Martin Heidegger and the Being and Time of Black Holes

Article
Open Access
by Gregory Phipps1
1 University of Iceland (Reykjavík, Iceland)
DOI: https://doi.org/10.29202/phil-cosm/25/2
Received: 19 June 2020 / Accepted: 25 July 2020 / Published: 3 October 2020

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Abstract

Scientific narratives about cosmology often present black holes as frightening objects of both creation and destruction, the centres of which are concealed behind event horizons. According to studies, black holes are capable of distorting time and tearing apart anything that plunges toward them. This article asks what the latest knowledge about the properties of black holes can contribute to philosophical understandings of being and time. Drawing on both scientific and narrative constructions of black holes in books written by physicists, the article analyzes black holes in relation to Martin Heidegger’s philosophy of ontology in Being and Time. The article argues that the topics of concealment, time, and mortality form interrelated points of intersection among scientific constructions of black holes and Heidegger’s philosophy. First, scientific commentaries on the concealment of singularities speak to Heidegger’s interpretation of the ways being is concealed in modern society. Second, with regard to time, the phenomenon of gravitational redshift invokes Heidegger’s criticisms of clock time and, by extension, notions of infinitude. On the other hand, theories about Hawking radiation and the decay of black holes also invoke Heidegger’s thesis that time subsists predominantly as a passing away toward the cessation of existence. Third and finally, Heidegger’s renowned and controversial explication of mortality helps frame black holes symbolically as forward-projections toward the impossibility of existence. Bringing these three subjects together, the article concludes that, as Heideggerian symbols of being and time, black holes represent projections toward the possibility of impossible modes and forms of existence. In this sense, black holes emblematize a relationship between being and time that marks the potential limits of existence, as humanity and science understand it.

Keywords: Black holes, Martin Heidegger, being, time, mortality, concealment, singularities

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Share and Cite

Phipps, Gregory (2020) Martin Heidegger and the Being and Time of Black Holes. Philosophy and Cosmology, Volume 25, 20-31. https://doi.org/10.29202/phil-cosm/25/2
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