PHIL 110 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Existence Precedes Essence, Existentialism

• School: University of San Diego
• Department: Philosophy
• Course: PHIL 110
• Professor: Colanter

Document Summary

There is no human nature that precedes our presence in the world. All humans individually create humanity at every moment through their free acts. There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy. I see many people die because they judge that life is not worth living. I see others paradoxically getting killed for the ideas or illusions that give them a reason for living (what is called a reason for living is also an excellent reason for dying). I, therefore, conclude that the meaning of life is the most urgent of questions. Suicide has never been dealt with except as a social phenomenon. On the contrary, we are concerned here, at the outset, with the relationship between individual thought and suicide.