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Abstract
This thesis explores Heidegger’s project in Being and Time as a response to the central problem of transcendental philosophy: epistemological foundationalism. Kant and post-Kantian thinkers seek to critically establish universal and necessary conditions for the possibility of knowledge, but their efforts rely on a foundational assumption that is left unjustified. I argue that Heidegger recognizes this problem and employs a method—hermeneutic phenomenology—that avoids making any foundational assumption. I show how Heidegger develops this method in his inquiry into the meaning of Being (the Seinsfrage), and how he further explores foundations in “On the Essence of Ground,” a treatise written shortly after Being and Time. I conclude that Heidegger is not a transcendental philosopher in the tradition of Kant, as his method avoids positing a foundation for epistemic justification. Nonetheless, his method remains deeply informed by transcendental philosophy in its structure and application. In this way, Heidegger transforms the transcendental tradition in his inquiry into the meaning of Being.