Not for nothing, Martin Heidegger—whose most famous work is Being and Time—is name dropped by Charles’ therapist in this episode. However, the most important thing to think about here may not be the line about being born as many and dying as one that is referenced, but Heidegger’s phenomenological account of time more broadly.

Phenomenology is about how things appear, or how they are experienced, and in the first instance brackets metaphysical questions about the ultimate nature of reality. In other words, rather than asking, like Aristotle, “what is Being qua Being?” Heidegger asks what it is like to be-there (Dasein) and articulates various aspects of this experience: being-with, being-towards-death, etc.

¶ 4:40 PM