Re: DEFENSE: B Rousse: Wednesday June 8th @ 2pm

[B Scot Rousse]

 

The Northwestern University Department of Philosophy presents

"Thrown Projection: An Interpretation and Defense of the Hermeneutic Conception of the Self in Heidegger's Being and Time"

A Dissertation Defense by

B Scot Rousse

Wednesday, June 8th at 2:00 PM

in the department seminar room, Kresge 2-345

~~~~~Abstract~~~~~

In the dissertation I present an interpretation and defense of the conception of human identity at work in Martin Heidegger’s Being and Time, and I critically situate it with respect to important positions in contemporary philosophy, in particular those of Christine Korsgaard and of Harry Frankfurt.  I argue for the overall superiority of the Heideggerian view by focusing on its ability to account for the pervasive social dimensions of human identity, something neither Korsgaard nor Frankfurt can plausibly do.

 

According to Heidegger, sociality, what he calls “being-with,” is constitutive of individual identity, and so a philosophical theory of the self that operates with an impoverished conception of sociality is bound to face difficulties.  The social dimensions of human identity cannot be theorized either in terms of natural-instinctual determination, or in terms of an individual’s free reflective choice, and yet these are the theoretical alternatives to which Frankfurt and Korsgaard are limited.  This limitation stems from a fundamental assumption that Heidegger rejects and criticizes and that Korsgaard and Frankfurt share in common, despite the opposed positions they often defend: the methodological individualism expressed in the assumptions that the core features of human agency are built-into each and every individual mind, and that an account of human identity can be given strictly through an analysis of the perspective of the first-person singular. I show that this assumption produces internal tensions and explanatory shortcomings in the views of both Korsgaard and Frankfurt. 

 

Heidegger’s view includes a powerful re-conception of the distinction between the receptive and the active dimensions of human agency (“thrownness” and “projection,” respectively), as well as the distinction between heteronomous and autonomous modes of agency (“inauthenticity” and “authenticity”).  Both distinctions are construed in terms the essential sociality of human identity.  Heidegger’s notion of the human being as “being-in-the-world” thus provides the theoretical resources to overcome the problematic dialectical impasse that frames the views of Korsgaard and Frankfurt.  The Heideggerian conception of human identity as a “thrown projection” is also able to capture the positive insights animating Korsgaard and Frankfurt.  Heidegger maintains Korsgaard’s Kant-inspired concern to give a non-naturalistic account of identity that emphasizes the task of active self-constitution and personal answerability, and he also maintains Frankfurt’s concern for the priority of caring and receptivity.  Yet the Heideggerian strategy for explaining these phenomena avoids and explains the problems Korsgaard and Frankfurt run into.

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