute Guzzoni,
"Bemerkungen zu Heidegger 1933," Ereiburger
Universittsbltter 25, whole no. 92 Gune 1986):
77.
43. Albert Speer, Spandau: The Secret Diaries (New
York: Macmillan, 1976), entries for March 11 and
December 1, 1963; and for August 9, 1964.
44. It is worth noting that no major study of the
holocaust considers the influence of technology
and yet it was precisely trains, telecommuni-
cations, and synthetic chemicals which allowed
the destruction of Jews and others to be pursued
on such a massive scale.
45. Hannah Arendt, "Martin Heidegger at Eighty," in
Michael Murray (1978), pp. 293-303, actually ar-
gues that "Heidegger himself corrected his own
'error' more quickly and more radically than many
of those who later sat in judgment over him" and
that "he took considerably greater risks than
were usual in German literary and university life
during that period" (p. 302, note 3). In this re-
gard, see Mildred Bakan, "Hannah Arendt's Ap-
propriation of Heidegger's Thought as Political
Philosophy," in Don Ihde and Hugh J. Silverman,
eds., Descriptions (Albany: State University of
New York Press, 1985).
46. As formulated, e.g., by Ronald Dworkin in
"Liberalism," in Stuart Hampshire ed., Public and
Private Morality (New York: Cambridge Univer-
sity Press, 1978), pp. 114-143.
47. See, e.g., John Kenneth Galbraith, The New In-
dustrial State, 2nd edition (Boston: Houghton
Mifflin, 1972); Staffan B. Under, The Harried
Leisure Class (New York: Columbia University
Press, 1970); Daniel J. Boorstin, Democracy and
Its Discontents (New York: Random House,
1975); Tiber Scitovsky, The Joyless Economy
(New York: Oxford Unviersity Press, 1976); and
Fred Hirsch, Social Limits to Growth (Cam-
bridge, M A : Harvard University Press, 1976).
49. See Ronald Dworkin, "To Each His Own" a
review of Michael Walzer's Spheres of Justice: A
Defense of Pluralism and Equality, New York
Review of Books 30, no. 6 (April 14, 1983): 4-6;
Dworkin and Michael Walzer, "'Spheres of Jus-
tice:' An Exchange," ibid. 30, no. 12 Guly 21,
1983): 43-46.
50. A partial copy in the authors' possession is due to
Wolfgang Schirmacher.
51. C f Albert Borgmann, "Mind, Body, and World,"
Philosophical Forum 8, no. 1 (Fall, 1976): 68-86.
52. Albert Hofstadter and Richard Kuhns, eds., Phi-
losophies of Art and Beauty (New York: Random
161
 House, 1964); Albert Hofstadter, Truth and Art
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1965).
53. Karsten Harries, The Meaning of Modem Art
(Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press,
1968). See also Harries, The Bavarian Rococo
Church: Between Faith and Aestheticism, (New
Haven: Yale University Press, 1981).
54. Kent C. Bloomer and Charles W. Moore, Body,
Memory, and Architecture (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1977); David P. Billington, The
Tower and the Bridge: The New Art of Struc-
tural Engineering (New York: Basic Books,
1984).
55. See Noel Perrin, Giving Up the Gun: Japan's Re-
version to the Sword (Boston: Godine, 1979).
56. See Zen Buddhism: Selected Writings of D.T.
Suzuki, ed. W. Barrett (Garden City, NY:
Doubleday Anchor Books, 1956), p. xi.
57. Yoshihiro Nitta and Hirotaka Tatematsu,
Japanese Phenomenology. Analecta Husserliana
vol. VIII (Boston: Reidel, 1979).
58. Chikao Fijisawa, Zen and Shinto (New York:
Philosophical Library, 1959; reprint Westport,
CT: Greenwood Press, 1971).
59. Kitaro Nishida, Intelligibility and the Philosophy
of Nothingness, trans. Robert Schinzinger (Hon-
olulu: East-West Center Press, 1958).
60. Kitaro Nishida, Fundamental Problems of Philos-
ophy, trans. David A. Dilwork (Tokyo: Sophia
University, 1970), pp. 40 and 94-95.
61. Eugen Herrigel, Zen in the Art of Archery, trans.
R.F.C. Hull (New York: Random House, 1971),
p. 77.
62. Murray Sayle, "Japan Victorious," New York Re-
view of Books 32, no. 5 (March 28, 1985): 33
40; Ian Buruma, "A New Japanese Nationalism,"
New York Times Magazine (April 12, 1987): 22
29, 38.
63. Some of the proceedings have been published in
Philosophisches Jahrbuch 102, no. 1 (1985): 110
148.
64. On the religious circumstances and influences of
Heidegger's youth and education, see Hugo Ott,
"Der junge Martin Heidegger," Ereiburger
Part Two
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The most extensive index to both primary and secondary materials is Hans-
Martin Sass, Martin Heidegger: Bibliography and Glossary (Bowling Green, OH:
Philosopohy Documentation Center, 1982) a volume with over 6000 unannotated
entries, which extends and updates Sass' earlier
(Meisenheim: Hain, 1968) and Materialien zur Heidegger-Bibliographie
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
162
Dizesan-Archiv 104 (1984): 315-325 and "Der
Habilitand Martin Heidegger and das von
Schaezler'sche Stipendium," ibid. 106 (1986):
141-160; Bernhard Casper, "Martin Heidegger
und die Theologische Fakultt Freiburg, 1909
1923," ibid. 100 (1980): 534-541.
65. Martin Heidegger zum 80. Geburtstag von seiner
Heimatstadt Messkirch (Frankfurt: Klostermann,
1969), pp. 1-15.
66. For references to God, Christianity and faith, see
Hildegard Feick, Index zu Heideggers Sein und
Zeit, " 2nd edition (Tbingen: Niemeyer, 1968),
or Rainer A. Bast and Heinrich P. Delfosse,
Handbuch zum Textstudium von Martin Heideg-
gers "Sein und Zeit" (Stuttgart-Bad Cannstadt:
Holzboog, 1979). For some of the biographical
circumstances that shed light on Heidegger's un-
derstandably troubled relation to the Catholic
Church, see note 64 above and also Mller,
1986, pp. 16 and 30.
67., See Cari Mitcham, "Questions of Christianity and
Technology: A Bibliographic Introduction," Sci-
ence, Technology and Society, whole no. 14
(November 1979): 1-17.
68. On Heidegger's combination of timidity and coun-
try smarts, see Mller, 1986, pp. 22-26 and 28;
Schmitt (see note 41 above), p. 85; and a remark
of Gerhart Ritter quoted by Ott in "Martin
Heidegger als Rektor der Universitt Freiburg i.
Br. 1933/34," Zeitschrift des Breisgau-
Geschichtesvereins 103 (1984): 127, n. 6.
69. For references see note 65 above.
70. Cari Mitcham and Jim Grote, eds.. Theology and
Technology (Lanham, M D : University Press of
America, 1984).
71. Hubert L. Dreyfus, What Computers Can't Do: A
Critique of Artificial Reason, rev. edition (New
York: Harper & Row, 1979). first edition,
1972); and Hubert L. Dreyfus and Stuart E.
Dreyfus, with Tom Athanasiou, Mind Over
Machine: The Power of Human Intuition and Ex-
pertise in the Era of the Computer (New York:
Free Press, 1986).
Heidegger-Bibliographie
1917-1971
(Meisenheim: Hain, 1975). Winfried Krnzen, Martin Heidegger (Stuttgart: Metz-
ler, 1976) is another compact bibliographic introduction which has been helpful in
preparing the present survey. The present bibliography, however, in the re-
stricted area of recent Heideggerian studies of technology and related issues, is
more complete than either Sass or Krnzen.
In order to preserve some focus, this bibliography does not include those non-
Heideggerian works for which notes have been provided. It does contain supple-
mental references and, particularly for minor articles and undiscussed entries,
annotations. Kor major works, it is generally assumed that discussions in the text,
to which reference is often made, already provides sufficient analysis. The index
provides a ready means for locating all authors in both bibliography and text.
The bibliography has two major divisions, the second of which is further sub-
divided.
A. Works by Heidegger
B. Works about Heidegger
1. Works on Science, Technology, and Politics
2. Works on Art and Religion
Sections B , l and B,2 correspond to Divisions A and B of the text, respectively.
Each includes (except for minor exceptions as indicated) all works referred to
therein, even when this requires some separation of works by a single author, or
some potential confusion because of duplicate dates. The aim is to preserve a
focus and facilitate selective use.
Because of the character of Division A of the text, bibliography B , l naturally
contains the more general works and collections. Without contraindication, non-
Heideggerian references are to bibliography B , l .

A. Works by Heidegger
N.B. Because translation dates would be confusing in the text, whenever possible
Heidegger's works are listed by date of original German publication. When En-
glish collections include works from more than one German source, the date is
unavoidably that of the translation.

Heidegger, Martin (1912). "The Problem of Reality in Modern Philosophy," trans.

Philip J . Bessert, Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology 4, no. 1 (Janu-
ary 1973): 64-71.

(1916). "The Concept of Time in the Science of History," trans.

Harry S. Taylor and Hans W. Uffelmann, Journal of the British Society for
Phenomenology 9, no. 1 (January 1978): 3-10.

(1927). Being and Time. Trans. John Macquarrie and Edward

Robinson. New York: Harper & Row, 1962. Pp. 589. All English references in the
text are followed by bracketed page numbers which refer to the 7th German edi-
tion. Another translation by Joan Stambaugh and J . Glenn Gray of the "Introduc-
tion" (pp. 1-40) is included in David Karrell Krell, ed. (1977), pp. 41-89.

(1929). "What Is Metaphysics?" trans. David Karrell Krell and in-

cluded in David Karrell Krell, ed. (1977), pp. 95-112. An earlier R.K.C. Hull and

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

163
Alan Crick trans, is in Werner Brock, ed.. Existence and Being (Chicago: Reg-
nery, 1949), pp. 325-361, along with Heidegger's nine-page 1943 "Postscript" criti-
cal of calculative thinking. A fifteen-page 1949 introduction entitled "The Way
Back into the Ground of Metaphysics," trans. Walter Kaufmann, is included
(along with the Hull-Crick trans, of "What Is Metaphysics?") in Walter Kauf-
mann, ed.. Existentialism: From Dostoevsky to Sartre (Cleveland: World, 1956),
pp. 207-221; revised and expanded edition (New York: New American Library,
1975), pp. 265-279.

(1933). "The Self-Assertion of the German University," trans.

Karsten Harries, Review of Metaphysics 38, no. 3, whole no. 151 (March 1985):
470-480. This includes a complete translation, with notes and introduction, of Die
Selbstbehauptung der deutschen Universitt: Rede, gehalten bei der feierlichen
bernahme des Rektorats der Universitt Freiburg i. Br. am 27.5.1933 and Das
Rektorat 1933/34: Tatsachen und Gedanken the first of which was originally
published, Breslau: Korn, 1933; and subsequently reprinted with Heidegger's
later remarks, Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1983. It corrects the scurrilous version
attributed to Heidegger by Dagobert Runes in German Existentialism (New
York: Philosophical Library, 1965), pp. 18-20.

(1947). "Letter on Humanism," trans. David Farrell Krell and in-

cluded in David Farrell Krell, ed. (1977), pp. 193-242. Another version, trans.
Edgar Lohner, can be found in William Barrett and Henry David Aiken, eds.. Phi-
losophy in the Twentieth Century, vol. 3 (New York: Random, 1962), pp. 270-302.

(1950). "The Age of the World View," trans. Marjorie Grene, Meas-
ure 2 (1951): 269-284. Later trans. William Lovitt as "The Age of the World Pic-
ture" and included in Heidegger (1977a), pp. 115-154. For explication see Joseph
Kockelmans (1970b).

(1953). An Introduction to Metaphysics. Trans. Ralph Manheim.

Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1961. Pp. 182. Trans, first published. New Haven,
CT: Yale University Press, 1959. This text actually dates from 1935.

(1954). What Is Called Thinking? Trans. J . Glenn Gray. New York:

Harper & Row, 1968. Pp. xvi, 244. Lectures from the summer terms of 1951 and
1952 the first Heidegger was permitted to give after 1944, and the last before his
formal retirement from the University of Freiburg. Early sections relate science
and technology and contrast them to thinking, which is described as a craft.
Selections included in David Farrell Krell, ed. (1977), pp. 345-367.

(1955). The Question of Being. Trans. Jean T. Wilde and WilUam

Kluback. New Haven, CT: College & University Press, 1958. Pp. 109. Originally an
essay contributed to an Ernst Jnger Festschrift.

(1957a). "The Principle of Ground," trans. Keith Hoeller, Man and

World 7, no. 3 (August 1974): 207-222. The concluding and summarizing essay

PHILOSOPHY TODAY

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from Der Satz vom Grund (Pfullingen: Neske, 1957), Heidegger's book on Leibniz.
Technology is the ultimate manifestation of the principle of sufficient reason.

(1957b). Identity and Difference. Trans. Joan Stambaugh. New

York: Harper & Row, 1969. First trans. Kurt F . Leidecker as Essays in
Metaphysics: Identity and Difference (New York: Philosophical Library, 1960), a
less literal version which nevertheless renders Gestell as "framework."

(1958). "A Recollection," trans. Hans Seigfried, Man and World 3,

no. 1 (February 1970): 3-4. Brief inaugural address at the Heidelberg Academy of
Science, first published in the Jahreshefte der Heidelberger Akademie der Wis-
senschaften (1957-1958).

(1959a). Discourse on Thinking [= Gelassenheit]. Trans. John M.

Anderson and E . Hans Freund. New York: Harper & Row, 1966. Pp. 90.

(1959b). On the Way to Language. Trans. Peter D. Hertz. New

York: Harper & Row, 1971. Pp. 200.

(1961a). Nietzsche I: The Will to Power as Art. Trans. David Farrell

Krell. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1979. Pp. xvi, 263.

(1961b). Nietzsche II: The Eternal Recurrence of the Same. Trans.

David Farrell Krell. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1984. Pp. xii, 290.

(1961c). Nietzsche III: The Will to Power as Knowledge and as

Metaphysics. Trans. David Farrell Krell. San Francisco: Harper & Row.

(1961d). Nietzsche IV: Nihilism. Trans. Frank A. Capuzzi. San

Francisco: Harper & Row, 1982. Pp. x, 301.

(1962). What Is a Thing? Trans. W.B. Barton Jr. and Vera Deutsch.
Chicago: Regnery, 1967. Pp. vii, 310. Eugene T. Gendlin's appended 50 page
"Analysis" of this book concludes with a discussion of technology, pp. 287-296. A
selection entitled "Modern Science, Metaphysics, and Mathematics" is included
in David Farrell Krell, ed. (1977), pp. 247-282.

(1969a). On Time and Being. Trans. Joan Stambaugh. New York:

Harper & Row, 1972. Pp. xi, 84. English translation of Zur Sache des Denkes
(Tbingen: Niemeyer, 1969).

(1969b). "Art and Space," trans. Charles H. Seibert, Man and World
6, no. 1 (February 1973): 3-8. Translation of Die Kunst und der Raum (St. Gallen:
Erker, 1969).

(1970). [Letter to a symposium on "Heidegger and Eastern

Thought"], trans. Albert Borgmann, Philosophy East and West 20, no. 3 (July
1970): 221.

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

165
 (1971). Poetry, Language, Thought. Trans. Albert Hofstadter. New
York: Harper & Row, 1971. Pp. xxv, 229. Essays from Holzwege (Frankfurt: Klo-
stermann, 1950), Vortrge und Aufstze (Pfullingen: Neske, 1954), and Unterwegs
zur Sprache (Pfullingen: Neske, 1959). An earlier translation of one essay in this
collection, "The Origin of the Work of Art" (from 1936), first appeared, minus
Heidegger's 1956 "Addendum," in Albert Hofstadter and Richard Kuhns, eds..
Philosophies of Art and Beauty (New York: Modern Library, 1964). An ab-
breviated version of this essay plus another from this collection, viz., "Building
Dwelling Thinking," are included in David Farrell Krell, ed. (1977), pp. 149-187
and 323-339, respectively.

(1973). The End of Philosophy. Trans. Joan Stambaugh. New York:

Harper & Row, 1973. Pp. xiv, 110. Includes one chapter from Vortrge und Auf-
stze (1954) and three from Nietzsche II (1961).

(1976a). "Only a God Can Save Us: Der Spiegel's Interview with
Martin Heidegger," trans. Maria P. Alter and John D. Caputo, Philosophy Today
20, no. 4 (Winter 1976): 267-284. This is an interview granted ten years earlier, on
the condition that it not be published until after his death. Appeared originally in
Der Spiegel, vol. 30, no. 23 (May 31, 1976): 193-219 (which includes about 15 pages
of advertising). Der Spiegel editorial comment, p. 3, provides a photograph of the
typescript indicating the extent of Heidegger's reworking of the interview. A
slightly freer version, trans. David Schendler, can be found in Graduate Faculty
Philosophy Journal 6, no. 1 (Winter 1977): 5-27. A more literal version, with notes,
trans. WiUiam J . Richardson, is included in Thomas Sheehan, ed. (1981), pp. 45
67. Two other occasional pieces in which Heidegger speaks about technology are
"The Pathway" and "Messkirch's Seventh Centennial," trans. Thomas F.
O'Meara and Thomas J . Sheehan, Listening 8, nos. 1-3 (1973): 32-57. Earlier ren-
derings of both these public lectures delivered in Heidegger's home town of
Messkirch appeared in Listening 2, no. 2 (Spring 1967) and 6, no. 3 (Autumn 1971),
respectively. Along the same line see also the interview in Richard Wisser, ed.
(1970), in bibliography B,2.

(1976b). The Piety of Thinking. Trans. James G. Hart and John C.

Maraldo. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1976. Pp. x, 212. Works
dealing with religion from 1927 to 1964.

(1977a). The Question Concerning Technology and Other Essays.

Trans. William Lovitt. New York: Harper & Row, 1977. Pp. xxxix, 182. Contains
translations of Heidegger's two major essays on technology, "Die Frage nach der
Technik" and "Die Kehre." These essays grew out of four lectures given in late
1949 and early 1950. "Die Frage . . . " was initially published as the first essay in
Vortrge und Aufstze (Pfullingen: Neske, 1954), and then along with "Die
Kehre" as a separate volume entitled Die Technik und die Kehre (Pfullingen:
Neske, 1962). Another (slavishly literal) translation of "Die Frage . . . " has been
done by Edwin M . Alexander as an MA thesis under George Grant, "Martin
Heidegger's The Question about Technic' A Translation and Commentary"
(Hamilton, Ontario: McMaster University, 1973). "Die Kehre" first trans. Ken-

PHILOSOPHY TODAY

166
neth R. Maly as "The Turning/' Research in Phenomenology 1 (1971): 3-16. Also
included in the Lovitt collection are the important "The Word of Nietzsche: 'God
Is Dead'," "The Age of the World Picture," and "Science and Reflection." This is
the crucial volume for understanding Heidegger's philosophy of technology. The
title essay is reprinted in David Farrell Krell, ed. (1977), pp. 287-317.

(1977b). "Modern Natural Science and Technology," Research in

Phenomenology 7 (1977): 3-4. German original, pp. 1-2. This is a letter of greeting
to a Heidegger conference held in Chicago two weeks before Heidegger's death. It
is reportedly his last composition. The volume is republished in John Sallis, ed..
Radical Phenomenology (Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press, 1978).

(1983). "Die Herkunft der Kunst und die Bestimmung des Den-
kens," in P. Jaeger and R. Lthe, eds., Distanz und Nhe: Reflexionen und Analy-
sen zur Kunst der Gegenwart (Wrzburg: Knigshausen & Neumann, 1983), pp.
11-22. This volume is a Festschrift for Walter Biemel.

Heidegger, Martin, and Eugen Fink (1979). Heraclitus Seminar 1966167. Trans.
Charles H. Seibert. University, AL: University of Alabama Press, 1979. Pp. xii,
169. See also John Sallis and Kenneth Maly, eds., Heraclitean Fragments: A Com-
panion Volume to the Heidegger/Fink Seminar on Heraclitus (University, A L :
University of Alabama Press, 1980).

B. Works about Heidegger

1. Works on Science, Technology, and Politics

Ahlers, Rolf (1971). "Technologie und Wissenschaft bei Heidegger und Marcuse,"
Zeitschrift fr philosophische Forschung 25, no. 4 (October-December 1971): 575
590. See also Ahlers, "Is Technology Intrinsically Repressive?" Continuum 8, no. 1
(Spring-Summer 1970): 111-122, which rejects both Marcuse's and Heidegger's
critiques of technology as romantic flights from Hegelian acceptance.

Alderman, Harold (1978). "Heidegger's Critique of Science and Technology," in

Michael Murray, ed. (1978), pp. 35-50. This combines and revises the author's
"Heidegger's Critique of Science," Personalist 50, no. 4 (Autumn 1969): 549-558;
and "Heidegger: Technology as Phenomenon," Personalist 51, no. 4 (Autumn
1970): 535-545. Alderman did a dissertation on "Heidegger and the Overthrow of
Philosophy" under Edward G. Ballard at Tulane University (1967). Pp. 148-163 of
this dissertation are on "Technicity."

AUemann, Beda (1969). "Martin Heidegger und die Politik," in Otto Pggeler, ed.,
Heidegger: Perspektiven zur Deutung seines Werks (Cologne: Kiepenheuer and
Witsch, 1969), pp. 246-260. First published in Merkur 21, no. 10 (1967): 962-976.

Axelos, Kostas (1966). Einfhrung in ein knftiges Denken: ber Marx und
Heidegger. Tbingen: Niemeyer, 1966. Pp. 104. See also Axelos, Alienation,

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

167
Praxis, and Techne in the Thought of Karl Marx, trans. Ronald Bruzina (Austin:
University of Texas Press, 1976), which exhibits a Heidegger influenced interpre-
tation of Marx; and Axelos, "Le 'Dialogue avec le Marxisme' et la 'Question de la
technique'," in Jean Beaufret, ed.. Dialogue avec Heidegger 11: Philosophie Mod-
erne (Paris: Editions de Minuit, 1973).

Ballard, Edward G. (1970). "Heidegger's View and Evaluation of Nature and Nat-
ural Science," in John Sallis, ed., Heidegger and the Path of Thinking
(Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1970), pp. 37-64.

(1978). Man and Technology: Toward the Measurement of a Cul-

ture. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1978. Pp. x, 251. See also Ballard,
"Man or Technology: Which Is to Rule?" in Stephen Skousgaard, ed. (1981, in sec-
tion B,2 of the bibliography), pp. 3-19. For discussion, see section A,4 of text. For
more detailed review, see Albert Borgmann, untitled review of Ballard and
Donald M. Borchert and David Stewart, eds.. Being Human in a Technological
Age (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1979), Man and World 15, vol. 1 (1982): 107
115.

Baker, Evelyn M . (1983). "Heidegger's Existential Conception of Science" in

Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka and Calvin 0. Schrg, eds.. Foundations of Morality,
Human Rights, and the Human Sciences: Phenomenology in a Foundational
Dialogue with the Human Sciences, Analecta Husserliana 15 (Boston: D. Reidel,
1983), pp. 431-440. Heidegger's existential interpretation of science (see the discus-
sion in section A , l of the text) shows that science cannot be a basis for morality.

Barrett, William (1978). The Illusion of Technique: A Search for Meaning in a

Technological Civilization. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1978. Pp. xx, 359. Chap-
ter 8, "Homeless in the World," an apology for Heidegger's collusion with Nazism,
first appeared, interestingly enough, in the Jewish magazine Commentary 61, no.
3 (March 1976): 34-43.

(1986). Death of the Soul: from Descartes to the Computer. Garden

City, NY: Doubleday, 1986. Pp. xvi, 173. Criticizes Heidegger's philosophical an-
thropology of Being and Time as of a piece with the idealistic desubstantialization
of the self that allows technology to put forward the computer as a replacement
for the human, pp. 137-140.

Baruzzi, Arno (1985). Alternative Lebensform? Freiburg: Karl Alber, 1985. Pp.
179. "Die Frage nach der Technik" discussed pp. 33-50 as a preliminary to E . F .
Schumacher and intermediate technology.

Beausoleil, Jocelyn R. (1983). "Heidegger ou le defi de penser la technique,"

Dialogue (Canada) 22, no. 4 (December 1983): 647-660. Sympathetic overview.

Becker, Oskar (1969). "Para-Existenz; Menschliches Dasein und Dawesen," in

Otto Pggeler, ed., Heidegger: Perspektiven zur Deutung seines Werks (Cologne:
Kiepenheuer und Witsch, 1969), pp. 261-285.

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Berciano, Modesto (1980). "Herbert Marcuse: E l Primer Marxista
Heideggeriano," Pensamiento 36 (April-June 1980): 131-164.

Biemel, Walter (1976). Heidegger. Trans. J.L. Mehta. New York: Harcourt Brace
Jovanovich, 1976. Chapter 8 (pp. 133-148) of this illustrated biographical introduc-
tion is on "Aletheia and the Nature of Technology."

Blitz, Mark (1981). Heidegger's ''Being and Time'' and the Possibility of Political
Philosophy. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1981. Pp. 260. For discussion,
see section A,7 of text.

Borgmann, Albert (1971). "Technology and Reality," Man and World 4, no. 1
(February 1971): 59-69.

(1972). "Orientation in Technology," Philosophy Today 16, no. 2

(Summer 1972): 135-147.

(1975). "Functionalism in Science and Technology," in Proceedings

of the XVth World Congress of Philosophy, vol. 6 (Sofia: Sofia Press Production
Center, 1975), pp. 31-36.

(1978a). "The Explanation of Technology," Research in Philosophy

and Technology, vol. 1 (1978): 99-118.

(1978b). "Heidegger and Symbolic Logic," in Michael Murray, ed.

(1978), pp. 3-22.

(1979). "Freedom and Determinism in a Technological Setting," Re-

search in Philosophy and Technology, vol. 2 (1979): 79-90.

(1980a). "Should Montana Share Its Coal? Technology and Public

Policy," Research in Philosophy and Technology, vol. 3 (1980): 287-311. An earlier
version appeared in Montana Trails, whole no. 2 (1977): 27-33.

(1980b). Untitled review of WiUiam Barrett, The Illusion of Tech-

nique (1978), Man and World 13, nos. 3-4 (1980): 458-465.

(1982a). Untitled review of Edward G. Ballard, Man and Technol-

ogy (1978); and Donald M. Borchert and David L. Stewart, eds.. Being Human in
a Technological Age (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1979), Man and World 15, no.
1 (1982): 107-115.

(1982b). "Technology and Nature in Europe and America," in

Richard N. Barrett, ed.. International Dimensions of the Environmental Crisis
(Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1982), pp. 3-20.

(1984). Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life: A

Philosophical Inquiry. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984. Pp. 306. An ex

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

169
tended study of the influence of modern technology on society and culture, with
suggestions for reform. The influence of Heidegger is strong but indirect. Two
other studies relevant to these themes are "The Good Life and Appropriate Tech-
nology," Research in Philosophy and Technology, vol. 6 (1983): 11-19; and "Tech-
nology and Democracy," Research in Philosophy and Technology, vol. 7 (1984):
211-228.

Bronner, Stephen Eric (1977). "Martin Heidegger: The Consequences of Political

Mystification," Salmagundi, whole nos. 38-39 (Summer-Fall 1977): 153-174.

(1979). "The Poverty of Scholasticism/A Pedant's Delight: A Re-

sponse to Thomas Sheehan," Salmagundi, whole no. 43 (Winter, 1979): 185-199.

Caputo, John D. (1971). "Heidegger's Original Ethics," New Scholasticism 45, no.
1 (Winter 1971): 127-138. Connects technology and ecology.

Colaizzi, Paul F . (1978). Technology and Dwelling: The Secrets of Life and Death.
Privately published: 5552 Beacon Street, Apt. 1, Pittsburgh, PA 15217. Pp. 187. For
discussion, see section A,4 of text.

Dallmayr, Fred R. (1984). "Ontology of Freedom: Heidegger and Political Philos-

ophy," Political Theory 12, no. 2 (May 1984): 204-234.

.Dauenhauer, Bernard P. (1976). "Renovating the Problem of Politics," Review of

Metaphysics 29, no. 4, whole no. 116 (June 1976): 626-641. See also Dauenhauer,
"Heidegger, the Spokesman for the Dweller," Southern Journal of Philosophy 15,
no. 2 (Summer 1977): 189-199. What substantive contribution does Heidegger
make to political thought? Answer: The idea of the human being as dweller, one
who can save the earth.

De Carolis, Massimo (1978). "Metafisica e tecnica in Heidegger," Sapienza 31

(July-September 1978): 330-346.

DeGeorge, Richard T. (1965). "Heidegger and the Marxists," Studies in Soviet

Thought 5, no. 4 (December 1965): 289-298.

Dessauer, Friedrich (1956). Strait um die Technik. Frankfurt: Knecht, 1956. Pp.
471. See especially pp. 348-368. Some commentary on Dessauer's failure to under-
stand Heidegger on technology can be found in Klaus Tuchel, "Friedrich Des-
sauer as Philosopher of Technology: Notes on his Dialogue with Jaspers and
Heidegger," Research in Philosophy and Technology, vol. 5 (1982): 269-280
which is a partial translation of Tuchel's Die Philosophie der Technik hei Fried-
rich Dessauer (Frankfurt: Knecht, 1964).

Dreyfus, Hubert L . (1980). "Holism and Hermeneutics," Review of Metaphysics

34, no. 1, whole no. 133 (September 1980): 3-23. See also Dreyfus' use of Heidegger
in "Cybernetics as the Last Stage of Metaphysics," in Proceedings of the XlVth
World Congress of Philosophy, vol. 2 (Vienna: Herder, 1968), pp. 493-499, and in

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What Computers Can't Do: A Critique of Artificial Reason (New York: Harper &
Row, 1972; revised edition, 1979).

(1984). "Between Techne and Technology: The Ambiguous Place of

Technology in Being and Time," in Michael E . Zimmerman, ed.. The Thought of
Martin Heidegger, "Tulane Studies in Philosophy," vol. 32 (New Orleans: Tulane
University, 1984), pp. 23-35. A French version of this essay first appeared in
Michel Haar, ed., Martin Heidegger (Paris: L'Herne, 1983).

Emad, Parvis (1981). "Technology as Presence: Heidegger's View," Listening 16,

no. 2 (Spring 1981): 133-144.

Fandozzi, Phillip R. (1982). Nihilism and Technology: A Heideggerian Investiga-

tion. Washington, DC: University Press of America, 1982. Pp. ix, 147. For discus-
sion, see both sections A,4 and A,5 of text.

Fay, Thomas A. (1977). Heidegger: The Critique of Logic. The Hague: Nijhoff,
1977.

Fell, Joseph P. (1979). Heidegger and Sartre: An Essay on Being and Place. New
York: Columbia University Press, 1979. Pp. 517. Some brief discussion of technol-
ogy in chapter 9, "Heidegger's Notion of Two Beginnings."

Franks, Dean (1971). "An Interpretation of Technology Through the Assertorical-

Problematical Distinction," Kinesis 4, no. 1 (Fall 1971): 22-30.

Gadamer, Hans-Georg (1975). Truth and Method. New York: Continuum, 1975.
Pp. xxvi, 551. First published as Wahrheit und Methode (Tbingen: Mohr, 1960).
Second, expanded edition, 1965.

(1977). "Theory, Technology, Practice: The Task of the Science of

Man," Social Research 44, no. 3 (Autumn 1977): 529-561. This is a poorly trans-
lated and slightly modified version of "Theorie, Technik, Praxis: Die Aufgabe
einer neuen Anthropologie," the introduction to H.G. Gadamer and Paul Vogler,
eds.. Neue Anthropologie (Stuttgart: Thieme, 1972-1975). The essay "What Is
Practice? The Conditions of Social Reason," in Gadamer, Reason in the Age of
Science, trans. Frederick G. Lawrence (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1983), pp.
69-87, also contains some comments on technology.

Gerratana, Valentino (1977). "Heidegger and Marx," New Left Review, whole no.
106 (November-December 1977): 51-58.

Globus, Gordon G. (1986). "The Machine Basis for the Dasein: On the Prospects
for an Existential Functionalism," Man and World 19, no. 1 (1986): 55-72. Heideg-
ger's Dasein cannot have a Turing machine as its physical base.

Goff, Robert Allen (1968). "Wittgenstein's Tools and Heidegger's Implements,"

Man and World 1, no. 3 (August 1968): 447-462.

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

171
Goldmann, Lucien (1977). Lukacs and Heidegger. Trans. William Q. Boelhower.
London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1977. Pp. xxii, 112. This is an expanded ver-
sion of a posthumous work first published in French in 1973.

Grange, Joseph (1974). "Magic, Technology and Being," Religious Humanism 8,

no. 2 (Spring 1974): 88-91.

(1977). "On the Way Toward Foundational Ecology," Soundings 60,

no. 2 (Summer 1977): 135-149.

Grant, George Parkin (1974). English-speaking Justice. Sackville, New

Brunswick, Canada: Mount Allison University, 1974. Pp. 112. Reprinted, Notre
Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1984. Pp. 104. In one of the interviews
in Larry Schmidt, ed., George Grant in Process: Essays and Conversations (To-
ronto: House of Anansi, 1978), Grant also indicates his indebtedness to Heidegger
(see p. 141). But in his earlier Technology and Empire (Toronto: House of Anansi,
1969), Grant relies on Jacques ElluFs definition of technology instead of Heideg-
ger's.

Grnder, Karlfried (1962). "M. Heideggers Wissenschaftskritik in ihren ge-

schichtlichen Zusammenhngen," Archiv fr Philosophie 11, nos. 3-4 (1962): 312
335. English trans, as "Heidegger's Critique of Science in its Historical Back-
ground," Philosophy Today 7, no. 1 (Spring 1963): 15-32.

Habermas, Jrgen (1970). "Technology and Science as Ideology'," in Toward a

Rational Society, trans. Jeremy J . Shapiro (Boston: Beacon Press, 1970), pp. 81
122. For an essay explicitly on Heidegger, see "Martin Heidegger: The Great In-
fluence" (from 1959), in Habermas, Philosophical-Political Profiles, trans. Fre-
derick G. Lawrence (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1983), pp. 53-60. Brief mention
of technology, p. 59. "The story of Heidegger's influence is great, and most would
call his work itself great. Perhaps this very case makes understandable why our
relationship to greatness is a broken one" (p. 60).

Harries, Karsten (1978). "Heidegger as a Political Thinker," in Michael Murray,

ed. (1978), pp. 304-328. First published in Review of Metaphysics 29, no. 4, whole
no. 116 (June 1976): 642-669.

Heelan, Patrick A. (1972a). "Nature and Its Transformations," Theological

Studies 33, no. 3 (September 1972): 486-502. "[T]he manifest image of nature as
the [historically] pregiven arena for human action . . . includes horizons that are
the product of science and technology" (p. 501). See also Heelan, "Purpose in the
Universe," Encyclopedia of Bioethics, vol. 3 (New York: Free Press, 1978), pp.
1399-1404.

(1972b). "Hermeneutics of Experimental Science in the Context of

the Life-World," Philosophia Mathematica 9, no. 2 (Winter 1972): 101-144. The con-
cluding summary of the paper (pp. 133-135) is reprinted as an English abstract in
Zeitschrift fr allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 5, no. 1 (1974): 123-124, followed

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by Theodore Kisiel's "Commentary on . . . " (pp. 124-135) and Heelan's "Com-
ments on . . ." (pp. 135-137). Original paper reprinted in Don Ihde and Richard
Zaner, eds., Interdisciplinary Phenomenology (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1975). As
Heelan observes in a footnote, this paper can be read as taking off from John J .
Compton, "Natural Science and the Experience of Nature," in James Edie, ed..
Phenomenology in America (Chicago: Quadrangle, 1969), pp. 80-95.

(1972c). "Toward a Hermeneutic of Natural Science," Journal of

the British Society for Phenomenology 3, no. 3 (October 1972): 252-260. This is fol-
lowed by Wolf Mays' "Toward a Hermeneutic of Natural Science: A Reply to Pat-
rick Heelan" (pp. 261-276), and Heelan's "Toward a Hermeneutic of Natural Sci-
ence: A Reply to Wolf Mays" (pp. 277-283).

(1983a). Space Perception and the Philosophy of Science. Berkeley:

University of California Press, 1983. Pp. xiv, 383. Heelan's "hermeneutical
realism" contains few explicit references to, yet is strongly influenced by,
Heidegger. For discussion, see section A , l of text, near the end.

(1983b). "Natural Science as a Hermeneutic of Instrumentation,"

Philosophy of Science 50, no. 2 (June 1983): 181-204. All perception, including sci-
entific observation, is hermeneutical as well as causal. For more on this, see
Heelan's "Perception as a Hermeneutical Act," Review of Metaphysics 37, no. 1,
whole no. 145 (September 1983): 61-75; and "Natural Science and Being-in-the-
World," Man and World 16, no. 3 (1983): 207-219. For a much earlier Heelan arti-
cle moving in this direction see "Horizon, Objectivity and Reality in the Physical
Sciences," International Philosophical Quarterly 7, no. 3 (September 1967): 375
412.

Hood, Webster F . (1972). "The Aristotelian Versus the Heideggerian Approach to

the Problem of Technology," in Carl Mitcham and Robert Mackey, eds. (1972),
pp. 347-363. Adapted from Hood's dissertation, "A Heideggerian Approach to the
Problem of Technology" (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University,
1968). For discussion, see section A,4 of text. See also Hood, "The Latent Dimen-
sion of Experience," Main Currents in Modern Thought 27, no. 3 (January-Feb-
ruary 1971): 84-88, which essays a broader sketch of Heidegger's thought, includ-
ing his philosophy of technology.

Ihde, Don (1979). Technics and Praxis. Boston: Reidel, 1979. Pp. xxviii, 151. For
discussion, see section 4. Paul Durbin in an untitled review. Humanities Perspec-
tives on Technology, whole no. 11 (April 1979): 14-16, calls this "the first full-scale
philosophical analysis of technology by an American to appear in English." There
is also an untitled review by Albert Borgmann, Philosophical Topics 12 (1982):
190-194. A closely related paper which is not included in this collection of essays
on technology is "A Phenomenology of Man-Machine Relations," in Walter Fein-
burg and Henry Rosemont Jr., eds.. Work, Technology, and Education (Urbana:
University of Illinois Press, 1975), pp. 186-202.

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

173
 (1983). Existential Technics. Albany, NY: State University of New
York Press, 1983. Pp. ix, 190. For discussion, see section A,4 of text. For further
analysis, see the untitled review by Carl Mitcham, Science, Technology & Society,
whole no. 37 (September 1983): 15-16. One essay, "The Historical-Ontological
Priority of Technology," is not properly credited as appearing first in German in
Paul Durbin and Friedrich Rapp, eds., Technikphilosophie in der Diskussion
(Braunschweig: Vieweg, 1982), pp. 205-217; and in the English version of this vol-
ume, Durbin and Rapp, eds.. Philosophy and Technoogy (Boston: Reidel, 1983),
pp. 235-252.

Jobin, Jean-Frangois (1975). "Heidegger et la technique," Studia Philosophica,

vol. 35 (1975): 81-127. Good, extended overview of technology in texts from Being
and Time on.

Jonas, Hans (1959). "The Practical Uses of Theory," in Carl Mitcham and Robert
Mackey, eds. (1972), pp. 335-346. First published in Social Research 26, no. 2
(1959): 151-166. Included in Jonas' The Phenomenon of Life (New York: Harper &
Row, 1966), pp. 188-210.

(1974). Philosophical Essays: From Ancient Creed to Technological

Man. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1974. Pp. xviii, 349. An introduction
provides an intellectual autobiography, and part one contains eight essays on
"Science, Technology, and Ethics." The first and third of these are "Technology
and Responsibility: Reflections on the New Task of Ethics" (from Social Re-
search [1973]) and "Seventeenth Century and After: The Meaning of the Scientific
and Technological Revolution" (from Philosophy Today [1971]).

(1976). "Responsibility Today: The Ethics of an Endangered Fu-

ture," Social Reserach 43, no. 1 (Spring 1976): 77-97. An earlier version of this
paper was presented at a conference at the Technical University in Israel in De-
cember, 1974, and published under the title "The Heuristics of Fear," in Melvin
Kranzberg, ed.. Ethics in an Age of Pervasive Technology (Boulder, CO:
Westview Press, 1980), pp. 213-221.

(1979). "Toward a Philosophy of Technology," Hastings Center Re-

port 9, no. 1 (February 1979): 34-43. Also appears in The Connecticut Scholar,
whole no. 3 (1980), in a symposium devoted to "Science, Technology, & Ethics."

(1984). The Imperative of Responsibility: In Search of an Ethics for

the Technological Age. Trans. Hans Jonas with David Herr. Chicago: University
of Chicago Press, 1984. Pp. xii, 255. For discussion, see section A,4 of text, near
the end. Originally published as Das Prinzip Verantwortung: Versuch einer Ethik
fr die technologische Zivilisation (Frankfurt: Insel, 1979) and Macht oder
Ohnmacht der Subjectivitt? Das Leib-Seele-Problem im Vorfeld des Prinzips
Vorantwortung (Frankfurt: Insel, 1981). Incorporates reworked versions of the
following earlier essays in roughly the following order: "Technology and Respon-
sibility: Reflections on the New Tasks of Ethics," Social Research 40, no. 1
(Spring 1973): 31-54, reprinted in Jonas (1974), pp. 3-20; "Responsibility Today:

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The Ethics of an Endangered Future," Social Research 43, no. 1 (Spring 1976): 77
97; "The Concept of Responsibility: An Inquiry into the Foundations of an Ethics
for Our Age," in H.T. Engelhardt and D. Callahan, ed., Knowledge, Value, and
Belief (Hastings-on-Hudson, NY: The Hastings Center, 1977), pp. 169-198; "Reflec-
tions on Technology, Progress, and Utopia," Social Research 48, no. 3 (Autumn
1981): 411-455; "Parallelism and Complementarity: The Psycho-Physical Prob-
lem in Spinoza and in the Succession of Niels Bohr," in R. Kennington, ed.. The
Philosophy of Baruch Spinoza (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America
Press, 1980), pp. 126-128; and "On the Power or Impotence of Subjectivity," in
S.F. Spicker and H.T. Englehardt, eds.. Philosophical Dimensions of the Neuro-
Medical Sciences (Boston: Reidel, 1976), pp. 143-160. Two subsequent, related ar-
ticles: "Yesterday's Values for Tomorrow's World?" (with German version), in
Folkert Precht, ed., Wandlung von Verantwortung und Werten in unserer Zeit/
Evolution of Responsibilities and Values Today (Munich: Saur, 1983), pp. 182-194;
and "Ontological Grounding of a Political Ethics: On the Metaphysics of Commit-
ment to the Future of Man," Graduate Faculty Philosophy Journal 10, no. 1
(1984): 47-61.

Jung, Hwa Yol (1972). "The Ecological Crisis: A Philosophical Perspective,"

Bucknell Review 20 (Winter 1972): 25-44.

(1974). "The Paradox of Man and Nature: Reflections on Man's

Ecological Predicament," Centennial Review 18, no. 1 (Winter 1974): 1-28.

Jung, Hwa Yol, and Pettee Jung (1975). "To Save the Earth," Philosophy Today
19, no. 2 (Summer 1975): 108-117.

(1976). "Humanism: The Politics of Civility in a 'No-Growth' Soci-

ety," Man and World 9, no. 3 (August 1976): 283-306.

Kimball, Roger (1985). "Heidegger at Freiburg, 1933," New Criterion 3, no. 10

(June 1985): 9-18.

King, Magda (1973). "Truth and Technology," Human Context 5, no. 1 (1973): 1
34. This supplements King's earlier Heidegger's Philosophy: A Guide to His Basic
Thought (New York: Macmillan, 1964), which does not consider technology.

Kisiel, Theodore J . (1970a). "Science, Phenomenology, and the Thinking of

Being," in Joseph J . Kockelmans and Theodore J . Kisiel, eds. (1970), pp. 167-183.
Good commentary on Heidegger's "Science and Reflection."

(1970b). "Ideology Critique and Phenomenology: The Current De-

bate in German Philosophy," Philosophy Today 14, no. 3 (Fall 1970): 151-160. Out-
lines distinctions between hermeneutic philosophy (Husserl, Heidegger,
Gadamer) and critical social theory (Marx, Marcuse, Habermas, Apel). For dis-
cussion, see section A,6 of text.

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175
 (1973). "On the Dimensions of a Phenomenology of Science in Hus-
serl and the Young Dr. Heidegger," Journal of the British Society for
Phenomenology 4, no. 3 (October 1973): 217-234.
(1977). "Heidegger and the New Images of Science." Research in
Phenomenology 7 (1977): 162-181. Reprinted in John Sallis, ed. (1978). For related
articles see Kisiel, "Zu einer Hermeneutik naturwissenschaftlicher Entdeckung,"
Zeitschrift fr allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 2 (1971): 195-221; "The
Mathematical and the Hermeneutical: On Heidegger's Notion of the A priori," in
Edward G. Ballard and Charles E . Scott, eds., Martin Heidegger: In Europe and
America (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1973), pp. 109-120; "Scientific Discovery: Logical,
Psychological or Hermeneutical?" in David Carr and Edward S. Casey, ed.. Ex-
plorations in Phenomenology (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1973), pp. 263-284 a paper
which is actually an earlier and shorter English version of "Zu einer Hermeneutik
naturwissenschaftlicher Entdeckung," op. cit. first in this list; "Commentary on
Patrick Heelan's 'Hermeneutics of Experimental Science in the Context of the
Life-World'," Zeitschrift fr allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 5 (1974): 124-135;
"New Philosophies of Science in the USA: A Selective Survey," co-authored with
Galen Johnson, ihid., pp. 138-191; and "Hermeneutic Models for Natural Science,"
in E.W. Orth, ed.. Die Phnomenologie und die Wissenschaften, no. 2 in the
"Phnomenologische Forschungen" series (Freiburg: Alber, 1976), pp. 180-191.

Kockelmans, Joseph J . (1966). Phenomenology and Physical Science. Pittsburgh:

Duquesne University Press, 1966. The relation between science and technology is
described in Heideggerian terms, pp. 170-175. See also Kockelmans, The World in
Science and Philosophy (Milwaukee: Bruce, 1969).
(1970a). "Heidegger on the Essential Difference and Necessary Re-
lationship Between Philosophy and Science," in Joseph J . Kockelmans and Theo-
dore J . Kisiel, ed., (1970), pp. 147-166.

(1970b). "The Era of the World-as-Picture," in Joseph J . Kockel-

mans and Theodore J . Kisiel, eds. (1970), pp. 184-201. Excellent commentary on
Heidegger (1951).

(1984). On the Truth of Being: Reflections on Heidegger's Later Phi-

losophy. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1984.

(1985). Heidegger and Science. Washington, DC: Center for Ad-

vanced Research in Phenomenology and University Press of America, 1985. Pp.
xiii, 309.

Kockelmans, Joseph J . , and Theodore J . Kisiel, eds. (1970). Phenomenology and

the Natural Sciences: Essays and Translations. Evanston, IL: Northwestern Uni-
versity Press, 1970. Pp. xxi, 520. An important volume which includes, in a section
on Heidegger, Kockelmans' "Heidegger on the Essential Difference and Neces-
sary Relationship Between Philosophy and Science" (pp. 147-166), Kisiel's "Sci-
ence, Phenomenology, and the Thinking of Being" (pp. 167-183), and Kockelmans'
"The Era of the World-as-Picture" (pp. 184-201).

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Kolb, David A. (1983). "Heidegger on the Limits of Science," Journal of the
British Society for Phenomenology 14, no. 2 (January 1983): 50-64.

Krell, David Farrell, ed. (1977). Martin Heidegger: Basic Writings. New York:
Random, 1977. Pp. xvi, 397. Contains a substantial introduction and a judicious
selection of ten texts from the introduction to Being and Time to "The End of Phi-
losophy and the Task of Thinking." Each selection is also preceded by a succinct
note. This is undoubtedly the best introduction to the Heidegger corpus.

Langan, Thomas (1967). The Meaning of Heidegger: A Critical Study of an Exis-

tentialist Phenomenology. New York: Columbia University Press, 1967. Chapter
11 (pp. 191-200) is on "The Notion of Technique."

Leach, Dirk (1987). Technik. Montpellier: Oris Banal, 1987. A French and English
version of a memoir of a period spent working in the Benz Daimler plant in which
the author uses Heidegger to interpret his experience.

Leder, Drew (1985). "Modes of Totalization: Heidegger on Modern Technology

and Science," Philosophy Today 29, no. 3 (Fall 1985): 245-256. Argues the unity of
Heidegger's (early) analyses of science and (later) analyses of technology.

Lingis, Alfonso F. (1968). "On the Essence of Technique," in Manfred S. Frings,

ed., Heidegger and the Quest for Truth (Chicago: Quadrangle, 1968), pp. 126-138.
See also Lingis, "The Production of Productive Man," Contemporary Philosophy
8, no. 2 (Late Spring 1980): 15-16. "Technological production is not simply a more
vast and more efficient expansion of pretechnological production; with technology
productive man enters into an entirely new history, in which not only his relations
with the productive means, but also with the products and with himself, are al-
tered essentially" (p. 15).

Loscerbo, John (1977). "Martin Heidegger: Remarks Concerning Some Early

Texts on Modern Technology," Tijdschrift voor Filosofie 39 (March 1977): 104-129.
Comments based on the last half of "Die ewige Wiederkehr des Gleichen und der
Wille zur Macht," which derives from lectures in 1939-1940 and is included in
Nietzsche II (Pfullingen: Neske, 1961), pp. 7-29; and section XXVI (first published
separately in 1951) of "Overcoming Metaphysics" in Heidegger (1973).

(1981). Being and Technology: A Study in the Philosophy of Martin

Heidegger. The Hague: Nijhoff, 1981. Pp. xii, 283. So far, the only book in English
focusing on the theme of technology in Heidegger. For discussion, see section A,2
of text.

Lovitt, William (1973). "A 'Gespraech' with Heidegger on Technology," Man and
World 6, no. 1 (February 1973): 44-59.

(1980). "Techne and Technology: Heidegger's Perspective on What

Is Happening Today," Philosophy Today 24, no. 1 (Spring 1980): 62-72.

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

177
Macomber, W.B. (1967). The Anatomy of Disillusion: Martin Heidegger's Notion
of Truth. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1967. Pp. 198-208 contain
a section entitled "Science and Technology: Mathematics and Manipulation."

Macquarrie, John (1975). "The Idea of a Theology of Nature," Union Seminary

Quarterly Review 30, nos. 2-4 (Winter-Summer 1975): 69-75. Nature can be inter-
preted from below, in terms of experiments, or from above, in terms of human
experience. Uses Heidegger's ontology to consider the second alternative. "[T]he
strength of Heidegger's contribution will ensure that, in this reflection on Nature,
the human existent, rather than the hydrogen atom, will be the point of depar-
ture" (p. 75).

Marcuse, Herbert (1964). One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology of Ad-

vanced Industrial Society. Boston: Beacon Press, 1964. Pp. xvii, 260.

(1977a). "Enttuschung," in Gnther Neske, ed., Erinnerung an

Martin Heidegger (Pfullingen: Neske, 1977), pp. 162-163.

(1977b). "Heidegger's Politics: An Interview with Herbert Marcuse

by Frederick Olafson," Graduate Faculty Philosophy Journal 6, no. 1 (Winter
1977): 28-40. Taken from the transcript of a film presented at a conference on the
philosophy of Martin Heidegger sponsored by the Department of Philosophy at
the University of California, San Diego, in May, 1974.

Marx, Werner (1971). Heidegger and the Tradition. Trans. Theodore Kisiel and
Murray Greene. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1971. Pp. xxxiii,
275. Contains a short chapter on "The Essence of Technology at the 'Turn'" (pp.
173-179).

Maurer, Reinhart (1970). "Der angewandte Heidegger: Herbert Marcuse und das
akademische Proletariat," Philosophisches Jahrbuch 77, no. 2 (1970): 238-259.

(1972). "Von Heidegger zur praktischen Philosophie," in Manfred

Riedel, ed., Rehabilitierung der praktischen Philosophie (Freiburg: Rombach,
1972), pp. 415-454. English translation minus footnotes by Walter E . Wright as
"From Heidegger to Practical Knlosophy," Idealistic Studies 3, no. 2 (May 1973):
133-162.

Mitcham, Carl (1980). "Philosophy of Technology," in Paul Durbin, ed.. Guide to

the Culture of Science, Technology and Medicine (New York: Free Press, 1980),
pp. 282-363. Heidegger discussed under the subheading "Technology as Volition,"
pp. 317-322.

(1985). "What is the Philosophy of Technology?" International

Philosophical Quarterly 25, no. 1, whole no. 97 (March 1985): 73-88. For the
explicit discussion of Heidegger, see pp. 80-83. Mitcham, Carl and Robert Mac-
key, eds. (1972). Philosophy and Technology: Readings in the Philosophical Prob-

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lems of Technology. New York: Free Press, 1972. Pp. ix, 339. Paperback reprint,
1983. Pp. xii, 403.

Moehling, Karl A. (1972). "Martin Heidegger and the Nazi Party: An Examina-
tion." DeKalb: Northern Illinois University, 1972. Pp. 298. Ann Arbor Microfilms,
No. 72-29, 319. Contains Heidegger's letters of explanation from 1945 to the rector
of Freiburg University and the de-Nazification committee. See also Moehling's
summary and restatement of his finding in view of Heidegger's Spiegel interview
in "Heidegger and the Nazis," Listening 12, no. 3 (Fall 1977): 92-105, reprinted in
Thomas Sheehan, ed. (1981), pp. 31-43.

Moser, Simon (1971). "Toward a Metaphysics of Technology," trans. William Car-

roll, Carl Mitcham, and Robert Mackey, Philosophy Today 15, no. 2 (Summer
1971): 129-156. Heidegger is discussed at length, pp. 144-156. Translated from "Zur
Metaphysik der Technik," in Metaphysik einst und jetzt (Berlin: De Gruyten,
1958). For a revised version of this essay, see Moser, "Kritik der traditionellen
Technikphilosophie," in Hans Lenk and Simon Moser, eds., Technik, Techne,
Technologie (Pullach: Verlag Dokumentation, 1973), pp. 11-81.

Mller, Max (1986). "Ein Gesprch mit Max Mller," Freiburger Univer-
sittsbltter whole no. 92 (June 1986): 13-31.

Murray, Michael, ed. (1978). Heidegger and Modern Philosophy. New Haven, CT:
Yale University Press, 1978. Pp. xxiii, 374. Includes Albert Borgmann's "Heideg-
ger and Symbolic Logic" (pp. 3-22), Harold Alderman's "Heidegger's Critique of
Science and Technology" (pp. 35-50), Richard Rorty's "Overcoming the Tradi-
tion: Heidegger and Dewey" (pp. 239-258), and Karsten Harries' "Heidegger as
Political Thinker" (pp. 304-328).

Murray, Patrick (1982). "The Frankfurt School Critique of Technology," Re-

search in Philosophy and Technology, vol. 5 (1982): 223-248.

Naess, Arne (1979). "Martin Heidegger," in International Encyclopedia of the So-

cial Sciences, vol. 18: Biographical Supplement (New York: Free Press and Mac-
millan, 1979), pp. 286-287.

Nicholson, Graeme (1971). "The Commune of Being and Time," Dialogue

(Canada) 10, no. 4 (1971): 708-726. See also Nicholson, "Camus and Heidegger:
Anarchists," University of Toronto Quarterly 41 (1971): 14-23.

Orr, John (1974). "German Social Theory and the Hidden Face of Technology,"
Archives Europeennes de Sociologie 15, no. 2 (1974): 312-336.

Ottmann, Henning (1980). "Praktische Philosophie und technische Welt: Pro-

legomena zu einer unfertigen Philosophie der Praxis," Zeitschrift fr philoso-
phische Forschung 34, no. 2 (April-June 1980): 157-178.

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Pachter, Henry (1976). "Heidegger and Hitler; The Incompatibility [sic] of Geist
and Politics," Boston University Journal 24, no. 3 (1976): 47-55. For discussion,
see section A,7 of text.

Palmier, Jean-lVIichel (1968). Les Ecrits politiques de Heidegger. Paris: L'Herne,

1968.

Piccone, Paul, and Alexander Delfini (1970). "Herbert Marcuse's Heideggerian

Marxism," Telos, whole no. 6 (Fall 1970): 36-47. For discussion, see section A,6 of
text.

Pggeler, Otto (1972). Philosophie und Politik bei Heidegger. Freiburg: Alber,
1972. Pp. 151.

(1982). "Neue Wege mit Heidegger?" Philosophische Rundschau,

29, nos. 1-3 (1982): 39-71. A review of six books three about and three by Heideg-
ger: Ute Guzzoni, ed., Nachdenken ber Heidegger (Hildesheim: Gerstenberg,
1980); Friedrich-Wilhelm von Herrmann, Heideggers Philosophie der Kunst
(Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1980); Jochen Schlter, Heidegger und Parmenides
(Bonn: Bouvier-Grundmann, 1979); and Heidegger's Gesamtausgabe, vols. 20, 39
and 55.

Rapp, Friedrich (1984). "Kosmische Technik als Zuspruch des Seins: Bemer-
kungen zu W. Schirmachers Weiterdenken nach Heidegger," Zeitschrift fr phi-
losophische Forschung 37, no. 3 (1984): 445-449.

Richardson, William J . (1968). "Heidegger's Critique of Science," New Scholasti-

cism 42, no. 4 (Autumn 1968): 511-536.

Robinet, Andre (1976). "Leibniz und Heidegger: Atomzeitalter oder Informatik-

zeitalter?" Studia Leibnitiana 8, no. 2 (1976): 241-256. Whereas Heidegger con-
trasts calculative and meditative thinking, number and being, Robinet argues
that Leibniz actually offers a synthesis of number and being. Heidegger is a
dualistic gnostic.

Rohrmoser, Gnter (1969). "Humanitt und Technologie," Studium Generale 22,

no. 8 (August 1969): 771-782. In a subsequent article, "Revolution, Philosophy, and
Psychoanalysis" in Universitas: A German Review of the Arts and Sciences 16,
no. 1 (1974): 37-42, the argument is that Marcuse develops a "Freud-Marxism."

Romano, Bruno. Tecnica e giustizia nel pensiero di Martin Heidegger. Milan: A.

Giuffre, 1969. Pp. xiv, 233.

Rouse, Joseph (1981). "Kuhn, Heidegger, and Scientific Realism," Man and World
14, no. 3 (1981): 269-290. Uses Heidegger to defend Kuhn and criticize realism. For
discussion, see section A , l of text.

Rorty, Richard (1978). "Overcoming the Tradition: Heidegger and Dewey," in

Michael Murray, ed. (1978), pp. 239-258.

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 (1979). Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature. Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1979. Pp. xv, 401. Views Wittgenstein, Heidegger, and Dewey as
leading a challenge to the idea that the mind mirrors nature. For discussion, see
section A , l of text, near the end.

Sachsse, Hans (1973). "Die Technik in der Sicht Herbert Marcuses und Martin
Heideggers," Proceedings of the XVth World Congress of Philosophy, vol. 1
(Sofia: Sofia Press Production Center, 1973), pp. 371-375.

Sallis, John (1970). "Toward the Movement of Reversal: Science, Technology,

and the Language of Homecoming," in John Sallis, ed., Heidegger and the Path of
Thinking (Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1970), pp. 138-168.

Sallis, John, ed. (1978). Radical Phenomenology. Atlantic Highlands, NJ:

Humanities Press, 1978. Pp. 318. This reprints the Heidegger Memorial Issue of
Research in Phenomenology 7 (1977), and contains papers from a Heidegger con-
ference held at DePaul University in Chicago, May 14-16, 1976.

Schirmacher, Wolfgang (1973). "Heidegger's Radikalkritik der Technik als

gesellschaftlicher Handlungsentwurf," Proceedings of the XVth World Congress
of Philosophy, vol. 1 (Sofia: Sofia Press Production Center, 1973), pp. 383-387.

(1982a). "Heideggers Einfluss auf das gegenwrtige Denken," Phi-

losophischer Literaturanzeiger 35, no. 4 (October-December 1982): 383-398. A re-
view of nine books: Ute Guzzoni, ed., Nachdenken ber Heidegger (Hildesheim:
Gerstenberg, 1980); Hermann Mrchen, Macht und Herrschaft im Denken von
Adorno und Heidegger (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1980); Mrchen, Adorno und
Heidegger (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1981); Assen Ignatow, Heidegger und die phi-
losophische Anthropologie (Meisenheim: Hain, 1979); Helga Kuschbert-Tlle,
Martin Heidegger: Der letzte Metaphysiker? (Meisenheim: Hain, 1979); Friedrich
Seven, Die Ewigkeit Gottes und die Zeitlichkeit des Menschen (Gttingen: Van-
denhoeck & Ruprecht, 1979); John Sallis, ed.. Radical Phenomenology (Atlantic
Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press, 1978); Mervyn Sprung, ed., The Question of
Being (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1978); and David
A. White, Heidegger and the Language of Poetry (Lincoln: University of Neb-
raska Press, 1978).

(1982b). "Bauen, Wohnen, Denken: Ethische Konsequenzen der

Naturphilosophie Martin Heidegger," Philosophisches Jahrbuch 89, no. 2 (1982):
405-410.

(1983a). Technik und Gelassenheit: Zeitkritik nach Heidegger.

Freiburg: Alber, 1983. Pp. 274. This is the second half of Schirmacher's disserta-
tion, Ereignis Technik: Heidegger und die Frage nach der Technik (University of
Hamburg, 1980), with a new introduction and conclusion. For discussion, see sec-
tion A,4 of text.

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 (1983b). "From the Phenomenon to the Event of Technology: a
Dialectical Approach to Heidegger's Phenomenology," in Paul T. Durbin and
Friedrich Rapp, eds.. Philosophy and Technology (Boston: Reidel, 1983), pp. 275
289. A German version of this paper is available in P. Durbin and F . Rapp, eds.,
Technikphilosophie in der Diskussion (Braunschweig: Vieweg, 1982), pp. 245-257.

Schmitt, Richard (1969). Martin Heidegger on Being Human. New York: Ran-
dom, 1969. Pp. 274. Most of chapter 2, "Things," appeared earlier as "Heidegger's
Analysis of 'Tool'," Monist 49, no. 1 (January 1965): 70-86.

Schufreider, Gregory (1981). "Heidegger on Community," Man and World 14, no.
1 (1981): 25-54.

Schrmann, Reiner (1978). "Political Thinking in Heidegger," Social Research 45,

no. 1 (Spring 1978): 191-221. See also the author's "Questioning the Foundations of
Practical Philosophy," Human Studies 1, no. 4 (October 1978): 357-368; "The On-
tological Difference and Political Philosophy," Philosophy and Phenomenological
Research 40, no. 1 (Septembr 1979): 99-122.

(1981). "Principles Precarious: The Origin of the Political in

Heidegger," in Thomas Sheehan, ed. (1981), pp. 245-256.

(1986). Heidegger on Being and Acting: From Principles to Anar-

chy, trans. Christine-Marie Gros. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press,
1986. Translation of Le Principe d^anarchie: Heidegger et la question de Vagir
(Paris: Seuil, 1982).

Schuurman, Egbert (1980). Technology and the Future: A Philosophical Chal-

lenge. Trans. Donald Morton. Toronto: Wedge Publishing Foundation, 1980. Pp.
xxiii, 434. See especially pp. 80-122. Originally published as Technik en tekomst:
Confrontatie met wijsgerige beschouwingen (Assen, The Netherlands: Van Gor-
cum, 1972). For sympathetic analysis, see Donald Morton, "Continuing the Neo-
Calvinist Critique of Technology: Review of Egbert Schuurman's Technology and
Deliverance," Research in Philosophy and Technology, vol. 2 (1979): 329-340.
("Technology and Deliverance" was the preliminary title for the translation on
which Morton was working at the time.)

Schwan, Alexander (1965). Politische Philosophie im Denken Heideggers. Col-

ogne: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1965. Pp. 206.

(1974). "Martin Heidegger, Politik und praktische Philosophie: Zur

Problematik neuerer Heidegger-Literatur," Philosophisches Jahrbuch 81, no. 1
(1974): 148-171.

Seeburger, Francis F . (1976). "The Conversion of Nature and Technology," in

Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka, ed., Analecta Husserliana, vol. 5: The Crisis of Cul-
ture: Steps to Reopen the Phenomenological Investigation of Man (Boston:
Reidel, 1976), pp. 281-290. "Nature, which, in the mythico-religious attitude, was

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manifest as the dimension of the sustaining, overwhelming, and ineluctable . . .
under the technological attitude . . . becomes manifest as a field open to human
organization and control" (pp. 286-287).

Seidel, George J . (1971). "Heidegger: Philosopher for Ecologists?" Man and

World 4, no. 1 (February 1971): 93-99.

Seigfried, Hans (1978). "Heidegger's Longest Day: Being and Time and the Sci-
ences," Philosophy Today 22, no. 4 (Winter 1978): 319-331.

(1980). "Scientific Realism and Phenomenology" Zeitschrift fr phi-

losophische Forschung 34, no. 3 (July-September 1980): 395-404.

Sheehan, Thomas (1979). "Philosophy and Propaganda: Response to Professor

Bronner," Salmagundi whole no. 43 (Winter 1979): 173-184.

Sheehan, Thomas, ed. (1981). Heidegger: The Man and the Thinker. Chicago: Pre-
cedent, 1981. Pp. XX, 347. The best single collection of essays on Heidegger in En-
glish. Divided into six parts. Part I, "Glimpses of the Philosopher's Life," con-
tains Sheehan's philosophical biography of the years leading up to Being and
Time, two brief auto-biographical reflections by Heidegger, as well as the Spiegel
interview, a letter from Husserl to Rudolph Otto about Heidegger, Karl Moehl-
ing's "Heidegger and the Nazis," and Fr. Bernhard Welte's funeral eulogy. Part
H, "Being, Dasein, and Subjectivity," contains essays by William J . Richardson,
Theodore Kisiel, John Sallis, and Robert E . Innis. Part HI deals with the Scheler-
Heidegger relationship and contains Max Scheler's critique of Being and Time,
section 43, a study by Parvis Emad, and Heidegger's "In Memory of Max
Scheler." Part IV, "Overcoming Metaphysics," contains essays by Walter
Biemel, Otto Pggeler, Jacques Taminiaux, and John D. Caputo. Part V is com-
posed of essays on "Technology, Politics, and Art" by Michael E . Zimmerman,
David Schweickart, Reiner Schrmann, and Sandra Lee Bartky. Part VI is an
exhaustive (but unannotated) bibliography of Heidegger translations and "Secon-
dary Literature in English, 1929-1977" by H. Miles Groth. The contributions by
Sheehan, Richardson, Kisiel, Biemel, Scheler, Zimmerman, Caputo, Moehling,
and Welte, along with three translations from Heidegger, only one of which is in-
cluded in the book, appeared earlier in Listening 12, no. 3 (Fall 1977), under the
same thematic title, "Heidegger: The Man and the Thinker."

Shmueli, Efraim (1975). "Contemporary Philosophical Theories and Their Rela-

tion to Science and Technology," Philosophy in Context vol. 4 (1975): 37-60.

Steiner, George (1979). Martin Heidegger. New York: Viking, 1979. Pp. 173.

Stewart, Roderick M. (1983). "Heidegger's Transcendental-Phenomenological

'Justification' of Science" in Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka and Calvin 0. Schrg,
eds.. Foundations of Morality, Human Rights, and the Human Sciences:
Phenomenology in a Foundational Dialogue with the Human Sciences, Analecta
Husserliana 15 (Boston: D. Reidel, 1983), pp. 189-207. An examination of Heideg-

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183
ger's "existential conception of science" in Being and Time and how this provides
only historical not a universal or transcendental justification of science.

Strauss, Leo (1971). "Philosophy as a Rigorous Science and Political Philosophy,"

Interpretation 2, no. 1 (Summer 1971): 1-9. Included in Strauss, Studies in Platonic
Political Philosophy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984). See also
Strauss' essay on "Kurt Riezler" in What Is Political Philosophy? and Other
Studies (Glencoe, IL: Free Press, 1959), especially pp. 246-248; the "Preface to
Spinoza's Critique of Religion," in Liberalism: Ancient and Modern (New York:
Basic Books, 1968), especially pp. 233-235; and Leo Strauss and Jacob Klein, "A
Giving of Accounts," The College [St. John's, Annapolis, MD] (April 1970), pp. 1
5.

Strawson, P.F. (1979). "Take the B Train," New York Review of Books 26, no. 6
(April 19, 1979): 35-37. A review of two books by George Steiner: Martin Heideg-
ger (1979) and On Difficulty and Other Essays (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1978).

Tribe, Laurence H. (1974). "Ways Not to Think about Plastic Trees," Yale Law
Journal 83, no. 7 (June 1974): 1315-1348. Limited use of Heidegger.

Van Meisen, Andrew G. (1961). Science and Technology. Pittsburgh: Duquesne

University Press, 1961. Pp. ix, 373. See especially chapters 9-13, where Heideg-
ger's analysis of technology is explicitly utilized.

Volpi, Franco (1980). "Nochmals Heidegger? Eine Bilanz der neuen internationa-
len Heidegger-Forschung," Philosophischer Literaturanzeiger 33, no. 4 (October-
December 1980): 366-386. A review of Alfred Jger, Gott: Nochmals Martin
Heidegger (Tbingen: Mohr, 1978); Manfred Thiel, Martin Heidegger: Sein Werk
Aufbau und Durchblick (Heidelberg: Elpis, 1977); Gerhard Schmitt, The Con-
cept of Being in Hegel and Heidegger (Bonn: Bouvier-Grundman, 1977); John D.
Caputo (1978); J.L. Mehta, Martin Heidegger: The Way and the Vision (Honolulu:
University of Hawaii Press, 1976); Jean Beaufret, Dialogue avec Heidegger, vols.
I-III (Paris: Editions de Minuit, 1973-1974); Henri Birault, Heidegger et Vexperi-
ence de la pensee (Paris: Gallimard, 1978); Vincenzo Vitiello, Heidegger: il nulla
e la fondazione della storicit <Urbino: Argalia, 1976); Vincenzo Vitiello, Dialet-
tica ed ermeneutica: Hegel e Heidegger (Naples: Guida, 1979); and Mario Rugge-
nini, II soggetto e la tecnica: Heidegger interprete ''inattuale'' delVepoca moderna
(Rome: Bulzoni, 1977).

Waterhouse, Roger (1981). A Heidegger Critique: A Critical Examination of the

Existential Phenomenology of Martin Heidegger. Atlantic Highlands, NJ:
Humanities Press, 1981. Pp. xi, 239.

Weizscker, Carl Friedrich von (1982). "Heidegger and Natural Science," in

Werner Marx, ed., Heidegger Memorial Lectures (Pittsburgh: Duquesne Univer-
sity Press, 1982), pp. 75-99.

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Winner, Langdon (1977). Autonomous Technology: Technics out of Control as a
Theme in Political Thought. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1977. Pp. x, 386.

Zimmerman, Michael (1974). "Heidegger, Ethics, and National Socialism,"

Southwestern Journal of Philosophy 5, no. 1 (Spring 1974): 97-106.

(1975). "Heidegger on Nihilism and Technique," Man and World 8,

no. 4 (November 1975): 394-414.

(1977a). "Beyond 'Humanism': Heidegger's Understanding of Tech-

nology," Listening 12, no. 3 (Fall 1977): 74-83. Reprinted in Thomas Sheehan, ed.
(1981), pp. 219-227.

(1977b). "A Brief Introduction to Heidegger's Concept of Technol-

ogy," Humanities Perspectives on Technology Newsletter, whole no. 2 (October
1977): 10-13.

(1979a). "Heidegger and Marcuse: Technology as Ideology," Re-

search in Philosophy and Technology, vol. 2 (1979): 245-261.

(1979b). "Marx and Heidegger on the Technological Domination of

Nature," Philosophy Today 23, no. 2 (Summer 1979): 99-111.

(1981). Eclipse of the Self: The Development of Heidegger's Concept

of Authenticity. Athens: Ohio University Press,TL981. Pp. xxx, 331. For discussion,
see section A,5 of text.

(1983a). "Humanism, Ontology, and the Nuclear Arms Race," Re-

search in Philosophy and Technology, vol. 6 (1983): 157-172.

(1983b). "Toward a Heideggerean Ethos for Radical Environmen-

talism," Environmental Ethics 5, no. 2 (Summer 1983): 99-131. For discussion, see
section A,3 of text.

(1984). "Karel Kosik's Heideggerian Marxism," Philosophical

Forum 15, no. 3 (Spring 1984): 209-233.

2. Works on Art and Religion

Alderman, Harold G. (1973). "The Work of Art and Other Things," in Edward G.
Ballard and Charles E . Scott, eds., Martin Heidegger: In Europe and America
(The Hague: Nijhoff, 1973), pp. 157-170. From thing to art to poetry, a good basic
statement of the relationships.

Bartky, Sandra Lee (1979). "Heidegger and the Modes of World Disclosure," Phi-
losophy and Phenomenological Research 40, no. 2 (December 1979): 212-236.

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

185
 (1981). "Heidegger's Philosophy of Art," in Thomas Sheehan, ed.
(1981), pp. 257-274. This is a revised version of an article with the same title,
British Journal of Aesthetics 9 (1969): 353-371. For discussion, see section B,2 of
text.

Biemel, Walter (1979). "Philosophy and Art," trans. Parvis Emad, Man and
World 12, no. 3 (1979): 267-283. Historical review from Plato to Heidegger, fol-
lowed by a Heideggerian attempt at "rendering intelligible what is articulated in
Art" (p. 275) in the case of one painting by Velazquez and another by Picasso.

Borgmann, Albert (1968). "The Place of Theology in a Technological World,"

NCEA [National Catholic Educational Association] Bulletin 64, no. 3 (February
1968): 28-33.

Bossart, William H. (1968). "Heidegger's Theory of Art," Journal of Aesthetics

and Art Criticism 27, no. 1 (Fall 1968): 57-66. For discussion, see section B,2 of
text.

Caputo, John D. (1978). The Mystical Element in Heidegger's Thought. Athens:

Ohio University Press, 1978. Pp. xvi, 292.

Cohen, Richard A. (1983). "Dasein's Responsibility for Being," Philosophy Today

27, no. 4 (Winter 1983): 317-325. Argues "an ethic of hermeneutic responsibility is
the very being of Dasein." Suggests an ethics in art.

Danner, Helmut (1971). Das Gttliche und der Gott bei Heidegger. Meisenheim:
Hain, 1971. Pp. 187.

DriscoU, Giles (1967). "Heidegger: A Response to Nihilism," Philosophy Today

11, no. 1 (Spring 1967): 17-37. Contains a brief discussion of technology in Heideg-
ger's via negativa response to nihilism.

Fandozzi, Phillip (1979). "Art in a Technological Society," Research in Philoso-

phy and Technology, vol. 2 (1979): 111-118. Commentary on the aesthetic theories
of Karsten Harries, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty, and Stanley Cavell. For further
reflection, see Fandozzi, "Art in a Technological Setting," Research in Philosophy
and Technology, vol. 5 (1982): 3-13, which (with only implicit reference to Heideg-
ger) argues that modern art "becomes a business rather than a fundamental
mode of knowledge; it becomes a recreation rather than genuine creation" (p. 8).

Foti, Veronique M. (1986). "Heidegger's and Merleau-Ponty's Turn from Technic-

ity to Art," Philosophy Today 30, No. 4 (Winter 1986): 306-16. Good comparison of
two different attempts to break out of technology by appealing to art.

Gethmann-Siefert, Annemarie (1974). Das Verhltnis von Philosophie und

Theologie im Denken Martin Heideggers. Freiburg: Alber, 1974. Pp. 340.

PHILOSOPHY TODAY

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Halliburton, David (1981a). "From Poetic Thinking to Concrete Interpretation/'
Papers on Language and Literature 17, no. 1 (Winter 1981): 71-79. A Heideggerian
analysis of Wordsworth's poem "Michael."

(1981b). Poetic Thinking: An Approach to Heidegger. Chicago: Uni-

versity of Chicago Press, 1981. Pp. xii, 235.

Harries, Karsten (1966). "Heidegger's Conception of the Holy," Personalist 47, no.
2 (Spring, April 1966): 169-184.

(1983). "Thoughts on a Non-Arbitrary Architecture," Perspecta 20,

no. 1 1983): 9-20.

Heine, Steven (1985). Existentialism and Ontological Dimensions of time in

Heidegger and Dogen. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1985. Pp. 202.

Herrmann, Friedrich-Wilhelm von (1980). Heideggers Philosophie der Kunst:

Eine systematische Interpretation der Holzwege-Abhandlung ''Der Ursprung des
Kunstwerkes.'' Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1980. Pp. 379.

(1985). "Kunst und Technik," Heidegger Studies 1 (1985): 25-62.

Hsiao, Paul Shih-Yi (1977). "Wir trafen uns am Holzmarktplatz," in Gnther

Neske, ed., Erinnerung an Martin Heidegger (Pfullingen: Neske, 1977), pp. 119-29.

Hyland, Drew A. (1971). "Art and the Happening of Truth: Reflections on the End
of Philosophy," Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 30, no. 2 (Winter 1971):
177-187.

Ishida, Akira (1975). "Between Art and the Work of Art: On the Ontological Dif-
ference of Art" (in Japanese), Bigaku 26 (1975): 27-39.

Jaeger, Hans (1958). "Heidegger and the Work of Art," Journal of Aesthetics and
Art Criticism 17, no. 1 (September 1958): 58-71.

Jonas, Hans (1964). "Heidegger and Theology," Review of Metaphysics 18, no. 2,
whole no. 70 (December 1964): 207-233. Reprinted in Jonas' The Phenomenon of
Life (New York: Harper & Row, 1966), pp. 235-261.

Kaelin, E . F . (1967). "Notes Toward an Understanding of Heidegger's Aesthe-

tics," in E.N. Lee and M. Mandelbaum, eds.. Phenomenology and Existentialism
(Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins Press, 1967), pp. 59-92.

Kelley, Derek A. (1977). "The Earth as Home," Religious Humanism 11, no. 4
(Autumn 1977): 216-218. Pop Heidegger.

Kockelmans, Joseph (1973). "Heidegger on Theology," Southwestern Journal of

Philosophy 4, no. 3 (Fall 1973): 85-108.

HEIDEGGER AND TECHNOLOGY

187
 (1985). Heidegger on Art and Art Works. Dordrecht: Nijhoff, 1985.
Pp. xiv, 249. Two earlier studies related to this book: "Alcune Riflessioni sull
Coincezione della Terra in Heidegger," Humanitas 33 (1978): 445-468; and "On Art
and Language," in Jacques Sojcher and Gilbert Hottois, eds., Philosophie et Lan-
gage (Brussels: Editions de I'Universite de Bruxelles, 1982), pp. 125-146.

Kohak, Erazim (1984). The Embers and the Stars: A Philosophical Inquiry into
the Moral Sense of Nature. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984. Pp. xiii,
269. For review see Gale A. Johnson, "A Philosophical Inquiry into the Moral
Sense of Nature and Artifacts," Man and World 19 (1986): 103-118.

Kreeft, Peter (1971). "Zen in Heidegger's Gelassenheit," International Philosophi-

cal Quarterly 11, no. 4 (December 1971): 521-545.

Krell, David Farrell (1976). "Art and Truth in Raging Discord: Heidegger and
Nietzsche on the Will to Power," Boundary 2, vol. 4 (1976): 379-392. Good descrip-
tion of how Heidegger builds on and transforms Nietzsche's theory of art.

Langan, Thomas (1972). "Heidegger and the Possibility of Authentic Christian-

ity," Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association, vol. 46
(1972): 101-112.

(1980). Untitled review of John D. Caputo's The Mystical Element

in Heidegger's Thought (1978), New Scholasticism 54, no. 4 (Autumn 1980): 519
522.

Lawry, Edward G. (1978). "The Work-Being of the Work of Art in Heidegger,"

Man and World 11, nos. 1-2 (1978): 186-198. The art work in "The Origin of the
Work of Art" fits none of the types of being found in Being and Time (i.e., ready-
to-hand equipment, present-at-hand things, Dasein). Heidegger thus adds a new
type of being.

Leonard, Linda (1972). "Toward an Ontological Analysis of Detachment," Philos-

ophy Today 15, no. 4 (Winter 1972): 268-280.

Luther, Arthur R. (1982). "Original Emergence in Heidegger and Nishida," Phi-

losophy Today 26, no. 4 (Winter 1982): 345-356.

Magnus, Bernd (1971). "Nihilism, Reason, and The Good'," Review of

Metaphysics 25, no. 2, whole no. 98 (December 1971): 292-310.

Malik, Charles Habib (1977). "A Christian Reflection on Martin Heidegger,"

Thomist 41, no. 1 (January 1977): 1-61.

Malet, Andre (1983). "The Believer in the Presence of Technique," trans. Jim
Grote, in Carl Mitcham and Jim Grote, eds., Theology and Technology: Essays in
Christian Analysis and Exegesis (Lanham, MD: University Press of America,

PHILOSOPHY TODAY

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1983), pp. 91-106. Originally published as "Le Croyant en face de la technique,"
Revue d'histoire et de philosophie religieuses 55, no. 3 (1975): 417-430.

Marx, Werner (1972). "The World in Another Beginning: Poetic Dwelling and the
Role of the Poet," in Joseph J . Kockelmans, ed. and trans.. On Heidegger and
Language (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1972), pp. 235-250.
From a conference. Discussion follows, pp. 250-259.

MiceU, Vincent P., SJ (1972). "Heidegger and Bultmann: Keepers of the Cosmic
Cage," UOsservatore Romano 25, no. 221 (June 22, 1972): 4 and 11.

Murray, Edward L. (1982). "Be-ing . . . Think-ing . . . Thank-ing: Reflections on

Technology in the Spirit of Martin Heidegger," Studies in Formative Spirituality
3, no. 2 (May 1982): 225-243.

Nakaoka, Narifumi (1985). "Zur Differenz-Frage: H. Tanabes Philosophie des Ab-

soluten Nichts," Philosophisches Jahrbuch 92, no. 1 (1985): 124-125.

Nwodo, Christopher (1976). "The Work of Art in Heidegger: A World Disclosure,"

Cultural Hermeneutics 4, no. 1 (November 1976): 61-74). Art is not only an object
of aesthetic experience but also a revelation of the world of a people at a particu-
lar time and place, and through this the epochal manifestation of a people's open-
ness to Being.

(1977). "The Role of Art in Heidegger's Philosophy," Philosophy

Today 21, no. 3 (Fall 1977): 294-304. For discussion, see section B,2 of text.

Olivier, G. (1984). "Heidegger and Architecture: Preliminary Remarks," South

African Journal of Philosophy 3, no. 1 (February 1984): 22-30.

Olson, Carl (1981). "The Leap of Thinking: A Comparison of Heidegger and the
Zen Master Dgen," Philosophy Today 25, no. 1 (Spring 1981): 55-62.

Omori, Shoichi (1972). "Art and Technology," Bigaku 23, no. 3, whole no. 91 (De-
cember 1972): 42 and 81. Japanese and German abstracts of a paper read at the
23rd National Congress of the Japanese Society for Aesthetics.

Perotti, James L. (1974). Heidegger on the Divine: The Thinker, the Poet, and
God. Athens: Ohio University Press, 1974. Pp. x, 134.

Richardson, Herbert W. (1965). "Heidegger and God and Professor Jonas,"

Thought 40, whole no. 156 (Spring 1965): 13-40.

Robinson, James M., and John B. Cobb, eds. (1963). The Later Heidegger and
Theology. New York: Harper & Row, 1963. Pp. xii, 212.

Rosen, Stanley (1969). Nihilism: A Philosophical Essay. New Haven, CT: Yale
University Press, 1969. Pp. xx, 241.

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Schaeffler, Richard (1978). Frmmigkeit des Denkens? Martin Heidegger und die
katholische Theologie. Darmstadt: Wissenschafthche Buchgesellshaft, 1978. Pp.
xiii, 160.

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Southwestern Journal of Philosophy 4, no. 3 (Fall 1973): 109-124.

Schrmann, Reiner (1973). "Heidegger and Meister Eckart on Releasement," Re-

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(1978). "The Loss of the Origin in Soto Zen and in Meister Eckhart,"
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Seigfried, Hans (1978). "Art and the Origin of Truth," Man and World 11, nos. 1-2
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Sendaydiego, Henry B. (1976). "Heidegger's Thoughts on Aesthetics," Journal of

the West Virginia Philosophical Society, vol. 10 (1976): 14-16. Attempts to use
Heidegger's theory of art as a basis for expanding public funding of artists. Vigor-
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Skousgaard, Stephen, ed. (1981). Phenomenology and the Understanding of

Human Destiny. Washington, DC: University Press of America, 1981. Pp. viii, 384.
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Smith, P. Christopher (1977). "A Poem of Rilke: Evidence for the Later Heideg-
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the outlines of a theory of techne which breaks radically with the modern princi-
ple of subjectivity, indeed with any understanding of self and world which sees
the world in terms of acts of objectification originating in the self." Uses this
poem to explicate the understandings of techne in Heidegger and Gadamer. Writ-
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perience herself as efficient cause but merely as the instrument of an event which
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 Part Three
INDEX OF NAMES
Name
Adorno, Theodor 111, 124, 125
Ahlers, Rolf 125, 141
Alderman, Harold 102, 109, 144
Allemann, Beda 129
Apel, Otto 123
Aristotle 136
Bahr, Hans-Dieter 125
Ballard, Edward 102, 116, 120, 157
Barth, Karl 156
Bartky, Sandra Lee 144
Barrett, William 157
Becker, Oskar 139
Benjamin, Walter 145
Berciano, Modesto 123
Biemel, Walter 108, 138, 142, 143
Billington, David P. 146
Blitz, Mark 135, 136, 137
Bloch, Ernst 119
Bloomer, Kent C. 146
Boorstin, Daniel 134
Borgmann, Albert 99, 111, 114, 148
Bossart, William 141, 143, 144
Brand, Stewart 113
Bronner, Stephen Eric 127, 128
Buruma, Ian 151
Caputo, John 106, 112, 134, 147, 149
150, 151, 152, 153
Colaizzi, Paul 112, 115, 120
Dallmayr, Fred 137, 138
Dauenhauer, Bernard 134, 135, 137
DeCarolis, Massimo 102
DeGeorge, Richard T. 126
Delfini, Alexander 123, 124, 141
Descartes, Rene 145
Dessauer, Friedrich 110, 115
Deutsch, Eliot 148
Dewey, John 105
Dooyeweerd, Herman 114
Dreyfus, Hubert 118, 121, 122, 132, 136,
139, 141, 157, 158
Dworkin, Ronald 136, 137
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
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Page Eckhart, Meister 147, 154
Einstein, Albert 144
Ellul, Jacques 114, 115, 133
Emad, Parvis 110
Fandozzi, Phillip 117, 122, 123, 146, 150
Fay, Thomas 114
Fell, Joseph 109
Fijisawa, Chikao 149
Fink, Eugen 126, 127
Foucault, Michel 135
Franks, Dean 113
Freud, Sigmund 146
Gadamer, Hans-Georg 104, 142
Galbraith, John Kenneth 134
Gerratana, Valentino 124
Goff, Robert 113
Goldmann, Lucien 125, 126
Grange, Joseph 112, 120, 141
Grant, George 111
Grene, Marjorie 108
Grote, Jim 109, 156
Grnder, Karlfried 102, 125
Guzzoni, Ute 129
Habermas, Jrgen 123, 124, 140
Halliburton, David 146
Harries, Karsten 133, 134, 141, 142, 146
Hartshorne, Charles 104
Heelan, Patrick 102, 106, 107, 138, 157
Hegel, G.W.F. 144
Hermann, Friedrich-Wilhelm von 108,
145
Hirsch, Fred 134
Hofstadter, Albert 103, 109, 142
Hlderlin, Friedrich 153
Holton, Gerald 100
Hood, Webster 115, 116, 141
Horkheimer, Max 124
Hhnerfeld, Paul 147
Husserl, Edmund 101, 123, 127, 149
Ihde, Don 118, 120, 121, 122, 139, 157
Ishida, Akika 149
Jaeger, Hans 143 Mitcham, Carl 99, 109, 113, 114,
Jaspers, Karl 129 115, 119, 156
Jonas, Hans 118, 119, 120, 139 Moehling, Karl A 129
Jung, Hwa Yol 112 Moore, Charles W. 146
Jung, Pette 112 Mrchen, Hermann 111, 124, 125
Jnger, Ernst 111, 127, 150 Moser, Simon 109, 115, 138, 139
Jnger, Friedrich Georg 114 Mller, Max 128, 129
Murray, Michael 108
Murray, Patrick 124
Kaelin, E . F . 143, 144
Kant, Immanuel 113, 126, 145
Kimball, Roger 127, 129 Naess, Arne 108, 112
King, Magda 102, 109 Nakaoka, Narifumi 149
Kisiel, Theodore 101, 102, 104, 105, Nicholson, Graeme 134
11, 123, 143 Nietzsche, Friedrich 122, 130
Klaus, Georg 114 Nishida, Kitaro 149
Kockelmans, Joseph 101, 102, 144, 145 Nitta, Hoshihiro 149
Kolb, David A. 107 Nwodo, Christopher 141, 143, 144
Krell, David Farrell 110, 111
Kuhn, Richard 142 Omori, Shoichi 149
Kuhn, Thomas 103 Orr, John 111
Kuki, Shuzo 148 Ott, Hugo 129
Ottmann, Henning 114
Laertius, Diogenes 110 Pachter, Henry 127, 128
Langan, Thomas 108 Palmier, Jean-Michel 111
Lawry, Edward 144 Perotti, James L. 152, 153, 154
Leiss, William 124 Picasso, Pablo 143
Linder, Staffan 134 Piccone, Paul 123, 124, 141
Lingis, A . F . 113 Pirsig, Robert 100
Loscerbo, John 108, 110, 114 Plato 136, 155
Lovitt, William 108, 109 Pggeler, Otto 108, 129, 130, 132,
Lowith, Karl 138, 147 133, 137, 141
Lukacs, Georg 124, 125, 146
Quine, Willard Van Or man 100
Maclntyre, Alasdair 128
Mackey, Robert 109, 119 Rapp, Friedrich 117
Macomber, W.B. 108 Richardson, WiUiam J . 101, 108
Macquarrie, John 102 Rohrmoser, Gunter 123
Magnus, Bernd 103, 108 Rorty, Richard 105, 106, 107, 128
Malet, Andre 109 Rosen, Stanley 127, 150
Marcuse, Herbert 123, 124, 125, Rouse, Joseph 103
127, 137, 140, 141
Marx, Werner 108, 119, 123, 124, Sachsse, Hans 125
125, 126, 127, 137 Sallis, John 102
Maurer, Reinhart 123, 124, 125, 137, Sayle, Murray 151
138, 147 Schinzinger, Robert 149
Merleau-Ponty, Maurice 135, 143 Schirmacher, Wolfgang 108, 113, 117,
Meyer, Hermann 114 121, 124, 125, 132

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193
Schmitt, Richard 120, 131, 132, 133
Schopenhauer, Arthur 117, 146
Schrg, Calvin 0. 143
Schufreider, Gregory 133
Schrmann, Reiner 127, 134, 135, 137
Schuurman, Egbert 114
Schwan, Alexander 125, 127, 130,
132, 133, 137, 141, 146
Scitovsky, Tiber 134
Seeburger, Francis F. 102
Seidel, George 112
Seigfried, Hans 101
Sendaydiego, Henry 142
Sheehan, Thomas 108, 128, 129
Shmueli, Efraim 125
Sophocles 119
Speer, Albert 129
Spinoza, Baruch 117
Stambaugh, Joan 109
Steinbuch, Karl 114
Steiner, George 108, 109, 129
Stone, Christopher 112
Strauss, Leo 127, 150
Tatematsu, Hirotaka 149
Tribe, Laurence 112
PHILOSOPHY TODAY
194
Umehara, Takeshi 151
Unger, Roberto Mangabeira 128
Valery, Paul 145
Van Meisen, Andrew G. 102
Velazquez 143
Versenyi, Laszlo 147
Walzer, Michael 136, 137
Waterhouse, Roger 104, III, 123, 126
Weizscker, Carl Friedrich von 105,
129, 138
Welte, Bernhard 152, 153, 154, 155, 156
White, David A. 150, 155
Wiener, Norbert 114
Winner, Langdon 133
Wittgenstein, Ludwig 105, 113
Wright Kathleen 145, 146
Zimmerman, Michael 102, 110, 111, 113,
122, 123, 124, 125, 127, 131, 154, 157