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only has a particular temporal form in each case, but this form also already means a specific being-in-time of whatever the discourse is about.
g) Connectedness (σύνθεσις) as the meaning
of the 'is' in the assertion.
As a pointing out, the assertion is a pointing toward or pointing away, and so in each case a revealing or concealing. What is revealed or concealed in each case are beings as beings that are or are not such and such. In this discursive form, the discourse is in each case about beings, and yet the discourse is also always of being—of the 'is'. The propositional discourse is not, in general, about being, yet it is of being, of beings as they are, in their being. The Greeks express this incisively in the following way. In the assertion there is discourse concerning the ὄντα ὡς ὄντα, beings as they in each case are as beings, beings with respect to themselves. We say at first, in a consciously ambivalent way: there is discourse of beings as beings. At the same time, however, Aristotle, in a context central to metaphysics, speaks of an investigation aimed at the ὂν ᾗ ὄν, which we again express formally by: Beings as beings. In the first instance I am directed toward beings themselves; I confine myself to their qualities. In the second instance, on the other hand, when I consider beings insofar as they are beings, I am not investigating their properties, but take them insofar as they are, with respect to the fact that they are determined by their being. I consider them with respect to their being. The assertion refers to beings, and the revealing and concealing is directed toward them. And yet being is concomitantly understood and referred to—not as an aside or afterthought, but precisely in that which is revealing, e.g., "the snow is alternating." The 'is' here plays a central role. The 'is' thus proves to be an essential structural moment of the assertion, and this is already expressed in the designation given to the 'is' in logic. In linguistic theory the 'is' is the copula, the tie or nexus, that which connects subject and predicate. However, that which is linguistic is meaningful in itself. What is referred to in it? Where do we find what is referred to?
Let us remember what our interpretation of the λόγος ἀποφαντικός has given us so far: σύνθεσις and διαίρεσις as the condition of the possibility of ἀληθεύειν and ψεύδεσθαι, and this in each case in the form of κατάφασις or ἀπόφανσις. All this is grounded in a νοεῖν, a pointing out that apprehends, indeed—as we saw—a pointing out of ὑπάρχον, of beings, and indeed in various tempora. Finally: in all this pointing out and apprehending comportment toward beings in discourse, a guiding understanding of the 'is', of being (not only of beings), manifests itself. Where does such 'being' belong? How does it stand within the whole structure of the λόγος? In particular, how does it