The Importance Of Existentialism

Existentialism is largely summed up in the quote “existence precedes essence.” Life is devoid of inherent meaning aside from the human existence. Put simply, you are put on earth without any idea of what the meaning of your life is, it is up to you to create meaning for your life and each individual may find a different meaning. What are the main arguments against existentialism? Why does the preservation of life matter to us in a world devoid of meaning? In this essay I will summarize what existentialism is and attempt to provide an argument against it.

The philosopher Sartre once said “existence precedes essence”. This quote sums up the belief that we are born into the world with no real purpose and that it is the goal of our life to find one. Essence in this case referring to the ancient philosophical belief that all things have a predefined ideal set of characteristics. For example the essence of a car is that it has four wheels an engine and people ride in it. Not everything matches its essence, a car could be missing a wheel, could have no engine and people may not ride in it. The actual details of a car form its existence. To Sartre existence is the concrete here and now, what you are given at birth. A pillar of the existentialist system of belief is that everyone is born with free will.

Free will is the belief that everyone has the ability to act at one’s own discretion. The idea is that your essence, or your "Authentic Self", is something that you decide and cultivate with your actions. You are your choices, and you are completely responsible for everything you do. Factors which you might consider to affect your choices -- your culture, nation, sex, era you live in, economic background, etc. -- which is called your ...

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... essence. Traditional Christianity believes that a person’s essence is predestined from God and precedes existence.

Existentialism, the belief that existence precedes essence has been debated in philosophy for a long time. Followers of Sartre’s existentialism would say we create all the meanings we have. This is clearly false, since there are many meanings that we do not choose and that we acquire passively. Think of how a song reminds us of someone, how a smell reminds us of a person in our lives, or how we find ourselves thinking a certain way without having chosen so. The fact of the matter is that we are always capable of stepping-back and re-evaluating our beliefs and meanings, but this process of stepping-back is something we do only when we make a conscious effort to do so. Ironically, perhaps, we can only be genuine existentialists when we choose to be.