Eduardo M. Duarte Being&Learning 2.0 Tyson Lewis dialogue Mar...

'beings' and 'learnings' is what I title this video which is a dialogue with my very good friend, colleague and collaborator Tyson Lewis, who is a professor of philosophy in the school of education at Montclair State University.   Enacting the thesis put forward by Arendt that philosophy, specifically in the Socratic form that I have been exploring in this project as exemplary, comes into the world through conversations between friends, Tyson and I have a conversation that is sparked by his impression of watching some of the B&L 2.0 videos.   In the course of our dialogue we take up the reduction of my project to the originary or fundamental ontological human situation of Learning (capital 'L' key).  Learning, we discuss, happens because humans are formed by Being's presencing/absencing, the encounter that is prelinguistic because we encounter the ineffability of Being's excess.  In this situation of 'silence' where we are captured (captivated) by the fundamental situation we are filled with wonder.   Tyson encourages me to think and talk further about how it is that this is related to Heidegger's ordering of dwelling as prior to building, and from this comes the order of Learning as first, primary and originary (in the sense that it initiates the making that follows).  First we are made, formed, then we make or form.  This is an version of Arendt's import of Augustine's: we can initiate because we are initiators, or we can begin because we are beginners.  The being of 'beginner' or 'initiators' is actually the condition of being initiated, or begun, swept and moved always already by what I will later in the experiment call ceaseless nativity.  Philosophy emerges from the linguistic turn 'away' from the effacement with Being's presencing, which is insisted by Being's withdrawal.  As Heidegger says, Being turns away from us.  A clearing opens up in the withdrawal and thus begins the process of learning (small 'l' key), from when philosophy appears in multiple manifestations  (music, painting, writing, etc.) through the making  the singular unique beings that have the aura of the original.  It is these that become the worldly expressions that mediate our further practices of philosophy, via conversation and study.   Tyson is very helpful in enabling me to see the usefulness of Heidegger's ontological/ontic distinction, so that I can now identify the originary effacement with Being as Learning as the fundamental ontological situation, and philosophy as the ontic making, or learning (small 'l').  As a result, the follow-up work to do can now be entitle 'beings and learnings.'