Being and Time describes his project in the following way: "our aim in the following treatise is to work out the question of the sense of "being" and to do so concretely." Heidegger claims that traditional ontology has prejudicially overlooked this question, dismissing it on the basis that being is the most universal and emptiest concept, that is indefinable or obvious. Instead Heidegger proposes to understand being itself, as distinguished from any specific entities (beings). "'Being' is not something like a being." Being, Heidegger claims, is "what determines beings as beings, that in terms of which beings are already understood." Heidegger is seeking
John Gray (philosopher) John Gray (philosopher) John Nicholas Gray (born 17 April 1948) is an English political philosopher with interests in analytic philosophy and the history of ideas. He retired in 2008 as School Professor of European Thought at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Gray contributes regularly to "The Guardian", "The Times Literary Supplement" and the "New Statesman", where he is the lead book reviewer. He is an atheist. Gray has written several influential books, including "" (1998), which argues that free market globalization is an unstable Enlightenment project currently in the process of disintegration; "Straw Dogs: Thoughts on Humans