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'Who is it who is in the everydayness of Da-sein?... By investigating in the direction of the phenomenon which allows us to answer the question of the who, we are led to structures of Da-sein which are equiprimordial with being-in-the-world: being-with and Mitda-sein.'
Heidegger summarily removes the option to reply to the 'question of the who' with the seemingly self-evident answer of 'the self'. To conceive of the self as an isolated subject that remains constant amongst all the experiences of a particular person is to treat that person as a thing, i.e. in possession of objective presence, and not Da-sein. Though the concept of the self seems 'given' and 'evident' Heidegger quickly casts doubt on it. Puzzlingly, he supposes that 'Da-sein is, initially and for the most part, not itself'.
We are well placed to discover who it is who is in the everydayness of Da-sein because the preceding analysis of being-in-the-world (Da-sein's fundamental constitution), has necessarily brought this partially into view already.
When we see things for what they are - useful, relevant and significant - we necessarily encounter other people. 'Others' are not added on to a 'world' of objectively present things. Rather it is only in a world of others that things can be heeded as useful at all, and thereby freed to be themselves. With this freeing of things the world also frees 'the others'. They are neither objectively present nor at hand, 'but... are like the very Da-sein which frees them - they are there, too, and there with it'.
But, importantly, 'the others' is not to be understood as everyone else but me. 'They are, rather, those from whom one does not distinguish oneself, those among who one is, too'. So, 'the world is always already the one that I share with the others. The world of Da-sein is a with-world. Being-in is being-with others. The innerworldly being-in-itself of others is Mitda-sein (M&R: Dasein-with).' Heidegger will call the others 'the they' (§27), and in my everydayness I am, inauthentically, part of 'them'.
An understanding of Da-sein's being-with nature is not derived from cognition but is instead a primordial existential kind of being. Indeed, it is being-in and being-with that make cognition and knowledge, in general, possible and, in particular, it is being-with that allows one to know oneself and factical others (the two are inextricably linked).
Being-with is an existential concept - it has nothing to do with whether a person is actually alongside others or not. Being-alone is manifestly an ontic possibility, but only because being-with is in the nature of Da-sein: 'Being-alone is a deficient mode of being-with, its possibility is a proof of the latter'.
Da-sein's being is, in general, constituted by care. The distinctive mode of care appropriate to the being of other Da-sein is 'concern' (M&R: 'solicitude'). There are numerous possible modes of concern: 'Being for-, against-, and without-one-another, passing-one-another-by, not-mattering-to-one-another...'. Everyday modes of concern are predominantly deficient modes. The inconspicuousness of these indifferent modes of concern is the reason why, mistakenly, others are encountered initially as objectively present subjects. But there is a world of difference between 'the 'indifferent' being together of arbitrary things and the not-mattering-to-one-another of beings who are with one another'.
Everyday being-with-one-another maintains itself in its positive modes between two extremes: 'leaping-in' and 'leaping-ahead'. At one extreme leaping-in occurs when one takes another's care away: the other is displaced and risks becoming dependent, or dominated. In contrast, leaping-ahead occurs when one is attentive to the existence of the other. It leaps ahead to give care back, helping the other 'to become transparent to himself in his care and free for it'. It is authentic because the being of the other is thus revealed.
This investigation of being-with leads to the insight that 'the others are encountered as what they are; they are what they do.'
Heidegger then discusses how an individual, in its everydayness, relates to 'the others' and introduces the notion of 'distantiality' ('stand-offishness' (King, 2001: 81)). He contends that it is how each person differs (stands off) from the others that determines its sense of self. Whether these differences are to be reduced at all costs or, perhaps, accentuated, either way it is 'das Man' ('the they') that defines the average and thereby directs the way each of us lives. Da-sein, as 'they-self', is subservient since 'the everyday possibilities of being of Da-sein are at the disposal of the whims of the others.' This process of conforming is mostly inconspicuous and unintentional.
Dreyfus dislikes the usual translation of 'das Man' as 'the they' since it suggests that I am distinguishable from them. The opposite is true: the ways that I employ useful things and enact my role(s) within society are as prescribed for me as anyone. Dreyfus considers 'we' or 'anyone' as alternative translations but concludes these fail to 'capture the normative character' of 'das Man'. He prefers 'the one' because this points up how it is that one does/does not do certain things and this makes explicit how norms are defined by 'the others'. Saying 'the others' also tends to cover over the fact that I am amongst 'them'. Since, for the most part, I am (in Heidegger's terms) not myself I am obliged to count myself amongst 'the others' too. The others are never specific individuals, nor indeed the sum of all. Rather, 'the they-self' is the inauthentic, everyday mode of being of us all.
Summarising: 'Everyone is the other, and no one is himself. The they, which supplies the answer to the who of everyday Da-sein, is the nobody to whom every Da-sein has always already surrendered itself, in its being-among-one-another.'
Though Heidegger does emphatically declare that 'the they is an existential and belongs... to the positive constitution of Da-sein' much of his discussion has an overwhelmingly pejorative ring. Emphasising conformism with talk of the 'dictatorship' of the they, 'averageness' and 'levelling-down' does little to show the necessity of conformity to norms. It is only by having agreed public practices that it is possible to live in the world at all. Without shared average comportment there could be no referential whole, no public world, but instead a plethora of individual subjects' worlds (which is precisely the notion that Heidegger is arguing against).
In contrast to the 'dispersed' they-self Heidegger re-introduces the 'authentic self'. Gaining authenticity (i.e. revealing the phenomenon of Da-sein, its being-in-the-world) is always an achievement, obtained by 'clearing away coverings and obscurities,... breaking up the disguises with which Da-sein cuts itself off from itself.'