1. Leena kakkori & rauno huttunen
sartrean humanism
Leena kakkori & rauno huttunen

2. Question on humanism
The question ‘what is human being?’, is the basic question of philosophy. It is also the basic question of the science of education. If we do not know what a human being is how can we educate her? We all have an idea of what human being is, but it is necessary to take this question into consideration. The question of human being is formulated as what makes us humans. Humanitas and paideia correspond to this question in Ancient Greek. How to become a human being rather than a barbarian? In this way education has always been at the heart of philosophy. After Immanuel Kant, the human being is seen as a rational and autonomous being and this has also been the picture of human being in education. It is now the time to ask, in a new way, the question of the nature of human being, and also ask questions about humanism. We must consider arguments against the desirability of humanism and also questions about the possibility of humanism.

3. SARTRE: L’existentialisme est un humanisme
“There are, on the one hand, the Christians, amongst whom I shall name Jaspers and Gabriel Marcel, both professed Catholics; and on the other the existential atheists, amongst whom we must place Heidegger as well as the French existentialists and myself. What they have in common is simply the fact that they believe that existence comes before essence… What do we mean by saying that existence precedes essence? We mean that man first of all exists, encounters himself, surges up in the world – and defines himself afterwards. If man as the existentialist sees him is not definable, it is because to begin with he is nothing. He will not be anything until later, and then he will be what he makes of himself. Thus, there is no human nature, because there is no God to have a conception of it. Man simply is. Not that he is simply what he conceives himself to be, but he is what he wills, and as he conceives himself after already existing – as he wills to be after that leap towards existence. Man is nothing else but that which he makes of himself. That is the first principle of existentialism… If, however, it is true that existence is prior to essence, man is responsible for what he is.”

4. SARTRE: The Transcendence of the Ego
Sartre claims that “the ego is not the owner of consciousness”. Sartre diverges from Husserl by stating that “the me” should not be sought in the states of unreflected consciousness nor behind them. The me appears only with the reflective consciousness and the reflective intention. The I and the me are two aspects of ego and they constitutes the unity of infinite series of our reflected consciousnesses. Ego is transcendent unity of states, of actions and of qualities. Thus for Sartre there exist a consciousness and a transcendental ego. Two basic elements of philosophical (theoretical) humanism are present in this early work of Sartre: Sartrean philosophy is 1) man-centered and 2) consciousness-centered.

5. SARTRE: Dasein A.K.A. réalité-humaine
Sartre adopts the concept of human reality in his book Sketch for a Theory of the Emotions. Here, Sartre focuses his philosophy on the study of man and his situation in a Heideggerian manner: ‘... a truly positive study of man in situation would have first to have elucidated the notions of man, of the world, of being-in-the-world, and of situation’. We can understand Sartre’s novels and plays from 1930s and 1940s as an existentialist illustration of a human reality. The novel Nausea, the collection of short stories The Wall, and the play No Exit created an impression that Sartrean existentialism is pessimistic, absurd, and anti-humanistic. Sartre’s philosophy can be described as somewhat pessimistic before the lecture ‘Existentialism is a Humanism’.

6. SARTRE: L’existentialisme est un humanisme
Sartre considers existentialism as optimistic and active. Existentialism is humanism both in the practical and the philosophical sense of the term. If we accept the existential conditions that God does not exist, that human existence comes before its essence, that humanity is abandoned, that a human is condemned to be free, that the destiny of man lies within himself, that man has no other hope than his own action, and that there is no pre-established morality, the result is that a human simply is and human life is possible.

7. SARTRE: L’existentialisme est un humanisme
Sartre states that a human is undefined because to begin with a human is nothing. A human is nothing until he becomes what he makes of himself. A human is a kind of self-filling nothingness. A human has existential freedom and that is for Sartre the first principle of existentialism. Following Heidegger’s terminology Sartre calls a being whose existence comes before its essence as ’human reality’ [Dasein].

8. SARTRE: L’existentialisme est un humanisme
Because existence precedes essence, one is morally respon-sible for what one is and what one does for others. One is not responsible for only oneself but instead for all humans. Our responsibility concern mankind as a whole. No God or society can take away this existential responsibility. Every time one makes a choice, one is responsible for oneself and for all the people because one is creating a certain image of a man. When one commits oneself to something, one acts at the same time as a kind of legislator who decides for the whole mankind. This human reality causes such existential feelings as anguish, abandonment and despair. If one tries to deny this freedom and responsibility, one is guilty of self-deception which causes bad faith.

9. SARTRE: L’existentialisme est un humanisme
A human is abandoned to the world, and there is no determinism which would limit human freedom. A human is determined by the concrete situation, but he still has existential freedom: A human cannot find anything to depend on, neither within nor outside of himself. The only thing a human can find out is that he is without any excuses. A human is condemned to be free. Sartre declares that a human is free to define himself and that he is defined only insofar as he acts. No other than he himself is responsible for his own actions.

10. SARTRE: L’existentialisme est un humanisme
How do I know which actions are right and which are wrong? Sartre’s answer is: ‘You are free, therefore choose—that is to say, invent. No rule of general morality can show you what you ought to do: no signs are vouchsafed in this world’. Values do not exist before humans create them. There is no foundation for values apart from human freedom and action. Sartre promotes the ethics of action and self-commitment. Although there is no separate kingdom of values, existentialism does recognize the dignity of man. A human is not an object or a thing.

11. SARTRE: L’existentialisme est un humanisme
Existential humanism considers man as being always outside of himself, because man is all the time projecting and losing himself beyond himself.
Man is always pursuing transcendent aims (aims that transcend his present being) and he is always in the state of self-surpassing. Sartre thinks that this relation of transcendence is constitutive for subjectivity. Existentialism is humanism because it reminds people that there is no other legislator apart from humans and that in situations of abandonment humans must look for themselves beyond their present selves.