Publication Details

Abstract

Patočka considers Heidegger’s dealing with the question of Being in his famous Being and Time as a premature problem; and he thinks similarly about the solutions Heidegger offered in his later thought. Being is always a Being of beings and Patočka is in the right contrary to Heidegger. Heidegger’s attempt at re-thinking Being as Being without beings undermines philosophy in a substantial way. Heidegger’s later reducing philosophy to metaphysics is acceptable; it doesn't follow, however, that we should accept also all its consequences assumed by Heidegger. There is a key difference between Patočka’s concept of philosophy, with man and history as its focus, and Heidegger’s concept of philosophy focused on the problem of Being. Patočka offers the insight according to which Being, when thought in itself, is a hypostatized Being. Therefore, it should be completely abandoned, simply because there is no such Being. This insight questions the fundamental thesis of Heidegger’s philosophy, which should unconditionally be rejected as groundless.