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Hermeneutics

Assigned Reading

• Winograd and Flores, Understanding and Being (Chapter 3)

Additional Resources and Readings

• Hans Georg Gadamer, Sections from Philosophical Hermeneutics.
• On Gadamer and the similarities between his hermeneutics and developments in Anglo-American philosophy and cognitive science, especially that of Donald Davidson:
  • Rorty, Richard, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1979. Parts II & III.
  • Dasenbrock, Reed W. (ed.), Literary Theory After Davidson, University Park: Pennsylvania University Press, 1993.
  • Davidson, Donald, Radical Interpretation, Dialectica, 27 (1973): 314–28
• Michael Reddy, The conduit metaphor: A case of frame conflict in our language about language. (A. Ortony, Ed.) Metaphor and Thought, Cambridge University Press, 1993, 164-201.

Discussion Questions

How does hermeneutics relate to phenomenology?

With which school of hermeneutics would Heidegger relate? Why?

Is there a single meaning in a body of text? Is there ever one correct interpretation? Why or why not?

What is a hermeneutic circle? Do you see any way to break out of the circle?

"There is no neutral viewpoint from which we can see our beliefs as things, since we always operate within the framework they provide." (Winograd and Flores 32, my emphasis) Can we have objective knowledge of others' beliefs?

Could neuroscience provide an escape from the hermeneutic circle? That is, could we gain a perfect, objective understanding of the contents and predispositions of the mind by tracing its literal, deterministic operation?

Responses

Hermeneutics and the Debate over a Living Constitution -- Matt Garr

When reading of the debate in hermeneutics between the objectivists and those led by Gadamer, I was struck how analogous this debate is to the legal debate in the modern United States Supreme Court over the nature of the constitution. In that realm, Justice Antonin Scalia subscribes to a textualist, originalist interpretation. Essentially, this means that the Constitution is not a living document, rather the fundamental meaning can be extracted from the text of the document itself. Such an interpretation would place Scalia firmly in the objectivist camp if applying hermeneutics to the interpretation of the Constitution. In the other camp are justices such as Breyer, who feel that legislative history, the common law of the United States, are better reflections of the intent of the document. Such justices would subscribe to Gadamer’s view that interpretation is the primary act, where reading is an act of assigning meaning to a text through interpretation in the context of one’s experience.

Understanding this debate within hermeneutics, sheds enormous light upon why there is such vigorous debate over the meaning of the Constitution. Choosing to rely only on the Constitution itself, as the originalists do, provides a different set of evidence from which to base legal decisions than those who subscribe to the idea of a living Constitution. In the debate over second-amendment gun rights, for example, an originalist feels that a militia is still as relevant to the defense of the nation as ever, for the Constitution itself says this is true, and other period literature corroborates this viewpoint. On the other hand, if the Constitution is alive, one sees that a militia is not as relevant a concept today as it was in a society recently divorced from British rule. There are countless conversations reinterpreting the concept of a militia, which change the meaning of the concept in the modern day.

The originalists, such as Scalia, however seem to be maintaining an untenable position when viewed through Gadamer’s lens. While Scalia argues that the Constitution may be interpreted only through its text, doing so is not possible, as the text was formed as part of a long and rich history of conversations embedded in the Dasein of the founding fathers of the United States. Truly understanding the Constitution requires complete knowledge about these conversations, and this knowledge will never be complete, for language, per Gadamer, cannot fully express the conversations. In simpler terms, we cannot understand the full context in which the founding fathers authored the Constitution.

From Gadamer’s lens, it is also unclear how an originalist could claim that he or she truly understands the Constitution as a fixed document. Because interpretation is always based on prejudice, even an originalst viewpoint must be fundamentally colored by its proponent’s background.

To me, the objectivist school of hermeneutics ultimately seems naive and flawed. There is always more to a text, sentence, or action than is evident in the visible or documented expression. Often hidden are the intents and motivations that compel a person to expound a certain viewpoint—to understand these we frequently seek guidance in the author or actor’s background, and often find illuminating but incomplete facts. That this information often is so explanatory seems in itself a disproval of the objectivist view. We know through the very presence of vigorous debate that our prejudices provide us with differing interpretations of the same text. If it were truly possible, as Scalia argues, to step back in time and outside one’s prejudices to interpret the Constitution for what it truly means, there would be precious little legal debate. That there is so much disagreement proves otherwise.

Descartes Had It Right - MF Schar

Hermeneutics as a life philosophy – Chris Anderson

The end of chapter 3 of Understanding Computers and Cognition reads “Heidegger insists that it is meaningless to talk about the existence of objects and their properties in the absence of concernful activity, with its potential for breaking down.” Which, taken to its logical conclusion, must imply that if a tree falls down in the forest and no one is around to hear it, we don’t care. This offends my rationalistic tradition-conditioned mind. Surely, the tree really did fall. And, surely, we should be concerned about how we might find this out or justify its existence. Accepting that we should not talk about that tree except as it relates to observers and interactors is almost bizarre.

However, I am drawn to the solutions that Heidegger’s hermeneutics offers: there is no problem of other minds, for instance. You do not have to reduce the mental to symbols (though perhaps it is compatible with other reductionist accounts). I wonder, however, whether it relies too much upon human intuition. As a philosophy, it relies upon certain intuitions about the world – for instance, our lack of a complete understanding of our immediate situation.

Can we violate some of these assumptions? Suppose you could build a machine that did have symbolic representations of the world around it, so the act of breaking-down is not always a useful one. In the case that we have a being-in-the-world that is more than just part of the flow of the world, but can represent it as well. Maybe it does have a theory for every domain. This all assumes that a version of AI similar to GOFAI is possible. Even so, if you can get part of the way to the machine really being a being-in-the-world, it seems as if some things – like a hammer – gain meaning independent of their “involvement” with the world. Perhaps, though, that is their involvement in the world. Perhaps I am confused about the nature of the fundamental tenets of Heidegger’s philosophy.

The fundamental question I want to ask is: does Heidegger’s philosophy rely upon our intrinsic weaknesses as people, or is it based upon fundamental properties (dare I use the term?) of beings-in-the-world.

Being within cultures: thoughts on reading (mostly about) Heidegger - Luke Dahl

Its difficult to put into words my impressions of or response to Heidegger’s philosophy, since it is complex and subtle. However, the thing I appreciate most about (my understanding of) Heidegger’s thought is how well it describes some of the aspects of life that are most interesting to me. I’ll give an example:

I’ve been practicing the non-violent martial art, Aikido, for over 10 years (since my mid twenties.) I find it an extremely rewarding practice, yet it is difficult to describe to non-practitioners why it is so rewarding or even exactly what Aikido is. It is not used for beating people up or ensuring personal safety (although it may aid in situations where these are required.) It is non-competitive, so there is no game to win.

It is a socially constructed practice that people engage in together for reasons they cannot entirely make explicit. No individual contains the whole of Aikido, and although there are conventions and traditions, no set of rules can represent the entirety of this sphere of human activity. The practitioners create Aikido through their actions, and these actions are informed by the practitoners’ interpretation of what it means to do Aikido. Through this same interpretation they define what it means to be an Aikidoist, and hence choose what it means to be themselves.

Aikido is an activity that participants choose consciously to begin, and so is different than the language, culture, and “implicit pedagogy” that we become selves within. But what about music? As infants we lack the coordination and mental skill to grow up as instrumentalists, but we certainly gain our sense of self, and become a musical listener, within a culture that is permeated with music. And not just any music but specifically that of our own culture, whose practices have existed long before us and which necessarily bias and limit our conception of what music is.

Heidegger claims that we can never be entirely aware of or free from the implicit practices that we emerged within. Heidegger’s thought accounts for the sense (which I suspect we all have at times) that the actions, words, and thoughts available to us are limited by some fact beyond our control. Musicians and composers sometimes have this same sense about the musical actions available to them: “If only I could step outside of my experiences and culture, then I’d be free to make really new music!”

So, we cannot step outside our culture, but what about when we encounter others? Perhaps Heidegger discusses this at some point, but how does our background affect our conception of other cultures, other musics? How do these encounters affect our sense of self (or “being”)?

One last question I have is how do we use Heidegger’s way of understanding ourselves? How does this framework allow us to say useful things, or more importantly make useful changes?

After class - Chris Anderson

In our discussion of hermeneutics, we touched on how teaching is not a process of conveying information, but on shaping the prejudices and other preconditions in students. That seems to lend itself well to a small class like ours, where the teacher can get feedback on what preconceived notions we have pretty easily. In a larger class - maybe a videotaped one -, I wonder how the thrownness of teaching affects the ability to understand the class' prejudices.

After class - Jeff Wear

As we discussed in lecture, teaching is not a matter of merely transferring information from the lecturer's mind to that of the student. But is this nevertheless the implicit goal of tutoring? And is this desirable, if possible? It seems to me that the more the teacher is able to frame his material in the student's cognitive language (in the context of the student's background), the more easily the student will absorb the material, without having to actively interpret it. If the text in question is written completely in terms the student understands, they would be able to read it directly, would they not? One-on-one tutoring is seen as the most effective means of teaching, at least in part because the teacher can devote personal attention to engaging the student's individual needs. But perhaps the danger here is that the student is not exposed as much to other viewpoints - other backgrounds from which to approach the material - that will extend his or her own horizon (as the tutor would be their sole conversational partner). Perhaps the best model for learning in this case would not be a personal tutor but rather a small discussion section where the teacher can pause to ensure each student grasps the material but in which multiple viewpoints can mingle.