Finitude is the necessary condition of the For-itself’s original project

Evidence

But this inapprehensible body is precisely the necessity that there be a choice, that I do not exist all at once. In this sense my finitude is the condition of my freedom, for there is no freedom without choice; and in the same way that the body conditions consciousness as pure consciousness of the world, it renders consciousness possible even in its very freedom. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 871 (#expands, via linked claim)

In any case it is evident following our analysis that the way in which my companion suffers his fatigue necessarily demands—if we are to understand it—that we undertake a regressive analysis which will lead us back to an initial project. … But this original relation is nothing other than the for-itself’s being-in-the-world inasmuch as this being-in-the-world is a choice—that is, we have reached the original type of nihilation by which the for-itself has to be its own nothingness. No interpretation of this can be attempted, for it would implicitly suppose the being-in-the-world of the for-itself just as all the demonstrations attempted by Euclid’s Postulate implicitly suppose the adoption of this postulate. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 1107 (#expands, via linked claim)

It must be understood of course that the project of the for-itself is not to establish a being of reason, that is a being which the for-itself would first conceive—form and matter—and then endow with existence. Such a being actually would be a pure abstraction, a universal; its conception could not be prior to being-in-the-world; on the contrary its conception would presuppose being-in-the-world as it supposes the pre-ontological comprehension of a being which is eminently concrete and present at the start, which is the “there” of the first being-there of the for-itself; that is the being of the world. The for-itself does not exist so as first to think a universal and then determine itself in terms of concepts. It is its choice and its choice can not be abstract without making the very being of the for-itself abstract. The being of the for-itself is an individual venture, and the choice must be an individual choice of a concrete being. … That which it forms the project of being appears to it as an eminently concrete totality; it is this particular being. Of course we can foresee in this project the possibilities of a universalizing development; but it is in the same way as we say of a lover that he loves all women or all womankind in one woman. The for-itself has the project of being the foundation of this concrete being, which as we have just seen, can not be conceived—for the very reason that it is concrete; neither can it be imagined, for the imaginary is nothingness and this being is eminently being. It must exist; that is, it must be encountered, but this encounter is identical with the choice which the for-itself makes. The for-itself is an encountered-choice; that is, it is defined as a choice of founding the being which it encounters. This means that the for-itself as an individual enterprise is a choice of this world, as an individual totality of being; it does not surpass it towards a logical universal but towards a new concrete “state” of the same world, in which being would be an in-itself founded by the for-itself; that is, it surpasses it towards a concrete-being-beyond-the-concrete-existing-being. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 1384 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: The for-itself’s project is a concrete individual choice, not an abstract universal — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 1384; The fundamental project is the for-itself’s choice of its own being-in-the-world. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 1107; Finitude is the condition of freedom, since freedom requires choice. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 871 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Finitude is the condition of freedom, since freedom requires choice. #expands (0.82) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 871
• The fundamental project is the for-itself’s choice of its own being-in-the-world. #expands (0.80) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 1107
• The for-itself’s project is a concrete individual choice, not an abstract universal #expands (0.78) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 1384
• Bad faith lets spontaneous projects remain unfounded flights from freedom #complicates (0.72) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Ethics of Ambiguity, 23