Phenomenology of "authentic time" in Husserl and Heidegger

Klaus Held

pp. 91-114

in: Dieter Lohmar, Ichiro Yamaguchi (eds), On time, Berlin, Springer, 2010

Abstract

In his dialogue the Timaeus, Plato recognized two aspects of time, the past and the future, but not the present. In contrast, Aristotle's analysis of time in the Physics took its orientation from the "now". It is the latter path that Husserl follows with his conception of the "original impression" (Urimpression). However, in certain parts of Husserl's Bernau Manuscripts, the present loses significance because of a novel interpretation of protention. This development, which revitalizes Plato's understanding of time, is furthered in Heidegger's late lecture Time and Being: the present can be understood on the basis of the "withdrawal" which determines the mutual relation between the arrival as authentic future and the having-been as authentic past.

Cited authors

Husserl Edmund

Heidegger Martin

Plato