Sartre in 60 seconds

In ‘On Freedom’, the French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre wrote: “I do not have nor can I have recourse to any value against the fact that it is I who sustain values in being.” What did he mean by this? ... Hold my beer!

Firstly, he distinguishes between being pour-soi and en-soi. Everyday objects, like a table, have no existential reflection about their being. They are what they are: en-soi, without consciousness. Human beings, however, are more than they are. They have an intentionality towards the world. They exist.

Next, Sartre states that we cannot calibrate our values to an external source, like a judging God. Therefore, we live without priorly established determinacy. L'existance précède l'essence. As a consequence, we have the freedom to sustain our own values in being.

Because we have absolute freedom to determine our values, we should remember that we ourselves create the meaning of our lives and circumstances. We are not born a medical doctor, we choose to pursue this as our goal in life. We are not tortured by our alarm clocks; we choose to render the alarm as the duty to get up. The Être pour-soi is itself absolutely responsible.

Therefore, Êre pour-soi cannot suffer from forces majeures. Mitigating circumstances cannot narrow one's freedom, they can only situate the responsibility to own them. In that sense, existentialism gives us a lot of power.