Man is Condemned to Be Free Essays

Man is Condemned to Be Free Essays Man is Condemned to Be Free Paper Man is Condemned to Be Free Paper Explain what Jean-Paul Sartre meant by the statement â€Å"Man is condemned to be free† Jean-Paul Sartre was a Gallic existential philosopher philosopher and was one of the taking figures in twentieth century Gallic doctrine. His major philosophical work. â€Å"Being and Nothingness† and his celebrated talk. â€Å"Existentialism is a Humanism† . is where he emphasised the statement â€Å"Man is condemned to be free† . The statement appears to be a apposition of linguistic communication because ‘freedom’ frequently has positive intensions while ‘condemned’ provides the opposite feeling. Sartre used the term ‘condemned’ as he believed we have no pick in the affair of being free. and being free ( even if against our will ) means we are responsible for all our actions. Bing responsible for our actions – without holding a pick about being free to take – is a signifier of disapprobation. Us holding to accept full duty for our actions includes us non being able to fault those around us – such as h ousehold. instructors and the authorities – for our state of affairs. In drumhead. adult male is condemned because â€Å"he did non make himself. yet is however at autonomy. and from the minute that he is thrown into this universe he is responsible for everything he does† ( Kaufmann ) . In the face of this duty. many worlds turn to religion. This allows us to experience answerable to a higher being. However. Sartre was non a truster in God ; this could be because of the atrociousnesss he witnessed first-hand during the Second World War while functioning in the Gallic ground forces. His experiences taught him that â€Å"God is soundless in the face of absurdness and horror. Because of this we are condemned to confront life entirely and with this comes absolute freedom and the cooling duty that comes with it. † If God genuinely doesn’t exist so our actions aren’t truly limited by His prognostications. commandments and ethical motives ; God can non legalize our behavior. or warrant it. or do it. We are finally responsible for o ur actions with no 1 to reply because we have chosen them on our ain. out of our freedom. Traditionally. freedom is seen as ‘good’ . Sartre on the other manus describes freedom to be a sort of load because as God does non be we are â€Å"without excuse† and we â€Å"can’t happen anything to depend on† . Sartre illustrates his belief utilizing the illustration of the paper cutter. When sing a paper cutter. we would presume that the Godhead had a program ( an kernel ) for it. Due to there being no Godhead of worlds. we have no kernel. This means that our actions and behaviors can non be explained by citing human nature. alternatively we are needfully to the full responsible for our actions. The kernel or nature of a paper cutter is to cut paper ; this is the intent the shaper of it had in head. However. there was no shaper or Godhead of human existences so we can’t mention to what we are meant to make. There is merely what we choose to make. â€Å"We are left entirely. without alibi. † To make up ones mind whether we are or are non â€Å"condemned to be free† it makes sense to make up ones mind whether our actions are genuinely free or if they may in fact be determined. Psychologists such as Sigmund Freud believe our early old ages have an impact on our future actions. Freud claimed that our moral actions are frequently caused by pent-up or subconscious memories or feelings stemming from childhood. Besides. B. F. Skinner said that we can non be held morally responsible for behavior determined by our psychological make-up because we could non hold chosen to act otherwise. Other minds. including Thomas Sowell. argue that our actions are in line with our societal conditioning. We so follow a sociologically determined way set by our upbringing. instruction and societal groups etc. Libertarianism has the major defect of non taking into history our experiences when doing determinations and when organizing our morality. For case. it is arguable that Sartre believed what he did because of the experiences he had during the war. non because of his freedom. Another valid statement is that genetic sciences determine physical and behavioral facets of humanity. All of these point of views province that worlds are non free to take and our lives and personalities are already determined ( by our past experiences. psychological make-up. socialization and genetic sciences ) . There is truth in these theories and so they take recognition off from Sartre’s belief that â€Å"man is condemned to be free† because they show that there are facets of our lives where we aren’t free to take. This means. in add-on. that our duty is lessened slightly as some of our actions are already determined for us. On the other manus. Sartre’s thoughts are potentially believable. We have all had experiences where the demand to take between multiple actions has caused us emotional convulsion. It is improbabl e that in these state of affairss we can avoid holding to come to a determination. Although we are free to do this pick. we are in a manner forced to do it. So. Sartre’s claim of worlds being condemned or damned to be free does non look so farcical. Even when we ask person for aid with an ethical quandary it is non their reply that determines our solution and attendant action. It is our pick to inquire them in the first topographic point and normally we already know what they are traveling to state ; we so make up ones mind whether to follow their advice. This once more shows the extent of our freedom of pick and the deficiency of finding factors to stamp down this ‘condemning’ freedom. In decision. Sartre examined the dashing nature of determination devising and limitless freedom. The moral duty we have in the instance of absolute freedom is stultifying and causes great desperation. However. this attack could be wrong because there are facets of our lives and make-up that act upon our behavior. If an action is determined by factors outside our control. we may non hold the moral duty for it. From this point of view we are non condemned to freedom but it alternatively allows us some input into our behavior and hence our lives.