GR translation: their own pitiable contingency here, in its midst

[jody boy]

Disclaimer: I'm not a German speaker, and even in translation, I find
Heidegger tough sledding. I'm curious, though, about how such a
divergent group of philosophers, social theorists, etc., could have
sprung from one individual- Husserl. Surely, Husserl is the Bob Dylan
of 20th century German Philosophy.

In that regard, Marcuse is much more accessible for the English
Monoglot, at least for me. And, although, he seems overly romantic
now, he had a much bigger impact in  America than the reformed Nazi,
Heidegger, during the 60's and 70's.

Regarding technology, both of them seem to agree: technology is
Instrumental in nature, a convenience, if you will, and as such- a tap
root to the Id. Marcuse, I think, makes the case more clearly by
hueing closer to Marx- Labor becomes part of the machine, another cog.
By avoiding Freud, Heidegger seems more capable of pealing away all
that we take for granted, without realizing it, and coming closer to
the essence of technology, that which manifests itself within the
human sphere.

But it is the social aspects and effects of technology that Pynchon
seems to be concerned with here- the way in which it disrupts and
reorganizes society in unpredictable ways, and that includes the
technology of presentation and representation, e.g., film (and then
t.v. and the WWW, etc., in his other works), often leading to a sense
of helplessness, as much as, empowerment. Humans become the agents of
manifestation of processes that take on a life of their own.



On Thu, May 11, 2017 at 3:32 AM, Kai Frederik Lorentzen
<lorentzen at hotmail.de> wrote:
>
>> If both the people launching the rockets and those being targeted by them
>> are victims
> of pure chance, then who or what, if anything, is controlling the rockets? <
>
>
> I'd say it's --- the Gestell (enframing).
>
>> ... In defining the essence of technology as Gestell, Heidegger indicated
>> that all that has come to presence in the world has been enframed. Thus what
>> is revealed in the world, what has shown itself as itself (the truth of
>> itself) required first an Enframing, literally a way to exist in the world,
>> to be able to be seen and understood. Concerning the essence of technology
>> and how we see things in our technological age, the world has been framed as
>> the "standing-reserve." Heidegger writes,
>
> Enframing means the gathering together of that setting-upon which sets upon
> man, i.e., challenges him forth, to reveal the real, in the mode of
> ordering, as standing-reserve. Enframing means that way of revealing which
> holds sway in the essence of modern technology and which is itself nothing
> technological.
>
> Furthermore, Heidegger uses the word in a way that is uncommon by giving
> Gestell an active role. In ordinary usage the word would signify simply a
> display apparatus of some sort, like a book rack, or picture frame; but for
> Heidegger, Gestell is literally a challenging forth, or performative
> "gathering together", for the purpose of revealing or presentation ... <
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gestell
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Question_Concerning_Technology
> http://www.psyp.org/question_concerning_technology.pdf
>
> The human being is not the lord of beings, but the shepherd of Being.
> Read more at:
> https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/m/martin_heidegger.html
> The human being is not the lord of beings, but the shepherd of Being.
> Read more at:
> https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/m/martin_heidegger.html
>
> Am 07.05.2017 um 01:50 schrieb jody boy:
>
>  Pitiable contingency is one of three qualities that together define
> their existence,
> here, along with the War and the "absolute rule of chance." There would seem
> to
> be an ironic connection between their condition and our narrator's
> suggestion, not
> sure where in the text, that we, too, "will want cause and effect" the
> absolute lack
> of which is as terrifying as its opposite- everything being caught in
> a causal web of
> connection. Of course, causality and contingency are not mutually exclusive,
> but
> in a universe ruled by absolute chance, causality is ultimately meaningless.
> Not
> that meaninglessness is such a bad thing...
>
> Ironic, too, in the sense of Roger Mexico's suggestion that Pointsman's
> focus on
> causality in his zeal to unravel the connection between Slothrop's map
> and the V2
> strikes in London, is outdated, and that he needs to move beyond cause
> and effect
> in order to come to terms with the two distinct yet complementary
> phenomenon.
>
> If both the people launching the rockets and those being targeted by
> them are victims
> of pure chance, then who or what, if anything, is controlling the
> rockets? Which leads us
> back to the consequences of Slothrop's conditioning forming an
> ?unintended? connection
> between cause and effect.
>
> On Sat, May 6, 2017 at 9:21 AM, Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> V96.5-16, P97.40-98.10   How seriously is she playing? In a conquered
> country, one’s own occupied country, it’s better, she believes, to
> enter into some formal, rationalized version of what, outside,
> proceeds without form or decent limit day and night, the summary
> executions, the roustings, beatings, subterfuge, paranoia, shame . . .
> though it is never discussed among them openly, it would seem Katje,
> Gottfried, and Captain Blicero have agreed that this Northern and
> ancient form, one they all know and are comfortable with—the strayed
> children, the wood-wife in the edible house, the captivity, the
> fattening, the Oven—shall be their preserving routine, their shelter,
> against what outside none of them can bear—the War, the absolute rule
> of chance, their own pitiable contingency here, in its midst. . . .
>
> What does "contingency" mean here?
> -
> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?listpynchon-l
>
> -
> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=nchon-l
> .
>
>
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