Opposition to positivism and rationalism
Existentialists oppose definitions of human beings as primarily rational, and, therefore, oppose positivism and
rationalism. Existentialism asserts that people actually make decisions based on the meaning to them rather than
rationally. The rejection of reason as the source of meaning is a common theme of existentialist thought, as is the
focus on the feelings of anxiety and dread that we feel in the face of our own radical freedom and our awareness of
death. Kierkegaard advocated rationality as means to interact with the objective world (e.g. in the natural sciences),
but when it comes to existential problems, reason is insufficient: "Human reason has boundaries". Like Kierkegaard, Sartre saw problems with rationality, calling it a form of "bad faith", an attempt by the self to
impose structure on a world of phenomena — "the Other" — that is fundamentally irrational and random. According
to Sartre, rationality and other forms of bad faith hinder people from finding meaning in freedom. To try to suppress
their feelings of anxiety and dread, people confine themselves within everyday experience, Sartre asserts, thereby
relinquishing their freedom and acquiescing to being possessed in one form or another by "the Look" of "the Other"
(i.e. possessed by another person — or at least one's idea of that other person).
Existentialism and religion
An existentialist reading of the Bible would demand that the reader recognize that he is an existing subject studying
the words more as a recollection of events. This is in contrast to looking at a collection of "truths" that are outside
and unrelated to the reader, but may develop a sense of reality/God. Such a reader is not obligated to follow the
commandments as if an external agent is forcing them upon him, but as though they are inside him and guiding him
from inside. This is the task Kierkegaard takes up when he asks: "Who has the more difficult task: the teacher who
lectures on earnest things a meteor's distance from everyday life-or the learner who should put it to use?" Existentialism 6
Existentialism and nihilism
Although nihilism and existentialism are distinct philosophies, they are often confused with one another. A primary
cause of confusion is that Friedrich Nietzsche is an important philosopher in both fields, but also the existentialist
insistence on the inherent meaninglessness of the world (read on Nietzsche and nihilism). Existentialist philosophers often stress the importance of
Angst as signifying the absolute lack of any objective ground for action, a move that is often reduced to a moral or
an existential nihilism. A pervasive theme in the works of existentialist philosophy, however, is to persist through
encounters with the absurd, as seen in Camus' The Myth of Sisyphus ("One must imagine Sisyphus happy"), and it
is only very rarely that existentialist philosophers dismiss morality or one's self-created meaning: Kierkegaard
regained a sort of morality in the religious (although he wouldn't himself agree that it was ethical; the religious
suspends the ethical), and Sartre's final words in Being and Nothingness are "All these questions, which refer us to a
pure and not an accessory (or impure) reflection, can find their reply only on the ethical plane. We shall devote to
them a future work."
Recommended books on Existentialism:
