Ontology and Ideology: Günther Anders’s Philosophical and Political Confrontation with Heidegger

This article integrates Günther Anders, a critic of technology and antinuclear militant still not widely known in the Anglophone world, into current critical discussions about Heidegger’s Nazism and his legacy for modern thought. It does so by sketching Anders’s many biographical connections but mainly focuses on his critiques of the political implications of Being and Time and of the later Heidegger. These two critiques I treat as parts of one larger “confrontation” with the reactionary character of Heideggerian philosophy. This article should help clarify Anders’s place in the history of Heideggerianism and also set the stage for a detailed evaluation of Anders’s approach to modern technology.