deficient

defizient, 61, 121; mode, 20, 57, 73, 104, 120-121, 123-125, 336, 352, 355. See also derivative; indifferent mode; privative (BT)

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If we now ask what shows itself in the phenomenal findings about knowing, we must keep in mind that knowing is grounded beforehand in a Being-already-alongside-the-world, which is essentially constitutive for Dasein  ’s Being. Proximally, this Being-already-alongside is not   just a fixed staring at something that is purely present-at-hand  . Being-in-the-world, as concern, is fascinated by the world with which it is concerned. If knowing is to be possible as a way of determining the nature of the present-at-hand by observing it, then there must first be a DEFICIENCY in our having-to-do with the world concernfully. When concern holds back [Sichenthalten  ] from any kind of producing, manipulating, and the like, it puts itself into what is now the sole remaining mode of Being-in, the mode of just tarrying alongside… . [das Nur-noch  -verweilen   bei   …] This kind of Being towards the world is one which lets us encounter entities within-the-world purely in the way the look (eidos  ), just that; on the basis of this kind of Being, and as a mode of it, looking explicitly at what we encounter is possible. Looking at something in this way is sometimes a definite way of taking up a direction towards something – of setting our sights towards what is present-at-hand. It takes over a ‘view-point’ in advance from the entity which it encounters. Such looking-at enters the mode of dwelling autonomously alongside entities within-the-world. In this kind of ‘dwelling’ as a holding-oneself-back from any manipulation or utilization, the perception of the present-at-hand is consummated. Perception is consummated when one addresses oneself to something as something and discusses it as such. This amounts to interpretation   in the broadest sense; and on the basis of such interpretation, perception becomes an act of making determinate. What is thus perceived and made determinate can be expressed in propositions, and can be retained and preserved as what has thus been asserted. This perceptive retention of an assertion about something is itself a way of Being-in-the-world; it is not to be Interpreted as a ‘procedure’ by which a subject provides itself with representations [Vorstellungen] of something which remain stored up ‘inside’ as having been thus appropriated, and with regard to which the question of how they ‘agree’ with actuality can occasionally arise. [SZ  :62] BTMR §13

This elemental historicality of Dasein may remain hidden from Dasein itself. But there is a way by which it can be discovered and given proper attention. Dasein can discover tradition  , preserve it, and study it explicitly. The discovery of tradition and the disclosure of what it ‘transmits’ and how this is transmitted, can be taken hold of as a task in its own right. In this way Dasein brings itself into the kind, of Being which consists in histoiriological inquiry and research. But historiology – or more precisely historicity – is possible as a kind of Being which the inquiring Dasein may possess, only because historicality is a determining characteristic for Dasein in the very basis of its Being. If this historicality remains hidden from Dasein, and as long as it so remains, Dasein is also denied the possibility of historiological inquiry or the discovery of history. If historiology is wanting, this is not evidence against Dasein’s historicality; on the contrary, as a DEFICIENT mode of this state of Being, it is evidence for it. Only because it is ‘historical’ can an era be unhistoriological. BTMR §6

Dasein’s facticity is such that its Being-in-the-world has always dispersed [zerstreut] itself or even split itself up into definite ways of Being-in. The multiplicity of these is indicated by the following examples: having to do with something, producing something, attending to something and looking after it, making use of something, giving something up and letting it go, undertaking, accomplishing, evincing, interrogating, considering, discussing, determining… . All these ways of Being-in have concern as their kind of Being – a kind of Being which we have yet to characterize in detail. Leaving undone, neglecting, renouncing, taking a rest – these too are ways of concern; but these are all DEFICIENT modes, in which the possibilities of concern are kept to a ‘bare minimum’. The term ‘concern’ has, in the first instance, its colloquial [vorwissenschaftliche] signification, and can mean to carry out something, to get it done [erledigen], to ‘straighten it out’. It can also mean to ‘provide oneself with something’. We use the expression with still another characteristic turn of phrase when we say “I am concerned for the success of the undertaking.” Here ‘concern’ means something like apprehensiveness. In contrast to these colloquial ontical significations, the expression ‘concern’ will be used in this investigation as an ontological term for an existentiale, and will designate the Being of a possible way of Being-in-the-world. This term has been chosen not because Dasein happens to be proximally and to a large extent ‘practical’ and economic, but because the Being of Dasein itself [SZ:57] is to be made visible as care. This expression too is to be taken as an ontological structural concept. (See Chapter 6 of this Division.) It has nothing to do with ‘tribulation’, ‘melancholy’, or the ‘cares of life’, though ontically one can come across these in every Dasein. These – like their opposites, ‘gaiety’ and ‘freedom from care’ – are ontically possible only because Dasein, when understood ontologically, is care. Because Being-in-the-world belongs essentially to Dasein, its Being towards the world [Sein   zur Welt  ] is essentially concern. BTMR §12

In our concernful dealings, however, we not only come up against unusable things within what is ready-to-hand already: we also find things which are missing – which not only are not ‘handy’ [“handlich”] but are not ‘to hand’ [“zur Hand”] at all. Again, to miss something in this way amounts to coming across something un-ready-to-hand. When we notice what is un-ready-to-hand, that which is ready-to-hand enters the mode of obtrusiveness The more urgently [Je dringlicher] we need what is missing, and the more authentically it is encountered in its un-readiness-to-hand, all the more obtrusive [um so aufdringlicher] does that which is ready-to-hand become – so much so, indeed, that it seems to lose its character of readiness-to-hand. It reveals itself as something just presentat-hand and no more, which cannot be budged without the thing that is missing. The helpless way in which we stand   before it is a DEFICIENT mode of concern, and as such it uncovers the Being-just-present-at-hand-andno-more of something ready-to-hand. BTMR §16

The readiness-to-hand which belongs to any such region beforehand has the character of inconspicuous familiarity, and it has it in an even more primordial sense than does the Being of the ready-to-hand. The region itself becomes visible in a conspicuous manner only when one discovers the ready-to-hand circumspectively and does so in the DEFICIENT modes of concern. Often the region of a place does not become accessible explicitly as such a region until one fails to find something in its place. The space which is discovered in circumspective Being-in-the-world as the spatiality of the totality of equipment, always belongs to entities themselves as the place of that totality. The bare space itself is still veiled over. Space has been split up into places. But this spatiality has its own unity through that totality-of-involvements in-accordance-with-the-world [weltmässige] which belongs to the spatially ready-to-hand. The ‘environment’ does not arrange itself in a space which has been given in advance; but its specific worldhood, in its significance, Articulates the context of involvements which belongs to some current to tality of circumspectively allotted places. The world at such a time always reveals the spatiality of the space which belongs to it. To encounter the ready-to-hand in its environmental space remains ontically possible only because Dasein itself is ‘spatial’ with regard to its Being-in-the-world. BTMR §22

The expression ‘Dasein’, however, shows plainly that ‘in the first instance’ this entity is unrelated to Others, and that of course it can still be ‘with’ Others afterwards. Yet one must not fail to notice that we use the term “Dasein-with” to designate that Being for which the Others who are [die scienden Anderen  ] are freed within-the-world. This Dasein-with of the Others is disclosed within-the-world for a Dasein, and so too for those who are Daseins with us [die Mitdaseienden], only because Dasein in itself is essentially Being-with. The phenomenological assertion that “Dasein is essentially Being-with” has an existential-ontological meaning. It does not seek to establish ontically that factically I am not present-at-hand alone, and that Others of my kind occur. If this were what is meant by the proposition that Dasein’s Being-in-the-world is essentially constituted by Being-with, then Being-with would not be an existential attribute which Dasein, of its own accord, has coming to it from its own kind of Being. It would rather be something which turns up in every case by reason of the occurrence of Others. Being-with is an existential characteristic of Dasein even when factically no Other is present-at-hand or perceived. Even Dasein’s Being-alone is Being-with in the world. The Other can be missing only in and for a Being-with. Being-alone is a DEFICIENT mode of Being-with; its very possibility is the proof of this. On the other hand, factical Being-alone is not obviated by the occurrence of a second example of a human being ‘beside’ me, or by ten such examples. Even if these and more are present-at-hand, Dasein can still be alone. So Being-with and the facticity of Being with one another are not based on the occurrence together of several ‘subjects’. Yet Being-alone ‘among’ many does not mean that with regard to their Being they are merely present-at-hand there alongside us. Even in our Being ‘among them’ they are there with us; their Dasein-with is encountered in a mode in which they are indifferent and alien. Being missing and ‘Being away’ [Das Fehlen   und “Fortsein”] are modes of Dasein-with, and are possible only because Dasein as Being-with lets the Dasein of Others be encountered in its world. Being-with is in every case a characteristic of one’s own Dasein; Dasein-with characterizes the Dasein of Others to the extent that it is freed by its world for a Being-with. Only so far as one’s own Dasein has the essential structure of Being-with, is it Dasein-with as encounterable for Others. BTMR §26

Even ‘concern’ with food and clothing, and the nursing of the sick body, are forms of solicitude. But we understand the expression “solicitude” in a way which corresponds to our use of “concern” as a term for an existentiale. For example, ‘welfare work’ [“Fürsorge  ”], as a factical social arrangement, is grounded in Dasein’s state of Being as Being-with. Its factical urgency gets its motivation in that Dasein maintains itself proximally and for the most part in the DEFICIENT modes of solicitude. Being for, against, or without one another, passing one another by, not “mattering” to one another – these are possible ways of solicitude. And it is precisely these last  -named DEFICIENT and Indifferent modes that characterize everyday, average Being-with-one-another. These modes of Being show again the characteristics of inconspicuousness and obviousness which belong just as much to the everyday Dasein-with of Others within-the-world as to the readiness-to-hand of the equipment with which one is daily concerned. These Indifferent modes of Being-with-one-another may easily mislead ontological Interpretation into interpreting this kind of Being, in the first instance, as the mere Being-present-at-hand of several subjects. It seems as if only negligible variations of the same kind of Being lie before us; yet ontologically there is an essential distinction between the ‘indifferent’ way in which Things at random occur together and the way in which entities who are with one another do not “matter” to one another. [SZ:122] BTMR §26

Just as circumspection belongs to concern as a way of discovering what is ready-to-hand, solicitude is guided by considerateness and forbearance. Like solicitude, these can range, through their respective DEFICIENT and Indifferent modes up to the point of inconsiderateness or the perfunctoriness for which indifference leads the way. BTMR §26

But because solicitude dwells proximally and for the most part in the DEFICIENT or at least the Indifferent modes (in the indifference of passing one another by), the kind of knowing-oneself which is essential and closest, demands that one become acquainted with oneself. And when, indeed, one’s knowing-oneself gets lost in such ways as aloofness, hiding oneself away, or putting on a disguise, Being-with-one-another must follow special routes of its own in order to come close to Others, or even to ‘see through them’ [“hinter sie” zu kommen  ]. BTMR §26

If the term “understanding” is taken in a way which is primordially existential, it means to be projecting towards a potentiality-for-Being for the sake of which any Dasein exists. In understanding, one’s own potentialityfor-Being is disclosed in such a way that one’s Dasein always knows understandingly what it is capable of. It ‘knows’ this, however, not by having discovered some fact, but by maintaining itself in an existentiell possibility. The kind of ignorance which corresponds to this, does not consist in an absence or cessation of understanding, but must be regarded as a DEFICIENT mode of the projectedness of one’s potentiality-for-Being. Existence can be questionable. If it is to be possible for something ‘to be in question’ [das “In-Frage  -stehen  ”], a disclosedness is needed. When one understands oneself projectively in an existentiell possibility, the future underlies this understanding, and it does so as a coming-towards-oneself out of that current possibility as which one’s Dasein exists. The future makes ontologically possible an entity which is in such a way that it exists understandingly in its potentiality-for-Being. Projection is basically futural; it does not primarily grasp the projected possibility thematically just by having it in view, but it throws itself into it as a possibility. In each case Dasein is understandingly in the way that it can be. Resoluteness has turned out to be a kind of existing which is primordial and authentic. Proximally and for the most part, to be sure, Dasein remains irresolute; that is to say, it remains closed off in its ownmost potentialityfor-Being, to which it brings itself only when it has been individualized. This implies that temporality does not temporalize itself constantly out of the authentic future. This inconstancy, however, does not mean that temporality sometimes lacks a future, but rather that the temporalizing of the future takes various forms. BTMR §68

How are we to obtain the right point of view for analysing the temporality of concern? We have called concernful Being alongside the ‘world’ our “dealings in and with the environment”. As phenomena which are examples of Being alongside, we have chosen the using, manipulation, and producing of the ready-to-hand, and the DEFICIENT and undifferentiated modes of these; that is, we have chosen ways of Being alongside what belongs to one’s everyday needs. In.this kind of concern Dasein’s authentic existence too maintains itself, even when for such existence this concern is ‘a matter of indifference’. The ready-to-hand things with which we concern ourselves are not the causes of our concern, as if this were to arise only by the effects of entities within-the-world. Being alongside the ready-to-hand cannot be explained ontically in terms of the ready-to-hand itself, nor can the ready-to-hand be derived contrariwise from this kind of Being. But neither are concern, as a kind of Being which belongs to Dasein, and that with which we concern ourselves, as something ready-to-hand within-the-world, just present-at-hand together. All the same, a ‘connection’ subsists between them. That which is dealt with, if rightly understood, sheds light upon concernful dealings themselves. And furthermore, if we miss the phenomenal structure of what is dealt with, then we fail to recognize the existential constitution of dealing. Of course we have already made an essential gain for the analysis of those entities which we encounter as closest to us, if their specific character as equipment does not get passed over. But we must understand further that concernful dealings never dwell with any individual item of equipment. Our using and manipulating of any definite item of equipment still remains oriented towards some equipmental context. If, for instance, we are searching for some equipment which we have ‘misplaced’, then what we have in mind is not merely what we are searching for, or even primarily this; nor do we have it in mind in an isolated ‘act’; but the range of the equipmental totality has already been discovered beforehand. Whenever we ‘go to work’ and seize hold of something, we do not push out from the “nothing” and come upon some item of equipment which has been presented to us in isolation; in laying hold of an item of equipment, we come back to it from whatever work-world has already been disclosed. BTMR §69

[SZ:355] And how is it possible to ‘ascertain’ what is missing [Fehlendem] – that is to say, un-ready-to-hand, not just ready-to-hand in an unmanageable way? That which is un-ready-to-hand is discovered circumspectively when we miss it [im Vermissen  ]. The ‘affirmation’ that something is not present-at-hand, is founded upon our missing it; and both our missing it and our affirmation have their own existential presuppositions. Such missing is by no means a not-making-present [Nichtgegenwärtigen]; it is rather a DEFICIENT mode of the Present in the sense of the making-unpresent [Ungegenwärtigens] of something which one has expected or which one has’ always had at one’s disposal. If, when one circumspectively lets something be involved, one were not ‘from the outset’ awaiting the object of one’s concern, and if such awaiting did not temporalize itself in a unity with a making-present, then Dasein could never ‘find’ that something is missing [fehlt]. BTMR §69