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Existential choices: to what degree is who we are a matter of choice?

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Abstract

On the one hand, it is commonly agreed that we make choices in which we are guided by a core of personal commitments, wishes, feelings, etc. that we take to express who we are. On the other, it is commonly agreed that some of these ‘existential’ choices constitute who we are. When confronting these two matters, the question of agency inevitably arises: Whether and in what sense can we choose ourselves? The paper will argue for a new perspective on existential choice.

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Notes

  1. Sartre (1956, p. 630).

  2. Sartre (1957, p. 24).

  3. Nietzsche (1974, p. 335).

  4. Foucault (1984, p. 392).

  5. Rorty (1989, p. 40).

  6. Sartre (1956, p. 631).

  7. Bainton (1950, p. 142–144).

  8. The theory of rational choice faces a great deal of difficulties in explaining collective action and social norms, altruism, reciprocity, trust and their origin. I will not get into these problems since the aim with this short introduction was solely to illustrate what kind of idea of choice we normally operate with.

  9. See for example: Heath (1976); Carling (1992).

  10. see Luckner (2007a, p. 24; 2007b).

  11. Luckner (2007a, b). At this point we need to be careful: while it might be that the unthinkably of alternatives characterizes existential choices, not all choice-situations that involve a sense of unthinkability are existential choices. It might appear unthinkable to someone to steal a car, but that does not mean that this person is existentially committed to not stealing cars. Rather the person in question might be existentially committed to being a righteous person who fully accepts private property and the authority of the law. As a consequence of such an existential commitment that makes up who he takes himself to be, stealing a car might just not appear as an option.

  12. Sartre (1956, p. 450).

  13. Sartre (1956, p. 450).

  14. Merleau-Ponty (2002, 507).

  15. Sartre (1956, p. 489).

  16. Merleau-Ponty (2002, p. 509).

  17. Merleau-Ponty (2002, p. 509).

  18. Merleau-Ponty (2002, p. 511).

  19. Sartre (1956, p. 450).

  20. Merleau-Ponty (2002, p. 529).

  21. Frankfurt (1999a, b).

  22. see also: Berofsky (2003).

  23. Frankfurt (1999a, b, p. 129).

  24. Bratman (1999).

  25. Heidegger (1962, p. 318).

  26. Heidegger (1962, p. 318).

  27. Heidegger (1962, p. 319).

  28. Blattner (2006, p. 156) connects death and anxiety in Heidegger with the concept of conscience, by stating that the call of conscience belongs to the extreme condition of death and anxiety. This of course delivers a plausible explanation why the call must be silent: because in the extreme condition of anxiety and death one is alienated from all self-understandings. Yet, in my view the connection does not have to be this tight. For the one, the call of conscience does not arise in anxiety or death. In other words, anxiety and death are not necessary conditions of conscience.

  29. Blattner (2006, p. 160).

  30. Heidegger (1962, p. 344).

  31. Merleau-Ponty (2002, p. 518).

  32. Taylor (1989, p. 27).

  33. Heidegger (1962, p. 167).

  34. Ibid., p. 168. Merleau-Ponty (2002, p. 522) implicitly refers to Heidegger's ‘das Man’ in his discussion of this subject. He argues that in order to become ourselves and create ourselves as moral beings by exercising our freedom, we must incorporate and take a stand on collectively created set of meanings. Such choices cannot be exercised in a vacuum, but only against such a background.

  35. Taylor (1991, p. 91).

  36. The idea of such a two-level account can be traced back to Heidegger. See: Tugendhat (1979). Instructive on Taylor's two-level account: Löw-Beer (1994); Rosa (1998); Anderson (1996).

  37. Ferrara (1998, p. 53).

  38. Habermas (1978, p. 141).

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  1. Institute of Cognitive Science, University of Osnabrueck, Albrechstr. 28, 49069, Osnabrueck, Germany

    Somogy Varga

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Varga, S. Existential choices: to what degree is who we are a matter of choice?. Cont Philos Rev 44, 65–79 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11007-011-9168-7

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