Katherine Withy, Heidegger on Being Affected, Cambridge University Press 2024

Katherine Withy’s Heidegger on Being Affected (2024) offers a clear and insightful account of Martin Heidegger’s philosophy of affectivity, emphasizing how Befindlichkeit (“Disposedness”, finding) and Stimmung (attunement) shape our existence as beings entangled with the world. By rooting Heidegger’s ideas in Aristotle’s concept of pathē and connecting them to other fields like psychology, psychiatry, and artificial intelligence, Withy reveals the enduring importance and relevance of Heidegger’s thought. The book argues that affectivity, our capacity to be moved by entities, grounds our understanding of Being, from everyday experiences to existential moments and experiences like angst and boredom.