A lot to Wrestle With

                For starters I would like to point out that I am not the biggest fan of Kierkegaard and am more of a fan of Camus. Probably because I feel that Camus tells more of a story which makes it much easier to follow. There were times while reading Kierkegaard that I got lost in his writings. I think that since Camus tells a story it is much easier to relate to and therefore easier to understand.

                Jean Baptiste makes it quite clear that he does not care too much for judges. But through my reading of The Fall I grew to understand why he feels this way. Throughout the story Jean is challenging us to admit our guilt and he is frustrated by those who do not. His attitude towards those who cannot admit what they have done wrong helped me realize why he does not like judges. Judges only judge other but never themselves, so who are they to call somebody guilty. I don’t think a person is guilty until they realize what they have done and feel sorry for it. I mean guilty in the emotion sense and not the legal sense. Jean is able to be a lawyer because he is not passing judgment on others; but instead he is helping other admit their guilt, just like he did to us in The Fall.

                The way Jean gets frustrated when people don’t admit what they have done wrong does seem a bit extreme, but I think we all do it. Most of us have been wronged by somebody once or twice in our lives, and if you are the exception then keep doing what you’re doing. But what I mean is, have you ever been wronged by someone and that person got away with it, leaving you hopeless? Your emotions have been messed with yet your offender is indifferent to what it is they have done to you. Personally I think it is frustrating when this happens and a person should apologize for having done it. It is in cases like this that I get frustrated when people do not admit their guilt.

                I would now like to talk about Kierkegaard writing titled The Rotation Method starting on page 8. Kierkegaard goes into detail about boredom and what it causes us to do. I agree that boredom causes us to advance because personally when I am bored I try to do something with my time. Then when I grow bored of the things I love I move on to something else to fill that void. What was troubling for me to understand was that he made a comment saying that gods could have created worlds just because they were bored. This is troubling to me because I do practice Christianity and I believe in one God, but I never thought about what if God grew bored of us. In other words what if our world is like the equivalent to the middle child of other worlds. What if what we do is seen as insignificant because there is another world that does it better. In reference to what I said before that when I get bored of something I love I move on to a new vice, well what if that is the same case for God. What if God got bored with our world and moved on to another leaving us to fall apart?

                Later Kierkegaard makes a comment about faith, “Faith is the objective uncertainty along with the repulsion of the absurd seized in the passion of inwardness potentiated to the highest degree.” (Page 27)  As a Catholic I feel that a world without God and heaven would be absurd. I have no other evidence telling me that this is true except for my faith. I believe that it is faith that allows us to disregard the absurd. 

An Absurd Fall

          

            I felt that class this week was a little bit harder to follow than the previous week’s class. I felt that the points brought up were a little bit difficult to follow, especially when discussing The Fall. The Fall was interesting to me because how the story line progressed. I felt that in the beginning it was a little bit slow and I kept questioning when is something going to happen. As the story progressed I started to pick up on what was going on in the main characters life that drove him to have such opinions. I believe that the reason behind his fall is his self conscience. It seemed as though everything he did he reflected on it to the point where his good deeds appeared to be bad. His thoughts made him appear as a fake individual. Fake in the sense that he is not acting like himself but instead the way he wants people to see him.

For instance when he tipped his hat to the blind man, this gesture was geared towards the onlookers in an attempt to win their favor. I understand the mental thought of why he is cautious of what complete strangers think of him because I do it every day, and I bet most people do as well. We are constantly concerned about what others think about us. For example, we base what we decide to wear on any given day to appeal to the satisfaction of others. What I mean is that most of us choose to wear clothing that shouldn’t give onlookers a bad perception of us. We do not want to be stared at in a negative way but instead positively, or not at all. Now what I meant before when I said his good deeds appeared bad is that he over thought what others might have thought about him over a simple action.

            His self conscience leads him to degrade his own being to the point where he thought about suicide. Why is it that one’s conscience can create such a heavy burden on oneself to the point of such actions? I think it was the repetitive self loathing that made him feel like a lesser man. He then speaks about the way in which he would treat woman. He would make them promise to be true to him without returning the same affections in return. He would pretty much use woman to sustain his own needs with little regard to the woman. Forgive me if my thoughts are not clear in my writing, but this is what I believe would cause such a man to fall.

            I would now like to touch on the subject of the absurd. It was brought up in class that it was absurd to want to end your life quickly; it is this statement that I whole heartedly agree with. Our lives are full of meaning to say that we have no purpose in this life but to die is absurd. I look at it in a way that our lives have check points. As we progress from generation to generation we accomplish something. This is something that I feel is full of meaning, just think of all we had to do in order to reach our twenties we have come a long way from when we could only crawl. What meaning is there in suicide? We end our lives so that we can no longer walk this earth. At the point of death our past lives lose their meanings as the generations grow older until no one remembers who we were or what purpose we would serve in the present. 

Strange with Strange Friends

Strange with Strange Friends

The Stranger was, well strange. This opinion is not limited to only Meursalt, but his friends as well. I feel this way because while reading this story about this man who neither expresses emotion nor even feels any emotion, I am constantly trying to figure out what’s up with this guy, when is he going to break down? As the story progresses I begin to lose hope that he is going to show anything that resembles a normal personality. Now, one can argue what is a “normal personality” but in this case I mean a personality that is filled with emotion.

                At first I thought to myself why do people want to be friends with such a strange individual, and then I came to this conclusion that maybe those people are strange as well. Take Marie for instance, Mersaults sex/swimming partner. At first Mersault introduced her as a girl that used to work with him but then left after shortly after, at first I thought nothing of it. However as I read more it occurred to me that maybe the job did not work out because of how strange she was. I mean were talking about a girl who is in a loveless relationship but still would like to marry Mersault. I think it’s strange that she would want to marry a man that tells her without any sense of guilt that he does not love her, yet is indifferent about getting married. I for one would think that could be a start of downward spiral in most relationships. Then to make matters even more interesting Mersault kills a man for no good reason, something that I thought was going to be the last straw in the relationship and from that point on there would be no talk of Marie for the rest of the story. With no regard to the fact that Mersault just killed a man and he said he did not love her she still stands by him to the end of days with the thought of marriage in her mind. You have to be strange to think that you can marry someone when you know they are serving a life sentence and you can’t even visit them.

                Next is Salamano, who I consider strange yet not as strange as the others involved in the story. Salamano hates his dog and treats it terribly aside from feeding it and taking it on walks. But then when his dog is gone he is sad and misses his dog and confides in Mersault who is indifferent about everything and everyone. He is can only confide in Mersault because everyon else is so turned off from Salamano because of the way they witness him beat his dog.

                Finally there is Raymond, an alleged pimp. Raymond is adamant about Mersault openly stating that the two of them are friends, which cannot be the case because Mersault is indifferent about everyone and has no need for friends, everyone is just there. What is strange about this man is that he was angry about this girl who he wanted to be done with, yet when she is gone he wants her back. He has Mersault write a letter to this girl asking her over so they can settle everything right. Mersault agrees to write the letter before and after Raymond says that he wants to get her naked and then kick her out of the house.

                I believe these people are strange because they exert behaviors that would not make most people feel comfortable, which is why Mersault is such a great friend. He is indifferent about everything and everyone and therefore his friends feel comfortable around him because he is open to them. Mersault is not only strange but also a terrible person as well.  It is his strangeness that causes him to be so terrible. He cares so little about everyone and anything that it causes him to be vulnerable to other people’s whims. Tragicaly he spent time in the company of a man who is considered a pimp and did act that only a pimp could only think about doing but be too conscious of doing said acts themselves.

                In conclusion I would like to talk about the trial about him being careless about his mothers passing and not so much the fact that he just killed a man. I believe that the trial was a metaphor. It was a judgment of the kind of person he is. His sentencing was death because not having a life fit the crime of being careless about his acts and emotions. 

Rereading for a Better Understanding of Self

Rereading for a Better Understanding of Self

Well I have finally finished reading the introduction for the third time this week and I am still a little unsure of what to write about. The fact that this is my first blog ever and I’m not exactly sure if I am following the blog structure correctly may have something to do with my difficulty of transferring my thoughts onto this post. I hope those who read this post won’t judge me too harshly for the content I display because I am still trying to figure this out.

                I felt that the introduction left me at a bit of a cliff hanger. As Robert Soloman went on trying to express the idea of existentialism he cited a handful of great philosophers who each said their piece about the topic. This was frustrating to me because I was searching for a definition amongst his pages, but was left with only an idea of what existentialism is like. My search for a definition came to an end when Robert Soloman stated at the end of the introduction “One might object that this sketch of the existential attitude and its philosophical expression has failed to give a definition of existentialism. But existentialism is not a dead doctrine to be bottled and labeled.” (xix Robert Soloman). It was because of my uncertainty about the subject which led me to read the introduction again and then again once more.

                The philosophers listed in the book are stating that existentialism is a way in which we see ourselves. The video camera examples appealed to me the most because it helped me better understand existentialism. We are as we think other people see us this is why the conscious is better than the self-conscious. It is the things that are going on around us that give our life meaning. If I were to succumb to my self-conscious only with no attention to my outer being how would I be able to put value on myself? It is the outer being that helps me understand the kind of life I am leading. The way I act in front of others causes me to think about how others are seeing me. Every day we are constantly thinking about what others are thinking about us. When we walk down the street and the passerby makes a glance up at you, you begin to question in your mind what that person may have been interested in about yourself. It’s this thought process that causes us to change in order to correct what may have gotten the passerby’s attention. It could be a bad thing which causes us to smell our armpit or possibly a good thing like the passerby may have been checking you out which may cause you to act with more confidence.

                I am confused with what the philosophers are saying about self consciousness, they say it is wrong because it hastens our moral judgment and can rob us of our principles. I believe that our self conscious can lead us to make decisions for the good of others and in a moral and highly principled way just as easy as it can lead us to the other.

                I hope my understanding of the topic is not too far off from what Robert Soloman was trying to explain. I believe with further reading of this book that I will arrive at a better understanding of what Existentialism is about. As for my blog post I really hope I completed it in the proper fashion. I believe that with good and hopefully not too bad of feedback that my blogging skills will improve over these weeks to come.  

Posted September 2 by Brendan McInerney