Existentialism: A Very Short Introduction Book

Notes:

I. Five Themes of Existentialism:

1. Existence precedes essence. What you are (your essence) is the result of your choices (your existence) rather than the reverse. Essence is not destiny. You are what you make yourself to be.
2. Time is of the essence. We are fundamentally time-bound beings. Unlike measurable, 'clock' time, lived time is qualitative: the 'not yet', the 'already', and the 'present' differ among themselves in meaning and value.
3. Humanism. Existentialism is a person-centered philosophy. Though not anti-science, its focus is on the human individual's pursuit of identity and meaning amidst the social and economic pressures of mass society for superficiality and conformism.
4. Freedom/responsibility. Existentialism is a philosophy of freedom. Its basis is the fact that we can stand back from our lives and reflect on what we have been doing. In this sense, we are always 'more' than ourselves. But we are as responsible as we are free.
5. Ethical considerations are paramount. Though each existentialist understands the ethical, as with 'freedom', in his or her own way, the underlying concern is to invite us to examine the authenticity of our personal lives and of our society.


II. Kierkegaard's Three stages : Aesthetic, Ethical & Religious - the last being a 'leap of faith' to go beyond ethics. (Scary.) Represented BY: Don Juan, Socrates & Abraham respectively. I will pick Socrates any day.

III. Nietzschean Limited Freedom: (only for those who can bear a doctrine of fatalism - of eternal recurrence)

IV. Ontology (the approach to Being) Vs. Metaphysics (the study of the ultimate categories by which to order our thoughts)

V. Bad Faith: 'knowledge that is ignorant and ignorance that knows better.'

VI. Being-in-situation: Situational Ethics. Way to reconcile individual freedom with need for ethical exercise of the same.

VII. Pre-reflective Awareness: Sartre's answer to Freud.

VIII. "Hell is other people" to "Existentialism is a Humanism": The Social evolution of an individualistic philosophy. The growing of ethical concerns and social concerns in the aftermath of the war. the best study of how a school of thought can be influenced by history? (keeps the principles of non-conformity alive despite the expansion!)

IX. Structuralism and poststructuralism: The next century's challenge. Not so much individual freedom after all? How do we reconcile responsibility and rigid social structures? - the thorny problem of the meaning of agency and responsibility in a structuralist world.

X. An Existential Freud: who will confer more freedom to the consciousness and its freedom over the unconscious... Still awaited.