Being and Time

#Dasein #being-in-the-world #care #temporality #authenticity #das-Man #fallenness #angst #being-toward-death #phenomenology #existential-ontology

Being and Time

Author: heidegger-martin
Year: 1927 (German original: Sein und Zeit; English trans. Macquarrie & Robinson, 1962)
Source type: book
Raw file: raw/books/heidegger_1927-being-and-time.md

Summary

Heidegger's magnum opus seeks to reopen the question of the meaning of Being (Sein) by analyzing the entity for whom Being is an issue—Dasein (human existence). The fundamental thesis: Dasein's Being is care (Sorge), whose ontological meaning is temporality. Authentic existence requires confronting one's own mortality and resolutely taking up one's thrown possibilities, rather than fleeing into the anonymous publicness of "the they" (das Man). The work provides the ontological foundation for dwelling, uncanny, and the phenomenology of place that anchors Geoffrey's research on the everyday-life and modernity's relation to dwelling.

Key Claims

The question of Being must be reopened via Dasein: "The question of the meaning of Being is the most universal and the emptiest of questions, but at the same time it is possible to individualize it very precisely for any particular Dasein." Dasein is the entity whose Being is an issue for it; its "essence lies in its existence" (existence precedes essence).
Being-in-the-world is the fundamental structure: "Being-in" derives from "innan" (to reside, dwell, be familiar with)—not spatial containment but existential dwelling. "Dasein is never 'proximally' an entity which is, so to speak, free from Being-in, but which sometimes has the inclination to take up a 'relationship' towards the world."
Ready-to-hand vs. present-at-hand: Equipment (Zeug) is primarily encountered as ready-to-hand (zuhanden)—withdrawn, manipulable, defined by its "in-order-to." "The less we just stare at the hammer-Thing, and the more we seize hold of it and use it, the more primordial does our relationship to it become, and the more unveiledly is it encountered as that which it is—as equipment." Only in breakdown does equipment become present-at-hand (vorhanden)—an object of theoretical observation.
Das Man (the "they") constitutes everyday inauthenticity: "The 'who' is the neuter, the 'they' [das Man]... We take pleasure and enjoy ourselves as they take pleasure; we read, see, and judge about literature and art as they see and judge." The they-self tranquilizes, disburdens, and alienates Dasein: "Every kind of priority gets noiselessly suppressed. Overnight, everything that is primordial gets glossed over as something that has long been well known."
Fallenness is Dasein's everyday absorption: "Dasein has, in the first instance, fallen away from itself as an authentic potentiality for Being its Self, and has fallen into the 'world'." This is not negative evaluation but existential structure: "In no case is a Dasein, untouched and unseduced by this way in which things have been interpreted, set before the open country of a 'world-in-itself'."
Idle talk, curiosity, and ambiguity characterize the they's disclosedness: "Idle talk is the possibility of understanding everything without previously making the thing one's own... It releases one from the task of genuinely understanding." Curiosity seeks the new without dwelling; ambiguity makes everything seem decided while deciding nothing.
Angst (anxiety) reveals uncanniness and individualizes: "In anxiety one feels 'uncanny'... 'not-being-at-home' [das Nichtzuhause-sein]... Dasein has been individualized, but individualized as Being-in-the-world." Angst reveals the "nothing" of the world and Dasein's thrownness.
Being-toward-death is Dasein's ownmost possibility: Death is "non-relational" (no one can die for me) and "not to be outstripped." The they says "one dies" to evade: "In Dasein's public way of interpreting, it is said that 'one dies', because everyone else and oneself can talk himself into saying that 'in no case is it I myself'." Authentic Being-toward-death is anticipation (Vorlaufen)—wrenching oneself from the they-self.
Conscience calls Dasein back from lostness: "Conscience summons Dasein's Self from its lostness in the 'they'... The caller is Dasein in its uncanniness: primordial, thrown Being-in-the-world as the 'not-at-home'." The call is silent—it "takes the words away from the common-sense idle talk of the 'they'."
Resoluteness is understanding the call: "Resoluteness signifies letting oneself be summoned out of one's lostness in the 'they'... In the counter-concept to irresoluteness, as resoluteness as existentially understood, we do not have in mind any ontico-psychical characteristic in the sense of Being-burdened with inhibitions."
Care (Sorge) is the Being of Dasein: "Being-ahead-of-itself-Being-already-in-(the-world)-as-Being-alongside (entities within-the-world)"—the unified structure of existentiality, facticity, and fallenness.
Temporality is the ontological meaning of Care: "Temporality as the ontological meaning of care"—the future (ahead-of-itself), past (already-in), and present (alongside) are unified in the ecstatic unity of temporality. Ordinary time derives from within-time-ness, which derives from Dasein's temporality.

Connections

Concepts: dasein · being-in-the-world · ready-to-hand-and-present-at-hand · das-man · fallenness · care · angst · being-toward-death · temporality · dwelling · uncanny · thing-ontology · lived-body · everyday-life · atmosphere · embodiment

Authors: heidegger-martin · arendt-hannah · norberg-schulz-christian · harries-karsten · heynen-hilde · vidler-anthony · pallasmaa-juhani · merleau-ponty-maurice

Debates: everyday-vs-iconic-architecture · genius-vs-bureaucracy · spectacle-vs-function · critical-vs-projective

Direct Quotes

"We do not dwell because we have built, but we build and have built because we dwell, that is, because we are dwellers." (Note: this is from BDT, but B&T grounds it ontologically—Being-in as dwelling)

"Being-in" is thus the formal existential expression for the Being of Dasein, which has Being-in-the-world as its essential state." (§12, H. 53)

"The less we just stare at the hammer-Thing, and the more we seize hold of it and use it, the more primordial does our relationship to it become, and the more unveiledly is it encountered as that which it is—as equipment." (§15, H. 69)

"The ready-to-hand is not grasped theoretically at all, nor is it itself the sort of thing that circumspection takes proximally as a circumspective theme. The peculiarity of what is proximally ready-to-hand is that, in its readiness-to-hand, it must, as it were, withdraw in order to be ready-to-hand quite authentically." (§15, H. 69)

"The 'who' is the neuter, the 'they' [das Man]... We take pleasure and enjoy ourselves as they take pleasure; we read, see, and judge about literature and art as they see and judge." (§27, H. 126-127)

"Every kind of priority gets noiselessly suppressed. Overnight, everything that is primordial gets glossed over as something that has long been well known. Everything gained by a struggle becomes just something to be manipulated. Every secret loses its force." (§27, H. 127)

"Dasein has, in the first instance, fallen away from itself as an authentic potentiality for Being its Self, and has fallen into the 'world'." (§38, H. 175)

"In no case is a Dasein, untouched and unseduced by this way in which things have been interpreted, set before the open country of a 'world-in-itself'." (§38, H. 175)

"Idle talk is the possibility of understanding everything without previously making the thing one's own... It releases one from the task of genuinely understanding." (§35, H. 167)

"In anxiety one feels 'uncanny'... 'not-being-at-home' [das Nichtzuhause-sein]... Dasein has been individualized, but individualized as Being-in-the-world." (§40, H. 186)

"In Dasein's public way of interpreting, it is said that 'one dies', because everyone else and oneself can talk himself into saying that 'in no case is it I myself', for this 'one' is the 'nobody'." (§51, H. 253)

"Death is Dasein's ownmost possibility. Being towards this possibility discloses to Dasein its ownmost potentiality-for-Being, in which its very Being is the issue. Here it can become manifest to Dasein that in this distinctive possibility of its own self, it has been wrenched away from the 'they'." (§53, H. 263)

"Conscience summons Dasein's Self from its lostness in the 'they'... The caller is Dasein in its uncanniness: primordial, thrown Being-in-the-world as the 'not-at-home'—the bare 'that-it-is' in the 'nothing' of the world." (§57, H. 276)

"The call does not report events; it calls without uttering anything. The call discourses in the uncanny mode of keeping silent." (§57, H. 276)

"Resoluteness signifies letting oneself be summoned out of one's lostness in the 'they'." (§60, H. 298)

"Care: Being-ahead-of-itself-Being-already-in-(the-world)-as-Being-alongside (entities within-the-world)" (§41, H. 192)

"Temporality as the ontological meaning of care" (§65, H. 323)

Open Questions

How does Heidegger's ontological grounding of dwelling in B&T relate to the normative/ethical function of architecture (Harries, Norberg-Schulz)? Can the fourfold be operationalized, or does it remain nostalgic?
What is the relationship between Heidegger's mortality-centered authenticity and Arendt's natality-centered politics? Does architecture belong to work (fabrication) or can it enable action?
How does the ready-to-hand/present-at-hand distinction apply to digital/immaterial production? Does software code constitute "work" (durable world) or "labor" (consumed in use)?
Can the critique of Cartesian space (space from locations, not extension) be mobilized against the financialized, brandable "space" of the neoliberal metropolis?
What would an "architecture of resoluteness" look like? Is there a risk of aestheticizing authenticity?