ATHEISTIC EXISTENTIALISM

Existentialism
Philosophical system that emerged within the 20th century and was prevalent in German &
France
Existence of the individual subject should be regarded as the foci of philosophical inquiries
Key Words/ Phrases
Individualism
Existence precedes essence
Denial of predetermined essences
Throwness - thrown into the world
Identity & purpose = subject
Max Stirner
Gratification of selfish concerns as the ultimate aim of human life
EGOIST- gratifies personal concerns instead of relinquishing them to external authority
Owness or Appropriation
highest level of self-affirmation by appropriating/possessing the wholeness of life as its own
property
asserting ownership over life
Affirmation of Mundane World
The spirit is a lie
Enjoyment of life is using life up. . .
Nothing is more to me than myself.
SELF-ACTUALIZATION
Attack of Predestination
Life of unfreedom, frustration and unhappiness
Union of Egoists
Egoists unite freely unite together to aspire for a common goal
Ensures egoists to individuate freely and optimize their appropriation of the world for personal
advantages
Freidrich Nietzsche
All inquiries, dispositions and morals will be founded on the subjective will of the individual self
God is Dead
Complete rejection of metaphysical/religious truth as grounds for reality
Spiritual dimension is illusory
Psychological desire for security and calculability
The Anti-Christ
GOD, SOUL, EGO, SPIRIT, FREEWILL are imaginary causes
denial of universal morality as the basis of human conduct
Will to Power
Inner drive to express a vigorous affirmation of all a person's powers
Inner propensity to dominate and assert superiority over one's life
Reaching the highest potentials through overcoming barriers and constraints
Christianity
advocates virtues that undermine and destabilize one's will to life- the will to power
master morality (elite class of society) vs. slave morality (Christianity)
Ethics
Good- all that heightens the feeling of power
Bad- All that proceeds from weakness and cowardice
Happiness- the feeling that power increases, that a resistance is overcome
Nobleman
He himself is the determiner of values
Does not need to be approved of
Highly individualistic

 Stands up for his own beliefs regardless of what other people say
Nobleman
Everything he knows to be part of himself, he honors
Aids the unfortunate but from an urge begotten by superfluity of power
Thrives on challenges, risks and exposure to forms of novelties in life
LIVIN' ON THE EDGE> TO LIVE DANGEROUSLY!
Ubermensch
Overman/ Superman
Revitalize faith in creative powers and earthly existence
Domination and exploitation of life for own personal ends
Enjoyment is living dangerously
Amor Fati
Love of one's fate.
Affirmation and acceptance of worldly life as it is
One's act of finding joy and meaning in states of happiness and despair
Asserts superiority and triumphs over the wholeness of life
Martin Heidegger
Being & Time
What is Being?- Totality of existence
DAS MAN
inauthentic form of existence
cannot distinguish oneself from the mass
aspires ordinary life
align personal needs, dispositions, ideals according to the common good
monotonous way of life, dissolution of individual self & uniqueness
DASEIN
individual self
'there being'
1. one who adopts an authentic mode of being
-drive to surmount the boundaries of tradition and go beyond the level of mediocrity
2. being-in-the-world
-engages in care/ concern sorge
-self realization can only be obtained through communion with other selves
DASEIN
projects towards the future
one who continues to aspire for possibilities in the future
being towards death- ultimate possibility
Death
extinction of one's possibility for self-actualization
something that the individual self must face alone
dreadful possibility
inevitable
happens by chance
obliterates being in the world
Angst
upon awareness of death
the das man completely denies death as a necessary element of human condition
Reclamation of Authenticity
Affirmation of death as an inescapable fact of human living
Liberation from anxiety
Self-empowerment over life itself
Albert Camus

 Absurdity- life is fundamentally meaningless

illustrates how the individual can confront the nothingness of human reality
Negation of God as the foundation of human existence
Existence of Human Subject
Purposeless
Superfluous
Meaningless
Individual Self
Legitimate authority of standards and valuation
mechanical routine- Myth of Sisyphus
WHY? Weariness tinged with amazement
ALIENATION
Kafka & Dostoyevsky
individuals were estranged in all aspects of human life
human institutions
bureaucratized government
national/political parties
Is life worth living at all?
Suicide- complete surrender to the voidness of human existence
Live life without hope or meaning
The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine
Sisyphus happy.
Atheistic: Jean Paul Sartre
Being and Nothingness
human beings are free and self-determining
Existence precedes essence
persons exist, turns up, appears on the scene and only afterwards, defines himself
man is nothing else but what he makes of himself
2 Regions of Being
1. Being-in-itself (en soi)
2. Being-for-itself (pour soi)
Being-in-itself (en soi)
Devoid of consciousness and subject to the causal laws of nature
unfree entity
determinate objects of the universe
Being-for-itself (pour soi)
Possesses consciousness and freedom
existence of a human being
Existence precedes essence
man exists, turns up, appears on the scene and only afterwards, defines himself
man is nothing else but what he makes of himself
there is no God
Individual Self
Existence void of any meaning and purpose
basis for norms and values
free to choose which possible action to pursue
There is no determinism. Man is free. Man is freedom
Man is condemned to be free
not given the option to be born
abandoned in situations where they are demanded to make choices
Responsible for what they make of themselves
no excuses, must accept the consequences

Bad Faith
State of inauthenticity
escaping from consequences of decisions through forms of excuses
promotes forms of weakness and cowardice
Authenticity
Dealing with consequences of one's decisions
Hell is the OTHER
anyone who undermines one's freedom and individuality
1. Look of the other
undermines one's freedom
becomes defined according to ideals, calculations and expectations
2. Leads to conflict
conflict is the real meaning of being-for-others