The dialectics of openness and closedness during the quarantine: Heideggerian meditations

Abstract

By appealing to Heidegger, I examine the dialectic of openness and closedness under quarantine conditions. The theses are developed as follows. (1) The cost of an open invasion of consumption is covered by other layers, including disinterested seeing (aesthetic), gratuitous help and empathy (ethical). (2) Openness and a policy of openness have their limits in a democratic environment that is inevitably infuenced by the mass media. (3) On the one hand, public opinion is always infuenced by the attitudes expressed in the media, including social networks, in which the so-called infuencers have a particularly strong voice. On the other hand, more and more decisions are made in a narrow circle of specialists, which is becoming more and more closed. (4) Extreme openness borders on extreme captivity, when we are no longer the masters of our bodies, being closed between the walls of entertainment. (5) When we are closed at home and privacy outweighs publicity, quarantine is a test of democracy. (6) During the exit periods, new stories and works were born, when the world opened surprisingly, before it was bracketed, i.e. after escaping from it. (7) The virus and declared quarantine remind us about the time of other organisms, about the “shortened” time of progress, and about the ecstatic time of a home event when we meet the world alone.