Heidegger and the Question of Daseins Being-a-Whole

The problem of individuation is an old metaphysical problem. Basically it could be

expressed in two questions: What makes an entity that exact entity? and What makes this
entity different from other entities?. This paper will be somewhat experimental. We will try to
see the shape this old problem takes in the post-metaphysical philosophy of Martin Heidegger.
First, we need to look back at Kant. In the Critique of Pure Reason Kant talks about two
different kinds of individuation: the individuation of the object and the individuation of the
subject. Although Heidegger is one of the most severe critics of the philosophy of the subject,
undoubtedly Dasein replaces Subject in "Being and Time". For Kant individuation is a
transcendental principle. Every phenomenon I experience is followed by a representation I
think. To simplify, every experienced phenomenon is experienced by someone. Subject gets its
identity and unity from the transcendental unity of apperception, which synthesizes all its
experiences under I think. The question of individuation then becomes, first and foremost, the
question of unity of the subject both, through time and synchronically, at one given instance.
Heidegger changes the terrain of Kantian philosophy (thus putting an end to it): Being
and Time no longer talks about structures of understanding and reason but about existential
structures of Dasein. However, before we start talking about Heidegger, we first need to prepare
the ground for it. In Being and Time Heidegger distinguishes three types of beings: presenceat-hand (objects) [vorhandenheit], ready-to-hand (equipment) [zuhandenheit] and Dasein. All
three types of beings have different types of Being. In this paper we will examine the
individuation of Dasein, being, which every one of us is (Heidegger: 27, 2008). Daseins type
of being is existence. Because of that, Heidegger warns us not to think about Dasein in
categorical vocabulary based on ontology of objects (The mistake Descartes made,
differentiating between thinking and extended substances, although still calling thinking
substance a thing, res cogitans). Categories, structures of understanding, should be replaced by
existentials, existential structures of Dasein.
As being-in-the-world Dasein is always factual. It is not some abstract subject Dasein is
always mine, submerged into certain activities, life situations, tradition and public opinion.
When watching ourselves in the world, we always notice that we constantly choose to do
something and not to do something other, to achieve certain goals, to communicate to certain
people and avoid others. Some things seem important to us and others do not. What does it say
about Dasein? Considering these problems, Heidegger gives an incredibly simple answer, not yet
thematized by the tradition: Dasein is driven by care [Sorge]. Being-in-the-world is essentially

care(Heidegger: 2008, 237). Care is inscribed into Daseins existence, its foundation (or
groundlessness): we care about the greatest plans in our career, we want to become academics,
celebrities or lawyers. But care also reveals itself in short-term goals and even in the activities
that we engage in unconsciously.
In the structure of care, Heidegger discovers the moment of temporality. This structure of
Being, which essentially belongs to care, we shall denote as Dasein's "Being-ahead-of-itself
(Heidegger, 2008: 294). Care is always ahead of the current state of affairs. Care makes plans
and creates projects that Dasein tries to accomplish in the future. This existential structure is the
core of Daseins being: I can plan to become a professor and I can (absolutely unconsciously)
move towards a cup of water in the kitchen. This structure of care reveals the foundational and
primal Daseins orientation towards the future. Dasein is always directed beyond itself. We
should notice that the philosophical tradition, always driven by the epistemic subject, always
thought of the present as its most important moment in time, while the existential subject of
Heidegger, cares most about the future.
As being-in-the-world, Dasein finds itself in certain possibilities. Lets say, we can be
born in certain social strata, have some or other talents, have an opportunity to gain an education.
Dasein does not choose these opportunities but it finds itself in them. This existential structure of
being Heidegger calls thrownness[Geworfenheit]. We are always thrown into certain
possibilities.
Its not enough to only understand owns possibilities, every single one of us try to realize
them in our being and when realized, they open new possibilities. Conscious or unconscious
choice to realize certain possibilities, Heidegger calls a project [Entwurf]. The fact that Dasein
exists as a possibility, points to a certain relation to its projects. If we talk about Dasein not in
terms of what?, but in terms of how?, then a certain project reveals itself not as a striving for
a certain state (becoming a teacher), but as an endless process (being a teacher). In this sense, the
process of being a teacher never ends and the project can never be accomplished. Therefore, to
be project-oriented, means to be in a constant process.
I choose some possibilities and reject others. That is how my essential finitude reveals
itself. As Dasein I cannot realize all of my possibilities, some of them have to be negated. This
mode of lacking, Heidegger calls nichtigkeit. Unrealized possibilities may haunt me just like the
ones I try to realize to constitute my identity. The fact that I didnt manage to become a lawyer is
as important to me as the fact that Im now trying to become something else. This two-sided
concept of project-orientation means that Dasein can never be characterized essentially by a set
of factual features, like its current goals and accomplishments (Dreyfus, 1991: 188). Imagine
that you estimate yourself only as your current achievements and your past, only by everything

that you are at the moment. You would lose an essential part of your identity. Lets say that a
hard-working student who dreams of becoming a professor already sees their future academic
career as an essential part of their identity which determines their current actions and values.
Tradition claims that who you are is determined by the events of the past that brought you to
your current situation but according to Heidegger, self-understanding is determined by Daseins
orientation towards the future.
What makes this fluid and open to future Dasein a whole? What makes Dasein one and
prevents from losing their identity through time, then for example it changes its project? To
answer these questions Heidegger turns to the analytic of being-towards death. For Heidegger
death is not only the end of life that shows itself when Dasein no longer exists. The phenomenon
of death cannot be understood by investigating other dead people, because we will always
encounter only them, not death itself. In other words, Heidegger disagrees with the famous
Epicurean thesis When we exist, death is not; and when death exists, we are not. Affirmation
of life and death shows themselves for Heidegger as a unity. That is why in the existential
analytic, death is replaced by being-towards-death.
While being open to possibilities, Dasein greets death as a special one. In general, every
project takes on a not-yet structure. Lets say that right now, while writing this paper, I am
have not-yet completed my master studies but this goal is essential for my self-understanding.
Being-towards-death also has the not-yet structure and, just like all the other possibilities, while
being a not-yet, it influences our being and self-understanding. Off course, in the case of
being-towards-death, this not-yet has a no-longer-Dasein structure. It means that when death
comes, i.e. when this possibility becomes actual, Dasein no longer exists. As a possibility, death
has one more important structural feature: I always have to experience my own death; no one can
die in my place.
Probably the most accurate description of the paradox of death as a possibility is given by
Giorgio Agamben in the first chapters of Language and Death (Agamben: 2006). Agamben
notices that Heidegger gathers the entire structure of being-towards-death into one sentence
death, as the end of Dasein, is Dasein's ownmost possibility non-relational, certain and as such
indefinite, not to be outstripped.. (Heidegger, 2008: 303). By saying the own most and
unconditional, Heidegger means that no one can take my place in my own death. We all know
that we are going to die even though the time of our death is not certain for us. Whatever we do,
we cannot avoid death, there is no medication to prevent it. Agamben also notices that death,
unlike other possibilities, gives Dasein no content that it could actualize. Death, as possibility,
gives Dasein nothing to be 'actualized', nothing which Dasein, as actual, could itself be
(Heidegger, 307: 2007) Moreover, death doesnt provide Dasein any image, any representation of

itself, it is the pure experience of negativity. Heidegger begins with this experience of a
negativity that is revealed as constitutive of Dascin at the very moment it reaches, in the
experience of death, its
ownmost possibility. (Agamben, 2006 :3). Death as a possibility is the only possibility that will
happen unavoidably. And yet, the question of death is not a question of knowing. For Heidegger
it is more an experience of owns finitude. The analytic of death, aside from the valuable
description of an important part of the reality of Dasein, achieves other positive aspects and
helps to solve the problem of the unity of Dasein. First of all, death gives meaning to separate
activities and projects. Lets imagine a football game what would last forever. What would a goal
mean in a match like that? If the game never ends, all the actions performed during that game,
lose their meaning. The meaning is given to the game by its limits, by its temporality and its
finitude. Just the same, death as finitude gives meaning to all Daseins projects by giving them
temporality. But what is the most important to us, being-towards-death helps Heidegger solve the
being-a-whole problem. If Dasein is an entity which exists within possibilities and the essential
part of its self-understanding are projects of the future, the infinite opening to the future would
never allow Dasein to understand itself as a whole. It would be shattered. Lets see it through an
example. If Dasein was infinite in the sense of time, it could, first and foremost, try to
accomplish all of its projects, like being an academic and later a part of the criminal world.
This infinity would not allow Dasein to understand itself as a whole, because it could always
take on new projects and completely change the old ones, thus changing its experience of
existence completely. Aside from that, it would still have an endless amount of possibilities in
the future. Thats why the bounding provided my death, the understanding that Dasein can only
realize so many projects, allows Dasein understand itself as a whole, as an integral individual.
The limit limits the future, the projects, but also opens up a unity and sense.