Chapter 4 - Logic, Language, and the Question of Method in Heidegger

Summary

This chapter examines the relationship between “logic,” language, and methodology in Heidegger. It begins by contrasting two ways in which one might understand that relationship: Dummett’s position as articulated in The Logical Basis of Metaphysics and Dreyfus’s influential reconstruction of Sein und Zeit. Focusing on Sein und Zeit §33, the chapter distinguishes Heidegger’s own view from each of these. First, drawing on his discussions of “grammar,” it shows where and why he diverges not just from someone like Dummett, but also from Kant. Second, it argues for the difference between the approach in this chapter and the Dreyfusian one: For Dreyfus, Heidegger’s attack on logic is ultimately a question of content, for Golob it is ultimately a question of method. The chapter closes by indicating how this analysis might be extended to texts from the 1924 Platon: Sophistes lectures to Die Sprache in the 1950s, paying particular attention to the concept of a “meta-language.”