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Human existence by Jean Paul Sartre

Question: what it is to be human?

Answer: This question has been the center of majority of philosopher’s theories. The main features of this ontology are the groundlessness and radical freedom which characterize the human condition. These are contrasted with the unproblematic being of the world of things. Sartre’s substantial literary output adds dramatic expression to the always unstable co-existence of facts and freedom in an indifferent world. Sartre replaces the traditional picture of the passivity of our emotional nature with one of the subject’s active participation in her emotional experiences. Emotion originates in a degradation of consciousness faced with a certain situation. The spontaneous conscious grasp of the situation which characterizes an emotion, involves what Sartre describes as a “magical” transformation of the situation. Faced with an object which poses an insurmountable problem, the subject attempts to view it differently, as though it were magically transformed. The essence of an emotional state is not an immanent feature of the mental world, but rather a transformation of the subject’s perspective upon the world. Sartre’s analysis of emotions, affective consciousness is a form of pre-reflective consciousness, and is therefore spontaneous and self-conscious. Against traditional views of the emotions as involving the subject’s passivity, Sartre can therefore claim that the agent is responsible for the pre-reflective transformation of his consciousness through emotion. Ultimately, I believe being human is unexplainable in words. A plethora of qualities and disadvantages that are perceived, felt, experienced, and innately ingrained is what makes one human.

MY RESPONSE TO THE ANSWER ABOVE (200-WORDS)

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