Dasein, Authenticity, and Free-Will: A Modern-Day Thomistic Response to Heidegger

Dasein, Authenticity, and Free-Will: A Modern-Day Thomistic Response to Heidegger

The rise of existentialism began in response to the modern worldview of the 15th and 16th centuries. While generally a difficult term to define, what is meant by existentialism is simply the understanding that the human individual can no longer rely on any sort of fixed foundation (such religious beliefs or the Ancient/Medieval understanding of human “essence”) from which to determine the proper end of man. Rather, it is man himself who determines his own end.[1] Perhaps one of the most renowned of existential philosophers is a German by the name of Martin Heidegger. Born in the year 1889, Heidegger spent his early academic years studying at the University of Freiburg and working as an assistant to the father of phenomenology, Edmund Husserl. In 1927, Heidegger penned what is considered his greatest academic work, Being and Time. In this work he explores the nature of being, most especially that of humans (dasein). This paper will primarily consider Heidegger’s concept of Authenticity and its relationship to the medieval understanding of free-will, seeking to affirm the ‘existentialle’ features of inauthentic/authentic dasein, while arguing that there must necessarily be more to the being of dasein than pure choice.

Heidegger’s ontology begins with Aristotle’s claim in Book One of the Metaphysics, “All humans by nature desire to know.”[2] It is within the very nature of man to be concerned with the question of Being and to seek a fuller understanding of it. In fact, Heidegger even says, “The question of Being, the striving for an understanding of Being, is the basic determinant of [human] existence.” However, he rejects the further developments of traditional ontology, claiming that such offers a distorted perspective of the nature of reality. Rather than seeing objects as simply taking up matter and space (being ‘there’), which is the objectified outlook of traditional ontology, Heidegger proposes that most objects in the world can defined as equipment, having the characteristic of ‘readiness-to-hand.’ Equipment, in this sense, he says, “can genuinely show itself only in dealings cut to its own measure; but in such dealings an entity of this kind is not grasped thematically as an occurring Thing, nor is the equipment-structure known as such even in the using.”[3] What is meant here is that we do not see objects as simply as material in space and time, but that we grasp their meaning from our interaction with them. Heidegger gives the example of hammering with a hammer: When we hammer a nail with a hammer, we are not aware of the hammer as an object itself, but we are aware of it as equipment, as being exactly what it is suppose to be by hammering. He explains, “The less we just stare at the hammer-Thing, and the more we seize hold of it and use it, the more primordial does our relationship to it become, and the more unveiledly is it encountered.”[4] It is in this distinction that Heidegger rejects traditional ontology, claiming that we cannot understand objects as containing meaning in themselves unless we see them as “ready-to-hand.”

Also important to understanding Heidegger’s ontology is his definition of the human person, dasein. “Dasein is an entity which does not just occur among other entities. Rather it is ontically distinguished by the fact that, in its very Being, Being is an issue for it,”[5] he says in the beginning of Being and Time. Dasein is the entity which has ‘its being to be’, thereby claiming a unique relationship with Being.
Further, what is inherent to dasein is its ‘mineness.’ “Dasein,” says Heidegger “is an entity which in each case I myself am.”[6] He continues to state that this ‘mineness’ belongs to dasein “as the condition which makes authenticity and inauthenticity possible.”[7] It is these concepts of authenticity and inauthenticity that provoke great interest, especially in consideration of the medievalist view of free-will, which will be discussed more in depth later in this paper.

Dasein, in its everydayness, often misunderstands itself. It sees and takes its understanding of itself from the ‘world.’ As Heidegger puts it, “The kind of Being which belongs to Dasein is such that, in understanding its own Being, it has a tendency to do so in terms of that entity towards which it comports itself proximally and in a way which is essentially constant—in terms of the ‘world.’”[8] Dasein often takes its being from the ‘they.’[9] It takes its everyday possibilities of Being from the ‘they’ and in fact, falls under subjection to the ‘they.’ Guignon and Pereboom, in their brief introduction to Heidegger, explain it thusly, “All our concrete possibilities of understanding and interpretation are drawn from the pool of interpretations opened by the public world in which we find ourselves.”[10] By allowing the ‘they’ to determine who dasein is, dasein becomes, in a sense, indispensable. In this mode of being, dasein is inauthentic. Heidegger says, “As they-self, the particular Dasein has been dispersed into the ‘they’, and must first find itself.”[11] The process of finding itself consists in anxiety and the end is, hopefully, authenticity.

Anxiety is a way in which the world appears to dasein: A way which reveals to dasein that it is absorbed in the world and that it is not directed toward a particular thing. Essentially, dasein becomes anxious about its own being in the world.[12] It understands that it has allowed the ‘they’ to dictate its being. Guignon and Pereboom write, “In anxiety the familiar world of equipment in which we find ourselves at home suddenly collapses into insignificance. The idea here seems to be that anxiety makes us see that the roles we play in everydayness are anonymous, ‘anyone’ roles.”[13] This anxiety, however, leads to authentic dasein. Dasein who ‘chooses’ its own being, rather than allowing the ‘they’ to dictate it. “To say that we should ‘choose to choose,’” say Guignon and Pereboom, “is to say that we should embrace the choices we make, and that we should give structure to our lives by continuously reaffirming those choices in everything we do.”[14] This is the mark of authentic dasein, one who chooses one’s own being. One who deliberately makes choices. Again they say, “To be authentic is to seize on some set of roles you have drawn from the public world and to make them into your own through a resolute and clear-sighted stand on them.”[15] This is resoluteness.

Now, what must be clear in Heidegger’s concept of Authenticity is that he believes it does not matter what a particular dasein chooses, but only that it chooses. By saying this, he wants to emphasize exactly what dasein is essentially. He says, “Humans just are the stands they take in living out their lives. Humans are what they do. This point follows from the awareness that there is no fixed human essence given to us in advance—no ‘Form of Humanity’ or ‘proper function of humans’ that determines what we are and ought to be.”[16] Dasein chooses itself from all possible possibilities and by thus doing so, ‘wins’ itself. But there is no ‘guide’ for what choices to make. All that matters is the act of choosing. In fact, this is how Heidegger defines what dasein is, saying, “But man's distinctive feature lies in this, that he, as the being who thinks, is open to Being, face to face with Being; thus man remains referred to Being and so answers to it. Man is essentially this relationship of responding to Being, and he is only this.”[17] Dasein, man, is possibility and making choices, according to Heidegger.

Although he has attempted to distance himself from most traditional ontology, Heidegger’s view of Authenticity actually finds itself to have much in common with the medieval concept of free-will. Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica, says, “Now man differs from irrational animals in this, that he is master of his actions.” This is a claim that Heidegger should have no difficulty in accepting, for being a ‘master of his actions’, essentially means being able to choose. Thomas continues, saying, “Now man is master of his actions through his reason and will; whence, too, the free-will is defined as the faculty and will of reason. Therefore those actions are properly called human which proceed from a deliberate will. ”[18] This is the distinguishing feature of man, according to Thomas: That man has a free-will and can thereby choose one thing over another. Irrational animals cannot do this, only man. To be human, then, is to choose. This ought to sound familiar, as it is the same definition that Heidegger gives of dasein. Man is most human, Thomas says, when he is acting with a deliberate will. To choose deliberately is to be aware of one’s choice, to choose to choose. This is precisely Heidegger’s view on Authenticity: Dasein is authentic when it chooses and is aware and deliberate in its choosing.

In this way, Thomas’ view of free-will does not seem altogether too different than Heidegger’s theory of Authenticity. Even inauthentic dasein seems to match with Thomas’ view. As quoted above, Thomas defines free-will as “the faculty and will of reason.” But even the medievalists recognized that not every human makes use of his reason. In fact, man often acts without using his reason or choosing deliberately. Thomas says of these actions, “And if any other actions are found in man, they can be called actions of a man, but not properly human actions, since they are not proper to man as man.”[19] This way of being is inauthentic, as it does not properly use the faculty of reason and free-will. Thomas and other medievalists (particularly Augustine) have much to say about the human person and the use (or lack thereof) of free-will and reason, but Heidegger delves much deeper into the ‘existentialle’ of inauthenticity. He discovers great truths in his concept of the ‘they’ and everyday dasein that build upon what the medieval philosophers previously thought. In this, Heidegger ought to be affirmed.

However, there are a few difficulties within Heidegger’s thought that need to be addressed. The first lies in his definition of man, of dasein. He says, as quoted earlier, “Man is essentially this relationship of responding to Being, and he is only this.” But man cannot simply be his choices: He can make choices, however, there must be a subject in order for a choice to be made. Even Heidegger’s concept of ‘mineness’ cannot account for the necessity of a subject. Man cannot both be, essentially, his choices and make choices at the same time. Such would be absurd. To say that man can make choices implies that there is something in man, that man is a subject. As a subject, man possesses the faculty of reason and free-will. Therefore man is, as Aristotle defines him, a rational animal. Man is a body and a soul, possessing reason and free-will.

Further, in Heidegger’s concept of Authenticity, he claims that it does not matter what one chooses, but only that ones chooses. This is directly related to what was previously discussed as well as his claim that there is “no fixed human essence… no ‘Form of Humanity’ or ‘proper function of humans’ that determines what we are and ought to be.”[20] There is a fallacy in Heidegger’s thought, however: Mainly that man’s end is to choose. But man must have an end that is more than simply to choose. Thomas speaks of man having a final end or a final cause: Something towards which man moves. This is necessary if it is true that man makes any choices whatsoever, “For if the agent were not determinate to some particular effect, it would not do one thing rather than another: consequently in order that it produce a determinate effect, it must, of necessity, be determined to some certain one, which has the nature of an end.”[21] Obviously this paper is not concerned with the nature of that end, which Aristotle holds is happiness and Thomas holds is God. Rather, the fact that man must have a particular end is clear. If it were not so, there would be no reason for man to choose one thing over another. In fact, it would be impossible. Consider the simple example of a man choosing to eat rather than take a nap. There must be a concrete reason for the man to choose one or the other: If to eat, because he is hungry and wishes to satisfy his hunger, but if to sleep, because he is tired and wishes to rest his body. Regardless of which possibility he chooses, there is an end to his decision: satisfaction of hunger or rest for his body. As this is true on the individual level of all choices, all the more is it true universally for man. Inauthentic man moves towards his end without making deliberate choices, while authentic man moves towards his end using his reason and free-will, making deliberate choices. Thus Thomas says, “Therefore those things that are possessed of reason, move themselves to an end; because they have dominion over their actions through their free-will, which is the faculty of will and reason.”[22]

The similarities between Heidegger’s philosophy of Authenticity and the medieval concept of free-will are striking, if not a bit surprising. Perhaps Heidegger would be appalled at such a comparison, but as has been proven in this paper, there is clear parallel between the two. There are, of course, always distinctions to be made and the most obvious one is the stark difference in which Heidegger claims there is no essence to humanity and in which Thomas claims there certainly is an essence to humanity. However, Heidegger’s claim is weakened by Thomas’ reasoning that man necessarily needs a final end in order to make any choices whatsoever, and being able to choose is at the heart of all of Heidegger’s ontology.

Every philosopher, whether one agrees with his philosophy or not, reveals some truth about mankind and/or the world in which we live. Although he is often rejected by neo-Thomists and those who hold to a more medieval and traditional ontology, Heidegger offers much insight into the truth of mankind and our world. His philosophy of authenticity and inauthenticity in particular, ought not to be rejected, but rather refined, for it reveals a great truth about man and offers much to the phenomenology of man.

Works Cited

Introduction by Charles Guignon & Derk Pereboom. Existentialism: Basic Writings. Hackett Publishing Company. Indianapolis. 2001.
Being and Time. Heidegger. Existentialism: Basic Writings. Hackett Publishing Company. Indianapolis. 2001.
"The Principle of Identity," Identity and Difference, Joan Stambaugh, trans. New York: University of Chicago Press, 1969.
[1] Introduction by Charles Guignon & Derk Pereboom. Existentialism: Basic Writings. Hackett Publishing Company. Indianapolis. 2001. Pg xvii
[2] Aristotle. Metaphysics.
[3] Being and Time. Heidegger. Existentialism: Basic Writings. Hackett Publishing Company. Indianapolis. 2001. 225.
[4] Ibid. 225
[5] Ibid. 213
[6] Ibid. 222
[7] Ibid. 222
[8] Ibid. 216
[9] Heidegger’s concept of the ‘they’ is lengthy and cannot be discussed in full in this paper. See §26 and §27 of Being and Time for a further explanation.
[10] Introduction by Charles Guignon & Derk Pereboom. 204
[11] Being and Time, 235.
[12] Class notes.
[13] Introduction by Charles Guignon & Derk Pereboom. 205
[14] Ibid. 207
[15] Ibid. 207
[16] Being and Time. 197
[17] "The Principle of Identity," Identity and Difference, Joan Stambaugh, trans. (New York: University of Chicago Press, 1969), 31.
[18]ST.II.Q.I.A.I
[19] Ibid.
[20] Being and Time. 197
[21] ST.II.Q.I.A.II.
[22] ST.II.Q.I.A.I