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Measure-taking: meaning and normativity in Heidegger’s philosophy

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Abstract

Following Marc Richir and others, László Tengelyi has recently developed the idea of Sinnereignis (meaning-event) as a way of capturing the emergence of meaning that does not flow from some prior project or constitutive act. As such, it might seem to pose something of a challenge to phenomenology: the paradox of an experience that is mine without being my accomplishment. This article offers a different sort of interpretation of meaning-events, claiming that in their structure they always involve what the late Heidegger called “measure-taking” (Maß-nehmen)—that is, an orientation toward the emergence of normative moments thanks to which what apparently eludes phenomenology becomes accessible in its inaccessibility. This is shown, first, on the example of conscience in Sein und Zeit and then on the example of the poetic image (Bild) in Heidegger’s later essays.

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Notes

  1. See Crowell (2001a).

  2. Tengelyi (1998). Translations from this and other German sources where no English translation is available are my own. In cases where English translations exist—for instance, when citing from Heidegger’s work—I have consulted them, but have made my own emendations without further comment.

  3. László Tengleyi, from the “Reflections on the Program” of the Internationalen Tagung der Deutschen Gesellschaft für phänomenologische Forschung, which took place October 5–8, 2005, at the Bergischen Universität Wuppertal. A German version of the present paper was delivered at this conference.

  4. Tengelyi (1998, p. 43).

  5. Tengelyi (1998, p. 109).

  6. Tengelyi (1998, p. 105).

  7. “Das Selbst, das als solches den Grund seiner selbst zu legen hat, kann dessen nie mächtig werden und hat doch existierend das Grundsein zu übernehmen.” Heidegger (1977, p. 284). Henceforth, cited in the text as SZ, according to the pagination given in the margins of GA 2.

  8. Tengelyi (1998, p. 116).

  9. Tengelyi (1998, pp. 30, 115).

  10. Tengelyi (1998, p. 37).

  11. At SZ 288 Heidegger speaks of the “essential consciencelessness [Gewissenslosigkeit] within which alone consists the existentielle possibility to be ‘good’.” I take the emphasis on “be” here, used specifically in relation to Dasein’s mode of being as Existenz or Zu-sein, to refer to all practical activity, all existential “projections”.

  12. Tengelyi (1998, pp. 36–37).

  13. See Crowell (2001b).

  14. Heidegger (1975, p. 227).

  15. It should be noted that, strictly speaking, such given “grounds” are not the particulars that can be identified scientifically or sociologically, etc., since these are already taken up into certain projects—namely theoretical ones—and are thus already meaningful. The factical as such is the totally inaccessible, that is, that which eludes all intelligibility. See Crowell (2002).

  16. Heidegger (1978a, p. 159). Henceforth cited in the text as WG.

  17. For a more developed version of the foregoing interpretation of conscience in Sein und Zeit, see Crowell (2007).

  18. Heidegger (1959, p. 262). Henceforth cited in the text as US.

  19. Heidegger (1967, p. 64). Henceforth cited in the text as VA.

  20. Heidegger (1978b, p. 355).

  21. Waldenfels (1994, p. 333f).

  22. Waldenfels (1994, p. 579).

  23. Waldenfels (1994, p. 580).

  24. Waldenfels (1994, p. 580).

  25. Waldenfels (1994, p. 579)

  26. Korsgaard (1996, p. 140).

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Crowell, S. Measure-taking: meaning and normativity in Heidegger’s philosophy. Cont Philos Rev 41, 261–276 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11007-008-9085-6

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