An essay on Husserl and Heidegger’s views on time

Both Husserl and Heidegger are prominent philosophers who contributed to our understanding of the
nature of time, but their views differ significantly.

Edmund Husserl, a founder of the philosophical movement called phenomenology, believed that time is
a fundamental aspect of human experience. Husserl argued that time cannot be reduced to any physical
or objective phenomena but is instead a subjective experience that depends on how we experience it.
According to Husserl, time is experienced as a flow of consciousness, a continuous present that is
constantly changing.

Husserl also introduced the concept of "retention" and "protention" to explain how the past and future
are present in our experience of time. Retention refers to the way the past is retained in our
consciousness, while protention refers to our anticipation of the future.

In contrast, Martin Heidegger, a philosopher heavily influenced by Husserl, argued that time is not just a
subjective experience but is also an essential feature of the world itself. Heidegger believed that time is
not just a series of moments or events but is an underlying structure that makes experience and
existence possible.

Heidegger introduced the concept of "temporality" to describe this underlying structure of time.
According to Heidegger, temporality is a way of being in the world that shapes our experience of time.
He believed that we are always "thrown" into a world that already exists and that our understanding of
time is shaped by this pre-existing world.

Heidegger also distinguished between two different modes of time: "clock time" and "authentic time."
Clock time is the objective time measured by clocks and calendars, while authentic time is the subjective
experience of time as a lived experience. Heidegger argued that modern society places too much
emphasis on clock time and that we need to recover a sense of authentic time in order to fully
understand our existence.

Overall, while both Husserl and Heidegger emphasized the importance of time in human experience and
existence, their views on the nature of time differed significantly.