Abstract

In Making Sense of Heidegger, Thomas Sheehan proposes that both Heidegger’s early and later thoughts shared the same mission of overcoming metaphysics. Sheehan discusses Heidegger’s uncovering of the “guiding question” of metaphysics, which is the question of what accounts for beings. By criticizing ancient Greek philosophy, and through the paradigm of phenomenology, he reconstructed the guiding question of metaphysics by interpreting Sein, i.e., what accounts for beings, as the meaningfulness of beings and as the relationship between beings and humans. According to Sheehan, Heidegger then turns to the “fundamental question” of metaphysics: He interprets Sein as Lichtung, which is necessarily linked to Existenz by means of Gegenschwung. With the clarification of Heidegger’s thoughts, Sheehan succeeds in shedding light on the dark and neglected “backside” of traditional metaphysics, which is the concrete practice of human beings.