New essay by Timothy J. Nulty for the Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology, online ahead of print edition.
Timothy J. Nulty – ‘Heidegger’s Relative Essentialism’: JBSP (Originally published online: 15 February 2021).
Abstract: There is relatively little comprehensive treatment of Heidegger’s theory of essences despite his ubiquitous use of essences. It is commonplace in contemporary analytic philosophy to view essences as the ground for true de re modal claims. I argue that Heidegger offers an account of essences that can best be understood as a type of relative essentialism. Relative essentialism is the view that more than one being can occupy the same space at the same time and those beings have distinct sets of de re modal truths about them. Heidegger’s account of essences allows for true de re modal claims about a wide variety of things including scientific and cultural entities. At the same time, Heidegger rejects absolute essentialism: the view that there is one privilege collection of beings whose natures determine the truth values of de re modal claims about them. Relative essentialism is distinguished from contextual essentialism.
Full article: https://doi.org/10.1080/00071773.2021.1885963
Timothy J. Nulty, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, North Dartmouth, MA, USAAccessing the JBSP Online: The online version of the Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology publishes articles in advance of the print edition. Articles can be accessed via our publisher’s website: JBSP at Taylor & Francis Online. Access to the JBSP is free to all members of the society, who also receive the quarterly print copy of the journal as part of their subscription. You can find out more about becoming a member and supporting the BSP on the membership webpage. If you are not a member of the BSP, you can also log in using institutional or personal access via Shibboleth and OpenAthens.