Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) popularised his brand of existentialism in various ways – through his philosophical writings and also through his novels (“La Nausée”) and plays (“Huis clos”, “Les mains sales”). His lecture “existentialism and humanism” he delivered in 1945 is a short and clear exposition of his ideas. It’s free of philosophical cant, and it can be read in one sitting. I’ll just sketch out briefly here his main points, and for more meat on the bone I’d suggest you read the full text itself. Here’s the link to the book on amazon:
“Existence before essence” – there’s no such thing as human nature!
Sartre starts off by pointing out there are many types of existentialists, but they all believe that “existence comes before essence” when it comes to humanity. He takes the example of a manufactured good like a paper-knife. The manufacturer has a conception of the paper-knife before going ahead and producing one. The theists of the past felt that God the creator worked in the same way. God had a conception of Man, and each individual man was a realisation of this conception. Sartre complains that the athiests of the 18th century like Voltaire and Kant, who even if they had thrown out the idea of God retained this idea of an original “human nature”. Sartre insists that there is no essential quality of Man. “Man first of all exists, encounters himself… and defines himself afterwards… He is what he wills, and as he conceives himself”. It seems that we have to go along here with the idea of free will.
By the way, even human nature may be an illusion, Sartre still recognises that there is a universal “human condition”. After all, “every purpose, even that of a Chinese, an Indian or a Negro, can be understood by a European”.
Man is responsible
This point is not well explained and I can’t say I really follow it but he claims that “in choosing for himself he chooses for all men”. We are asked to consider the following example:
“If I decide to marry and to have children, even though this decision proceeds simply from my situation… I am committing not only myself, but humanity as a whole, to the practice of monogamy. I am thus responsible for myself and for all men, and I am creating a certain image of man as I would have him to be”.
Man is in anguish, abandonment and despair
These are key terms for the existentialist and can be explained as follows:
- anguish – man should feel a profound sense of responsibility for deciding for the whole of mankind. Sartre hammers the point home thus: “What would happen if everyone did so?” they shrug their shoulders and reply “Everyone does not do so”. But in truth, one ought always to ask oneself what would happen if everyone did as one is doing…”. This is difficult to swallow – most readers might feel that “everyone does not do so” is a very fair reply!
- abandonment (very Heideggerian) – “the existentialist finds it extremely embarrassing that God does not exist” because he can’t justify honesty, not beating one’s wife, or any other moral imperative. Sartre agrees with Dostoievsky’s much -quoted “If God did not exist, everything would be permitted”. Man is condemned to be free, and “from the moment that he is thrown into this world he is responsible for everything he does”.
- despair – “we limit ourselves to a reliance upon that which is within our wills” and Sartre insists that “I cannot count upon men whom I do not know”. He doesn’t dismiss the idea of getting behind a political movement – eg Marxism – on the grounds that he cannot be sure how they will really take the movement forward, but “I should be without illusion and that I should do what I can”
You are what you do
Action is everything. “You are nothing else but what you live”. Since there is no human nature, we have to create ourselves. “The coward makes himself cowardly, the hero makes himself heroic; and there is always a possibility for the coward to give up cowardise and for the hero to stop being a hero”. He therefore rejects the charge that existentialism boils down to quietism since “it defines man by his action”.
An interesting comparison is drawn with the work of art. “Does anyone reproach an artist when he paints a picture for not following rules established à priori? Does one ever ask what is the picture that he ought to paint?… We never speak of a work of art as irresponsible”. Creation and invention are at the core of morality as they are for art.
You cannot judge others
The final portion of the lecture replies to a number of objections, one of which is to say that the existentialist cannot judge others. This question is dealt with over a number of pages, but for the sake of simplicity and glossing over the nuances, he essentially agrees with the statement. Man cannot rely on any easy external objective “golden rule” of morality. Sartre ties extentialism to humanism by reminding us that Man has “no legislator but himself”.