ABSTRACT
This chapter examines Heidegger’s involvement with the Nazis in light of the account of Western history that he introduces in Being and Time, develops in his work from the 1930s, and finalizes in his lectures on technology in the 1940s. Specifically, I start with a summary of Heidegger’s aim in Being and Time, i.e., to “raise anew the question of the meaning of being” via a “deconstruction of the history of ontology.” I then demonstrate that Heidegger’s early enthusiasm for National Socialism was partially based on his belief that the Nazis represented a break from the Western tradition that begins with Greek metaphysics and culminates in the human dislocation found in our modern, technologically driven societies. From here, I show that Heidegger realized that National Socialism actually represented the apotheosis of modern technology. I also explain how Heidegger’s critique of technology develops out of his disillusionment with the Nazis, and so amounts to an implicit critique of National Socialism. Finally, I object to Heidegger’s account of the Western tradition by showing that his focus on the general trends of history overlooks the concrete suffering of individual human beings. But then I illustrate how this criticism is addressed by one of Heidegger’s students: Emmanuel Levinas.
