UNDERSTANDING HEIDEGGER'S ONTOLOGICAL DIFFERENCE I N RELATION TO TEMPORALITY AND TIME

Abstract

In his quest to unravel the mystery behind the meaning of Being, Heidegger discovered that the manner in which this question was raised in traditional ontology is the reason for the forgetfulness of Being. So it became pertinent for Heidegger to do something new by moving away from the traditional method of raising the question of Being in order to rescue Being from its forgetfulness. In establishing a new ontology Heidegger identified a particular kind of Being that its understanding can provide an inroad into the understanding of Being in general. This Being Heidegger designates as Dasein. In an attempt to understand the Being of Dasein, Heidegger holds that the knowledge of this Being is only possible through carrying out an explicit distinction between Being and beings. This kind of distinction Heidegger calls 'ontological difference'. For Heidegger this distinction is only possible in relation to temporality and time because time constitutes the horizon for the understanding of Being. Taking Heidegger's phenomenological insights even further, this paper considers the question of ontological difference and the relationship between time and temporality. What we intend to explain in this paper is the distinction between Being and beings and to establish whether temporality can simply be referred to as time. With Heidegger, this paper submits that the Being of Dasein is intrinsically connected to temporality and time. The Being of Dasein is that of existence and existence is only possible within the framework of time. Dasein also defines time and its temporal moments. Dasein is a being that creates history through its actions on the world. The performance of any kind of action at all is always the present action of Dasein aims at affecting the world. These human actions are projected in the future perfect tense. In this light, time becomes more than the mere flowing time of the clock but acquires a new meaningfulness defined by human actions.