Saul Kripke Book

Michael Gelven's Commentary on Heidegger's Being and Time is a clear exposition of Martin Heidegger's work. Here is the brief sketch of Heidegger's work. Most of a person's daily activities are habitual and do not involve that person being conscious of her activities. Most of the use the person makes of the objects in her environment involves treating those objects as means to other ends. However, the person is only really aware of her environment when something in the environment malfunctions or breaks down. Otherwise, the person goes on about her day. Another means to raise awareness about what one is doing, though, is awareness of one's finitude. When the person stops to reflect on her activities and the importance of those activities given the relatively short time she has on Earth, she has an opportunity to make sure she is engaging in those activities that are meaningful for her specifically and that she would reasonably want to engage in given her short time on Earth. This allows the person a new way to frame the experiences of her past, the present situation, and the ends she would like to reach.

I warn that this is not the kind of language Heidegger uses. This above explanation would have been too prosaic to him. But for the work's relevance, this is his view in a nutshell. And Michael Gelven does an excellent job of providing this interpretation, more or less.