Playfulness as a Mode of State-of-Mind

When looking at the example of 'fear' that Heidegger uses for state-of-mind in Being and Time, it has become difficult for me to directly compare with playfulness. So I will tease out playfulness and associated concepts, and then come back to fear. Below is informed by Gadamer's Truth and Method (which I need to at closely again), together with some insights inspired by Heidegger. This is intended to replicate in part the analysis that Heidegger has given to fear (pp. 179-182).

Play

Play has its own mode of being which we will call a game. This being exists only in the world and is not aware of its own being (ie does not have Dasein character). It does however require participants with Dasein character to give the game importance and make it matter.

Players

The players are the participants in the game. In order for them to be players then they must take the game seriously. All players are played by the game and lost to the game while they are playing it. They are concerned only with being-in-the-world, with the they, in fact only as it exists within the world of the game. Their 'authentic being' is lost to them. The game could not be disclosed to the world without the players being predisposed to being players in the first place.

Playing

Playing is giving oneself to the game and the play - in as much as the game has to be taken seriously one is played by the game. The point is to be part of the they and therefore it is unlikely for Dasein's authentic being to disclosed. It is useful to note here that this being lost is not necessarily negative or positive - I would like to say this depends on your playfulness.

Now to my terms of interest (and away from Gadamer's) and possible representations of them:

Being Playful

Being playful allows one to be able to play with what is serious and the games that matter within one's Being-in-the-world. Being playful can make one feel as though they are outside the game or games, it is also equally seductive in transforming what is serious into a game. In the constructing a new game, which may be more a complex or a simplified version of it constituents, it creates the pitfalls of other games. This game is still part of Being-in-the-world. It does have the benefit of being of Dasein's conscious construction, making it more likely to phenomenologically disclose aspects of 'authentic being'.

Playfulness

Playfulness as a mode of state-of-mind is of Dasein and cannot apprehend itself without losing authenticity. This allows playfulness to envision the possibilities of our 'authentic being' be realised within Being-in-the-world, and the possibilities of Being-in-the-world to inform our 'authentic being'. Here it can be said that Playfulness is a conduit and its phenomenologically is of 'authentic being'.

From Being and Time:

That which fear fears about is that very entity which is afraid - Dasein. (p. 180)

To paraphrase:

That which playfulness is playful with is that very entity which is playful - Dasein.


I need to reflect more on this; I am sure what I have done so far is only a small step - but I have a better sense of the journey to come.

Being-in as such (Being there as a State of mind)

The last two chapters in the first division of Being and Time are huge and my personal reflections are becoming increasingly grandiose, so I will try and look at things on a smaller scale to maintain my discipline. This way the issues raised in the previous blog about playfulness as state-of-mind can be discussed.

Some quotes and comments:

Dasein's existential spatiality, which thus determines its 'location', is itself grounded in Being-in-the-world. (p. 171)

It could be said that playfulness has to have subjects for its play and I think it is reasonable that these subjects are grounded in Being-in-the-world.

By its very nature, Dasein brings its "there" along with it... ...Dasein is its disclosedness. (p. 171)

This is here for completeness; the "there" is Dasein's they-self and discloses the authentic self. The relationship between the authentic self and the "there" is the "throwness" of Desein.

What we indicate ontologically by the term "state-of-mind" is ontically the most familiar and everyday sort of thing; our mood, our Being attuned. (p. 172)

Playfulness seems to fit within this broad definition.

In having a mood, Dasein is always disclosed moodwise as that entity to which it has been delivered over in its Being; and in this way it has been delivered over to the Being which, in existing, it has to be. (p. 173)

Just reasserting that Being predicates experience in the world, but mood (or state-of-mind) discloses aspects of authentic being.

The "that-it-is" which is disclosed in Dasein's state-of-mind must... ...be conceived as an existential attribute of the entity which has Being-in-the-world as its way of being. (p. 174) In a state-of-mind Dasein is always brought before itself, and has always found itself, not in the sense of coming across itself by perceiving itself, but in the sense of finding itself in the mood that it has. (p. 174)

For the moment I do not think it is unnecessarily limiting to consider that when playfulness itself is perceived then it becomes play, not a state-of-mind - although playfulness may be your state-of-mind when you are being playful in your play. Playfulness as distinct from being playful, playing, play and being played is central to my thesis.

The way in which the mood discloses is not one in which we look at throwness, but one in which we turn towards or turn away. For the most part the mood does not turn towards the burdensome character of Dasein which is manifest in it, and least of all does it do so in the mood of elation when this burden has been alleviated. It is always by way of a state-of-mind that this turning away is what it is. (p. 174)

If ever there was a playfulness trick this was it, but I think playfulness can allow a person to be able to turn towards their authentic self and what it is disclosing in ways other states-of-mind might not. This implies there are complexities to playfulness that need to be further explored - I would like to say that playfulness has many pathways into our very being. I will contain myself, at least publicly, while I am trying to inhabit Heidegger's rich and informative world.

Ontologically, we thus obtain the first essential characteristic of states-of-mind that they disclose Dasein in its throwness, and - proximally and for the most part - in the manner of an evasive turning away. (p. 175)

I am OK with that - sort of covered in my last comment.

And only because the 'senses' belong ontologically to an entity whose kind of being is Being-in-the-world with a state-of-mind, can they be 'touched' by anything or 'have a sense for' something in such a way that what touches them shows itself in an affect. (p. 176-7)

I have no issues with being playful, play, playing and being played made possible by an entity whose kind of being is Being-in-the-world with a state-of-mind of playfulness.

Existentially, a state-of-mind implies a disclosive submission to the world, out of which we can encounter something that matters to us. (p. 177)

A state-of-mind not only discloses Dasein in its throwness and its submission to that world which is already disclosed with its own Being; it is itself the existential kind of Being in which Dasein constantly surrenders itself to the 'world' and lets the 'world' "matter" to it in such a way that Dasein evades its very self. (p. 178)

Again playfulness fits into this genre with ease, although, it does not as easily sit with me that this does justice to playfulness.

The next section describes fear as a state-of-mind, I think playfulness has scrubbed up well so far. It will be interesting to make a comparison between fear and playfulness.