Dasein and the regress to conscious awareness

pp. 62-77

in: John Deely, The tradition via Heidegger, Berlin, Springer, 1971

Abstract

There is no doubt that for Heidegger the question of Being cannot be resolved in terms of conscious awareness. It is equally certain that the sphere of awareness provides the necessary access to the question. Thus the very title of our chapter is an allusion to the crucial text on "The Idea of Phenomenology"¹ wherein Heidegger sets forth both the prerogatives and limits of conciousness as the sphere of access to the question, if not the truth, of Being. Starting with the transcendent Dasein as the only adequate phenomenal base from which to set out in determining the sense of Being, "it is not so much a question of pursuing a study of the intrinsic constitution of transcendence as of elucidating its assential unity with affective tonalities ontologically understood and thrownness," i.e., the referential dependency of Dasein on Beings.²