Sartre’s for-itself is an active nothingness, unlike Heidegger’s Dasein

Evidence

For Sartre, the in-itself and the for-itself are as opposed as matter and antimatter. Heidegger at least wrote about Dasein as a kind of being, but for Sartre the for-itself is not a being at all. It is a ‘nothingness’, a vacuum-like hole in the world. Gabriel Marcel memorably described Sartre’s nothingness as an ‘air-pocket’ in the midst of being. It is, however, an active and specific nothingness — the sort of nothingness that goes out and plays soccer. — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 497

Categorization

• XREF: The ‘air-pocket’ image and ‘nothingness that goes out and plays soccer’ sharpen how Sartre differs from Heidegger’s Dasein — useful on the existentialism-phenomenology synthesis thread. — connects to: Sartre’s For-itself is a radicalized version of Plato’s Other.; Heidegger’s positive descriptions of Dasein mask hidden negations — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 216; Sartre divides being into free for-itself consciousness and inert in-itself matter — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café: Freedom,…, 496 (+2 more)
• CANDY: ‘The sort of nothingness that goes out and plays soccer’ is a delightful, tweetable compression of Sartre.

Broader Connections

• Sartre divides being into free for-itself consciousness and inert in-itself matter #expands (0.85) — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 496
• Sartre’s concept of the for-itself projects itself toward objects as lacks. #expands (0.85) — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 240