1272867

Mid-Semester Essay

Question: 6) What does Sartre mean in suggesting that humans have ‘absolute’

freedom? Critically assess the extent to which this is a satisfactory conception of human

freedom.

In suggesting humans have absolute freedom, Sartre puts forward a piece of

ontological phenomenology which presents “freedom” as the defining feature of human

consciousness. I will argue that, although this freedom may be a satisfactory conception in a

descriptive sense about the nature of consciousness and our experience of freedom in it,

Sartre remains unable to make more practical and ethical claims in light of this ontological

model. In order to prove this, it will first be important to outline the structures of Sartre’s

ontology as they appear in his seminal text, Being and Nothingness (1969), namely, being in-

itself and for-itself. Sartre’s conception of absolute freedom then falls out from his

explanation of the relationship between these two structures, using a further distinction

between facticity and transcendence in the for-itself. Thus, with Sartre’s ontology fully

canvassed, we can interrogate its shortcomings by looking at two influential critiques by

Marcuse and Merleau-Ponty, who point to a metaphysical gap Sartre creates between

consciousness and everything else. We can perhaps resurrect Sartre’s argument from these

critiques by highlighting the ontological character of his conception which offers a valid

descriptive phenomenology of consciousness, undermining the critiques on the basis of

differing interpretations of freedom. Unfortunately, however, when we return to the text, we

see that Sartre is to some degree responsible for these interpretations by making normative

claims with ethical and practical implications that he does not seem to be able to support.

To begin, Sartre establishes the foundation of his ontology by distinguishing between

the structures of being in-itself and being for-itself. In the “Introduction” to the text, Sartre
summarises the “phenomenon of being” with three propositions that, “Being is. Being is in-

itself. Being is what it is” (Sartre 1969, p. 22). Essentially, being in-itself exists outside of

human notions of justification, creation, explanation, necessity and possibility, activity or

passivity, or affirmation or negation, and is thus agent-independent (Sartre 1969). It cannot

refer to itself, and is in that sense, self-identical (which can be expressed as “A is A”), thus

constituting the absolute plenitude or mass of mere stuff that is complete independent of

consciousness (Gardner 2009). As such, if being in-itself “is what it is”, then being for-itself

can be initially understood as “being what it is not and not being what it is” (Sartre 1969, p.

21). This paradox aims to convey the centrality of nothingness “at the heart of

consciousness”, which functions as a “nihilation” of the in-itself, thus creating the scope for

possibility, and by extension consciousness (Ibid. p. 102). This is illustrated by Sartre’s

explanation of the process of negation, which is shown to be intrinsic to the act of perception,

in that to distinguish an object in consciousness we have to nihilate the possibilities of that

object being anything else. I recognise that a table is a table by identifying that it is not

anything else (Gardner 2009). It is then demonstrated that this negation is a general function

of cognition that inhabits the entire structure of consciousness, and in this way, nothingness is

“dispersed in being” (Sartre 1969, p. 45). It follows, then, that this nothingness is the defining

ontological feature of the for-itself, notably not a property, but instead, “the for-itself must be

its own nothingness,” thus separating it from the self-identical in-itself (Ibid. p. 102). As

such, these two ontological structures, being in-itself inversely related to being for-itself,

form the basis of Sartre’s conception of absolute freedom.

The conception of absolute freedom then falls out from Sartre’s investigation of the

relationship between being in-itself and for-itself, which is explained by a further distinction

of structures of the for-itself, being facticity and transcendence. The relationship between the

for-itself and in-itself is clarified through the concept of facticity, described as our
“unjustifiable presence in the world”, or the “residue” of the in-itself that “haunts” the for-

itself (Ibid., p. 107). It is the faculty through which consciousness comes to comprehend its

physical, spatio-temporal, cultural, and historical “situation” in particularity, and thus

represents an ambivalent bind to the nihilated in-itself that is beyond consciousness (Gardner

2009, p. 99). Internally related to facticity, then, is the faculty of transcendence, framed here

as a “lack of being”, in which the for-itself continually apprehends that the positive being of

the in-itself is perpetually “out of reach” (Ibid.). Sartre demonstrates that this “lack”

fundamentally underscores human conceptions of value, desire, and possibility, in that each

process involves an internal ontological relation of projection towards a state of being that is

absent or “lacking” in the situated for-itself (Gardner 2009). It is this faculty of transcendence

that allows Sartre to claim that we have absolute freedom, in that we have the freedom to

transcend our facticity (Morris 2008). This freedom is, in the first sense, a freedom from

determinism, framed by Sartre as an ability to escape or detach from the “causal order of the

world” (Sartre 1969, p. 47). For example, if I decide to go to the shops to get milk, both the

thought and the action come into being through the combination of the specific apprehended

absence or “lack” of milk and a projected end that is not-yet-existent, involving a human

nihilating process that cannot be justified or explained by an external determining factor in

our facticity (Morris 2008). Further, this projected end is, for Sartre, an inherently free

choice, albeit a non-reflective one. This means that I act on buying milk because of a wider

network of chosen projects in order to, say, have milk with a coffee, in order to be more

productive, in order to succeed in my chosen occupation, in order to finally realise a pre-

reflectively chosen (and thus perpetually changing) “fundamental project” (Ibid.). Sartre

describes this fundamental project as a choice of the “transcendent image of what I am”

(Sartre 1969, p. 485), and as such, “existence precedes essence” in that we exist with the

freedom of transcendence first that enables us to choose the properties that come to constitute
our essence (Ibid., p. 588). It is important to note, at this point, the ontological nature of the

freedom being described, which is intrinsic, and a defining feature of what it means to exist,

or as Sartre puts it, “freedom is existence” (Ibid.). Thus, this freedom should in no way be

confused with a more common-sense conception of freedom, which implies a realisation of

its projected ends, or a kind of omnipotence, as “success is not important to freedom” of this

ontological kind (Ibid. p. 505). As such, this provides an initial outline of Sartre’s ontological

conception of absolute freedom.

With Sartre’s conception of absolute freedom fully outlined, we can now turn to two

influential critiques of the model, namely those by Marcuse and Merleau-Ponty, to see the

ways in which this is perhaps not a satisfactory conception of human freedom. Firstly,

Marcuse argues that Sartre, in acknowledging the existence of things like the Other, has made

a move to make claims about the “ontic-empirical” that he is not able to do with his

fundamentally “transcendental-ontological” model (Marcuse 1948, p. 319). He problematises

Sartre’s emphasis on choice, targeting his example that “the slave in chains is free to break

them” (Sartre 1969, p. 570). Marcuse points out that, in this situation, the choice between

enslavement and death is not a meaningful choice at all as both options end up destroying the

for-itself which is freedom, and in this sense the freedom has become “irrelevant” (Marcuse

1948, p. 322). While the slave may still be “free” in his ability to transcend his facticity and

choose new projects (i.e. to not break the chains), the ontological validity here demonstrates

the “remoteness” of the model, in that we in no better position to change our social conditions

(Ibid.). We can say that Sartre has offered an idealist solution to a realist problem. In sum,

Marcuse has identified the way in which Sartre has exaggerated the extent of his absolute

freedom by not accounting for the efficacy of consciousness and its ability to change its

facticity. Secondly, Merleau-Ponty takes a somewhat inverse approach and demonstrates that

Sartre has failed to account for the efficacy of the world on consciousness, particularly in
regard to the body. We can understand Merleau-Ponty’s critique initially by comparing the

two thinkers’ analysis of the “situation”. Where in Sartre, the meaning and “coefficient of

adversity” in a situation only appears in light of a freely chosen project, Merleau-Ponty

instead proposes that to be situated is to already be engaged in a world of meaning with

bodily intentions that I do not choose (Compton 1998). While the for-itself may impose

meaning on to the brute mass of the in-itself, this does not necessarily imply that this

meaning arises from an absolutely free choice. Indeed, the very idea of a fundamental choice

of values suggests the presence of a world with prior values which inform our possibilities,

and thus is a self-contradiction (Ibid., p. 181). In summary, Merleau-Ponty puts forward an

ontology in which consciousness is fundamentally “within” the world, where in Sartre we

remain outside of it, and this allows him to construct a more insightful hierarchy of being

from the physical to the human, that can account for the efficacy of the world on

consciousness in a way Sartre cannot (Ibid. p. 184). As such, we can see that both of these

critiques point to a metaphysical gap in Sartre’s conception of absolute freedom between

consciousness and everything else that restricts Sartre to the realm of purely ontological

description.

For a final evaluation of Sartre’s conception of absolute freedom, we can consider the

success of the model as it stands as a phenomenological description, isolating it from the later

normative claims Sartre attempts to make. In doing this, we can see that Sartre’s claim that

“to be is to choose” seems to hold up, in that regardless of our physical condition, we are still

confronted with a choice of how to exist in this condition, and there perpetually looms the

choice of death. We can respond to Marcuse from this position by saying that he has

misinterpreted Sartre by assuming the common sense meaning of freedom that necessitates a

degree of success or failure in the projected end. It does not matter that the choice between

death and enslavement is “irrelevant” (meaning that no practical change can be enacted)
because the presence of a choice remains steadfast. In essence, Sartre does not need to

account for the efficacy of consciousness on the world, as he is merely describing a feature of

consciousness. Although Merleau-Ponty’s critique does not fall as easily from this new

position, we can make the claim that ontologically, his idea that consciousness is “within” the

world is actually consistent with Sartre. This is due to the internal nature of the relation

between facticity and transcendence, which emphasises that Sartre’s freedom can only occur

“in a situation” (Sartre 1969, p. 510). This situation acts as the setting through which freedom

can occur, and would include things like the body, as well as social conditions, neither of

which have an impact on the ontological obligation to choose something in the present

moment, even if this choice is a non-reflective one. As such, if both critiques point to a

metaphysical gap in Sartre’s model, then, in fact, they have both located exactly where

Sartre’s freedom resides, namely, in this metaphysical gap. It is precisely because the in-itself

is out-of-reach that the for-itself comes to exist, and similarly, it is the gap between the

constraining facticity and the transcendent project that condemns humans to be free. Sartre

seems to also take this position. In later years, Sartre turned to Marxism which he describes

as the “philosophy” of the twentieth century, where existentialism is relegated to an

“ideology” that cannot contradict or replace the philosophy in any practical sense (Warnock

1969, p. xviii). Unfortunately, however, when Sartre makes normative sounding claims like

“We have the war we deserve – and I am as profoundly responsible for the war as if I myself

declared it,” he opens himself back up to the critiques given above and is not able to respond

without returning to his prior ontology (Sartre 1969, p. 576). Sartre becomes responsible for

his problematic interpretation by Marcuse. Ultimately, whether Sartre’s absolute freedom

provides a satisfactory conception of freedom depends on the degree to which we are

prepared to accept the ontology but reject the practical and ethical implications proposed.
 To conclude, it is clear that the adequacy of Sartre’s absolute freedom remains

somewhat ambiguous on the basis of what we choose to take from it. Absolute freedom is

presented as a nothingness that is the fundamental ontological property of human

consciousness. The critiques of Marcuse and Merleau-Ponty demonstrate the way in which

Sartre is unable to move from this ontology towards an ethical position with practical

implications, which he nevertheless attempts to do. We can perhaps consider the “usefulness”

of such an ontological model. To me it seems that, in an age where the question of what

consciousness actually is comes into focus in light of developments in artificial intelligence,

Sartre’s phenomenology can provide significant insight into what it is that makes us

fundamentally human.

Word count: 2199

Bibliography

Catalano, J 1980, A Commentary on Sartre’s ‘Being and Nothingness’, University of Chicago

Press, Chicago.

Compton, J 1998, ‘Sartre, Merleau-Ponty, and Human Freedom’, in J Stewart (ed.), The

Debate Between Sartre and Merleau-Ponty, Northwestern University Press, Evanston.

Gardner, S 2009, Sartre’s ‘Being and Nothingness’ a Reader’s Guide, Continuum, London.

Grelland, HH 2006, ‘The Case for Sartrean Freedom’, Sartre Studies International, vol. 12,

no. 1, pp. 18–32, viewed 13 May 2022, <https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/23511221.pdf?

refreqid=excelsior

%3Adb3b7b27e09b181c6c5a3f644cafbfe4&ab_segments=&origin=&acceptTC=1>.
Marcuse, H 1948, ‘Existentialism: Remarks on Jean-Paul Sartre’s L’Etre et le Néant’,

Washington.

Merleau-Ponty, M 1945, Phenomenology of Perception, Forgotten Books, London.

Morris, KJ 2008, ‘Chapter 8’ in Sartre, Blackwell, Malden.

Natanson, M 1951, A Critique of Jean-Paul Sartre’s Ontology, University of Nebraska Press,

Lincoln.

Sartre, J 1969, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on Phenomenological Ontology, Taylor &

Francis Group, Abingdon, Oxon. Available from: ProQuest Ebook Central.

Warnock, M 1969, ‘Introduction’, in Being and Nothingness: An Essay on Phenomenological

Ontology, Taylor & Francis Group, Abingdon, Oxon. Available from: ProQuest Ebook

Central.

Webber, J 2008, The Existentialism of Jean-Paul Sartre, Taylor & Francis Group, London.

Available from: ProQuest Ebook Central.