Heidegger’s Philosophy of Gewalt: Annihilation and the Struggle for Existence

Abstract

This project aims at clarifying Heidegger’s term Gewalt and arguing that it trivializes physical violence, and most notably, the annihilation of life by the atomic bomb. This will be done by showing how Heidegger presupposes that Gewalt is synonymous with misunderstanding the essence of things, most often through disguising it, what he terms ‘semblance’. By making Gewalt exclusively concerned with the ontological, or the being of things, Heidegger removes the possibility of any meaningful discourse about flesh and blood violence.