2.37
‘Are you an idealist?’
I don’t think the real is constituted by our minds.
‘So, you think there’s a real world out there?’
I think that, though the question is poorly formulated, the world is constituted by things that are really there. There is a sense in which things aren’t mind-dependent.
‘But how can you think this when you seem to subscribe to some kind of divergence theory of truth, i.e., even though you gesture towards asymptotic convergence (§2.14), you multiply worlds?’
You seem to imply that truth is true if and only if it converges on one thing or one fact.
‘Why shouldn’t truth be restricted in this way?’
Why should it?
‘Are you a relativist? Relative either to a culture or to the individual? Wouldn’t you say that if someone believes something crazy they’re entitled to it insofar as it’s true for them? Doesn’t this remove all ability to criticize the practices of others?’
I’m not sure why we need to speak of entitlements, but maybe this will help. Today, I saw an inebriated man treat a rivulet of water as though it were a river. — Would I say that for me it’s a rivulet, but for him, his truth, is that it’s a river? — No. Because I can inspect the phenomenon; I can examine the rivulet. And then I could, if I wanted, ask others around me. We could discuss the rivulet and the man’s reaction. All this evidence would show that he’s wrong.
However, we could ask him why he acted that way. Perhaps his shoes have holes in them. Perhaps he was surprised by the rivulet and that surprise played out in his body. Perhaps the context of his inebriation provides reasons. Perhaps there are even reasons that emerge from a differing set of metaphysical assumptions, themselves from a different way of being, a different world.
‘So, something may be reasonable to him?’
Of course. But it may also turn out that he erred. Nonetheless, he acted in a specific way, and the action emerged from a context for him.
‘But what if he insists that the rivulet is in fact a river?’
Well, if the point is whether or not I’d concede that this was true for him, I would not, for truth isn’t relative to an individual. Truth has to do with opening and responding (corresponding) to phenomena as they unfold into and in relation to our world-horizon. And our world, into which we’re thrown, is an intersubjective world: it’s always already constituted by (as Heidegger calls it[1]) being-with, that is, by others. We’re fundamentally and essentially open: an opening, a clearing.[2] This clearing of being is always open to others (humans, but also others — not just animals or plants, but all others, every or any other thing): Heidegger calls this ek-sistence.[3]
Am I a cultural relativist? For I’ve seemed to admit the existence of other worlds. Well, but first, let’s bracket off life worlds (§2.12), which suggest my relativism, if I’m a relativist, is broader than human cultures.
Let’s think what we mean by cultural relativist. We may mean that truth is relative to cultures. Or that morality or ethics is relative in this way. We may mean we have no grounds on which to base criticism of another culture’s practice.
As a preliminary point, I don’t think ‘culture’ is the right way to think about this. I’d rather speak of groups with shared histories, traditions, languages, and so on—i.e., shared worlds—because ‘groups’ touches more directly on the assemblage of beings (whereas ‘culture’ can mean trappings, ideas, beliefs, or some surface phenomenon). In addition, ‘groups’ works better for life worlds.
Groups are never immured in themselves—there’s no way to transmit an exact meaning generation to generation—and they may be, and often are, geographically dispersed. ‘Groups’ isn’t a locational, but an ontological category: a group, in my sense, is the nexus for a shared world. With that said, we cannot draw strict lines around groups: groups are symbiotic with and open to other groups and things; groups aren’t static, stable, or essentializable.
Truth and morality are relative to groups in their relations with others because disclosures or worlds are relative to groups. Worlds disclose an onto-ethical (§2.19), metaphysical (§2.16) horizon of understanding (§2.5) and thus of correspondence (§2.14) for truth and ethics. A group provides an arena within which its members begin their understanding of truth and ethics. From there, one engages with things themselves.
If that’s the case, can we criticize another group’s practice? Of course; we do it all the time. What’s required, however, is that we acknowledge that this criticism occurs from within a particular disclosure, reaches towards another, and gains its force there, in the relation between the two. However, there’s no full understanding, and conveying meaning requires that bridges be built, not once and for all, but constantly each time. One strategy might consist in trying to show an internal contradiction within the group’s thinking.[4] Criticism is better or worse, depending on how much of the practice and its context are understood. For even if a group has justifications for a practice, borne out by history and traditions, such that the practice makes sense and fits within a larger scheme, it may be that the group’s practice doesn’t heed phenomena and silences resistance.
To take up the image of the cube again, while the lines may fit the cube, they leave room for slack. The goal of transformation isn’t to fully tighten the relations between the cube and the lines: there’ll always be slack, but it’s a question of what kind. Why will there always be slack? There’s no absolutely consistent way to understand all phenomena because phenomena hang together in various ways, they constantly and relationally reveal new aspects of themselves, we can’t (adequately) respond to all that calls us, and we’re also always changing. Phenomena and how they’re arranged always leave room for gestalt shifts and other ways of seeing.
There is room to change harmful practices, which often come from inattentive relations. Harmful practices come from an urge to speak for someone or something other, to deny that this other can speak, or to ignore them.
Seeing is a practice: it’s something we do. And it’s something we can work on.
[1] Heidegger, B&T, 118/155.
[2] ibid, 132–3/171; Martin Heidegger, “Letter on ‘Humanism’,” in Pathmarks, trans. Frank A. Capuzzi, ed. William McNeill (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009), p. 248.
[3] Martin Heidegger, “On the Essence of Truth” in Pathmarks, trans. John Sallis, p. 144–5, 147, 150; Heidegger, “Letter on ‘Humanism,’” p. 248–9.
[4] This may be a Rancièrian-inspired strategy. Rancière’s theorization of politics will be introduced in §2.67.