Heidegger’s philosophical themes could be travestied into Nazi propaganda

Evidence

Heidegger’s Nazism was significant because he was now in a position of real power over others’ lives. He had developed from being the nutty professor in funny clothes, writing beautiful and barely comprehensible works of genius for the few, into the official whom every student and professor would have to court. He could ruin careers and endanger people’s physical safety if he chose to. Heidegger had said that Dasein’s call would be unrecognisable, but few people reading Being and Time could have imagined that it would sound so much like a call to Nazi obedience. — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 271

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The closing irony — that Dasein’s call would be unrecognisable yet sound so much like a call to Nazi obedience — captures the whole tragic ambiguity of Heidegger’s political turn in one devastating line.
• XREF: connects to: Heidegger’s ‘uncanniness’ described Germans’ pervasive anxiety and unreality under Nazism — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café: Freedom,…, 258; Heidegger’s core concepts could as easily justify anti-Nazi resistance as submission — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café: Freedom,…, 294; Heidegger’s Nazi commitment emerged from the objective structure of his philosophy — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 2299

Broader Connections

• Heidegger’s core concepts could as easily justify anti-Nazi resistance as submission #expands (0.80) — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 294
• Heidegger’s Nazi commitment emerged from the objective structure of his philosophy #qualifies (0.75) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2299