Early Heidegger in 60 seconds
In ‘Sein und Zeit’, the German philosopher Martin Heidegger distinguishes between the “definition” and the “meaning” of science. What does he mean with that? ... Hold my beer!
Heidegger defines science as “the totality of fundamentally coherent true positions”. However, he acknowledges that this does not capture the meaning of science.
How do we distinguish between mere beings and beings that know what it means to be or not to be? That’s the question for which Heidegger coined the term “Da-sein”: a being that relates to its own being. Da-sein understands its being “existence” by the very fact of being.
For Da-sein, science is a way of being in which it concerns itself about the being of other beings. Although science does not necessarily study Da-sein's own being, disciplines that study beings unlike Da-sein are still motivated by existence, because Da-sein exists in the world, where other beings become part of the being of Da-sein.
Clearly, science means more to Da-sein than true propositions, because Da-sein is through being ontologically driven. Its meaning should be understood in terms of existence.
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