 Welcome to this lecture series on aspects of western philosophy module 37 lecture number 37. This lecture will concentrate on the philosophy of Jean-Paul Sartre a prominent existential philosopher French thinker of 20th century. In fact, we have already mentioned in the previous lecture about the importance of Sartre as an existential philosopher because it is actually when we talk about existentialism today there is a by default reference to Sartre because he is so associated with this moment. And if at all there is a philosopher who is a complete existentialist probably we can say that it is Sartre because all other philosophers where sort of you know for example Heidegger. Heidegger is often associated with existentialism and many consider him as an existentialist though Heidegger himself did not want to be considered so. But Sartre was on the other hand Sartre consciously associated himself as existentialism and tried to defend existentialism as a philosophical position apart from his magnum opus being a nothingness. He has written many other works including a small book which actually is a defense of existentialism the title of the book is existentialism and humanism. And the major themes of this lecture would be of following this small book is actually written in order to defend the philosophical position of existentialism from its critics. So, we are going to address some of the important issues which Sartre considered are philosophically central to existentialism in this lecture. Now, when we talk about Sartre's conception of human existence there is a notion called being for itself which he very carefully distinguished from another concept which is being in itself. What are these concepts in detail we are going to address it in the next lecture because the next lecture primarily focuses on these concepts. But being for itself for the time being let us understand it as the being of man. It is something which is very similar to what Heidegger considered as Daseem the being in the world. While Heidegger was emphasizing on the situatedness by saying that you know the Daseem the being of man finds itself in a world which is ontologically related to its being. Sartre is rather trying to analyze the structure of this being of man and he asserts the importance of one aspect of freedom. Comparing the being of man from the being of other entities which he calls being in itself the being of man is essentially incomplete because it exercises freedom and with the exercise of freedom it make choices and through with this making such choices it creates itself. So, in that sense Sartre's conception of human existence is quite unique and it emerges and comes into being by negating its essence. So, this is a very important aspect of Sartre's conception of man because man according to him emerges into being by negating its essence. Any attempt to a priori decide what is man say for instance something called human nature or essence of man these are conceptions which Sartre would deny from the very outset by negating the being in itself. The being in itself is something which is fixed for example the being of this remote controller. It is being pre-decided pre-determined by the creator of this object or any a knife for that another example to take another example or a pen. I mean the uses of these things are pre-decided pre-determined, but in the case of man whatever way in which you try to define man the case of man man's activities in this world after he or she comes into existence what he or she does by exercising this freedom of choice this is what is going to matter and that would decide what man actually is. So, the essence is decided by existence. So, this is what we have already seen in the previous lecture when we discussed this notion called existence precedes essence which is actually coined by Sartre. Freedom and negation are central to the conception of Sartrean concept of man in that sense. So, now the statement existence comes before essence was made by Sartre in his that is book which I refer to existentialism and humanism where he categorically states that in the case of man the being of man is so different remarkably different from the being of other entities which are fixed in advance. What both the Christian existentialist and the existential atheist have in common is this fundamental doctrine that existence precedes essence. This is again an observation made by Sartre because it is Sartre when he writes this book he made a distinction between existential philosophers who are theist for whom God is an important philosophical concern and people like him who are existential atheists who very consciously and deliberately deny the existence of God. So, in one sense as we have seen in the previous lecture that there is a kind of diversity in the conception of man existence or various other things which these thinkers who are labeled as existentialist deal with. But at the same time there is something which is common whether they are theist or atheist there is one aspect that is common according to Sartre and that point is that essence or rather existence comes before essence. And when in developing his philosophical position Sartre was visibly influenced by many thinkers particularly notably by Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Husserl and Heidegger. He himself acknowledges the importance of these thinkers in shaping his ideas. So, let us see one by one let us see Kierkegaard. Kierkegaard is again something which you have already examined in the previous lecture a thinker who has given a lot of importance to man's relationship with God. The third aspect the third stage of life according to Kierkegaard the first two are aesthetic stage and ethical stage. But the third stage is a religious stage which where you know man stands in direct relationship with God and that subjective experience of you know his faith in God is very important according to Kierkegaard. But ironically Sartre is one philosopher who is who has opposed any conception or rather he is a theist he is an atheist to the currentistic thinker. But still he says that you know this notion Kierkegaard's notion truth as subjectivity has influenced him and also according to Sartre influenced and inspired all existential philosophers to conceive their thinking in a particular direction when when Kierkegaard said that truth is subjectivity. He Kierkegaard protested the omission of man in the total unfathomable inwardness of his being from the whole history of the development of ideas. This is Sartre's own words like where he has I mean this protest against the against the omission complete omission of man from the whole history of the development of ideas as we have seen again in the previous lecture that the theory of ideas the the the philosopher the traditional philosophy has always been either a theory of ideas or a theory of the world there is no man figuring in. But Kierkegaard comes with this problem and says that truth is subjective stress on the individual man here and now here now concrete individual man man in his passion and anxiety and emphasis on personal experiences like as we see so yesterday in the previous lecture the the three stages from one to next the passage from one stage to the next stage is actually not a rational not based on any rational universal strategy or plan. But it is a personal choice which each individual has to make his own choice in his life taking into account of several factors that influence and shape his life. So, during the intellectual disorder this is what this is an observation which Sartre makes about the influence of Kierkegaard he says during the intellectual disorder between the two great wars his influence in Germany was associated with certain currents of post Nietzschean thought. So, interestingly Nietzsche is on the other side on the other extreme who was categorically asserted the the death of God and but somehow you know in the he says that during the intellectual disorder between the two great wars somehow the Kierkegaard's conceptions about you know or is associating the concept of truth with subjectivity and the post Nietzschean philosophy they got sort of associated with each other. Now, let us see what is Sartre's take on Nietzsche. Sartre says that Nietzsche was an existentialist in his almost romantic emphasis upon the passion anxiety and decision of individual man and had a sense of the tragic predicament of humanity in modern civilization. So, though it is very it is ironical in one sense to consider Nietzsche as an existential philosopher, but Sartre considers him as an existentialist philosopher and with this as he said you know romantic passion emphasis upon the passion anxiety and decision of individual man and has a sense of the tragic predicament of humanity in modern civilization. So, in all his you know his conceptions of freedom his idea of death of God then again the distinctions he makes between master morality and slave morality and ideas about creating once on self the emphasis on conceptions like will to power all these are concepts which Sartre was attracted towards. Nietzsche's criticism of Christianity particularly because Christianity as a religious institution as an organization of power was criticized by Nietzsche his conception of the transcendence of passion and intellectualism through the power of some purely involved integrity of mastery. This is again this is the kind of will to power he emphasizes on the transcendence of passion and intellectualism through this power something which man finds within himself according to Nietzsche the will to power is a fundamental drive which man has to discover within himself and exercise it and values are estimated based on purely subjective criteria. There is no objective universal measure to decide that a particular set of values are important when we have discussed Nietzsche's contributions in one of our previous lectures. We have identified the kind of evolution which suggests from camel to lion and from lion to the child where at the stage of the lion there is a violent no I mean a kind of rejection of all morality and once all morality is rejected it creates a huge vacuum which needs to be filled in and this is filled in not by a rational conception of morality but by subjective criteria. Now it is very interesting to see how these two thinkers come together the two thinkers are Paul apart Saath himself says of course but that means that the world of ideas which their relative positions define is recognizably the same world and Nietzsche's criticism of Christianity with regard to its negative bearing upon man's complete individuation has points of relation to Kierkegaard's sublime anti-clericalism. So both of them in one sense opposed the established church or the kind of dictum which was projected by the established church as the essence of religion for Nietzsche it was a complete rejection of Christianity as a religion as a moral philosophy but for Kierkegaard it is a kind of you know sublime anti-clericalism and Nietzsche's Superman and Kierkegaard's night of faith are both conceptions of the transcendence of passion transcendence of passion I repeat and intellectualism through the power of some purely involved integrity which we have already seen in the case of Nietzsche when Saath makes such an observation in his existentialism and humanism. Now another very remarkable influence on Saath's philosophy is the phenomenologist whose conception of phenomenology we have already seen as part of one of our lectures in this lecture series. So here again you know like all phenomenologists or for all phenomenologists the central philosophical concern is consciousness its phenomenology is actually basically a study of consciousness and Saath also takes up consciousness as a very important component in this philosophical theory. So but again the interesting aspect of phenomenology is that all phenomenology is right from Usel approach consciousness from a very different angle not from the traditional philosophical perspectives but in a very different way and this is naturally you know influenced many thinkers actually Usel's approach to human consciousness conceiving consciousness as fundamentally intentional in nature I mean when you consider consciousness as intentional it means that consciousness is always consciousness of or about something. So there is a kind of outwardness it points to something else outside itself. So in that sense understanding consciousness in a different light is very important consciousness is first and foremost a consciousness of something. So this is a fundamental Uselian idea and again consciousness is a being such that in its being its being is in question. So far in so far as that this being implies a being other than itself because this is a very interesting aspect when consciousness is a being such that in its being its being is in question this is an observation made by Saath in so far as this being implies a being other than itself because since consciousness is always consciousness of something else it implies always what a being other than itself. It always points to something else and again consciousness is about something this aboutness points to an existence other than its own and to its own existence as a question. So this is what is very interesting aspect very interesting dimension of consciousness which probably one who studies Usel would get enlightened upon. Now Saath was not ready to accept Uselian position in Toto. Saath was very careful when he assessed Usel he was opposing the kind of transcendentalism or the notion of transcendental ego which Usel was trying to advocate or rather that was so central to Uselian phenomenology which Saath opposed. Saath accepts Usel's intentionality principle but demystified consciousness by rejecting transcendentalism and again consciousness is nothing but a consciousness of being conscious of the object before it. So this is how you know Saath is demystifying Uselian notion of consciousness. He is actually trying to argue that this point is very important consciousness is nothing but a consciousness of being conscious of the object before it. There is nothing a mysterious entity like transcendental ego which stands against an object which is the object of consciousness which intentionality principle reveals to us but rather it is nothing but a consciousness of being conscious of the object before it. So it says that consciousness is a being the nature of which is to be conscious of its being and if there is anything as knowing consciousness then it is knowledge of an object. So you cannot really separate consciousness from the knowledge of an object so that is what it says if there is anything as knowing consciousness then it is knowledge of an object. Individual finds himself in the world of objects which constitute the unity of his consciousness and the eye I mean for Usel there is a transcendental eye but here Saath says that the eye appears indistinct through consciousness and is not as a pure transcendental ego. So you cannot separate the eye from the process of being conscious of something. So they are so indistinct according to Saath and there is no ego consciousness distinction ego consciousness distinction. There is no such distinction which was so central for Uselian phenomenology is this is rejected by Saath. Now for Usel again he proposes a method the method of phenomenology is the method of bracketing and ultimately what Usel does is he brackets the world and brackets everything and finally he applies this method to the self itself. Now bracketing the empirical self results in a kind of you know isolation of the transcendental self the transcendental ego in Uselian phenomenology. Hi Saath would say that even this can be I said this can be bracketed not that I have consciousness of this computer which is there in front of me. Say for instance I mean I am conscious of a computer there is in front of me Saath would say that it is not that I have consciousness of this computer rather there is consciousness of this computer. So you cannot separate the I or the me from the me being conscious of something on any occasion for that matter there is no isolation of the pure I possible at all. So it can be like something like this this is the I or ego and this is the object the computer in the world and now what is it I have consciousness of the computer. So here as if there is an ego here on the left hand side you can see the ego then the consciousness of the computer or the object then the object itself. So there are three things apparently here. So here you have consciousness of the computer the ego and the actual computer this is a picture which Saath would reject he says that there is no fixed ego but always consciousness of something say of table of flower of pen of man of computer and various other things we come across. So you cannot separate the I which is conscious of these things from these activities or processes of being conscious of these things that it is a kind of artificial abstraction according to Saath. Now let us see the idea of consciousness and being says that the phenomenon of being is disclosed to consciousness. So this is this is very close to the high degree in notion because there is a idea of disclosure the phenomenon of being is disclosed to consciousness and that is the being is in itself we can say and being is what it is being of phenomenon is radically different from the being of consciousness. So here Saath makes a very important distinction between the being of an object or any phenomenon for that matter and the being of consciousness which is the being of man one can say we have already started discussing the notion of consciousness in Saath the intentional consciousness which is a very different kind of being according to him consciousness is being for itself and here comes Heidegger's philosophy how Heidegger has influenced Saath. Heidegger's work is the principle source of contemporary French existentialism according to Saath. I mean contemporary French existentialism means his theory and many others who were associated with existentialism in France. There is nothing beyond man himself that can solve the problem of man's existence. This is Saath identifies this concept this notion as the center point in Heidegger's philosophy that there is nothing beyond man himself that can solve the problem of man's existence. The concept of being in the world and the existence are so central to Heidegger's philosophy we have already examined this in the previous two lectures that how the being in the world and you know the existence of Dazin existence of being in the world the kind of possibilities Dazin the man can either have an authentic existence or an inauthentic existence. So these possibilities are extremely important for Saath to understand to conceptualize his theory about human existence. Dazin is being's destiny this is again a very interesting Heideggerian idea truth and knowledge are possible because of Dazin and Saath was influenced by the account of human existence as both free and situated as Heidegger conceives it man is both situated and also at the same time free. See there is an account of facticity with Saath himself provides when he discusses human existence or human consciousness separately what he says is that man's existence is situated no doubt about it there is a world in which man finds himself but at the same time unlike other entities which are not just which are neither situated nor free in the case of man man is free because human essence is not predetermined like the essence of other objects like a pen or a knife. So here I mean here he introduces this concept of existence precedes essence the assertion of particularity individuality concreteness and contingency. So when you say existence of man precedes everything you are emphasizing on these aspects the particular man because existence of each man is bound to be different essence you can talk about if at all there is an essence like the platonic essence or any essence I mean notion of essence is always a historical it is not particular it is always universal and it is nothing to do with the individual rather the individual himself is only a copy of this essence that is the way essences are conceived in philosophy but when you talk about existence it is inevitably bound to be a kind of a particular entity you are referring to a particular individual. So particularity individuality concreteness and contingencies are emphasized and then the rejection of the platonic idea the ideal human that determines what we are the essence of man who predetermines our life in this world that is completely rejected and since there is nothing like a predetermined essence of man which would decide what man is the easeness the that assures a complete freedom since there is nothing like that which predetermines man's existence man is free. Man first is and then he makes his essence through his choices he makes in this world when he leaves and again man is what he conceives and wills himself to be and atheism is natural for such an existentialist like Sartre. So I am just going to discuss Sartrean atheism because that is so central to Sartre conception of existence human existence human destiny and various other things associated or various other problems associated to the problem of human existence according to Sartre. So he says I repeat man first is and then he makes his essence through the choices he make I decide for instance I can decide what I want to do whether I want to be a teacher or a writer or a musician these things are to a very great extent discussed decided by me of course based on my abilities I have to decide things but even see suppose even I am so gifted an artist a musician that does not mean that I should necessarily take up the profession of a musician I can still prefer to be something else and again you know being a honest man for instance or being a crook these are all my possibilities I can be either a crook or a honest person these are my conscious choices. So when I decide to contribute a certain amount to the you know what you call developmental activities in my country or not to do that I am making a choice and this choice would ultimately make what sort of a man I am. So I can be either a philanthropist or a miser all kinds of possibilities are open to me for Sartre. Atheism is so natural in the sense so here there is this is what Sartre writes in his existentialism and humanism which he considered was the first principle of existentialism I quote man is nothing else but that which he makes of himself that is the first principle of existentialism and this is what people call its subjectivity using the word as a reproach against us for we mean to say that man primarily exist that man is before all else something which propels itself towards a future and is aware that it is doing so man is indeed a project which possesses a subjective life instead of being a kind of mouse or a fungus or a cauliflower before that projection of the self nothing exist not even in the heaven of intelligence man will only attain existence when he is what he purposes to be. So he is not just a fungus or a cauliflower whose identities or whose being are predetermined by their essences he is not just like a computer or a knife or any other objects in the world he is nothing in the beginning before the projection of the self nothing exist. So I mean through my projects I project myself I do certain things I have certain plans to do so and I will be pursuing those plans and projects and with that I create myself again the human individual is a subject rather than an object a person rather than a thing man's being is being in the world this is again Heidegger once he comes into being he and others will start defining him. So this is a very interactive process a social process a political process and Saat is well aware of it the kind of political social cultural and other aspect involved in creating oneself it is a process where you know man when man comes into being and he and others will start defining him. So the essence is created through his actions definitely since he lives in a world he lives in a world of other human beings the impact of other human beings would definitely be there and he is quite anxious about it. So all those factors ultimately define what his actual being is so in one sense we can say that he defines himself he creates himself not fixed and predefined essence in terms of which he understands him and actually his existence is different from a pen or a computer that have fixed essences man makes himself through his choices and actions he creates an essence for him again essence is a product of a person's mode of existence something which the way in which I exist decides my essence the way in which I exist means the kind of person I want to be which I have consciously adopted or there is a possibility of consciously adopting it and if I say that I have not consciously adopted it or I have not consciously done certain things according to Sartre that is bad faith that is something which you are running away from your responsibility which is which is equivalent to exist in authentically. So man makes his essence each man is different there is no common essence so that is what since existence precedes essence and existence of each human being is bound to be different the situations context and everything the context of actions the mode of thinking everything is different since man makes his essence through his actions and choices and the actions and choices of each individual is are bound to be different from each other so there cannot be a common essence which all human beings would be jointly creating essence depends on its subjectivity therefore there is no fixed and ever changing never changing essence which is universal so essence of the other things and of man are in that sense very different because in the case of other objects the essences are defined a priori objects like a paper knife has been made by an artisan who had a conception of it and the paper knife essence which is the sum of the formulae and the qualities which made its prediction and its definition possible precedes its existence this is all examples given by Sartre himself in this book on the other hand he says the conception of man in the mind of god is comparable to that of the paper knife in the mind of the artisan if at all there is a god so once you conceive that there is a god who is a creator of man then god can be compared to a kind of an artisan a person who made the knife had an idea about the knife in his mind so all this you know the sum total of the formulae and the qualities which made its prediction possible so similarly god if at all god exist god also might have had a similar kind of idea about man and produce man accordingly god makes man according to a procedure and a conception here human essence precedes man's existence but here the interesting aspect is that the idea of human nature the conception of human being found in every man is emphasized if the talk about human essence would emphasize would focus on this then there is there is a kind of human nature the conception of human being found in every man each man is a particular example of a universal conception if such an essence exists then it precedes his existence if there is a universal nature if god has created man out of a blueprint that existed in his mind then definitely there is no doubt that essence precedes existence and god in this sense needs to be conceived as a supernatural artisan the will either follows from the understanding or at least accompanies it this is what sard says in the case of god creating man what happens is that he knows precisely what he is creating there is a clear blueprint in his mind each individual man is a realization of certain conception which dwells in the divine understanding so in that sense human essence is predetermined now let us come to sard's position I have already mentioned that sard is an uncompromising atheist he denies god's existence god cannot exist and to demonstrate that there is no such universal human nature sard envisages or sard ventures to prove god's inexistence he demonstrates how human beings are different from other entities like the paper knife to show that while entities like paper knife have a creator an idea before its prediction man does not have a creator god does not exist so this is sard's atheism and he says that human beings have no model or blueprint god does not exist and hence in the case of the being of man existence comes before its essence we will actually discuss in fact for sard when he discusses the problem of being he basically tells us that there are three types of being possible being in itself being for itself and being for others and being in itself is a complete entity like a paper knife whose essence is predetermined it cannot be anything else but a paper knife and being in for itself is the being of man so the idea is that sard is trying to prove that god's existence if god exist then god is at the same time being in itself and being for itself we will discuss the details of this argument in the next lecture and this involves a kind of contradictions no one can nothing can be at the same time being in itself and being for itself if being in itself then it is fixed it has no freedom a knife has no freedom a computer has no freedom it cannot be but a computer it cannot be but a knife but in the case of man it is not so man is free being for itself is free it can be a musician a hindustani musician or a karnatic musician a painter if I decide to be a painter I can be a realistic painter or an expressionist or an impressionist or a cubist or a surrealist whatever mode of expression I prefer I have various choices whether to be a homeless man or a dishonest man or a crook all these are my choices so in my case or in the case of man the existence is prior to essence man is a being which exists before it can be defined by any conception of it and absence of a model is the it that indicates the absence of norms and standards see if there is no such idea of human nature there is no such predetermined a priori conception of human essence then there is nothing which regulates human existence I mean there is something which very strongly regulates human existence or our life so we are not free in that sense we are completely determined by this so called human nature or this human essence if that is the case then there is no freedom but Sartre asserts the opposite he says that man is free there is no such human nature or human essence which determines his existence prior to his coming into being so in that sense there is no model there is no standard there is no norms that would tell him very strongly what course of action is the right course of action so in other words we can say that there is the conceptions of good and right the conception of value meaning of life there is nothing which pre exist there is nothing which predetermined human existence value of my life is something which I have to conceive the meaning of my life is something which I have to realize and understand it is I who decide what meaning my life has through my activities through my choices so the absence of a model indicates the absence of norms and standards absence of values and no pre given meanings for human life and this Sartre says is the first effect of existentialism it puts every man in possession of himself as he is so every man in possession of himself as he is so I cannot be someone else I cannot say that I am doing certain things because that is what all humans do I cannot say that there is nothing like something which or a model of man or universal human nature based on which I can say that this is what all human beings do there is nothing like what all human beings do no universal norms and standards of behavior man does things on the basis of his choices conscious choices and he is free to make his choices it places the entire responsibility for his existence wisely upon his own shoulders so I cannot blame others by saying that oh I did it because see this is what often we come across people saying that circumstances led me to do certain things or the kind of pressure of circumstances I did certain things so Sartre says that all these are instances of bad faith which we will discuss in the next lecture the concept of bad faith bad faith so here what he says is that you cannot run away from your responsibilities and this is from existentialism and humanism all the actions a man may take in order to create himself as he wills to be there is not one which is not creative at the same time of an image of man such as he believes he ought to be so he says that there is I mean every action you take you perform may take in order to create himself as he wills to be is based on a choice a conscious choice I decide I am going to be a kind of man like this and based on this conception I make a choice and do act so this brings us to the problem of responsibility when we make a choice between alternatives we are affirming that what we have chosen is valuable so I am making a choice say for instance or to protest against the government for instance the protest against the government policies let us take such a concrete example when we make a choice between alternatives I have alternatives I can either be silent or be part of the protest when I make a choice either to be silent or to protest I am affirming that what I have chosen is valuable so whatever is the alternate whether to be part of the agitation or just keep mum and silent both are choices which I make which I can make and whatever choice I make I am actually asserting that this course of action is valuable so there is a value I am creating a value which is valuable for me we cannot choose the verse because I am choosing it for me and what we choose is always the better and nothing can be better for us unless it is better for all so when I make a choice I do make a choice in a world where I share with other people so there are others so when I make a choice I am indirectly suggesting that that is the better choice available which means that this is a choice which is available for each one of you for everyone so we are responsible not only for our own individuality but also for all men so this is the problem responsibility the problem of responsibility is that see Sarth takes this example of a general who orders shooting and in that process it is his decision to attack and in that process some soldiers die so in one sense we can say that it is his choice to attack and his decision to attack his decision has led to the death of several number of soldiers so he is responsible for their death but as an officer as a military general he has to take a decision he has to make a choice so you and you cannot blame him but then at the same time he knows that it is his conscious choice he has alternatives either not to attack or to attack whatever choices he makes it is his personal choice in one sense we can say but when he makes a choice it affects others it ultimately resulted in the death of 10 soldiers for instance then he is responsible for that so when he makes a choice he asserts that or he affirms that that is the better choice for others as well so we are responsible not only for our own individuality but also for all men and this creates this awareness that our responsibility concerns mankind as a hall results in a kind of anguish a kind of anxiety it creates in and when I know that I have to act in such a manner that humanity regulates itself by what I do this actually frightens me that my decision I mean I am presenting myself when by making a choice I am presenting myself as a model in front of humanity that humanity all human beings can adopt this model so this actually frightens me the weight of my responsibility not an anguish that leads to criticism or inaction this is something which Sartre would assert because of course freedom brings responsibility if man is free then man is responsible for his actions you cannot run away from your responsibility so even if I remain inactive that itself is a kind of action which is based on a choice a conscious choice I make and an action I perform to be inactive so the example which I have taken to be part of an agitation political agitation against the government whom I consider has done wrongs or not to be part of the agitation whatever decision I take I am responsible for that because I am free to take either this or that so this weight of responsibility creates a kind of anguish a kind of dread in my mind but this does not lead to criticism because criticism is you know that is impossible even to be inactive is a conscious choice and this freedom responsibility and anguish do not separate us from performing the action anguish is a condition of action itself this is what Sartre is trying to argue for every choice human beings make if you are consciously aware of it you can find this element of anguish you cannot avoid it it is a condition of our human action so here he talks about in this connection he talks about abandonment another very important concept in existentialism again from existentialism and humanism what Sartre says is Dostoevsky says that if God did not exist everything would be permitted and that for existentialism is a starting point so from this statement which Dostoevsky makes in his brother's Karamazov God does not exist everything is permitted because there is no moral governance possible then there is nothing which binds man to act in a particular way it is the conception of God which the divine wisdom the divine justice the conception of divine justice upon which you know our conceptions of right good contact goodness all these things of conceptions of value and meaning everything is based upon such a such a notion of God so once such a notion of God such a concept of God does not exist then anything is permitted so this is the implication of Nietzsche's death of God so which according to Sartre is a starting point of existentialism with the disappearance of God all possibility of finding values in an intelligible heaven to disappear so there is no God's world the world of God that exists the previous lecture we have seen how Dostoevsky drives us to that kind of a situation where in a conversation between Ivan and Alyosha so with the disappearance of God according to Sartre all possibility of finding values in an intelligible heaven to disappears there can be no longer be any good a priori there is no universal conceptions of goodness and rightness since there is no infinite in perfect consciousness to think it and in this connection another very important concept is abandonment as I already mentioned it is nowhere written that again Sartre says it is nowhere written that the good exist that one must be honest or must not like since we are now upon the plane where there are only men so there is nothing a universal humanity or God or supernatural realm of which predetermines human morality the choices are ours individuals are concrete each individual is concrete each individuals situation and context of life are different so the decisions and choices they make are bound to be different from each other and in this context Sartre says the famous statement man is condemned to be free because as I already mentioned man is there is freedom because man is not created by God there is no blueprint a priori blueprint that exists in the case of man like unlike other objects so since there is freedom there is responsibility choices are to be made by each individual and there is no model available the individual cannot really go and ask someone else and take a decision accordingly then that would be that someone else's decision each individual has to negotiate with his or his or her life and take decisions accordingly so in that context what happens is that creates a kind of anguish in the mind anxiety uncertainty about future the thinking that the very thought that you know the actions which I perform the choices will which I make have impacts might be having certain impacts and also when I make a choice I actually choose for the entire humanity so I am responsible for the entire humanity in that sense all these things create a kind of anxiety very uncomfortable anxiety and Sartre says that in this context freedom becomes like this man is condemned to be free there is but this is human situatedness you cannot run away from this situation where you find yourself as a free human being we are completely free condemned to be free since there is no God to give us essence we must create our own essence we are completely responsible for our actions and are responsible for everyone else's to because we are free to create our values and our world we must exist in anguish for loneliness and despair Sartre would conclude that man is condemned to be free there is no way you can escape from this situation the existential situation in which man finds himself let us try to wind up this lecture the next lecture we are going to discuss the concept of you know being the three kinds of being being in itself for itself and for others so this lecture is actually an introduction to that we have already seen some of the major concepts of existentialism in the previous lecture and this lecture was concerned was basically trying to understand Sartre's conception of human existence he distinguishes consciousness from other entities being in itself and being for itself consciousness is being for itself which is intentional in nature and from this concept he comes to his atheism he asserts atheism the absence of God and he would say that this absence of God ultimately results in a conception of human being without any model so man is absolutely free freedom makes man responsible and responsibility creates anguish and anxiety hence man is condemned to be free so the situatedness the existential situation the existential context in which man finds himself so or rather the very nature of human existence itself is bearing upon it this weight of responsibility so we will wind this lecture here thank you