Logic: The Question of Truth

by Martin Heidegger, Thomas Sheehan (Translator)

Martin Heidegger's 1925–26 lectures on truth and time provided much of the basis for his momentous work, Being and Time. Not published until 1976 as volume 21 of the Complete Works, three months before Heidegger's death, this work is central to Heidegger's overall project of reinterpreting Western thought in terms of time and truth. The text shows the degree to which Aristotle underlies Heidegger's hermeneutical theory of meaning. It also contains Heidegger’s first published critique of Husserl and takes major steps toward establishing the temporal bases of logic and truth. Thomas Sheehan's elegant and insightful translation offers English-speaking readers access to this fundamental text for the first time.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction, Germany

376 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1926

About the author

Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) was a German philosopher whose work is perhaps most readily associated with phenomenology and existentialism, although his thinking should be identified as part of such philosophical movements only with extreme care and qualification. His ideas have exerted a seminal influence on the development of contemporary European philosophy. They have also had an impact far beyond philosophy, for example in architectural theory (see e.g., Sharr 2007), literary criticism (see e.g., Ziarek 1989), theology (see e.g., Caputo 1993), psychotherapy (see e.g., Binswanger 1943/1964, Guignon 1993) and cognitive science (see e.g., Dreyfus 1992, 2008; Wheeler 2005; Kiverstein and Wheeler forthcoming).

Reviews

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Heidegger names this course/book “Logic” and he starts it that way; however he mainly talks about truth, Kant, time, and Being. In this respect, it is an earlier version of “Being and Time”. The book starts along Husserl's defense of logic against psychology. Then it moves into Aristotle and the question of truth. The core of the book is a fundamental/radical reading of Kant's “Critique of Pure Reason” in terms of time.
The basic claim is that no one in the history of philosophy (starting with Aristotle and including Hegel and Bergson) got the right interpretation and the fundamental importance of time. Kant in his “Critique of Pure Reason” got the right phenomenological interpretation of time; but because of his Cartesian dogmatism did not follow through. As Heidegger put it – Kant looked into the abyss, but only to withdraw his view immediately and to forego the discovery of the basic structure in terms of time. In the schematism chapter, Kant tried to sensibilize (i.e. present a category as an image and thus make it visible) his pure concepts of understanding. Kant did it for only three categories – number as the schema of quantity, sensation as the schema of reality, and persistence as the schema of substance. Heidegger takes Kant's schematism further and shows that they all emanate from now-present and its sequence that let something be seen. Number is derived from the counting of this now-sequence, sensation from its now-something, and persistence from the encounter of something as the self-same at all times. This principle of persistence/permanence stands as the a priori condition of the possibility of the objectively determined being-in-time of nature. According to Heidegger, Cartesian/Kantian “I think” is also derived from time; that is, as being-in-the-world, human being is in fact nothing else but “making-present” and consequently “I think” should be understood as “making-present”.
Beside a very close reading/understanding of the “Critique of Pure Reason”, the time aspect from being-and-time is way better explained here by Heidegger when compared with “Being and Time”.

[Dionysius the Areopagite · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you're reading this because you've left my cabin and Google'd me on the way home and are now wondering why this magnitudinal tome was nestled between Seneca's 'How to Die', Ezra Pound's Selected Cantos, and Trump's 'Art of the Deal,' ponder no further: it has been made clear that a great deal of reprobate American minds live for the sole purpose of being offended. I am making your life easier. Next time you stop by I'll have a portrait of Stalin up and G.G. Allin on shuffle. I have two novellas up in Amazon you can buy. I wrote them when I was 19 and still took one Arthur Rimbaud seriously. Perhaps I was onto something? Thank me later.

[Andrew Noselli · Rating 3 out of 5]

Time, from the point of view of its now-time aspects, is the phenomenal truth of space. Thus Heidegger shows how Hegel accurately predicted Einstein's 20th century physical theory, and that's a succinct statement as to why he's the most misunderstood philosopher of all time. Key for me to be able to read this text - I don't say comprehend, I merely digested the basic tenor of its rhetoric and acted as a word-processor would, an intake of verbiage without necessarily grasping its ultimate meaning - was my previous reading of Husserl's Ideas and J.S. Mill's A System of Ratiocinative Logic. Despite these precedents, which would appear to give additional weight to the analytic understanding of being, I feel Heidegger was writer who was psychically unable to create a philosophy of joy; however, considering he wrote in the wake of Nietzsche's exuberant corpus, his only progenitors were those thinkers who, like Sartre and de Beauvoir, could only espouse post-WWII philosophies which focused on the diminishing prospect of becoming nothing which, in a world dominated by capitalism, provoke only horror. Three stars.

[Lucas Sipe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Divided into two parts, an analysis of truth and an analysis of time, "Logic" was an engaging read. Themes that would come to dominate Heidegger's more mature thought are present here but expressed differently. As lecture notes turned into a book, the text isn't quite as expansive as the subsequent "Being & Time" would be. The analysis of traditional logic, philosophizing logic, and truth is much more concerned with the tradition (especially Aristotle) and how people have continued to move in the wrong direction. His analysis of truth, as uncovering, is honestly brilliant every single time he discourses on it. Soon after this lecture course ends, Heidegger begins working on "Being & Time" and the roots of "Being & Time" are evident at all times.

The first half was a brilliant analysis of logic and truth. It has all the hallmarks of a classic Heidegger analysis. Radical readings, master of the traditional interpretation, and brilliant insight are all present. Having read "Being & Time" already, much of this was familiar with me already. That doesn't take away from the precision, however, and I would likely recommend his analysis of truth here over the one offered in "Being & Time."

Sadly, my inexperience with Kant rendered much of the second half of text, if not inaccessible, than excruciatingly difficult to understand. The second half of the text is almost totally devoted to an "analysis" of Kant. Analysis might be the wrong word; Heidegger offers a radical reading of Kant's texts (primarily CPR but others as well) that both highlight where Kant was heading but also how he was limited by the traditional understanding of time. By and large, this was my first introduction to Kant so hearing him filtered through Heidegger made understanding difficult. Future readings, with a better background, will enable me get more out of this second section.

While not as important as "Being & Time", Heidegger's 'Logic" might be my favorite text of his. It's more narrow and focused (or at least the first half is) than some of his more meandering moments in following texts. That being said, one needs to be familiar with Aristotle and Kant on a level that his other texts don't require. Even in "The Basic Problems of Phenomenology", Heidegger spends more time expressing the thought of Aquinas/ Aristotle, Kant, Suarez, and so on such that the reader is familiar with them without having to be a master beforehand. "Logic", on the other hand, assumes a mastery or familiarity with Aristotle and Kant that renders the text, on some level, inaccessible to the laymen.

Perhaps that critique is unfair; it's not the fault of the text that I don't know Kant. On the other hand, Heidegger is a brilliant teacher in so many of his works that the assumption of knowledge is odd because so much of Heidegger is about "destruction" - he essentially has to teach the thinker he's analyzing at the same time he critiques them. Here, the phenomenological analysis is almost entirely alone. Of course he talks about what Kant thinks but it's always in the context of the analysis.

In the final analysis, however, "Logic" was a brilliant text and one that I will be turning back to time and time again. First, however, I'll spend more time with Kant and work to understand the second half better than I did this time. A large part of my notes (in the second half) express confusion and I hope that will not repeat itself on a re-read.

[Charles · Rating 2 out of 5]

The first and last third were far too abstruse, focusing on the history and interpretation of logic in the 19th-century then interpreting Kant for about 100 hundred pages (tbh, I didn't bother reading the last 50 pages)—few of which I understood, despite taking a class on Kant right now. I did, however, really enjoy the middle of the book, where Heidegger does a kind of trial run of Being and Time, working out basic categories of Dasein like care, being-with, the as-structure, possibility, and (in)authenticity.

[Vittirivizzik · Rating 5 out of 5]

Haven't read the following Kant books but the most original and lucid reading of any philosopher by far by Heidegger until the publication of SZ. Previous lectures weren't detailed as this book in terms linking inquiry with time. banger.

[Enrique · Rating 5 out of 5]

At the end a very original introduction to Kant.

[Aaron Schuschu · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of his more down to earth jawns…. and then it would space out. But basically, the dilemmas of at least what I understand “phenomenology” to mean.