Abstract
A good way to begin a reconstruction of the notion of objectivity in philosophical hermeneutics is to sketch the ambiguous status of the idea of the transcendental in Gadamer’s Truth and Method. On the one hand, understanding always takes place within and is therefore constitutively shaped by our historical pre-understanding. This view of understanding as essentially an expression of our being-in-world makes Gadamer highly sceptical of all traditional attempts to describe the necessary and sufficient conditions for experience from a position that does not presuppose the structures of our situated world-view. On the other hand, Gadamer claims that, by its very nature, the idea of understanding as essentially embedded in a world-view goes beyond a certain empirical domain and has a transcendental or universal reach. Gadamer never clarifies this tension in his view of the idea of transcendentality, and therefore there remains a fundamental ambiguity concerning the status of his hermeneutical account of understanding (Sect. 1 below).
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Notes
- 1.
Paradigmatically, this hermeneutics is developed in the lecture course from 1923, Ontologie. Hermeneutik der Faktizität (Heidegger, M. 1982. Gesamtausgabe 63. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann).
- 2.
Gadamer, H.-G. 2004. Truth and Method, 250. London and New York: Continuum; Gadamer, H.-G. 1990. Wahrheit und Methode, 264. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck).
- 3.
Cf. the note published with the lecture course ‘Nietzsches Metaphysik’ from 1943, where Heidegger interprets his relation to Nietzsche as an Auseinandersetzung (Heidegger, M. 2007. Nietzsches Metaphysik. Gesamtausgabe 50, 84. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann).
- 4.
Gadamer, H.-G. 1999. Nietzsche – der Antipode. Das Drama Zarathustras [1984]. In Gesammelte Werke 4, 450–51. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck).
- 5.
Nietzsche’s involvement in the tradition of metaphysics is ‘deeper’, not least because it is unrecognised – he thinks of himself as having decisively overcome metaphysics.
- 6.
Gadamer, H.-G. 2004. Truth and Method, 250. London and New York: Continuum; ‘Verstehen ist der ursprünglichste Seinscharakter des menschlichen Lebens selber’ (Gadamer, H.-G. 1990. Wahrheit und Methode, 264. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck)).
- 7.
Gadamer, H.-G. 2004. Truth and Method, 252–253. London and New York: Continuum; Gadamer, H.-G. 1990. Wahrheit und Methode, 267–268. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck).
- 8.
Gadamer, H.-G. 2004. Truth and Method, 254. London and New York: Continuum; ‘So knüpfen auch wir zunächst an den transzendentalen Sinn der Heideggerschen Fragestellung an. Durch Heideggers transzendentale Interpretation des Verstehens gewinnt das Problem der Hermeneutik einen universalen Umriss, ja den Zuwachs einer neuen Dimension’ (Gadamer, H.-G. 1990. Wahrheit und Methode, 268. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck)).
- 9.
Gadamer, H.-G. 2004. Truth and Method, 268–371. London and New York: Continuum; Gadamer, H.-G. 1990. Wahrheit und Methode, 270–384. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck).
- 10.
Gadamer, H.-G. 2004. Truth and Method, 305. London and New York: Continuum; Gadamer, H.-G. 1990. Wahrheit und Methode, 311. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck).
- 11.
Gadamer, H.-G. 1999. Hermeneutik und Historismus [1965]. In Gesammelte Werke 2, 394. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck).
- 12.
Ibid.
- 13.
A consequence of this is that the fusion of horizons should not be conceived as merely a methodological concept describing a certain kind of understanding; it happens every time we understand something that is initially alien to us. Cf. Sect. 5 in Chap. 5. If the fusion of horizons is not established when agreement or consensus is secured on the subject matter, then this also has consequences for how we should understand the role of otherness or alterity in Gadamer’s theory of understanding. The concern that Gadamer’s hermeneutics disregards or plays down the role of otherness in experience must be reconsidered when it is acknowledged that his theory of understanding is not oriented toward agreement. In this sense, a transcendental interpretation of the fusion of horizons could lead to an account of hermeneutic experience that is more open to irreducible forms of otherness.
- 14.
‘Mein eigentlicher Anspruch aber war und ist ein philosophischer: Nicht, was wir tun, was wir tun sollten, sondern was über unser Wollen und Tun hinaus mit uns geschieht, steht in Frage’ (Gadamer, H.-G. 1999. Vorwort zur 2. Auflage [1965]. In Gesammelte Werke 2, 438. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck)).
- 15.
Gadamer, H.-G. 1999. Rhetorik, Hermeneutik und Ideologiekritik. Metakritische Erörterungen zu Wahrheit und Methode [1967]. In Gesammelte Werke 2, 232. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck).
- 16.
Gadamer, H.-G. 2004. Truth and Method, 268. London and New York: Continuum. ‘Erhebung der Geschichtlichkeit des Verstehens zum hermeneutischen Prinzip’. In Gadamer, H.-G. 1990. Wahrheit und Methode, 270. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck).
- 17.
Cf. Vattimo, G. 1989. Heideggers Nihilismus: Nietzsche als Interpret Heideggers. In Kunst und Technik. Gedächtnisschrift zum 100. Geburtstag von Martin Heidegger, ed. W. Biemel and F.W. v. Herrmann, 141ff. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann. Koinē refers to hē koinē dialektikos, the common dialect. This was the popular form of Greek used in post-classical antiquity.
- 18.
Vattimo, G. 1997. Beyond Interpretation – The Meaning of Hermeneutics for Philosophy, 6. Cambridge (UK): Cambridge University Press. This passage is quoted from Beyond Interpretation, first published in 1994. Vattimo writes in his foreword to this book that the reflections presented here are ‘in lieu of a larger work’ (ibid.: ix). Beyond Interpretation, with the telling subtitle The Meaning of Hermeneutics for Philosophy, thus presents Vattimo’s most definitive and systematic articulation of hermeneutics so far and it is therefore this work to which I shall primarily refer in the following discussion.
- 19.
Ibid.: 6.
- 20.
Nietzsche, F. 2002. Beyond Good and Evil, 23. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; ‘Gesetzt, dass auch dies nur Interpretation ist – und ihr werdet eifrig genug sein, dies einzuwenden? – nun, um so besser –’ (Nietzsche, F. 1999. Sämtliche Werke. Kritische Studienausgabe in 15 Bänden 5, 37. Bonn: de Gruyter).
- 21.
Vattimo, G. 1997. Beyond Interpretation – The Meaning of Hermeneutics for Philosophy, 8. Cambridge (UK): Cambridge University Press.
- 22.
Cf. Nietzsche’s aphorism, ‘The madman’ (Der Tolle Mensch). Nietzsche, F. 2001. The Gay Science, 119f. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; Nietzsche, F. 1999. Sämtliche Werke. Kritische Studienausgabe in 15 Bänden 3, 480ff. Bonn: de Gruyter.
- 23.
Vattimo, G. 1997. Beyond Interpretation – The Meaning of Hermeneutics for Philosophy, 7. Cambridge (UK): Cambridge University Press.
- 24.
Ibid.
- 25.
Vattimo, G. 1989. Heideggers Nihilismus: Nietzsche als Interpret Heideggers. In Kunst und Technik. Gedächtnisschrift zum 100. Geburtstag von Martin Heidegger, ed. W. Biemel and F.W. v. Herrmann, 141ff. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann.
- 26.
This discussion was spurred by the publication of Heidegger’s collection of texts Holzwege in 1950, which includes ‘Nietzsches Wort: Gott ist Tot’, the publication of Heidegger’s lectures on Nietzsche (Nietzsche I–II) in 1961, and Colli’s and Montinari’s publication of Nietzsche’s collected writings in 1964, which was the first to be based upon proper philological editing principles.
- 27.
Vattimo, G. 1989. Heideggers Nihilismus: Nietzsche als Interpret Heideggers. In Kunst und Technik. Gedächtnisschrift zum 100. Geburtstag von Martin Heidegger, ed. W. Biemel and F.W. v. Herrmann, 141. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann.
- 28.
Ibid.: 148. The notion of Gedächtnisfeste (celebrations of memory) is used by Nietzsche in Menschliches Allzumenschliches (Nietzsche, F. 1999. Sämtliche Werke. Kritische Studienausgabe in 15 Bänden 2, 186. Bonn: de Gruyter). On Vattimo’s reading, the notion expresses the idea of a historical form of philosophy that aims at a reappropriation of history, conceived as a series of metaphysical ‘mistakes’ or illusions. We are, according to Nietzsche, not liberated from these mistakes or illusions by refuting them. Nietzsche characterises the attitude towards the history of metaphysics that is beyond rejection and refusal as a ‘good temper’. (Vattimo, G. 1992. Nietzsche – eine Einführung, 53f. Stuttgart: Verlag J.B. Metzler). It is precisely such good-tempered thinking that Vattimo seeks to develop.
- 29.
Vattimo, G. 1989. Heideggers Nihilismus: Nietzsche als Interpret Heideggers. In Kunst und Technik. Gedächtnisschrift zum 100. Geburtstag von Martin Heidegger, ed. W. Biemel and F.W. v. Herrmann, 148f. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann.
- 30.
Here, Vattimo quotes from Nietzsche, F. 2001. The Gay Science, 63f. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (Nietzsche, F. 1999. Sämtliche Werke. Kritische Studienausgabe in 15 Bänden 3,416f. Bonn: de Gruyter). I will return to this aphorism in detail in Sect. 4 below.
- 31.
Being, as it is conceived in the tradition of metaphysics, is, according to Nietzsche, an ‘illusion’, but this illusion permeates all of the diverse expressions of our past culture and is thus the only form of being at all. We only exist in so far as we are related to this tradition of illusions. Heidegger’s concept of post-metaphysical thinking as An-denken, i.e. as the continued remembrance and reappropriation of metaphysics, is in Vattimo’s reading quite similar to Nietzsche’s idea of philosophy as consisting of genealogical celebrations of memory (Gedächtnisfeste). Both conceive of ‘being’ not as a permanent structure or foundation, but as an ‘event’. Heidegger does not recognise this affinity because he shies away from accepting and articulating the nihilistic implication of his conception of being (Vattimo, G. 1989. Heideggers Nihilismus: Nietzsche als Interpret Heideggers. In Kunst und Technik. Gedächtnisschrift zum 100. Geburtstag von Martin Heidegger, ed. W. Biemel and F.W. v. Herrmann, 149. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann). It is thus a provocative consequence of Vattimo’s Nietzschean interpretation of Heidegger that the process of ever-expanding Seinsvergessenheit is a tendency to be embraced (ibid., 152).
- 32.
Vattimo sometimes presents his post-metaphysical philosophy as ‘weak thought’ (pensiero debole).
- 33.
Ibid. This is where Vattimo’s distinction between a Heideggerian Left and a Heideggerian Right becomes relevant. As Vattimo emphasises, this distinction is not to be understood in a political sense but rather in analogy with the well-established distinction between a Hegelian Left and a Hegelian Right: Vattimo continues: ‘Right, in the case of Heidegger, denotes an interpretation of his overcoming of metaphysics as an effort, in spite of everything, somehow to prepare “a return of Being”, perhaps in the form of an apophasic, negative, mystical ontology; left denotes the reading that I propose of the history of Being as the story of a “long goodbye”, of an interminable weakening of Being’ (Vattimo, G. 1997. Beyond Interpretation – The Meaning of Hermeneutics for Philosophy, 13. Cambridge (UK): Cambridge University Press). Vattimo argues that by opting for a leftist interpretation of Heidegger we are able to ‘remain faithful, even beyond the letter of his texts, to the ontological difference’ (ibid.). If we do not accept that Being is only the history of how it has gradually revealed itself as a product of the play of interpretations we inevitably objectify it as a being.
- 34.
Ibid.: 10f.
- 35.
Cf. Nietzsche’s Götzen-Dämmerung (Nietzsche, F. 2005. The Anti-Christ, Ecce Homo, Twilight of the Idols, 171. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; Nietzsche, F. 1999. Sämtliche Werke. Kritische Studienausgabe in 15 Bänden 6, 80f. Bonn: de Gruyter).
- 36.
Vattimo, G. 1997. Beyond Interpretation – The Meaning of Hermeneutics for Philosophy, 12. Cambridge (UK): Cambridge University Press.
- 37.
Ibid.: 11.
- 38.
Ibid.: 28.
- 39.
Ibid.: 105.
- 40.
Ibid.: 305.
- 41.
Ibid. In Beyond Interpretation, Vattimo states that ‘Ontology of Actuality’ is the definitive title of a larger work that is yet to be published.
- 42.
Ibid.: 12.
- 43.
Ibid.: 103f.
- 44.
Ibid.: 80.
- 45.
Ibid.: 81.
- 46.
Ibid.: 88.
- 47.
Ibid.: 75.
- 48.
Ibid.: 76.
- 49.
Ibid.: 91.
- 50.
Ibid.: 88.
- 51.
Ibid.: 10–11, 105; emphasis added.
- 52.
Ibid.: 10–11.
- 53.
Ibid.: 30.
- 54.
Ibid.: 29.
- 55.
Ibid.: 31.
- 56.
Ibid.: 38.
- 57.
Ibid.
- 58.
Ibid.
- 59.
Ibid.: 39.
- 60.
Cf. the definition of violence given by Vattimo in an interview with Zabala: ‘VATTIMO: What we do lose in the dissolution of metaphysics is the idea that in nature there are a right and a wrong. Put it this way: given the dissolution of metaphysics, it seems to me that the only supreme principle to be propounded both in ethics and law is the reduction of violence. According to Heidegger, metaphysics must be refused, not only because it produces a totalitarian and overly rationalist social structure, but also because the idea of Grund, of ultimate foundation, is an authoritarian idea. The notion of primeval evidence, of a Eureka!, of a moment in which I have reached bedrock, of a foundation at which no questions can or need be asked – that state, in which questions are lacking, is not the end product of violence, but its origin. ZABALA: Would that be your definition of violence? VATTIMO: I would say so. Philosophically, violence can only be defined as the silencing of questions […]’ (Vattimo, G. and Zabala, S. 2002. ‘Weak thought’ and the Reduction of Violence: A Dialogue with Gianni Vattimo. Common Knowledge 8: 455; last emphasis added).
- 61.
Vattimo, G. 2002. Gadamer and the Problem of Ontology. In Gadamer’s Century: Essays in Honor of Hans-Georg Gadamer, ed. Malpas, J., Arnswald, U. v. and Kertscher, J., 304. London: The MIT Press.
- 62.
Ibid. In this sentence, Vattimo is paraphrasing a passage from Gadamer, H.-G. 2004. Truth and Method, 291. London and New York: Continuum; Wahrheit und Methode (Gadamer, H.-G. 1990. Wahrheit und Methode, 295. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck)).
- 63.
Gadamer, H.-G. 2004. Truth and Method, 270. London and New York: Continuum; Gadamer, Hans-Georg. 1990. Wahrheit und Methode, 272. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck).
- 64.
Gadamer, H.-G. 2004. Truth and Method, 270. London and New York: Continuum; ‘Die Ausarbeitung der rechten, sachangemessenen Entwürfe, die als Entwürfe Vorwegnahmen sind, die sich “an den Sachen” erst bestätigen soll, ist die ständige Aufgabe des Verstehens’ (Gadamer, Hans-Georg. 1990. Wahrheit und Methode, 272. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck)).
- 65.
Vattimo, G. 1997. Beyond Interpretation – The Meaning of Hermeneutics for Philosophy, 77. Cambridge (UK): Cambridge University Press.
- 66.
Gadamer, H.-G. 2004. Truth and Method, 340f. London and New York: Continuum; Gadamer, H.-G. 1990. Wahrheit und Methode, 350f. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck). Heidegger also remarks that such arguments express ‘the harmlessness of formal-dialectical surprise attacks (Überrumpelungsversuche)’ (Heidegger, M. 1993. Sein und Zeit, 229. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag).
- 67.
Vattimo never engages in a full-fledged discussion of this aphorism, and the following represents my own attempt to employ the aphorism in order to articulate the strongest possible version of Vattimo’s interpretation of philosophical hermeneutics.
- 68.
Nietzsche, F. 2001. The Gay Science, 63f. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; ‘Das Bewusstsein vom Scheine. – Wie wundervoll und neu und zugleich wie schauerlich und ironisch fühle ich mich mit meiner Erkenntnis zum gesamten Dasein gestellt! Ich habe für mich entdeckt, dass die alte Mensch- und Thierheit, ja die gesamte Urzeit und Vergangenheit alles empfindenden Seins in mir fortdichtet, fortliebt, forthasst, fortschliesst, − ich bin plötzlich mitten in diesem Träume erwacht, aber nur zum Bewusstsein, dass ich eben träume und das ich eben weiterträumen muss, um nicht zu Grunde zu gehen: wie der Nachtwandler weiterträumen muss, um nicht hinabzustürzen. Was ist mir jetzt “Schein”! Wahrlich nicht der Gegensatz irgendeines Wesens, − was weiß ich von irgend welchem Wesen auszusagen, als eben nur die Prädicate eines Scheines! Wahrlich nicht eine todte Maske, die man einem unbekannten X aufsetzen und auch wohl abnehmen könnte! Schein ist für mich das Wirkende und Lebende selber, das soweit in seiner Selbstverspottung geht, mich fühlen zu lassen, dass hier Schein und Irrlicht und Geistertanz und nichts Mehr ist, − dass unter allen diesen Träumenden auch ich, der “Erkennende”, meinen Tanz tanze, dass der Erkennende ein Mittel ist, den irdischen Tanz in die Länge zu ziehen und insofern zu den Festordnern des Daseins gehört, und dass die erhabene Consequenz und Verbundenheit aller Erkenntnisse vielleicht das höchste Mittel ist und sein wird, die Allgemeinheit der Träumerei und die Allverständlichkeit aller dieser Träumenden unter einander und eben damit die Dauer des Traumes aufrecht zu erhalten’ (Nietzsche, F. 1999. Sämtliche Werke. Kritische Studienausgabe in 15 Bänden 3, 416f. Bonn: de Gruyter).
- 69.
For the idea of experience as the dialectic reversal (Umkehr) of consciousness, cf. Hegel, G.W.F. 1999. Phänomenologie des Geistes. In: Hauptwerke in sechs Bänden 2, 53–62. Hamburg: Felix Meiner Verlag.
- 70.
Nietzsche, F. 1999. Sämtliche Werke. Kritische Studienausgabe in 15 Bänden 3:659f. Bonn: De Gruyter.
- 71.
I owe this image to Raffnsøe, who has employed it in relation to the question of the nature of the coherence (samhørighed) of our social practices. Cf. Raffnsøe, S. 2002. Sameksistens uden common sense, Bind I, 17. København: Akademisk Forlag.
- 72.
Cf. Vattimo, G. and Zabala, S. 2002. ‘Weak thought’ and the Reduction of Violence. A Dialogue with Gianni Vattimo. Common Knowledge 8: 455.
- 73.
According to Vattimo, the purpose of philosophy is to be edifying. Ibid: 452. He also emphasises this point in his interpretation of Nietzsche. Vattimo, G. 1992. Nietzsche – eine Einführung, 55. Stuttgart: Verlag J.B. Metzler.
- 74.
The paradigmatic example of such a genealogy is of course Nietzsche’s Zur Genealogie der Moral. Foucault’s work refines this interpretative strategy and applies it to a host of subjects. Cf. Raffnsøe, S. 2007. Nietzsches Genealogie der Moral. Ein einführender Kommentar. München: Beck Verlag.
- 75.
Figal uses the verb austragen, which can mean both ‘to carry out’ and ‘to discharge’, to describe Nietzsche’s way of dealing with the antinomy developed in the aphorism between knowledge and illusion (Irrtum). He emphasises how philosophy is the conscious process of carrying out or discharging this antinomy. Figal, G. 1999. Nietzsche – eine philosophische Einführung, 155. Stuttgart: Reclam; Figal quotes from Die Fröhliche Wissenschaft (Nietzsche, F. 1999. Sämtliche Werke. Kritische Studienausgabe in 15 Bänden 3: 471. Bonn: De Gruyter).
- 76.
Grondin, J. 2007. Vattimo’s Latinization of Hermeneutics: Why Did Gadamer Resist Postmodernism? In: Weakening Philosophy. Essays in Honour of Gianni Vattimo, ed. S. Zabala, 207. Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press.
- 77.
Ibid.: 208.
- 78.
Gadamer, H.-G. 2004. Truth and Method, 247. London and New York: Continuum; Gadamer, H.-G. 1990. Wahrheit und Methode, 261. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck). This remark is found in the same chapter interpreted above (Sect. 1), where Gadamer oscillates between a Nietzschean rejection of all forms of transcendental philosophy and an adamant support of Heidegger’s transcendental concept of understanding.
- 79.
McDowell, J. 2009. Sellars, Kant and intentionality. In Having the World in View: Essays on Kant, Hegel, and Sellars, 17f. Cambridge (MA): Harvard University Press.
- 80.
Rorty, R. 1980. Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature, 293. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers Ltd; cf. McDowell, J. 2009. Sellars, Kant and intentionality. In Having the World in View: Essays on Kant, Hegel, and Sellars, 18 n. 26. Cambridge (MA): Harvard University Press.
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Thaning, M.S. (2015). The Lack of Objectivity in Postmodern Hermeneutics. In: The Problem of Objectivity in Gadamer's Hermeneutics in Light of McDowell's Empiricism. Contributions to Hermeneutics, vol 1. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-18648-1_2
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