FREEDOM TO FAIL: HEIDEGGER’S ANARCHY


does not capture the sense of unconcealment. Heidegger proceeds from the fact that things which show themselves need an “open place” in order to appear. Yet this open place itself springs from a prior concealment and remains bound up with it. Unconcealment is “un-concealment,” a concealment that recedes in favor of something opened up, as it is “un-concealment,” the openness that recedes in favor of something previously concealed. In the metaphorics of light, light is always the source of the shadow, yet openness is not simply the source of concealment. Openness and concealment reciprocally refer to one another.

This unsublatable interplay of concealment and openness is the “truth of being.” It forms the topography in which human freedom is actualized. A consequence of this is that action is not only related to things that show themselves. At first glance, this relation presents itself as unproblematic. What shows itself can be procured and worked on. In the world of production everything is present and available – together with apparatuses that make visible what is not present and available per se. Everything that can be objectified can become the object or


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Freedom To Fail : Heidegger’s Anarchy by Peter Trawny