## Definition **Existentialism** is a philosophical movement, associated chiefly with Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, and Albert Camus (flourishing in post-World War II France), that holds that human existence precedes and determines any fixed essence or purpose. There is no God-given nature, no pre-assigned role, and no objective meaning waiting to be discovered. Human beings are "condemned to be free": each individual must create their own values and take full responsibility for who they become through their choices. ## Existence Precedes Essence Sartre's formula reverses the traditional metaphysics in which things are made to fulfil a pre-given purpose (a knife is designed to cut before any particular knife is forged). For humans, existence comes first — we find ourselves thrown into the world without prior specification — and essence (what we are, what we stand for) is something we construct through our actions. This is not a consolation but a burden: it removes every excuse and every hiding place. ## Freedom and Anguish Warburton emphasises that most people do not want to face the full weight of this freedom. It is easier to follow the crowd, to defer to authority, to play a social role without questioning it — what Sartre called *bad faith* (*mauvaise foi*): the self-deception of pretending you have no choice when you do. Authentic existence requires acknowledging the full scope of your freedom even though doing so produces *anguish*. Importantly, declining to choose is itself a choice: "You are condemned to be free." ## Failure, Responsibility, and the Stoic Thread Sartre was realistic about failure: it is inevitable and cannot be prevented. But failure does not justify resignation. What matters is that you took your own decisions and faced the consequences. Warburton notes the proximity to Stoicism: both traditions counsel that while we cannot control external outcomes, our response to them — our attitude, our choices — is genuinely our own. ## Beauvoir and Feminist Existentialism Simone de Beauvoir, Sartre's partner and a major philosopher in her own right, applied existentialist principles to the condition of women. Her central claim in *The Second Sex* (1949): "One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman." Femininity is not a biological given but a social construction — a set of roles and self-conceptions that women have been conditioned to internalise. Existentialist freedom demands that women refuse this passivity and define themselves on their own terms. ## Camus: The Absurd and Myth of Sisyphus Albert Camus developed a related but distinct position he called *the philosophy of the absurd*. The human desire for meaning and clarity confronts a universe that is silent and indifferent — the collision produces absurdity. Rather than suicide (despair) or religious faith (a "leap"), Camus advocated revolt: accepting the absurdity while continuing to live and create. He illustrated this with the myth of Sisyphus — doomed to roll a boulder up a hill only to see it fall back forever. Warburton follows Camus in arguing that Sisyphus nevertheless has a purpose, and one should imagine Sisyphus happy. ## Historical Context Existentialism emerged from the wreckage of two World Wars. Traditional religious and political certainties had collapsed. The movement gave philosophical expression to the experience of groundlessness and offered a secular framework for taking one's life seriously without recourse to God, fate, or ideology. ## Related - [[Utilitarianism]] - [[The Categorical Imperative]] - [[Aristotelian Virtue Ethics]] ## Sources - [[A Little History of Philosophy (Warburton 2011)]]