“Man cannot endure his own littleness unless he can translate it into meaningfulness on the largest possible level.”
– Ernest Becker, 1973, The Denial of Death, p. 196
Existentialism is a philosophy which deals with the problem of human existence. At the core of existentialism is the idea that existence precedes essence. This means that individuals are not born with predetermined purposes or essential natures, but rather they define themselves and give meaning to their lives through their choices and actions. Existentialists reject the notion of a fixed human nature or a predetermined destiny. Existentialists criticize rationalism and positivism arguing that humanity cannot be understood rationally nor scientifically.
Beliefs[edit | edit source]
Existence Precedes Essence[edit | edit source]
Sartre, an existentialist philosopher, argued that individuals define themselves through their existence rather than by preconceived categories. This opposes Aristotle and Aquinas, who believed essence comes before existence. According to Sartre, people create their own values and meaning in life through their consciousness.
Sartre's view is echoed by other existentialists like Heidegger and Kierkegaard, who emphasize the importance of subjective experience in defining oneself. They argue that one's actions determine their identity, and individuals are responsible for their choices.
Sartre's concept of essence refers to the purpose or function of something. Unlike objects like houses, humans don't have a predetermined purpose. Instead, they are free to choose their own purpose, shaping their essence through their actions.
Sartre emphasizes radical freedom, meaning individuals are solely responsible for their choices and direction in life. Simone de Beauvoir adds that past choices and societal influences create resistance to change, shaping one's outlook until changes are made slowly over time.
Sartre's ideas are influenced by Heidegger's work, although Heidegger believed Sartre misunderstood him, leading to a focus on subjectivism. Heidegger argued that Sartre simply reversed traditional concepts of essence and existence without fully exploring their meanings.
Absurdism[edit | edit source]
The idea of the absurd suggests that life has no inherent meaning, and any meaning we find is created by us. This concept challenges traditional religious beliefs, which say that life's purpose is to fulfill divine commandments.
Living with the absurd means accepting that life has no predefined meaning, as Albert Camus argues. Absurdity arises from the clash between human beings and the world they inhabit. Another view, by Søren Kierkegaard, suggests that absurdity arises from the actions and choices of humans, which defy external justification.
In the face of the absurd, there's no guarantee that bad things won't happen to good people. Life's unpredictability means anyone can face tragedy at any time, as seen in the works of various authors like Camus, Kafka, and Dostoevsky.
Camus famously said that the most serious philosophical question is whether or not to commit suicide, highlighting the struggle with meaninglessness. Existentialist philosophers aim to help people navigate this challenge, urging them to persevere despite the absurdity of life.
Existentialism warns against quietism, the resignation to meaninglessness. Despite life's inherent lack of meaning, existentialists advocate for living authentically and facing the possibility of meaning breakdown without succumbing to despair.
Facticity[edit | edit source]
Facticity, as defined by Sartre, refers to the facts of one's personal life, such as past experiences and physical attributes. It's like the way we are thrown into the world, according to Heidegger. Your past shapes who you are now, but it doesn't define you entirely. Ignoring your past or not acknowledging how it influences you leads to an inauthentic life.
Facticity limits our freedom because it includes things we didn't choose, like where we were born. But it also conditions our freedom because our values often depend on it. Even though our past is fixed, we still choose how we interpret it and what meaning we give it.
For example, two people could have committed similar crimes, but one moves forward with their life while the other blames their past for their actions. The difference lies in how they interpret their past and choose to move forward.
Denying or ignoring facticity while planning for the future is also inauthentic. Authentic living involves considering both your current situation and your future goals. It's about acknowledging your limitations and working towards change within those constraints.
Facticity also brings about anxiety because it limits our freedom and can make us feel responsible for our actions. However, it also highlights our ability to change our values and take responsibility for our choices, regardless of societal norms. Our freedom and responsibility are closely linked, and understanding one helps clarify the other.
Authenticity[edit | edit source]
Existentialists stress the importance of authentic existence, which means being true to oneself and living according to one's own values. Authenticity involves acting freely, not just following societal norms or external expectations.
To be authentic, one must make choices based on one's true values, taking responsibility for those choices. This contrasts with inauthenticity, where one denies their freedom and acts according to societal roles or expectations. For example, in "bad faith," someone might pretend to be a stereotypical waiter, conforming to expectations rather than expressing their true self. This behavior reflects a lack of authenticity. Authenticity isn't about rejecting all social norms; it's about embracing one's freedom and acting in accordance with one's own values and beliefs.
The Other and The Look[edit | edit source]
The concept of the Other, often capitalized as "O," is central to phenomenology, but it's also discussed in existentialist writings with some differences. The Other refers to the experience of encountering another free individual who shares the same world as oneself. This experience creates a sense of objectivity and intersubjectivity.
When we encounter the Other, we perceive them as experiencing the same world as us, albeit from a different perspective. This mutual perception makes the world seem objective and shared. The experience of being looked at by the Other, called the Look or Gaze, not only confirms our own existence but can also limit our freedom by objectifying us.
For example, imagine someone peeping through a keyhole and suddenly realizing they're being observed. This realization can evoke feelings of shame, as they perceive themselves as an object seen by another person. This experience of shame, according to Sartre, proves the existence of other minds and defeats solipsism.
It's important to note that the Look doesn't necessarily require another person to be present. It's more about how we perceive ourselves being seen by others, even if no one is actually observing us.
Angst and Dread[edit | edit source]
Existential angst, also known as existential dread or anxiety, is a common theme in existentialist thought. It arises from the experience of human freedom and responsibility. An example is feeling anxious while standing on a cliff, where one realizes the freedom to either step back or jump off.
Unlike fear, which has a specific object, angst is a feeling of unease before nothingness. There's a sense of insecurity about the consequences of one's actions, as one realizes the full responsibility for them. There's no external factor to blame if things go wrong, making every choice significant. While not every choice leads to dread, the awareness of freedom remains constant.
Despair[edit | edit source]
Despair in existentialism goes beyond just losing hope; it's about losing hope when something crucial to your identity breaks down. For example, if a singer loses their ability to sing and has nothing else to rely on for their identity, they may feel despair. What's unique about existential despair is that it's a constant state, even if you're not actively feeling hopeless. As per existentialist thought, because human identity is based on qualities that can crumble, everyone is in a state of perpetual despair.
Kierkegaard describes this as an eternal decision—either to hope or to fear. Choosing hope means looking expectantly towards good possibilities, while choosing fear means expecting evil possibilities. This choice has a profound impact on one's life and outlook.
Opposition to 
Positivism and 
Rationalism[edit | edit source]
Existentialists reject the idea that humans are mainly rational and challenge both positivism and rationalism. They believe that people make decisions based on personal meaning rather than strict rationality. Instead of relying solely on reason, existentialism focuses on the anxiety and dread we feel because of our radical free will and awareness of death.
Kierkegaard and Sartre both criticized rationality. Kierkegaard saw it as limited when dealing with existential issues, while Sartre called it "bad faith", a way to impose order on a world that is fundamentally irrational and unpredictable. Sartre believed that trying to suppress anxiety leads people to conform to everyday experiences, giving up their freedom and becoming controlled by societal expectations or the judgments of others.
Religion[edit | edit source]
An existentialist approach to the Bible means seeing oneself as an existing person studying its words, not just as a passive recipient of truths. Instead of viewing the commandments as imposed from outside, an existentialist reader interprets them as inner guidance. This perspective challenges individuals to engage deeply with the teachings and apply them to their lives. Scholars like Hans Jonas and Rudolph Bultmann brought this existentialist interpretation into discussions of Early Christianity and Christian Theology.
Nihilism[edit | edit source]
Nihilism and existentialism are often mixed up because they both grapple with the feeling of emptiness and confusion in a world that seems to lack meaning. Friedrich Nietzsche, a key figure in both philosophies, adds to the confusion.
Existentialists highlight the feeling of angst, which suggests a complete absence of any clear reason for action. This can be wrongly interpreted as moral or existential nihilism. However, existentialism often encourages facing life's absurdities head-on, as shown in Albert Camus's statement in "The Myth of Sisyphus" that we should imagine Sisyphus happy. Existentialists rarely reject morality or the pursuit of self-created meaning entirely: Søren Kierkegaard found a form of morality in religion, while Jean-Paul Sartre hinted at addressing ethical questions in future works.
Variants[edit | edit source]
Atheist Existentialism[edit | edit source]
Atheist Existentialism is the exclusion of any transcendental, metaphysical, or religious beliefs from philosophical existentialist thought. It is a kind of existentialism which strongly diverged from the Christian existential works of Søren Kierkegaard and developed within the context of an atheistic world view. The philosophies of Søren Kierkegaard and Friedrich Nietzsche provided existentialism's theoretical foundation in the 19th century, although their differing views on religion proved essential to the development of alternate types of existentialism. Atheistic existentialism was formally recognized after the 1943 publication of Being and Nothingness by Jean-Paul Sartre and Sartre later explicitly alluded to it in Existentialism is a Humanism in 1946.
Christian Existentialism[edit | edit source]
Islamic Existentialism[edit | edit source]
Jewish Existentialism[edit | edit source]
Black Existentialism[edit | edit source]
Existential Phenomenology[edit | edit source]
Feminist Existentialism[edit | edit source]
Relationships[edit | edit source]
Friends[edit | edit source]
Romanticism - Emotions and individuality are core aspects of the human experience.
Idealism - Matter doesn’t just make up the world around us. It’s also the ideas that we come up with.
Subjectivism - The human experience is subjective and differs between everyone.
Irrationalism - You don’t like this snooty asshole? Me neither! Let’s talk sometime!
Free Will - We decide our own fates.
Mysticism - Who needs organized religion to have a relationship with the divine?
Optimistic Nihilism - Do whatever makes you happy 😊. We all have one life, so let’s make the most of it.
Frenemies[edit | edit source]
Humanism - Humans can and do create their own unique experiences. Also, my atheistic variant likes you a lot. But you are a bit too essentialist for my tastes.
Empiricism - On one hand, you do rely on observations and personal experiences to create knowledge, and mysticism is based on you. But on the other hand, you have some 
nerdy weirdos 
following you around.
Continental Philosophy - Many of the continental philosophers supported existentialism, but there are some who are materialistic and essentialist.
Enemies[edit | edit source]
Essentialism - Existence comes before essence!- Scientism and Scientific Realism - There are things in this world that cannot be explained or understood by scientific research alone.
- Rationalism - There are things in the world that cannot be understood by pure reason, either.
Analytic Philosophy - Name me one prominent analytic philosopher that supports existentialism. Oh wait, you can’t.
-
William James? He supported Existentialism and he was also a philosopher who specialized in Pragmatism, which is a branch of Analytic Philosophy.
Do you have any source that William James explicitly supported Existentialism?
Historicism and 
Structuralism - The are no strict patterns of how history or social relationships happen, let alone how they work.
Further Information[edit | edit source]
Wikipedia[edit | edit source]
 Mainstream Philosophy - Aristotle, Marx, Nietszche and Zizek | |
|---|---|
 Ancient Era | |
 Grecoroman Era |  Aristotelianism •  Christianity •  Cynicism •  Epicureanism •  Neoplatonism •  Platonism •  Stoicism •  Skepticism •  Socratism |
 Medieval Era | |
 Enlightenment Era | |
 Modern Era | |
 Contemporary Era  | |
 Metaphysics - Beyond the physical world | |
|---|---|
| Metaphysicists |  Parmenides •  Plato • Aristotle •  Plotinus •  Duns Scotus •  Thomas Aquinas •  Nicolas Malebranche •  Rene Descartes •  John Locke •  David Hume •  Immanuel Kant •  Isaac Newton •  Arthur Schopenhauer •  Baruch Spinoza •  G.W.F. Hegel •  G.W. Leibniz •  Henry Bergson •  Friedrich Nietzsche •  Ludwig Wittgenstein •  Martin Heidegger •  A.N. Whitehead •  Bertrand Russell •  J.-P. Sartre |
| Theories |  Anti-Realism •  Capitalism •  Determinism •  Dualism •  Essentialism •  Existentialism •  Free Will •  Idealism •  Materialism •  Mechanism •  Monism •  Naturalism •  Nihilism •  Nominalism •  Objectivism •  Realism •  Relativism •  Scientific Realism •  Solipsism |