Zollikon Seminars: Protocols - Conversations - Letters

by Martin Heidegger, Franz Mayr (Translator)

Long awaited and eagerly anticipated, this remarkable volume allows English-speaking readers to experience a profound dialogue between the German philosopher Martin Heidegger and the Swiss psychiatrist Medard Boss. A product of their warm friendship, Zollikon Seminars chronicles an extraordinary exchange of ideas. Heidegger strove to transcend the bounds of philosophy while Boss and his colleagues in the scientific community sought to understand their patients and their world. The result: the best and clearest introduction to Heidegger's philosophy available.

Boss approached Heidegger asking for help in reflective thinking on the nature of Heidegger's work. Soon they were holding annual two-week meetings in Boss's home in Zollikon, Switzerland. The protocols from these seminars, recorded by Boss and reviewed, corrected, and supplemented by Heidegger himself, make up one part of this volume. They are augmented by Boss's record of the conversations he had with Heidegger in the days between seminars and by excerpts from the hundreds of letters the philosopher wrote to Boss between 1947 and 1971.

Genres: Philosophy, Psychology

360 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1987

About the author

Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) was a German philosopher whose work is perhaps most readily associated with phenomenology and existentialism, although his thinking should be identified as part of such philosophical movements only with extreme care and qualification. His ideas have exerted a seminal influence on the development of contemporary European philosophy. They have also had an impact far beyond philosophy, for example in architectural theory (see e.g., Sharr 2007), literary criticism (see e.g., Ziarek 1989), theology (see e.g., Caputo 1993), psychotherapy (see e.g., Binswanger 1943/1964, Guignon 1993) and cognitive science (see e.g., Dreyfus 1992, 2008; Wheeler 2005; Kiverstein and Wheeler forthcoming).

Reviews

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

For Heidegger, science progresses by questioning its own foundations in a continuous, philosophical, and radical fashion. Moreover, each science has its proper and per-assigned domain and method. For some time now - Cartesian ontology, mathematical projection initiated by Galileo and Newton, along with Kantian transcendental subjectivity and epistemology - monopolized these basic foundations, instituted “the dictatorship of scientific thinking”, and further turned science and especially its method into the new religion. Nietzsche nicely expressed this with the absolute “victory of the scientific method over science”.
Psychology and psychoanalysis - as mainly developed by Freud - blindly followed this “dictatorship of scientific thinking” as initiated in physics; even if their domain and method were farthest away from those of physics. Heidegger always dismissed and ridiculed psychology for this reason. When some students of Freud and Jung became more and more dissatisfied with the foundations of psychology, they turned to Heidegger's “Being and Time” for a new foundation and method for their field. This is exactly what Binswanger and Boss did; except that Boss approached and befriended Heidegger. Around this friendship that lasted more than 25 years, under the mentorship of Heidegger, and in Boss's home in Zollikon - they met with a group of Swiss psychologists over a period of 10 years.
Because “Being and Time” is centered on what it means to be a human/Dasein, this book is the main reference for these seminars – even if Heidegger moved away from this original project in the second part of his life. Being-in-the-world, the meaning of Being, the ecstatic-intentional character of Dasein towards world, space and time, clearing and opening, care, overcoming subject and object, beings and Being, readiness for receiving-perceiving, making-present, and so on are discussed and clarified by Heidegger. Heidegger is also expressing his opinion on some topics for the first time here: body, dreams, diseases, hallucinations, stress, and so on.
Here are two details from this book. When Boss respectfully approached Heidegger with a request for a collaboration in 1947, Heidegger agreed and asked for a “little package of chocolate”. Later, when the misinterpretations of Heidegger proliferated mainly in France, Heidegger wrote to Boss: “I would like to dissuade you from the literature on Heidegger.” So, eat chocolate and avoid any secondary literature on Heidegger.

[Seppe · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting and unique document. Heidegger speaking at the home of Medard Boss to an audience of physicians, therapists and analysts. I assume he got an interested due to his own quiet unsurprising depressive episode after WWII. To be honest it is almost too fragmentary too read, it is mostly an arrangment of written reports of year long lectures in Zollikon, letters and memories of conversations by his friend and colleague Medard Boss (who was not free of idolizing Heidegger). However! It is a fundamental metaphysics for the physician, an introduction to the method of Heidegger tackling philosophical issues to its essence, tracing key ideas such as the difference between the ontic and the ontological, connection between psyche and soma (and how phenomenology tackles this duality). In a sense the lectures are making room for new ideas on existential analysis. Who looks for therapeutic insights might be rather disappointed,
A lot of the book is a critique on the mechanistic outlook of modern science, tracing this back to a crisis in modern sciences after Descartes (remembering Husserl).

Interesting is how Heidegger engages with Freud and criticizes him as well as too much a mechanistic thinker. He goes in conversation with the ambition of Ludwig Binswanger to create "Daseinsanalysis", a combination of Freudian and Heideggerian thinking. He has his remarks on this topic (chapter on daseinsanalysis) which makes for me the summum of this engaging read.

Dr. Medard Boss wrote his main work "Existential foundations of medicine and psychology" (1977) with a lot of help of Heidegger. Perhaps this is more or less the fruit of these lectures.

This edition concludes a great essay by Richard askay which elucidates the connection between Heideggers philosophy and discussions of psychology in the 20th century.

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book creates more expectations than it is able to fulfil. Heidegger tries to engage directly with the audience of non-philosophers (psychologists and psychiatrists), who would be able to profit most from his thinking, but there is still a degree of looking-down-upon and inflexibility of formulation that prevents a true theoretico-practical dialogue.

[Can Sabaner · Rating 2 out of 5]

"Zollikon Seminars: Protocols, Conversations, Letters" edited by Medard Boss demonstrates a scattered view of Heidegger's philosophy. This book as a concept is compelling: it's about Heidegger's philosophy in the context of psychotherapy and psychiatry. However, with the way this book is edited, it is near impossible to gain anything that is concrete or coherent. The seminar protocols are too scattered and Heidegger always remains shallow in this thinking; he never gets to the meat of it. The letters between Medard Boss and Heidegger are too short to have any real substance.

The only reason this book gets 2 stars rather than 1 is the essay at the very end of the book written by the translator Richard Askay. This essay is titled "Heidegger's Philosophy and Its Implications for Psychology, Freud, and Existential Psychoanalysis". I loved the essay and would highly recommend everyone to read it.

If you're interested in learning more about Heidegger, I would recommend reading "The Question Concerning Technology" and "What Is Called Thinking?" as a starting point. It's more accessible than his magnum opus "Being and Time". Also you can check out anything Hubert Dreyfus has written on Heidegger; Dreyfus hardly ever disappoints.

[Edward Moran · Rating 5 out of 5]

Disappointing book that doesn't sparkle like most of the ways written by heidegger. Edited by medard boss so I think most of the book comes from his memory,recollections, and notes. Summary of heideggers thinking that doesn't sparkle like similar thoughts expressed in other works by heidegger.
addendum(3/6/16): I read again the translators afterwords which includes "Heidegger's critique of Freudian psychoanalysis": this section is a gem and is a very deep and insightful critique of freud: this alone makes the book a bargain at many times the price I paid for it. great insight into Bertrand Russell and Russell's hero, David Hume.