§ 17. Summary:1 The modes of ἀληθεύειν as
modifications of self-orienting Dasein.
We have gained an insight into Dasein insofar as in it various modes of ἀληθεύειν initially occur in such a way that they are not delimited against one another and thus that the expressions τέχνη, ἐπιστήμη, φρόνησις, and σοφία are ambiguous. The development of this ambiguity is not arbitrary. And a real overcoming of this ambiguity cannot occur simply by putting dogmatic definitions up against it and making these modes of comportment fixed. The ambiguity will be overcome only when its motives are visible, i.e., when it becomes understood why these various expressions are employed with this ambiguity.
Dasein discloses its immediate surrounding world: it orients itself in its world without the individual modes of self-orientation becoming explicit. Insofar as this self-orientation is a taking cognizance and a deliberating concerned with producing, it is of the character of τέχνη. Insofar as this know-how is nevertheless a knowing and makes its appearance explicitly as knowing, the same state can be conceived as ἐπιστήμη. But it does not yet have to be science at all. Insofar as the self-orientation is concerned with a πρακτόν which is dealt with for one's own use, αὐτῷ, for one's self, this self-orienting is φρόνησις in the broadest sense, as it is proper to the ζῷα. Whether what is discovered in such orienting is the ποιητόν of a πρᾶξις or not does not matter at all. Insofar as the self-orienting is concerned explicitly with the αἴτιον and becomes real understanding for its own sake, these same modes of self-orienting—τέχνη, ἐπιστήμη, φρόνησις—can also be conceived as σοφία. That is the basic way Dasein itself uses these expressions. We must make this fundamentally clear in order to see that the γένεσις into explicit modes of existence is accomplished precisely on the basis of Dasein itself.
It has been shown that Dasein aims at σοφία merely διὰ τὸ εἰδέναι and not χρήσεώς τινος ἕνεκεν (b20f.), that θεωρεῖν is a completely autonomous comportment of Dasein, not related to anything else. In this way σοφία manifests a possibility of existence in which Dasein discloses itself as free, as completely delivered over to itself. ὥσπερ ἄνθρωπος φαμέν ἐλεύθερος ὁ ἑαυτοῦ ἕνεκα καὶ μὴ ἄλλου ὤν, οὕτω καὶ αὐτὴ, μόνη ἐλευθέραν οὖσα τῶν ἐπιστημῶν: μόνη γὰρ αὕτη ἑαυτῆς ἕνεκέν ἐστιν. (b25ff.). And thus the question arises whether such a possibility of existence is at all within the reach of human Dasein, since, after all, the ζωή of man is δούλη (b29), i.e., since the life of man, his Being in the world, is in a certain sense to be a slave of circumstances and of everyday importunities. It seems therefore that insofar as human Dasein is a slave, the possibility of an autonomous comportment in pure θεωρία must remain denied it, that consequently σοφία cannot be a possible κτῆσις (b29) for man.
1. Title in Heidegger's manuscript.