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Heidegger’s phenomenology of embodiment in the Zollikon Seminars

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Abstract

In this article, I focus on the problem of body as it is developed in Heidegger’s Zollikon Seminars, in contrast with its enigmatic concealment in Being and Time. In the first part, I emphasize the implicit connection of Heidegger’s approach of body with Husserl’s problematic of Leib and Körper, and with his phenomenological analyses of tactility. In the second part, I focus on Heidegger’s distinction between the limits of the lived body and the limits of the corresponding corporeal thing, opening to an ontological understanding of the ecstatic bodying forth of the body. In the third part, I analyse this ecstatic bodiliness in relation to the problem of spatiality, exploring the tension between the here and the over there in the experience of the embodiment. Heidegger not only refuses to understand the space starting from the here of the body, but he also refuses to understand the body starting from the here of the space. Thus, there are two interconnected inversions that Heidegger operates in relation to Husserl: In the topic of spatiality, he rejects the pre-eminence of the here; in relation to the body, he contests the primacy of tactility. Finally, the conclusion stresses that, even if the bodying forth penetrates almost all behaviour of Dasein in the world, there is however a limit of embodiment, an unreachable frontier beyond any possibility of the bodying forth, namely the understanding of being. This also implies that the problem of body needs be understood in the context of the ontological difference.

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Notes

  1. See Cerbone (2000), Ciocan (2008) and Aho (2009).

  2. See the echoes in Heidegger (1987, pp. 202, 292; 2001, pp. 157, 231).

  3. Greisch (1994).

  4. Haar (1985, p. 81 sq.).

  5. See Benoist (1994) and Gros-Azorin (1998).

  6. Heidegger (1987, p. 99; 2001, p. 76).

  7. Heidegger (1987, pp. 232–233; 2001, p. 186).

  8. Heidegger (1987, p. 112; 2001, p. 86).

  9. Heidegger (1987, p. 113; 2001, p. 86).

  10. Heidegger (1987, p. 108; 2001, p. 82).

  11. Heidegger (1987, p. 108; 2001, p. 83).

  12. Merleau-Ponty (1964, pp. 24, 183, 191–192).

  13. Husserl (1973a, p. 162).

  14. Husserl (1952, p. 145).

  15. Husserl (1991, p. 128).

  16. Husserl (1952, p. 148; 1989, p. 155).

  17. Husserl (1952, p. 147; 1989, p. 155).

  18. Husserl (1952, p. 150; 1989, p. 158).

  19. Heidegger (1987, p. 108; 2001, p. 83): “Wenn ich das Glas greife, so spüre ich das Glas und meine Hand. Das ist die sogenannte Doppelempfindung, nämlich das Empfinden des Getasteten und das Spüren meiner Hand. Beim Sehen spüre ich nicht mein Auge in dieser Weise.”

  20. Husserl (1952, p. 147; 1989, p. 155). See a similar passage, Husserl (1989, p. 154): “In the case of one hand touching the other, it is again the same, only more complicated, for we have then two sensations, and each is apprehendable or experienceable in a double way.”

  21. Heidegger (1987, p. 108; 2001, p. 83).

  22. Husserl (1991, p. 128; 1960, p. 97).

  23. Heidegger (1987, p. 108; 2001, p. 83).

  24. Husserl (1952, p. 161; 1989, pp. 168–169).

  25. Heidegger (1987, p. 134; 2001, p. 103).

  26. Heidegger (1987, p. 233; 2001, p. 186).

  27. Heidegger (1987, p. 215; 2001, p. 170).

  28. Heidegger (1987, p. 233; 2001, p. 186).

  29. Heidegger (1987, p. 110; 2001, p. 85).

  30. Heidegger (1987, p. 113; 2001, p. 86).

  31. Heidegger (1987, p. 112; 2001, p. 86).

  32. Heidegger (1987, p. 113; 2001, p. 86).

  33. Heidegger (1987, p. 113; 2001, p. 87).

  34. Heidegger (1987, p. 113; 2001, p. 87).

  35. Heidegger (1987, p. 132; 2001, p. 102).

  36. Heidegger (1987, p. 113; 2001, p. 87).

  37. Heidegger (1987, p. 113; 2001, p. 87).

  38. This idea appears already in the Nietzsche lectures, see Heidegger (1996, pp. 100, 106, 195, 295, 508–512, 514). See, for an extended discussion, D’Angelo (2012). Husserl uses the verb leiben for a few times, but not as a noun, Leiben. I thank Betsy Behnke for making me aware of these occurrences. See Husserl (1973b, p. 287): “Als leibliches Ich, als Ich das in der Welt leibt und lebt […]”; Husserl (1973b, p. 294: “[…] als leiblich seiend, als leibend-lebend”; Husserl (2008, pp. 459–460): “[…] Menschen, der leiblich in der Welt ist und als Person-Ich in der Welt leibt und lebt […].”

  39. Heidegger (1987, pp. 113, 118, 122).

  40. Heidegger (1987, p. 245; 2001, p. 197).

  41. Heidegger (1987, p. 122; 2001, p. 93).

  42. Heidegger (1987, p. 113; 2001, p. 87).

  43. Heidegger (1987, p. 113; 2001, pp. 86–87): “Das Leiben des Leibes (the bodying forth of the body) bestimmt sich aus der Weise meines Seins (is determined by the way of my being). Das Leiben des Leibes ist somit eine Weise des Da-seins (the bodying forth of body, therefore, is a way of Da-sein’s being).”

  44. Heidegger (1987, p. 113; 2001, p. 87).

  45. Heidegger (1987, p. 113; 2001, p. 87).

  46. Heidegger (1987, p. 113; 2001, p. 87).

  47. Heidegger (1987, p. 278; 2001, p. 221).

  48. Heidegger (1987, p. 118; 2001, p. 91).

  49. Heidegger (1986, p. 107).

  50. Heidegger (1987, p. 110; 2001, p. 84).

  51. Heidegger (1987, p. 109; 2001, pp. 83–84).

  52. Heidegger (1987, p. 127; 2001, p. 97).

  53. Heidegger (1987, p. 141; 2001, p. 108), my emphasis.

  54. Heidegger (1987, p. 111; 2001, p. 85).

  55. Heidegger (1987, p. 118; 2001, p. 90–91).

  56. Heidegger (1987, p. 126; 2001, p. 97).

  57. Heidegger (1987, p. 126; 2001, pp. 96–97).

  58. Heidegger (1987, pp. 126, 272).

  59. Heidegger (1987, p. 110; 2001, p. 84).

  60. Heidegger (1987, p. 245; 2001, p. 197).

  61. Heidegger (1987, p. 248; 2001, p. 199).

  62. Heidegger (1987, p. 244; 2001, p. 196).

  63. Heidegger (1987, p. 244; 2001, p. 197).

  64. Heidegger (1987, p. 113; 2001, p. 87).

  65. Heidegger (1987, pp. 244–245; 2001, pp. 196–197).

  66. Heidegger states that it is impossible for us to understand phenomenologically how the brain is bodily involved in thinking, how thinking is embodied. Here, there is another fragment that may be of interest for scholars that link the phenomenological approach with the brain studies. How can we link the understanding of being, the body and the brain? Heidegger says: “If one says that bodying forth is involved in the understanding of being as well, and if this means that physiological processes in the brain are also involved in this understanding, then one puts body [Leib] in place of the corporeal thing [Körper]. We have no possibility at all for knowing how the brain is bodying forth in thinking [wie das Gehirn beim Denken leibt].” Heidegger (1987, p. 245; 2001, p. 197).

  67. Heidegger (1987, p. 248; 2001, p. 199).

  68. Heidegger (1986, p. 108).

  69. Heidegger (1987, p. 292; 2001, p. 231).

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Acknowledgments

This article is part of the research Project PN-II-RU-TE-2010-156 funded by CNCSIS-UEFISCSU.

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  1. Institute for Philosophy “Alexandru Dragomir” Bucharest, Romanian Society for Phenomenology, Bd. Mihail Kogalniceanu nr. 49, 050104, Bucharest, Romania

    Cristian Ciocan

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Ciocan, C. Heidegger’s phenomenology of embodiment in the Zollikon Seminars . Cont Philos Rev 48, 463–478 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11007-015-9347-z

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