Existentialism: Remarks on Jean-Paul Sartre's L'Etre ... - Marcuse.org

EXISTENTIALISM 313
The question thus aims at the full and concrete structure of the human
being as being-in-the-world (la realite humaine) .
. In order to elucidate this structure, the' analysis orients itself on certain
typical "human attitudes" (conduites exemplaires). The first of these is
the attitude of questioning (l'attitude interrogative), the specific human
attitude of interrogating, reflecting on himself and his situation at any
given moment. The interrogation implies a threefold (potential) negativ- -
ity: the not-knowing, the permanent possibility of a negative answer, and
the limitation expressed in the affirmative answer: "It is thus and not
otherwise." The interrogative attitude thus brings to the fore the fact
that man is surrounded by and permeated with negativity:
"C'est la possibilite permanente de non-etre, hors de nous et en nous, qui
conditionne nos questions sur l'etre."7
However, the negativity implied in the interrogative attitude serves only
as an example and indication of the fundamental fact that negativity
surrounds and permeates man's entire existence and all his attitudes:
"La condition necessaire pour qu'il soit possible de dire non, c'est que Ie
non-etre soit une presence perpetuelle, en nous et en dehors de nous, c'est que
Ie neant hante I 'etre."8
Negativity originates with and constantly accompanies the human being,
manifesting itself in a whole series of negations (neantissations) with which
the human being experiences, comprehends, and acts upon himself and the
world. The totality of these negations constitutes the very being of the
subject: man exists "comme mode perpetuel d'arrachement a ce qui est"j9
he transcends himself as well as his objects toward his and their possibilities,
he is always "beyond" his situation, "wanting" his full reality. By
the same token, man does not simply exist like a thing (en soi) but makes
himself and his world exist, "creates" himself and his world at any moment
and in any situation.
This characterization of the "realite humaine" (which is hardly more
than a restatement of the idealistic conception of the Cogito or Selfconsciousness,
especially in the form in which the Pherurmenology of Mind
develops this conception) furnishes the fundamental terms of Sartre's
<strong>Existentialism</strong>-,the terms which guide the subsequent development of his
philosophy. - There is first of all the identification of the human being with
7 Page 40. "It is the permanent possibility of not-being, outside of us and in us,
which conditions our questions about being,"
8 Page 47. "The necessary condition which makes it possible to Bay 'no' is that
the not-being is perpetually present, in us and outside of UB, is that the void haunts
being."
9 Page 73. "as perpetually detaching himself from what is."