OPPAI ORACLE

Many thinkers who have sought to unearth and make clear the conditions of human thought have noticeably avoided the question and the domain of developmental psychology. One on hand, this is understandable, and vital to the project of a truly philosophical understanding of the mind and the conditions through which knowledge, experience, and cognition generally are possible. Proximally, we do not experience or “have access” to the mind in terms of psychological principles; we chiefly have access to the mind in terms of its daily operation and phenomenological revealing-itself-to-us. As such, for a thinker like Heidegger, the question of the meaning of being and subsequent questions like the “who” of Dasein are able to sever themselves totally from an investigation of a present-at-hand object like a “developing mind.” Dasein already is, with or without an understanding of how it came to be, and so reckoning with that is—Dasein’s being—is the first and pivotal question.

However, this does not mean that the question of how Dasein emerges (in clearer terms: how does being-in-the-world come to be?, or what does the beginning of being-in-the-world look like?) is useless, impossible, or wrong. The in-the-world factual emergence and development of Dasein was simply not a major concern for Heidegger. This does not mean that it may not become of concern or interest to us, as we navigate through the unfolding of Being. With the aid of Heidegger we have a sketch of some of the constitution and the basic states of Dasein, and we may very well find it of interest to attempt to trace back under what conditions Dasein emerges (if we find the concept of Dasein “emerging” or having a “beginning” acceptable and viable in the first place, which would need to be argued and clarified if this line of thought was fully and properly pursued).

As a preliminary thought and orientation of an investigation of Dasein’s emerging, we must ask how such an investigation might be possible. The most proximal “clue” to the development of Dasein, our own Dasein, is unfortunately not able to reveal anything at all in this respect. The revealing of the emergence of Dasein to itself is untenable because the conditions of “self-understanding” or “self-reflection” that might ordinarily be able to give us some insight is already indicative of a mode of being that is already in-the-world, and already Dasein. If one tries to recall, through memory or intuition, a sort of being before being-in-the-world proper, and how being-in-the-world emerged or arose for them, it is a task doomed by the fact that recollection and understanding already function fundamentally and originally in being-in-the-world. “Remembering” and “reflection” is the gathering of aspects of Dasein by Dasein, and so can not remotely orient us to not-Dasein or before-Dasein. Thus, Dasein itself is not able to grasp the question of the emergence or development of Dasein.

We are saved from this situation by the fact that Dasein is not alone in-the-world. Dasein is, in fact, always Dasein-with (Mitdasein) and proximally aware of others. In the condition of Dasein-with, there lies a clue towards a Dasein that is not one’s own, and in such a phenomenon lies the potential for an attention-towards or an investigation-of the emergence and development of a Dasein that is not one’s own. An aspect of Dasein-with that makes itself known in Dasein’s experience is “seeing” other Dasein, and this can be understood phenomenologically. One directly “experiences” or can more properly “put into words” the condition of Dasein-with when one is discoursing with a friend. The condition of Dasein-with “makes itself less seen” or is “less seen in” ones relation with a rock, or, principally for us in our consideration of Dasein’s development, a sperm cell. The question arises of how, factually, the condition for the recognition of external or “other” Dasein that is indicative of Dasein-with emerges in the world. In the pursuit of an understanding of the emerge of Dasein-with, the coming-into-being of Other Dasein may be at least marginally revealed. Simultaneous attention towards the development of our understanding of a developing biological human as “other Dasein” and of the being of that developing human seems to be a viable strategy.

A close study, factual and phenomenological, of developmental psychology may be useful to us here. While the insights of psychology typically do not elucidate questions relating to Being and Dasein, it would be careless to fully throw out the aspects of Dasein that they can reveal. One can approach psychological data in a phenomenological and interpretive way, in the sense that such data is not taken as a collection of mere facts making up a physical or metaphysical “picture or system of the world,” but to approach the “realm” or “clearing” of this work as an expression and a clue to the apprehension and interpretation of the the Dasein of others.

Factual aspects of the behavior of infants can contribute to a phenomenological picture of Dasein-in-development, and can center and elucidate the question of whether the equiprimordial factical aspects of Dasein come “all at once” or have a consistent “unfolding” that is interpretable with implications for Dasein broadly. This question, while not essential to the meaning of being, and not necessarily “overlooked” by Heidegger as much as “set aside,” is, I believe, still a worthy and interesting one.

Deoster wrote: Wed Jul 01, 2026 10:46 pm

Factual aspects of the behavior of infants can contribute to a phenomenological picture of Dasein-in-development, and can center and elucidate the question of whether the equiprimordial factical aspects of Dasein come “all at once” or have a consistent “unfolding” that is interpretable with implications for Dasein broadly. This question, while not essential to the meaning of being, and not necessarily “overlooked” by Heidegger as much as “set aside,” is, I believe, still a worthy and interesting one.

From what I gathered in your post, this is the essential point: Can the study of developmental psychology be of use to Heidegger's phenomenology, or is it a kind of scientific study that is ultimately separate from his real concerns, as he is quick to point out most "sciences" are? I think you're onto something here. I haven't read very much of Merleau-Ponty and the later phenomenologists who picked up where Heidegger left off in Being and Time in a lot of ways. From what I understand, Heidegger's analysis of Dasein was all done for the purpose of getting at the ground of being-as-such. But these later French guys actually found all this Dasein-centric thought to be more interesting, so they wanted to make this more in-depth. And they also happened to be doing this in the 40s-50s, when the field of psychology was experiencing great breakthroughs.

A question that some commentators asked and which I find interesting is at what level of development human beings can "be" Dasein (or "have" it, or whatever other verb you want to use). There might be a good argument that an organism can be a human far before it ever becomes Dasein. Dreyfus makes this point in his commentary as well. He contrasts Japanese and American child-rearing practices (the book was written in 1990, so who knows what's out of date or not) and explains that much of what creates the "Dasein" of that individual baby will rely on cultural "background practices" that shape it before it is ever as self-aware as we would think is necessary to have an "identity," such as how much time it spends swaddled versus actively roaming (apparently Japanese babies spend much more time swaddled).

He mentions how this can continue onward and upward through development. As an example, he points to how close people stand to each other when talking to each other in different cultures. People in North Africa tend to give a lot less "personal space" to their conversation partners than do people in Scandinavia, for example. Of course, we can talk about exceptions to these rules that make them fluid. You will stand closer than normal if you're in a noisy room and need the other person to hear you better. You will stand further than normal if the other person is sick. And so on. But you can only ever "explain" these by resorting to the original background practices themselves. They are just "there" before we ever begin to think theoretically. And our ideas of what it is to know, to communicate, to have an identity, and the like are all bound up with them. I think this has some good empirical evidence from behavioral psychology.

This might have a potentially sinister undertone, however. Some accuse Heidegger of endorsing a radical kind of "cultural determinism" and with it "cultural relativism." But rather than being a kind of enlightened, liberal "cultural relativism," it's a very isolating one. It might be read to mean that a Scandinavian and North African could never "really" understand each other, because who "they" are is constructed from fundamentally different background practices that can't be undone or done away with at once. It's not hard to see how you could link that to a Nazi idea that Jews are "fundamentally" unable to even inhabit the same world as Aryans and therefore that cultural dialogue and coexistence is impossible.

For me though, I think that this idea focuses too much on the first half of Being and Time and not enough on the second half. He makes it very clear in the second half that while we can never exist APART from the background practices were were brought up in, we are never strictly BOUND by them either. Our reaction always must EMERGE FROM them and be IN REFERENCE TO them, but that reaction ITSELF can be anything. A quote from him I like which seems to make this point is that "Every man is born as many men and dies as a single one." It's the same reason he refused to ever take a totally fatalistic attitude towards Enframing. The crisis is here and is unavoidable, but our fate is not "a fate that compels."

Amlux wrote: Thu Jul 02, 2026 12:17 am

I haven't read very much of Merleau-Ponty and the later phenomenologists who picked up where Heidegger left off in Being and Time in a lot of ways.

It's true that I think Merleau-Ponty looks more into these sort of things. That's certainly someone I need to get around to reading. Him and Gadamer interest me in terms of how other people have taken up and evolved certain parts of Heidegger's project.

Amlux wrote: Thu Jul 02, 2026 12:17 am

A question that some commentators asked and which I find interesting is at what level of development human beings can "be" Dasein (or "have" it, or whatever other verb you want to use). There might be a good argument that an organism can be a human far before it ever becomes Dasein.

This is the question that's quite interesting to me, and particularly how and why they "get" it. Part of my impulse towards wanting an answer here is probably not "skillful" though, as I think it continues to reflect a basic desire for a very simple metaphysical "ground" or "explanation" for our existence.

Amlux wrote: Thu Jul 02, 2026 12:17 am

For me though, I think that this idea focuses too much on the first half of Being and Time and not enough on the second half. He makes it very clear in the second half that while we can never exist APART from the background practices were were brought up in, we are never strictly BOUND by them either. Our reaction always must EMERGE FROM them and be IN REFERENCE TO them, but that reaction ITSELF can be anything. A quote from him I like which seems to make this point is that "Every man is born as many men and dies as a single one." It's the same reason he refused to ever take a totally fatalistic attitude towards Enframing. The crisis is here and is unavoidable, but our fate is not "a fate that compels."

This is a good point and a very good quote!

As much as I want to add to this discussion, I've tried reading through his works and I find his German prose to be too boring to finish

Hans Sepp wrote: Thu Jul 02, 2026 6:46 am

As much as I want to add to this discussion, I've tried reading through his works and I find his German prose to be too boring to finish

Which works? The early ones are dry. The later ones can be really pretty in English at least. I don't know about the original German

Amlux wrote: Thu Jul 02, 2026 6:55 am

Which works? The early ones are dry. The later ones can be really pretty in English at least.

I've tried reading through Being and Time, only because he was often cited as an influence on this novel on which I had to write my final German exam and I wanted to flex on my teacher.

Amlux wrote: Thu Jul 02, 2026 6:55 am

I don't know about the original German

It's very convoluted - I imagine the English translation needed a ton of footnotes / explanations / direct translations of non-English words.

Thank you for making this thread, Deoster. I think this is a really interesting discussion.

I agree that the question you are asking probably shifts the discussion away from Heidegger's central concern, as I understand it. Heidegger isn't asking how Dasein comes into being developmentally, but what structures make any disclosure of Being possible in the first place. The existential structures are equiprimordial because they function as conditions of possibility rather than developmental stages. Once we ask whether these structures emerge gradually during development, we have shifted from asking about fundamental ontology to the problem of individuation. That, to me, is one of the points at which later French thinkers such as Simondon and Deleuze begin to transform the transcendental question in interesting ways.

My somewhat idiosyncratic reading is that Difference and Repetition can be read as an indirect response to this aspect of Heidegger. While Deleuze rarely mentions Heidegger in that book, he is clearly (to my mind at least) one of the important interlocutors in the background. Deleuze inherits Heidegger's critique of Western metaphysics, but argues that Heidegger's response remains too organized around the ontological difference between Being and beings. Deleuze instead seeks to think difference itself as transcendental and genetic, as productive of the distinctions through which beings and subjects are individuated.

In effect, Heidegger radicalizes the distinction between Being and beings, whereas Deleuze argues that this still does not go far enough. Instead, Being is understood univocally, while individuation proceeds through differential and intensive processes.

So instead of asking what structures must already characterize Dasein for Being to be disclosed, he asks what differential processes of individuation produce subjects capable of disclosure in the first place. Of course, the validity of this move depends on whether you find his reading of Heidegger defensible