Sartre's Argument For The Existence Of God

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Professor Aaron Brooks PHI2010 (176040) December 1, 2017 Essay 3 Jean-Paul Sartre Sartre’s argument for the claim that without God, a person is “nothing else but what he makes of himself,” is based in the Age of Forlornness. According to the philosopher, the existence of God is impossible, since the very concept of God is contradictory, because it would be the achieved in-itself-for-itself. Therefore, if God does not exist, he has not created man according to an idea that fixes his essence, so that man meets his radical freedom. This theory has an ethical consequence: Sartre affirms that values depend entirely on man and are his own creation. Man is condemned to be free and to take responsibility for this freedom, nothing else can force him …show more content…

“If God does not exist … it means that, first of all, man exists, turns up, appears on the scene, and, only afterwards, defines himself … because at first he is nothing. Only afterward will he be something, and he himself will have made what he will be. Thus, there is no human nature, since there is no God to conceive it. Not only is man what he conceives himself to be, but he is also only what he wills himself to be.” First, you will quickly summarize what his claim means, along with his argument for it (1-2 paragraphs). Second, I want you to come up with one – and only one – objection to this argument. That is, tell me where you think this argument might go wrong. Do you disagree with one of its premises? Or do you think the conclusion does not necessarily follow from the premises? (1 paragraph). Third, you will present a response to your own objection. In other words, do your best to respond to your own objection with something Sartre might say himself (1

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