Gadamer`s hermeneutics – a case of hidden relativism
Hans Georg Gadamer enjoys a reputation of conservative thinker. No doubt that he won that for his critique of the European enlightenment tradition and for endorsing to some extent prejudice convictions.1
However, this reputation is telling only half of the story. Gadamer`s social conservatism co-exists, more precisely, grounded, in a hard core relativism – a comprehensive and thorough one. This relativistic ground – which stands in no contradiction to the social conservatism it is holding upon its shoulders – manifests itself in its historic attitude towards the question of human understanding in general and hermeneutics specifically. Even more specific, it addresses the traditional hermeneutical problem of "hermeneutical circle". In this paper I attempt to unravel this sometimes overlooked relativistic ground behind the social conservative theory and its connection to the challenge of the hermeneutical circle.2
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A good place to start our enquiry is with the Heideggerian notion of Dasein – the human being. Heidegger, as famously known, is a forerunner of a new ontological approach towards the question of philosophical hermeneutics, and in that respect (at least) Gadamer happens to be his follower. It is this very concept of Dasein that associates so well in Gadamer`s eyes with the new ontological discourse founded by Heidegger3; eventually it ends up with the amalgam of a bold new strategy for the interpreter who wish to deal with the hermeneutical circle.
Now Heidegger takes Dasein`s essence to be “care”: an intentional position aimed at the world, at ontology, a constant “ecstasies” or inclination of the human being to transcend himself towards the world. In his words:
The expression "taking care" is used in this enquiry as an ontological term (an existential) to designate the being of possible being-in-the-world (Being and Time, 56, p., 57).
1. ”It is a familiar thought about Gadamer`s hermeneutics that its political and ethical implications lead in too conservative direction” (Warnke, Georgia, Hermeneutics, Ethics and Politics in: The Cambridge Companion to Gadamer, Edited by Robert j. Dostal, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2002).
2. Of course, I take side here with an important figures such as Habermass who stress the relativistic character of Gadamer`s thought.
Habermas, 1988.
Nevertheless, my main interest here is to question the very base of the metaphysical structure of Gadamer`s argument..
3."Heidegger temporal analytics of Dasein has, I think, shown convincingly that understanding is not just one of the various ways possible behaviors of the subject but the mode of being of Dasein itself…Not caprice, or even elaboration of a single aspect, but the nature of the thing in itself makes the movement of understanding comprehensive and universal" (TM, forword to second edition, xxvii, my emphasis).
As the term implies care is not so much cognitive or intellectual but practical, and that practicality is exactly what connects it to the ontological discourse. For while the traditional notion of theoretical relation (understanding) presupposes a schism between Dasein and world – we understand the world outside us (and hence we are compelled to settle on a mere image or copy of it) – care implies that Dasein is rutted in the world, that is, being integral part of it. In this way Heidegger opposes vigorously the Modern Cartesian dualistic legacy in an attempt to shift the philosophical discourse back to the question of ontology.4
Notice that Dasein`s care for ontology is temporal: "Temporality reveals itself as the meaning of authentic care" (Ibid, p. 326). To be sure, for Heidegger this matter of states is simply so because caring (or understanding) is always caring for something which is not actual (a negative or null reality) and exactly because of that it is demanding its "fulfilment" (actualization). In other words, since "care itself is in its essence thoroughly permeated with nullity" (Ibid, p. 285), Dasein cannot rest in peace in its own finite existence, but he has to keep moving into the nullity which awaits him.
But that rises the question: what possibly can be such thing as negative or null reality? A reality which is a sheer potentiality? For that Heidegger gives us a striking answer: it is death:
With death, Dasein stands before itself in its ownmost potentiality of being… Death is the possibility the absolute impossibility of Dasein (Ibid, p. 250).
Death serves as an ultimate purpose (an end) for Dasein. This purpose, belonging to the potentiality-of-being, that is, to the open limit of Dasein, defines the possible totality of Dasein (Being and time, p., 234).5 Now the concept of death – i.e. nullity or negativity, or potentiality – assures that Dasein (a "caring" agent) strives endlessly to reach his end, literally. That is, Dasein strives to annul itself, to die. In so far he is an agent (a not-yet-dead entity) he is directed to this goal of reaching the borderline of his life. As a result, Dasein in his innermost nature is not an inert entity but a function or becoming – a constant act towards what is ahead of him, or, put in temporal terms: towards is future death (Ibid, p. 325).6
But keep in mind this: if Dasein is temporal in his innermost nature all he is able to address is an object that is produced by himself alone, an object that is made by his own image. Consequently that object becomes – against Heidegger intention, I believe – a temporal entity that keeps changing on and on. In that sense the notion of temporality is conditioning the notion of ontology (the concept of death) and not vice versa. Being is subjected to the endless caprices of becoming.
4. "not only that Descartes had to neglect the question of being altogether, but also… he had the opinion that absolute 'being certain' of the cogito exempted him from the question of the meaning of the being of this being [Seienden]" (Being and Time, p., 24).
5. In equating the concept of death with an end (a goal or a purpose) one should try staying faithful to the original Heideggerian intention. Death is not external end in Dasein`s life, but "always already is its end" (Ibid, 245), namely it is an immanent end for it.
6. Obviously this picture simplifies Heidegger`s intention. For him the vector of realization is not only ahead, but first and for most backwards – from the future to the past. All and all, these two contradicting vectors are granted due to the pre-supposition that in fact all dimensions of time are united. Put differently: the Dasein is "set" to the future and then unites the other dimensions on the axis of time (past and present) by being projected onto them.
This philosophical oscillation between an absolute ontological discussion, which relates to the open totality that lies beyond life (death) on the one hand, and a relative (temporal) anthropocentric discussion which confines itself to life alone on the other hand, constitutes an awkward circularity at the backbone of Heidegger`s thought.7
In its turn that circularity will reappear in its enhanced shape in Gadamer`s thought and thus obscure its relativistic ground.
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In Truth and Methods Gadamer draws heavily on Heidegger main theses. "With Heidegger", he says, "the whole meaning of being… reduced to time and historiocity… (p. 246) …Heidegger thesis was that being itself is time" (Ibid, 257). For Gadamer all understanding and as a result all human science are necessarily bounds with the ontology and so with temporality.8
Therefore, historicity (temporality) is the cornerstone of any attempt to understand humans and to conceptualize the way they form to themselves understanding.
Being ahead of himself – due to the openness, negative nature of the world`s fundamental ontology – one doesn`t firstly reflect on the world that allegedly transcends him or her. Rather his understanding is a mode of his very being in the world, a mode of being which dwells, as it were, inside the world.9
Only later, on the daily conscience activity, he may reflect (theoretically) on the input that he gets from the ontological structure he shares. That reflection is in fact merely interpretation of the subject`s own existential state – a reflection on his own “understanding”.10 Now it is true that Gadamer declares that ontology is only a side question for him (TM, p., 278).
Hence he says that he is interested only in the question of "how hermeneutics, once freed from the ontological obstructions of the scientific concept of objectivity, can do justice to the historicity of understanding" (TM, p., 278). Still, due to this line of thinking there is a significant Heideggerian ontological residue in his thought, only rather than "Sein" or death of his teacher, Gadamer seeks more specified kind of ontology. What is it? In short: language:
We have, then, a confirmation of what we stated above, namely that in language the world itself presents itself. Verbal experience of the world is "absolute". It transcends all relative ways being is posited because it embraces all being in itself, in whatever relationships (relativities) it appears… the object of knowledge and statements is always already enclosed within the world horizon of language (TM, p., 466).11
7. Heidegger is not ignorant, of course, to that objection. but I don`t see how the way he is dealing with it can save him from that circular argument.
8. True, Gadamer is not so much interested in ontology per se, (TM, p,. 278) neither his philosophy deals with death. Nevertheless, I will show that he follows the road map charted by Heidegger. That is, the logical resemblance between these two ontologies is thorough enough to the conclusion that what applies in principle to Heidegger true also to the Gadamer.
9. We will see shortly that the entire world for Gadamer is history, or more precisely, historicity. Nothing can transcends that.
10. Of course, the (philosophical) theory of hermeneutics, including the Gadamerian theory, is even another reflection, a higher one. The philosopher who practice hermeneutics lays another lair, a third one, in which in it he reflect on the daily life understanding.
11. Or elsewhere he says: "This activity of the thing itself is the real speculative movement that takes holds of the speaker. We have sought the subjective reflection of it in speech. We can now see that this activity of the thing itself, the coming into language of meaning, points to a universal ontological structure, namely to the basic nature of everything toward which understanding can be directed. Being that can be understood is language" (Ibid, p., 490). Hereafter Gadamer insists on softening this idealistic picture in which the thing in itself is dependent, from human point of view, on language. Is he succsseading in that? I will address that later.
Since "in language the world itself presents itself" it seems that the basic Heideggerian circularity with regard to ontology (meaning: an ontology that exists in itself as long as Dasein functioning as its bearer) simply is reappearing here. Nonetheless, now it is dressed up in an absolute verbal experience: on the one hand the phrase "the world itself" implies a reality which lies beyond human (and therefore beyond language); on the other hand this very world is understandable if and only if the human being produces it (qua "in itself") linguistically, that is, calls it by a name.
So the picture we get is complicated: on the first layer, so to speak, we have an ontology: it is the very option (openness) of language to exist. That ontology could be seen as transcending human and hence transcending any actual understanding or actual language. Secondly, on the next layer, comes understanding: we understand the ontological level. In other words, we relate to ontology – relate to the very for-structure or potentiality of language – simply by being interwoven in to it. Finally comes the third layer – the intellect – which reflects on the first and the second layers.12
But if in one respect these layers are disconnected, in another respect, even more significant, they constitute a unity:
Before any differentiation of understanding into the various directions of pragmatic and theoretical interest, understanding is Dasein`s mode of being, in so far as it is potentiality-for-being and possibility (TM, p., 260).
Therefore, although one would think that the thing in itself qua itself is not a product of language – it is by definition departed from language – nevertheless for Gadamer it is directed to language in the first place in order to be united with it. In other words: we must assume that the thing in itself (the potentiality of language to exist) is simply a necessary pre-condition which actual language has to complete or extend, as it were. Hence arises the paradox according to which there is no thing in itself lest it is not for itself but for language.
At any rate, it is crucial to notice carefully that language, as a unifying act of the world, is functioning as a medium: it mediates between the thing itself (as such) and human being:
Our inquiry has been guided by the basic idea that language is a medium where I and the world meet, or, rather, manifest their original belonging together… this activity of the thing itself is the real speculative that takes hold of the speaker (TM p., 490).
One can take this quotation as an attempt to deploy the circularity (inherited from Heidegger) in its own service. The act of polarizing further away the allegedly existing polarities, leads to break down this very dichotomy. Hence the two extreme poles – Dasein on the one hand and the thing in itself on the other hand – turned out to be no more than an illusive phantom, one that covers a single unified historical medium runs under them. In short: the paradox is said to be resolved by being treated not as a problem but as solution.
12 Obviously the philosophical activity (the theorizing) is happening on the third layer.
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We are ready now to leave language aside and approach directly the methodological consequences of this view, namely to elaborate on the problem of the hermeneutical circle; from there on we will connect it with the conservative social level in Gadamer`s thought, and ultimately get to its relativistic ground.13
In principle, the circle poses a basic challenge to the interpreter – a great and endless effort. That situation results from the fact that any act of interpreting necessarily faces the relations between the whole and its parts, between a single segment of the text and the rule to apply the "right" meaning to it:
"A person who is trying to understand a text is always projecting. He projects a meaning for the text as a whole as soon as some initial meaning emerges in the text. Again ,the initial meaning emerges only because he is reading the text with particular expectations in regard to a certain meaning. Working out this for-projection, which is constantly revised in terms of what emerges as he penetrates into the meaning, is understanding what is there" (TM, p., 279).14
What is Gadamer trying to teach us here? Well the dilemmas of the interpreter are evoked since he is trapped ("projects") between two extreme poles: the general meaning of the whole text (as we expect it to be) and its particular parts as we find in actuality, that is, while the process of reading it continues. These two poles are constantly conditioning one another and so raising all the time new possibilities for reading. In other words: our existential condition is to be caught in the hermeneutical circle and hence the question of dealing with it – meaning: reaching the "right" interpretation of it – arises.
Elaborating on that, Gadamer characterizes the structure of the circle furthermore and defines it in terms of "logic of question and answer", or "dialogue", or "dialectics"15: "As the art of asking questions, dialectics proves its value because only the person who knows how to ask questions is able to persist his questioning, which involve being able to preserve his orientation toward openness.
13. It is noteworthy to underscore here that Gadamer insists that his view his not prescriptive but descriptive; he is not offering a method but simply portrays philosophically what is out there (Introduction, xxii). Nevertheless, one can wonder if there are no practical implications for acknowledging and admitting this certain view. You may say that by choosing to accept that picture (at the expanse of alternative ones) it becomes a normative assertion.
Is it not true that Gadamer himself, in his own notion, expect to convince the readers, and as a result – expect them to actually change their way of handling hermeneutics? It would be naïve, I think, to offer a philosophical view which has no consequences.
14. In modern theories of hermeneutics such as Shleichermacher`s the part is considered as a specific expression of thought of the writer while the whole that "contained" the part is reckoned as the comprehensive life and personality of him. Yet, for Gadamer the logical structure behind these relation of the two poles (part and whole) answers to the same picture. What he is criticizes though is the idea that the interpreter understands the author better than the author understands himself.
15. To be sure, it is not optional for finite beings like us to choose to live in the hermeneutical circle, in a dialogue between two contradictory poles. Put differently, we do not choose voluntarily to dwell in the medium ("in-between"). Rather it is a necessary ontological pre-condition for any epistemology.
The art of questioning is the art of questioning ever further – i.e., the art of thinking. It is called dialectic because it is the art of conducting a real dialogue" (TM, p., 375).16
So it turned out that within this existential dialogue of the hermeneutical circle there is neither a final answer which leads one to win an argument, nor there is a way to resolve a puzzle for good, so to speak. On the contrary: finite spirits like us are engaged – if we like or not – in the act of interpreting and re-interpreting our past. We are always in a dialogue, always rooted in the "logic of question and answer". To be sure, that is exactly what makes human historic creatures. Hence we can never be indifferent to our past which means that from our practical interest in the past we look "ahead" to it in order to question it again and again:
… that we study history only in so far as we are ourselves "historical" means that historicity of human Dasein in its expectancy… is the condition of our being able to re-present the past. What first seemed simply a barrier, according to the traditional concept of science and method, or a subjective condition of access to historical knowledge, now becomes the center of a fundamental inquiry (TM, p., 262).17
Again, we see that all there is for Gadamer is the paradoxical reality in which the essence of human condition is a dynamic medium with no extreme poles (the latter were annulled by their own act). It is a rotating circular medium, so to speak, that feeds itself with an endless series of questions and answers. That medium could be phrased as a dialogue with history, or more accurately puts, it is history performing a dialogue through us. Hence it is obligatory for Gadamer to argue that "there is no such thing, in fact, as a point outside history" (TM, p., 384).18
Now one can see clearer than before the footprints of Heidegger. Likewise, Gadamer's Proposal is simply to avoid any attempt to transcend the hermeneutical circle (historicity), for in any case such transcending is impossible.19 Thus, in similarity with the Heideggerian paradox, here too it is dealt in an unconventional way: instead of finding a way out of it, namely reaching a so called rational solution, the circular structure is shifted to the front stage and served for us as the very solution:
The circle of whole and part is not dissolved in perfect understanding but, on the contrary, is most fully realized (TM, p. 304).
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16. See also Ibid, p., 378.
17. Although Gadamer accepts from Heidegger the notion that we are always directed (projected) ahead of us, still he departs from him in locating this "ahead": for him the site of it is the past, i. e. history, not the future.
18. To sum up: all the latter terms: a history (historicity), a dialogue and the hermeneutical circle are in fact synonyms. They all signify a medium which is, paradoxically, mediates nothing but itself, creates itself.
19. For Heidegger, he emphasizes, this circle "possesses an ontologically positive significance" (TM, p. 279).
So how this bold, vigorous picture has got the reputation of being sweepingly conservative? Easy. That ubiquitous temporal supra-narrative seems to compel the rejection of any enlightened (progressive) values. The hard core of the enlightenment was an attempt to transcend history (or historicity) and so transcend prejudices thinking.20 It was a project that meant to find a safe haven in the universal abstractions, above the burden of tradition and time. If that vision to work, it would open the door to break the hermeneutical circle, namely to find an Archimedean point to lean against and so to secure the art (better: science) of interpretation. Eventually that vision meant to deploy these ultimate abstractions as a jumping board for the progress of science and society.21
But Gadamer denies that we are capable to reach these high, abstract altitudes, certainly not to find peace in an Archimedean point. In contrast to the Enlightenment philosophers he believes that:
Reason exists for us only in concrete, historical terms – i.e., it is not its own master but remains constantly dependent on the given circumstances in which it operates".
(TM, p., 288).
It is clear, then, that for him we are not a perfect rational autonomous creatures which in power to transcend time as, for instance, Kant claimed. No, we are immersed in history, language, tradition, prejudices and the like. Thus, there is no escape from the all-encompassing medium to find a shelter in the extreme poles, allegedly transcending that medium. There is no getaway from the hermeneutical circle, from historicity.
No wonder that some commentators could not resist the temptation to classify Gadamer, categorically, under the rubric of conservative thinker. If one interprets the inclination to take human experience as imbedded in history one certainly will consider seriously this inclination as a counter-progressive.22
Nevertheless, this way of putting the things is flattening the picture. Gadamer`s main contribution is neither the burden of history or tradition, a fortiori nor that of ontology. Rather it is the actual knowledge of history, namely the present consciousness of it which the human creature – as an historic creature – possesses:
Tradition is not simply a permanent condition; rather, we produce it ourselves inasmuch as we understand, participate in the evolution of tradition, and hence further determine it ourselves (TM, p. 305).
20. The history of ideas shows that not until the enlightenment does the concept of prejudice acquire the negative connotation familiar today (TM, p. 283).
21. Although, Gadamer argues, this attempt is, by itself prejudices: "The overcoming of all prejudices, this global demand of the Enlightenment, will itself proves to be a prejudice, and removing it opens the way to an appropriate understanding of the finitude which dominates not only our humanity but also our historical consciousness (Ibid, p. 288).
22. "Gadamer's hermeneutics, then, was characterized by a proudly uncritical veneration of the powers of tradition. His denigration of the capacities of "insight" and "reflection" are cornerstones of the modern Counter-Enlightenment. Since he believed that human understanding is intrinsically untrustworthy, he concluded that the best course is to limit its use as much as possible. Should a confrontation between authority and reason arise, it is always safer to err on the side of authority. This is not exactly the beginning of wisdom for citizenship in an open society". Id. at 39 (emphasis added). Richard Wolin, Untruth and Method: Nazism and the Complicities of Hans-Georg Gadamer, NEW REPUBLIC, May 15, 2000, at 36, 36-45, (in: Chicago-Kent Law Review Volume 76 Issue 2 Symposium on Philosophical Hermeneutics and Critical Legal Theory Article 7 December 2000 Gadamer, Heidegger, and the Social Dimensions of Language Ingrid Scheibler p. 856) 305).
Indeed, the hidden assumption here, as with the case of Heidegger, is that we are understanding history – in so far it is nothing but a medium – here and now, regardless of the events, facts etc.
We can support this reading if we recall Gadamer`s theory of language. Language, as I showed earlier, is functioning as a medium that bridges between past and present:
"We shall see that in other ways too the word is called on to mediate between past and present, and that it therefore comes to play a leading role in the problem of hermeneutic" (TM, p., 198).
The term "word" means in this case the actual word which is uttered in present time. Therefore, the past (and as a result also the future which is foreseen from the past) is reduced to the present.23
In light of it, our finite (historical) nature must be reckoned as far more than conservative interest in the past. Against this one dimensional conservative reading, one can realizes that under the surface Gadamer is not interested in legitimacy for tradition as a source of authority. For him the authority, though it allegedly acquires its validity from the past, is produced here and now, in the present. Thus the past (and the future which is foreseen from the past) wins its weightiness and significance due to the actual present – a stance that can hardly by digested by conservatives.24
If so what, then, is the historical understanding? Certainly not mirroring with words an outer reality, i.e. posing a mere abstract (a-historical) image of that reality. That ideal accords nicely with the conservative vision. For the conservative vision wishes to fortify the past – true or imagined one – against the intimidating changes which occurs in the present. But Gadamer is not intimidated from these changes whatsoever. On the contrary, he is embracing them to his lap. Hence his notion of historical understanding is taken mainly as an act of producing that reality, namely, producing all existence from the present point of view. It is performing a Gospel (a word) which in uttering it the very world (the past) is created "online". Therefore, history and the knowledge of it are one and the same living tissue, as showed in quoting Dilthey:
"The first condition of possibility of a science of history is that I myself am a historical being, that the person studying history is the person making history" (TM, p.225).
Commenting on this quote Gadamer is clarifying: "What makes historical knowledge possible is the homogeneity of subject and object" (Ibid). The notion of history in the sense of sequel of events separated from us gives way to a more fundamental notion, that of historicity: an immanent existential condition of the human being which sublates all past events (facts).25
23. The same point is elucidated by an analogy to the field of art: artistic objects are:\\\\ …(TM, p.. 120) Language is treated likewise: for while history could be seen as an unending chain of words, one follows the other, in fact only the single word that is uttered now, namely present in this very moment, is the true locomotive of history.
24. I would like to underscore, again, that I don`t deny that Gadamer is a conservative on the social level. He might very well be so. The relativistic character that I ascribe him pertains to the theoretical infra-structure of his thought, i.e. what I called above a metaphysical conservatism.
25. Gadamer is working hard to defend this thesis against the charge that he is reducing historical knowledge to a mere "psychology" (TM, p., 262). However, one may wonder: if our nature is so.
Having said that, it is most significant to show how Gadamer tries hardly to discern himself from an "ordinary" relativism or skepticism (what he termed hereafter subjectivism). As before he is following Heidegger`s discovery:
"…Heidegger`s criticism of modern subjectivism [relativism] is that his temporal interpretation of being has opened up new possibilities. Interpreting being from the horizon of time does not mean, as it is constantly misunderstood to mean, that Dasein is radically temporal, so that it can no longer be considered as everlasting or eternal but is understandable only in relation to its own time and future… the philosophical question involved here, however, is directed precisely at this subjectivism itself… it does not preach blind commitment out of nihilistic despair, but opens itself to hitherto concealed experience that transcend thinking from the position of subjectivity…" (TM, p., 90).
From this standpoint relativism lacks a true conception of historicity and so it has to settle on the conception of history alone, that is, a fragmented notion of time. For the relativist all human existence is no more than discreet moments in history, indifferent one to another. Relativism, put differently, is blind to the integrational (unified) nature of all human stance and understanding, including his own. Therefore, it cannot explain or defend even his own contentions. As such, Gadamer believes, it defeats itself.26
On this background it makes it easier for us to understand the great importance that is ascribed by Gadamer to the present as the focus of historicity (the hermeneutical circle). The present is utilized as a remedy – not very successful as I will show soon – against all nihilist fantasies. Gadamer believes that only an endeavor to capture the temporal "in-between", the medium which unify past and future, could claim for valid rational discourse about understanding. If true, that is the only way one can overcome the self defeating mechanism of relativism without falling prey to the naivety of scientific objectivism.
Now Gadamer`s concept of "fusion of horizons" would be very handy here. It turned out that different isolated point of views, allegedly spread along an endless timeline – as the relativist claims – are, after all, fused (connected). This fusion is made by history in its most genuine reality, that is, a fusion that takes place under the wings of an ultimate present.27
26. That is why relativism cannot sincerely adopt dialogism. A dialogue is established on community and reciprocity. Now the relativist denies the very possibility of that community while, on the other hand, he is involved – like the rest of us – in a dialogue in so far that he uses language. Hence he is approving community among humans as much as everybody else. In doing so, clearly, he is contradicting himself.
27. A support for the above is suggested by Gadamer`s theory of art and aesthetics: "What is aesthetic being?… [a] presentation or performance of a work of a literature or music is something essential, and not incidental to it, for it merely completes what the works of art already are – the being there of what is presented in them" (Ibid, p. 135). As much as an artistic object cannot be separated from its own actual presence in history, historic narratives are interwoven into an ultimate, single "now".
Moreover, the notion of fusion of horizons which is happening in the ultimate present, better said – it is the present! – constitutes its own being. In that respect it is a parallel to the Aristotelian unmoved mover which is also the cause of his own reality and essence.28 For while the naive relativist tries to find, unsuccessfully, a bizarre comfort in the fact that he is abandoned in his own time (as if he was deserted on his own inaccessible era), the Gadamerian does not suffer from this problem whatsoever. Again, the existential fact that tie him to his own present reality, in fact, unites him with it, is deployed to transcend this very reality and hence transcend the relativist stance. In contrast to the relativist Gadamer uses, or at least tries to use, circularity to get away from a self-refuting position.29
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I began this article with an argument that the well known social conservative reputation of Gadamer might blind our eyes to see its relativistic ruts. Nevertheless, the last paragraphs above seems to contradict this contention. For what I showed there is that Gadamer is holding a notion of an ultimate present, one that its logical structure might even be compared to the Aristotelian Unmoved Mover. Historicity, in so far it is revealed as identified with an ultimate present (a self-generating present), inspires to reach a somewhat metaphysical status. Where all the relativistic Gadamerian discourse I claimed to be is gone? Isn`t true that in light of that Gadamer`s first floor is conservative too?
I deny that. The concept of ultimate present, though it looks as if it challenges the relativistic stance, in reality it should be seen as an attempt to substantiate relativism and in that respect it becomes a pure relativism itself. For the notion of becoming, which is identified with a performing (moving) present, cannot be coherent for finite spirits like us unless it is set against its contradictory, namely against the notion of invariance (being).30 The one necessarily implies the other. Thus, if Gadamer really insists that everything is said to become (everything is changing), it includes our theories as well and eventually this very concept of becoming. "Becoming" is doomed to the same fate of changing, namely the fate of passing away. Radical relativism, one which its self refuting mechanism is essential to it, is established.
28. See Aristo, Metaphysics, book XII, chapter 7, 1072, 17. The common ground for both ideas is maximum actuality – maximum presence.
29. Once again the broad ontological scheme, put there by Heidegger, is effecting that philosophical picture. What I am pointing at in this context is the Heideggerian approach toward the old question of being and becoming (Again, see Heidegger`s discussion of death as an immanent end constantly present in Dasein`s life. Heidegger, 1953, p. 246). Take for instance the case of a festival which Gadamer brings about. A festival "is not one and the same thing. It exists by being always something different. It has its being in becoming" (TM, p., 74, footnote 34). In this quote the idea is that a social institution (a festival) that is taking place in present time (and so it seems as a static being), generates dynamically its own existence. Due to the Heideggerian contribution to the matter, this self-generation is not taken as if it is actualized by enduring the changes (resting so to speak), but by participating in them, actually organizing them. In other words: the being of a festival is located in a genuine concept of the present – i. e., a present that "moves" and thus creates itself – as opposed to the dogmatic concept of static present, as held by objectivist and relativist alike.
30. That alone raises a question mark about Gadamer`s attempt to uncover the finite nature of human beings.
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