Heidegger and the formalization of thought

Thomas A. Fay

pp. 1-23

in: Thomas M. Seebohm, Dagfinn Føllesdal, Mohanty (eds), Phenomenology and the formal sciences, Berlin, Springer, 1991

Abstract

The thinking of two of the most influential members of the phenomenological movement, Husserl and Heidegger, had its origin in the problems of logic. Husserl continued throughout his life to be concerned with these problems, as did Heidegger, though in a very different way. The differences in approach of these two thinkers to problems of logic such as its foundations and formalization of thought and language reveals the widening gulf which was developing between what would become two quite different approaches to phenomenology which took it in two quite different directions — that of Husserl on the one hand, and the existential hermeneutical approach led by Heidegger on the other. While Husserl's concerns about logic remained quite similar throughout his life, e. g. the nature of and manner of givenness of logical concepts and numbers, the role of formalized language, the idea of a pure logical grammar and so on, this was not at all the case with Heidegger. Heidegger did indeed manifest considerable interest in logic from the very beginning of his career.

Cited authors

Husserl Edmund

Heidegger Martin