being in the world
Dasein — Heidegger's untranslated term for the kind of being that human existence is, rendered in the Macquarrie-Robinson translation alternately as 'Being-there' and retained in the original German — stands as the axial concept around which Being and Time organises its entire phenomenological-ontological project. Within the depth-psychology corpus, Dasein functions not merely as a technical philosophical label but as the ground upon which any authentic inquiry into human existence, temporality, anxiety, authenticity, and care must proceed. Heidegger insists that Dasein is never a worldless subject subsequently placed in relation to objects; rather, Being-in-the-world is its primordial constitution. The term gathers within itself the structures of thrownness, projection, fallenness, and care, each of which discloses a distinctive dimension of human factical life. Crucially, Dasein is always 'mine' — marked by Jemeinigkeit, mineness — yet it habitually loses itself in the anonymous 'they' (das Man). Death, anxiety, conscience, resoluteness, and temporality are all elaborated as existential features of Dasein's Being rather than psychological events. The relevance to depth psychology is profound: where classical psychoanalytic and analytical frameworks presuppose a bounded intrapsychic subject, Heidegger's Dasein dissolves that presupposition entirely, situating existence as always already worldly, temporal, and oriented towards its own ownmost possibility of death.
"Inauthenticity" does not mean anything like Being-no-longer-in-the-world, but amounts rather to a quite distinctive kind of Being-in-the-world — the kind which is completely fascinated by the 'world'
This passage establishes the crucial distinction between authentic and inauthentic Dasein, insisting that inauthenticity is itself a mode of Being-in-the-world rather than an absence of it.
, Being and Time, 1962thesis
only in so far as Dasein has been disclosed has it also been closed off; and only in so far as entities within-the-world have been uncovered along with Dasein, have such entities been covered up
Dasein's disclosedness is shown to be equiprimordially an untruth, grounding the existential analysis of thrownness, concealment, and the constitutive tension between disclosure and hiddenness.
, Being and Time, 1962thesis
everyday Dasein covers up the ownmost possibility of its Being — that possibility which is non-relational and not to be out-stripped. This factical tendency to cover up confirms our thesis that Dasein, as factical, is in the 'untruth'.
Dasein's evasion of its ownmost possibility — death — is identified as a constitutive feature of its factical being, demonstrating the structural relationship between inauthenticity, concealment, and Being-towards-death.
, Being and Time, 1962thesis
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.
Anxiety is identified as the privileged attunement through which Dasein can be wrested from its lostness in the 'they' and made disclosable in its primordial authentic constitution.
, Being and Time, 1962thesis
Because Dasein is lost in the 'they', it must first find itself. In order to find itself at all, it must be 'shown' to itself in its possible authenticity.
The movement from lostness-in-the-they to authentic self-finding is here articulated as the structural problem of Dasein's potentiality-for-Being-its-Self, mediated through conscience.
, Being and Time, 1962thesis
truth, as Dasein's disclosedness, must be. This belongs to Dasein's essential thrownness into the world. Has Dasein as itself ever decided freely whether it wants to come into 'Dasein' or not?
Truth is grounded in Dasein's disclosedness, and Dasein's thrownness — its always already having-been-delivered-into-existence without choice — is presented as constitutive of its Being.
, Being and Time, 1962thesis
In death, Dasein has not been fulfilled nor has it simply disappeared; it has not become finished nor is it wholly at one's disposal as something ready-to-hand.
Death is distinguished from all other modes of ending precisely because Dasein cannot be reduced to presence-at-hand, establishing the existential-ontological uniqueness of Being-towards-death.
, Being and Time, 1962thesis
Being-guilty belongs to Dasein's Being, and signifies the null Being-the-basis of a nullity. The 'Guilty!' which belongs to the Being of Dasein is something that can be neither augmented nor diminished.
Guilt is ontologised as a permanent structural feature of Dasein's Being rather than a moral or psychological episode, grounding the analysis of conscience and resoluteness.
, Being and Time, 1962thesis
factical Dasein, understanding itself and its world ecstatically in the unity of the 'there', comes back from these horizons to the entities encountered within them.
Temporality is presented as the ecstatical-horizonal ground of Dasein's Being, through which the structural unity of future, present, and having-been is constituted.
, Being and Time, 1962thesis
Being 'is' only in the understanding of those entities to whose Being something like an understanding of Being belongs. Hence Being can be something unconceptualized, but it never
This passage establishes that Being itself is accessible only through Dasein, making Dasein the ontological site through which the question of Being can be posed at all.
, Being and Time, 1962thesis
even everyday Dasein already is towards its end — that is to say, is constantly coming to grips with its death, though in a 'fugitive' manner
Everyday Dasein is shown to be always already oriented towards death even in its flight from it, grounding the claim that Being-towards-death is a constant existential structure.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
Even when one is without Illusions and 'is ready for anything', here too the 'ahead-of-itself' lies hidden. The 'ahead-of-itself', as an item in the structure of care
The care-structure's 'ahead-of-itself' moment is shown to persist even in apparently tranquil or resigned modes of Dasein's existence, confirming its ontological rather than merely psychological status.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
Dasein is for the sake of the 'they' in an everyday manner, and the 'they' itself articulates the referential context of significance.
The 'they' is identified as the structural agent through which Dasein's everyday world and its interpretive horizons are shaped and maintained.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
Dasein itself. That in the face of which it thus shrinks back cannot be taken as something 'fearsome', for anything 'fearsome' is always encountered as an entity within-the-world.
Anxiety's intentional object is identified not as any intraworldly entity but as Dasein's own Being, distinguishing anxiety structurally from fear and disclosing uncanniness as Dasein's ground.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
"Existence" means a potentiality-for-Being — still lacked something essential. The end which belongs to the potentiality-for-Being — that is to say, to existence — limits and determines in every case whatever totality is possible for Dasein.
Death is articulated as the structural limit that first makes possible any consideration of Dasein's Being-a-whole, grounding the analysis of authentic totality.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
'Care' first shaped this creature, she shall possess it as long as it lives. And because there is now a dispute among you as to its name, let it be called 'homo', for it is made out of humus (earth).
The myth of Cura is invoked to ground the ontological claim that care is the primordial constitution of Dasein's Being, prior to any theological or scientific determination.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
'In' is derived from 'innan' — 'to reside', 'habitare', 'to dwell'. 'An' signifies 'I am accustomed', 'I am familiar with', 'I look after something'.
The etymology of 'in' is deployed to show that Being-in-the-world denotes dwelling and familiarity rather than spatial containment, establishing the existential character of Dasein's worldly Being.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
Ontically as well as ontologically, the priority belongs to Being-in-the-world as concern. In the analytic of Dasein this structure undergoes a basic Interpretation.
Care (Sorge) is established as the unifying ontological structure of Dasein's Being-in-the-world, with priority over both regional ontical and ontological determinations.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
Along with Dasein as Being-in-the-world, entities within-the-world have in each case already been disclosed. This existential-ontological assertion seems to accord with the thesis of realism that the external world is Really present-at-hand.
The existential-ontological claim that the world is always already disclosed with Dasein is distinguished from both realist and idealist positions, grounding a distinctive ontology of worldhood.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
Dasein is essentially de-severance — that is, it is spatial. It cannot wander about within the current range of its de-severances; it can never do more than change them.
Dasein's spatiality is characterised through de-severance and directionality as existential rather than Cartesian-geometric, showing that space is always disclosed through Dasein's concernful orientation.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
Resoluteness, by its ontological essence, is always the resoluteness of some particular factical Dasein.
Resoluteness is shown to be irreducibly particular and factical rather than a formal universal, grounding authentic self-disclosure in Dasein's concrete situatedness.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
No one can take the Other's dying away from him. Of course someone can 'go to his death for another'. But that always means to sacrifice oneself for the Other.
The ownmost and non-relational character of death as a possibility of Dasein is established through the analysis of dying, which cannot be represented or substituted by another.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
only because the Being of the 'there' receives its Constitution through understanding and through the character of understanding as projection, only because it is what it becomes
Understanding as projection is identified as constitutive of the 'there' (Da) of Dasein, grounding the disclosedness of Dasein's possibilities in its projective character.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
Ethnology itself already presupposes as its clue an inadequate analytic of Dasein.
The positive sciences, including ethnology, are shown to presuppose an ontology of Dasein that they have not themselves worked out, establishing the priority and urgency of the existential analytic.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
This 'with' is something of the character of Dasein; the 'too' means a sameness of Being as circumspectively concernful Being-in-the-world.
Co-Dasein (Mitdasein) is analysed through the existential meaning of 'with' and 'too', grounding the ontology of being-with-others in the same mode of concernful Being-in-the-world.
, Being and Time, 1962supporting
Only in some definite mode of its own Being-in-the-world can Dasein discover entities as Nature.
Nature as a scientific object is shown to be derivative of a specific mode of Dasein's Being-in-the-world, subordinating the natural-scientific attitude to the existential analytic.
, Being and Time, 1962aside
understood as finite, 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
The finitude of Dasein's understanding is shown to be a risk as well as a condition, requiring that authentic Being-towards-death orient Dasein properly towards others' possibilities.
, Being and Time, 1962aside