Abstract

This paper outlines a central tension and difficulty within Heidegger's thought in relation to his attempt to articulate and promote the 'turn' in the 'history of being'. Particular attention is paid to 'The Question Concerning Technology' and related late texts as well as aspects of Heidegger's interpretation of Nietzsche. The basic claim advanced is that Heidegger tends to fall short of the most rigorous and radical stance he occasionally glimpses for which the contemporary 'age of technology' would be regarded as the highest manifestation of 'being'in the series of historical epochs as Heidegger conceives them. Heidegger senses but rarely affirms this non-privative, affirmative perspective on the essence of technology within which the 'withdrawal' that constitutes the essence of being explicitly and unambiguously reveals itself for the first time in the historical relationship of being and human being.