Summary of Jaspers’ Notion of Encompassing:
In “Philosophy of Existence,” Karl Jaspers argues that all knowledge belongs within an encompassing context of being. This encompassing refers to the sense of awareness that a person has towards their own existence. Reality should not be understood as an object, but rather a conscious awareness of existence. This paper will summarize Jaspers notions of the encompassing. In “The Being of the Encompassing,” Jaspers argues that there is a tendency to condense being into determinate mental objects. This is false because we are taking one aspect, or mode of being, and understanding it as being in itself. Jaspers writes that “no known being is being itself.” This tendency to understand objects of being as being in itself is most prevalent in scientific knowledge. Take biological explanations of the brain for instance. If we think of human consciousness as nothing more than the biological functioning of the brain, we condense being into that object of being. There becomes no other understanding of being outside this biological framework. Being becomes a biological object. Jaspers argues that we should not think of being as an object, but a “horizon of knowledge.” If we think of being as a vast and endless ocean, we are situated in the waters surrounded by endless horizons on all sides. We cannot grasp what lies beyond the horizon, nor can we acquire a viewpoint that will allow us to do so. We are engulfed on all sides and at all times by our being. All thought exists within this endless sea of being. Being “remains open” – an encompassing of all possible objects of being. “On all sides it draws us into the unlimited.” This ‘unlimited’ Jaspers writes, is what draws us continually to pursue some new “determinate being.” For Jaspers this explains the course of knowledge as it has progressed throughout our history. It is important