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Heideggers Concept of Truth Revisited

Sren Overgaard
In his recently published treatise Heideggers Concept of Truth Daniel O. Dahlstrom provides an insightful, detailed account of most aspects of Heideggers thinking during the Marburg years, in particular Heideggers reflections on the phenomenon of truth. Central in this undertaking is Dahlstroms attempt to defend Heidegger against Ernst Tugendhats almost classic critique of the Heideggerian account of truth. As I shall argue in the present article, Dahlstroms defense of Heidegger does not bear critical scrutiny, because it simply fails to address the real issue. In his attempt to demonstrate that Heideggers notion of disclosedness as original truth meets the demands, Tugendhat claims any meaningful concept of truth must meet, Dahlstrom confuses two essentially different phenomenological levels. What is really an issue pertaining to the level of the studied phenomenon is by Dahlstrom tacitly construed as an issue pertaining to the level of phenomenological description itself. This will be demonstrated in three steps. First, I present Heideggers conception of truth as it appears in the magnum opus Being and Time; then I introduce what I take to be the core of Tugendhats critique; and finally, Dahlstroms defense will be presented and criticized.

Abstract

1. Introduction

In 1967 Ernst Tugendhat published a book entitled Der Wahrheitsbegriff bei Husserl und Heidegger. To this day, Tugendhats book remains one of the most lucid and convincing studies of the relation between the phenomenologies of Husserl and Heidegger ever published. Tugendhat deserves praise not only for the sensitivity with which he handles the dynamite issue of Heideggers indebtedness to Husserl, but also for the fair, but critical way he engages in dialogue with both thinkers. In the end, it is the critical tendency that emerges as dominant in Tugendhats commentary. Although he finds useful resources in both phenomenological accounts of truth, neither account is, on his view, adequate. Especially Heideggers analyses could, according to Tugendhat,

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supply important insights into the phenomenon of truth, but the way Heidegger chooses to develop them they are ultimately untenable.1 Recently, another study with the concept of truth as its central theme has been published, and once again the relation between Husserl and Heidegger is discussed extensively. This book Daniel O. Dahlstroms Heideggers Concept of Truth,2 is unique in that it, on the one hand, displays a sensitive understanding of both Husserls and Heideggers thinking, an understanding comparable to that of Tugendhat; and on the other hand argues, in clear contrast to Tugendhat, that Heidegger does offer a coherent and compelling account of truth. Though most of Dahlstroms book is dedicated to revealing how a certain logical prejudice viz., the notion that the site of truth is the proposition or assertion is at work in most previous accounts of truth, including Husserls otherwise groundbreaking account, Dahlstrom does take time in the final chapter of his book to discuss Tugendhats criticisms. Not surprisingly, these criticisms are found to be unconvincing. The aim of the present article is to evaluate Dahlstroms defense of Heidegger. This might seem like not only a modest aim, but also a rather insignificant one. But it should be noted from the outset that one of the presuppositions of the article is that HCT is a publication of immense importance, not only for its illuminating discussion of the Husserl-Heidegger relation,3 but also for the light it sheds on almost all other aspects of Heideggers thinking during the Marburg years.4 Moreover, HCT displays scholarly workmanship of the highest possible quality. The lucidity of its style, and the way Dahlstrom handles the used literature (not least the German quotations), to mention but a few of those areas where Dahlstrom displays scholarly excellence, should satisfy both Heidegger scholars and philosophers with less training in phenomenology. In
Tugendhat, Der Wahrheitsbegriff bei Husserl und Heidegger [henceforth: WHH] (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1970, 2nd edition), p. 405. 2 Dahlstrom, Heideggers Concept of Truth [henceforth: HCT] (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2001). Originally, this book was composed in German and published under the title Das logische Vorurteil (Vienna: Passagen Verlag, 1994). 3 For another recently published, lucid and convincing study of the Husserl-Heidegger relation, cf. Steven Galt Crowell, Husserl, Heidegger, and the Space of Meaning (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 2001). 4 Of course, Theodore Kisiels mammoth study, The Genesis of Heideggers Being and Time (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), still offers the authoritative historical account of Heideggers philosophical development between 1919 and 1926. Dahlstrom clearly wants to do something else than Kisiel: even though Dahlstrom is very well informed about Heideggers intellectual development, his real aim, in contrast to Kisiel, is to present an argument for a philosophical thesis.
1

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other words, the trenchancy of Dahlstroms argument vis-a-vis Tugendhats critique is important, because HCT is one of the major contributions to Heidegger (and Husserl) scholarship in recent years. In the present article I shall argue that, all the merits of HCT notwithstanding, as far as the issue of Tugendhats critique goes, Dahlstroms defense of Heidegger does not bear critical scrutiny. It does not, because in the attempt to demonstrate how Heideggers notion of original truth satisfies those demands any adequate conception of truth according to Tugendhat, and Dahlstrom agrees must satisfy, Dahlstrom conflates two essentially distinct levels of discourse. Before we can bring this to light, however, we need to briefly review the conception of truth Heidegger develops in Sein und Zeit, and the charge Tugendhat levels against it. Accordingly, the article will be divided in three main sections, followed by a conclusion. First, a brief outline of the theory of truth developed in SZ will be given; second, what I take to be the core of Tugendhats critique will be presented; and finally, I shall introduce Dahlstroms defense of Heidegger and discuss its validity.

2. The Concept of Truth in Sein und Zeit

In Sein und Zeit,5 Heidegger is struggling to prepare the ground for the explicit posing of the question of being (Sein) a question that has allegedly remained unasked since the times of Plato and Aristotle (SZ, p. 2). In order to understand what Heidegger has to say on the subject of truth in that work, one must keep this ontological framework in mind. Being, according to Heidegger, must be distinguished from entities (das Seiende). Although being is necessarily the being of some entity, it is of the utmost importance that we do not confound being with entities.6 Every entity, Heidegger claims, has one or other mode of being, and we are able to experience entities only because we are able to understand as what they are, that is, their modes of being. In other words, any relation with an entity any perception of a tree, hammering with a hammer, or greeting a neighbor presupposes an understanding of the mode of being of the entity in question. In Heideggers terminology, any uncovering or discovering of an entity, presupposes a disclosing of its being.7 It is
Heidegger, Sein und Zeit [henceforth: SZ], 17th edition (Tbingen: Niemeyer, 1993). This distinction is not yet in Seit und Zeit labeled the ontological difference, but the notion is introduced shortly after the publication of the magnum opus. See Heideggers 1927 lecture course, Die Grundprobleme der Phnomenologie (Gesamtausgabe Band 24), ed. F.-W. von Herrmann (Frankfurt a. M.: Klostermann, 1975), pp. 22, 102, 109, 454. 7 Heidegger calls whatever has to do with entities ontic, and reserves the terms ontology, ontological, and preontological for what specifically concerns being. Accordingly, we might
5 6

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impossible to develop these points in any detail here (let alone argue for them), so this rough sketch must suffice. One further point that we need to consider before we can approach Heideggers account of truth is that there seems to be a certain hierarchy among ways of relating to entities. As already pointed out, all ways of relating to entities have in common that they are founded somehow in an understanding of being, but among these ways of relating to entities, not all are equally original, according to Heidegger. The most original way of relating to things in ones surroundings is, with Heideggers famous expression, not gaping (begaffen) at them, but putting them to use in one way or another (cf. SZ, pp. 61, 69). The theoretical approach to things, where one describes their shape, and color, measures their weight, and the like, is something secondary, Heidegger claims, since we in fact need a switch-over (Umstellung) from the immediate, practical, using relation to things in order to get to the purely theoretical level (SZ, p. 149). A hammer, for instance, is immediately experienced as being adequate for the job or not, but hardly anyone has ever set about determining how many kilograms and grams it might weigh. It is hard to imagine which circumstances would urge one to do something like that, and clearly it involves a relation to the hammer significantly different from the immediate one of approaching the hammer in terms of its aptness for the job at hand. Turning to Heideggers discussion of truth in Sein und Zeit,8 let us first make a note on the strategy he employs. The analysis, so Heidegger says, begins with the traditional concept of truth, and attempts to unearth its ontological foundations (SZ, p. 214).9 Through these foundations, then, Heidegger hopes to make the original [ursprngliche] phenomenon of truth visible, and thereby to display the derived nature of the traditional conception of truth (ibid.). To make a long story very short, the traditional concept of truth is the concept according to which truth is the property of certain propositions or assertions (ibid.), more precisely those assertions that correspond with their actual objects. The important thing in the present context is not whether Heidegger fails to
formulate the point thus: an ontic knowledge [Erkenntnis] can never alone [fr sich] direct itself to [nach] the objects, because without the ontological [knowledge] it can have no possible Whereto. Heidegger, Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik, ed. F.-W. von Herrmann (Frankfurt a. M.: Klostermann, 1998), p. 13. 8 The theory of truth presented in Sein und Zeit is unfolded in great detail in Heideggers 192526 lecture course Logik: Die Frage nach der Wahrheit (Gesamtausgabe Band 21), ed. Walter Biemel (Frankfurt a. M.: Klostermann, 1976). 9 All translations are my own, unless otherwise indicated.

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notice that the philosophical tradition encompasses more than simply varieties of the correspondence theory of truth, but that traditionally, truth has been conceived as essentially belonging to propositions or assertions. Traditionally, propositional truth has been perceived as coextensive with truth as such. Thus, the proposition, This hammer weighs 2.5 kilograms would be a paradigm case of the setting in which truth is to be found, on the traditional account. As Heidegger elaborates, an assertion such as this one is a way of relating to an object, more precisely, it is a way of revealing something about an object. When I say that the hammer weighs 2.5 kilograms, I am revealing something about this hammer, or to put it in Heideggers terminology, I am uncovering or discovering (entdecken) the hammer in some way (SZ, p. 218). Of course, what I reveal may prove to be wrong. It might be that the hammer weighs 3 kilograms instead of 2.5. In this case, I am still relating to this hammer, I am still in a way uncovering it, or revealing it, but not in the way it is itself hence we might say that the hammer is precisely revealed in such a way that it is (in and through that uncoveredness) covered up. In the true assertion, on the other hand, the intended entity manifests itself as it is in itself [so, wie es an ihm selbst ist], that is, it is in sameness thus, as it was displayed [aufgezeigt], uncovered in the assertion (ibid.). Heidegger concludes that the [b]eingtrue (truth) of the assertion [Aussage] must be understood as its beinguncovering (ibid.). Consistently with the hierarchical ordering of ways of relating to entities outlined above, there is some evidence that between the traditional conception of truth and what Heidegger takes to be the original phenomenon of truth, there is an intermediary stage. After all, the truth of a statement or a proposition is its uncovering, but as we have seen, Heidegger argues that there is a more original way of uncovering entities than the predicative-judgmental determination of their objective properties. When I pick up the hammer and use it for hammering, I have uncovered it in the most original way imaginable; I have appropriated it in the most adequate manner possible (SZ, p. 69). This is not necessarily to say that non-linguistic use must have absolute priority, because there are also original linguistic ways of relating to the hammer. In the context of using involvement, I might exclaim, Too heavy! and thereby uncover the hammer in an original manner (uncover it in its being unsuited for the job), at least in a decidedly more original manner than had I judged its weight to be 2.5 kilograms (cf. SZ, p. 157). Finally, then, there is what Heidegger calls original truth. As a preface to his discussion of original truth, Heidegger repeats the preliminary conclusion drawn from the discussion of propositional truth: Being-true (truth) means

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being-uncovering (SZ, p. 219). This, Heidegger argues, is in fact already implicit in the Greek notion of aletheia which is an important point because it is precisely the business of philosophy to preserve the force of the most elementary words (SZ, pp. 219-220). Now uncovering, or revealing (things about) things, is itself a manner of being (Seinsweise) of the human being (Dasein), Heidegger points out. And he continues: What makes possible this uncovering must necessarily be called true in an even more original sense. Only the existential-ontological foundations for uncovering point out the original phenomenon of truth (SZ, p. 220). After these remarks, Heidegger introduces a number of further considerations, of which only a few need to be mentioned here. The uncovering of an entity such as the hammer is itself founded in the dis-closedness (Erschlossenheit) of the world, Heidegger claims. The disclosedness of something like a world, in turn, is part of what it means to be a Dasein, a human being (ibid.). These ruminations are not as obscure as they might appear at first sight. The hammering with a hammer, e.g., is a way of uncovering an entity and it is itself made possible by the presence of further entities such as nails and boards. Obviously, in order to get the job done with the hammer, I need some understanding of the hammers functioning, its reference (What is it for?). Understanding this, that the hammer is something with which to (etwas, um zu..; SZ, p. 68), is understanding the mode of being of the hammer (SZ, p. 69), according to Heidegger. Further, I must understand the hammers functional place in a whole of such references (hammer nails boards house, etc.). Since this referential whole is what Heidegger labels the world (SZ, p. 75), the claim that the encounter with the individual entity (the hammer) presupposes the disclosedness of the world is, after all, not completely unconvincing. That this disclosedness is something that characterizes the (being of the) human being appears a reasonable claim as well, since in the absence of an understanding human being, no reference of Um-zu, and no referential whole would ever be revealed. In other words, the disclosedness belonging to the being of Dasein is what founds the truth as uncovering, i.e., with the notion of the disclosedness of Dasein we have reached the most original [ursprnglichste] phenomenon of truth (SZ, pp. 220-221). The proposition, then, is not the site of truth, but the other way around: since propositional truth (The hammer weighs 2.5 kg.), as a way of uncovering entities, presupposes and is founded in the disclosedness characteristic of the being of Dasein (for hammers to manifest themselves, Dasein must have disclosed a world and understood something like modes of being), we can say that the most original truth is the site [Ort] of the assertion and the ontological precondition of assertions possibly being either true or false (uncovering or

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covering-up) (SZ, p. 226). The original truth is the site of propositional truth, and only when the fundamental disclosedness characteristic of Dasein is in place is it possible to either uncover entities or conceal them. We have now outlined three (increasingly original) levels of truth, extracted from Heideggers account. We may, following Daniel O. Dahlstrom, label them propositional, instrumental, and existential truth (cf. HCT, p. 450), the last mentioned being the disclosedness characteristic of the being of Dasein (and therefore an existential; cf. SZ, p. 226). With this somewhat compact and rough sketch of the concept of truth in Heideggers SZ in hand, let me turn to Tugendhats criticism. What forms the background for Tugendhats critical analysis of the concepts of truth in Husserl and Heidegger is the conviction that the conception of truth found in most contemporary analytical philosophy is correct, yet far too narrow. We cannot rest content with the notion of propositional truth alone as the analytic philosophers allegedly do if we want to comprehend the possibility of a whole human life directed towards truth. Some kind of widening of the concept of truth is, according to Tugendhat, needed (WHH, p. 3), and it is to this end that the turn to Husserl and Heidegger could prove helpful. The critique of Husserl need not occupy us here, so let us turn at once to the critical question Tugendhat confronts Heidegger with. Though maintaining that a wider notion of truth would be desirable, Tugendhat wants to investigate whether Heideggers concept of truth might in fact be so wide that it no longer corresponds to what we are accustomed to understand by truth (WHH, pp. 3-4). The introduction to Der Wahrheitsbegriff bei Husserl und Heidegger already makes it patent that this is precisely what Tugendhat intends to argue is the case. Tugendhat holds that any conception of truth if it is to be a conception of just that: truth must, at the very least, be able to accommodate a difference between fulfillment, or the matter itself, and mere intention (WHH, pp. 296, 336). Though expressed in Husserlian terms, it is not difficult to understand Tugendhats point. If truth is to make sense, so must falsity, that is to say, it must be possible to intend a matter both as it is in itself and as something it is not. For it to make sense to say of my claim, This hammer weighs 2.5 kilograms that it is a true statement, it must be possible for such a statement to miss the target as well, to still reveal the hammer, still be about the hammer, but get its weight wrong.10 Where we find no such difference
10

3. Tugendhats Critique

Obviously, this is completely independent of whether we are dealing with an empirical statement or not. As we all know, it is also possible to get the answers to mathematical questions wrong.

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between my mere intending the matter and the matter itself, then it appears we can no longer meaningfully speak of truth, Tugendhat insists (WHH, p. 297). As Tugendhat points out, this condition is perfectly fulfilled by Heideggers initial definition of propositional truth. When we say that the true statement is the one that uncovers the entity as it is in itself, we have clearly satisfied the requirement that it be possible also to intend the same matter, e.g., to relate to the same entity, and still cover it up (WHH, p. 332). What Tugendhat is critical of is Heideggers next step, where truth is identified with uncovering as such, since this seems to result in some confusion regarding the actual meaning of uncovering. Both of the statements, This hammer weighs 2.5 kg, and This hammer weighs 3 kg, are successfully pointing out this hammer, and in that sense uncovering it. Yet we would also have to say that if my hammer weighs 3 kilograms, then the former statement does not reveal the true weight of the hammer, and thus in that sense fails to uncover the hammer, namely, uncover it the way it is in itself (WHH, p. 333). Tugendhats thesis is that Heidegger exploits this ambiguity in roughly the following way: (1) If truth is to be identified with uncovering (period), without losing the specific sense of truth, then uncovering must be understood to signify uncovering something as it is in itself. (2) Tacitly, however, Heidegger ignores this and infers that since truth means uncovering, then any successful encounter with an entity might constitute a truth (cf. WHH, p. 350). With this step, Tugendhat charges, Heidegger has already left behind the specific characteristic of truth (WHH, pp. 350, 334-335). How is it possible, at this latter level of uncovering, to preserve a difference between the intention and the matter itself? It seems that the mere pointing out of an entity say, the encounter with the hammer is not itself something that admits of a difference between the matter intended and the matter itself: if this pointing out were unsuccessful, then there would simply be no matter intended, and hence also no difference between the matter as intended and the matter as it is itself. Yet Heidegger seems to take no notice of any of this. Indeed, because he silently passes over these considerations, he is even able, without further ado, to take the final step leading to the identification of Daseins disclosedness with original truth. And with this move, so Tugendhat argues, the concept of truth [is] not widened, but rather, no longer retained at all (WHH, p. 350). The disclosedness of being, and of a world11 is, on Heideggers account, the precondition for all ways of uncovering entities, so how could it make sense to say of this disclosedness
11 And as Dahlstrom notes, Tugendhat [] is not denying the phenomenon of disclosedness, but rejecting the use of the term truth to designate it (HCT, p. 395).

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that it might itself merely intend something in a way possibly different from the way it is in itself? Rather, the disclosedness of Dasein, this openedness of being and the world, provides, as it were, the space in which such a difference can obtain, thus it must itself be beyond the distinction between revealing something as it is in itself and as it is not in itself. This sort of distinction can only apply to that which is revealed within the sphere of disclosedness characteristic of Dasein (cf. WHH, p. 329). For me to be able to judge (rightly or wrongly) the weight of my hammer, I must be in such a way that hammers can manifest themselves to me in the first place; but precisely as such, as the sphere of openedness that allows hammers as well as a multitude of other things to be manifest, I can neither be correct nor mistaken. And since precisely this difference (or, strictly speaking the distinction between mere intention and the matter as it is in itself) was the minimal condition for any concept of truth, then it is obvious that Heideggers equivalence of truth and disclosedness (unhiddenness) is not tenable, and even leads to covering over the problem of truth (WHH, p. 260). This is the core of Tugendhats critique of Heidegger. Because Heidegger lets the specific characteristic of truth fall to the wayside almost at the outset, he precludes himself from pursuing otherwise fruitful tendencies inherent in his phenomenology. Though the point plays no crucial role in the argument of the present paper the aim of which is to evaluate Dahlstroms defense of Heidegger it deserves to be emphasized that Tugendhat fully recognizes the presence of such positive tendencies in Heideggers thinking (cf. WHH, p. 346). Heideggers approach is full of promise, Tugendhat contends, and should not be held responsible for the accidental inadequacies of the actually developed analyses (WHH, p. 405). In order to understand what Tugendhat appreciates in Heideggers approach to the concept of truth, we must turn briefly to the reasons for Tugendhats dissatisfaction with traditional conceptions of truth. One immediate problem, as Tugendhat sees it, is that truth is often limited to assertions, whereas it also has its proper place in other areas of human life. Since Heidegger conceives of human existence as historical and practical, his phenomenology is very useful in terms of bringing about the desired widening of the concept of truth beyond the confines of mere propositional truth (WHH, p. 404). Thus, although he does not deal with these issues in detail, Tugendhat seems to recognize and appreciate that Heidegger widens the concept of truth so as to cover what we have called instrumental truth. But there is another issue that concerns Tugendhat equally much, and that is that when truth is limited to propositional truth [t]he question of the possibility

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of directing human life as a whole at truth is simply no longer posed (WHH, p. 3). This is because truth, as it is understood on the propositional model, is either something that a certain proposition has, or it is at least something it implicitly claims to posses. Truth possession (Wahrheitsbesitz) is the paradigmatic phenomenon for the traditional account of truth, according to Tugendhat (WHH, p. 375n). Tugendhats intuition thus seems to be that when truth is limited to propositions, then a static conception of truth is the inevitable result. When I assert that my hammer weighs 2.5 kilograms, I either possess some truth about my hammer, or I at least claim to do so, without perhaps getting it right. Hence, my relation to truth is defined exclusively in terms of possession, and to the extent that I do not possess truth or claim to be in possession of it, I appear to have no relation with it whatsoever. What Tugendhat calls for is a theory of truth in which the relation to truth is primarily understood, not as realizable possession, but rather as the destination [Zielpunkt] of a movement (WHH, p. 347). Truth, according to Tugendhat, is not primarily something one is in possession of, or claims to be in possession of, but something one is in search of; something one is on the way towards or trying to flee, as is the case with the so-called inauthentic Dasein (WHH, pp. 316327). From Tugendhats perspective, Heideggers approach to truth is valuable precisely because it promotes a dynamic understanding of truth. In this context, the phenomena of disclosedness and uncovering paradoxical as it may seem, given Tugendhats thorough critique of Heideggers use of the word truth in connection with just these notions are of fundamental importance. Disclosedness and uncovering (in the sense of making contact with some entity) are the ontological and ontic conditions for the possibility of truth and falsity alike. But uncovering, Tugendhat points out, has its goal in the narrow notion of uncovering, viz. uncovering something as it is in itself (WHH, p. 340). In other words, uncovering in the broad sense of pointing out an entity, discovering it, while being the precondition for falsity as well as truth, finds its real fulfillment, as Husserl would say,12 in uncovering the entity as it is in itself, i.e., in truth. If I assert something about my hammer that is not true, I am still relating to my hammer, still successfully pointing it out, but this pointing out has not really reached its goal. Pointing out, uncovering, as it were strives towards uncovering things as they are. Obviously, this does not mean that in pointing out an entity I cannot possibly be trying to present it differently from
12

Husserls theory of the fulfillment (Erfllung) of intentional acts, so obviously present in Tugendhats way of formulating the principle of bivalence, is found in the sixth of Husserls Logische Untersuchungen. Cf. Husserliana, Band XIX/2, ed. U. Panzer (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1984).

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the way it is in itself; it only means that in the pointing out or uncovering itself lies a direction toward revealing the uncovered entity as it is, whether or not this suits the interests of a particular uncovering agent (WHH, p. 340n). Thus, once one has carefully weeded out the ambiguities inherent in Heideggers own use of such a term as uncovering, it becomes clear that precisely the sense of uncovering that Tugendhat explicitly denies the right to the title of truth, has an all-important role to play in a dynamic conception of truth. The phenomena of disclosedness and uncovering (in the broad sense) do not meet the bivalence requirement; they are preconditions for truth (and falsity), and as such they are not to be identified with either truth or falsity. But they not only make truth and falsity possible; in addition they bring with them a direction towards truth, a direction that remains in force even when (as is often the case) human beings are mainly uncovering things in ways other than the way these things are in themselves. At the same time living in untruth and living as directed towards truth appears to be a basic human condition. This, according to Tugendhat, is what Heidegger is actually trying to say when he rhetorically asks whether Dasein is not equiprimordially in truth and untruth (SZ, p. 229; WHH, p. 347). From Tugendhats perspective, then, Heidegger first of all gives a precise, formal definition of truth truth as letting something be seen as it is in itself (SZ, p. 218) albeit one he is quick to let fall to the wayside. Secondly, and more importantly, he describes phenomena that as soon as they are properly distinguished from the phenomenon of truth can make intelligible both that human life is as such directed at truth and that, in spite of this, humans may be living more in untruth than in truth (WHH, p. 404). On Heideggers account truth is intelligible as something one is on the way towards rather than in possession of (WHH, pp. 346-347, 375n). Thirdly, Tugendhat explicitly acknowledges that Heideggers conception of human life as practical concern tears the concept of truth free from its exclusive ties with propositional truth thus paving the way for the necessary expansion of the concept. Although Tugendhat believes that Heidegger cuts himself off from developing his conception of truth along these lines, erroneously neglecting the addition as it is in itself in conceiving truth as uncoveredness, he can thus declare that Heideggers theory of truth is of so far unparalleled importance [] to the question of truth (WHH, p. 404).13
13

It deserves notice that Tugendhat becomes increasingly critical of Heidegger throughout his career. If we may take Tugendhats 1991 lecture Heideggers Seinsfrage as his final word on the matter, then he appears ultimately to conclude that hardly anything meaningful can be salvaged from Heideggerian ontology. See Tugendhat, Philosophische Aufstze (Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp, 1992), pp. 108-135. In Der Wahrheitsbegriff bei Husserl und Heidegger, however, Tugendhat presents a much more charitable reading of Heidegger.

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After this excursus into Tugendhats positive appraisal of Heideggers conception of truth, let us turn to Dahlstroms response to the more critical elements of Tugendhats commentary. As Dahlstrom declares repeatedly, he agrees completely with Tugendhat that any acceptable theory of truth must satisfy the demand that a distinction be preserved between the matter as merely intended and the matter as it is in itself (HCT, pp. 397, 404, 423). So what Dahlstrom intends to demonstrate is simply that the concept of truth Heidegger develops in SZ meets Tugendhats requirements. Dahlstrom is well aware that other commentators have already taken upon them to defend Heidegger against Tugendhats charges, most notably (in the German literature that Dahlstrom knows so well) Carl Friedrich Gethmann.14 In Gethmanns defense, an important part is played by the attempt to argue that Heidegger replaces a propositional model of truth with an operational model (D, p. 156). According to the latter type of account, the predicate true may be applied when an intention [Absicht] has been realized, a task has been completed (ibid.). Within this model, Heidegger further rejects the mentalism (allegedly) found in, e.g., Husserls account of truth, and instead argues that haptic actions should be considered primary (D, pp. 156-157). The result is, as Gethmann is quick to point out, that Heideggers conception of truth is pragmatic in nature. According to Heideggers operational model, the agreement with reality is not comparable to the way the photograph agrees with the original, but rather it is quite literally like the agreement between the key and the lock. Whether the key agrees [bereinstimmt] with the lock shows itself in locking, that is, in using the key, not in talking about it (D, p. 157).15 It is precisely this Heideggerian pragmatism, Gethmann charges, that Tugendhat completely overlooks (D, p. 158).
Cf. the two articles Zum Wahrheitsbegriff, and Die Wahrheitskonzeption in den Marburger Vorlesungen in Gethmanns Dasein: Erkennen und Handeln [henceforth: D] (Berlin/New York: de Gruyter, 1993). It must be said that Gethmann seems, if not unwilling to accept Tugendhats minimal requirement of any meaningful concept of truth, then at least less willing than Dahlstrom (cf. D, pp. 116-117, 127-128). Ultimately, however, also Gethmanns defense strategy proves to be that of maintaining that Tugendhats minimal requirement [] is obviously immediately met by Heidegger (ibid., p. 154). 15 Cf. to this, William James, Pragmatism and Other Writings, ed. Giles Nunn (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 2000), pp. 93-94: To copy a reality is, indeed, one very important way of agreeing with it, but it is far from being essential. The essential thing is the process of being guided. Any idea that helps us to deal, whether practically or intellectually, with either the reality or its belongings, that doesnt entangle our progress in frustrations, that fits, in fact, and adapts our life to the realitys whole setting, will agree sufficiently to meet the requirement. It will hold true of that reality.
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Dahlstroms Defense

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Returning to Tugendhats objection, we can see that the Heidegger presented by Gethmann clearly meets the minimal requirement. Though Tugendhat formulates his requirement in terms most fitted for propositional truth, or at best for a Husserlian-mentalistic account of truth (empty intending, perceptual fulfillment) and this is indeed also one of Gethmanns lesser objections to Tugendhat (cf. D, p. 158) then operational truth still admits of a distinction between the matter as it is in itself and our mere intention of it. I can fail to uncover the lock in use as well as in predicative judgments: if I try to lock the door with the wrong key, I have successfully related to the lock (I am intending the lock), but I have not in use revealed it as it is in itself, namely something with which to bar doors. Perhaps it is strange, in this situation, to say that I am then covering over the lock as it is in itself, as opposed to the uncovering of it that I would have done, had I used the right key but clearly the bivalence that Tugendhat demands is still in place here. Now Dahlstrom has, at various places in his book, a great deal to say about the pragmatic interpretation of Heidegger, and although he recognizes that this interpretation is in certain respects illuminating, the pragmatic reading is ultimately dismissed as untenable. Recalling the three levels of truth in SZ outline above, it is not difficult to see what the problem is. Stated in a slightly oversimplified way, it is as if the pragmatist simply moves from the level of propositional truth to the level of instrumental, or operational truth, and forgets the most original truth, viz. the disclosedness of Dasein.16 In what must be one of the most compelling and to-the-point critiques of the influential at least in America pragmatic reading of Heidegger, Dahlstrom argues that pragmatic interpretations tend to ignore or at least misconstrue the significance of the difference between ontic, preontological, and ontological levels (HCT, p. 428). Take the well-known reading of SZ, according to which our general background coping [] is our understanding of being.17 With an eye to the
This is hardly true of Gethmann, but paradoxically enough, he seems not to notice that the level of truth as disclosedness is precisely the primary target of Tugendhats criticism. If this is where the battle must be fought, then it does not really matter whether Tugendhat overlooks the intermediate level of operational truth. 17 Hubert L. Dreyfus, Being-in-the-World (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press 1991), p. 107. Similarly, Mark Okrent, Heideggers Pragmatism (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1988). We should note in passing that Dreyfus position seems rather more complex than Okrents. Whereas Okrent appears to identify understanding of being with practical understanding as such, Dreyfus claims that only ones background practical coping may be labeled understanding of being. The more specific kind of coping e.g., using a specific hammer to drive a nail into a wall is, according to Dreyfus, an ontic phenomenon of discovery, made possible by the pre-ontological background coping (unthematically orienting oneself, balancing, avoiding obstacles, locat16

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way this interpretation blurs the ontological difference, Dahlstrom observes that mere coping can be adequately described in strictly ontic terms, whereas understanding as an existential is not a way of uncovering things but rather the way in which their manner of being is (preontologically) disclosed (HCT, p. 233 n. 11). He insists, in other words, that the pragmatic rendering of disclosedness conflates the distinction between being-here [i.e., Dasein] as the site of the disclosure of manners of being, on the one hand, and its behavior of dealing with and uncovering entities on the other (HCT, p. 424). Viewed as a defense strategy against the type of critique advanced by Tugendhat, the pragmatic interpretation is thus not very promising: only by conflating the distinction between disclosedness and instrumental or operational truth i.e., in effect interpreting away the level of truth criticized by Tugendhat, making it look like a type of ontic phenomenon that does admit of bivalence, and is recognized by Tugendhat as such does the pragmatic reading mount a defense. To our present inquiry into Tugendhats critique of Heidegger, the fact that Dahlstrom so unhesitatingly distances himself from the pragmatic reading is a significant one. It means that he takes upon himself the task of defending Heideggers concept of truth all the way up to the most original truth, Daseins disclosedness. Dahlstrom is very clear about this: he will take on the full force of Tugendhats criticism and argue that Tugendhats minimal requirement is not only met by Heideggers accounts of propositional and instrumental, or operational truth, but also by the phenomenon of disclosedness itself (cf. HCT, pp. 398, 406-407, 422). At first, one is surprised to note how much Dahlstrom is willing to acknowledge. It seems as if he is willing to follow Tugendhat so far that all defense of Heidegger must prove impossible. As Dahlstrom willingly admits, being-here is disclosedness and, hence, can only fail to disclose if it fails to be (HCT, p. 402). Therefore, indeed it is impossible or nonsensical to speak of falsity or a false disclosure at this ontological level, in other words disclosedness is in certain respects beyond bivalent truth and falsity (HCT, pp. 402-403). Original truth is beyond the bivalence of truth and falsity, or better, of the matter as it is in itself and the matter as merely intended surely, these are all the concessions Tugendhat needs in order to have demonstrated that what Heidegger labels original truth cannot meaningfully
ing the hammer, picking it up, etc.) that Heidegger labels disclosing (Being-in-the-World, pp. 104-107). It would appear to me, however, that the phenomenon of background coping that Dreyfus describes, remains an ontic relation; an unthematic, perhaps even unnoticed way of dealing with entities, but nevertheless precisely a way of dealing with entities.

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be called so? And Dahlstrom, it hardly needs to be repeated, unconditionally accepts Tugendhats minimal requirement. But of course, Dahlstrom only admits that disclosedness is in certain respects, not in all respects, beyond the principle of bivalence. As we shall see, he points out at least one important respect in which original truth remains decidedly within the confines of Tugendhats principle. Whereas Dahlstrom grants that disclosedness is construed as underlying the ways in which entities are uncovered, obscured, and concealed, and in this sense is a presupposition for, rather than on a par with these ontic notions of truth and falsity, then he urges us not to forget that, as the history of ontology amply exemplifies, this disclosedness can be misunderstood or overlooked (HCT, p. 407). To be sure, examples easily come to mind in particular since the philosophical tradition since Aristotle has fallen into oblivion of the question of being, according to Heidegger. Even Husserl, who with his groundbreaking rethinking of Brentanos account of intentionality could be viewed as having discovered something not unlike Heideggers notion of disclosedness, remains (seen from the Heideggerian viewpoint) focussed on an ontic phenomenon. He does not see, Heidegger would undoubtedly maintain, that the ontic relation of intentionality is itself only made possible by the ontological relation to being, and ultimately by the phenomenon of disclosedness as such. So some sort of bivalence remains on the level of disclosedness: this phenomenon can be completely overlooked, or interpreted as an ontic relation (intentionality), or misconstrued in some other way. Precisely this observation is the core of Dahlstroms defense: Heideggers attempt to explain the originality or primordiality of this truth, not only over and against ontic truths but also over and against competing claims in the history of philosophy, contradicts the charge that he fails to uphold what Tugendhat understands as the specific and basic sense of truth (HCT, p. 423; my emphasis). Since a brief survey of modern ontology documents that all sorts of competing claims have been made about that which Heidegger interprets as disclosedness (original truth), then Tugendhats minimal requirement is clearly met. One can, e.g., misconstrue disclosedness along ontic lines (intentionality), thereby merely intending the phenomenon and not successfully revealing it as it is in itself. Original truth, then, may perfectly well be labeled truth. However, here we need to pause. Though perhaps at first sight compelling, there is something not quite right about Dahlstroms argument. Let me fist quote the very last lines of Dahlstroms discussion of Tugendhat: Heidegger interprets the original truth as the disclosedness that lies in advance of every proposition and thereby every possibility of

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Once again, we have the acknowledgment that original truth lies, in some way, beyond the dichotomy of propositional truth and falsity. And again Dahlstrom points out that there are, nevertheless, alternative interpretations of this phenomenon, and for this reason Tugendhats minimal requirement is still met. However, it seems to me that this defense does not address the real issue. It seems that the quotation documents very well how Dahlstrom simply confuses two different levels here, viz. the level of the described phenomenon and the level of the descriptive discourse itself. Let me illustrate that with an example, taken for the sake of simplicity from the domain of propositional truth. My hammer weighs 2.5 kilograms. Such a proposition meets Tugendhats demand, since it is possible for it both to merely intend the weight of the hammer without getting it right, and to unveil the hammer as it is in itself, i.e., in terms of measurable weight. Now, and this is the crucial point, such a proposition meets the requirement because the proposition itself has the mentioned property of possibly merely intending, and possibly pointing out the matter as it is in itself. Of course, we can also make judgments about the proposition, we can, e.g., say, The proposition, This hammer weighs 2.5 kilograms is a tautology, and such a proposition about a proposition can also get it right or (as it does in this case) get it wrong. The studied phenomenon, in the present example the proposition, can satisfy the bivalence principle, and in this case we may apply the predicates true and false to phenomena of this type. But whether or not the phenomenon under consideration meets Tugendhats requirement for an example of a phenomenon that does not, one may think of the meaningless cluster of words, Green is or then it is, of course, possible to make assertions about the studied phenomenon, assertions that do meet the requirement. Thus, the proposition, The cluster of words, Green is or is a false proposition, certainly meets the requirement (and is, in fact, false). When Dahlstrom tries to argue that the phenomenon of disclosedness meets the requirement of bivalence, he silently replaces the level of the phenomenon with the level of the phenomenologists propositions about the phenomenon. Fully comparable to this way of arguing would be the following: Insofar as there can be incommensurable propositions about the

propositional truth or falsity. Insofar as the interpretation takes the form of a transcendental argument or a scientific discourse, the original truth is construed in assertions for which there are contraries. Thus, propositional truth or, more precisely, the bivalency criterion of meaningful talk about truth, on which Tugendhat rightly insists, remains in force. [HCT, p. 423]

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string of words, Green is or, then Tugendhats requirement is met, and we may call constellations of words of the type Green is or true or false. Obviously, this is simply not an acceptable argument. Tugendhats criticism is, of course, not directed at the possibility of our saying right or wrong things about the phenomenon of disclosedness, but at the impossibility of the phenomenon of disclosedness itself admitting of bivalence. When the issue is whether or not it is meaningful to call the phenomenon of disclosedness original truth, then it does not matter whether there are multiple incompatible ways of interpreting the phenomenon what matters is whether the phenomenon (as described by Heidegger) itself admits of the distinction between merely intending the matter and getting the matter as it is in itself right, just as the phenomenon of the proposition This hammer weighs 2.5 kilograms obviously does. Dahlstroms defense, then, would appear to fall completely to the ground. It gains credibility only on the basis of a confusion of the level of the described phenomenon and the level of phenomenological description. Once these two levels have been clearly distinguished, it emerges that Dahlstroms whole argument pertains to the level of phenomenological discourse, rather than to what is really at stake, viz. the status of the studied phenomenon. Since Dahlstroms rehabilitative efforts are thus wasted, the phenomenon of disclosedness appears just as incapable of meeting Tugendhats requirement after one has finished reading Heideggers Concept of Truth as it appeared before one opened the book. Since Dahlstrom in fact agrees with so many of Tugendhats points (he accepts Tugendhats bivalence principle, and grants that disclosedness is in certain respects beyond the either-or of truth and falsity), and since his main argument simply fails to address the real issue, Heideggers Concept of Truth leaves its reader with the impression that the prospects for any unconditional defense of Heideggers account of truth are very bleak indeed. To be sure, there are still available interpretations la the pragmatic one, but, as Dahlstrom so nicely demonstrates, these cut Heidegger down in size to such an extent that his real concern (the question of being) gets lost in the process. Also, I take it that denying Tugendhats principle of bivalence is a very unpromising alternative. So what options are we left with? It is important not to lose sight of the fact that Tugendhat at least in WHH has no objections to the phenomenon of disclosedness as such. What he objects to in the last analysis is only that the phenomenon of disclosedness is

Conclusion

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labeled original truth. In other words, it might certainly still be the case that disclosedness designates an important phenomenon, indeed perhaps the ultimate phenomenon of phenomenological ontology. But if we are to preserve the force (cf. SZ, p. 220) of the concept of truth, then we should simply avoid applying it to the phenomenon of disclosedness. Hence, the frank confession of an older Heidegger is enough to mend matters: The question of Aletheia, of the unhiddenness [Unverborgenheit] as such, is not the question of truth. Therefore, it was not in accordance with the matter and, consequently, misleading to call Aletheia in the sense of the clearing [Lichtung] truth.6 Institut for Filosofi Aarhus Universitet filso@hum.au.dk

18 Heidegger, Zur Sache des Denkens (Tbingen: Niemeyer, 1969), p. 77 (translation from HCT, p. 403). Cf. Zur Sache des Denkens, p. 76: Aletheia, unhiddenness thought as the clearing of presence, is not yet truth. In the transcripts of Heideggers last seminar, in Zhringen, 1973, Heidegger is quoted as emphasizing the same point: Aletheia is translated with unhiddenness. This translation is exact. What this word names has not yet anything to do with truth; it is important to stress this. Heidegger, Seminare (Gesamtausgabe Band 15), ed. C. Ochwadt (Frankfurt a. M.: Klostermann, 1986), p. 396. Dahlstrom is highly critical of this selfinterpretation, partly because, as he cautions, it is not obvious that Heideggers later remarks should be read as an endorsement precisely of the sort of criticisms subsequently elaborated by Tugendhat (HCT, p. 404). Otto Pggeler argues along the same lines in his article Heideggers logische Untersuchungen, in Martin Heidegger: Innen- und Auenansichten, ed. S. Blasche et al. (Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp, 1989), pp. 75-100. Dahlstrom and Pggeler might be right on this point, although it deserves to be noted that Cristina Lafont argues persuasively in her Sprache und Welterschlieung (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1994), pp. 155-156, that Heidegger could very well have been responding to Tugendhats critique. In any case, even if Dahlstrom and Pggeler are right, that does not change the fact that the later Heideggers remark seems simply the only correct response to Tugendhats criticism.