finitude

death

Martin Heidegger

is (i.e. Endlichkeit) more or less a reference to death.

finitude In BT 'finitude' (Endlichkeit) invariably refers, more or less explicitly, to death and is thus temporal finitude. Finitude haunts our whole existence: DASEIN 'does not have an end [Ende], at which it just stops, it exist finitely' (BT, 329). (inwood 69)

is always taken as a given in philosophy, something to be worked within.

Finitude is always taken as a given, something to be worked within.

is an aspect of being in that being requires other things to reveal itself in a civilization, amounting to an always necessarily partial revelation, and a revelation within the context of a civilization that has a beginning and an end.

Being is finite in three senses: (a) It requires other things (God, etc.) to reveal itself in a civilization, (b) No revelation of being reveals everything there is... there is always more than any civilization discloses. (Hence die finitude of beyng refutes any idealism.) (c) Every civilization has a beginning and a end. (71)

is concerned not only with spatial, temporal, definitional, or cognitive limits, but it also refers to how an awareness of absence is intrinsic to the presence of things.

Being is associated with the process of disclosing the meaning of the world in its finitude. Accordingly, being is 'essentially finite' (WM, 108). The finitude of being does not refer simply to spatial, temporal, definitional, or cognitive limits, but also to how an awareness of absence is intrinsic to the presence of things (BP, 311).

is not a quantitative boundary, but a relationship to nothingness. Man, as the 'placeholder of the nothing,' is the most finite of all creatures.

We might compare Balthasar's sense of finitude to that of Heidegger, who also rejects the notion of finitude as a quantitative boundary. For Heidegger, finitude is the relationship to Nothingness... it follows, therefore, that man as the 'placeholder of the nothing' is the most finite of all creatures. Balthasar would agree, it seems. But he would add, beyond Heidegger, that such finitude emerges specifically out of man's relationship to the infinite. It is not the case that man becomes less finite the closer he approaches the infinite... rather, the contrary is true.

is nothing apart from its dialectical relativity to infinitude and vice versa.

For Hegel finitude is nothing apart from its dialectical relativity to infinitude and vice versa. The between is simply the dialectical relativity, the dynamic . . .

is our fundamental way of being. And in order to become authentic, we cannot abandon or deceive ourselves about it, but must safeguard it.

For Heidegger, finitude is our fundamental way of being. And in order to become authentic, we cannot abandon or deceive ourselves about it, but must safeguard it. As Heidegger says, 'Finitude only is in truly becoming finite.

is primary. Infinity is a derivative, or secondary to finitude.

Original time is finite' (BT, 331). The time that is infinite is 'derived' or secondary... Heidegger implies that infinity (Unendlichkeit) is posterior to finitude by writing Un-endlichkeit ('infinitude') and un-endlich ('in-finite'). (69)

finitude, n.All

finitude