This is is all super interesting but my dense self is missing why you find it terrifying? I totally get why abandoning your initial framework was terrifying, but once you've done that ...
And apologies in advance (or slightly in retro re the above paragraph) if our thought patterns, worldview & etc are too different for my observations to be more than annoying, but, here goes
While some people do try to dismiss responsibility for unpleasant actions or really bizarre conclusions to their preferred overarching framework, why would you think you would do that? Or do you think it's inherent? I can't see why it would or should be for major stuff?
Why do you think (or did you think, obviously we're still past tense here) your conscience is composed of what other people have told you? When i was much younger, there was a frequent EXTREME conflict with what I'd call my conscious and the socially constructed framework that I knew was what other people expected. The vast majority of my pre college graduation regrets came from following the latter over the former, but the older I got the better I became at that so don't do it hardly ever on anything important anymore. Maybe what I'm calling conscience is what you're calling guidance, except I'm assuming it's internal and you're thinking it might be external?
I'm not arguing for the necessity of an overarching framework here, btw, I don't have one myself, i don't think, except possibly in the very loosest of frameworks, and it's more moral/ethical, not theistic; firmly agnostic in most senses, tho I'd be thrilled to have a sufficient understanding or intuition of things that i could be otherwise.
Regardless of whether you thought those questions were kinda dumb or obtuse, looking forward to where your existential free fall takes you!
I can definitely relate to what you’re saying in your last few paragraphs about conflicts between yourself and society and about having an agnostic moral/ethical framework.
A really big theme of everything I’m writing, here, is that people can construct themselves, internally, in very different ways. I think you’re right to point out that the distinction between conscience/guidance is in some ways an odd one. There have probably been times in my life when I would have thought of both together as “conscience” just as you suggest.
The observation that frameworks can feel protective is pretty longstanding in both theistic and atheistic existentialism. Camus talks about it a lot from an atheist perspective. On the Christian side, Dostoevsky has this famous parable in The Brothers Karamazov in which the Grand Inquisitor tells Jesus that people don’t want what Jesus offers because they want a nice clear system that tells them what to do. Freedom can be scary!
But of course it’s not quite that simple. Most of us desire freedom, in some ways, even as we desire frameworks that help us to make decisions and make sense of ourselves. Existentialist philosophers often seem to intensely feel both the desire for freedom and the discomfort with it at the same time.
I do find that existentialism can make that almost paradoxical dislike of freedom become more salient to you just because you’re hitting it more often. So I guess the reason I was thinking I might divert responsibility to a framework is precisely because, deep down, there is a part of me that would genuinely like to do that! But part of what I’m realising, in this piece, is that I could of course choose not to anyway.
As for ongoing Angst, I think for me personally there are a few relevant factors. Right here, when I say I care deeply about something that isn’t guaranteed to work out, what I mean is that I’d like for morality to have some ideal form, because I care about it a lot, but I also understand that there may not be any such thing; the questions I care most about may not have definite answers and I have to accept that possibility.
Thanks so much for the thoughtful comment. I’m writing about philosophy on a particularly personal level, in this series, and it means a lot to me that people are bringing their own perspectives to it.
Thank you for the comment and these essays and also some of your recs.
I now very much wish the philosophy department at my university had been more oriented towards existentialism, I missed out on all the more modern philosophy I might have actually liked (philosophy of religion the notable exception) - the intro guy i mentioned in my post about philosophy retired to professor emeritus after that year, the rest were of the “if you can't define your terms everything you say is meaningless nonsense” (kinda what Wittgenstein might have been saying was a dead end iirc, funnily enough these people loved Wittgenstein) and spent all their time on a philosophy of correct language sort. I wanted to do a paper on an existentialist work i found on my own instead of the stuff that was boring me to insanity & I remember being told “if you can't explain it to me in a way that makes sense I would have ro give you an F for writing nonsense, and no one has ever explained existentialism to me in a way that I don't think is meaningless gobbledygook, but it's up to you.” I'm all for challenging dares but not gonna deliberately lose a rigged game, so that was that.
Anyway, one thing you've made me acutely aware of is gaps in my reading. I loved The Stranger but read nothing else by Camus, like Notes from the Underground much better in retrospect than I did at the time but read nothing else by Doestevsky, have only read excerpts from Nietschze.
Re: the framework, using Christianity as an example coz that's the one i know, I never got people (including adherents) who thought it was a simple set of shall & shall not, or “believe & get a free pass to eternal heaven no matter what else you do.” The Bible was pretty clear on “love thy neighbors as thyself” & “do unto others” being at the top of the commandments food chain (along with “love God”)(for any non biblically inclined who might see this, see also the bit about faith hope & love as the greatest virtues with love being the greatest of those) & this requires dynamic thought, especially when it seemingly contradicts some of the shalls & shall nots, which I always took as necessarily situation dependent anyway. I think any framework would sort of have to work like that, whether you wanted it to or not -- even the most Jalvert person is occasionally gonna run into their “Valjean is a criminal but a good person what do i do?” existential crisis on the bridge.
So cool with frameworks & don't think they get in the way of freedom, as you're still making the free choice to use those frameworks and have to make choices in deciding how to apply them. & still in agreement with those guiding principles from Christianity even if i no longer adopt the cosmology. Which is kinda irrelevant but thought I'd toss it in.
I always feel like I have gaps in my reading, too! I guess the bright side of that is that it means I have a nice long list of possible things to read.
You’re mentioning a number of things that I’m about to talk about next week, actually: different types of reasoning being one, and things that an atheist might borrow from Christianity being another. It’s nice to hear your thoughts on that, because it makes it easier for me to think about how to phrase things for the audience I have. Thanks for reading and commenting!
This is is all super interesting but my dense self is missing why you find it terrifying? I totally get why abandoning your initial framework was terrifying, but once you've done that ...
And apologies in advance (or slightly in retro re the above paragraph) if our thought patterns, worldview & etc are too different for my observations to be more than annoying, but, here goes
While some people do try to dismiss responsibility for unpleasant actions or really bizarre conclusions to their preferred overarching framework, why would you think you would do that? Or do you think it's inherent? I can't see why it would or should be for major stuff?
Why do you think (or did you think, obviously we're still past tense here) your conscience is composed of what other people have told you? When i was much younger, there was a frequent EXTREME conflict with what I'd call my conscious and the socially constructed framework that I knew was what other people expected. The vast majority of my pre college graduation regrets came from following the latter over the former, but the older I got the better I became at that so don't do it hardly ever on anything important anymore. Maybe what I'm calling conscience is what you're calling guidance, except I'm assuming it's internal and you're thinking it might be external?
I'm not arguing for the necessity of an overarching framework here, btw, I don't have one myself, i don't think, except possibly in the very loosest of frameworks, and it's more moral/ethical, not theistic; firmly agnostic in most senses, tho I'd be thrilled to have a sufficient understanding or intuition of things that i could be otherwise.
Regardless of whether you thought those questions were kinda dumb or obtuse, looking forward to where your existential free fall takes you!
I can definitely relate to what you’re saying in your last few paragraphs about conflicts between yourself and society and about having an agnostic moral/ethical framework.
A really big theme of everything I’m writing, here, is that people can construct themselves, internally, in very different ways. I think you’re right to point out that the distinction between conscience/guidance is in some ways an odd one. There have probably been times in my life when I would have thought of both together as “conscience” just as you suggest.
The observation that frameworks can feel protective is pretty longstanding in both theistic and atheistic existentialism. Camus talks about it a lot from an atheist perspective. On the Christian side, Dostoevsky has this famous parable in The Brothers Karamazov in which the Grand Inquisitor tells Jesus that people don’t want what Jesus offers because they want a nice clear system that tells them what to do. Freedom can be scary!
But of course it’s not quite that simple. Most of us desire freedom, in some ways, even as we desire frameworks that help us to make decisions and make sense of ourselves. Existentialist philosophers often seem to intensely feel both the desire for freedom and the discomfort with it at the same time.
I do find that existentialism can make that almost paradoxical dislike of freedom become more salient to you just because you’re hitting it more often. So I guess the reason I was thinking I might divert responsibility to a framework is precisely because, deep down, there is a part of me that would genuinely like to do that! But part of what I’m realising, in this piece, is that I could of course choose not to anyway.
As for ongoing Angst, I think for me personally there are a few relevant factors. Right here, when I say I care deeply about something that isn’t guaranteed to work out, what I mean is that I’d like for morality to have some ideal form, because I care about it a lot, but I also understand that there may not be any such thing; the questions I care most about may not have definite answers and I have to accept that possibility.
Thanks so much for the thoughtful comment. I’m writing about philosophy on a particularly personal level, in this series, and it means a lot to me that people are bringing their own perspectives to it.
🙏
Thank you for the comment and these essays and also some of your recs.
I now very much wish the philosophy department at my university had been more oriented towards existentialism, I missed out on all the more modern philosophy I might have actually liked (philosophy of religion the notable exception) - the intro guy i mentioned in my post about philosophy retired to professor emeritus after that year, the rest were of the “if you can't define your terms everything you say is meaningless nonsense” (kinda what Wittgenstein might have been saying was a dead end iirc, funnily enough these people loved Wittgenstein) and spent all their time on a philosophy of correct language sort. I wanted to do a paper on an existentialist work i found on my own instead of the stuff that was boring me to insanity & I remember being told “if you can't explain it to me in a way that makes sense I would have ro give you an F for writing nonsense, and no one has ever explained existentialism to me in a way that I don't think is meaningless gobbledygook, but it's up to you.” I'm all for challenging dares but not gonna deliberately lose a rigged game, so that was that.
Anyway, one thing you've made me acutely aware of is gaps in my reading. I loved The Stranger but read nothing else by Camus, like Notes from the Underground much better in retrospect than I did at the time but read nothing else by Doestevsky, have only read excerpts from Nietschze.
Re: the framework, using Christianity as an example coz that's the one i know, I never got people (including adherents) who thought it was a simple set of shall & shall not, or “believe & get a free pass to eternal heaven no matter what else you do.” The Bible was pretty clear on “love thy neighbors as thyself” & “do unto others” being at the top of the commandments food chain (along with “love God”)(for any non biblically inclined who might see this, see also the bit about faith hope & love as the greatest virtues with love being the greatest of those) & this requires dynamic thought, especially when it seemingly contradicts some of the shalls & shall nots, which I always took as necessarily situation dependent anyway. I think any framework would sort of have to work like that, whether you wanted it to or not -- even the most Jalvert person is occasionally gonna run into their “Valjean is a criminal but a good person what do i do?” existential crisis on the bridge.
So cool with frameworks & don't think they get in the way of freedom, as you're still making the free choice to use those frameworks and have to make choices in deciding how to apply them. & still in agreement with those guiding principles from Christianity even if i no longer adopt the cosmology. Which is kinda irrelevant but thought I'd toss it in.
I always feel like I have gaps in my reading, too! I guess the bright side of that is that it means I have a nice long list of possible things to read.
You’re mentioning a number of things that I’m about to talk about next week, actually: different types of reasoning being one, and things that an atheist might borrow from Christianity being another. It’s nice to hear your thoughts on that, because it makes it easier for me to think about how to phrase things for the audience I have. Thanks for reading and commenting!