faktisch: 145-146, 179, 192, 221, 229, 251-252, 256-257, 259-260, 263-264, 266, 269, 276, et passim (BTJS)
Thus an analytic of Dasein must remain our first requirement in the question of Being. But in that case the problem of obtaining and securing the kind of access which will lead to Dasein, becomes even more a burning one. To put it negatively, we have no right to resort to dogmatic constructions and to apply just any idea of Being and actuality to this entity, no matter how ‘self-evident’ that idea may be; nor may any of the ‘categories’ which such an idea prescribes be forced upon Dasein without proper ontological consideration. We must rather choose such a way of access and such a kind of interpretation that this entity can show itself in itself and from itself [an ihm selbst von ihm selbst her]. And this means that it is to be shown as it is proximally and for the most part – in its average everydayness. In this everydayness there are certain structures which we shall exhibit – not just any accidental structures, but essential ones which, in every kind of Being that FACTICAL Dasein may possess, persist as determinative for the character of its Being. Thus by having regard for the basic state of Dasein’s everydayness, we shall bring out the Being of this entity in a preparatory fashion. [SZ:17] BTMR §5
”Historicality” stands for the state of Being that is constitutive for Dasein’s ‘historizing’ as such; only on the basis of such ‘historizing’ is anything like ‘world-history’ possible or can anything belong historically to world-history. In its FACTICAL Being, any Dasein is as it already was, and it is ‘what’ it already was. It is its past, whether explicitly or not. And this is so not only in that its past is, as it were, pushing itself along ‘behind’ it, and that Dasein possesses what is past as a property which is still presentat-hand and which sometimes has after-effects upon it: Dasein ‘is’ its past in the way of its own Being, which, to put it roughly, ‘historizes’ out of its future on each occasion. Whatever the way of being it may have at the time, and thus with whatever understanding of Being it may possess, Dasein has grown up both into, and in a traditional way of interpreting itself: in terms of this it understands itself proximally and, within a certain range, constantly. By this understanding, the possibilities of its Being are disclosed and regulated. Its own past – and this always means the past of its ‘generation’ – is not something which follows along after Dasein, but something which already goes ahead of it. [SZ:20] BTMR §6
Ontically, “letting something be involved” signifies that within our FACTICAL concern we let something ready-to-hand be so-and-so as it is already and in order that it be such. The way we take this ontical sense of ‘letting be’ is, in principle, ontological. And therewith we Interpret the meaning of previously freeing what is proximally ready-to-hand within-the-world. Previously letting something ‘be’ does not mean that we must first bring it into its Being and produce it; it means rather that something which is already an ‘entity’ must be discovered in its readiness-to-hand, and that we must thus let the entity which has this Being be encountered. This ‘a priori’ letting-something-be-involved is ‘the’ condition for the possibility of encountering anything ready-to-hand, so that Dasein, in its ontical dealings with the entity thus encountered, can thereby let it be involved in the ontical sense. On the other hand, if letting something be involved is understood ontologically, what is then pertinent is the freeing of everything ready-to-hand as ready-to-hand, no matter whether, taken ontically, it is involved thereby, or whether it is rather an entity of precisely such a sort that ontically it is not involved thereby. Such entities are, proximally and for the most part, those with which we concern ourselves when we do not let them ‘be’ as we have discovered that they are, but work upon them, make improvements in them, or smash them to pieces. [SZ:85] BTMR §18
[SZ:105] When we speak of deseverance as a kind of Being which Dasein has with regard to its Being-in-the-world, we do not understand by it any such thing as remoteness (or closeness) or even a distance. We use the expression “deseverance” in a signification which is both active and transitive. It stands for a constitutive state of Dasein’s ‘ Being – a state with regard to which removing something in the sense of putting it away is only a determinate FACTICAL mode. “De-severing” amounts to making the farness vanish – that is, making the remoteness of something disappear, bringing it close. Dasein is essentially de-severant: it lets any entity be encountered close by as the entity which it is. De-severance discovers remoteness; and remoteness, like distance, is a determinate categorial characteristic of entities whose nature is not that of Dasein. De-severance, however, is an existentiale; this must be kept in mind. Only to the extent that entities are revealed for Dasein in their deseveredness [Entferntheit], do ‘remotenesses’ ‘ [“Entfernungen”] and distances with regard to other things become accessible in entities within-the-world themselves. Two points are just as little desevered from one another as two Things, for neither of these types of entity has the kind of Being which would make it capable of desevering. They merely have a measurable distance between them, which we can come across in our de-severing. BTMR §23The space which is thus disclosed with the worldhood of the world still lacks the pure multiplicity of the three dimensions. In this disclosedness which is closest to us, space, as the pure “wherein” in which positions are ordered by measurement and the situations of things are determined, still remains hidden. In the phenomenon of ‘the region we have already indicated that on the basis of which space is discovered beforehand is Dasein. By a “region” we have understood the “whither” to which an equipment-context ready-to-hand might possibly belong, when that context is of such a sort that it can be encountered as directionally desevered – that is, as having been placed. This belongingness [Gehärigkcit] is determined in terms of the significance which is constitutive for the world, and it Articulates the “hither” and “thither” within the possible “whither”. In general the “whither” gets prescribed by a referential totality which has been made fast in a “for-the-sake-of-which” of concern, and within which letting something be involved by freeing it, assigns itself. With anything encountered as ready-to-hand there is always an involvement in [bei] a region. To the totality of involvements which makes up the Being of the ready-to-hand within-the-world, there belongs a spatial involvement which has the character of a region. By reason of such an involvement, the ready-to-hand becomes something which we can come across and ascertain as having form and direction. With the FACTICAL Being of [SZ:111] Dasein, what is ready-to-hand within-the-world is desevered and given directionality, depending upon the degree of transparency that is possible for concernful circumspection. BTMR §24
When we let entities within-the-world be encountered in the way which is constitutive for Being-in-the-world, we ‘give them space’. This ‘giving space’, which we also call ‘making-room’ for them, consists in freeing the ready-to-hand for its spatiality. As a way of discovering and presenting. a possible totality of spaces determined by involvements, this making-room is what makes possible one’s FACTICAL orientation at the time. In concerning itself, circumspectively with the world, Dasein can move things around or out of the way or ‘make-room’ for them [um – , weg – , und “einraumen”] only because making-room – understood as an existentiale – belongs to its Being-in-the-world. But neither the region previously discovered nor in general the current spatiality is explicitly in view. In itself it is present [zugegen] for circumspection in the inconspicuousness of those ready-to-hand things in which that circumspection is concernfully absorbed. With Being-in-the-world, space is proximally discovered in this spatiality. On the basis of the spatiality thus discovered, space itself becomes accessible for cognition. BTMR §24
In this context of an existential analytic of FACTICAL Dasein, the question arises whether giving the “I” in the way we have mentioned discloses Dasein in its everydayness, if it discloses Dasein at all. Is it then obvious a priori that access to Dasein must be gained only by mere reflective awareness of the “I” of actions? What if this kind of ‘giving-itself’ on the part of Dasein should lead our existential analytic astray and do so, indeed, in a manner grounded in the Being of Dasein itself? Perhaps when Dasein addresses itself in the way which is closest to itself, it always says “I am this entity”, and in the long run says this loudest when it is ‘not’ this entity. Dasein is in each case mine, and this is its constitution; but what if this should be the very reason why, proximally and for the most part, Dasein is not itself? What if the aforementioned approach, starting with the givenness of the “I” to Dasein itself, and with a rather patent selfinterpretation of Dasein, should lead the existential analytic, as it were, into a pitfall? If that which is accessible by mere “giving” can be determined, there is presumably an ontological horizon for determining it; but what if this horizon should remain in principle undetermined? It may well be that it is always ontically correct to say of this entity that ‘I’ am it. Yet the ontological analytic which makes use of such assertions must make certain reservations about them in principle. The word ‘I’ is to be [SZ:116] understood only in the sense of a non-committal formal indicator, indicating something which may perhaps reveal itself as its ‘opposite’ in some particular phenomenal context of Being. In that case, the ‘not-I’ is by no means tantamount to an entity which essentially lacks ‘I-hood’ [“Ichheit”], but is rather a definite kind of Being which the ‘I’ itself possesses, such as having lost itself [Selbstverlorenheit]. BTMR §25
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
According to the analysis which we have now completed, Being with Others belongs to the Being of Dasein, which is an issue for Dasein in its very Being. Thus as Being-with, Dasein ‘is’ essentially for the sake of Others. This must be understood as an existential statement as to its essence. Even if the particular FACTICAL Dasein does not turn to Others, and supposes that it has no need of them or manages to get along without them, it is in the way of Being-with. In Being-with, as the existential “forthe-sake-of” of Others, these have already been disclosed in their Dasein. With their Being-with, their disclosedness has been constituted beforehand; accordingly, this disclosedness also goes to make up significancethat is to say, worldhood. And, significance, as worldhood, is tied up with the existential “for-the-sake-of-which”. Since the worldhood of that world in which every Dasein essentially is already, is thus constituted, it accordingly lets us encounter what is environmentally ready-to-hand as something with which we are circumspectively concerned, and it does so in such a way that together with it we encounter the Dasein-with of Others. The structure of the world’s worldhood is such that Others are not proximally present-at-hand as free-floating subjects along with other Things, but show themselves in the world in their special environmental Being, and do so in terms of what is ready-to-hand in that world. BTMR §26
The Self of everyday Dasein is the they-self, which we distinguish from the authentic Self – that is, from the Self which has been taken hold of in its own way [eigens ergriffenen]. As they-self, the particular Dasein has been dispersed into the “they”, and must first find itself. This dispersal characterizes the ‘subject’ of that kind of Being which we know as concernful absorption in the world we encounter as closest to us. If Dasein is familiar with itself as they-self, this means at the same time that the “they” itself prescribes that way of interpreting the world and Being-in-the-world which lies closest. Dasein is for the sake of the “they” in an everyday manner, and the “they” itself Articulates the referential context of significance. When entities are encountered, Dasein’s world frees them for a totality of involvements with which the “they” is familiar, and within the limits which have been established with the “they’s” averageness. Proximally, FACTICAL Dasein is in the with-world, which is discovered in an average way. Proximally, it is not ‘I’, in the sense of my own Self, that ‘am’, but rather the Others, whose way is that of the “they”. In terms of the “they”, and as the “they”, I am ‘given’ proximally to ‘myself’ [mir “selbst”]. Proximally Dasein is “they”, and for the most part it remains so. If Dasein discovers the world in its own way [eigens] and brings it close, if it discloses to itself its own authentic Being, then this discovery of the ‘world’ and this disclosure of Dasein are always accomplished as a clearing-away of concealments and obscurities, as a breaking up of the disguises with which Dasein bars its own way. BTMR §27
There can be variations in the constitutive items of the full phenomenon of fear. Accordingly, different possibilities of Being emerge in fearing. Bringing-close close by, belongs to the structure of the threatening as encounterable. If something threatening breaks in suddenly upon concernful Being-in-the-world (something threatening in its ‘not right away, but any moment’), fear becomes alarm [Erschrecken]. So, in what is threatening we must distinguish between the closest way in which it brings itself close, and the manner in which this bringing-close gets encountered – its suddenness. That in the face of which we are alarmed is proximally something well known and familiar. But if, on the other hand, that which threatens has the character of something altogether unfamiliar, then fear becomes dread [Grauen]. And where that which threatens is laden with dread, and is at the same time encountered with the suddenness of the alarming, then fear becomes terror [Entsetzen]. There are further variations of fear, which we know as timidity, shyness, misgiving, becoming startled. All modifications of fear, as possibilities of having a state-of-mind, point to the fact that Dasein as Being-in-the-world is ‘fearful’ [“furchtsam”]. This ‘fearfulness’ is not to be understood in an ontical sense as some FACTICAL ‘individualized’ disposition, but as an existential possibility of the essential state-of-mind of Dasein in general, though of course it is not the only one. BTMR §30
Why does the understanding – whatever may be the essential dimensions of that which can be disclosed in it – always press forward into possibilities? It is because the understanding has in itself the existential structure which we call “projection”. With equal primordiality the understanding projects Dasein’s Being both upon its “for-the-sake-of-which” and upon significance, as the worldhood of its current world. The character of understanding as projection is constitutive for Being-in-the-world with regard to the disclosedness of its existentially constitutive state-of-Being by which the FACTICAL potentiality-for-Being gets its leeway [Spielraum]. And as thrown, Dasein is thrown into the kind of Being which we call “projecting”. Projecting has nothing to do with comporting oneself towards a plan that has been thought out, and in iccordance with which Dasein arranges its Being. On the contrary, any Dasein has, as Dasein, already projected itself; and as long as it is, it is projecting. As long as it is, Dasein always has understood itself and always will understand itself in terms of possibilities. Furthermore, the character of understanding as projection is such that the understanding does not grasp thematically that upon which it projects – that is’ to say, possibilities. Grasping it in such a manner would take away from what is projected its very character as a possibility, and would reduce it to the given contents which we have in mind; whereas projection, in throwing, throws before itself the possibility as possibility, and lets it be as such. As projecting, understanding is the kind of Being of Dasein in which it is its possibilities as possibilities. BTMR §31
As FACTICAL Dasein, any Dasein has already diverted its potentiality-for-Being into a possibility of understanding. BTMR §31
In discourse the intelligibility of Being-in-the-world (an intelligibility which goes with a state-of-mind) is articulated according to significations; and discourse is this articulation. The items constitutive for discourse are: what the discourse is about (what is talked about); what is said-in-the-talk, as such; the communication; and the making-known. These are not properties which can just be raked up empirically from language. They are existential characteristics rooted in the state of Dasein’s Being, and it is they that first make anything like language ontologically possible. In the FACTICAL linguistic form of any definite case of discourse, some of these items may be lacking, or may remain unnoticed. The fact that they often do not receive ‘verbal’ expression, is merely an index of some definite kind of discourse which, in so far as it is discourse, must in every case lie within the totality of the structures we have mentioned. [SZ:163] BTMR §34
In falling, Dasein itself as FACTICAL Being-in-the-world, is something from which it has already fallen away. And it has not fallen into some entity which it comes upon for the first time in the course of its Being, or even one which it has not come upon at all; it has fallen into the world, which itself belongs to its Being. Falling is a definite existential characteristic of Dasein itself. It makes no assertion about Dasein as something presentat-hand, or about present-at-hand relations to entities from which Dasein ‘is descended’ or with which Dasein has subsequently wound up in some sort of commercium. BTMR §38
To understand this talk about Dasein’s fleeing in the face of itself in falling, we must recall that Being-in-the-world is a basic state of Dasein. That in the face of which one has anxiety [das Wovor der Angst] is Being-in-the-world as such. What is the difference phenomenally between that in the face of which anxiety is anxious [sich ängstet] and that in the face of which fear is afraid? That in the face of which one has anxiety is not an entity within-the-world. Thus it is essentially incapable of having an involvement. This threatening does not have the character of a definite detrimentality which reaches what is threatened, and which reaches it with definite regard to a special FACTICAL potentiality-for-Being. That in the face of which one is anxious is completely indefinite. Not only does this indefiniteness leave factically undecided which entity within-the-world is threatening us, but it also tells us that entities within-the-world are not ‘relevant’ at all. Nothing which is ready-to-hand or present-at-hand within the world functions as that in the face of which anxiety is anxious. Here the totality of involvements of the ready-to-hand and the presentat-hand discovered within-the-world, is, as such, of no consequence; it collapses into itself; the world has the character of completely lacking significance. In anxiety one does not encounter this thing or that thing which, as something threatening, must have an involvement. BTMR §40
If we Interpret Dasein’s uncanniness from an existential-ontological point of view as a threat which reaches Dasein itself and which comes from Dasein itself, we are not contending that in FACTICAL anxiety too it has always been understood in this sense. When Dasein “understands” uncanniness in the everyday manner, it does so by turning away from it in falling; in this turning-away, the “not-at-home” gets ‘dimmed down’. Yet the everydayness of this fleeing shows phenomenally that anxiety, as a basic state-of-mind, belongs to Dasein’s essential state of Being-in-the-world, which, as one that is existential, is never present-at-hand but is itself always in a mode of FACTICAL Being-there – that is, in the mode of a state-of-mind. That kind of Being-in-the-world which is tranquillized and familiar is a mode of Dasein’s uncanniness, not the reverse. From an existential-ontological point of view, the “not-at-home” must be conceived as the more primordial phenomenon. BTMR §40
Even rarer than the existentiell Fact of “real” anxiety are attempts to Interpret this phenomenon according to the principles of its existential-ontological Constitution and function. The reasons for this lie partly in the general neglect of the existential analytic of Dasein, but more particularly in a failure to recognize the phenomenon of state-of-mind . Yet the FACTICAL rarity of anxiety as a phenomenon cannot deprive it of its fitness to take over a methodological function in principle for the existential analytic. On the contrary, the rarity of the phenomenon is an index that Dasein, which for the most part remains concealed from itself in its authenticity because of the way in which things have been publicly interpreted by the “they”, becomes disclosable in a primordial sense in this basic state-of-mind. BTMR §40
But this structure pertains to the whole of Dasein’s constitution. “Being-ahead-of-itself” does not signify ‘anything like an isolated tendency in a worldless ‘subject’, but characterizes Being-in-the-world. To Being-in-the-world, however, belongs the fact that it has been delivered over to itself – that it has in each case already been thrown into a world. The abandonment of Dasein to itself is shown with primordial concreteness in anxiety. “Being-ahead-of-itself” means, if we grasp it more fully, “ahead-of-itselfin-already-being-in-a-world”. As soon as this essentially unitary structure is seen as a phenomenon, what we have set forth earlier in our analysis of worldhood also becomes plain. The upshot of that analysis was that the referential totality of significance (which as such is constitutive for worldhood) has been ‘tied up’ with a “for-the-sake-of-which”. The fact that this referential totality of the manifold relations of the ‘in-order-to’ has been bound up with that which is an issue for Dasein, does not signify that a ‘world’ of Objects which is present-at-hand has been welded together with a subject. It is rather the phenomenal expression of the fact that the constitution of Dasein, whose totality is now brought out explicitly as aheadof-itself-in-Being-already-in …, is primordially a whole. To put it otherwise, existing is always FACTICAL. Existentiality is essentially determined by facticity. BTMR §41
Furthermore, Dasein’s FACTICAL existing is not only generally and without further differentiation a thrown potentiality-for-Being-in-the-world; it is always also absorbed in the world of its concern. In this falling Being-alongside …, fleeing in the face of uncanniness (which for the most part remains concealed with latent anxiety, since the publicness of the “they” suppresses everything unfamiliar), announces itself, whether it does so explicitly or not, and whether it is understood or not. Ahead-of-itselfBeing-already-in-a-world essentially includes one’s falling and one’s Being alongside those things ready-to-hand within-the-world with which one concerns oneself. BTMR §41
Care, as a primordial structural totality, lies ‘before’ [“vor”] every. FACTICAL ‘attitude’ and ‘situation’ of Dasein, and it does so existentially a priori; this means that it always lies in them. So this phenomenon by no means expresses a priority of the ‘practical’ attitude over the theoretical. When we ascertain something present-at-hand by merely beholding it, this activity has the character of care just as much as does a ‘political action’ or taking a rest and enjoying oneself. ‘Theory’ and ‘practice’ are possibilities of Being for an entity whose Being must be defined as “care”. BTMR §41
As something FACTICAL, Dasein’s projection of itself understandingly is in each case already alongside a world that has been discovered. From this world it takes its possibilities, and it does so first in accordance with the way things have been interpreted by the “they”. This interpretation has already restricted the possible options of choice to what lies within the range of the familiar, the attainable, the respectable – that which is fitting and proper. This levelling off of Dasein’s possibilities to what is proximally at its everyday disposal also results in a dimming down of the possible as such. The average everydayness of concern becomes blind to its possibilities, and tranquillizes itself with that which is merely ‘actual’. This tranquillizing does not rule out a high degree of diligence in one’s concern, but arouses it. In this case no positive new possibilities are willed, but that which is at one’s disposal becomes ‘tactically’ altered in such a way that there is a semblance of something happening. [SZ:195] BTMR §41
All the same, this tranquillized ‘willing’ under the guidance of the “they”, does not signify that one’s Being towards one’s potentiality-for-Being has been extinguished, but only that it has been modified. In such a case, one’s Being towards possibilities shows itself for the most part as mere wishing. In the wish Dasein projects its Being upon possibilities which not only have not been taken hold of in concern, but whose fulfilment has not even been pondered over and expected. On the contrary, in the mode of mere wishing, the ascendancy of Being-ahead-of-oneself brings with it a lack of understanding for the FACTICAL possibilities. When the world has been primarily projected as a wish-world, Being-in-the-world has lost itself inertly in what is at its disposal; but it has done so in such a way that, in the light of what is wished for, that which is at its disposal (and this is all that is ready-to-hand) is never enough. Wishing is an existential modification of projecting oneself understandingly, when such selfprojection has’ fallen forfeit to thrownness and just keeps hankering after possibilities. Such hankering closes off the possibilities; what is ‘there’ in wishful hankering turns into the ‘actual world’. Ontologically, wishing presupposes care. BTMR §41
In our pursuit of the tasks of a preparatory existential analytic of Dasein, there emerged an Interpretation of understanding, meaning, and interpretation. Our analysis of Dasein’s disclosedness showed further that, with this disclosedness, Dasein, in its basic state of Being-in-the-world, has been, revealed equiprimordially with regard to the world, Being-in, and the Self. Furthermore, in the FACTICAL disclosedness of the world, entities within-the-world are discovered too. This implies that the Being of these entities is always understood in a certain manner, even if it is not conceived in a way which is appropriately ontological. To be sure, the pre-ontological understanding of Being embraces all entities which are essentially disclosed in Dasein; but the understanding of Being has not yet Articulated itself in a way which corresponds to the various modes of Being. [SZ:201] BTMR §43
As we have noted, Being (not entities) is dependent upon the understanding of Being; that is to say, Reality (not the Real) is dependent upon care. By this dependency our further analytic of Dasein is held secure in. the face of an uncritical Interpretation which nevertheless keeps urging itself upon us – an Interpretation in which the idea of Reality is taken as the clue to Dasein. Only if we take our orientation from existentiality as Interpreted in an ontologically positive manner, can we have any guarantee that in the FACTICAL course of the analysis of ‘consciousness’ or of ‘life’, some sense of “Reality” does not get made basic, even if it is one which has not been further differentiated. BTMR §43
Must we, however, bring up here the ‘epistemological’ problematic as regards the subject-Object relation, or can our analysis restrict itself to Interpreting the ‘immanent consciousness of truth’, and thus remain ‘within the sphere’ of the subject? According to the general opinion, what is true is knowledge. But knowledge is judging. In judgment one must distinguish between the judging as a Real psychical process, and that which is judged, as an ideal content. It will be said of the latter that it is ‘true’. The Real psychical process, however, is either present-at-hand or not. According to this opinion, the ideal content of judgment stands in a relationship of agreement. This relationship thus pertains to a connection between an ideal content of judgment and the Real Thing as that which is judged about. Is this agreement Real or ideal in its kind of Being, or neither of these? How are we to take ontologicalty the relation between an ideal entity and something that is Real and present-at-hand? Such a relation indeed subsists [besteht]; and in FACTICAL judgments it subsists not only as a relation between the content of judgment and the Real Object, but likewise as a relation between the ideal content and the Real act of judgment. And does it manifestly subsist ‘more inwardly’ in this latter case? BTMR §44
2. To Dasein’s state of Being belongs thrownness; indeed it is constitutive for Dasein’s disclosedness. In thrownness is revealed that in each case Dasein, as my Dasein and this Dasein, is already in a definite world and alongside a definite range of definite entities within-the-world. Disclosedness is essentially FACTICAL. BTMR §44
Truth (uncoveredness) is something that must always first be wrested from entities. Entities get snatched out of their hiddenness. The FACTICAL uncoveredness of anything is always, as it were, a kind of robbery. Is it accidental that when the Greeks express themselves as to the essence of truth, they use a privative expression – a-letheia? When Dasein so expresses itself, does not a primordial understanding of its own Being thus make itself known – the understanding (even if it is only pre-ontological) that Being-in-untruth makes up an essential characteristic of Being-in-the-world? BTMR §44
Thus with the question of the Being of truth and the necessity of presupposing it, just as with the question of the essence of knowledge, an ‘ideal subject’ has generally been posited. The motive for this, whether explicit or tacit, lies in the requirement that philosophy should have the ‘a priori’ as its theme, rather than ‘empirical facts’ as such. There is some justification for this requirement, though it still needs to be grounded ontologically. Yet is this requirement satisfied by positing an ‘ideal subject’? Is not such a subject a fanciful idealization? With such a conception have we not missed precisely the a priori character of that merely ‘factual’ subject, Dasein? Is it not an attribute of the a priori character of the FACTICAL subject (that is, an attribute of Dasein’s facticity) that it is in the truth and in untruth equiprimordially? BTMR §44
If in care we have arrived at Dasein’s primordial state of Being, then this must also be the basis for conceptualizing that understanding of Being which lies in care; that is to say, it must be possible to define the meaning of Being. But is the phenomenon of care one in which the most primordial existential-ontological state of Dasein is disclosed? And has the structural manifoldness which lies in this phenomenon, presented us with the most primordial totality of FACTICAL Dasein’s Being? Has our investigation up to this point ever brought Dasein into view as a whole? BTMR §44
The existential Interpretation of death takes precedence over any biology and ontology of life. But it is also the foundation for any investigation of death which is biographical or historiological, ethnological or psychological. In any ‘typology’ of ‘dying’, as a characterization of the conditions under which a demise is ‘Experienced’ and of the ways in which it is ‘Experienced’, the concept of death is already presupposed. Moreover, a psychology of ‘dying’ gives information about the ‘living’ of the person who is ‘dying’, rather than about dying itself. This simply reflects the fact that when Dasein dies – and even when it dies authentically – it does not have to do so with an Experience of its FACTICAL dernising, or in such an Experience. Likewise the ways in which death is taken among primitive peoples, and their ways of comporting themselves towards it in magic and cult, illuminate primarily the understanding of Dasein; but the Interpretation of this understanding already requires an existential analytic and a corresponding conception of death. BTMR §49
Being-towards-the-end does not first arise through some attitude which occasionally emerges, nor does it arise as such an attitude; it belongs essentially to Dasein’s thrownness, which reveals itself in a state-of-mind (mood) in one way or another. The FACTICAL ‘knowledge’ or ‘ignorance’ which prevails in any Dasein as to its ownmost Being-towards-the-end, is only the expression of the existentiell possibility that there are different ways of maintaining oneself in this Being. Factically, there are many who, proximally and for the most part, do not know about death; but this must not be passed off as a ground for proving that Being-towards-death does not belong to Dasein ‘universally’. It only proves that proximally and for the most part Dasein covers up its ownmost Being-towards-death, fleeing in the face of it. Factically, Dasein is dying as long as it exists, but proximally and for the most part, it does so by way of falling. For FACTICAL existing is not only generally and without further differentiation a thrown potentiality-for-Being-in-the-world, but it has always likewise been absorbed in the ‘world’ of its concern. In this falling Being alongside, fleeing from [SZ:252] uncanniness announces itself; and this means now, a fleeing in the face of one’s ownmost Being-towards-death. Existence, facticity, and falling characterize Being-towards-the-end, and are therefore constitutive for the existential conception of death. As regards its ontological possibility, dying is grounded in care. BTMR §50
For the most part, everyday Dasein covers up the owninost possibility of its Being – that possibility which is non-relational and not to be outstripped. This FACTICAL tendency to cover up confirms our thesis that Dasein, as FACTICAL, is in the ‘untruth’. Therefore the certainty which belongs to such a covering-up of Being-towards-death must be an inappropriate way of holding-for-true, and not, for instance, an uncertainty in the sense of a doubting. In inappropriate certainty, that of which one is certain is held covered up. If ‘one’ understands death as an event which one encounters in one’s environment, then the certainty which is related to such events does not pertain to Being-towards-the-end. [SZ:257] BTMR §52
In this ‘critical’ determination of the certainty of death, and of its impendence, what is manifested in the first instance is, once again, a failure to recognize Dasein’s kind of Being and the Being-towards-death which belongs to Dasein – a failure that is characteristic of everydayness. The fact that demise, as an event which occurs, is ‘only’ empirically certain, is in no way decisive as to the certainty of death. Cases of death may be the FACTICAL occasion for Dasein’s first paying attention to death at all. So long, however, as Dasein remains in the empirical certainty which we have mentioned, death, in the way that it ‘is’, is something of which Dasein can by no means become certain. Even though, in the publicness of the “they”, Dasein seems to ‘talk’ only of this ‘empirical’ certainty of death, nevertheless at bottom Dasein does not exclusively or primarily stick to those cases of death which merely occur. In evading its death, even everyday Being-towards-the-end is indeed certain of its death in another way than it might itself like to have true on purely theoretical considerations. This ‘other way’ is what everydayness for the most part veils from itself. Everydayness does not dare to let itself become transparent in such a manner. We have already characterized the everyday state-of-mind which consists in an air of superiority with regard to the certain ‘fact’ of death – a superiority which is ‘anxiously’ concerned while seemingly free from anxiety. In’ this state-of-mind, everydayness acknowledges a ‘higher’ certainty than one which is only empirical. One knows about the certainty of death, and yet ‘is’ not authentically certain of one’s own. The falling everydayness of Dasein is acquainted with death’s certainty, and yet evades Being-certain. But in the light of what it evades, this very evasion attests phenomenally that death must be conceived as one’s owrimost possibility, non-relational, not to be outstripped, and – above all – certain. [SZ:258] BTMR §52
[SZ:263] 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”. This means that in anticipation any Dasein can have wrenched itself away from the “they” already. But when one understands that this is something which Dasein ‘can’ have done, this only reveals its FACTICAL lostness in the everydayness of the they-self. BTMR §53The ownmost, non-relational possibility is not to be outstripped. Being towards this possibility enables Dasein to understand that giving itself up impends for it as the uttermost possibility of its existence. Anticipation, however, unlike inauthentic Being-towards-death, does not evade the fact that death is not to be outstripped; instead, anticipation frees itself for accepting this. When, by anticipation, one becomes free for one’s own death, one is liberated from one’s lostness in those possibilities which may accidentally thrust themselves upon one; and one is liberated in such a way that for the first time one can authentically understand and choose among the FACTICAL possibilities lying ahead of that possibility which is not to be outstripped. Anticipation discloses to existence that its uttermost possibility lies in giving itself up, and thus it shatters all one’s tenaciousness to whatever existence one has reached. In anticipation, Dasein guards itself against falling back behind itself, or behind the potentialityfor-Being which it has understood. It guards itself against ‘becoming too old for its victories’ (Nietzsche). Free for its ownmost possibilities, which are determined by the end and so are understood as finite [endliche], Dasein dispels the danger that it may, by its own finite understanding of existence, fail to recognize that it is getting outstripped by the existence-possibilities of Others, or rather that it may explain these possibilities wrongly and force them back upon its own, so that it may divest itself of its ownmost FACTICAL existence. As the non-relational possibility, death individualizes – but only in such a manner that, as the possibility which is not to be outstripped, it makes Dasein, as Being-with, have some understanding of the potentiality-for-Being of Others. Since anticipation of the possibility which is not to be outstripped discloses also all the possibilities which lie ahead of that possibility, this anticipation includes the possibility of taking the whole of Dasein in advance [Vorwegnehmens] in an existentiell manner; that is to say, it includes the possibility of existing as a whole potentialityfor-Being. BTMR §53
We may now summarize our characterization of authentic Being-towards-death as we have projected it existentially: anticipation reveals to Dasein its lostness in the they-self, and brings it face to face with the possibility of being itself, primarily unsupported by concernful solicitude, but of being itself, rather, in an impassionedfreedom towards death – a freedom which has been released from the Illusions of the “they”, and which is FACTICAL, certain of itself, and anxious. BTMR §53
With Dasein’s lostness in the “they”, that FACTICAL potentiality-for-Being which is closest to it (the tasks, rules, and standards, the urgency and extent, of concernful and solicitous Being-in-the-world) has already been decided upon. The “they” has always kept Dasein from taking hold of these possibilities of Being. The “they” even hides the manner in which it has tacitly relieved Dasein of the burden of explicitly choosing these possibilities. It remains indefinite who has ‘really’ done the choosing. So Dasein make no choices, gets carried along by the nobody, and thus ensnares itself in inauthenticity. This process can be reversed only if Dasein specifically brings itself back to itself from its lostness in the “they”. But this bringing-back must have that kind of Being by the neglect of which [SZ:268] BTMR §54
Nevertheless, even when our investigation of conscience is thus restricted,,we must neither exaggerate its outcome nor make perverse claims about it and lessen its worth. As a phenomenon of Dasein, conscience is not just a fact which occurs and is occasionally present-at-hand. It ‘is’ only in Dasein’s kind of Being, and it makes itself known as a Fact only with FACTICAL existence and in it. The demand that an ‘inductive empirical proof’ should’ be given for the ‘factuality’ of conscience and for the legitimacy of its ‘voice’, rests upon an ontological perversion of the phenomenon. This perversion, however, is one that is shared by every “superior” criticism in which conscience is taken as something just occurring from time to time rather than as a ‘universally established and ascertainable fact’. Among such proofs and counterproofs, the Fact of conscience cannot present itself at all. This is no lack in it, but merely a sign by which we can recognize it as ontologically of a different kind from what is environmentally present-at-hand. BTMR §54
Conscience summons Dasein’s Self from its lostness in the “they”. The Self to which the appeal is made remains indefinite and empty in its “what”. When Dasein interprets itself in terms of that with which it concerns itself, the call passes over what Dasein, proximally and for the most part, understands itself a s. And yet the Self has been reached, unequivocally and unmistakably. Not only is the call meant for him to whom the appeal is made ‘without regard for persons’, but even the caller maintains itself in conspicuous indefiniteness. If the caller is asked about its name, status, origin, or repute, it not only refuses to answer, but does not even leave the slightest possibility of one’s making it into something with which one can be familiar when one’s understanding of Dasein has a ‘worldly’ orientation. On the other hand, it by no means disguises itself in the call. That which calls the call, simply holds itself aloof from any way’of becoming well-known, and this belongs to its phenomenal character. To let itself be drawn into getting considered and talked about, goes against its kind of Being. The peculiar indefiniteness of the caller and the impossibility of making more definite what this caller is, are not just nothing; they are distinctive for it in a positive way. They make known to us that the caller is solely absorbed in summoning us to something, that it is heard only as such, and furthermore that it will not let itself be coaxed. But if so, is it not quite appropriate to the phenomenon to leave unasked the question of what the caller is? Yes indeed, when it comes to listening to the FACTICAL call of conscience in an existentiell way, but not when it comes to analysing existentially the facticity of the calling and the existentiality of the hearing. [SZ:275] BTMR §57
But is it at all necessary to keep raising explicitly the question of who does the calling? Is this not answered for Dasein just as unequivocally as the question of to whom the call makes its appeal? In conscience Dasein calls itself. This understanding of the caller may be more or less awake in the FACTICAL hearing of the call. Ontologically, however, it is not enough to answer that Dasein is at the same time both the caller and the one to whom the appeal is made. When Dasein is appealed to, is it not ‘there’ in a different way from that in which it does the calling? Shall we say that its ownmost potentiality-for-Being-its-Self functions as the caller? BTMR §57
Not only can entities whose Being is care load themselves with FACTICAL guilt, but they are guilty in the very basis of their Being; and this Being-guilty is what provides, above all, the ontological condition for Dasein’s ability to come to owe anything in factically existing. This essential Being-guilty is, equiprimordially, the existential condition for the possibility of the ‘morally’ good and for that of the ‘morally’ evil – that is, for morality in general and for the possible forms which this may take factically. The primordial “Being-guilty” cannot be defined by morality, since morality already presupposes it for itself. BTMR §58
This does not mean ‘ that one wants to have a ‘good conscience’, still less that one cultivates the call voluntarily; it means solely that one is ready to be appealed to. Wanting to have a conscience is just as far from seeking out one’s FACTICAL indebtednesses as it is from the tendency to liberation from guilt in the sense of the essential ‘guilty’. BTMR §58
Wanting to have a conscience is rather the most primordial existentiell presupposition for the possibility of factically coming to owe something. In understanding the call, Dasein lets its ownmost Self take action in itself [in sich handeln] in terms of that potentiality-for-Being which it has chose. Only so can it be answerable [verantwortlich]. Factically, however, any taking-action is necessarily ‘conscienceless’, not only because it may fail to avoid some FACTICAL moral indebtedness, but because, on the null basis of its null projection, it has, in Being with Others, already become guilty towards them. Thus one’s wanting-to-have-a-conscience becomes the taking-over of that essential consciencelessness within which alone the existentiell possibility of being ‘good’ subsists. BTMR §58
But does the ‘fact’ that the voice comes afterwards, prevent the call from being basically a calling-forth? That the voice gets taken as a stirring of conscience which follows after is not enough to prove that we understand the phenomenon of conscience primordially. What if FACTICAL indebtedness were only the occasion for the FACTICAL calling of conscience? What if that Interpretation of the ‘evil’ conscience which we have described goes only half way? That such is the case is evident from the ontological fore-having within whose scope the phenomenon has been brought by this Interpretation. The voice is something that turns up; it has its position in the sequence of Experiences which are present-at-hand, and it follows after the Experience of the deed. But neither the call, nor the deed which has happened, nor the guilt with which one is laden, is an occurrence with the character of something present-at-hand which runs its course. The call has the kind of Being which belongs to care. In the call Dasein ‘is’ ahead of itself in such a way that at the same time it directs itself back to its thrownness. Only by first positing that Dasein is an interconnected sequence of successive Experiences, is it possible to take the voice as something which comes afterwards, something later, which therefore necessarily refers back. The voice does call back, but it calls beyond the deed which has happened, and back to the Being-guilty into which one has been thrown, which is ‘earlier’ than any indebtedness. But at the same time, this calling-back calls forth to Being-guilty, as something to be seized upon in one’s own existence, so that authentic existentiell Being-guilty only ‘follows after’ the call, not vice versa. Bad conscience is basically so far from just reproving and pointing back that it rather points forward as it calls one back into one’s thrownness. The order of the sequence in which Experiences run their course does not give us the phenomenal structure of existing. [SZ:291] BTMR §59
We miss a ‘positive’ content in that which is-called, because we expect to be told something currently useful about assured possibilities of ‘taking action’ which are available and calculable. This expectation has its basis within the horizon of that way of interpreting which belongs to common-sense concern – a way of interpreting which forces Dasein’s existence to be subsumed under the idea of a business procedure that can be regulated. Such expectations (and in part these tacitly underlie even the demand for a material ethic of value as ‘contrasted with one that is ‘merely’ formal) are of course disappointed by the conscience. The call of conscience fails to give any such ‘practical’ injunctions, solely because it summons Dasein to existence, to its ownmost potentiality-for-Being-its-Self. With the maxims which one might be led to expect – maxims which could be reckoned up unequivocally – the conscience would deny to existence nothing less than the very possibility of taking action. But because the conscience manifestly cannot be ‘positive’ in this manner, neither does it function ‘just negatively’ in this same manner. The call discloses nothing which could be either positive or negative as something with which we can concern ourselves; for what it has in view is a Being which is ontologically quite different – namely, existence. On the other hand, when the call is rightly understood, it gives us that which in the existential sense is the most positive’ of all – namely, the owninost possibility which Dasein can present to itself, as a calling-back which calls it forth into its FACTICAL potentiality-for-being-its-Self at the time. To hear the call authentically, signifies bringing oneself into a FACTICAL taking-action. But only by setting forth the existential structure implied in our understanding of the appeal when we hear it authentically, shall we obtain a fully adequate Interpretation of what is called in the call. BTMR §59
Wanting to have a conscience is, as an understanding of oneself in one’s ownmost potentiality-for-Being, a way in which Dasein has been disclosed. This disclosedness is constituted by discourse and state-of-mind, as well as by understanding. To understand in an existentiell manner implies projecting oneself in each case upon one’s ownmost FACTICAL possibility of having the potentiality-for-Being-in-the-world. But the potentiality-for-Being is understood only by existing in this possibility. BTMR §60
In resoluteness we have now arrived at that truth of Dasein which is most primordial because it is authentic. Whenever a “there” is disclosed, its whole Being-in-the-world – that is to say, the world, Being-in, and the Self which, as an ‘I am’, this entity is – is disclosed with equal primordiality. Whenever the world is disclosed, entities within-the-world have been discovered already. The discoveredness of the ready-to-hand and the present-at-hand is based on the disclosedness of the world for if the current totality of involvements is to be freed, this requires that significance be understood beforehand. In understanding significance, concernful Dasein submits itself circumspectively to what it encounters as ready-to-hand. Any discovering of a totality of involvements goes back to a “for-the-sake-of-which”; and on the understanding of such a “for-the-sake-of-which” is based in turn the understanding of significance as the disclosedness of the current world. In seeking shelter, sustenance, livelihood, we do so “for the sake of” constant possibilities of Dasein which are very close to it; upon these the entity for which its own Being is an issue, has already projected itself. Thrown into its ‘there’, every Dasein has been factically submitted to a definite ‘world’ – its ‘world’. At the same time those FACTICAL projections which are closest to it, have been guided by its concernful lostness in the “they”. To this lostness, one’s own Dasein can appeal, and this appeal can be understood in the way of resoluteness. But in that case this authentic disclosedness modifies with equal primordiality both the way in which the ‘world’ is discovered (and this is founded upon that disclosedness) and the way in which the Dasein-with of Others is disclosed. The ‘world’ which is ready-to-hand does not become another one ‘in its content’, nor does the circle of Others get exchanged for a new one; but both one’s Being towards the ready-to-hand understandingly and concernfully, and one’s solicitous Being with Others, are now given a definite character in terms of their ownmost potentiality-for-Being-their-Selves. [SZ:298] BTMR §60
Resoluteness, by its ontological essence, is always the resoluteness of some FACTICAL Dasein at a particular time. The essence of Dasein as an entity is its existence. Resolutcness ‘exists’ only as a resolution [Entschluss] which understandingly projects itself. But on what basis does Dasein disclose itself in resoluteness? On what is it to resolve? Only the resolution itself can give the answer. One would completely misunderstand the phenomenon of resoluteness if one should want to suppose that this consists simply in taking up possibilities which have been proposed and recommended, and seizing hold of them. The resolution is precisely the disclosive projection and determination of what is factically possible at the time. To resoluteness, the indefiniteness characteristic of every potentiality-for-Being into which Dasein has been factically thrown, is something that necessarily belongs. Only in a resolution is resoluteness sure of itself. The existentiell indefiniteness of resoluteness never makes itself definite except in a resolution; yet it has, all the same, its existential definiteness. BTMR §60
What one resolves upon in resoluteness has been prescribed ontologically in the existentiality of Dasein in general as a potentiality-for-Being in the manner of concernful solicitude. As care, however, Dasein has been Determined by facticity and falling. Disclosed in its ‘there’, it maintains itself both in truth and in untruth with equal primordiality. This ‘really’ holds in particular for resoluteness as authentic truth. Resoluteness appropriates untruth authentically. Dasein is already in irresoluteness [Unentschlossenheit], and soon, perhaps, will be in it again. The term “irresoluteness’ merely expresses that phenomenon which we have Interpreted as a Being-surrendered to the way in which things have been prevalently interpreted by the “they”. Dasein, as a they-self, gets ‘lived’ by the common-sense ambiguity of that publicness in which nobody resolves upon anything but which has always made its decision. “Resoluteness” signifies letting oneself be summoned out of one’s lostness in the “they”. The irresoluteness of the “they” remains dominant notwithstanding, but it cannot impugn resolute existence. In the counterconcept 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. Even resolutions remain dependent upon [SZ:299] the “they” and its world. The understanding of this is one of the things that a resolution discloses, inasmuch as resoluteness is what first gives authentic transparency to Dasein. In resoluteness the issue for Dasein is its ownmost potentiality-for-Being, which, as something thrown, can project itself only upon definite FACTICAL possibilities. Resolution does not withdraw itself from ‘actuality’, but discovers first what is factically possible; and it does so by seizing upon it in whatever way is possible for it as its ownmost potentiality-for-Being in the “they”. The existential attributes of any possible resolute Dasein include the items constitutive for an existential phenomenon which we call a “Situation” and which we have hitherto passed over. BTMR §60
In the term “Situation” (“situation” – ‘to be in a situation’) there is an overtone of a signification that is spatial. We shall not try to eliminate this from the existential conception, for such an overtone is also implied in the ‘there’ of Dasein. Being-in-the-world has a spatiality of its own, characterized by the phenomena of de-severance and directionality. Dasein ‘makes room’ in so far as it factically exists. But spatiality of the kind which belongs to Dasein, and on the basis of which existence always determines its ‘location’, is grounded in the state of Being-in-the-world, for which disclosedness is primarily constitutive. Just as the spatiality of the “there” is grounded in disclosedness, the Situation has its foundations in resoluteness. The Situation is the “there” which is disclosed in resoluteness – the “there” as which the existent entity is there. It is not a framework present-at-hand in which Dasein occurs, or into which it might even just bring itself. Far removed from any present-at-hand mixture of circumstances and accidents which we encounter, the Situation is only through resoluteness and in it. The current FACTICAL involvement-character of the circumstances discloses itself to the Self only when that involvementcharacter is such that one has resolved upon the “there” as which that Self, in existing, has to be. When what we call “accidents” befall from the with-world and the environment, they can be-fall only resoluteness. BTMR §60
Resoluteness brings the Being of the “there” into the existence of its Situation. Indeed it delimits the existential structure of that authentic potentiality-for-Being which the conscience attests – wanting to have a conscience. In this potentiality we have recognized the appropriate way of understanding the appeal. This makes it entirely plain that when the call of conscience summons us to our potentiality-for-Being, it does not hold before us some empty’ ideal of existence, but calls us forth into the Situation. This existential positivity which the call of conscience possesses when rightly understood, gives us at the same time an insight: it makes us see to what extent we fail to recognize the disclosive character of the conscience if the tendency of the call is restricted to indebtednesses which have already occurred or which we have before us; it also makes us see to what extent the concrete understanding of the voice of conscience is only seemingly transmitted to us if this restriction is made. When our understanding of the appeal is Interpreted existentially as resoluteness, the conscience is revealed as that kind of Being – included in the very basis of Dasein – in which Dasein makes possible for itself its FACTICAL existence, thus attesting its ownmost potentiality-for-Being. BTMR §60
To present the FACTICAL existentiell possibilities in their chief features and interconnections, and to Interpret them according to their existential structure, falls among the tasks of a th