Sartre argues that
in terms of humans “existence precedes
essence”
“man is nothing
else but what he makes of himself ”
Although I do
understand and agree that you must take control of your own life at times, I disagree
that contexts do not matter. To my mind
both nurture and nature always play a role, and hence I believe essence
precedes existence. What made the existence in the first place? It was the essence.
The problem with
this existentialist claim is that the idea that consciousness is a separate
entity to the body. The body is made up
of matter that forms together to have bodily functions that come from the
mother and father. This includes the brain, which supposedly
where the consciousness resides: without the brain there is no conscious existence.
But what made the
brain? Here we come to the chicken
and the egg: which came first? Firstly
the mother’s and father’s temperaments will be passed on to the child; and
secondly as the child grow up into a man or woman, his his or her experiences will influence the person
he or she becomes. It may be true
that when this man/woman reaches adulthood, he or she is free to decide what to
will make of their life, but the choices made will reflect the upbringing. Sartre argues his childhood circumstance would
make no differences in the decision he is able to make for himself on what sort
of essence he believes he posesses. Even
if that is true in his case, it is not
shown to be universally true. A hero who
is born a hero may do heroic acts. but at another time he might also have acted
in a cowardly way. But how can we say
that the “will” to do those certain acts is not inherited.
The counter
argument for this in the end it does not matter that the man/woman gets to have
the last say in taking control of his or her life. Some needs we have to satisfy in order to
survive at that point. Is there really an opportunity to make a
choice where are only choice would be to live or die.
What can be said
about slaves who are put in a situation where they are made to do acts against
their will: how can they be making a
decision in that case? What is to be
said about nazi concentration camps, which put the inmates them in circumstances
which test their will to an extreme of which would otherwise have never been
tested, such as Primo Levi explored in ‘If
this is a man’. How could one say that
the circumstance did not influence the will at that point?
is as Zola claims of which despite what Sartre
says about these type of people who do nothing and blame their situation for
their bad misfortunes may be considered as weak. If this is true although,
sometimes existentialism has been seen negatively and in a scared light I would
argue that it is positive for certain people who situations and circumstance
some would argue would prevent them from doing.
Hi Isadora! I liked your post and I am agree with many things you says in it. I also think that nurture and nature always play a role in what we are and in my opinion it is difficult to argue the contrary. It is obvious that my choices are influenced by my education, at very least. We are free to choose to be how we want to be, but our possibilities are limited by our knowledges, because I cannot choose something that I don´t know. Then, our choices are influenced and we are not totaly free when we have to choose how we want to be. The thing is that although we are influenced by many things such as education, nurture or circumstances, we always have the possibility to change and start being as we want to be. I think that this things play a role, as you said, but we are not sentenced to be a certain way. Although this things and many others influenced our way of being, they don´t determine it. Then, we always are free to be what we want to be.
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