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Existentialism Is A Humanism

1) Jean-Paul Sartre's book Existentialism is a Humanism argues that existence precedes essence, meaning people define their own purpose rather than having a predetermined essence. 2) In contrast, essentialism believes people have a predetermined meaning or purpose in life. Existentialism argues we create our own essence through how we choose to live. 3) Sartre's focus on existentialism is about human freedom rather than a meaningless world. We must design our own moral codes and find meaning without external authorities providing absolute answers.

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Charles Bryan Alicaya
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312 views2 pages

Existentialism Is A Humanism

1) Jean-Paul Sartre's book Existentialism is a Humanism argues that existence precedes essence, meaning people define their own purpose rather than having a predetermined essence. 2) In contrast, essentialism believes people have a predetermined meaning or purpose in life. Existentialism argues we create our own essence through how we choose to live. 3) Sartre's focus on existentialism is about human freedom rather than a meaningless world. We must design our own moral codes and find meaning without external authorities providing absolute answers.

Uploaded by

Charles Bryan Alicaya
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Charles Bryan M.

Alicaya A56
Existentialism is a Humanism

Existentialism is a Humanism is a book authored by Jean-Paul Sartre


published in 1946 and is based on a lecture he gave of the same title at
Paris on the 29th of October 1945, just 5 months after the end of World War
2. The premise of his lecture states that “Existence precedes Essence” and
implies that there is no other worldly or non-worldly being that defines our
meaning or purpose in life but ourselves. It is essential that I state the
context of his lecture and World War 2 because Essentialism was a prevailing
philosophy before the fore mentioned war.

Essentialism, in comparison to Existentialism, is about how we are


predetermined to have a meaning or a purpose in life, to be born to be
somebody. Essence is then the purpose or the meaning of something.
Existentialism then presupposes that we write or make our own essence
through the way we choose to live rather than somebody else to
predetermine it for us. The rise of the idea of Existentialism was partly
caused by the existence of the war, the meaning of an ordered world and
cosmic justice became harder and harder to find and defined the world and
everything meaningless.

But Jean-Paul Sartre’s focus on existentialism is about our abundance


of freedom, not the world’s lack of meaning. According to Sartre, if there are
no guidelines for our actions, then each of us is forced to design our own
moral code, to invent a morality to live by. It is how to find meaning in a
meaningless world. He also talks about how someone can find answers from
some authorities but really there is no absolute answer; those authorities
are just like us, who doesn’t have any answers but had to figure out how to
live, essentially created those answers by their moral codes. There is no
absolute answer but one’s authentic answer, authentic being defined as the
answer is determined by the values one chooses to accept. One who chooses
to follow a path that someone else has determined or has set is of bad faith.

Personally, I identify myself as a chopseuy Catholic, a term a TREDTWO


professor called for someone who only picks parts of the teachings of the
church. The catholic guilt always lingers around when I was younger and
when I had to go to a catholic confession set by my catholic school, I always
hated that I had to list down my sins or mistakes and say it to someone who
I don’t really know as a private person. As I grew older, I defined my own
morality based on Christian principles; Understanding other people and
accepting them for who they are and the avoidance of causing all kinds of
harm to others and develop self-improvement. In my view of the argument
of existence precedes essence, I choose to believe that my purpose is to be
an engineer or an inventor but I still believe that God has set this purpose.
And to quote Crash Course Philosopy about existentialism,
“There could be a meaning in life only if you choose to
assign it. If the world is inherent of purpose, you can choose a
view whatever you like as long as you yourself chose it. Any
meaning of life has, is given to it by you.”

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