To affirm an object is simultaneously to deny that I am it.

Evidence

Reflection is a knowledge; of that there is no doubt. It is provided with a positional character; it affirms the consciousness reflected-on. But every affirmation, as we shall soon see, is conditioned by a negation: to affirm this object is simultaneously to deny that I am this object. To know is to make oneself other. Now the reflective can not make itself wholly other than the reflected-on since it is-in-order-to-be the reflected-on. Its affirmation is stopped halfway because its negation is not entirely realized. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 517

Categorization

• DEFINE: Explains that positional knowledge always operates through negation — a key structural principle of Sartre’s ontology of consciousness.
• XREF: Connects to the for-itself’s fundamental ‘not-being’ structure and prefigures bad faith as a denial of negation. Also links to Beauvoir’s account of women’s objectification in The Second Sex. — connects to: Identity is constructed through opposition to a continuously reinterpreted other; Identity is defined oppositionally, against those one is not.; Identity is constituted through exclusion of what it is not (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Identity is constructed through opposition to a continuously reinterpreted other #expands (0.85)
• Identity is defined oppositionally, against those one is not. #expands (0.85)
• Identity is constituted through exclusion of what it is not #expands (0.85)