Existentialism is a Humanism, Jean-Paul Sarte 1946. Jean-Paul Sartre 1946 Existentialism Is a Humanism Written: Lecture given in 1946Source: Existentialism from Dostoyevsky to Sartre, ed. Walter Kaufman, Meridian Publishing Company, 1989;First Published: World Publishing Company in 1956;Translator: Philip Mairet;Copyright: reproduced under the “Fair Use” provisions;HTML Markup: by Andy Blunden 1998; proofed and corrected February 2005. My purpose here is to offer a defence of existentialism against several reproaches that have been laid against it. First, it has been reproached as an invitation to people to dwell in quietism of despair.
For if every way to a solution is barred, one would have to regard any action in this world as entirely ineffective, and one would arrive finally at a contemplative philosophy. From the Christian side, we are reproached as people who deny the reality and seriousness of human affairs. Most of those who are making use of this word would be highly confused if required to explain its meaning. Soren Kierkegaard summary. Psy. 307; Review for Psy. 462 1. Generally considered the first relatively modern "existentialist" (if we do not consider existential currents in ancient Greek thought, Zen, etc.) 2. In K's view, truth is found through subjectivity, through our individual, unique apprehension of things. a) We do not find truth through a detached "objectivity" but through a deep engagement with the world. b) "The task is precisely to be objective toward oneself and subjective toward all others. " 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.
A. 8. 9. 10. Ll. 12. 13 "Lofty shut-upness" leaves a child able to respond to the world on the basis of his or her individuality. 14. 15. 16. 17. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. Philosophical Connections: Diderot. Soren Kierkegaard summary. Jean-Paul Sartre summary. 1. EXISTENCE PRECEDES ESSENCE. "Freedom is existence, and in it existence precedes essence. " This means that what we do, how we act in our life, determines our apparent "qualities. " It is not that someone tells the truth because she is honest, but rather she defines herself as honest by telling the truth again and again. I am a professor in a way different than the way I am six feet tall, or the way a table is a table.
The table simply is; I exist by defining myself in the world at each moment. 2. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. Greatest Philosophers Summary. What is Idealism? Subjective Idealism The major philosophers of subjective idealism were Bishop George Berkeley (1685-1753) and David Hume (1711-1776). As a student at Trinity College in Dublin, Berkeley studied the works of John Locke (1632-1704), which greatly influenced the development of his idealistic theories. Locke had held that a distinction can be made between what he considered the primary qualities of an object, such as its size, shape, and motion, and its secondary qualities, such as color, odor, and taste. He claimed that only the primary qualities belong to the object. The secondary qualities exist in the mind of the person perceiving the object. A rose has a certain size and shape, but without an eye to perceive them it has no color.
Berkeley carried Locke's theory further and contended that both primary and secondary qualities exist in the mind. The Scottish philosopher David Hume pressed subjective idealism to its logical conclusion. Objective Idealism The German philosopher Georg W. Schiller as Philosopher: A Re-Examination. In his short novel, Billy Budd, Foretopman (1891), Herman Melville presents the tragedy of a physically strong and attractive young seaman, innocent of heart and worldly experience -- a naïve, beautiful soul, in a sense -- whose capital crime was to lash out instinctively at a malevolent superior officer who had falsely charged him with mutiny.
The novel's ensuing and concluding reflections upon the tensions between moral truth and legal necessity approach some of the finest to be found in moral philosophy. Melville was an outstanding American novelist with acute philosophical insight, but he is not among the leading Western philosophers. Friedrich Schiller, one of Germany's finest poets and playwrights, wrote a small proportion of philosophical letters and essays, and he accordingly remains an ambiguous and confusing figure: academic philosophy professionals usually dismiss him as a philosophical amateur; some intellectuals celebrate him as a first-rate philosophical theoretician.
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