[MD] Does Existence precede Essence?

[Ham Priday]

Greetings, Marsha --



> This essay twists like a knife.  I am interested to hear the
> comments.  But first I would like to know if I am understanding
> 'existence precedes essence' correctly.  If I stated that 'experience
> precedes thought' or that 'an event precedes definition' would I be
> correctly paraphrasing?

Yes.  Sartre is saying that the existence of things is primary to their
essence.  To the existentialists, essence is the "being" that becomes
(evolves) from existence (the material world).  Therefore, for Sartre, life
is a "process of becoming".  Only when life is completed can the individual
be objectified for others to evaluate.  Thoughts, intentions and definitions
account for little in Sartre's "value" system.  It's the decisions and
actions made in the totality one's life that define its essential value.

Sartre, Heidegger, and Nietschze were evolutionary nihilists.  Their reality
was totally objective.  While man, as a work in progress, stands apart from
this reality, he is "burdened" with Free Will -- the responsibility for
making decisions that determine his fate -- the object he ultimately
becomes.

I developed my philosophy of Essentialism in direct opposition to this
ontology.  For me, thoughts, values and desires are what constitute the
individual, and the material universe is the individual subject's own
construct of reality.  Rather than asking chicken-and-egg questions like
"which came first?", I acknowledge existence to be a dichotomy between the
sentient self and insensient otherness.  I assert that everything in
existence, including values and morality, is relative to the subject.  In
the final analysis, subjectivity has more reality than objectivity.  One of
the reasons I believe this, is that while conscious awareness cannot be
explained in terms of the organization of matter, without this awareness
there is no such organization.  A material world that exists unexperienced
is a meaningless concept and would have to be self-caused.  I believe that
sentient life has both meaning and a primary (i.e., uncreated) cause.

Thanks for jumping in, Marsha.  I, too, will be interested to see where the
Pirsigians stand with regard to existentialism.

Regards,
Ham