Heidegger on representation: The danger lurking in the a priori

Heidegger’s stance towards representational thinking has been widely discussed and debated. In this paper I show how based on an analysis of the mathematical in modern science in Die Frage nach dem Ding, Heidegger draws up a distinction between intuitive representations and representations against experience. I argue that this last type of representations corresponds to his understanding of the way in which representational thinking takes place in modernity, that is, modern representations. Based on an analysis of these two types of representation I claim that in the mid-30s Heidegger realizes that thinking being as the a priori carries a danger, which consists in the fact that being can break its relation with that which is given in ordinary experience and become determined by pure reason alone, and that this danger is the decisive factor underlying Heidegger’s critical stance towards modern representations.