Meaning without a manual
Use Sartre's idea of bad faith and Camus's idea of the absurd to spot when you're hiding from your own choices, and to think about meaning when no answer is handed to you.
SARTRE
Existence precedes essence
Sartre (1905–1980) used the example of a paper knife. Someone had its purpose in mind before making it: its essence came first. People, he argued, are the other way round. We exist first, and only then define ourselves through what we choose and do. There is no fixed human nature or ready-made purpose that decides for you.
On this view, 'I'm a coward' or 'I'm a generous person' isn't a fact stamped on you at birth. It's the running total of your choices, and the next choice can change it.
Bad faith
Lying to yourself about your own freedom: pretending you have no choice so you don't have to own what you choose. Sartre's example is a café waiter who plays the role so mechanically that he acts as if he were nothing but a waiter, like a thing rather than a person.
Everyday versions: 'That's just how I am.' 'I had no choice, my boss expects it.' 'People like me don't do that.' Sometimes these are true. Often they're a way of not looking at a decision you are, in fact, making.
Check yourself
Navid, 38, dreams of teaching but says: 'I can't change careers. I'm an accountant, that's who I am.' He has savings and a teaching course near his home. What would Sartre say?
- He's right: his upbringing fixed his nature, so this is simply who he is now
- He must quit tomorrow, because following your dream is the only authentic choice
- Only his happiness matters, so he should do whatever feels best right now
- He's hiding a choice behind a job title; staying is fine, if he owns it
Show the answer
He's hiding a choice behind a job title; staying is fine, if he owns it
Yes. Sartre wouldn't tell Navid what to choose. He'd say 'that's who I am' hides a decision, and that staying an accountant, if he chooses it with open eyes, is just as authentic.
CONDEMNED TO BE FREE
Not choosing is also a choice
Sartre said we are condemned to be free: we didn't ask for freedom, but we can't give it back. Even refusing to decide is a decision. He told of a student who asked him whether to join the Free French forces in the war or stay with his mother, who depended on him. No ethical rulebook could settle it, Sartre said. The student had to choose, and in choosing, define himself.
That echoes lesson 9: when the lenses split, no formula decides for you. Sartre adds that the weight of that moment is not a sign something is wrong. It's what being a person feels like.
Check yourself
Golnaz can't afford university fees this year. Her friend says: 'Existentialism says you're totally free, so blaming money is just bad faith.' On the fairer reading of existentialism, her friend is right.
Show the answer
False
False. The lack of money is a real limit, and naming it isn't bad faith. Bad faith would be using it to deny the choices she does have: studying on her own, saving for next year, looking for a scholarship. Freedom works inside a situation, not outside it.
CAMUS
The absurd
Camus (1913–1960) started from a clash: we hunger for meaning, and the universe gives no answer. He called that clash the absurd. In The Myth of Sisyphus he looked at ways out. Giving up on life itself was one. Another was leaping to a comforting answer you can't honestly justify; he called that a kind of philosophical suicide. He rejected both and chose revolt: live fully and lucidly, without the guarantee.
Camus himself refused the label 'existentialist', though he's usually taught alongside Sartre. They were friends for a while and later fell out publicly.
Sisyphus and his boulder
In the Greek myth, Sisyphus is condemned to push a boulder up a hill forever, only to watch it roll down each time. Camus saw in him our situation: effort with no final payoff. He ends by saying we must imagine Sisyphus happy, because the struggle itself can fill a heart. Where the analogy breaks: most of our tasks aren't truly pointless, and unlike Sisyphus we can sometimes choose a different hill.
Check yourself
Which of these would Camus call revolt, and which an escape from the absurd?
- Committing to friends and good work while admitting there's no guarantee
- Numbing out with endless scrolling so the question never comes up
- Deciding that since nothing is guaranteed, nothing is worth doing
- Finding real joy in the daily task itself, not only in where it leads
- Grabbing a comforting certainty you don't honestly believe
- Looking at the question clearly and choosing to live fully anyway
Show the answer
Revolt: Committing to friends and good work while admitting there's no guarantee, Finding real joy in the daily task itself, not only in where it leads, Looking at the question clearly and choosing to live fully anyway
Escape: Numbing out with endless scrolling so the question never comes up, Deciding that since nothing is guaranteed, nothing is worth doing, Grabbing a comforting certainty you don't honestly believe
Two answers to 'what's it for?'
Sartre
Life has no meaning given in advance, so you make it through your choices, and you're responsible for what you make.
Camus
The world stays silent, and the clash never goes away. Don't escape it: live fully in spite of it, with open eyes.
Check yourself
Farzaneh, 34, feels her life is drifting. She asks four friends for advice. Whose is closest to Sartre and Camus?
- 'Stop waiting to be told what your life is for. Choose it on purpose.'
- 'Find the one true purpose you were born for, and everything will fall into place.'
- 'Nothing matters in the end anyway, so there's no point worrying about any of it.'
- 'Just do whatever feels best in the moment; that's the only meaning there is.'
Show the answer
'Stop waiting to be told what your life is for. Choose it on purpose.'
Yes. Both say meaning isn't delivered to you; you take it up through what you choose and how you live, with your eyes open.
Check yourself
- Payam stays in engineering, telling himself: 'My father would be crushed. I have no choice.'
- Payam stays in engineering after weighing it, because he values the stability it gives his family, and says so plainly: 'I'm choosing this.'
Payam does the same thing in both cases. What would Sartre say is different?
- Nothing: for Sartre only the outward action counts, not the attitude
- The second option pays better and gives him more security
- The first is selfish and the second is selfless and generous
- Whether he owns the choice or hides behind 'no choice'
Show the answer
Whether he owns the choice or hides behind 'no choice'
Yes. Same job, different stance. The first is bad faith; the second is what Sartre calls authentic: a free choice, openly taken and owned.
Lesson recap
- Sartre: existence precedes essence. No ready-made purpose; you define yourself by your choices.
- Bad faith is pretending you have no choice so you don't have to own what you choose.
- Freedom works inside real limits; naming a constraint isn't bad faith, denying your remaining choices is.
- Camus: the absurd is our hunger for meaning meeting a silent world. His answer is revolt: live fully, with open eyes.