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Activists against the “climate change” such as Last Generation are drawing into their activism more and more scientists. Greta Thunberg once asked her audiences that she wants the world listen to the scientists. Now that also scientists in some cases become activists themselves the discussion of such political engagement of scientists become a hefty argument.

Similar was the situation in the US in the late 1960ies about the war in Vietnam and the atomic bomb, the science research for military exploits. Take the case of Joseph Weizenbaum who protested at his workplace at the MIT against the contributions to warfare by MIT’s research.

Since the problem has not changed up today there must be a deeper reason for it. In fact – and this is the idea of a hint that comes to my mind and why I would want to drop this comment today – it is the separation of science – in German we say “Naturwissenschaften” – from philosophy. I understand philosophy as connecting believes, morality, holistic thinking. In philosophy there is also a long term view possible of a “whole picture” of the world, whereas the analytical and detailed view of the world looses such holistic views with every inch it moves forward in more and more detailed reasearch.

This seems to be an unsolvable problem. In fact, the political engagement of all sorts of people, not only scientists, but especially scientists, seem to become a spare-time hobby of moralists. Just as if moral responsibility was a spare-time occupation whereas it should be the inner carrying pillow of any person, be it a scientist, a politician, or someone from the economic field.

I can’t suggest a solution to this basic problem of our technologically advanced society, as such a solution would question the basic assumptions of how “science” has to be and a “scientist” to be as a social being or a human, a man, at all. People from the science who walk outside their “churches” tend to either be burned (“social shitstorm”, mediatic murder…) or ridiculed… Seems that there is no error and “imagination” allowed. Inhuman infallibility rules our science. Why? Because it is a marketing tool.

The perversion of human life through marketing is the deeper reason for this problem. Remedies exist only in very small doses, to be given individually… and beware!

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…what you are: The human mind is a physical structure

Reading the article Does mathematics really exist in the universe or is it just a human assumption? by Josh Anderson I want to drop a quick comment.

It is a general idea and long-standing tradition inherent to such thinking and tinkering with similar questions which rarely underline the fact that the human being is not an entity coming from “outside” the universe with its physical laws. Or, to be more precise, the structure of a human being is the same or similar to other structures in the universe. The human intelligent mind fools us to draw an existential line between “us” (human beings) and “it” (the universe, the world, – i.e. everything non-human).

In the case of mathematics, just as one example of many structures inherent to the universe, we might have to bridge the gap between “invention” and “discovery”. In other words, this is a gap between “abstract thinking” (abstraction) and “thinking in concrete terms”, experimental on facts. One would say this repeats the difference between Platoneian and Aristotelian schools, but I would say it is not. Maybe it is deriving from that or those ancient greek philosophers felt this “gap” and had to either stress on or the other side to explain the world.

Just imagine if there was no difference between concept and fact, between “invention” and “discovery”, that we ourselves are of the same structure of how we are thinking and thus what we are thinking, but not yet having arrived at the proper thinking of what is.

(Maybe this “not having yet arrived at the proper thinking” is an idea derived from Heidegger’s lecture, yes, but he didn’t push the idea far enough to get to this meeting point between physicality and the mind. He still ended up in some quirky ideological historical and pseudo-historical conundrum, discussing the past and traditions. He did not break through to say that we only can think what we are.)

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About reading Heidegger

Just finished reading “Was heißt denken” by Martin Heidegger. Initially the text is in pleasant ways not only challenging but also made me smile as being inherently witty. Later on, Heidegger gets hooked on explaining Nietzsches “Übermensch” in order to connect his assumption that “we still do not think” (“Das Bedenklichste ist, dass wir noch nicht denken“) – where the word “we” (Wir) on some pages is used in an inflationary way – to Nietzsches monumental legacy. My “Take-Away” from the reading is a kind-of explanation of what Nietzsches highest idea on future mankind: living in a world dominated by technology – quite visionary I must say! – might bring, but Heidegger’s text does not answer its promising title: What means to think. (Was heißt denken? – It is the printed version of a lecture from the early 1950ies).

Looking up Heidegger about his Nazism I found a lengthy article on Wikipedia dedicated to this subject. Despite my sympathy for Heidegger’s language, his way of thinking and discussing along etymological traits of German words, which sometimes verge into word-play and often seeks proof in ancient greek (which looks to me as some people over-stress a noble ancestry and bears eerie similarity to the Nazi’s “Arierpass”, while on the same time balancing between formats of philosophy and poetry, the Wikipedia article heavily tainted my idea about the philosopher. Although Heidegger’s interest in Hölderlin as a philosopher expressing his ideas in poetry, cherishing poetry as the essential method describing the world – which is a very fascinating idea indeed! -; it is inexcusable to me that such a high mind can be so narrowminded to adhere to stupid concepts and utterances of Nazism and Hitler’s hypertrophic Germanism. I can’t say – as I don’t research the subject – how such narrow-mindedness occurs in the mind of a great and “open-minded” thinker simultaneosly. – One tiny detail from Heidegger’s biography nevertheless gave a hint to answer his question: When in the last days of World War II Heidegger was drawn to the Nazi-German “Volkssturm” he apparently tried to get away from action as fast as possible. This is most understandable for “ordinary” people. But it is in stark contrast to how Heidegger hailed the German heroic character earlier on in his writings. The bravery and force of everything smelling German (as promoted by Nazi ideology) did not find a mirroring reality in the life of this healthy, then 55 Martin H.

Insofar Heidegger discusses Schopenhauer’s “Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung“, and muses at length about the “Wille” and the “Wollen” in the context of a mental dichotomy of reality and idealism (just in the same way as Schiller did a few years earlier on in “Briefe zur ästhetischen Erziehung des Menschen“) there is a notable lack of courage in Heidegger. It is to me just simply and plainly morally disappointing. More than that, I even find it tragic, not only regarding Heidegger’s biography as a whole, but in my personal perception, coming to know about the not only moral but philosophical erring of a person who I thought should know better. He has no other idea then a pyramidal “Führer-Prinzip”, even in philosophy. He never (at least in “Was heißt denken?”) touches on the subjects of cooperation or democracy, on group-work or social ties in a constructive manner. The only “group” he is talking is unfortunately the obnoxious word “Volk” (“the people”) which in German has a deprecated meaning, to say at least.

What do I learn from this? Sapienza non è Saggezza. We need in the first place wisdom (Weisheit, saggezza) , in the second place knowledge (Wissen, sapienza). Having both might be the best fit as a life-long challenge for a human being. Isn’t it?