Jean-Paul Sartre's existentialism is based on the tragedy of human freedom. We are doomed to only rely on ourselves in the choices we make, and we are fully responsible for them. There's no comfort in moral code or religion.

When I read Sartre's lecture about existentialism as humanism, I was in awe, but his philosophy is that of loneliness and despair. It takes the highest form of heroism to own our deeds 100%, without relying on excuses and circumstances to pardon our mistakes.

It would be hard for most to make decisions without any moral guidance. I think there is no deed of ours that's solely our business. Everything we do affects other people in some way. Does Sartre advise disregarding them in the choices we make?

Sounds like remnants of a polytheistic Roman or Greek ancient culture where many so-called gods were humans and more as well that claimed that status... answerable only to themselves.

I think our freedom is in our hands. We should defend our rights, our opinion and our dreams. Everybody is responsible for his choices and nobody more. We obtain what we deserve and there is no another way.

Hello, everybody. It was very interesting to read your insights on human freedom, choices that we make and responsibility that we take. I agree that it is hard to totally rake the responsibility of our actions, choices, words and everything else in our lives. It is always comfortable to have a backup plan, i.e. in case something goes wrong have somebody who we can share our responsibility with. However, I still think that it is even more difficult to live our lives making decisions that are somehow influenced by the people around us and their views. It is no secret, that our main goal in living is being happy. And it is just a very, very thin line between courage and fear. And when we make a choice in regard to courage, when we are ready to accept our lives and ourselves as we are, taking full responsibility for the life that we are living, we discover such a power within ourselves to live the life that we want, to build our destiny the way we want it to see. Taking responsibility for our lives equals the power to build our lives the way we want to see it. That is the main reason why I always support philosophers who propagandize not relying on any religion or any political system but searching for the way within and follow it with heart full of courage. It is just a matter of a choice- to follow the crowd or to make your own path. Even though the first maybe the easiest, but the second one is anyway a way of courage, heroism, happiness, joy and lively existence.

Thank you for this thread. I think Jean-Paul Sartre is very interesting writer and influencial philosopher. Sartre’s works are definitely is not an easy reading. I read his Being and Nothingness and honestly did not understand a lot. The only thing I got that his main idea is that all people should be free. It is, however, not easy to achieve. It is possible to achieve that freedom through being, in other words through existentialism. Here Sartre is very similar to Martin Heidegger's Being and Time. Fiction Sartre’s works such as The Flies, The Words and many other are easier to read and understand in my opinion.