Il ya

Going Beyond Heidegger

For Heidegger, the distinction between being as noun (as in an existent) and Being as verb (as in the verb of existing) is of paramount importance. Heidegger says that we are guilty of the forgetfulness of Being.

Levinas is greatly influenced by Heidegger and he does not ignore his contribution. But whereas Heidegger is interested in beings insofar as they lead to being as Being, Levinas observes that what we have forgotten is not Being but we have forgotten the particular beings in front of us, the human Others.

Levinas says that it is impossible to go back to philosophy before Heidegger therefore, one must go beyond Heidegger. Levinas takes two steps backward and three steps forward. Levinas will move back from Being to beings, and move another step backward by describing a situation where even beings become nothing, but not absolutely nothing. This is a situation he calls the “There is” or Il ya.

There is or Il ya

‘Il ya’ is French for “It is there.” In this situation, beings fall back into nothing, but not completely nothing. What if, suddenly, we all go back to nothing? There would be no thing, but not nothing. If you close your eyes, everything becomes dark and every object, person and thing disappears; but it is not nothing because there is still that formless darkness. Il ya is indeterminacy. Il ya is an impersonal form; when we say “It rains, what is ‘it’? Its anonymity is essential. There is no distinction between what is inside and what is outside, what is called an I is invaded by the night, stifled by it.

There would be no thing; no thing is not nothing. What we have is a presence of an absence. Merong wala. There is nothing. Il ya is indetermination. It is pure indetermination. In the state of il ya, you are not yet an I, you have not yet come out. What would it be like if there was no I?

Separation and Emergence of Subjectivity

He is trying to describe subjectivity from the absence of subjectivity. He is trying to show us a new way of understanding the subject, by making us imagine the absence of the subject. How does one arise as a subject? He is trying to describe an impossible situation.

What does it take to become a subject? It takes separation.  We have to rise up from anonymity and impersonality. We have to have a strong effort to be unique, singular, and different. It takes an effort to be me. Levinas makes Heidegger’s Being more dynamic by showing us that it takes great effort to truly exist. In order to ex-sist, there is this effort to push the indeterminacy down. There need be the effort to be, to be unique.

Approximate Experiences of Il ya

One can only describe the experience of il ya once one has emerged from it. By the fact that one exists, one is already separated and different. However, there are instances when one reverts to il ya and Levinas shows this by showing instances of partial il ya. He is not only describing an absolute il ya, but he is comparing it with instances of partial il ya.

He shows certain experiences where we fail to emerge on the level of being. We can say that it’s the fear of emerging from our comfort zone. Levinas says that we fear to be because we fear to take responsibility and we are afraid to take the initiative, and we are afraid to make decisions. We don’t want to be disturbed. He is trying to describe this situation where the subject is sort of stuck, riveted in indeterminacy.

It’s not limitation that frightens us, it is anonymity and it is impersonality. It is the commonplace. It’s this inability and refusal to be disturbed. We are only alive if we are willing to be disturbed by the Other.

Fear of Emerging and Becoming Separate

Levinas describes this fear to be. One is afraid to be unique and different. There is certain sadness in being conscious, because you are separated. You cannot fuse with any other person; the tighter the embrace, the more poignant the separation. You must respect difference, the other is different and you will never fuse and melt together.

Disaster

One way to understand il ya is to speak of disaster. The word ‘astra’ means ‘star’ and the Ancients thought that when a star goes haywire, there is a disaster. Dis-aster signifies neither death nor accident, but a piece of being that is detached from its fixity in being, its reference point from a star. It’s losing one’s orientation.

Emergence into Being is not Enough

It is not enough that one emerges into Being; Levinas shows us that there is another step: Being Good.

The true life is absent

Today’s lecture was essentially a recap and a summing up of important points discussed in the course so far. Hopefully, you see how the points thread together. So far, we are only settling the stage and preparing ourselves to understand Levinas by understanding the traditions which inform his thought. His main influences are: the Hebrew Bible, the Russian Classics, and Husserlian and Heideggerian philosophy.

1. The traumatisms from life make us reflect:

2.  Loving struggle with the text

3. “The true life is elsewhere.”

Can those from Section A supply the last three points that Doc mentioned? I didn’t catch them.

 

“The True Life is Elsewhere.”

To read is to love, to read is to realize that one is never alone. To read is to be de-centered. He says that to read is to realize that “the true life is elsewhere, ” a famous  quotation from Arthur Rimbaud. When one reads, one realizes a lot of wonderful and good possibilities for oneself and the world. It becomes apparent that the life  is lacking, insufficient– and in worse cases, miserable. The young Rimbaud clung to poetry as a means of hanging on to that idealized world, but later he

The Brief Poetic Life of Arthur Rimbaud

Arthur Rimbaud. (Guys, he's your age!

Arthur Rimbauld, Hollywood Version

Arthur Rimbaud was young poet whose poetic life was only about 3 years. He wrote this famous text called, “A Season in Hell” when he was only 18. It’s an adolescent text, screaming with passion and anger. But it also shows a certain vision. When one is young, one sees better than older people, one is purer and more absolute. He is able to see things which is more than what ordinary things could see

There are two interpretations of “Season in Hell” Some people interpret it as a farewell to the exciting life of Rimbaud and Verlaine. But it could also be seen as a return from those dark places to duty. Even in his rebellion, he was still a nigger because he was constrained by society; “I have sent back to the soil to seek some obligation.”

There is a line in A Season of Hell that becomes of the 20^th century, “One must be absolutely modern.” What does that mean to be modern? There is no hope; There is no meaning to life, nothing at the bottom of the pit. One may only try to see as clearly as possible. If one does that, maybe just out of nothing, a new possibility will arise. This is a generation that looks for meaning but cannot find it. Philosophy becomes very dark. Rimbaud says “The true life is absent. We are not of this world.”

HOWEVER, Levinas says that “Though the true life is absent, we are in the world.” Though life seems to have no  meaning because misery and pain persist, and because evil persons flourish, we still have to look for meaning in this world. Precisely because the world is not right, that we should strive to better it. All the more so that we should be compelled to put it right.

Quest for Meaning

Why does one rebel? Because one does not see the meaning. There is this quest for the sense of life. Rimbaud did not find meaning in what they were doing, and that is why they were trying to return to duty.

Levinas read the Russian novels because especially evident in these novels are characters looking for the sense and  direction of life. One of the French novelist Albert Camus’ books began with this sentence: “Yes or no. Is life worth living?” Because if it is not, then the alternative is suicide. This is a philosophical problem.

 

Phenomenology

Is life worth living? We’re looking for the meaning and phenomenology answers that by asking, “Is meaning already in the objects themselves or is meaning only coming from our heads?” Is meaning only subjective, or is meaning only objective? Meaning is both, and it is neither objective nor subjective. It’s not just totally there and totally in my head, which I impose. Meaning is how things unravel in my unconsciousness. Phenomenology must describe how the phenomenon appears to consciousness. This is why we have to describe the way it really appears to us.

The phenomenologist does not begin with definitions but instead says, “Let us try to describe how the reality appears to me.” If you’re going to talk about love, you’re not going to give a definition of life, but you will describe how love unfolds to you. When we are looking at reality, we must set aside our usual definitions for the time being and just look at them and how they unfold to us.

Phenomenology is a rigorous science. If in the objective, positive sciences we only describe what is out there and neglect the sense, it is not yet rigorous science. It is only rigorous when you include the participation of the subject. The objectivity of the sciences is limited and it’s only a slice and therefore the scientists must only go back to the things themselves, to the more fundamental experience, which is the human experience. It is more objective than the objective sciences because it includes the subject. It includes subjectivity.

Husserl and Phenomenology

Levinas liked Husserl because Husserl had both openness and method. Openness is the realization that there is always something to learn. You have met certain people—young or old, whose minds are already old. It’s sad because they’ve already closed their minds.

Phenomenology 101

 

Phenomenology was founded by Edmund Husserl (1859-1938).  Phenomenology is capable of describing concrete experiences such as insomnia, laziness, anxiety, nausea or love. We see that it’s a rigorous description of how things appear to human consciousness. What happens in phenomenology? There is the possibility of recollecting oneself, or of grasping oneself. Reflection is a gaze that goes out and goes back to the I. There is the possibility of becoming aware and of posing to oneself, “What does it mean for me?”

Meaning as both objective and subjective

Phenomenology is trying to stress that meaning is not something that is already there, neither is it already something that is already in my mind. Meaning is born of the encounter between the human consciousness and existents; that is, meaning is both objective and subjective. Phenomenology is trying to make us aware that when we experience a phenomenon, the meaning of that phenomenon also depends on the way we approach it.

This is because phenomena can have many levels of meaning. Let’s take water as an example. In the chemistry, water is understood as combination of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom.  But there are many levels of meaning to water aside from our chemical understanding of it; water can be life as it provides a source of livelihood, and water could mean death as in the case of the torrential rains of Ondoy. Water could also be a symbol of cleanliness.

Another example: Husserl talks about the blossoming apple tree in his garden. The apple tree does not have a meaning in itself. When I look at that apple tree in the garden, I might look at with pleasure because it brings back my childhood memories, or I may look at it with anger because that’s where I feel from and broke my leg.

I’m trying to get past a naive conception of meaning—that meaning is already there without the human being. The idealist thinks that all meaning only comes from me, while the realist thinks that all meaning comes only from the object. We are trying to show that meaning is both objective and subjective. Reality is rich and has many levels of meanings.

Intentionality

Phenomenology tries to tell us that there is no world already with meaning. The world is already a world in reference subject, and you cannot have a human subject but one who is already in the world. The human subject is not closed, like Descartes cogito. I don’t need to prove the outside world. This quality of being open to the world is called intentionality. Intentionality means that consciousness is always consciousness of something other than itself. It shows us that the human being is already open to the world.

It’s to show the intimate relationship between the human and the world. There is no human without the world, and there is no world without the human being. When we say world, we don’t mean the physical existence of things but rather we speak of the meaning, value, relationship between things. To be a human being is to be in the world, it is to be conscious of the world in the world.

Michael Lewis clarifies Husserl’s use of the word “world”. “World in a phenomenological sense is not the totality of entities, but it designates the relations or references between them; it is a context of references. We find ourselves in this context; we don’t bring it about, but we do give meaning to it”1

Levinas’ Contribution to Phenomenology

We already saw in the first semester that there is a world in front of us, but in the second semester, we talk about something more. It is not just about seeing, looking or knowing but there are realities which demand something from us. There are realities which ask something of us. There are realities which are not about knowledge, but an experience of being put into question. These are experiences which demand something from me. If they are unable to give it, I have to say at least, “patawad po.”

Recommended Reading:

If you want a short and friendly introduction to phenomenology, try reading the Introduction of Phenomenology: An Introduction. Read pages 1-7. 🙂 These pages are readily available thanks to Google Books. 🙂

 

 

 

 

1. Lewis, Michael and Tanja Staehler, Phenomenology: An Introduction (New York: Continuum International Publishing Group,  2010), 15.

Bible and Philosophy

Reading: “The Bible and Philosophy”, Ethics and Infinity by Emmanuel Levinas

Levinas’ Life

Levinas is a Jew in Russia, who is uprooted and goes to France to study German phenomenology. A lot of traditions converge, and because of this convergence that he becomes sensitive. There is this ability to see your culture from the inside, and the ability to see it from the outside.

Bible and Philosophy

The first chapter of Ethics and Infinity is about the major sources of Levinas’ thinking. Philippe Nemo asks what initiates our thinking: is it our experiences or is it the books that we read? He posed it as if it was only one or the other; Levinas answers that it is both. Levinas says that thinking probably begins through traumatisms. Trauma could be a wounding physically and mentally, though it is not always completel negative. There are certain kinds of wounding and suffering that open you up. But one might have trouble expressing or verbalizing these experiences of trauma. The reading of books gives our groping and trauma the form of questions and problems.

The book is not a tool or a simply source of information, but it offers possibilities of being in the world.There are books which inspire us and which make us leap from the text to action.

Philosophy and Religion

Nemo asks how Levinas harmonized philosophy and religion. Levinas asks if they were really supposed to harmonize? Philosophy is mainly reliant on human reason, while theology and religion rely on scriptures and faith.  If they happen to be in harmony it’s because every philosophical thought rests on pre-philosophical experiences. Pre-philosophical experiences include all the levels of human experience, including religious ones. Both the philosophical and the biblical text can be approached as texts, and they can make us better human beings.

Between the Bible and the philosophers, there is the influence of the Russian classics. Why does he like these novels? He likes these novels because it shows how people are trying to pursue a meaningful direction for their lives. Perhaps the best preparation for philosophy is the reading of Great Books.

Senseless Acts of Kindness

The Question Of Philosophy:

What  questions did we ask in the first semester? “Who am I?”, “What is philosophy?”, and “What is being human?” But in the second semester, we come upon a philosopher who makes us think that perhaps the question we have been asking is wrong. The more fundamental question is: “What must I do for the Other?” And perhaps with regard to philosophy, it’s not just about the love for wisdom but philosophy as the wisdom of love. Being human is not just about simply being. It’s not enough to be. What good is it to be, if you’re not being good?

We are not thinking of reciprocity anymore, he is talking a doing good that is not reciprocal.  The basic question he is asking here is, “Why be good when everyone around you is unethical and they seem to flourish?”In  other words, we ask: what is natural for the human being? Is it natural to do good or to take advantage of the other?

Levinas’ Earthquake

Emmanuel Levinas

Levinas is a very puzzling philosopher. He puts into question what everyone was talking about. In 1971, when he published his book Totality and Infinity, philosophers speak of a certain earthquake.

Senseless Acts of Kindness in Life and Fate

Vasily Grossman

To give you a foretaste of how Levinas shook the world of philosophy, Levinas talked about the senseless or stupid acts of kindness. What do we mean by stupid and senseless? To make it more concrete, we would like to examine the book that he kept on commenting in the last 15 years of his life. It is a book titled Life and Fate by Vasily Grossman. Grossman wrote about concentration camps, the Holocaust, the Nazis.

The first one is about a woman, Yevgenia, who left her husband and is now with her lover Nikolai. When she learned that her husband was imprisoned, she left her lover and went back to her husband. Trying to get news or deliver a package, she waited everyday by the prison gates. Lining up, she saw the backs and necks of the crowd. It was as if she could read the misery in the necks of the people before her. It’s as if there is a crying, sobbing, and a certain misery. This imagery appealed to Levinas because, later on, we will see that he will talk about the experience of The Face. The Face is not the physical countenance; the Face is the experience of a reality which is other than you. It could be the back, the human form, the shadow of a person. There are experiences wherein we experience an otherness, which places a demand within us.

The second episode took place after the Battle of Stalingrad. The Russians taunted the defeated German soldiers. Among the crowd was a very spiteful woman. Intending to hit a German officer, she picked up a brick. Just as she was going to strike the officer, she dug deep into her pocket and gave him a piece of bread.

What is Natural?

It is a senseless act of kindness. Yevgenia felt like a fool; why did she do that? The main insight here is: Though the  forces that strive to make us lose our humanity is strong, there is still something inside us that fights these forces. The truest act of freedom is the senseless act of goodness. In other words, at a time when people experience as if there is no God because God seemed to have abandoned us, there are still these acts of kindness. Levinas is pointing out that philosophy is not having many things in your head, it’s not about knowledge, but it is about action.

One cannot legislate goodness and kindness; there is no system and no regime which would ensure it. It must come from within. This is not salvational egoism—which is a faulty presentation of religion wherein one performs the good in order to get points. It is not about doing good because it makes us happy or because it makes us look good.  Maybe in those senseless acts of kindness, this is where true religion is. Religion is not going to Church, it’s what you do for the Other. It’s the moment when you give a piece of bread—that is when God appears.

Two points to ponder: first, the radical shift in philosophy; and second, the non-reciprocal, non-symmetrical acts of goodness.

Ricoeur: Personal Capacities and Mutual Recognition

Reading: Paul Ricoeur, “Assessing Personal Capacities and Pleading for Mutual Recognition”

Last semester’s discussion centred on philosophical reflection and being human. This semester will be still be about being human, but it will focus more on the HB’s relations with other human beings. Today’s lecture will transition the two semesters by probing more deeply into the fundamental sociality of the human being and the struggle and need for human recognition. Ricoeur’s speech may be seen as having three parts: first is about basic human capacities; second, the struggle for mutual recognition between individuals in society; and last, the possibility of the giving as holding together the social bond.

Ricoeur’s conception of the human being emphasizes on the HB’s vulnerability and capability. He points out that though capacities can be observed by others, it is “fundamentally felt, and lived in the mode of certainty by the individual herself. When we examine the capacities, we realize that the capacities imply that the subject is deeply social; for instance, speech is always addressed to another person, acting is always in view that one is not the solitary shaker and mover of things and that Others are also capable of effecting change in their own, and being responsible is always being responsible to Others.  The individual cannot be cleanly and completely excised from her network and relations—after all, one’s story never only has one character, and there can be no personal capacity without Others.

Though all human beings are capable, there is a lack of reciprocity, mutuality and recognition of these capacities in society. Ricoeur writes, “The idea of a struggle for recognition is at the heart of modern social relations.” For the political philosopher Thomas Hobbes, communities are formed because of a social contract in which each member forfeits his unlimited freedom, and agrees to be bound by common rule. Without this social contract, the HB exists in the state of nature where he is free to murder, pillage, rape or do anything that will ensure her survival or thriving. This view sees the human being as primarily predatory, innately selfish, and must be reined in by social inventions.

However, there is still a struggle in the conquest of equality and justice. There is lack of consideration, disdain and violence. The refusal to recognize the Other’s capacity is symptomatic of the unwillingness to see the other as a fellow human being. Murder is essentially a refusal to recognize the humanity of another; it is a forgetfulness of the fact that the Other has her own story, fears, dreams, capacities and limitations. When we talk about murder, we are not speaking only of a single individual snuffed out of life, we speak of an entire community diminished by it. A murderer steals a father, husband, friend, neighbor, colleague from all the victim’s relations. Because, as was said earlier, each person is deeply embedded in the web of relations that the flourishing or the death of one affects the whole.

Ricoeur does not completely agree that the society is held together merely by mutual self-interest. He wondered if there is “at the origin a sort of good will tied to the resemblance of one person to another in the great human family.” He discussed the significance of gift-giving between people and communities. The gift does not enter into the language of exchange; it is radically different from buying something because genuine gift giving does not demand anything in return. It does not elicit a dependence to the given party, but it encourages the Other to give as well.  One feels so much happiness and gratitude over the gift that one feels excited and happy to share it with others. Gift-giving is a way of saying to the other person, “I recognize you as a human being and I believe you are worthy of being given something valuable.” It can function as a peaceful counterpart for the struggle for recognition.

Ricoeur ends the article, “The intertwining of struggle and celebration is perhaps the indication of an absolutely primitive relation at the source of the social bond linking defiance of war of all against with all the good will that arises from the encounter with the other, my fellow human being.”

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Welcome to the philosophy blog of Dr Garcia’s Philosophy 102 students, School Year 2011-2012! 🙂

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Though Abby Lewis made the banner, acknowledgement is due to those who graciously allowed use of their photographs. Thank you to Serica Roxas for the still of Doc Garcia from her video. Check out her  works in vimeo, especially the tribute to  Doctor Garcia. And much thanks to Bracha Ettinger for the picture of Levinas, which is among many of her awesome portraits of philosophers and thinkers. 🙂