Babbette Babich - The Problem of Science in Nietzsche and Heidegger

Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia
"The Problem of Science" in Nietzsche and Heidegger Author(s): Babette E. Babich Source: Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia, T. 63, Fasc. 1/3, Filosofia e Cincia / Science in Philosophy (Jan. - Sep., 2007), pp. 205-237 Published by: Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40419516 . Accessed: 30/09/2013 05:39
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"TheProblem ofScience"in and Heidegger Nietzsche

Babette E. Babich*
and Heidegger to science Abstract: Nietzsche pose important philosophical questions Theresultant contributes towhat becalled a conanditstechnological may projects. that sucha rigorously critiandthe author tinental ofscience argues only philosophy a genuinely to thequestion cal approach philosophical reflection ofscience permits the heart onscience, than a thoughtful More onscience. however, ofphilosoreflection that Theauthor insuchreflections. is also at stake defends ifNietzsche proposes phy knowltruth andthe us against resources the oftragic deadly insights ofarttodefend and is his science claim more then Nietzsche's art, of justas equation arresting edge, science and artdrawuponthe and poiesis.ForNietzsche, alignstechne Heidegger tothe andartaredirected science andboth samecreative oflife. purpose powers KeyWords: Art; ExpeCausality; ComputerAge; Philosophy; Biotechnology; Analytic Human Genome; Internet; Martin; rience;Genome Heidegger, Project;Gestett; Kuhn, Thomas S.; Measuring; Mechanization;Natural Science; Nature; Passion in Science;Philosophy of Friedrich; ofScience;Philosophy Nietzsche, Research;Sciencein Practice;Science;StemCeti Representation; Philosophy; Truth; Research; Virtuality. Theory; Technology; e deque Friedrich reconhecimento o deste departida Nietzsche Resumo: O ponto artigo relevantes so doisfilsofos Martin profundamente questes que colocam Heidegger o planoda autora Neste e dosseusprojectos da Ciencia acerca sentido, tecnolgicos. ou do modonao-analtico, e a importancia a viabilidade em demonstrar consiste da Ciencia, de fazer continental, que urnareflexo genuiFilosofa argumentando como de umconfronto nao se podedispensar acercada Ciencia namente filosfica como tanto de fazer crtico Nietzsche modo por Heidegger. representado por filosofa sao bem acercada Ciencia crticos destes os pensamentos Paraa autora, pensadores o que aqui na verdade, acercada Ciencia; maisdo que urnamera reflexo filosfica ada prpria de que se trata saber estemcausa propramente quandoa questuo da arte os recursos emque Nietzsche e na medida Assim, paranos prope Filosofia. atisdo conhecimento e as intuiges da verdade as invectivas contra trgico, f defender a ver tem naposiconietzscheana do artigo a autora que o maisinteressante defende e Arte, talcorno Ciencia a relago entre como seu modode equacionar Heidegger estemqueparaNietzsche da questao O fundo techne e poiesis. acabar poralinhar aos mesmos recorrem comoa Arte a Ciencia tanto criativos, para almde poderes a Vida. do mesmo estoorientadas e a Arte propsito: paraa defesa quea Ciencia
* Fordham (New York,U.S.A.). University
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Babette E. Babich Ciencia Palavras-Chave: Arte;Biotecnologia;Causalidade; Clulas Estatuirais; natural;Ciencia; Computador; FilosofiaAnaltica;Filosofiada Experiencia; Martin; Ciencia;Filosofiada Filosofia;GenomaHumano; Gestell; Heidegger, MensuInternet; Kuhn,ThomasS.; Maqumismo;Mecanizando; Investigando; Paixdo na Ciencia;Prcticacientfica; Friedrich; rando;Natureza;Nietzsche, Virtualidade. Teoria;Verdade; Representaco; Tecnologia;
Prelude thenamesof context To write aboutsciencein a philosophical including in Nietzsche's horns"1 with Nietzsche and Heidegger is to engage"a problem is thatofcontinental The dilemma philosoruefully provocative expression. ofscience, withanalytic as it conflicts philosophy phyof scienceinasmuch disciand ergoredoubtable a robustly well financed and well-established of science." to be thewholeof "philosophy pline,one indeedthatpretends seemsnotto support from thisperspective, Nietzsche's approach, perceived ofscience," a philosophy of science2 and whathe named"theproblem i.e., likewise seemsto havenothing scienceregarded conceived as questionable, concerns to do withthephilosophy ofscienceproper. Heidegger's Similarly, withmodern can seem alien to thephilosophy scienceand its technology Nevertheless of science.Thisalienating can and shouldbe granted. quality on thesciences, there is indeed a continental tradition ofreflection including and many, Nietzsche as well as Husserl,Heidegger, many Merleau-Ponty,
1Friedrich Selbst-Kritik" DieGeburt der "Versuch einer Nietzsche, 2,inNietzsche, Tragdie, Vol.1. 1 use Kritische de Gruyter, ed. G. Colliand M. Montinari 1980), (Berlin: Studienausgabe, translastandard to approximate butwherever here, myowntranslations possibleI attempt as BT bysection tionssuch as Walter Citedhereafter Kaufmanns1967edition of thistext. rather thanpage number willbe citedusinglowercase romannumerals). (thepreface 2 Theexistence E. Babich, Babette ofseveral bookson thetopic, myowneffort, including of NewYorkPress,1994,in Italian StateUniversity Nietzsche's Philosophy ofScience(Albany: as Nietzsche e la scienza. Fulvia Vimercati trans. Cortina, [Milan:Rafello Arte, vita, conoscenza, Babichwiththecollaborato thetwovolume collection edited 1994])in addition by Babette ofScience: tionofRobert in theHistory and Philosophy S. Cohenin theseries BostonStudies ofthe the II (Dordrecht: from a meeting Sciences as wellas a collection Kluwer, 1999), resulting heldat Cambridge Friedrich oftheUK on thetheme andscience Nietzsche ofNietzsche Society andthe Sciin2001andedited andThomas Moore Nietzsche entitled, University byGreg Brobjer, Reinhard encesin addition Hans Seigfried, to reflections Low, Grimm, byMiliCapek, Rdiger Alwin in connection and indeed Alistair KlausSpiekermann, Walter Mittasch, Zimmerli, Moles, with Nietzsche's oflogic, himself. Thesamecan be said for Heidegger given critique Heidegger Trish in addition to myself whohave Glazebrooks andauthors ofScience Heidegger's Philosophy A. Patrick reflections on science, suchas Joseph Kockelmans, engaged Heidegger's philosophical Dmitri Ginev as wellas Stuart andLefebvre, on Heiddeger, Heelan, Foucault, Elden, representing thebreadth ofleading continental ofscience. philosophy
and Philosophy of Science: Nietzscheand includingthe plainly titled,Nietzsche's Epistemology
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on science is nothing Whatcharacterizes such perspectives less others.3 called a and Cartesian what than questioning, phenomenological Heidegger ofquestioning which is especially force on thefoundational reflection clearly and Time that bearsthe ofBeing at thestart articulated (Int.I. 2), a reflection a Nietzschean also to be heard of Nietzsche's marks influence, provenance thatquestions to Metaphysics wherehe writes Introduction in Heideggers areas they are actually orbooks.Questions likeshoes,clothes, "arenotgiven are."4 and thisis theonly asked, they waythat continue to make s and Heideggers bothNietzsche perspectives Although of of traditional withand on theterms foran odd fit philosophy analytic efforts to colonize conrecent true this remains and science,5 analytic despite ifalso critiadd an exactly their tinental philosophical questions philosophy, as such. ofscience to thephilosophy cal reflection Science 'The ProblemofScience Itself and Alexandrine thatsciencecan be Nietzsche contends oflife," as a "symptom Regarded the truth." form ofself-defense seenas a "subtle (BT 1) ForNietzsche against as he action:sometruths suchdefensive can compel assumesthatthetruth are andLie inan Extramoral us inhisessayon "Truth tells Sense," dangerous etc.(GM I: 1) Thus orrepellent, or hateful arebitter others tolife, and hostile so that as saying, Nietzsche liked to as of need we have art, Heidegger quote wir damit "Wir die haben the truth: to we are notdone ground Kunst, by Will to cites Nietzsche's an derWahrheit nicht zu Grunde (Heidegger gehen" the of "self-defense Power, against 822,cf.WM 853). If scienceis a kind in a simiofscienceis to engage oftheproblem to raisethequestion truth," sees thetaskNietzsche By reasonof thisdanger, prospect. dangerous larly as ofhis reflections, thevery as his own from maybe expressed beginning for scienceconsidered "the thetaskof presenting ofscienceitself, problem
3 See Babich, ContinentalPhilosophyof Science" in ConstantinBoundas, The Edinburgh Press, 2007), Philosophies(Edinburgh: EdinburghUniversity Century Companion to Twentieth pp. 545-558 and Babich, "Philosophies of Science: Mach, Duhem, Bachelard," in Richard Vol. 8 (London/NewYork: Routledge, in the 20thCentury, Philosophy Kearney,ed., Continental 1994/2003), pp. 175-221. 4 trans, regory Fried and Richard rat (New Heidegger,Introductionto Metaphysics, in die Metaphysik Haven: Yale University Press, 2000) p. 21, [Einfhrung (Tubingen:Niemeyer, cited in brackets. 1976 ), p. 15.] IM. Germanpage numbersare hereafter 5 Michael Friedmans (La baile: Upen Partingof the Ways:Carnap, Cassirerand Heidegger formedscholar, Court,2000) has not alteredthisbut Friedman,who forhis part an analytically on Heideggerin the continental who have written is oftenset in place of othercommentators See JamesLuchtes forthcoming tradition. essay,"MartinHeideggerand RudolfCarnap: Radical and the Roots of the Continental/Analytic Divide,"Philosophy Phenomenology, Logical Positivism 51/3(Winter 2007). Today,
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Babette E. Babich the first timeas problematic, as questionable."(BT ii) Quite apart fromthe of this problem in termsof the science in separate question understanding fieldof classical philology Nietzsche's case this was the scientific question (in or physics) as a science),theprojectof questioning science (whether philology in theno-man's land beyondthedominionofreceived locatesthethinker truth, and on the question of science vulnerableto confusion,misunderstanding, and logic in Nietzsche'sand Heidegger's case, not a littlemockery. Failing to raise the question of science - and most philosophyof science fails to raise anythinglike Nietzsche's question - one followsblindlyafter science, and not only Heideggerwould suggestthatthis is a poor course for philosophy, supposed queen of the sciences. The project of science unchalas we are wontto do in science intotheplace of philosophy lenged,installing of criticaland into the destruction the current world circumstance, develops between relation which not the philosophical thinking only upends original to and science but tends altogether. philosophy philosophy ultimately destroy an end thatis to say This is what Heideggernames "theend of philosophy," in science, reduced to science and on science's terms,a reductionwhereby "philosophyis dissolved into the technologicalsciences"6 and can, so one use. be put to practical'cognitive' supposes, finally Nietzsche offersus the resources of art as a defense against truthand antidoteto the deadly insightsof tragicknowledge.Yet the promiseof such redemptionseems trivial- forwho among us does not believe in the saving claim is his equapower of art? I will argue that Nietzsche'smost arresting tion of science and art,similar to Heidegger'salliance of techneand poiesis which I take to be a non-attributed Nietzscheanecho in Heidegger's thought. For Nietzsche,science and art draw upon the same creativepowersand both science and artare directedto life. Nietzsche'sfirst out of theSpiritof Music, took book, The Birthof Tragedy its departurefromand was articulatedin termsof the "scienceof aesthetics." at the hand of (BT 1) Nietzsche'sprojectin the wake of the death of tragedy Socratic science was the articulation of tragicculture, of a possible "rebirth" of a rebirth that"theman of theory" requiring recognizethe fatallimitations it itself his own enterprise that from the foundations science) (including apart claims as necessaryand which it itselfhas undermined as such (see BT 19). Note that on logical grounds alone, empirical science cannot be regarded as self-grounding can be self(Nietzsche challenges the idea that anything or antior for an atheist self-caused a grounded straightforward challenge takes the For a critical Nietzsche, metaphysicalthinker). philosophymerely cultureof scientific reason to its utmostbut stillfully logical consequences.
6 Martin "The End of Philosophy" in Timeand Being,trans.J. Stambaugh Heidegger, (New York:Harperand Row,1972),p. 59. Revista deFilosofa Portuguesa 63.2007 pigi___ I LliPF I 208
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the critique of scientificreason Using "the paraphernalia of science itself/' of knowledgegenerally"outlines "the limits and the relativity effectively the claims of science to universalvalidity and ultimately denying"decisively universalaims" (BT 18). In thisway,forNietzsche,Kant'sphilosophiclegacy of "scientific Socratism'scomplacentdelight signalledthe logicaldestruction its boundaries"(BT 19). in existenceby establishing "Socraticculture"whichNietzschediscoversat the heartof Kant's critical so called, is also the Alexandrine(or, to use, Nietzsche'stermiphilosophy, theslavish) culminationof the in his latercriticalstudiesof morality: nology confidence thatis stillthecharacmodern vision of the same logico-scientific This Nietzschecalled culture. techno-scientific of scientific, teristic especially a focus "thedelusion of limitlesspower"(BT 18), Heideggerrepeatsin both as he discusses therepresenand theBeitrdge to Metaphysics TheIntroduction tationof quantityas quality.The ideal of limitlesspower describes modern cultureon the millenarianbasis of "thebeliefin the earthly happiness of all" a first (BT 18) and offers genealogyof the modern technologicaland con"demandforsuch an Alexandrine sumerist happiness,"stillexpressed earthly 7 up of a Euripideandeus ex machina" (BT 18). todayas "theconjuring mobile phone, etc.) Today's networkedand mediatized world (internet, invocation of such a Nietzsche's of the ideal has transformed metaphoricity of if leave the we and itis seemingly consummate, question "reality" conjuring has taughtus about ourselves, what phenomenology to one side (considering that we can and we do project it is the power of conscious intentionality ourselves, our passions, our inmost personal being onto a screen that is world like the tragicskene).This Baudrilliardianunreal or hyperreal nothing A virtual and profit. is adumbratedin economic terms:advertisement place of on a mobile phone,or a gaminglifefor engagements deplacementfortexting in working or just cybersex practice gamingcommunities, playersin internet More must be this is the dot.com business in stillelusive theory. and profit, in whatever written on this,but our lives today, partof theworld,forthe rich We take this and forthe poor, are mediated more and more by technology. of science.8 to be the "gift" "connectedness"
7 NotethatKaufmann See also than'Alexandrine'. rather has 'Alexandrian' s translation of an 'irdische Consonarliin the place of metaphysical herein the context the reference in thethird undSchmelztiegel derMaschinen 'denGott , an imagethatrecurs comfort: essay in GM III: 18. muchmorerefinedly, oftheGenealogy ironically ofMorals(III: 9) and indeed, 8 Thisis a metonymic uerKoorKoger itnotto be surethesubject thetitle with association Harvard Science The on book 2005). witz's University, Leibniz, (Cambridge: Gift of insightful
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On Science and Wissenschaft' For contemporary readerswho are not inclined to speak of 'scientific Socratism' in terms of thecategories ofAlexandrine and who do notthink Nietzsche's Socratism culture orEuripidean machinations from is,apart (that orhisAlexandrine the vision orcritical of understandingEuripides), question ofthemeaning and for ofsciencefor Nietzsche butalso for Kant, Heidegger as wellas Hegel,and evenGoethe, can be troublesome.10 Here,as a further it ofscience, toNietzsche's and to Heidegger's critical philosophy preliminary the both of his era and is helpful to ask whatNietzsche and other Germans, than is more current meanwhenthey Thisinquiry day, speakofWissenschaft, at hiswordwhenhe reminds and,ifwe takeHeidegger merely etymological adumus thattranslation thesame inquiry is alwaysalready interpretation, brates a hermeneutic reflection. remarked is routinely theGerman term Wissenschaft Intriguingly, although difference the as different from the term for science, specific upon English between thetwois notin factcommonly discussed.Froma philosophical what is moresignificant is that(apart from perspective, myown earlier what thedifference on thisquestion) we lackanyreflection reflections upon between and science for Wissenschaft philosophy might signify (Anglophone) of scienceand thestudies to theGerman thought discipline usually proper to render theformer, or Wissenschaftsphilosophie.11 i.e.,Wissenschaftstheorie ofpurThisis nottheoccasionto do morethanemphasize theimportance I briefly notethe further butin whatfollows, suingthissubstantive question within its differences between and science.Every wordcarries Wissenschaft ownlinguistic itsownpenumbra ofderivations anditsownsetofassosphere
9 1draw this inWords inBlood, Like for ofmy "Nietzsche's uponparts chapter 'GayScience'"
StateUniversity ofNewYork Press, 2006),pp. 67-68 10 Theseauthors to be sure,on Wissenschaft, wrote, indeed, and,in thecase of differently on nature. Hegeland Goethe, 11See however, in thisdirection, und WissenGerhard Budin,"Wissen(schaft)stheorie in PeterOhly, G. Rahmstorf and A. Sigel,Alexander (eds.), Globalisierung sorganisation" und Wissensorganisation: Neue Aspekte und Informationssysteme frWissen, Wissenschaft undTerminologie: 2000),pp. 41-48as wellas Budins Wissensorganisation (Ergon:Wrzburg, Die Komplexitat undDynamik undKommunikationsprozesse Wissenschaftlicher Informations Gunter und WissenschaftsNarr,1996) and, withErhardOser,eds., Terminolgie (Tubingen, theorie are purely in thesereflections but technical (Vienna: TermNet, 1997).Budins points relevant to thelogicaloperating of analytic of science.Thus exactly principles philosophy Budincan citeRichard ofunivocity Status Boydon theimportance (Boyd,"On theCurrent of Scientific Erkenntnis 19 (1983): 45-90).See also Harald Weinreich, "WissenRealism," und die Einheitder Wissenschaften" in H. L. Kretzenbecher schaftssprache, Sprachkultur andWeinreich, derWissenschaftssprache de Gruyter, eds.,Linguistik (Berlin: 1994), pp. 55-74.
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as wellas metonymic. For thisreasons, I wouldargue ciations, metaphoric thephilosophy ofscience itis significant that is increasingly that written only in theus or theUK in Germany inEnglish, be itspractitioners orbe they or in at meetings etc.Thusonecan hearscholarly ofGerman social France, papers in English scientists rather thanin German andnatural presented exclusively native ofEnglish is present to hearthose and evenwhennota single speaker papers. to this linguistic albeit indirectly Lorraine colonialization, Testifying, of anything likea reverse withsomechagrin ofthedifficulty Dastonwrites that theGerman word for translation Wissenschaft Wissenschaft, noting always Of for a native a problem painfulness Englishspeaker. particular presents in non-German localeswiththeword herself forDastonis to find speaking to on herbusiness card,as it were, thereby seeming Geschichtswissenschaft ofscience.12 ofthehistory ofthe"science" a practitioner laya claimto being is not unambiguously UlrikeFelt likewiseemphasizesthatWissenschaft,
12 ftir WortWissenschaft stellt here:"Das deutsche in German translation Dastonwrites in diesem Fall auch Franzsisch oder ist dessen (oder Englisch Muttersprache jemanden, im Deutumfasst dar.DennWissenschaft wieder eine Herausforderung immer Italienisch), beralle mglichen und Arten des systematischen schensmtliche Wissens, Gegenstnde, - wogegen die leichter erkennbaren scientiaam nchsten damitdem lateinischen kommt von scientiain andereneuropischen Sprachen- science (frz.),scienza, Abkmmlinge - ihrBedeutungsfeld teilweise sichhauptschlich, haben.Sie beziehen science(engl.) verengt franauf die Naturwissenschaften oder sogarausschliefilich oder,wie in einemaktuellen articules nachzulesen zsischenWrterbuch constitues, ist,auf 'Corpsde connaissance Les mathmatiques, d'etre vrifies par l'exprience. logiqueet susceptibles par deduction sichein In derangloamerikanischen sontdes sciences'. la physique beschftigt Philosophic und Verteidigung der Grenzen mitder Festlegung ganzerZweigder Wissenschaftstheorie und anderenWissensgebieten zwischenden Naturwissenschaften (nichtnur Astrologie, dafurlautet:demarcationCriteauch Soziologie);das Stichwort sondernbeispielsweise in Oxford, oder Paris nurdas Wort Man braucht rion'-, Abgrenzungskriterium'. Berkeley Professoren um den Damen und Herrn in den Mundzu nehmen, Geschichtswissenschaft - berdie Leichtigkeit, aus Erheiterung eineMischung Lachelnzu entlocken, einskeptisches - und Verwirrung werden alle mglichen mitim Deutschen Zusammensetzungen gebildet mitLwenhaupt sehen:eine Chimare die sie daraus hervorwachsen berdie Fabelwesen, und dazwischen und Schlangenschwanz Daston,"Die etwas,was wie eine Ziegeaussieht." derWissenschaftsIn: Michael derwissenschaftlichen Kultur ed.,Ansichten Hagner, Objektivitt," Feltwhowrites Cf.Ulrike here Frankfurt/Main: 2001,pp. 137-158, Fischer, pp. 137ff. geschichte, defined and cannotindeedbe setas is notunambiguously "Wissenschaft" as a concept, that thereverse Feltarguesthatin German science.Nevertheless, to theEnglishterm identical Wis"Bereits der Begriff evident. science is increasingly of the Anglo-American influence nicht definiert undKulturkreise istberdie verschiedenen senschaft eindeutig hinweg Sprachdemenglischen inhaltlichen nochin seinen formal weder undsicherlich Begriff Nuancierungen Diskussion dass in der anglo-amerikanischen Daherist es auch klar, Sciencegleichzusetzen. imdeutschsprachigen im Fokusdes Interesses nurdie Naturwissenschaften tatschlich stehen, "Scientific Ulrike wird." anders diesaberzumTeil Raum Felt, Citizenship: Schlaglichter gesehen 15 (2003), pp. 12-15. in Gegenwrter: einerDiskussion," Hefte frden DisputberWissen,
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Babette E. Babich definedas a conceptand hence cannot be equated withor set identicalto the Englishtermscience.Atthe same time,Felt argues thatthe reverseinfluence of Anglo-American science is increasingly evidentin German.13 was coined for the word Wissenschaft Dating fromthe fourteenth century, the needs of a theologicaland mysticalcontextin order to translatesciens, scientiawhich is likewiserenderedby the English word science,withits furto cut, divide therroots in the Latin,scire,to know,and relatedto scindere, (here we should note Heidegger's associated reflectionon the translation fromGreektheoriato the Latincontemplado, just whereHeideggerattendsto itsdefining focuson "precinct" as sundering, as divideor cutting: templum).14 of the German Wissenschaft are the complexset of Key to an understanding in particular associationsoftherootterms, thepowerful arrayofetymological connectionsvia wissenlinkedto the Old High Germanwizzan and Old Saxon wita but also the Englishwit and wot as well as to the Sanskritveda and the I have seen, ancient Greek oda (Aeolian: i'a, which is the perfect of ecu, and is used as present, I know.Liddell givesthe rootas FIA, cognatewiththe Latin vid-eo,to see), as well as the Latin, videre.As a philologist, Nietzsche was characteristically conscious of this root connectionbetweenvision and scientific knowledge- hence his focus on the ocular tendencyof science in And it might be worthinvestigating general but especiallynaturalscience.15 the degree to which this ocular conceptioninspiredboth his focus on what he called the 'science of aesthetics'in his first book, his emphasis upon the of in the sense the of the importance haptic physical sciences (cf. Twilight to taste,a focus Idols, '"Reason" in Philosophy'3), and his special attention he earlierplayed back to its etymological association withwisdom as such: "The Greekword,which signifies the 'wise,' belongs etymologically to sapio, I taste,sapiens,thetastingone, sisyphos, theman of thesharpesttaste;a keen bringingforthand recognition,a foremostdiscernmentthus constitutes, according to folkconsciousness, the authenticart of the philosopher."(ksa 1,813). and foremost as he was, alludes to Nietzsche,a classical philologistfirst the etymologicalstem of wissen in Greek (oia, ecd)and in Latin (videre).
13"Bereits der Wissenschaft ist ber die verschiedenenSprach- und Kulturkreise Begriff und sicherlichweder formalnoch in seinen inhaltlichen Nuanhinwegnichteindeutigdefniert Science gleichzusetzen.Daher ist es auch klar,dass in der cierungendem englischenBegriff Diskussion tatschlichnur die Naturwissenschaften im Fokus des Interanglo-amerikanischen esses stehen,im deutschsprachigen Raum dies aber zum Teil anders gesehenwird."Ibid. 14 Heidegger attends to the change from the Greek conception of theory,theoremto Latin contemplationwith its not evidentshiftin divisive meaning. "Science and Reflection," p. 165. 15'Die Wissenschaft ist darauf aus, dieselbenPhnomenedurchverschiedene Sinne zu interund alies auf den deutlichsten Sinn, den optischen,zu reduziren.So lernenwirdie Sinne pretiren - der dunklerewirddurchden hellerenerleuchtet' fcennen (KSA 11, 25 [389]).
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Nietzsche emphasizes the consequences of the limitationto a Additionally, of the traditionof science since sense (notablyocular) characteristic single fora possible science Thus Nietzsche asks afterthe difference the Greeks.16 ifwe were to include the broader sensible range of the human 'of the future' instruknowing Regardingthebodyas a complexly bodybeyondthevisual?17 reduced to the rather than all its senses to mentarium, merely widelykeyed of the an of body on primacy vision,permits understanding singleprivileged the order of mind, not as a Cartesian or Lockean adjunct, but larger than definesthe to ourselvesas mind.Thus Nietzschefamously whatwe represent withone reason and thebodyas a "grandreason,a plurality mindas thelittle 18- the last invocationof "a war and a and a war a peace" peace" sensibility, being Nietzsche'sword for the homeostasis so importantin the biological sciencesof his day. withwisdom,the wordscience is not an Anglo-Saxonword. As contrasted exhaustwhat is at YettheLatin and Roman originofsciencedoes not entirely thatscience the since workin the word. Indeed it is only century eighteenth had been terms that that such to the in contrast has its current arts, meaning are now science art and one forthe other, substitutable opposed.19Although
16Cf. Nietzsche'sdiscussion of Thales and ocularityin his Die Philosophieim tragischen citedabove. (PTG 3, KSA 1, 816.) But even more,see Nietzsche'sforeword Zeitalterder Griechen, woman, ( 4) to The Gay Science and his discussion of the visual pursuitof wisdom and truth, Nietzsche's as - to speak Greek(as he says there,)- 'Baubo.' In TheBirthof Tragedy characterised to gain access to is to the received aim of scientificresearches as so many efforts reference truthitselfbare, a goal Nietzschealso characterizedby the Greek "a naked goddess,"stripping femalegenitaliaand hence a literally reference, pornographic aspect of thegoddess representing makes all to plain, speakingas a littlegirland alternately as Nietzschehimself takingthe partof an old woman to do so. Sarah Kofmanand manyothershave takenup thistheme. 17Yet it is not clear thatour latestinstruments, regardedas extensionsof our senses, rightly Nietzsche'sdreams (in addition to the sense of sight,Nietzsche speaks of hearing would fulfill of tasteand smell,as well as touch). Heideggeras we shall see claims that but mostparticularly that extendour senses in a technologicalera are also the tools fortheir the veryinstruments in the place of the same senses. condensationintoor ultimatesubstitution 18'Der Leib ist eine mitEinem Sinne,ein Kriegund ein Frteden. eine Vielheit grosseVernunft, Thomas Commonhas recourse To render Zarathustra Also 4, 39). Vernunft, (KSA Nietzsche, Sprach in this and WalterKaufmann,correctly to 'sagacity',R. J. Hollingdale speaks of 'intelligence', case, rendersthe termas 'reason' in its exactlyphilosophicalsense, where Nietzschecontinues: die du "Geist"nennst,ein mein Bruder, deines Leibes ist auch deine ideine Vernunft, 'Werkzeug see also: 'Es For even more Kantian clarity, und SpielzeugdeinergrossenVernunft'. kleinesWerkin deinemLeibe als in deinerVernunft' (KSA 10, 4[240]). Nietzsche thus sets ist mehrVernunft kleinen littlehuman reason' [viereckigen our 'four-square the body in contrastto the intellect, contextof empiricalscience (GS 373). in the materialist Menschenvernunft] 19In the ZollikonSeminars,Heideggeremphasized that "forthe most part,science today is the English language as natural science" and invokes,forclarification, understoodexclusively if the implicationsare yet to be fully opposition "sciencevs. arts." (p. 20/S.24) It is instructive consideredthatHeideggerplayson thisparadox,confounding Englishreaders,in his "The Quesas he speaks of techneand art in connectionwith making and tion ConcerningTechnology," poiesis,and calls forDichtungor poetry.
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Babette E. Babich scholars remindus thatthe two terms, are increasscience and Wissenschaft, it remains essential to recall the of identical, ingly play meaningsand usage I referred to above as a words penumbra. We recall that Wildhagen-Hraucourt Dictionaryrefers German-English of Wissenschaft first to naturalscience beforelistingthe extendeddefinition as first as 'learning, . Although and knowledge coined, erudition, scholarship, - as Die kleine referred Pauly Wissenschaft originally onlyto simpleknowledge - today it typically correnotes Goethe's 'davon hab' ich kein Wissenschaft* is in turn sponds to the collectivepursuitof knowledgekinds.The collectivity In distinguishing themeaningof -schaft, analogous to the-shipin scholarship. in Englishand Germanusage, withimporbetweenscience and Wissenschaft ofscience tantconsequences forthephilosophicaldisciplineofthephilosophy in particular, this complex difference continues to make all the difference, as it were. The Wahrigdictionarythus defines Wissenschaft as 'geordnetes, , folgerichtig aufegebautes,zusammenhangendesGebiet von Erkenntnissen while by contrastthe shorter definesscienceas 'the Oxford EnglishDictionary state or factof knowing;knowledgeor cognizance of something specifiedor implied' and featuresa separate definition, citing "Wissenschaft" explicitly as '(The systematicpursuit of) knowledge,science, learning,scholarship'. definedin termsof an ordered,systematic and coherent Wissenschaft discipliin the OED: naryarena of knowledgecorrespondsonlyto the last sub-entry 'The kind of organized knowledge or intellectual activityof which the various branches of learningare examples'. As the noun correspondingto thus retainsthe connotationsof the 'ways' or conduits wissen, Wissenschaft of knowing, ways that can stillbe heard in English withthe archaic wis (to show the way,to instruct) or wist,(know), and is not limitedto "knowledge" alone. [Erkenntnis] More relevantthan etymology and definitions is the applicable scope of that can be called as disciplines Wissenschaften compared with "science" and this is especiallyrelevantforphilosophizingon science be it Nietzsche's aesthetic science, Kuhn's sociology of science, or historyor gene or rocket science. Hence it is importantto underscore the breadth of professional Wissenschaften,2 just to the degreethattheseare more numerousthanthose
20Germanacademic fieldscan be expressedas so manyWissenschaften, generally along the Literathus we can list Musikwissenschaft, Diltheyanaxis of Geistes-and Naturwissenschaften: - a term etc. Thus one can speak of Kunstwissenschaft turwissenschaft, Museumswissenschaft, difficult to renderin English as the disciplinary subdivisionforus shakes down, at least at the - or of Literaturwissenschaft studies or level, to art history, university Kunstgeschichte (literary such as physics[Physik], [Chemie], theory)in additionto Naturwissenschaften chemistry biology [Biologie], etc. The equalizing denominationof seeminglyall disciplines is a bit frustrating for the English-speaking distinction between the scholar,especially given the aforementioned and the Naturwissenschaften, termsroutinely translated withmore conveGeisteswissenschaften nience thanaccuracyas the'human sciences' (but including artand literature as well as theology
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of science.21 This means,in part,thatalthough undertherubric gathered himself as a 'scientific' strikes a conidentification of Nietzsche's practitioner which as eccentric elicits (an impression routinely speaker English temporary anxious to depict Nietzsche as sciencefrom a footnote philosophers analytic a scientist wouldn't rather thansciencecritical), callinghimself friendly as of his interests havebeen out of place in his day and his identification - in contempo- and thatmeansunremarkable accurate remains scientific German. rary of 'whatthings are the subtleproblem But,as withall equivocations, into convention is shifted when this Nietzsche's called'(in words)persists of and academic English.Despiteall the well-known idiomatic exigency a to be is not or classics classicalphilology theclassicist, thought currently of religion as 'religious to thestudy one does notrefer "science." Similarly, unless(butthatis someof'religious science'(one speaksinstead studies'), Science of a cult(such as Christian else again) one is a practitioner thing to 'arthistory' to 'artscience'butrather nordoes one refer or Scientology), forthediscipline, difference where- and thismakesa not inconsiderable is able to academicusage and corresponding German practice disciplinary Yetin themiddle and Kunstwissenschaft. bothKunstgeschichte distinguish benemoduof musicwas called (albeitin Latin),a scientia ages,thestudy rare'as we but 'now still current of science a (a landi, usage using meaning wordstill in turns of the the heard still be can that the arereminded oed) by in the musical skill or incurrent use,archbutnotarchaic, technique meaning Fats in which Minnesota and science' a 'sweet still be can senseinwhich jazz footand a leagueofEnglish couldhavehisgameofpooldowntoa 'science', etc.22 the'schoolofscience,' thesobriquet, ballplayers carry Science as Passion and Leidenschaft: The Resonanceof Wissenschaft bookDie frhofNietzsche's toboththetitle callsourattention Heidegger ifaccurately whichhas been fatefully licheWissenschaft, (and capriciously
and othersocial sciences) and the 'naturalsciences'. Howeversuch a leveling along withhistory to kindsof 'science' or Wissenschaften. refers is onlyapparentas Diltheyconsistently conflation The pointis essentialto keep in mind withregard,forone keyexemple,to Max Weber'sScience as Vocation. 21For followed chapteron Philosophy, example,a recentbook on the sciences ottersa first by Theology,Justice,Literature,etc., with essays on Mathematics,Physics,etc., making an 2001: Diagnosen and appearance only in the last 100 pages (out of 240) cf. Wissenschaften Wallstein, 2002). (Gttingen: Prognosen 221 thank M. Moore forthis helpfuladdition. Moore commentsthat the Everton Gregory Football Club (in Liverpool)used to be knownas the 'School of Science', such, he explained to me, 'was the technicalbrillianceof theirsoccer'. [E-mail communication.]
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enough)23translatedas The Gay Science: it could also be translatedas The I am inclinedto Wisdomor even theMerry whichjocular rendering Art, Joyful own in of Nietzsche's because it is stilted the direction veryromanprefer just for handbook about a matter after medieval all, talking (we are, tically subject that the word is What is frhliche happy Provencaltroubadours). important of Wissenschaft.24 attunement or joyful- effects a metonymic or gay,merry withpassion [Leidenschaft] WhatNietzschenames science has moreaffinities than theusuallydustyscholarshipof his peers,in his day or our own. Heideggerexplainsthatwhat he speaks of as "Echo" - and whichalso not - the reflective accidentallynames one of the major sections of the Beitrage call of the reflection thatsays the same (and in such repetition differentiates, on the mythof Narcissus) is "the this is its appeal forDerrida who reflects of thinking [Leidendes Denkens]" Heideggeremphasizes thatthis suffering is ... more difficult because more dangerous than the "passion infinitely much named substantiality [Sachlichkeit]of scientificresearch. To be an the of Being, calls fora solicitude forlanguage, that of claim echo, namely of which to be sure the technical-technological language styleof science can know nothing/'25 to raise the question "What does gay science mean?" in his Undertaking collective lecture courses on Nietzsche, Heidegger invokes the inherently a collectiveconnotationso non-evicharacterof the German Wissenschaft, dent in the word science that sociologistsof science have all theycan do to Thus researchnatureofthescientific enterprise.26 emphasize theinstitutional "Here" delimits Nietzsche's from Heidegger today'susage. Heidegger project is not a collectivenoun forthe sciences as we writes,"science [Wissenschaft] findthemtoday,withall theirparaphernaliathe shape theyassumed during the course of the last century."27 as passion is opposed to the Leidenschaft usual conceptionof science or scholarship, perhaps especiallyin philosophy, the disciplinenamed forthepassion (or love) of wisdom.
23Thecombination s Kaufmann ofcaprice and intentionality can be related only byWalter then-assistants. 24This and as a complete on laughter accords with Nietzsche's metonymic tuning emphasis invites us to in thevery where Nietzsche first section of TheGayScience, engaged enterprise at ourselves as radically intotheforce oflaughter, and evenintothechanceoflaughing inquire form an we ought in order that to laugh, outofthewholetruth, and ultimately might laughter alliance with wisdom. 25"DieGefahr," GA79,66. Emphasis added. Heidegger, 26Thissamecollective toexplain theotherwise dimension alsogoessomeway incomprehenan Anglo-Saxon as scientifiofview, materialist convictions ofsocialist sible,from point theory of thisconviction, Scholars haveargued aboutthelogicand thecoherence callyconfirmable. some inverting of an Englishtheproblem to blamethehabitus on Engelsas representative deformation ofMarx's language original theory. 27 Volume Nietzsche, II, p. 20. Heidegger,
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art or joyfulscience is to be understoodin opposition Nietzsche'smerry nineteenth to the centuryideal of the positive, measuring or technologically definedsciences.28Thus Heideggercontinues,"the word Wissenschaft [science]resounds like Leidenschaft [passion], namely,the passion of a well us and over our own way of over the thingsthatconfront groundedmastery and to what confronts us, positingall thesethingsin magnificent responding essentialgoals."29The throesof such a passionate science would not reflect attainedbythenaturalsciences/'30 thekindof "knowledge Passionately joyful If Heideggercan claim that science is more rigorousthan science heretofore. of genuineknowledge...to thatis to say partaking "science is onlyscientific, thisphilosophically thatit is philosophical,"31 the extent rigorousknowledge that is not the kind of cheerfulness is joyfulto the extentthatit exemplifies The undone "even in the face of the hardest and most terrifying things."32 "the is science a of such challenge, affirming invigoratedby joyful passion of theseveryquestionablethings."33 necessity on science in Nietzsche'sThe Gay Having invokedHeidegger'sreflection Science,it is relevantin Heidegger'sown spiritto ask: what is science? What in the makes science science? Is the "essence" of science nothingscientific, is nothing same way thatHeideggerclaimed thatthe "essence" of technology technological? Science is routinely presumedto be a matterof methodand quantifying and Heidegger(speakingof truthand of the theory Nietzsche analysis.Both and the same measure-directed of thereal) take theirpointof departurefrom in the Thus science. on in their reflections calculatingmethodicassumption the scientific of of the claim victory HeideggerinvokesNietzsche's Beitrage, method over science itself(ksa 13, 15[51]). This hegemonic ideal further inspireswhat Heideggerregardsas the coordinaterelationbetween science and "calculation."This same calculatingforceof methoddrivesmodernscito contemporary almost presaginga reference ence and technology, analytic expresespecially in its more cognitiveand neurophysiological philosophy, to referto the independenceof psychology, "it suffices sions. For Heidegger, to the role of logic as logisas culturalanthropology, anthropology sociology, tics and semantics. Philosophyturnsinto the empirical science of man, of
28And stillfurther as fromthe collectiveideal of a unifiedcoordinatescience of everything in all languages,the singuGermanears can hear it,we note,at least in Englishbut increasingly forthe as prototypical physics, larizingparadigm,as it were,of the naturalsciences,particularly as such. of science meaning
29Ibid. 30Ibid.
31 VolumeII, p. 112. Nietzsche, Heidegger,
32Ibid., p. 21. 33Ibid., p. 21.

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forman,the all thatcan becometheexperiential objectof his technology on it in which he in world establishes himself the technology by byworking to thescienthevarious modesofmaking and shaping/134 Butthisamounts thiswillonly in philosophy, ifsciencehas itsorigins tifization ofphilosophy: this into And meanthat turns science. ranges famously Heidegger philosophy here and ofcybernetics. transformation under therubric insight Heidegger's theruleofmodern his assessment ofitseffects remains accurate, uncannily of intoan exchange information transforms scienceeffectively "language of information."35 instruments news.The artsbecomeregulated-regulating into"the In thisway, dissolved vision ofthe"endofphilosophy" Heidegger's of the manipulable sciences"corresponds to "thetriumph technologized ofa scientific-technological world andofthesocialorder proper arrangement ofwhatwe underto thisworld." Thisis forHeidegger theliteral meaning ofthe thebeginning standas globalism means: "Theendofphilosophy today: world civilization basedon Western thinking."36 European in philosophy whoinhabit exotic Thisis whywhenourcolleagues lands, we are able to underconferences suchas Chinaand India,invite us to their - moreor less to be sureyetin defiance of every standthem presumption not and sometimes from ofhermeneutics and anthropology: language, apart write and eventhat.We find between thesubjects no difference speak they aboutand whatwe write and speakabout.In justthemeasure by suggested to theEnglishhas longceasedto be limited Heidegger, analytic philosophy Andwhere that this world. hegemony increasing speaking Heidegger suggests the into"thesciences, maybe tracedto whathe calls its full"dissolution ofanalytic is no accident. globaldominance philosophy Science in theWakeofthe QuestionConcerning Technology inVortrdge Thepublished version of"Science andReflection" which appears und Aufsatze, in was first as a lecture 1954 to a small groupin presented Munich.The orienting and themeof the lectureis reflection [Besinnung] science. to the features of Heidegger begins by pointing distinguishing Notmerely a humanor cultural from notonlyas distinguished art, activity, scienceincreasingly defines whatis realand dominates theglobein a singuirresistible fashion. Andhere, as always, attends to thequeslarly Heidegger tionofessence. Is science whatitappearstobe,themere desire toknow only in an Aristotelian of humanity and henceglobal for sense,characteristic thischaracteristic reason?Just as Heidegger theheart of is able to uncover
34 "The End of Philosophy," Heidegger, p. 57. 35Ibid., 58. p. 36Ibid., 59. p.
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- an equallycounter-intuitive as revelatory truth modern claim technology he that and non-Luddite alike else reigns" forLuddite argues "something other" that all thesciences, inscience, a "something but prevails "throughout themselves."37 hidden to thesciences HenceHeidegger reflects thatremains essencein scienceas something butprevailing on thisself-obscuring specific reflection on scienceand whichhe drawsout of a hermeneutic to modern 38 is thetheory definition "Science theformula: of thereal" This formulaic ancient andmedieval science. Thisdistincscience from modern distinguishes and is accordingly morethan or progress ofdevelopment tionis nota matter shift characterizes theexactly A manifestly historical.39 paradigmatic merely and ancient Greek between differences incommensurable medieval, modern, with Kuhn on the of recent and inspires science together Heidegger readings of the same disarticulates here science.40 ofresearch nature many Heidegger in Discipline and Experience madebyPeterDear in his reflections tinctions the and modern recourse to between on thedifference empirical experiential research scientific procedure.41 experimental or experithataims at empirical an observation For Heidegger, reports, thatbelongsto from the observation different ence, "remains essentially a preestablished For theexperiment scienceas research."42 rule,a requires of calculation: and thus of is the basis this and law, calculability stipulated the or conceive[vorstellen] means to represent "To set up an experiment can be madesusceptible seriesofmotions a specific which under conditions in in its necessary of beingfollowed i.e., of beingcontrolled progression, is theexpresAndbecause such an experiment advanceby calculation."43 foras wellas a limitation sion ofa projected law,one has botha criterion and of measurement the is of course This results. possibility uponpossible is a modern because se, notobservation thisis essentially physics per "Only can it be mathematical is that Beginning experimental."44 essentially physics built intoit, intoit," and sketched a preliminary from planofnature "ground in its which is that that observes planmethodology "experiment Heidegger
37 in The QuestionConcerning "Science and Reflection" Technology, p. 156. Heidegger, 38Ibid., 157. p. 39 Expressedin such terms,we are not speakingof the "science of the middle ages nor that of antiquity." Ibid., p. 157. 40SteveFulleris the mostinformed the side source of thisreadingon the side of Kuhn; from see PatriciaGlazebrookHeidegger's of Heidegger, ofScience (New York:FordhamUniPhilosophy Press,2000). See also BrentDean Robbins,"A Reading of Kuhn in Lightof Heideggeras versity JanusHead Summer 1998. Web-journal a Response to Hoellers Critiqueof Giorgi," publication. 41See Peter Dear, of Chicago Press, 1995). Disciplineand Experience(Chicago: University s point Dear seeks to make. a usefulphilosophersgloss on the subtle,historian Heideggeroffers 42 "The Age of WorldPicture in The QuestionConcerning Technology, p. 121. Heidegger, 43Ibid. 44Ibid.
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and guided on thebasisofthefundamental is supported ningand execution, the law laid down, in order either and confirm to adducethefacts that verify the rulegenerates law or deny itsconfirmation."45 Thissamemethodological in turn for which is of modern science, Heidegger necessary specialization of discoveries of resultsand progressive less a resultof the proliferation as such. results those cumulative modern than the for science, presupposition thanmathscience for thecharacter ofmodern Almost morefundamental ofus wouldtake and so many ematics and measurement or whatNietzsche of nature institutional is thevery to be themethodology ofmodern science, of calculation science- its -shaft character remadein theon-track image or its own isolation so Heidegger whichsimultaneously, argues, engenders we see an Here too thatis its disciplenary field, innocently specialization. of as thebusiness connection with ThomasKuhn:everyday busyness simple describof"ordinary as thedegradation science as usual,understood science," in modern research programmes.46 ing a possibledangeralwaysinherent science.Hence the open spirit of research Science in practice can betray science conventionalized tellsus thatthedanger of regularized, Heidegger in its because research "hasto be combated at all times, essence, is, precisely more Thisis one ofHeidegger's insights. powerful ongoing activity."47 so institutional and consequently, Scientific researchis necessarily instituthe it For is Heidegger Heidegger, argues, fundamentally systematic.48 tionthatis also theinstrumentarium of modern science(its technological in "Within the complexof the science: modern world) being exemplifies in out thesmashing that is to order to machinery cany necessary physics
45Precise,scientific "a methodmeasurement is not "precise"observation because it reflects and at the different in kind,relatedto the verification of law in the framework, ologyessentially serviceof an exact plan of nature."Ibid., p. 122. 46And here observationis in the spiritof HerbertDingle as much as Rom Harr Heidegger's or Peter Medawar. See HerbertDingle, Science at the Crossroads(London: Martin,Brian and at stake see the OTCeefe, 1972) and fora discussion of the ideological concernsor 'alternatives' letterssection of Physics Today December 2003, especially noting Dingle's "Modern Aristotein its proper lianism,"Nature 139 (1937), p. 784. It is importantto take this Aristotelianism context.Articulating a quasi-Kuhnian notion of revolutionary science, albeit far in advance of is won, not advance "in scientific Kuhn, Dingle had earlierobservedthattransformative theory by rigidadherenceto the rules of logic,but by bold speculationwhichdares even to breakthose rules ifby thatmeans new regionsof interest Science to Philosophy may be opened up." Through (Oxford:OxfordUniversity Press, 1937), p. 346. 47 "The Age of WorldPicture," Heidegger, p. 138. 48 Interestingly enough, one can also draw parallels to Weber here, on managerial in researchis a specificbodying-forth and expertise,where Heideggerwrites:"Ongoingactivity in which, at the same time,the latterreciprocally determinesthe orderingof the systematic, comes to ordering.Where the world becomes picture,the system,and not only in thinking, dominance."Ibid., p. 141.
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This technological of the atom lies hiddenthe whole of physicsup to now/'49 the current of scientific framework array laboratoryequipcorrespondsto ment,includinglinguisticand logical analysis as well as computersimulations or models. This means that predictable or confirmableresults are exactlypossible and theyare possible because theyare built into the project of researchscience fromthe start.And in 1938, Heideggercould point to the extensionof this groundplan fromthe natural to the social sciences, using the specificexample of historiography. Presciently describingthe life of the modern academic in any field,indeed especially the academic researcher that or internet access, Heideggerremarks equipped withwirelesstechnology in place of the traditionally scholar,we now have, "the research polymathic Giventhenew "information" man engagedin researchprojects/'50 technology - always a more a matterof potentialinformation than knowledgeper se the life of such a new-age research academician is all about being at the picture cuttingedge as opposed to Heidegger'sdeliberately"old-fashioned" For Heidegger(and forhow many graduate studentsin phiof "erudition." losophy and other theoreticaldisciplines could this not be said and it has "The researchman no long been trueof the naturaland the social scientists), on the move. He he is Moreover home. at a needs constantly library longer He contracts at conferences. information collects and at negotiates meetings We are oftentold and on. And on so with for commissions publishers."51 to know for know to much thatthereis simplytoo verymuch anyone today - thatthe scholarlyideal of past ages is verylike the ideal of neighborliness in a small town,an ideal impossibleto sustainwiththe explosionof informaratherthan the tion. But Heideggercan be read as arguingthat technology the characterand therewith has transformed supposed excess of information researchas well). thequalityof scholarship(and one imaginesscientific doctrina nor ancient medieval is neither science modern that Noting "the essence of modern names what he on focuses episteme,Heidegger of modernscienThe nature in its understood science" ground. metaphysical thisdepends and calls calculation is what researchknowledge tific Heidegger with account to is called "whatever of prescription upon its determinative itself be it lets which to the extent and put at regard to the way in which Gestell this names the disposal of representation."52 arguingthat Heidegger in a of whateveris, is accomplished before,a reprethis "objectifying setting it each particularbeing before in such a way that aims at bringing senting, thatthe human beingwho calculates can be sure,and thatmeans, certain,of
49Ibid., p. 50Ibid., p. 51Ibid., p. 52Ibid., p. 124. 125. 125. 126.
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53Ibid., p. 54Ibid., p. 55Ibid., p. 56Ibid., p. 57Ibid., p. 127. 128. 152. 130. 130.
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himselfto what presences in that he apprehends it."58This more surrendered,dispositionaland available orientationto thatwhich is is lost to our as it was to Nietzsche,the keyto but it is forHeidegger, modernsensibilities, or the Greekworld. Beyond objectiverepresentation, subjectiveviewpoints, in antiquity, forthe ancientGreekmind,"thehuman scientific measurement, being is the one who is lookedupon by thatwhich is; he is the one who is in company with itself- gathered toward that presencing,by that which is also Greekdestiny: the natureof thisinsight For Heidegger, opens itself."59 "To be beheld by what is, to be includedand maintainedwithinits openness and in thatway to be borne along by it,to be drivenabout by its oppositions here is partand parcel of the The tragicinsight and markedby its discord."60 whichis whatwe learn from the not thecenter, realizationthatman is exactly a hero as an such of even son, was, Oedipus king's exemplary agonisticstory who noblyfought everypromiseof violationand doom, who took on destiny, and relying himself upon his own resourcesto oppose it. consulting worldthatis Greece of the uncannilydifferent a dense summary Offering of at its inception, and so Western Heideggerdescribesthe trajectory thought his essence, Greekman in the world:"in orderto fulfill Greekthinking/being whatopens itself and save [sozein],catchup and preserve, mustgather[legein] in its openness,and he must remain exposed [alethuein]to all its sundering confusions.Greekman is as the one who apprehendsthatwhich is, and this is whyin the age of the Greeksthe world cannot be a picture."61 Heidegger moves rightinto his own complexity by adding thatpreciselythisvulnerable of the modernperexpositionto what is is also what sets up the possibility in turn into an the world this turns And world as the on picture. spective a for correlate subject.62 representing objective
58Ibid., 130. p. 59Ibid., 131. p. 60Ibid., 131. p. 61Ibid., 131. p. 62 we note, the insurgenceof the human as measure and reference point,the Intriguingly, and subjectiverelevance or individual importance coordinaterole of objective representation of Thus Heidegger describes the trajectory leveled uniformity. is also the era of increasingly as a humanism: "In the planetaryimperialismof technologically the insurgenceof technology whichpointit will descend to the of man attainsits acme, from organizedman, the subjectivism becomes thesurest This uniformity establishitself. and therefirmly leveloforganizeduniformity of the total, i.e., technological,rule over the earth." Paradoxicallythis means that instrument commensuratewith it." vanishes totallyin the objectivity the "modernfreedomof subjectivity Ibid., pp. 152-153.We note that the way fromHeidegger's1938 essay here to his 1954 lecture for Heidegger on science and is clear at this juncture. The watchword here as everywhere albeit and to be sure,questioningof a particularkindof turnsout to be questioning, technology thatwhich is incalcuwill know,thatis, carefully safeguardinto its truth, "Humanity exigency: into that'between'in which lable, onlyin creativequestioningand in shapingman of the future amid thatwhich is." Ibid., p. 136. he belongsto Being and yetremainsa stranger
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Babette E. Babich We have already noted that the real, calculativelyunderstood as what works, belongs to the essence of modern science.63 Scientific truth for thatis "the via its efficacity, as forthe restof us too, provesitself Heidegger, is the science of what of its own effects."64 As the works, efficiency theory the worked of the real as "the Gewirkte]) [Wirlcende, [Wirkliche] theory working, and thiswhichhas thatwhichbringshither and bringsforth intopresencing, been brought hither and brought intopresencing. means, Reality[Wirklichkeit] into hither forth when then, thought sufficiently broadly:thatwhich,brought selfin of consummated itself, lies before;itmeans thepresencing, presencing, 65This is theheartofGreek Andthe forth." physisand thisis energeia. bringing Greek here makes all the difference forHeideggerbecause translating ergon is changed. in termso operano as actio, insteadofenergeia, actus, everything For with this "totallydifferent word,"we have forHeidegger,"a totallydifferentrealm of meaning. That which is broughthitherand broughtforth now appears as thatwhich resultsfroman operatio."66 And the resulthere is of modernscience than the nothingless momentousforthe verypossibility in its modernaspect, formodern Henceforth, veryideal of causal thinking. science, what is "real now appears in the lightof the causalityof the causa of orderand time Andthiseffective or efficient efficiens." causalityis a matter and Heideggercan invokeHeisenberghere to pointto the latestculmination in a seeminglyneutraland mathematicalform:"the of this transformation of the causal is the purelymathematicalproblemof the measuring problem reversof time."This would seem to be a matter of counter-intuitive urgency: in the in we resist the idea is not a a mathematical but world, ibility problem this the of context of clock-time. But such reflections very overspring strength transformation of what is: therealbecomes thereby a matter of fact,and that and we are back again to Heidegger remindsus is the essence of certainty the point of measurementand calculation but forHeideggerthis is possible because we are speakingobjectively of the object. that science is thetheory ofthereal we are alreadyin thesphere Affirming of the transformation of the Greek meaning of theoryinto the Roman precinctof contemplation.67 In particular we have gone froman attentive regard forwhatpresencesto "observation We now have to do withan [Betrachtung]" encroachment a challengingforth, upon the real, an ensnaring, "specifically
63Thus science is the in TheQuesof thereal" in Heidegger, "Science and Reflection" "theory tion Concerning Technology, p. 159. 64 'Time and Being,"p. 58. Heidegger, 65 "Science and Reflection," Heidegger, p. 160. 00Ibid., 161. p. ' The Romans translatetheorem theriaby contemplano. This translation, by contemplari, which issues fromthe spiritof the Roman language,thatis, fromRoman existence,makes that which is essentialin what the Greekwords say vanish at a stroke." Ibid., p. 165.
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This objective, through aimingat its objectness.Science sets upon thereal."68 the essence of modern this is where science is effective science, setting upon can that "Because modern Thus Heidegger explain power.69 gets its working in all its observing[Be-trachten] the mannerof science is theory... therefore after[Trachtens], its striving i.e., the manner of entrapping-securing proceIn this context,Heideggercites dure, i.e., its method,has decisive security." Max Planck,"The real is thatwhichcan be measured."Planck'sdictummeans that"thedecision about what may pass in science, in thiscase in physics,for assured knowledgerestswiththe measurability supplied in the objectnessof in in the possibilitiesinherent natureand in keepingwiththatmeasurability, thatsuch measuringis oftheessence It is important themeasuring process."70 of modernscience as such and not just physicsor the supposedly, putatively is a of the mathematicalsciences.71 consequence Disciplinaryspecialization of the real, delimitedin each natureof modernscience as the regionaltheory in the case, in termsof object areas. Hence mathematics"is not a reckoning establishthe of for with numbers sense of performing purpose operations mathematicsis the reckoning results;but, on the contrary, ing quantitative that,everywhere by means of equations,has set up as the goal of its expecta'reckons'in of all relationsof order,and thattherefore tion the harmonizing all for advance withone fundamental merelypossible ordering."72 equation and so to manage the delimit need to the from not results Specialization withthe "amount"ofknowlsheeraccumulatedbulkofknowledgecontrasted ago. This is on the face of it a strangenotion,as if edge to be had a century one knew less about grammaticalrules a centuryago than one does today (this is not to say thatemphases have not changed,and old grammarbooks belabor thingswe dispense with today and elide thingsthat absorb todays scholar),as if,in otherwords,therewere less to know in supercededknowlin edge schemes than in those thatnow rule. Calling instead fora revolution reminds to in Introduction in and Heidegger Metaphysics, teaching thought us, using the same example of grammar and speaking in recognizably Nietzscheanlanguage,that "It simplyno longeroccurs to us thateverything
68 "Science and Reflection," p. 167. Heidegger, 69 as theoryin the sense ot an observingthat stnves science "modern Heideggerexplains, of the real that does encroach uncannilyupon it. Preciselythroughthis afteris a refining of the real. The real is what presencesas characteristic it correspondsto a fundamental refining and Reflection," p. 167. self-exhibiting.""Science 70 "Science and Reflection," p. 169. Heidegger, 71In an odd way,this means thatthe modernacademic endeavorto which Kant seemingly or sociology),on or linguistics to put whateverdiscipline,(metaphysics gave voice as the effort the secure path of a science, is far further along its way than we are usually inclinedto think. 72 "Science and Reflection," Elden, SpeakingAgainstNumber: p. 170. See further, Heidegger, and thePolitics Press,2006). University Edinburgh ofCalculation(Edinburgh: Language, Heidegger,
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Babette E. Babich we have all known for so long, and all too well, could be otherwise- that these grammaticalformshave not dissectedand regulatedlanguage as such since eternity like an absolute, that instead theygrew out of a verydefinite of the Greekand Latin languages/1 (IM 56/41) interpretation and so dividing Rather than servingas a means of compartmentalizing an otherwiseunsurveyablemass of information, specialization is a "conse73 quence of the coming to presence of modern science." This delimitation of a specificdomain or regionproperto each science is what makes modern It also and its capacityfornovelty. science possible in its comprehensiveness means thatthemostobscure consequences of science,theparadoxes ofquanas much as theyare reflections tum mechanics are not mattersof mystery Whether we are speaking of the essence of modernscience as measurement. of classical physicsor of quantum physics,Heidegger can say that "nature has in advance to set itselfin place forthe entrapping securingthatscience, which is as theory, This accomplishes."74 entrapping-securing measurement resentbased a certain one oftencalls calculation,trading economically upon ment in the process. It can be helpfulin the contextof science to bracket such a reflection fora bit. For Heidegger,everything includingthe subjectand an issue of as standing-reserves" object relation,becomes "sucked up in to be commandedand set order."75 "standing-reserve Heidegger began the fourlectures to the Club of Bremen, lecturesthat and otheressays, would develop into his "Question ConcerningTechnology" of the definitions as these are about eclipsed by by talking ordinarythings, what naturebecomes whatcan be worked, science.76 Naturebecomes theread, ofnature, can be measuredor calculated,used or reserved. But theambiguity itself as the from out of the inherent that arises as itself of which ambiguity of Greeks understoodphysis,althoughutterly accessible to the refinements And this is modernphysics,is not reducibleto the same set of refinements. not because physicalscience failsto be cleverenough to do this.Ratherit is because physics, cannot ask the question concerning physis, per impossibile, much less even raise the questionconcerning physicsfromits own basis.
Heidegger's 1949 presentationfromthe call to Husserlian phenomenologicalexigence,while by the timeof the ZollikonSeminars he has recourseto preas a methodology of science ideallysuited to his interlocutors ciselyHusserlian phenomenology there: medical scientistsinterestedin the workingsof the mind, as psychiatrists, psychoanaI explore this in "Die Wissenschaftsbegriff bei Martin Heideggerund lysts,and psychologists. Medard Boss: PhilosophischesDenken und Daseinsanalyse." In: Harald Seubert,ed., Heidegger and Daseinsanalyse.(Cologne: Bhlau, 2003), pp. 249-268.
73Ibid., pp. 172-173. 74Ibid. 75Ibid., 173. p. 76We note that this distances
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This once again is the Nietzschean problem of science with which we began: a double-hornedproblem or dilemma as conceived on the ground and necessarilyremains of science: a conceptual project which inherently impossibleforscience. Thus Heideggerexplains,"Physicscan make no assertions about physics.All the assertionsabout physicsspeak afterthe manner of physics.Physicsitselfis not a possible object of a physicalexperiment."77 it patentthatthisis always trueof any science (we Heideggerthinks Although of the human is that interpretation recall forexample, that "Anthropology whatthehuman is and hence can neverask thatalreadyknowsfundamentally who he might be"78),he takes care to be precise.Even wherehe immediately draws a parallel to philology(as thatwhich itselfis not a "possible object of he is carefulto make the exactlyDiltheyanpoint philologicalobservation"79), excellenceof the interpretive, contrawhat can appear to be the hermeneutic have seen thatHeideggertakes historiwe Thus sciences. human particularly as do therest it has "a history that in case a reflexive as point,noting ography "its of the sciences,"and thus should be able to apply,qua science of history, The problemhoweveris not own methodand thematicprocedureto itself." recourseto the subjectiveor human hermeneutic resolvedby such a reflexive on its own can grasp in reflecting of science all the because sciences history "essence as historiits own and not account is a historiographical history a science."80 i.e., as ography, In this same way,Heideggerremindsus that "ifwe want to assert somewe must leave behind the object area thingabout mathematicsas a theory, We own way of representing. of mathematics,togetherwith mathematics1 what mathematicsitself mathematicalreckoning can neverdiscoverthrough and, in this case, is."81 The reason for this limitationis logical reflexivity not between subject-discursive reference, the clear order of and distinction in a are not "the sciences that notes In this fiat. way,Heidegger Heideggerian to set themselves to themselves to time at themselves, represent position any the modes of proceand through beforethemselves, by means of theirtheory of science, now essence that the means But this dure belongingto theory/182 scientific." will have to be in a nicelyobvious form, "nothing
77 "Science and Reflection," p. 176. Heidegger, 78 "The Age of WorldPicture," p. 153. Heidegger, 79 "Science and Reflection," p. 176. Heidegger, 80 "Science and Reflection," p. 177. Heidegger,
81Ibid. 82Ibid.
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Heideggerand Nietzsche: FromtheBeitrge to TheQuestionConcerning Technology and Readthrough ofnihilism theexpress invocation ofNietzsche's history in tacitcorrespondence withbothCassirer and Carnap, Beitrdge Heidegger's reflects theconcentrated withwhatwhatwas of his engagement specificity thencalled positivism butwhichcontinues phitodaynotonlyas analytic but also as the ofmodern scienceand/as losophy efficacy veritably working as Machenschaft, thatis: thedealings of technology. Heidegger technology in opposition to thekind setsauthentic or genuine bycontrast questioning of questioning research.83 thatcorresponds to "curiosity" and investigative A reflection from on questioning runsthroughout Being Heidegger's thought and lime to TheQuestion whichlast is a sustained Concerning Technology, - he evenwrites a letter reflection on questioning, to hisvery latest thought with to theAmerican Conference before hisdeathin 1976, Heidegger shortly theepistolary that human by greetings pleasantry beings exchange thoughtful thewell-being tooneanother: after he goeson nottoinquire posing questions ofhisfriends at that orManfred suchas JoanStambaugh conference, Frings, that butto ask thequestion as a question scienceand technology concerning be framed and askedanewat theconference. might For Heidegger, of answer-bound or problem-directed stopsshort inquiry Contra theradical received genuine proposes questioning. logic,Heidegger ofreflective in all itsmodesty. Thisreceived poverty logic thinking: thought, would not merely be thatof the logicalpositivists (the logic thatwas to becomeCarnap'sintellectual propocapital)but wouldhave moregeneric nentsof another less rigorous kindin thejournalistic and self-importance cavalier and Time that self-confidence ofthecritics ofBeing correspondingly wouldtakeHeidegger's in other to morebitter reflections contexts, musing I refer hereto Heidegger's comments on deathand whathe calledthe"journalistic" ofhisBeing and Time when which, (and "philistine") interpretations it was notpresented as an anthropology intotheterms ofexisten(evolving or indeedas a philosophy ofdeath.84 The minimal that achievement tialism) was forHeidegger themodesty ofopenreflection, is or reticent questioning however morethanwe are used to regard ifonlybecause,as as thinking, renunciation or as releasement and letting to lead us out be, it promises of calculative "the of reflection is the ofa wealth thought: poverty promise whosetreasures in the of that uselessness which can never glow resplendence be included inanyreckoning."85
83Ibid, 142;cf. 5. p. Beitrdge 84See 162,163. Heidegger's Beitrge, 85 "Science and Reflection," Heidegger, p. 181.
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Modest or not, this proposal still strikesus as wrong-headed.Such talk strikesus as opposed to serious attemptsto cognizingscience in general as sensibilities well as to thecognitivist (and analyticpractice)of thephilosophy of science. If todays philosophyof science is no longerdominatedby schoit continuesto lasticphilosophy or,as in Heidegger's day,by neo-Kantianism, be dominatedby the stillenduringanalyticapproach to conceivingthe very scientific problemof science on the termsof the modernworldview (this is what Heideggermeans by speakingas he does of "scienceas worldview,"i.e., of science, Heidegger in contra the idea and ethos of Heidegger'sthinking and beyond). Heideggercriticizesmodernscience in its totalizthe Beitrage ing logic or technologicalessence. And in Nietzsche'sspirit,Heideggerlater totalizationin its subversionof any alternaexpressesthe logic of scientific But to say such thingsis to challengeor tive:"Science 5the new religion."86 oppose science and science,as Nietzschehad alreadyremindedus in thethird brooksno criticique. sectionof On theGenealogy ofMorals,like religion, advert to a take To to, as Nietzsche did, the up position against science, as to or and limits of logic clarify, Heidegger seeks to do, the language, and even and of science, seems anti-scientific philosophy respectiveroles has been raised of And the against charge incompetence science-incompetent. inaccuindeed,even fromthe startand in spite of being patently Heidegger, rate.Heidegger's problemwas not thathe didn'tknow science much less that he did notknowlogic (he knewboth) nor indeed thatthescience he did know standards. or academic or university wasn'tup to sophisticated sense of order. For Heideggerwhat was at stake was a good Aristotelian that for and to ancilla unimpeachablymetaphysicalreasons, theology, Only but priorto or above science. Thus science ancilla to was hardly philosophy withan ironythat to Metaphysics, sectionof Introduction in the first writing continuesto elude casual readers,Heideggertakes issue withthe notionthat in analyticphilosophy, can stillbe seen to be influential namelythat "scienit alone can and that alone is the authentic, tificthinking rigorousthinking, must be made the measure even of philosophic thinking."87 Heidegger can the document of the of attitude scientific "in the that sciences, emphasize theirbirthfromphilosophystillspeaks."88And almost thirty yearsbefore(in is "science that Nietzsche his onlyscientific, lectures),Heideggeremphasizes that theextent ... to of science to thatis say, onlypartakes genuineknowledge it is philosophical."89
86 Heidegger,Zollikon Seminars, p. 18/20.See Paul Valadiers essay on the same theme, and Philosophy "Science as New Religion,"in Babich, ed., Nietzsche, of Science: Epistemology, and theSciences II, (Dordrecht:Kluwer,1999), pp. 241-252. Nietzsche 87 to Metaphysics, An Introduction p. 27 [20]. Heidegger, 88 End of Philosophy," p. 59. Heidegger/The 89 VolumeII, p. 112. Nietzsche, Heidegger,
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Babette E. Babich We recall too in this context,Heidegger's argumentin Being and Time whichdemandsa similardistinction between(and ordering of) theproblemof is whatHeidegger of science" science and philosophy: the foundations "Laying names "a productivelogic" - not limpingafterscience, but indeed "leaping or ahead" of science, thus disclosing the constitutionof its subject-matter its concern and making these structures"available to the positivesciences In this same ironic fashion, as transparent assignmentsfortheirinquiry."90 in his Introduction to Metaphysics, Heidegger reprises and compounds his claims regarding as a "productive byway logic"in Beingand Time, philosophy charof a tacticalrepriseof Carnaps criticism of theillogicaland unscientific acter of his thought:"Talkingabout Nothingis illogical. Whoevertalks and thinks is an unscientific person."91 AgainstCarnap'sclaims,and not illogically thatwould become the the claims of the same logical positivism incidentally analyticphilosophythat now dominates the academic philosophical world, thoughtis just a derivativeand rigidified Heidegger argues that "scientific sciformof philosophicalthinking. Philosophyneverarises fromor through ence."92Michael Friedmanthusrightly identifies a concernwiththeprimacy of logic and the exact sciences as what unifiesHeidegger and Carnap and the same difference between them.For Heidegger, philosophy distinguishes and notjust logically/as it were,or in inherently "belongsto a higherorder, a table of the systemof the sciences."93What Heideggermeans by this is a Yet by failas much as a thematically reflective rank-ordering. classificatory in of scientific to to of the science its accustomed age ing grant pride place an to reserve reason - nota bene,thenas now - whenever Heideggerattempts orientation betweenphilosophy and science thatwould requirecriticalreflecis tion, or thoughtfulness (recognizingthat forHeideggercriticalreflection theproperprovinceof philosophy and inevitably unavailableto and therefore science qua science), Heideggeris judged anti-science, a judgmenthe just as refused a as confused one.94 persistently In the spiritof the genuine knowingHeideggeralways believed to correspond to scientific thoughtas such, the ascriptionof antagonismto science mistakesthe criticalpoint he had learntso earlyin his own lifefromAristotle'sspecification of what we may name "methodological" phronesis.Much of
90 and Time, & Robinson & Row, trans., (NewYork: Heidegger, Being Macquarrie Harper Int.I, (BT31/SZ 11). See also I.I, (BT 75/50); 1962), 1.6, 212-230). 44 (BT 256-273/SZ 91Heidegger, AnIntroduction toMetaphysics, p. 25 [181. 92Heidegger, AnIntroduction toMetaphysics, p. 28 [201. 93Ibid. 94Thiswas a thatwouldworkto thedetriment of Boss'shopesfora scientific prejudice ofDaseinsanalyse. As thework ofAdolf Griinbaum wouldmake (therepeated work) reception thebugbear ofscience andscientificity but is notmerely an elusive one for clear, Daseinsanalyse ingeneral. psychoanalysis
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thevictory of sciens enthusiasmforNietzsche'sclaim concerning Heidegger - and itself derives from this critical distinction methodoverscience tific just of thequalifying indeed thephilosophicalimportance philosophicalabilityto account of such judgmentin As Heideggercites Aristotle's makedistinctions. as well as throughout the "The End of Philosophyand the Task of Thinking" of such references): "For not to know a lifetime ZollikonSeminars(following and ofwhatone maynot,arguessimply we maydemand proof, ofwhatthings we a want of education/1 (Meta. 1006a, cf.,Me. Eth. 1094b,etc.) Accordingly on science listedin reviewof the serriedpropositions findthatin Heidegger's For he also advertsto the same chargeof being "anti-science."95 theBeitmge, science doesn't arise of "characterization his howevef summary Heidegger of the sortis simplyimpossible." to science because hostility froma hostility (B76) which As Heideggerexplains this same simplifying disjunctivetendency, with a tendencyeven in philosophy to reduce things he always identified to speak ofpros or cons, philosophic down to levelofjournalisticoppositions, of likes and dislikes.Accordingis likewisenot an either/or thinking thought fornor againstscience." (B 76.1 1)96 is [thus]neither "Philosophy gly, Nietzschepolemicizesand teases us on thispointwhereHeideggerargues with a schoolteacher'spatience. But we still find it hard, just as Descartes muses, to break our old convictionsor prejudices of thought.How can we How are we to philosoon enlightenment? come to an enlightened perspective phize on thesubjectof science? kind we If thiswere an armchairproblemof the classicallymetaphysical could let it go as conundrum,a mere dilemma. But because the problem is to of thereal,"we have been attempting theproblemof science as the "theory
95The anti-science charge dogged Heideggersince reviewsof Beingand Time,thendirected BT, p. 269/ to claims he makes thereconcerningtruthand especiallyconcerningphysicsitself, of Galileo, "als Physiker S. 226-227. See also his characterization Philosoph."Logik: Die Frage nach der Wahrheit, (1925-26), GA 21, p. 97. Later his directcommentson science and thinking drewgreaterfire. 961 do not need to emphasize here that Heideggers cntics have been unpersuaded by this the judgirrational, claim. If his criticscharge thathis philosophyis anti-scienceand therefore In the age of to answersuch critiquedirectly. menthas provento endureHeideggersown efforts of science is assumed to be irrational, science,under the rationalaegis of science,any criticism references and in spite of his painstaking in logic and mathematics, and all Heideggerstraining of thatlogic into theorgamasterof scientific the first to Aristotle, logic and to the development modernscience in Descartes(and Galileo) and in Kant (and Leibniz), does nothnon of precisely I attemptto oppose this reading here as elsewhere. the to charge of irrationality. ing abrogate see Patricia Glazebrooks On Heideggerand logic, see Friedman and Luchte and on Aristotle Fordham York: Science Press, 2000) and fora stillmore (New University of Philosophy Heidegger's preciseand sustainedreading,WilliamMcNeill, The Glance of theEye (Albany:State University of New YorkPress, 1999).
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Babette E. Babich take it by the veritablehornsand this not because we wish to revivethe lost of the Cretan art of bull dancing - in the spiritof Nietzsche'sidentification mention with the of as a with science" horns," "problem whereby "problem are crownedwith of "horns/'we philosophers,as failedsuitorsof the truth, to Nietzscheor all the allusions to the liar thatare inevitablewithreference is more our ambition of to Theseus himself. Here, even, thinking Ariadne, sober than matters of scholarlypride.In the modernage of science,it is now to modern science life itselfthat is at stake. An unquestioninginattention and technologyrules in modern confidence,that is, in our convictions,as Nietzsche named what Gadamer called our prejudices. Takinga word from Nietzsche and fromHlderlin,Heideggernames this our needfulness [Nte] and Heideggerplays on the Germanto explicatethisin termsof our modern technological resourcefulness (indeed our being of ourselves our own that resourcesforourselves,whichis thewatchwordof the future technology as our is ourselves,the design of the human: cloningas human engineering) of our needlessness,our ultimate needlessness[Notlosigkeit], The needfulness is also our abandonment- of Being, gods, even the world resourcefulness, we have made. We increasingly approximatethe time in which,as we note but its own encounters nothing Heisenberg'sexpression, humanity seemingly face whereeverit turnsto look on the earth,and we can add: howeverdeeply it gazes into the depthsof the universe.97 For Heideggerwho turnspresumed thishumanistic into the absence of reticent globaliintimacy regard, reigning zation means thathumanity has neverbeen more alien to itself. oftheserviceoffered For theessence ofthemachine,the"dead" bymachine to can onlycorrespond is no different), (and electronic technology technology can be a literalderacination.98 This unsettling displacementor derangement in themoderntechnological effected via industrialization sense or via wireless and otherwisemobile communicationsin the now postmodern, increasingly "cellular" or atomicizing sense of connectivity in a condition of totalizing dispersalthatis globalization.Today indeed we know thatone can remainin one's home and manage to be derangedin this sense by nothingmore egreconnection:the resultis not an alienation in a tradigious than an internet - note theword!- a tionalsense: indeed one is projectedupon, one can "surf" virtualether(picturesand projectsof personal interests do worldsof good in this measure,but ultimately what matters most is thatone presses a keyand
97 timein thecourseof reference is to Heisenberg's declaration: thefirst Heidegger's "for Conmodem manonthis earth nowconfronts inHeisenberg, The alone." history himself Physicists trans. Arnold J.Pomerantz Hutchinson and Company, 1958), (London: ception ofNature, p. 23. 98In this inthehistorical home workers aretorn from context oftheBeitrge, industrial way, andhistory inJnger's aus Heimat undGeschichte"], andputtouse ("mobilized" ["herausgerissen and notonlyhiswords, or in moreeconomically and madeproductive, neutral terms, engaged "wired" orbrought intotheloop).
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is absorbedby the sense of magical power grantedby nothingmore fantastic than an immediate response, howevervirtualand indeed if only fromthe - anything - hapwitheveryclick of a keyor a mouse, something keyitself: in what Marx's is enoughforus). Whatis volatilized, pens and thatsomething itself. substanceless modernity words, "meltsinto thin air," is increasingly of Da-sein Atrisk,Heideggerargues,is the possibility (and responsibility) - bothwithreference to the locale and substanceof the earthand the known and knowableworld. In place of earthand world is only machination- that the e-business or digital ideal, is, mechanization,i.e., global technicization, to a shadow,a play of whereeven themachinestandsto lose its substantiality like the a-dimensional an on screen, technologicalprojecincreasingly light elevatedto the statusof a movie icon of desire in tionsof uttertransparency or to be experiencedat will in or visceralizedin the Matrix, Report, Minority latest with the technology." any home-theatre a human made in theimage of Shelley's Not a representation Frankenstein, notofgod,but man,ofcobbled together bodyparts;noteventherobotfantasy thatstillcharmsus in thetelevision images of Star Trekandroids,todays illusions have since givenway to the similarly imaginarycyborgof metonymic between virtual interfaces in the indistinct now appearing fantasygaming, techand real - avatarsand second-life selves,like so much body-adornment, of bits of in extensions exposed arranged decoratively place earrings, nological thanHollyor evenbetter withflawlessflesh, interfaced electronic machinery wood can do, the classic computeranime, smoothed out in flatanimation of2-dimensional screens,and programming measuredto pixels,theresolution in the language of in our essence named find ourselves we variations.Today, As research.100 cell stem coded, we are not we so dna and, genetically hope,
99The cult film,Minority of fascism,representsthe Report,with its parabolic indictment as the visions of storytellersfrom lineamentsof the all-too-often veritably previsioned"future," Goethe to MaryWollstonecraft Shelleyto JulesVerneto George Orwellare so oftenable to do. what speculations,our absorptionin such virtualworlds exemplifies Apartfromsuch literary one would ratherwill nothing(real) than not will at all. Nietzschecalled nihilism, 100 In the ZollikonSeminaren,Heidegger had argued with some ironic humor,against the of the human offered definition reductiveclaim of the cybernetic by NorbertWiener."What the human being is, is determined by the method of natural science." (p. 92/S. 119). Weiner's device. For Heidegger, which exists in print,describes "man" as an "information" definition, of science. Heidegger limitations thescientific in overstepping attainsabsurdity such a definition then advertsto the criticalobjections that we have already seen are automatic in the wake of to this one labels the reference "Customarily well-justified: any critique,even one so seemingly of the being of the human being withinscience (with its absolute self-destruction threatening towardscience,as such, but of hostility towardscience. Yet,it is not a matter claims) as hostility on itselfby science." This lack of reflection the prevailing rathera matterof critiqueregarding and here Heidegger sense of critique,as noted above, Marcuse has in common withHeidegger, of separatedomains,appropriateto science on theone hand emphasizesthatmorethana matter such reflective on the other, and properto philosophy critiqueis essentialto science qua science:
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Babette E. Babich eventhetechnizedanimal brought to lifeas dynamoin FritzLang'sMetropolis mechanical virgin.As techmachine, the beautifully armored,malignantly the nized animality,we imagine operators like nucleotide transcriptions, transformations of modified as or as uptake remodeling genes therapies mechanical organismsready made for deliberately injected via the literally the workat hand alreadyextant,and hence not at all dependenton our notvirusesreadymade (thoughnot due to our efforts) quite-ready technologies: forjust such a process of on-the-fly genetic modification.Using viruses as as researchers the technizedanimal becomes in turnthe vectors, today's do, if viralvector(and we growmosaics of animal and human stemscells we will be modifying this plan still further), likewise the bacterial plasmid,just so, the dream of the human clone. Technologicaldealingor machinationbeginsat theinceptionoftherevelationofmakingas such,morethana merely mannerofthepresencing negative of being.101 With or withoutthe idea of a creatorgod in the Judeao-Christian tradition,"what remains essential is the being-causedness[das Verursthis achtsein]of beings."(Ibid.) At the heightof medievalschool philosophy, the idea fundamental would become (God as ruling cause-effect-relationship causa sui). Thus Heideggercan say that "mechanicaland biological ways of are always onlyconsequences of thehiddenmachinational[machenthinking articulation of beings."(Ibid) The littlethatscience has changed scPiaftlicheh] since the folk-science of "breeding" not only in 1930s Germanybut internaand research still confirms this. The ideology tionallyen vogue in nutrition of hygiene,including nutritionand exercise, envisioned a maximalization of potentialdevelopment, This same idea has raising "superior"children.102 founda new resonance but nothinglike a new ambitionin todays vision of genetic engineering(this is of course not just forsheep but preciselyin its
as "insightinto the verymethoddetermining the characterof modern science." (p. 95/S. 125) If one can do science withoutphilosophyone cannot do so reflexively. This is notjust a matter of thinking as some readersof Heideggerhave supposed, but correspondsto the veryessence of science proper,the same essence that findsphilosophyhigher, is higher, as ontoas possibility than science or ontic inquiry.(See Heidegger, logical inquiryis higher, Being and Time,Int. I, to Metaphysics, p. 31/S. 11, and Introduction p. 40/S.29.) 101 For Heidegger, what is as makeable,as made, whether from out of itself or else as unfolded at the hands of the craftsman, is not yet machinationas such. The emergenceof the machinations of modern(scientific) technology requiredthe originalconceptionof the causal schema of beings as such, not derivedfromthe era of modernscience and so not limitedin historicaltime, but drawingin its rootsupon the earliestbeginning of philosophy, articulatedin Plato who uses the termof formative manufacture or invention/creation and sets the standardsforthe same in his Timaeus. 102 See, forinstanceI. NewtonKugelmass,Growing (New York:D. Appleton SuperiorChildren CenturyCo., 1935), a book published in English,indeed in America,by an expatriateAustrian who was a practicing physician-researcher pediatricianon New YorkCity'sPark Avenue.
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modalityas human engineering)as Sloterdijks incendiarytractatus"Rules forthe Human Zoo" made an issue of the matterforphilosophical debate in Germany.103 (and even greater public consternation) the transformational of refers Nietzsche, trajectory Heidegger Following of causal the modern force creatum to ens from working thinking.104 causality with referenceto ourselves and our For Nietzsche, we explain everything we fashion own motivationalintentionality, consequently and inevitably, misconstrue both the and of a cause the (or invent) thereby veryconcept In context this Nietzschean blow.105 in a ourselves and world (it was single of the more or less the as Nietzschewho definedknowledge illicit, reduction, "cause-effect relationthat the to thefamiliar), unfamiliar Heideggerexplains i.e., to ship is ... employedby all human calculation ... to explain something, we Once again and the familiar." of the ordinary may push it into the clarity recall thatNietzsche has argued that we everywhere explain the unfamiliar by reductionto the familiar- an illusion which has the charm of silencing See Nietzsche, ofnon-knowing. thediscomfort and alleviating Twilight mystery in quesof theIdols, "The Four GreatErrors,"5. The 'reliefof non-knowing an emphasis also made, if in Nietzsche'sargument, tion is what is important reasons by C. S. Peirce who spoke of the "quiescent"power of fordifferent even "thebeingnessof beings fades into a logical form belief.For Heidegger, thatis itself intowhat is thinkable (B 52) ungrounded." by a thinking in the of As elementsof the forgottenness Being Heideggerhad Beitrge, claim the and outlinedcalculation [Berechnung], acceleration, overwhelming on calculation,Heideggerpoints to of themassive.(B 57) In his reflections the exact opposite of the precisionclaimed forit as essential to the effective ofleadingprinciplesand theunclearpre-conception success ofscience: "from of dispositionsand plans." This forHeidegger rules one derivesthe certainty [Versuch]"thatis as attempts, correspondsto the essence of "theexperiment sense but also even in a Machian sense, understoodin an arch-Nietzschean is the probwhich always remaincorrigible (this always flexible corrigibility For "normal calls Kuhn what of science.") (after Popper) lem-solving power from abstracted techno-science research modern of essence the Heidegger
103 Ein Antwortschreiben zum Briefber den Peter Sloterdijk, Regelnfrden Menschenpark: am Main: Suhkamp, 1999). Humanismus(Frankfurt 104 What Heidegger means by ens creatumwhen he goes on to coordinate ens creatumto a divinecreativepower,and accordingly modernnature- withtechnicity requiresno reference is non-theological. 105 Nietzsche argues that "Die einzige Kausalitat, die uns bewufitist, ist zwischen Wollen von zwei immer wir auf alle Dinge und deuten uns das Verhltnifi und Thun - diese bertragen Die Absichtoder das Wollen ergiebtdie Nomina, das beisammenbefindlichen Veranderungen. Thun die Verba.Das Thier als wollendes- das ist sein Wesen." KSA 7, p. 482. See forreferences to thiscomplextopic myseveralstudieson Nietzscheand science, as cited above.
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Babette E. Babich no necesidealized researchscience or falsificational logicising,exemplifies realist conor world of with the real,physical empiricist sarycorrespondence viction but its own unquestioninglogic, forscience then destroysthe very spiritof the possible thatstands higherthan actualityby makingpossibility all pervasiveand so levelingit altogether presagingwhat the laterHeidegger would name totalizing thoughtlessness. What is betrayed in todays digitalized ideal is no longer the warning worldof "naturalresources/' threat thathumanity notjust the "natural" itself, in of may come to be taken the image Heidegger'sstandingreserve.The past the entirepopulation fifty years has made this danger quite real. In theory, the of Iceland, but also, less a matterof civic speculationthan exploitation, Human Genome Diversity Projectwhichhas, withouteven the appearance of informed consentas in Iceland, soughtto do the same forMiddle and South Americanindigenoustribes. banks of human In practice,we name onlythe fertility clinicsas veritable beings,potentialand actual. So many ova, so manyvials of sperm,so many the basis of genetic not to mentionstem cells and cloned cell-lines, embryos, researchand cultivatedin some cases now alreadyformore than fifty years. and nothingat all comAll alreadystockon hand, so much standingreserve, If the genomeproject pared withthe virtualpromiseof the same technology. has provento be as anticlimacticas it has, the geneticcode remains as the stillallurand accessible essence of humanity, molecularidea of a registered we hope to take forgrantedin place of thelivedcomplexities ing as a signifier of human life. I have elsewhereexploredthe implicationsof the conclusion to be drawn withrespectto thedangerto animal lifeand to thelivedworldas a whole: for the most partwhat horrifies us in the transformation of the worldthatbears of that the verysymbolicalname of "global warming"is not the destruction worldor theconcomitant devastation of animal and plantlife,as we continue withoutcease to trawlthe oceans bare of all the fishesthatswim,cetaceans, sea-tortoiseswho will drown in our nets cephalopods, and slow-maturing beforetheycan swim to shore to lay theireggs and bringnew lifeagain, and as we continueour breakneck which and road-building, pace of deforestation we name, withneitherironynor embarrassment, development, irremediably the worlds of apes and of lions, of elephantsand bears, of tigers destroying and antelope alike but also small things,like butterflies and like frogsand otherthingswe have not noticed. Our problemis not frailty: the naked ape is anything but defenselessand we have lied to ourselvesformillenniaabout our imaginedweaknessand thus arrogatedto ourselvesthe rightto take any advantagepossible against other animals and against the earth. We have since developed those advantages
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"TheProblem of Science" in Nietzscheand Heidegger to an extraordinary pitch and we are poised to do more. In all this the only whereall want is to have no limitand no end problemis thatof sustainability to whatwe do. Thus we use and rape the world and wish only to be able to continuein replace the heaven to just this fashionforall time. Science and technology come withheaven on earthand this is our idea of thatheaven. We have not consuminventedthe lamentingto be heard in the loss of such now utterly We need morethanHeideggerand Nietzsche,but as they mate humanvanity. both urged us to learn,and now forthe sake of the earth,as forthe sake of we need to learn to think. lifeitself,
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Babbette Babich - The Problem of Science in Nietzsche and Heidegger

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Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia

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"TheProblem ofScience"in and Heidegger Nietzsche

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"TheProblem of Science" in Nietzscheand Heidegger

31 VolumeII, p. 112. Nietzsche, Heidegger,

32Ibid., p. 21. 33Ibid., p. 21.

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