Existentialism

Discussion
Soren Kierkegaard, Jean Paul Sartre and
Fredrich Nietzsche and Camus
What is meant by
Existentialism
Existentialism in the broader sense is a 20th
century philosophy that is centered upon the
analysis of existence and of the way humans
find themselves existing in the world.
The notion is that humans exist first and then
each individual spends a lifetime changing
their essence or nature.
Conti
In simpler terms, existentialism is a
philosophy concerned with finding self and the
meaning of life through free will, choice, and
personal responsibility.
Existentialismis a philosophy that
emphasizesindividual,freedomandchoice.
It is the view that humansdefine their own
meaningin life, and try to makerational
decisionsdespite existing in anirrational
universe
Conti
It focuses on the question ofhuman
existence, and the feeling that there isno
purposeorexplanationat the core of
existence. (optional view)
An existentialist believes that a person should
be forced to choose and be responsible
without the help of laws, ethnic rules, or
traditions.
Existentialist take the responsibility of their
being on their own.
The only way to bring meaningfulness is the
Tenants of
Existentialism
Human free will
Human nature is chosen through life choices
A person is best when struggling against their
individual nature, fighting for life
Decisions are not without stress and consequences
There are things that are not rational. (Destiny)
Personal responsibility and discipline is crucial
Society is unnatural and its traditional religious and
secular rules are arbitrary
Worldly desire is futile
Conti
It holds that, as there isno supreme poweror
any othertranscendent force. (An optional view)
There is nothing in the core of existence.
The only way to cope with this nothingness is to
take responsibility.
Man is free but is always subdued by mortal
bounds.
Controlled by destiny which is made and
resulted by his own decisions and experiences.
Conti
Existentialistic ideas came out of a time in society
when there was a deep sense of despair following the
Great Depression and World War II.
There was a spirit of optimism in society that was
destroyed by World War I and its mid-century
calamities.
This despair has been articulated by existentialist
philosophers well into the 1970s and continues on to
this day as a popular way of thinking and reasoning.
Advocating the freedom to choose ones preferred
moral belief system and lifestyle.
Conti
An existentialist could either be a religious
moralist, agnostic relativist, or an amoral
atheist. Kierkegaard, a religious philosopher,
Nietzsche, an anti-Christian, Sartre, an atheist,
and Camus an atheist, are credited for their
works and writings about existentialism.
Conti
Each basically agrees that human life is in no
way complete and fully satisfying because of
suffering and losses that occur when
considering the lack of perfection, power, and
control one has over their life.
Even though they do agree that life is not
optimally satisfying, it nonetheless has
meaning.
Existentialism is the search and journey for
true self and true personal meaning in life.
Soren Kierkegaard

The thing is to find a truth which is true

for me, to find the idea for which I can
live and die."
Sren Aabye Kierkegaard
Conti
He himself used the terms existential and
existentialism in relation to his philosophizing,
his heartfelt view was that life, (existence) in
all its aspects was subjective and ambiguous.
In his view individuals must be prepared to
defy the accepted practices of society, if this
was necessary to their leading, what seemed
to that person, to be a personally valid and
meaningful life.
Conti
He in his work Either (1843) suggests that people
might effectively choose to live within either of two
"existence spheres". He called these "spheres"
theaestheticand theethical.
Aesthetical lives were lives lived in search of such
things pleasure, novelty, and romantic individualism.
But this will ultimately lead to meaninglessness and
decay according to Sartre.
Will lead to much boredom and dire frustration.
Conti
Ethical lives, meanwhile, as being lived very
much in line with a sense of duty to observe
societal and confessional obligations.
Such a life would be easy, in some ways, to
live, yet would also involve much compromise
of several genuinely human faculties and
potentials but life seems to be progressing.
(Honor and courage)
Life is not easy in any of the ways but will be
worth living in moral considerations.
Conti
In his later works he suggested that there was
a third, religious, "sphere" where people
accepted that they could "live in the truth"
that they were "individual before the Eternal"
to which they belonged.
The truth of everyones own
Jean Paul Sartre (1905-
1980)
The philosophical career of Jean Paul Sartre
(1905-1980) focuses, in its first phase, upon
the construction of a philosophy of existence
known as Existentialism.
Was a particularly important contributor to
the process of the development and
popularization of a form of existentialism.
After the Second World War the atheistic,
humanistic, and socialistic, approach to
existentialism is a contribution of Sartre.
Conti
Its purpose is to understand the human
existence rather than the world as such.
Sartre sets out to develop an account of what
it is to be human.
What needs to be a human.
What is the purpose of human existence and
how to make it meaningful.
Conti
Existentialism and Humanismprovides a good
introduction to a number of key themes in his major
work of the same period,Being and Nothingness, and
to some of the fundamental questions about human
existence which are the starting point for most
peoples interest in philosophy at all.
Appearance is the only reality. From this starting point,
Sartre contends that the world can be seen as an
infinite series of finite appearances.(Being and
Nothingness)
He beliefs that man has no purpose before existence.
He sees existence and essence of existence differently.
Conti
Human beings have no pre-established purpose
or nature, nor anything that we have to or ought
to be.
He was an ardent atheist.
He believed that there could be no Divine
Artisan in whose mind our essential properties
had been conceived. Nor did he believe there to
be any other external source of values: unlike for
example, Aristotle, Sartre did not believe in a
common human nature which could be the
source of morality.
Conti
Man first of all exists, encounters
himself, surges up in the world and
defines himself afterwards. If man as the
existentialist sees him is not definable, it
is because to begin with he is nothing.
He will not be anything until later, and
then he will be what he makes of
himself (p.28).
Conti
So, unlike moralist existentialists like
kierkegaar Sartre believes that human beings
are forced to create themselves.
By force he means pushed to. For living n
surviving in a society they have to bring
meaning to their existence on their own.
They are nothing but themselves to bring
meaning to their lives.
No morality no divine force but their own
selves.
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)

Many existentialists, in their attempt to differentiate the

value of individual existence from the alienating effects of
the masses, formed an uneasy relation with the value of
the everyday man.
The common man was thought to be lacking
inwill,tastein matter of aesthetics, andindividualityin the
sense that the assertion of his existence comes exclusively
from his participation in larger groups and from the herd
mentality with which these groups infuse their members.
Nietzsche believed that men in society are divided and
ordered according to their willingness and capacity to
participate in a life of spiritual and cultural transformation.
Conti
Certainly not everyone wishes this participation.
Nietzsches condemnation of those unwilling to challenge
their fundamental beliefs is harsh; however it would be a
mistake to suggest that Nietzsche thought their presence
dispensable.
For Nietzsche the crisis of meaning (of existence) is
inextricably linked to the crisis of religious
consciousness in the West.
Whereas for Kierkegaard the problem of meaning was to be
resolved through the individuals relation to the Divine.
For Nietzsche the militantly anti-Christian, the problem of
meaning is rendered possibleat allbecause of the demise
of the Divine. (Atheistic view)
Conti

What is the difference?

Argue!!!!
Conti
It is only after the cultivation of truth as a value by the
priest that truth comes to question its own value and
function. What truth discovers is that at the ground of
all truth lies an unquestionablefaithin the value
of truth. (prob is with faith)Christianity is
destroyed when it is pushed to tell the truth about
itself, when the illusions of the old ideals are revealed.
What is called The death of God is also then the death
of truth (though not of the value oftruthfulness); this is
an event of immense consequences for the future.
Everyone is born to make his own truth. The truth lies
in humanitarianism.
Conti
He cries, Where is God? he cried; Ill
tell you!We have killed him you and I!
We are all his murderers. But how did we
do this? How were we able to drink up
the sea? Who gave us the sponge to wipe
away the entire horizon? What were we
doing when we unchained this earth
from its sun? Where is it moving? Where
are we moving to? Away from all suns?
(Nietzsche 2001:125).
Conti
He is not a nave atheist.
He does not tend to focus on the petty issues of
individuality but he thinks and plays in
humanitarian grounds.
Just like Kant, he beliefs that out of the influence
of what is called divine one will be able to think
freely and hence will be able to find the truth.
Divine to him is a concept that is blocking the
way to understand the truth of human existence.
Conti
Kant is an influential philosopher in the history of
western philosophy.
His contribution to metaphysics, epistemology, ethic
and aesthetics have had a profound impact on his
contemporary philosophies.
Kant famously described Enlightenment as mans
emergence from his self-incurred immaturity (Kant
1991:54).
Similarly Nietzsche believes that the demise of the
divine could be the opportunity for the emergence of a
being which derives the meaning of its existence from
within itself and not from some authority external to it.
Conti
So, he believes that If the meaning of the
human derived from God then, with the
universe empty, mancannottake the place of
the absent God. This empty space can only be
filled by something greater and fuller, which in
the Nietzschean jargon means the greatest
unity of contradictory forces.

What could be the greatest unity of

contradictory forcrs?
References
http://www.allaboutphilosophy.org/existential
ism.htm
http://www.age-of-the-sage.org/philosophy/ki
erkegaard.html
https://philosophynow.org/issues/15/A_studen
ts_guide_to_Jean-Paul_Sartres_Existentialism
_and_Humanism
http://www.iep.utm.edu/existent/#SH2b
http://www.iep.utm.edu/camus/
Albert Camus

Is he really an
existentialist?
Whether or not Camus was an existentialist is an
issue for some people.
Some people say he is while others suggest he is
an absurdist.
Camus, like most people, did not like himself to be
labeled as.
So why do people want to label him, either as an
existentialist or an absurdist?
His name is often thrown in with other
philosophers already labelled existentialists, such
as Sartre and Nietzsche.
His work shares many themes near to
existentialism.
Camus didn't consider himself to be an
existentialist but neither of them had ever
given any affirmation about it.
Camus believes that considering him an
existentialist is ridiculous.
The only thing he had been published with
such views was for the sake of mocking the
existential notions.
He was talking about his work The Myth of
No, I am not an existentialist. Sartre and I
are always surprised to see our names linked.
We have even thought of publishing a short
statement in which the undersigned declare
that they have nothing in common with each
other and refuse to be held responsible for the
debts they might respectively incur. It's a joke
actually.
Camus as an Absurdist
Many critics find him as a an Absurdist.
He claims to have writtenThe Myth of
Sisyphusas a challenge to existentialists.
This is how another allegation comes to him
that is of an absurdist.
Absurdism
A philosophy based on the belief that the
universe is irrational and meaningless and
that the search for order brings the individual
into conflict with the universe.
Aphilosophy,oftentranslatedintoartforms,
holdingthathumansexistinameaningless,ir
rationaluniverseandthatanysearchfororder
bythemwillbringthemintodirectconflictwit
hthisuniverse
It was in these works that he introduced and
developed the twin philosophical ideasthe
concept of the Absurd and the notion of Revolt
that made him famous.
The Absurd can be defined as a metaphysical
tension or opposition that results from the
presence of human consciousnesswith its
ever-pressing demand for order and meaning
in lifein an essentially meaningless and
indifferent universe.
Camus considered the Absurd to be a
fundamental and even defining characteristic
of the modern human condition.
The notion of Revolt refers to both a path of
resolved action and a state of mind.
It can take extreme forms such as terrorism or
a reckless and unrestrained egoism (both of
which are rejected by Camus), but basically,
and in simple terms, it consists of an attitude
of heroic defiance or resistance to whatever
oppresses human beings.