On Being and the Existentialist’s Nausea

Saberi Roy

"Something has happened to me. I can’t doubt that any more. It came as an illness does, not like an ordinary certainty, not like anything obvious. It installed itself cunningly, little by little; I felt a little strange, a little awkward, and that was all. Once it was established, it didn’t move anymore, it lay low and I was able to persuade myself that there was nothing wrong with me, that it was a false alarm. And now it has started blossoming……". ~ Jean Paul Sartre, Nausea

 The human search for reality has been a journey towards understanding, not just the manifested but also the internal. The subjective and the objective. This search has imparted diverse colors to the philosophy of ontology. Phenomenological insight into one’s being manifested itself through the Cogito to Descartes and through Nausea to Sartre.

 In Nausea the Cartesian expression ‘ I think therefore I am’ has been posited as ‘I am’ replacing the dualism of the existent and the essence with necessarily the non-dualistic primacy of the existent over the essence, where existence becomes the essence. And that is the theme of the existentialist: Undiluted existence, existence in its totality and existence with a freedom ‘to be’. Sartre’s debut novel Nausea written in the form of a diary by the protagonist Antoine Roquentin, begins with a feeling – the feeling of an unexplained illness enmeshing him. This illness that he writes about – the one that ‘blossoms’ is the Nausea, the subjective understanding of existence.

Though it is a ‘nausea of existence’, the existence is in its purest form. It is Nausea that confronts existence. The confrontation happens slowly, the revelation of Sartre’s philosophy – being for itself.

In Sartre’s words:

“Consciousness is a being whose existence posits its essence, and inversely it is consciousness of a being, whose essence implies its existence; that is, in which appearance lays claim to being. Being is everywhere…….we must understand that this being is no other than the transphenomenal being of phenomena and not a noumenal being which is hidden behind them….it requires simply that the being of that which appears does not exist only in so far as it appears. The transphenomenal being of what exists for consciousness is itself in itself….consciousness is the revealed-revealed of existents, and existents appear before consciousness on the foundation of their being….” ~Jean Paul Sartre (Being and Nothingness)

Sartre’s concept of consciousness is the revealed revelation of existents. Existents thus appear ‘before’ consciousness on the foundation of their independent entity of ‘being’. Sartre was influenced by his predecessors like Husserl, who claimed consciousness is always ‘of something’ and added an intentional element to the process of awareness, the bedrock of phenomenology. Sartre’s approach derived from the Cartesian subjectivism is however non-dualistic in the sense, appearance is reality as essence is existence. There is a deviation from the Kantian because the a priori and the noumenal have been undermined to emphasize the ‘transphenomenal being of phenomena’ where all prior beliefs make way for the phenomena. However the self to Sartre is in this world vulnerable to judgment so the self is not equated with self consciousness.

Consciousness and self are not identical. Here Sartre makes the distinction of the being-in-itself (en-soi) and the being-for-itself (pour soi). The being in itself is the being of objects in the real of consciousness, the being for itself is the being of consciousness. Sartre believed in the ‘aboutness of consciousness’ that consciousness is dependent on the world, on the objects; there is always ‘something to be conscious of’. Thus consciousness is not ‘in itself’, not an isolated, independent thing to be separated from what is perceived. Consciousness is for-itself. A conscious being is not just conscious of the external, the en soi, but is also conscious of itself as conscious of the external.

Consciousness is not pure, it is like a mirror reflecting, helping a being to perceive the outer. It is a medium through which other objects are known. It is of a moment not concomittant with the moment itself. Thus consciousness is itself without content, it is a gaping emptiness. This is the beginning of nothingness, a consciousness distinct and separate from its objects, the world of which it is conscious; there is a void, a wide gap between the conscious being and the world where the being is ‘thrown’. This void, this gap, this nothingness, this separation of consciousness from the objects of consciousness is the foundation of the existentialist freedom, the existentialist absurdity and the existentialist – Nausea.

"I get up. On the wall there is a white hole, the mirror. It is a trap. I know that I’m going to let myself be caught in it. I have. The grey thing has just appeared in the mirror. I go over and look at it, I can no longer move away. It is the reflection of my face. Often, during these wasted days, I stay here contemplating it. I can understand nothing about this face. Other people’s faces have some significance. Not mine". ~ Jean Paul Sartre (Nausea)

Antoine Roquentin is an introspective historian. Roquentin’s reflective consciousness observes himself as an object. The phenomenon of existence ‘disturbs’ him. He records his shifts in perception and analyzes his conscious being as it tries to harmonize with the world, only to be appalled by the discordance between the two. The realization nauseates him. The white hole, the mirror seems like a trap to him because it is consciousness reflecting the world of objects.

Roquentin does not grasp this consciousness, ‘I can understand nothing of this face’ because its features are not revealed to him, there is no inner life of thoughts or feelings in consciousness. It is the external revealed reality that has significance. His own existence as a conscious being is a contingency. So his face, is not important, in fact it is meaningless. Sartre’s famous words, ‘I am condemned to be free’ is paragraphed here as a verbalization of one’s absurdity. Neither past, nor future, neither determinism nor causation, explains human existence.

It is the individual who chooses the situation in life to give it a meaning. The past and all that is not present, does not exist. The undated information of the diary Nausea justifies this – ‘I must say how I see this table, the street, people, my packet of tobacco, since these are things which have changed. I must fix the exact extent and nature of this change.’ The diary goes on – ‘I think it is I who has changed’. His awareness of the world is continually shifting….. Antoine Roquentin is working on the biography of the eighteenth century adventurer and diplomat Marquis de Rollebon. He has come for research in the archives of the city library in Bouville, France. “The Marquis was present: pending the moment whe I should have finally installed him in historical existence. I was lending him my life. I could feel him like a slight glow in the pit of my stomach.” ~ Jean Paul Sartre (Nausea)

 It seems to Roquentin, the Marquis has become one with him and exists within him. This is Sartre’s analysis of past becoming the present, because the past, or any other deterministic factor is unnecessary here. So the Marquis has ceased to be a historical personality. He exists through his biographer.

Elsewhere in Nausea, Sartre writes, “The true nature of the present revealed itself: it was that which exists…the past did not exist. Not at all. Neither in things nor even in my thoughts. True, I had realized a long time before that my past had escaped me….we find it so difficult to imagine nothingness. Now I knew. Things are entirely what they appear to be and behind them….there is nothing.” The present existence is all that is in him. The past has no meaning. This existence is manifested through the body – ‘pit of my stomach’.

Consciousness or the ‘for-itself’ is always of something outside of itself and this external referent is the object of self, the body. It is through the body that the ‘other’ perceives the existent. Maybe, the mental process is somehow recognizable as the psychoanalytic defense of ‘identification’. Roquentin identifies with the character, as the Maquis might have experienced some of his unfulfilled wishes. He speculates on the past as present and the present as a freedom from being: ‘Monsieur de Rollebon was my partner: he needed me in order to be and I needed him in order not to feel my being’. Yet

Sartre completely rejects the psychoanalytic explanation and the role of the unconscious in shaping human thinking as psychoanalysis posits the priority of the unconscious dynamism over the existent. Sartre’s nihilistic approach towards the past might be criticized here, as rejection of the past is an annihilation of one’s ‘roots’. Sartre makes the human rootless and insecure. That is why he unconsciously seeks freedom from existence. Again this is the psychoanalytic fallout of denial or repression of the present ‘angst of existence’. Sartre attributes to consciousness a no-thingness, thus it becomes that which can separate out of the external world and observe things-in-themselves, yet remaining free of extraneous determinants. Consciousness and thus the human is the ‘onlooker’. Sartre uses the term reflective consciousness to define the role of consciousness as the analyzer not just of the phenomenal but also of the ontological, because consciousness is always conscious of itself. To be aware of something is to be aware of being aware, otherwise awareness is relegated to the realm of the unconscious, which is acceptable in existential phenomenology. As existence precedes existence, the psychological ‘causes’ of human ‘nature’ and the psychoanalytic dynamism of the libido are de-emphasized. The unconscious drives are inconsequential. A Kantian position would be – man being born, becomes aware of himself and of his world and in accordance with a priori concepts defines himself and his reality. The existentialist refutes – man himself sculpts man’s nature and circumstance. His power of being is important. It is he who defines himself. Being is.

‘The object does not refer to being as to a signification, it would be impossible to define being as a presence since absence too discloses being since not to be there means still to be. The object does not possess being and its existence is not a participation in being, nor any other kind of relation. It is. That is the only way to define its manner off being; the object does not hide being, nor does it reveal being….the existent is a phenomenon, this means that it designates itself as an organized totality of qualities. It designates itself and not its being. Being is simply the condition of all revelation. It is being for revealing and not revealed being’ ~ Jean Paul Sartre (Being and Nothingness)

Sartre distinguishes the qualities of objects – color, odor etc. from the object. These qualities says Sartre, implies an essence, as a sign implies its meaning. An organized whole of an object is to be considered in totality of object and essence. ‘The essence is not in the object’, it is a meaning, an appearance, which reveals the object . The existent is a totality of qualities whereas being is for the condition of disclosure. Thus the phenomenal existent and the ontological being are not one. Yet the ‘for-revealing’ and the ‘revealed’ are associated through the revelation. This distinction however might be a preface to the modern problem of qualia in consciousness, where qualities tilt towards the experience of the perceiver and are not considered as being in the object.

Sartrean existentialism shows no line of separation between the appearance and the essence. The object’s essence is what it appears. This primacy on the appearance and a denial of the past weaves a coherent theme in Nausea when Antoine Roquentin egins to doubt the historical reality of Rollebon. ‘The Marquis’ face is like this ink: it has grown much paler since I started taking an interest in him…..Rollebon the man is beginning to bore me….I am beginning to believe that nothing can ever be proved’. This appearance of the present, which forms the foundation of existence, is an inter-subjective phenomenon. It is susceptible to a loss of its own freedom, by being-in-world, in its capacity as what Sartre terms the ‘being for others’.

Roquentin visits the Bouville museum and admires the displayed portraits.

“Pacome the merchant was looking down at me with his bright eyes…..I gave up trying to find any fault with him. But he for his part didn’t let me go. I read a calm, implacable judgment in his eyes. Then I realized what separated us: what I might think about him could not touch him; it was just psychology…but his judgment pierced me like a sword and called in question my very right to exist. I had appeared by chance, I existed like a stone, a plant, a microbe. My life grew in a haphazard way and in all directions. Sometimes it sent me vague signals; at other times I could feel nothing but an inconsequential buzzing.”

Hell is other people – Sartre’s core philosophy for the one ‘thrown’ (as Heidegger said) with a human life. The being-for-others is explicated by the ‘look’ through which conscious being relate to others.

One exists as a conscious being with other conscious beings, in the world and this being-for-others implies two possibilities: A being for itself, the body as an object to be perceived by others as conscious and the consciousness of the other being as being-in-itself with the inherent for-itself dimension. That is, the consciousness of oneself as perceived by others and the consciousness of others as perceiving oneself.

Sartre is influenced by Heigel’s concept of ‘looking-glass self’ when one is conscious of one’s self only when it is reflected in the consciousness of the other. Consciousness is always conscious of objects and is self conscious, so Sartre distinguishes between an unreflective consciousness and a reflective consciousness. This concept is similar in its approach to the first order of perceptual consciousness and the second order or reflective consciousness as proposed by contemporary researchers.

Perceptual consciousness is consciousness of the world, of all external objects. It is a ‘physical-state-consciousness’. Reflective consciousness is introspective observation of one’s state of awareness. It is a ‘mental-state-consciousness’. Self-consciousness in its entirety is dependent upon being perceived by another consciousness as an object. Consciousness of oneself is being conscious of oneself as body for the other’s perception – awareness o being looked at. Though Cartesian dualism separates two realities: mind and matter, Sartrean philosophy does not distinguish between two realities or substances. The emphasis is on the subjective.

The apparent dichotomy between the being-for-itself and the being-in-itself is again on the level of the subjective. A human is conscious of being looked at. Being looked at is, being judged by the other, which means a loss of freedom for the self. Thus with the appearance of the other and the attention on the self, the being-in-itself is reduced to the being-for-others, a mere object, a body, for the perception of the other. The look of others strips the self of its independence and makes the otherwise free self, limited and anxious. Sartre writes “….in the shock which seizes me when I apprehend the other’s look, this happens – that suddenly I experience a subtle alienation of all my possibilities, which are now associated with objects of the world, far from me in the midst of the world.”

Thus being reduced to a thing and losing one’s freedom (“I am no longer master of the situation”) are the consequences of interpersonal relations. According to H. Barnes, translator of Being and Nothingness, ‘The for-others involves a perceptual conflict as each for-itself seeks to recover is own being by directly or indirectly making an object out of the other’.

Sartre’s skepticism for people and the anxiety created by interactive situations, might be explainable in terms of a ‘psychology of phobia’ which led Sartre to his dictum – “Hell is other people”. “I exist. It’s sweet, so sweet, so slow. And light: you’d swear that it floats in the air all by itself. It moves. Little brushing movements everywhere which melt and disappear. Gently, gently. There is some frothy water in my mouth. I swallow it, it slides down my throat, it caresses me – and now it is starting up again in my mouth – unassuming – touching my tongue. And this pool is me too. And the tongue. And the throat is me.” ~ Jean Paul Sartre (Nausea)

Antoine Roquentin ‘romances his existence’. The imagery of being embodied with all its absurdity is still a signifier of the existential ‘sense of being’. It might seem apparently contradictory that when the existence is a mistake, it’s expressed as ‘so sweet’. This sweetness that Sartre uses is the taste of existence as revealed by having a body and by becoming an object to oneself. The body is the medium through which existence and the other’s perception of one’s existence is possible.

The realization is a subtle shift from ‘down my throat’ to the ‘throat is me’, from ‘I have a body’ to ‘I am my body’. This is Sartre’s philosophy of consciousness as consciousness of an object; self-consciousness is dependent on the other’s “look” and as this conscious self is perceived as body, the self becomes a body. “They don’t know one another, but they look at one another with a conspiratorial air because it’s such a fine day and they are people. People embrace one another without knowing one another….” ~ Jean Paul Sartre (Nausea)

These lines reflect the ‘contingency’ and ‘freedom’ of human existence. Existence is a nothingness. As Sartre writes “………….if anybody had asked me what existence was, I should have replied in good faith that it was nothing, just an empty form which added itself to external things, without changing anything in their nature.” Only one knows of oneself.

The objective world is unimportant and does not determine or cause the human phenomenon of ‘being’. “I must not be frightened”. Roquentin wrote only one sentence in his diary on a Wednesday. Anxiety and a subsequent despair is the consequence of the realization about human facticity. Man is thrown into the world, his existence is absurd and he is a mistake, an accident. The fear of the existentialist arises from an inner void, a lack of meaning and purpose in life.

 The human has no destiny, no past, no predetermined future. One chooses life events and is responsible for one’s actions. The anxiety of Roquentin is the anxiety of the atheistic man living in the world without a reason, a support or a control.

Psychological analyses phrases the anxiety of freedom as ‘separation anxiety’, the inherent fear of every being separated from the security of the mother’s womb to face lone individuality in this harsh world. However the existentialist concept of anxiety is ‘anxiety without cause’. It is not defined by psychology and is a feeling of nothingness independent of prior and posterior deterministic factors. That is why ‘I must not be frightened’ has been written as a separate idea of a day without record of any other events on that particular day.

“The thing on which I’m sitting, on which I leaned my hand just now, is called a seat. They made it on purpose for people to sit on, they took some leather, some springs, some cloth, they set to work with the idea of making a seat ad when they had finished, this was what they had made…..I murmur: it’s a seat….but the word stays on my lips: it refuses to go and put itself on the thing. It stays what it is, with its red plush, thousands of red plush, thousands of little red paws in the air, all still dead paws.

This enormous belly turned upward, bleeding, inflated – bloated with all its dead paws, this belly floating in this car, in this grey sky, is not a seat. It could as well be a dead donkey tossed about in the water…..and I could be sitting on the donkey’s belly, my feet dangling in the clear water.” ~ Jean Paul Sartre, Nausea

The seat could be belly of a donkey with red dead paws. Things, their names ad their actual existence have no commonality or interconnection, thus existence and essence do not imply anything about each other.

Existence is undefined by the names or essences we attribute to them. We perceive the world through language, the words and reason. Meaning is imparted by names of objects, yet Roquentin realizes that names in themselves are separate from the things they signify. Our understanding of the world based on logic and language is a falsity, a delusion. So the world, its objects, and the human existence are meaningless and irrational. Just like the contingency of existence, the world is also accidental and purposeless. Antoine Roquentin encounters gnarled chestnut tree. “The root of the chestnut tree plunged into the ground just underneath my bench. I no longer remembered that it was a root….it took my breath away….I…experienced the absolute…the root – there was nothing in relation to which it was not absurd….absurd, irreducible, nothing – not even a profound secret aberration of Nature – could explain that….the root was…black….I was the root o the chestnut tree.

Or rather I was all consciousness of its existence. Still detached from it – since I was conscious of it – and yet lost in it, nothing but it…there was nothing left at all, my eyes were empty, and I felt delighted with my deliverance.” ~ Jean Paul Sartre (Nausea) The chestnut tree revealed to Roquentin the irreducibility of the being of objects. He realized that it wasn’t analyzable to its components or abstractions. It is simply there, in its absolute existence. The black, crude, knotty mass described only the root. It was not the word ‘root’ or the color ‘black’ that gave it a presence; the presence was of the root itself. The ‘root’ frightened him; it was an object, a being in-itself, redefining his own existence.

The sheer magnitude of the tree, its force, rigidity, revealed to Roquentin, a sudden insight on the power of pure existence. He realized there was nothing intermediate between non-existence and the ‘rapturous abundance’ of existence. If one exists, one would have to exist to an extent that characterizes the existence. One always exists in totality and the existence cannot be reduced or lessened in any manner, it can only be ceased to non-existence. The sudden impact of the revelation identified him with the tree for conscious of the tree, made him conscious being in it and he uttered his feelings – ‘I understood that I had found the key to Existence, the key to Nausea, to my own life’. Nothingness is nonexistence. Nothingness is itself without being but rests on being. It comes into world by the ‘for-itself’. Consciousness creates nothingness and is created by nothingness.

The existentialist fear of death springs from this consciousness of nothingness. Death is a cessation of the accidental present. The Freudian primacy of the death instincts and the consequent death fear echoes a similar realization – all aim of life is death. However existentialism might be psychoanalyzed to reveal the implications of the ‘psyche’ of existentialist phenomenology, to probe the depths of consciousness and maybe to prove that existentialism is not only about absurdity or meaninglessness of life, but also about innate human libidinal desire for a freedom – to live.

Blaise Pascal one of the early philosophers, summarized his life in these lines:

“When I consider the short duration of my life, swallowed up in the eternity before and after, and the little space I fill, and even can see, engulfed in the infinite immensity of space of which I am ignorant, and which knows me not, I am frightened, and am astonished at being here rather than there, why now – rather than then.”

References:

Sartre, Jean Paul. (1969/1943). Being and Nothingness. London: Routledge.

Sartre, Jean Paul. (1974/1946). Existentialism and Humanism. London: Methuen.

Sartre, Jean Paul. (2000/1938). Nausea. Harmondsworth: Penguin Modern Classics.