Constructing Heidegger's 'Ethics'

Abstract

Is there ethics within the doctrine of Heidegger’s philosophy of Being, Heidegger seems to hold a contemptuous attitude towards ethics and only places ethics under ontology, believing that it is rootless to talk about norms and goodness without properly addressing the issues of Being. Daniel J Schmidt even said, “Discussing Heidegger with ethical life together is a provocation.” However, in fact, Heidegger’s late period had discussions on ethics, mainly displayed on Letter on “Humanism”. In that letter, he mentioned a type of “ursprüngliche Ethik (primordial ethics). However, this kind of “ethics” is neither the conventional study of goodness or oughtness following the past, nor should it even be called “ology”, because it is not a science related to ethics, but a Language that discloses êthos (dwelling) and clearing (Lichtung) the original elements of existence, insofar as the existential Being. That is, Heidegger intended to explore the essence of existence through the process of Ek-sistence, which relates to the nearest home of Being. The Home of Being is tied to the destiny of Ek-sistence, and this is the process of Ethics. Therefore, many scholars in China also believe that this primordial ethics is not a study of normal ethics, but a doctrine of preontology. But in other hand, I precisely believe that Heidegger’s contribution actually enriches the extension of ethics. Based on this, I will explore the issue of Heidegger’s “lost of ethics” and construct it from two dimensions, namely, from the perspectives of “existential ethics” and “primordial ethics”.