Heidegger Is Heidegger, Even If He Was a Nazi!

2006/5/19 21:55:04

Heidegger was always associated with the Nazis -- this is true. Just like Karajan, one of the greatest conductors of the last century, who was also associated with the Nazis. Among scientists, there were even more. From a global perspective, Nazism certainly deserves to be condemned. But the reasons are too complex, and political reasons cannot overshadow achievements in other domains. You can't listen to Karajan conducting Beethoven's symphonies and hear Hitler giving a speech just because Karajan once had Nazi ties.

Great upheavals in history are often driven by coincidence. Take Wittgenstein, one of the greatest philosophers of the first half of the last century -- he and Hitler were classmates in secondary school. The former was Jewish and homosexual. Something very unusual occurred between them. Hitler later targeted two groups in the concentration camps: Jews and homosexuals. If not for Wittgenstein, there might have been no Hitler. The course of history is often connected to bizarre little incidents, and it's hard to draw any definitive conclusions from them.

Nazism was certainly bad, and Heidegger's attitude toward Nazism is certainly a question worth scrutinizing. Yet Heidegger is Heidegger, even if he was a Nazi. Politics and morality have nothing to do with art, science, philosophy, and so on. If that weren't the case, the uncertainty principle in quantum mechanics couldn't be used either, because its discoverer Heisenberg led the Nazi atomic bomb research. Richard Strauss's music couldn't be performed either, even though he was one of the greatest composers of the twentieth century. Heidegger's connection to Nazism is a stain, but it absolutely does not diminish his achievements in philosophy. Is there really anything to doubt about this?

Art, science, philosophy, and similar fields all have their own standards of judgment, which are unrelated to politics and morality. Nobody is perfect. You can attack a person with politics and morality, but you cannot attack a person's academic achievements that way. Academic matters must be judged by academic standards. This is a basic, non-negotiable stance.