Sartre Today A CENTENARY CELEBRATION Bidited by Adrian van den Hoven. and Andrew Leak dL Berghabn Books rw Your - oxronD vee baplanoksconfottalsFirst published in 2005 by ‘Berghahn Books SarsreSsudies International, Volume 11, Issues 1 8 2, Fall 2005, Paperback edition published in 2005 by ‘Berghahn Books \www-berghahnbooks com (© 2005 United Kingdom Society for and the North American Si All eights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages ind review, no part ofthis book electronic of ‘any information recording, jow known oto be invented, ‘without written permission ofthe publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data, Sartre today :a centenary celebration / edited by Adrian van den Hoven and ‘Andrew Leak, 14545-166-X (pbk.) fan den Hoven, Adrian, 1939-. 182430,$348324 2005 194 -de22 2005052015, British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data ‘A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Printed in the United States on acid-free paper Contents Preface by Adrian van den Hoven Introduction: Sart at One Hundred—a Man of the Ninetecuth Century Addressing the Twenty-First? ‘Thomas R. Fyn ‘SARTRE AND PHILOSOPHY 1. Sartre’s Ontology from Being and Nothingness to The Family Idiot ‘Joseph 8. Catalano 2. Freedom, Nothingness, Consciousness: Some Remarks on the Structure of Being and Nothingness Reidar Due 43. The Sartrean Account of the Look as a Theory of Dialogue Steve Marsinot 4. The Bad Faith of Violence—and Is Sartre in Bad Faith Regarding It Ronald E, Santoni 5. Sartre on Freedom and Education David Detmer Sartre and Realism-Al Jobn Duncan Way-Down SARTRE AND PSYCHOLOGY 7. Consciousness and Digestion: Sartre and Neuroscience Hazel E. Barnes 8. Group Therapy as Revolutionary Praxis: A Sartrean View Betty Cannon al 43 2 78 a1 u7vit Comets 9, A Feminist-Sartrean Approach to Understanding Rape ‘Trauma Constance L. Mai with Freud SARTRE: (AUTO)BIOGRAPHY, THEATER, AND CINEMA Biography and the Question of Literature in Sartre Ann Jefferion From Prague and Sartre's Dennis A. Gilbert Sartre's Conception of Hi for a Motive in Camus’ Novel Tbe Stranger and Sartre's Play Dirty Hands Adrian van den Hoven Sartre and the Return of the Living Dead Colin Davis . Les Mots Sartre and the Language of Belief Jobn Gillespie SARTRE AND POLITICS Sartre and Terror Ian Birchall Alter-Globalization Movement and Sartre’s rality and History Bessy Bowman and Bab Stone Sartre and Fanon: On Negritude and Political Participation ‘Aszedine Haddowr Camus versus Sartre: The Unresolved Conflict 153 166 179 195 207 222 234 265 286 302 aun 319 326 Preface ‘This collection of twenty-one articles by thirteen American, six British, and two Canadian scholars is divided into four sections: Sartre and Philosoph and Psychology; Sartre: (Auto)biography, ‘Theater, and Cinema; and, finally, Sartre and Politics. The great diversty of approaches and commentaries is @ tribute to the stature of Sartre, whose writings continue to have an impact on the English-speaking world and farther afield. Sartre was the embodiment of the ‘modern intellectual who in his own words “constantly meddled in matters others considered to be none of [his] business.”! Therefore, that, to paraphrase Bernard-Henei Lévy, “the twentieth century bel Sartre,”? while on the other hand, John Gerassi saw him as the (most) conscience of the age.”*'Then again, the right-wing reviewer Algis Valiunas does “for Sartre, his passionate temperament issued in a disfiguring taste for revolutionary violence, to explain the world as nobody had adequately explained ic fatuity, Sartre knew everything, and everything he knew was course, right-wingers would love to see Sartre of his four years as a f the commu minded such diverse and his work? Not at ‘Nothingness Sartte proclaimed Jo be dead is to be a but he adds that even though iow “reduced to the In this capacity [one] will pursue [one’s] history in the human ‘death will] confer a meaning from the outside on everything in his preface to The Family Idiot, xegin, How, and by what means? dead person] is open to all comers. ‘The essential thing is. Jblem.... What we must try and understand is the origin of, cannot be said that a lot has remained hidden, especially si A to publish posthumously an enormous amount of his work. In addition, his [Notes fortis section are located on pagered every angle of his existence and thought stories, and biography are as ey are direct or indirect personal revelat ure that her memoirs include as cn there are the corresp of course, other people's memoirs, autobiographies, uric and sometimes overlapping circles and themes occur and reoccur, often recei , then again, total the crisscrossing of these various wri pression that all aspects of Sartre’s life have already n dealt with and a seamless web has been woven, to be said about Sartre and his work. He raised many n different realms: for example, the matters of freedot and commitment are as relevant today as they were in his id the notions of the absurd and contingency frst n 1938 in his novel Nawsea, when Roquentin proclaims that “just now I expe- so that he could speak to his raised questions about torture, cow: for freedom—questions that remain as By framing the action in that lice, commitment, and man’s evant today as they were some of his age. As Michel Rybalka has remarked, his life can be divided into three periods corresponding to the motto of the French Republic and to his main preoccupations at the time, ie., Liberty, Equality, Once forays in terms of sometimes concentric les. Nauea and the short stories in nded France. Yet the story the Spanish civil war and the angu fa Leader” is a pen nn of the ominous threat of fascism in France. From 1939 to 1941, Sartre became a meteorol prisoner and spent time in a stalag. For the firs time he encountered, an hhuge scale, the Other as the ultimate antagon his experience colors his fist ingness.Italso colors his p Roads to Freedom. 's life seems pervaded by gloom and his in to act until he finally lets loose in hyper-dramatic fashion. ‘These novels arc ized historical canvases of te late 1930s and early 1940s when the 3s of every stripe showed the defenseless on the altar of ‘their callous willingness to sacrifice the lives ‘macro-historical events than the second volume The Reprieve, while Iron im the Soul gives a sardonic and satirical account of the disaster that was the ‘grotesque defeat and the pathetic surrender of France. No wonder that, 2s a consequence, Sartre decided to become politically engaged. He had seen the ‘enemy face to face in the form of the Nazis and their French henchmen and had become aware of the role that the French ruling class had played in the betrayal of the peop! In this sense Sartre’s decision in the early 1950s to become a “critical fellow- traveler” of the Communist Party was not an aberration. His distaste of his own class—the French bourgeoisie—and his innate sympathy for the underdog and. fe attitude toward the work his play Dirty that phenomenon! However, very much with us, b ‘one of the spokesmen respor anti-color changed faces, and Sartre was cert the transformation of the colonial nightmare into the post-colonial word, ‘which many people can now speak with a voice of their own. Racism, economic imperialist expansionism, and dictatorships remain ed our understanding of all these matters and. ‘gave us some of the ‘opened up ever-widening, questior world over. As Thomas Flynn puts ‘turned into a “singular universal.” ‘The Family Idiot, Sartre's final magnum opus, tries to go full circle and exp into his time, thus taking us back il he became important to peop his volume, Sartre Rollebon. When he discovers that he is re-creating Rollebon i he biography. Sartre's Hantertis meant to be a biography and a rue.” Clearly, th relationship of an author’s work to his life fascinated Sartre and remains important for biographers and readers. Of artre wished to go beyond banal psychologisms, which would sec in ple reflection of the a life, Fe wanted to lay barext Prac the “original project” and uncover why and how the child becomes the author ‘gives imaginative shape to his deepest conflicts tus conclude with Sartre's pere \famous interviews with Benny Lévy, unbroken chain, beca age he helped sha certain periods. As he said in Ho 1 specific readers hing of beauty but to have an commitment on the part of the author but als reader. When the latter refuses that involvement, he stops reading and being ‘guided by the author." When in August 1952 Sartre attacked Camus harshly in his re id ‘Camus’ letter to the editor published in Les Temps modernes, he icize Camus’ “haughty stance,” revealed in his personal attitude and writing, as exen his unwillingness to become involved in history. Clearly h Jot separate aesthetic and moral consideratio dealing with authors, and this holds true for his political convictions. Ne did he distinguish between the means and the end, as Elizabeth Bowmat Robert Stone illustrate in their discussion of the 1964 Rome lecture. artre’s life and work was very much a tour de force. Not only reach out farther and farther in his quest to understand himself, others, and his age, but he was ready to take on all comers and compete with the great cers of past and present in order to have his views previ nd proto-fascist chreats that were b Continued to assume bigger tasks and to vanquish greater obstacles. Being amd [Nothingness takes issue with all of modern phil plays and novels embrace m , the afterlife, and Europe's a tre, the postwar public persona, broadened his politic: pte of his worldwide tr: in goals. En rou igue of Dialectical Reason, but uubert. AS a conse ed posthumously ~ Adrian van den Hoven Preface | xi Gers, Ja Chicago Press, 1989), 4. Als Valiunas, “Sarte vs, Carns,” Commensary, January 2008, 62. snd Three Otber Plays Dirty Hands, The Pls, The Repectfud © Books, 1956), 47. 9, Jean-Paul ny Lévy, Hope Now: The 1980 Interiews, tansated by Adan van den Hoven, with an introduction by Ronald Aronson (Chicago University of Chicago ‘Easy introduction by Steven Ungar (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univesity Press, 1988), 70-14 11, David A. Sprintzen and Advan van den Hoven, eds. and trans, Jean-Paul Sartre and Albers Cams: A ioric Confrontsion (New York: Humanity Books, 2004), 131-161Introduction Sartre at One Hundred—a Man of the Nineteenth Century Addressing the Twenty-First? THOMAS R. FLYNN We are celebrating the centennial year ofthe birth of Jean-Paul Sartre (1905 1980). His death and the huge funcral cortege that spontaneously gathered on that occasion marked the passing of the last of the philosophical “personalities” cof our era, Contrast, for example, his departure, which I did not witness, that of Michel Foucault, which I dd. The latter was acknowledged in a modest ceremony at the door of the Salpéuiére Hospital; his private funeral 15 exhibit the distinction graphi the most likely candidate to become Sarte’s successor as ri oon the Left Bank, exited the institution that had figured in several of| books attended by a small crowd of a couple hundred, admittedly assembled ithout public notification, on a damp morning to hear Gilles Deleuze read a brief passage from the preface to The Uses of Pleasure. Describing philosophy 2s “the eral work that thought Brings to bea on ise,” the meseage had an ironically haunting Sartrean “Though Sartre and Foucault shared a common intellectual hertage—both had attended prestigious lycées in Paris, Sarre almost from the start and Foucault asa young man from the provinces, preparing for the national exams tog: to the Ecole Normale Supérieure to which each was ad marked generational difference between them, a5 well hilosophical divergence, Winston Churchill's famous quip (that the British and the Americans ‘mentioned the Hus- setlian heritage that he and others shared with Sartre and Merleau-Ponty. But he insisted that whereas the latter pair focused on experience, meaning (sens), and. the subject, Foucault and his intellectual colleagues looked toward a philosophy [Notes for this section begin on page 12.of knowledge (savoir, ra ‘thought separated by a common Tusserlian legacy? jot only to serve as af Bain access to a door (two schools of philos lluminating the contrast- work of aru in Sartre’s thought and work Foucault can be seen to have both closed and later reopened. I take their ioship a indicatve of the “offal” reading of Sartrea the next generation of Parisian intel 1g work of Sartre, but nderstood anything of Heg saw him as one of those pe ts teers, covering ‘echoes with the thunder of his rivalry with S the best-known philosopher of the twentieth century (based to academics—is seen as a sign of jously someone whose phone number even pages on language that were seventy-five years late, ignoran sred.”® So Foucault closes the door on the kin id been doing, namely, “existentialism,” to encapsulate ject of his disdain. As he the magnificent and pathetic tury to think the tw: * Introduction Sartre t One Hundred | 3 Sartre is their respective conceptions of the intellectual, Sartre propounding, what Foucault rejects as the ideal of a “total” or “universal” intellectual and Foucault offering as his alternative the “specific intellectual.” Let us examine this last entry in the brief against Sartre more closely, for in many ways it dist the other eriticsms mounted by the generation of French thinkers that came to the fore in the 1970s and 1980s. Sartre as Universal Intellectual 1s his idea of an intellectual in a tio of conferences delivered September and October 1965.* Published together as Plsidoyer ctuels? these three lectures address such questions as “What is an re function of the intellectual Is the writer (Vécrivain) i Whar Lectute, which had been delivered the year before.1° We find to the Japanese the usual existentialist criticism of bourgeois humanism and the characteristic Sartrean appeal to the work of artas the model for non-alienating, communication among freedoms. But concepts ftom his Critigue of Dialecti- cal Reason such as praxis, class struggle, the singular universal, and dialectical relations themselves are now emphasized. his critics, Sartre arrives at the following common charge against the lectual is someone who gets involved in what doesn’t concern him and who pretends to contest a collection of received truths and the conduct that they inspire in the name of a global conception n and of society. But such a conception, these critics argue, is impos: sible ... because developing societies are defined by the extreme diversification ‘of modes of life, of social functions and of concrete problems” (Siruasions 8:37), Ina word, the intellectual is tr ter, in the manner of the German Aristotle), to understand the many through the one, when the preferred mode should be what Foucault calls a *poly- hedron of intelligibility." ‘Sartre counters with an example: the people who built the atomic bomb. ‘They should be called “scientists” (savanss) but not “intellectuals.” Indicat- ing the politico-cthical condition that he ascribes to this term, Sartre explains lectuals” if they left their fields of expertise, reputations accorded them in order er principles that they put into play, ‘eminently contestable that take ir supreme norm” (Sirwasions 8:378-379). -r words, the -rum of his particular expertise to move the injustice with the normative lever of “human life.” sounds suspiciously like the kind of appeal to human nature that Sartre has regulatly rejected (that is, the idea of nature would be better to liken “human life” to the concept of the “complete human” (hommewwe are dealing with what age” Ala Scheler rather than a nomological role of imaging consciousness in worth noting that Foucau tual, uses the same example of the atomic physicist, specifically, J. Robert Oppen~ hheimer, who objects to the use to which his work is being put (inthis cas, the does so in the name of humanity. In other Sartre and Foucault employs his professional ‘of the Vietnamese boat p ie “star system”) to further 1 function of analytic reason that, its blindness to dialectical of “technician of practical knowledge (sayoir).” As such, he is divided against ‘and exists in a state of “unhappy consciousness.” As Sartre explains: someone who becomes aware of the opposition both within search for practical truth (wit Introduction: Sartre at One Hundred |S In appealing to “human life” and criticizing bourgeois humanism, Sartre sets before us an ideal of what the integral human eam be. Itis not an essence to be actualized but the result of a creative choice: “The human universal is yer 10 come [a fairel” (Situations 8:410; BEM 253). When it is a matter of “the city of ends,” as he sometimes says, or the realization of positive reciprocity ly free, organic individuals-in-relation, Sartre warns us that no pat- fe Very criterion of success 3s just received, the model, I suggest, is n choice, Rathe 3p or a criterionless sminating leap, a criterion riences, whether religious, ethical, political, or lift-orienting in some other sense (such as, perhaps, the experience of “falling” in love), conversion as a criterion-constituting choice is at least a hypothesis worth considering. ‘This suggestion is especially pertinent in view of Sartre’s claim in his Nosebooks for fan Evhies that “we can conc ‘conjuncture (suppression of classes and of the State) as its necessary cor ‘warns] this suppression is not sufficient by later, “Marxiai ‘needed to make History.”!* existentialist fame loses much of his appeal when the conceptual framework— the “ideology,” if you will—for this project is dialectical6 1 Thomas R. Finn ‘The Future of Marxist Existentialism Returning to the ttle of this essay, can existentialism inherit the historical dialectic in the twenty-first century that various forms of Marxism seem to have in its alliance with philosophical Marxism or with dialectical thinking more broadly conceived? Or must one look elsewhere for its continued relevance? ‘One matter is clear: iit is to be more than a “coffee-table” ‘curiosity or a romanticized version of bourgeois individualism, requires a social theory and, I would argue, though not here, a social ontology on which to base 's Critique of Dialectical Rea for conveying existentialist lennium. What I have in mind are its basic yecessary systems and i alized, our economy more transnat ethical and the politic: creasingly compromised. And while the is famous “choice” of rat namely, analytical a] reson this could well ose the pragmatic spit ofthe current age. rt of the difficulty is the “dialectic” itself, In its Hegel han a ladder, these dialectics resemble flypaper or .grasps and cannot escape. Sartre himself has spoken of the need for a more “supple” dialectic and a “dialectic wit NE 459), those holes being the contingencies of human freedom and the counter-productive nature of the pra in the late 1940s, he even speaks of orhernes as “the true n if History” and as being ‘one species of otherness” (NE 56). The very “othering” character of human consciousness, its ali seems to imply, makes dialectic possible ‘even as it resists its totalizing power.” Introduction: Sartre at One Hundred | 7 ‘The Return to Experience Let me turn to another topic that linguistically oriented philosophers have tended to leave for phenomenologists, whether Husserlian or Hegelian, and others, namely, “experience.” Recall that Foucault had contrasted his stress ‘on concept with the emphasis on experience that marked the path in Flussea's place in contemporary French thou concept might meet the needs of philosophers in the twenty-first century, that is, in a post-poststructuralist age. A basic thesis that I have defended over the years is that Sartre conceptual logjam that had blocked his constructing a satisfactory sox ‘when he moved from a philosophy of consciousness to on: lived experience” (le vécu), assuming functions commonly as sudian unconscious, which he continued to reject in name. T jew given in 1969, Sartre admits | do not believe inthe unconscious in the form in which psychoan it to us, In my present book on Flaubert, I have replaced my earlier notion of consciousness (although I still use the word a lot), with what I call le éew—tived ‘experience. Iwill ty to describe in a moment what I mean by 1 nither the precautions of the preconsci but the terain in which the individual is perpet and his riches and consciousness plays the trick of determining itself by forgetful ness, (BEM 39) ‘As always, Sartze is intent on preserving individual responsi d moral ground of such respor is “comprehension,” ‘as “the translucidity of praxis to itself”? Plenty of room this terminology for “bad faith” (for example, the “tick of determining, 3 forgetfulness” or selective recollection), as wel as for the play of ide~ 2 Though objective conditions play an increasingly important role in his later thought, Sartre never regards us as the passive objects of abstract structures land impersonal forces, Even in this more nuanced account, his carly existentialist sboleth continues to hold true: “We are without excuse.” idity” (as distinct from “transparency”) of pra ideological self-deception, such as the form that infects the “false thanks to a kind of awareness, namely, “comprehension found than “knowledge.” Where Freudian psychoan scious, Sartrean existential psychoanalysis appeals to compre sudy of Flaubert, Describing the mor ly pierced the fog of self-deception uubert’s writings, Sartre observes:Bt Tomar R. Fem ad with what is 5, and what I would calla total absence of knowledge, tinguish here between comprehension and intellec pasion, Whi iz. One can be conscious of an external totalizaton, but one cannot be con scious of a totaization which aso totalizes consciousness. ‘Lived experienc perpetually susceptible of comprehension but never of knowledge of departure, one can know certain psychic phenomena by concepts, but ‘not this experience itself. The highest form of comprehension ofived experience can forge its own language—which will always be inadequate, nd yet which will often hhave the metaphorical structure of the dream ite. (BEM 41) larites with French Freudian analysis become evident w ymprehension of a dream occurs when a man can express a language which is itself dreamt. Lacan says that the unconscious is struc: ture of a dream” (BED 41 acceptance of an unconscious” level of awareness. Indeed, he introduces the term “lived experience” in his Hubert study as alent of co scious-unconscious.”™ But the retention ofa locus for individual responsii mains uncompromised. Sartre repeats that view and elaborat terview given late i rience does not ‘The conception of “lived experience” marks my change since L'Bere et le néant. My «philosophy of consciousness It was all very well for me fact remains 1 end it becomes an ‘monument of rationality irrationalism, bect not account rationally for “below” consciousness and which are also rational, but ational. Today, jon of “lived experience” represents an effort to preserve that presence to self which seems to me indispensable for the existence of any psychic fact, while Introduction: Sartre at One Homndsed | 9 at the same time this presence isso opaque and blind before itself tha itis also an absence from itself, Lived experience is always simultaneously present to itself and. itself. (REM 41-42) “Richness,” “opaque and blind before itself,” “processes which are ‘below? consciousness”—these are some of the features that “the lived” brings to the unblinking eye of existentialist consciousness such that “conscious-unconscious” and “presence-absence” without romises his staun distinctions are called for. notion of presence-absence has, in fi lowing that this rejection of the Freudian unconscious. Clearly, some imaging consciousness is paradi Such awareness “de rendering it “present-absent” to the imaging subject That he should characterize the (pre-reflec tive) comprehension as that ofa dream may sound sm minus the unconscious, butit claborates an old Sartrean thesis. The dividedness that makes it possible to comprehend without “knowing” was already pres ent in Being and Nothingness It occurred in the distinction between reflec: tive and pre-reflective consciousness, What was lacking i epistemic notion of “experience” was what we might call the “existential richness” of the later usage.” Likewise, he speaks of an Erlebnis (using the German but not le véen) of simultaneity.# In this earlier work, for example, he dismisses our awareness of the “we” as a “purely subjective experience (Brlebnis),” having no ontological significance (BN 429). Itis this wealth that Sartre mines in his multi-volume existential psychoanalysis of Flaubert and his age. Indeed, he once described The Family Idiot asa sequel to The Paycholagy of Imagination (BEM 46) "s point in introducing the category of lived experience is strategic. ‘He wishes to “surpass the traditional psychoanalytic ambiguity of psychic facts hanical, by showing that every psychic ity which aims at something, while among them are comprehended but neither named snes is preserved, the as “presence-to-self.” Recall Sartre's assertion th: ‘a self but a presence-to-self™ (BN 440; EN 516). He describes immanence as fe from self to itself” (BN Ixvs EN Being ani Nothingness possibility of one an object for oneself “I a who cannot be an object for myself” (BN 241). Ontologically speaking, this101 ToomasR. Ben “inner distance” is the basis of temporalization. Human reality is temporally fed, which isthe reason for the many paradoxical statements that Sartre its regard throughout Being and Noshingness. This subject that cannot ‘of course, nota transcendental go asitis for Husserl and Ka is another way of describing the presence-to-self that is the ontologi cal ground for Sartrean freedom and responsibility?” But that vintage existentialist notion of “subjectivity” changed in Sartre's later work. By 1969, he insists: “What you call ‘subjectivty” in Being and Nothingnessis not what it would be for me now, the small mat to experience.” TI ‘cannot can be shown that the concept of experience i Foucaul Janguage and discourse has become boring. We've been talking about language to change the subject. Personally Tam in egory of historical experience.” oucault’s appeal to “experience” does seem to have a wider extension than either language or discourse. And the concept of experience Introduction: Sarit One Hundred ‘Thinking the Twenty-first Century “To the extent that existentialism reflects the experience of Western Europe in the 1940s, it seems inextricably tied to its own faticiy. As Sartre liked to quote from Hegel, its essence is its history (Das Wesen ist was gewesen is). But to the extent that it addresses the human condition (of situation, choice, mortal tm poraity, and the lke), its relevance transcends the historical values one attaches to these variables. ‘The drama may shift with the dramatis personae, but what historian Paul Veyne calls the “plot” (Pinarigne) remains the same: people trying creasingly co eatening, and impersonal world. ‘And so 1 shall close with five existentialist “themes” that, in a the concept of experience, promise to remain relevant rough these can merely be cited as we conclude, they raise mat int discussion as they point toward the continued philosophical relevance -talist thought. , T would m in-situation. ‘The former breaks open and thoroughly temporalizng it. The ncepts of presnce-toself and being subject, desubstan the subject essen in any situation. T is best understood by appeal t tempers the notion of a meani so strenuously resisted when he sovereign, founding subject, a universal form of subject to Tam very skeptical of this view of the subject and very host con the e¢ {uted through practices ‘a more autonomous way, thr “Antiquity, on the basis, of course, of a numbei in the cultural environment.” to a seemingly endless series of reciprocal relati ‘might call a “Kierkegaardian” dialectic (one with of dialectical thought, though problematized especially by so remains 2 cn 1d, abiding existentialist theme is that of committed knowledge— The specifically, the concepts of committed literature, philosophy, and history. Again, estates objections against the positivist claim to value-frce know! ter Novik call “That Noble Dream” ina book by that tile ty." This is scarcely an exclusively ry question let alone one mired inthe nineteenth century often described as the sole existen- am pleased to underscore the important work that sd questions of good and bad synonymous with Sartrean 1 of the stature of121 Thomas Figo ‘Taylor could underscore the importance of “authenticity” in contem. timony to its abiding and general relevance.** watk and a topic in contemporary ethics. Indeed, so-called postmodemist ethics is rim: ethics of responsbilty, and its propelling of Emmanuel Levinas to center stage, | would suggest, renders implicit homage to the Sartrean ethics hhaunts this discourse, waiting to be revived as the context becomes more secular. and in a'sense that encompasses the other themes, is primarily a way of life, a form of what the Greeks called (cpimeleia beawsow), This has always been admitted. In fact, it was occasi cited as one of existentialism’s limitations. But the revival of interes and phenomen “kind of existentialization of Foucault,” to which that our condition, it analyzes and challenges us to own, Notes 1, Didier Eribon, Michel Foncaus trans Betsy Wing (Cambridge: Harvard Univesity Press, 1991), 330 2, Miche! Foucault, “La gence of Rowen 4 ophique de Michel Foucault,” Crisiqe 660 Introduction Sartre t One Hundred | 13 9. Sioasion8:375-A85; *A Dlea for Iotllecral John Mathews (New York Morrow, 1978), 228-285; ‘Secad Test 13-14 (Winter Spring, 198 DES2. See Stone and Bowman, “Dialectical Ethic.” Library, 1956), 140; 1/Bie fle néant (Pass: Gallimard, 1943); hereaer cited BN and EN, respectively. 28, See SME9-13.iy odginl intention Ewa Domatska, Encounters: Pilesoply of History after Peomaernion (Chasot Virgina Press, 199% pnald E. Santon, Bad Faith Good Fath and Authenticity in Sri Early Pilly Iphia: Temple University Press, 199 SARTRE AND PHILOSOPHYChapter 1 Sartre’s Ontology from Being and Nothingness to The Family Idiot JOSPEH S. CATALANO T came to Sartre late and by sheer accident. I had a tenured position at Saint John’s University, and for such radical activities as attempting to choose my own textbooks, I was dismissed with about 20 others, after which almost the entire Hera arts faculty waked out in sympathy. This dismissal barred me i “the pilesophy of mathematics, although I could teach the philosophy of si ence.” Pause, “Joe, what do you know about existentialism?” Well, T had heard. the term, and, besides, I was ready for a change. And thus here I am, In part 4 of Being and Nothingness, Sartre writ project—for these are but one—is, as we shall n of the problem of being.” And he ad ceived and then realized; we are this sok are a commentary upon this remark. In its most g » the problem of being is nothing less than under: standing the relation of all existence to human existence. Ifwe are cach a solution ‘of the problem of being, then in our own lives, we, individually and collectively, catline a possible meaning forall human existence and, indeed, or the origin of wonder: experiences before it society. All children are born Idiot of the seeming backwardness of the tion then bears on everything, and this is the stupor: [Notes for this chapter begin on page 29.being an outline of the solution of the problem ‘we mere mortals attempt to of being may appear tobe pretentious. Ho id ats -s? On the other hand, we are 1d what is most fundamental to our being given just such answers from every area of study nowadays. We are essentially products of the Market, which, like God, is unknowable, but which we must stil study and investigate to see just what It expects of us. We are also products of a neuroscience that intelligence, is sure that i and that the creative thought and actio product of the god of Chance. We do not kn ‘not yet understood the jot unlike a complex comput jave given us our culture pest responses appear to arse from a pluralist sey providing ws wi eu efccionson our human condition, but they ate cach in het cmp to ge as aslution tothe problem of beng hiltophers have the ight to presen 's ontology to develop in three stages: first, through Being and Nothingness and Sains Genet: Actor and Martyr, second, through the Critique of Dialecsieal Reason; and, finally, as it unfolds stage depends upon the former and deepens the ori lucing novel elements. For exampl which is the source of our world-making, develops in the Critigueinto which isthe world made artifact and in The Family iat, A and the practico-inert unite to becon vr adventure with nature to that of our adventure with our fam cry. My reflection will be developed in four stages: frst, a general |, 4 more extended study of what Sartre calls the problematic 4 brief reflection on Sartre's methodology; and finally, Being and Nothingnes, the the Spirit of the Age, I should note that in my reflect -s upon Sartre, I have hi saw developing some tural numbers are a ugh the success of the have refused to carry Sartre Ontoly 19 that we could feed, cloth, and house every human being in the world, despite increase in population. Iam aware that I have used the healthy ambiguit the Sartrean texts to nudge Sartre toward my own anthropocentic view of world, but I believe that I have fleshed out his ontology rather than done vio- lence toit. Finally, I might note—for those whose views might hinder reflections on this attempt to place the human reality in the center of our adventure with nature and history—that this anthropocentrc effort is nothing, ‘more than the attempt to accept responsibi ‘our world. An Introductory Sketch of Sartre’s Ontology ‘To begin with, in its most general sense the ontology of Being and Noshing- nesshas a twofold purpose: fis, to show that the world isthe way iti because our body is the way it is; second, to show that all our interpersonal relations arise from a specific contact with another person, that is to say, fom the con tact of one body upon another, and thi the ontology of the look. Sartre's study of Genet develops this ontology of the look, stressing the ct establishes the general parameters within which our logy of the Gritigue of Dinlecical Reason formally yp and again there is a twofold purpose: fist, it forge the intellectual tools that we use to understand out his- uses and tests these very tools to reveal thatthe pluralism and freedom of our Western democracies hide a dependent, reciprocal relation to the poor and oppressed of the world, a tains scarcity as the main of our history. On one level sm is real, but itis part of ich keeps us po pot calls “seriality.” The ontology of The Family Idiot unites all these elements in the study of a family drama of a seeming i Flaubert, the father of realism in literature. This realism that masks a hatred of ‘ot as naked as our present hatred, but rather is hidden by making. the imaginary more real than realty, within the impossible ideal of a literature that is written not to be read by anyone but merely to sustain itself, ‘The general direction of this ontology is to reveal the any type of structure and human existence. Trees, stars, the entire universe, the internal structures that we nature and the rules of human though connected to sense or meaning, all of the Is, €2 tics, but only because we exist. 1 as I proceed. is an anthropocentrism that structures for actual linguistic usage. In regard to our body, there are certain20.1 Jub S. Casatano features that can be said to be primary of their aflects speech. However, to speak of the deaf and dumb is to give this bio logical lack a human dimension and thus to open the door to a new form of ‘oppression, rendering the deaf subhy the uniqueness of sign language. che topic proposed for the forthcom- ing meeting, for which abstracts were being solicited, was the genetic origins of criminal behavior. My own abstract called attention to the in giving a ncutral definition of criminal or violent behavior; moreover, it pointed to the hidden racis to begin this reflection. My abstract, ‘was not accepted, and no reply was ever given to my argh In itself, a structure is morally neutral. On the other spect nake structures appear selves is itself a philosophical platform: we regard ourselves as merely accider 1¢ greater adventure of the universe, the greater advent age, in Derrida’s trace. Toward the end of The Family Idiot, Sartre is fueled by false ideas: the idea of nature, I conception of a bourgeoisie con: onat least three from the bonds that hold in check those people poor, the oppressed, and those we choose to call the ed and refined to mask oppression. The general reason is very ystem of a priori laws that attempts to speak to us of human nature segments of humanity. Within ‘complex of laws, we are t and ifsome of us are essen inferior to others, that is simply the way things are. In The Family Idior, Sartre returns to the language of Being and Nothingnes in his description of false humanism, He writes: “[MJan knowledge, already acquired, can be exploited, strictly speaking, or developed to there is no more specific problematic of human reality.”* ‘Ontology and the Human Reality which is the substance of my second reflec: unfolds from the small early monograph, 1¢ massive study, The Family Idiot. 1 wh tion, connects 8) The Transcendence of the Fo, to Sartre's Ontolegy 21 10 test with you this not by pressing it along lines indicated by Sartre, although perhaps not fully developed by him. In “The Transcendence of the Ego, Sartre writes: “My I, in effect, is no more certain {for consciousness than the [of other men. It is only more intimate. ‘can never discover within us a pure center that is our self, independent of its relation to others. We might have developed a history in which we used this dependency on others to raise ourselves mutually int ally higher forms cof humanity; in fact, we have too often done the opposite A central theme that runs throughout Sartre’s ontology is the way we mold people to believe that they are naturally inferior to others. We can, without violence to Sartre's thought, refer to this as the production of realms of sub- humanity. Of course, there is always freedom, and the notion of intimacy ‘evolves into that of personality. But it is the look of Being and Nothingness that develops the implication of the transcendence of the ego. Sartre writes: “That subject’s presence without intermediary is the necessary condition of all thought which I would attempt to form concerning myself.” look reveals not the way 1am an object for the other but, through the 7 precise the and through his look, The Other is in ‘meaning of this upsurge of the Other no way given to us asan object... ies: “The Indian untouchable thinks he is actually untouchable. He prohibition of which he is the object, and makes of it an inner justifies and explains the conduct of ited freedom.” To return to Saint Genet in a quote more relevant to Genet himself, Sarre writes: “Paralyzed by men’s gaze, marked by man in his very depths and transformed by man in his perceptions and even his inner language, he encounters everywhere, between him and men, between him and nature, between him and himself, the blurzed transparency of human meanings. Only cone question confronts this homunculus: man. The child Genet is an inhuman product of which man is the sole problem. How to be accepted by men?” In the Critique of Dialectical Rearon, we encounter the famous example of the division between skilled and unskilled workers. Sartre notes that even in their unified opposition to managem was accepted as a natural hierarch igence.!? And throughout The Family dos Sarte returns to this theme of subhumanity. In referring both to the Affican and to Genet, Sartre frst nots thatthe slave rather than being the truth ofthe master accepts as lesser evil the master’s being bis truth, on the sole condition that he can internalize this truth and throw it in the face of the oppressor.”!* But221 Jongh. Catalans onttinues: “By gathering those judgements out of the mud, all the Afficans acquired was the freedom to proclaim themselves submen, In the same way, by declaring that he was the evil, Genet did nothing more than recognize the reference to the worker, Sartre ‘The Family Idiot, “Such consciousness developed slowly among the iat ofthe ninetcenth century because at the outset it requires shame and, asits primary determinations." ‘Nevertheless, Sartre recognizes that these movements of self-discovery were first, because they were joined to true revolt on the part of the second, because Genet was able to personalize himself as a he system of natu roclaims that all men are cre- ated equal but which means that be that no genuine 1¢ two we-relations are subhuman are a deep sf reflection found in The ‘our ego is ontologically the problematic of human reality. Fist, freedom is not a thing residing. within tus a8 some Aristotelian essence. Free y to give new weaning to what others try to make of us; but the other's making is primary, reason than because as infants, we are helpless. Second, we freedom in the universe, and thus the making and unmaking the human is our collective task. It is not a games we and we ‘and genuine good. Third, the true efficacy of our acti that we have forged not only a world of artifacts but a world populated by those whose freedom is essential ced in respect to the freedom of the middle class. In 1963, Marti Churches and Synagogues,” spoke hyperbole to a certain ext ther ‘only to underscore what ym. The very nature o le of personhood ied.” King’s words are Sarir' Ontslegy | 23 Ontology and Method My third reflection will consider Sartre’s methodology. In general, this meth- odology directs us back to concrete human actions, but it does not abandon to 2 false pluralism within which actions are mere isolated events with no istorical force. In particular, the singular, for Sartre, is never a mere instance in the universal. In their correct usage, general notions direct our reflec ut a specific analysis ma the important -rmining factor; the freedom and This give and take between the general and the part in Sartze's notion of the singular universal, is Critique as a diz human body and ‘ontological primacy of individuals.* Even are the omological basis for the group. In retcospect, this nominalsm appears in Being and Nothingness and Saint Genet as a comtextualism; thats, forthe most part, Sartre limits his discussion cither to the point at hand, or to the person to whom he Jess of what qualifications a wider consideration would require. usage represents gamble, 2 fundamental desire to communic tics of being misunderstood. On the part ofthe listener and requires sympathy, that is, the willingness always to , Sartre frequently refers favor ably to the Kantian “kingdom of ends,” when the issue at hand—namely, the ‘oppressive use of others—is so obvious that he can make his point by bringing, Kant over to his side. Flowever, when the di fF the stats of human ce is more formal, Sartre separates himself from Kant, and thus, toward the end of Saint Gene, Sarre writes, reminding us of the problematic of the human reality: nd that, on all levels, affirms the the Critique, individual actions I we could all be, simultaneously and reciprocally, both object and subject for ‘each other, of if we could all sink toget the Kantian city of ends, we were never any objectivi undertake the impossible liquidation of of cass and race, concealed by the historical condi social hierarchy.” by nati24 Josep 9 ate ave more to say about )w I wish to continue with a few me, this dialectical nomin: 4 progressive-regressive movement; that to sce the dialectic as an aspe ” For alism has nothing to do with names being is nominalism reject universality. Rather, it ts both to the way we have forged the connections between language and the world, and the way we have forged our universal notions. This nomi is no more mys of our collective efforts to give us a world in which every fork is both this fork ar believe, con ‘This nominalism is joined to a progressive regressive movemen ‘our attention to the temporal dimension of our individual and group actions. we heed the words—for example, “terror”—that we use to si by connecting with certain past regressive study seems to reveal n: past of our present and then move bee a scries of causal connections ut Sartre’s study of Flaubert, the regressive analysis bri ily background and the he anthropocentric tendencies initiated in idegger’s Being and Time, Indeed, the titles of the two works indicate i fact, for we are the source of that nothingness that distinguishes being, in world and makes hum ns into a history. The basic ontological insight ‘Being and Time's that Aristotelian clock time, in which only the no derivative of more basic temporal structure of Dasein, ot what we might loo Serare Ontolegy | 25 implication is thatthe continuity ofall uhings over nately related to the temporality ofthe human realty, Heidegger later came to reject this implication, or at least to view it as not primary. see a threefold hesitation throughout Heidegger's Being and Time, whose clarification is, toa great extent, the parameters of Sartre's Being and Nothing nes. The initial Heideggerian stroke of genius—thats, to introduce time within the fabric ofall existence through the human realty, not, as Hegel would have it, at the end of our epoch, but atthe beginning of it—leaves open the issue of the being of temporality. If temporality isthe basic structure of Dasein, what is the relation of freedom and questioning to this temporal structure? The second hesitation comes about because of the relation of the Mitsein to Dasein. In Being and Time, burnan interpersonal relations scem to be on the same onto. logical level as the original bond of Dasein to being, Finally, Heidegger is not clear about the relation of Daiein to the human orga three aspects, Sartre's Being and Noshingness dee anthropocentrism in Being and Time: fist, by reveal to question realty is ontologically one with our freedom and our temporal- ty; second, by clarifying a different order than o both our adventure essential organic natu tures, that of our adve of our adventure with other hut Sartre’s ontology 12005 rath their spatial ives rise to history. iake the world out of primordial jow that the continuity of things over time, as well as s from a relation to the human body. The nusness that knows this universe is a relatively small, compact organism that lives usually less than a hundred years. If consciousness was embodied in the simplest quantum elements of the initial big bang, the entire history Of the universe would be one life span, and we can only attempt to imagine what strange beings would inhabit that universe, that be differentiated with respect to such a consciousness. But our universe is the way it is because we arc an organic consciousness with specific senses. Here, knowledge is on the level of world-making, Sartre writes in part 2 of Being and Nothingness. “We have attempted to show how the presence of the for-itself to being reveals being as a shing ... the upsurge of the for-itself causes the thing to be revealed with the totality of its structures.” On one level, this revealing, lows being to exist with its own structures, and we, taking the place inction as the only witness to this revealing, However, that which is revealed is precisely the relation of matter to ou ferentiated body. Thus, our universe is our body's garmer26 | Jongh. Catalano hits faraway bright- shy colors and textures at an angel could ia way that defines us. Both a st ‘non-human heat and a tree with its non- ness and define me by being not-me and transces never defi that if we attempt to define the human body in relation to pure spirit, we then ty. But if we are open to Conceive of the body as pure matt wor. ‘with sounds, colors, and view the things of the world as qu: textures as ees and stars and out organic body with is various senses, ities tall es that aopect of mater that comes tour asthe response of matter to the way in which we diferente the word on tany level Given the Sense of ight, the intl responds wth colrs—and indeed, wth jut these Colors—and we transcend this response by forming both commonsense and Scemtifc notions about color. ‘The ontology of Sartrean world-aking, 8 well the prope view of his of fredom and out relations to other, is best understood iFone reads ‘ond Nothingness asa whole that pivots about the chapter on the body. Tote be unique By is that of phenomenogy that has eyes and fingers, for such knowledge requi srentiated organs. ‘The phenomenok knowledge of where, is to observe strict order in discus appears first as the known, it bond of the world to the body is now made © in part 3 of Being and No the unequivocal claim: “he body is the totality of meaningful relations world." Further, once the thematic notion of the body has been intro- |, the seeming abstract character of freedom becomes concrete a8 .” and “My Death.” in the concrete, our relations to the world and to our own body are her humans as they are bodies, itis logical evel as our legger, by Buber, by followed by the early 1 of Sart 1g away froma true relat inauthenticiy, Sarere’s Ontolagy 127 this means that Sartre docs not view our rel be on the same ontological level as our relation to the world, thrust of the ontology of the look, In Sartre’s studies of Genet and of Flaubert, we encounter a constant and subtle dialectic between the look and the historical conditions ofthe time. We to sce the roots ofthe making and unmaking of the human. Contingency both erucial and constitutive; some contingency is chance, but this chance i molded for human purposes. Had Genet been older, m to others to id this is the ety only asa reformed thief, constantly struggling against “wtites: “Pinned by a look, a butterfly fixed to a cork, he is naked, everyone can see him and spit on him. ‘The gaze of the adults is a constitwent power which is absolute and unconditio could have been difference, there thus, before the it receives love, hate, or fant can do for itself. the frowns, the feeding, it, all are a transcendence to the uudding freedom. In this frst encounter, the infant does not meet an; what would another human be like? The infant meets God and this God or Devil has the power to constitute the inner sub- infant through the way its body is validated or rejected. Sartre ‘writes of Genet: “Let there be no misunderstanding: I am not saying that his crisis resembles a rape, I say itis one." he historical and moral consequences of Sartre's study of Genet are two- ht evil than to attempt to do good. Thus, I create evil. Second, imian need for evil asa love of evil, forcing. truly want. In The Family Idiot, Sartre writes: “Indeed, the Other is from the first day in that discovery I make of myself through at is, through the repeated handling of mj -n, purposive, serving my needs,” I zeal that constituted Gustave a passive agent.” In volume 2, we read: “Gustave’s relationship with his mother deprived him of affirmative ted his relationship to the word and to truth, destined him for sex281 JoghS.Catnlane 's notion of bad faith. Through consistently restr ad directing self-reflection, and re-creating for hi 1eous pre-reflective cogito, Successfully completing hi lows hi ‘The Family Idiot unites the individual and historical drama on the level of both nature and history. Here, as Hazel Barnes correctly notes, all the major notions of Sartre’s earice writings are integrated: we find not only the terminol ogy of Being and Nothingness, but all of its foremost concepts, The imaginary, cannot be understood within the parameters ofa faculty psychol- ogy; rath inary is an aspect of as a question that fractures being from things being ‘and both God and Satan are defeated because they have wasted iden question runs throughout this marvelous work: regard Flaubert as the father of realism, and just what is Why do we today this strange real In conclusion, if Sartre is correct when he claims that we have entered a process of self domestication, a domesticatio alive even as subhumans, if he is right, as I believe he is, that we history into the hel of scarcity, then what we have done we can undo. ¢ only hope we have and the only hope we need. Savors Omslagy | 29 Notes suddres atthe twelfth meeting ofthe North American ‘in September 2008. I want to thank the members ofthe com that my commentary on Being and Nothing relatively Bolted atthe time 1 3 4 ul Sate, Being and Noshingnes Am Enay on Phenemenslgical Onley, tans Harel E. Bames (New York: Philosophical Library, 1956) FF, with the appropeate volume ‘original thre French volumes into fv in Engl 715329. 15.208, Paul Sartre, The Transcendence of he yo trans, Forest Willams and Robert Krkpateick sv York: Noonday Press, 1957), 104 4BN271, Bate, Sartre had noted: “Thus the relation which I< been explicated Jean-Paul Sarte, Saint Gener: Actor and Martyr, trans. Besnard Frechtman (New York Georg ile, 196), 50; heed Genet 9, Gener 34; ar 10. Jean Pal Sure, Noes fram Beis rans. David Pellane (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), 381 11, Gener 6, Jean-Paul Sartre, Critique of Dialectical Reason, vol ‘Alan Sheridan Smith (London: New Left Books, 13. #12175, 14. 715.204, note 26. 15. #713685, 16. “Before it canbe mative fore, contradiction alectc appear as the ‘Tiers of Practice! Envemble tans. 242-282.301 Jp S. Catalano 22, BN344, In the Critique, Sartre summaries our ration to nature: “[Man is ‘mediated! by things to the same extent that things are mediated! by man” (Critique 79) 23, Gener 49, Chapter 2 Freedom, Nothingness, Consciousness Some Remarks on the Structure of Being and Nothingness REIDAR DUE ‘The Project of Being and Nothingness ‘Thisessay ses some questions concerning the method and conceptual sruc- ture of Sartre's Being and Nothingness! Thrce substantially diferent types of interpretation of this text have been put forward, ‘The first is phenomenological. In this reading, Being and Nothingness pro vides a transcendental argun the constitution of a structure of subjec- tivity correlated with a meaningful i? The book describes the acts of ity and the appearance of a differ developed out of the absolutely simple starting point of nothingness. ‘I genesis of the for-itself is then to be seen as arising from the seif¢movement of nothingness tion to the transcendental-phenomenological reading, this, as the advantage that it clearly distinguishes nothi upon reality and as nbound by any [Notes fortis chapter begin on page 4132 | Reidar Due ly ofits own contingent perspective (thereby reducing the burden of having to stand up for its own views). Whereas the frst two readings ental a genetic and dynamic conception of the method in Being and Nothingness, te third ses the develop ‘ment of te argument from the point of view of the conclusions that the book argues towards, the demonstration of an irreducible ontological, ethical and jeedom! ‘on the face of it the most plausible, It corresponds to .ge of Sartre as a defender of freedom—and it also appears understanding asi is expressed in Being and last third of the book, ‘ontological argument to spell ‘were the real core and gon the concept of method and structure of Being snd Nothingnes. es separating, the thre the relationship that they each establish between Sartre's three fundamental concepts: conse cbingness and freedom—each of which can be seen to play the fund: crucial for any interpretation of Being and Nothingness to determine the exact relationship between these terms. However, Being and Nothingness presents a hybrid argument that interweaves metaphysical deduction, phenomenol cal description and moral-existential argument in a way that impossible to decide which of the strands of the argument should be sec tate the others. of its principal concepts has the most central place in the therefore argue that a reading of Bring and Nothingness should aim to account for (rather than dismiss) the hybridity of the argument and then seek to assign relative functions to its different strands. The following remarks are intended asa step in Sart | phenomenology describing, a reflexive ning the appearance of a complex, differ ly and existentially, as part of be judged. The subject is elf, and, at the same time, Such a conceptual pat ween the transcendental argument centred around consciousness, the ontological argument arising, from the distinction Freedom, Noshingnes, Conconomes 33 between Being and Nothingness, and the moral, metaphysical and existential 18 around the notion of frcedom would seem to indicate ingness and consciousness are equivalent terms, translat- able into one another, and thet they therefore have an equal status in the argument, We may summarize such a position by saying that freedom is what consciousness isin so far as consciousness exists as nothingness. Such a view is also supported by the way the text seems to have been written around a set of fandamental intuitions. an unjustifia sense that his or her question is what pl Another intuition guiding the argument of Being and Nothingness is of that may appear to consciousness, such as emot hhas a merely relative status. Consciousness can thus never be bound by what it confronts as objects of awareness. This idea entails a different notion of freedom from that of existential groundlessness mentioned above, freedom of consciousness of which we are not always conscious? fhis question can be taken in a substantial and in a methodological sense. ‘We may ask what freedom is, how it is experienced, how it exists within the life of the for itself. Being and Nothingnes offers plenty of material for answer ing these questions, since each part of the argument—whether ontological, epistemological, or psychological, for example—has implications for such a substantive theory of freedom. A more elusive question concerns the status of the concept of freedom in the argumentative structure and conceptual archi tecture of Being and Nothingness Is it gum freedom that consciousness has a yothingness is a primary34 | Reider Dae that inition isthe most important form of node, though he dos Cpl out wat it eane to sy that inaton sa pimay form a Philosophal tnowiedge, "The eonepra and phenomenclogkal struct of fe oxer hand the outcome of ong ing Moving fom maninal firms of negation ans sures of ex. is ths constructive nue fsctur or the argunentativeconiniy ofthe book, ng the argument Fom one part tothe net even though tay not be he : x dear to Saree nself. argumentative strands ‘Consciousness e's metaphysics of consciousness 2s abs ves from a productive readin, cophy of mind: the apodicrc status of sl mology, the structural and temporal wnity of individual alism and the external reference of 3s Sartre reads (or misreads) the x thought, but awareness that 1f-consciousness is for Sartre an absolute starting point it is not the beginning of an idealist system, for the objects, iat can be predicated of it. Sa 1ess by its very nature cat thereby raises 1g a definite, essence is 2 consciousness of whic ing can be predicated, Freedom, Nothingness, Concionmess | 35 ‘The solution to this question is ontological. Consciousness exist as a nothing- ness that acquires consistency through the relations that it establishes with what itis not. The operation of differentiating itself from what it is aware of is used by consciousness also in relation to its own past actions, which atthe same time define a human being as an individual and asa specific being, since the past of an individual has a definite, unchangeable being. Consciousness relates to this being, ofits past a a being that it has to take responsiblity for, but which it cannot use to produce predicates about itself. Sartre thereby seeks to hold together two dif ferent principles: the definite or determined nature ofan individual human being and the ireducible freedom of consciousness. A lage part of Being and Nothing ness consists in creating 2 bridge between these two poles, between the definite being ofan individual and the freedom of his or her consciousness, tal activity, from sensa to presuppose that this uni self-unifying activity without 15 102 substantial centre? in perception and in the temporal cont (€xistential project)—without having to presuppose that this coherence is upheld by an underlying substance. Am individual subject i a selfunifying series of conscious acts by which it constitutes and determines itself as concrete individual This sel determination does not have the struc ture of conceptual determination. We do not determine ourselves by acquiring hnameable properties but by perpetually unifying and carrying forward our conscious activity. It is only in our being-for-others that this unity appears in the reified form of personal properties and character traits. I determine myself and my actions by projecting possibilities directly, non-representa ito the world. These possibilities appear within the objective rep- at the other may have of me as mere probabilities. The same is true of perception: I organize around my body a sensual world, the represei separate sense qualities. 1 determine myself through the composite set of unifying acts ing power of consciousness therefore never refers to the centre, or an ego. It isthe unity of series of acts that cannot be repress subject as a unity. [visa unity that | am but which I cannot think or and which can appear and be represented only in the refied form of my being: for-others. All my activities are structur in the reflexive circuit of