Consciousness is necessarily consciousness of something, always self-consciousness through its object

Evidence

20 In love, something is loved: Brentano, Psychology from an Empirical Standpoint, 88. … 21 ‘To wrest oneself’ and ‘in a nice warm room’: Sartre, ‘A Fundamental Idea of Husserl’s Phenomenology: intentionality’, in Critical Essays (Situations I) 40–6, this 42–3 (originally published in 1939). — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 1186 (#expands, via linked claim)

Every conscious existence exists as consciousness of existing. We understand now why the first consciousness of consciousness is not positional; it is because it is one with the consciousness of which it is consciousness. At one stroke it determines itself as consciousness of perception and as perception. The necessity of syntax has compelled us hitherto to speak of the “non-positional consciousness of self.” But we can no longer use this expression in which the “of self” still evokes the idea of knowledge. (Henceforth we shall put the “of” inside parentheses to show that it merely satisfies a grammatical requirement.) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 134 (#expands, via linked claim)

Consciousness is consciousness of something. This means that transcendence is the constitutive structure of consciousness; that is, that consciousness is born supported by a being which is not itself. This is what we call the ontological proof. … Not only does pure subjectivity, if initially given, fail to transcend itself to posit the objective; a “pure” subjectivity disappears. What can properly be called subjectivity is consciousness (of) consciousness. But this consciousness (of being) consciousness must be qualified in some way, and it can be qualified only as revealing intuition or it is nothing. Now a revealing intuition implies something revealed. Absolute subjectivity can be established only in the face of something revealed; immanence can be defined only within the apprehension of a transcendent. … It is not a question of showing that the phenomena of inner sense imply the existence of objective spatial phenomena, but that consciousness implies in its being a non-conscious and transphenomenal being. … To say that consciousness is consciousness of something is to say that it must produce itself as a revealed-revelation of a being which is not it and which gives itself as already existing when consciousness reveals it. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 151 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Consciousness defines itself by internal negation of its own objects; Self-consciousness is the sole mode of existence for any consciousness of something — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 135; Consciousness has no content because it is always directed outward at objects — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 129 (+9 more)

Broader Connections

• Intentionality means consciousness is always directed toward something beyond itself. #expands (0.95) — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 1186
• Consciousness of self is identical with consciousness of the object, not a separate act #expands (0.92) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 134
• Consciousness is necessarily directed at a being other than itself #expands (0.90) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 151
• Consciousness is a duality that is unity, irreducible to the in-itself #corroborates (0.85)
• Consciousness transcends toward the meaning of being, not being itself #expands (0.82) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 154
• Consciousness is a temporary fold in being, not separate from it #complicates (0.80) — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 739