The chapter introduces the central problematic in the text: that of the disenchantment of the world. Modern people reflect on their values, life conditions, and goals in a way that is markedly different from that of traditional people. Modern humans are much less deeply "embedded" in their socio-cultural horizon of values. Art also becomes philosophical and disenchanted. How can the philosophy of Martin Heidegger be understood as a response to the problem of disenchantment? What are the various modes and manners of reinvigorating a society that has become ratiocinated by instrumental rationality, egoism, and the domination of nature as resources for technical progress?