An 'event of appropriation': a magpie is seen pecking at something in the grass. A second magpie flies in squawking loudly and alighting close by. The first magpie retreats and the second magpie bends over the find. It raises its head and it is holding a small mouse by the neck, its long tail hanging below it.  The magpie holds it up triumphantly and takes a few small steps. The first magpie stays at a distance silently watching. After a short time the second magpie carries the mouse to a more distant spot drops it and commences working on it with its beak. Every actor in this three-part drama is singular and surely feels its position keenly, but the dominant bird seems to do so in a further sense since it its interest is in the display as much as in the prey. There can only be one dominant actor in a play structured by dominance, and this seems as if it is at the very origin of ego consciousness, its prototype in a sense. Since the first magpie is the intended audience of this display we could say that it internalises the ego-ity in an alienated fashion, just as the second magpie must also internalise the first's internalisation, etc. All of the participants, including the mouse and the human observers are individualised figures in the event considered as a whole. From the point of view of awareness, however, there is no difference between these positions, all arise equally but in their own way within global awareness. is this also what is meant by Heidegger's  'Ereignis'?