Absurdity means the choice grounds all reasons and reasons-for-being
Evidence
In one sense choice is possible, but what is not possible is not to choose. I can always choose, but I must know that if I do not choose, that is still a choice. This, although it may appear merely formal, is of great importance as a limit to fantasy and caprice. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Existentialism Is a Humanism, 26 (
#expands, via linked claim)
Categorization
- XREF: connects to: The absurdity of choice lives in a felt unjustifiability that freedom itself generates — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 1147; A fundamental choice is only real as a choice in the world — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 1147; Absolute freedom makes one’s every choice perpetually fragile and invertible (+10 more)
Broader Connections
- The refusal to choose is itself a choice.
#expands(0.82) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Existentialism Is a Humanism, 26 - Absolute freedom makes one’s every choice perpetually fragile and invertible
#expands(0.80) - Existentialist ethics demand acting as if the fate of humanity rests on each choice
#expands(0.80) — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 919 - Self-justification sought outside oneself collapses into perceived absurdity.
#corroborates(0.80) - Every act expresses the totality of the self rather than prior causes
#expands(0.80) - The for-itself is fully responsible for its being yet cannot justify or choose it
#qualifies(0.78) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 343 - Avoiding choice through victimhood excuses constitutes inauthentic existence
#corroborates(0.76) — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 37 - Formalism is treating as inexorable any choice that is not.
#corroborates(0.75) — Frederick Schauer, Formalism, 34 - Border situations force whole-being choices that abstract thought cannot resolve
#expands(0.75) — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 274 - Choice is the moment spirit passes into nature and morality is realized
#exemplifies(0.72) - Rational choices today can make rational choices tomorrow impossible.
#expands(0.72) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 385