1997 SPEP abstract

The first chapter of Towards Speculative Realism is “Phenomenology and the Theory of Equipment,” a paper submitted to the SPEP conference (and rejected by them) in 1997.

Just now, while filing away my Claremont lecture in the proper folder, I ran across the abstract for that 1997 SPEP paper.

Phenomenology and the Theory of Equipment

100-word abstract

The central contention of this paper is that Heidegger’s famous analysis of equipment in Being and Time makes up the thematic center of that work, and of Heidegger’s thought as a whole. If we ignore the usual connotations of the word “tool”, we find that the terms of Heidegger’s description of Zuhandenheit do not apply only to the usual examples of hammers, drills, and bridges. Every entity is primarily a withdrawn, subterranean activity that recedes behind its present-at-hand surface. The analysis of equipment is not concerned with human “use” of tools. What is really at stake is the drama of things themselves.

Not a bad abstract, I think. I could write it better than that now, but it’s not so badly written.

It was written on February 1, 1997 according to the file information. It’s still what I think about Heidegger, though my big “realist” conversion was not until December 1997.

I don’t think I ever submitted anything to SPEP again, and I haven’t even attended since 1993. I’m glad SPEP exists, but it never seemed like much of a home for fresh work. Maybe it’s just too large to reflect anything but the continental mainstream at any given moment.