Being is conversation: Remains, Weak Thought, and Hermeneutics

Abstract

In this essay I try to indicate that Heidegger’s destruction of metaphysics together with the ontological effects of hermeneutics result in “conversation,” that is, in something “weak,” as Rorty explained, “in comparison to scientific inquiry”. While con- temporary philosophers as Nancy, Derrida, and Vattimo have given different answers to Being’s condition after metaphysics, they all agree that it must be a concept which can easily be modified, attuned, and open to further interpretations. But in order to demonstrate that Being is conversation, as I suggest, it is first necessary to outline the remains of Being that Heidegger’s destruction exposed and the ontological effects that interpretation implies. While I have exposed these remains in my book, The Remains of Being, in this essay I try to indicate how “conversation” is a remain. “Conversation” will become not only the most appropriate result of Heidegger’s destruction of metaphysics but also, as Vattimo has emphasized, “what interpretation can generate,” that is, “Being, new senses of experience, new ways for the world to announce itself”.