PHIL304: Existentialism

9a. Identify the role of Albert Camus in the history of existentialism

• In what ways is Camus an existentialist?
• How does Camus pursue existentialist themes?
• What is the absurd, according to Camus?
• What is the correct response to the absurd?

Camus, like Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Sartre, and de Beauvoir, was not an academic philosopher. He was a journalist, a playwright, and a political activist, among other things. He refused to be called a philosopher. While his essays were philosophical – the essay is the bread-and-butter work in a philosopher's career – many of his other works and concerns were also deeply philosophical. He did not "do" philosophy as it was practiced traditionally. In other words, he did not present a complete system of philosophy in the vein of, for example, Plato or Immanuel Kant.
 
Camus rejected the labels of philosopher and existentialist, preferring to think in terms of the absurd. In the realm of logic, absurdity is a contradiction. The claim "life has and does not have meaning" includes two contradictory phrases that cannot be true or false simultaneously. For example, we cannot logically say that "all dogs are animals" and "some dogs are not animals".
 
But the logical contradiction is not what Camus believed the absurdity to be. The absurd is just that feeling you get when you try to find meaning in a "silent" universe. Camus, like other existential philosophers, rejected traditional philosophy as a rational system-building project. He believed that reason and the systems it generates do not capture the human condition.
 
Even if it is not a logical contradiction, the absurd is a type of contradiction. Camus described an incompatibility between the human desire to seek meaning and the inability to find it because it simply does not exist. We have the burden of deciding how to live despite this absurdity. Camus looked to the Sisyphus myth to explain what we should do in the face of this conundrum.
 
To review, see Why Camus Is Not an Existentialist and Albert Camus.
 

9b. Analyze Camus' The Myth of Sisyphus

• According to Camus, what is life's central question?
• Who is Sisyphus?
• How is Sisyphus the hero of the absurd?

Camus said that the most important question in life was also the most important question in philosophy: "Deciding whether or not life is worth living amounts to answering the most important question in philosophy". Camus believed the human condition is a philosopher's proper concern. While Heidegger believed that the existential starting point is an examination of "that being for whom being is an issue", Camus believes that the issue of being is central to life and death. In other words, the most important philosophical question is "whether or not life is worth living".
 
Unfortunately, we do not dwell on this issue. Instead, "We get into the habit of living before acquiring the habit of thinking". In other words, we get on with the business of living rather than contemplating what life is.
 
Camus pointed to the Greek myth of Sisyphus to concentrate our attention on what life means and how we should respond. Zeus punished Sisyphus, who was called "the useless worker of the underworld", by making him roll a huge boulder up a hill for all time. As soon as Sisyphus reached the top, the boulder rolled back down, and the process repeats indefinitely. The exercise has no achievable purpose, and his effort is futile. Camus believed this allegory represents life, which has no purpose and is futile. In short, life is meaningless.
 
Camus believes suicide is not an appropriate response to the meaninglessness of life. Although we know there is no meaning, that does not mean we should stop trying or give in to the absurd. Rather, the proper response is to learn how to live with it. When we learn to live with the absurd, we conduct an open revolt against meaninglessness and are rendered free of the preconceptions and artificial meanings life imposes on us. We begin to live fully and passionately in the present.
 
For this reason, Sisyphus, according to Camus, is the hero of the absurd. According to Camus, Sisyphus descended from the top of the hill to begin again. He was aware of his situation and knew that his job was pointless and would never end. Nonetheless, Camus proposed, he is content. He embraced his reality and, in so doing, defeated his own punishment.
 
To review, see The Myth of Sisyphus and More on the Myth of Sisyphus.
 

9c. Summarize Camus' departure from Kierkegaard and Dostoevsky

• In what ways is Camus' critique of rationality similar to his predecessors?
• What is the relation between Camus' critique of rationality and metaphysical commitments, such as the existence of God?

Perhaps what differentiated Camus from his predecessors was his rejection of the designation "philosopher", which he associated with systematic reasoning. Systematic reasoning, in turn, is associated with rationality. Since existentialists are generally skeptical of the power of reasoning, they are critical of the faith previous philosophers have placed in it. While it is true that Camus "did" philosophy, he did not engage in system-building or rigorous argumentation.
 
Camus thought that rationality was too simple, just like most of his existentialist predecessors, such as Kierkegaard and Nietzsche. It simply cannot capture the human experience in all its variety. Certainly, the human experience cannot be thoroughly systematized or rationalized, as many thinkers propose. The human condition simply resists this type of reduction.
 
Having said this, existentialists did not share the same views of rationality. For example, Pascal disagreed with Descartes' idea that we are born knowing things like logic, math, geometry, morality, and God. Other so-called rationalists agreed with Descartes. The concept of ourselves and our very being (his famous comment, "I think therefore I am") is also innate. Pascal believed we gained knowledge through our senses and observation, the empirical method.
 
Kierkegaard rejected rationality because he believed in the subjectivity of religious faith. Camus, on the other hand, didn't do this for the same reason. Like Nietzsche, Sartre, and de Beauvoir, Camus was an atheist. Camus viewed the world as fundamentally meaningless and so devoid of divinity.
 
To review, see Absurdism and Is Life Meaningless?.
 

9d. Discuss the value of The Stranger as an existentialist work of fiction

• Who is the stranger, according to Camus?
• Is there a connection between the absurd and Meursault's disposition before the murder?
• What does murder have to do with the absurd?

From the very beginning of The Stranger, it is clear that the anti-hero Meursault is not connected to life. He responds to his mother's death and the rituals surrounding it with a sort of noncommittal curiosity rather than grief. His lack of emotional distress is not the issue. Rather, he is not engaged with life at all. The death of his mother is neither distressing nor consoling. In one sense, Meursault, the main character, is the stranger.
 
To develop a notion of the absurd is to contemplate the answerless question, 'Why is there something, rather than nothing?' in connection with the fact that the human condition compels that question in the first place. The notion of the absurd includes the understanding that reality neither comforts nor frightens: it does nothing at all. Camus noted that reality is silent: it does not respond to the apparent human need to understand, let alone discern a purpose for existence. Before the murder, however, Meursault did not confront this fact.
 
On the one hand, should Meursault care about his life any more than he cared for the life of the man he murdered? Life is, after all, meaningless. There is no reason to be good or bad because there is no good or bad at all. Yet Meursault begins to care at the moment when escape becomes impossible and death is inevitable.
 
We know we will die from a young age. However, what death means and its impact on how we live do not necessarily come with this knowledge. Death does not resonate with us because we are detached. Who cares about death? I am alive now; what does death have to do with me? Indifference toward life and death is a blind acceptance, not a revolt.
 
Meursault's initial detachment may be, in fact, a revolt against societal rules. From the beginning, he refused to conform to social norms. He does not express sadness, let alone grief, over his mother's death. He does not engage with his girlfriend or develop other meaningful relationships. Worst of all, he violates the fundamental social prohibition against unjust killing and seems unperturbed by society's response: his being put to death.
 
Perhaps Meursault is not simply an emotionally-inept, socially-incompetent psychopath but represents what it means to live a life in full view of its utter lack of meaning.
 
To review, see The Stranger.
 

Unit 9 Vocabulary

Be sure you understand these terms as you study for the final exam. Try to think of the reason why each term is included.

• absurd
• hero of the absurd
• revolt
• Sisyphus
• The Stranger