Com 520 - Philosophy of Communication - Week 12

Week 12

There were a lot of great ideas presented this week.  I bumped into the problem of agreeing and relating to most of them, but they were presented as competing philosophies.   I found myself attempting to reconcile my thoughts, and that ultimately changed how I view Being.

Heidegger (1977) viewed being as having an “I” that is the culmination of one’s historical past.  It views itself against the future, and it is fully interactive with the environment.   Levinas suggests there is no “I”, but a collection preconscious experiences that are not attached to ego or intention. 

Kristeva also speaks to preconscious states as we tend to feel our emotions first and then fill them in with reason.   I not only agree with Kristeva, but our cultural shortfall is allowing ourselves to be emotionally confused by others rather than developing our emotional skills, and then listening to them.  

 Mickunas, through Merlau-Ponty, suggests communication manifests from our physical orientation using our bodies as the center of our world and sensory experience. Mickunas is difficult to ignore due to the volume of language that uses spatial, bodily and sensory references.  

I agree with these thoughts, but according to Levinas and Mickunas, I cannot.  Heidegger’s being is   formed through historical context that forms an “I” at the center of being, while Levinas and Mickunas rejects an “I.”  However, Levinas and Mickunas then go on to describe communication with the world in   similar fashions as Heidegger’s use of historical context.  It was a bit confusing for me.

A questioned popped into my mind: Why can’t our being be dynamic?  I’m not always thinking about myself as being, or “I.”  In fact, I think I walk around most of the day like Levinas, Kristeva and Mickunas might suggest.  However, there are times when my being snaps into form and I’m aware of myself relative to whatever is confronting me, and I’m consciously evaluating possibilities for resolution.   In many ways, it feels like Levinas and Mickunas are speaking to the unconscious, and Heidegger is speaking to the conscious. 

 Aristotle and Heidegger (1977) looked to a singular form of being that prevailed over the other forms of being.  Levinas and Mickunas are speaking to being without ego, but again, this is a singular view of existence.   I’m thinking being is the totality of several modes of thought, much in the same way a rainbow is the totality of the range of colors.  Being seems central to the Philosophy of communication because it defines how we interpret and share our view of reality.  My interpretations might be off, but for now, they are my interpretations and I need a dynamic model of Being in order to synthesize all of these great thoughts in a manner that makes sense to me.

References

Bergo. B. (2007). Ethical selfhood: Emmanuel Levinas’s contribution to a philosophy of communication. In P. Arneson (Ed). Perspectives on Philosophy of Communication (pp. 113-134).  West Lafayette: Purdue University Press.

Heidegger, M. (1977). Basic Writings. New York: HarperCollins.

Mickunas, A. Maurice Merleau-Ponty: communicative practice. In P. Arneson (Ed). Perspectives on Philosophy of Communication (pp. 139-161). West Lafayette: Purdue University Press.