...Kierkegaard vs. Nietzsche Soren Kierkegaard and Friedrich Nietzsche are known to be two of the greatest nineteenth century existentialists of all time. Existentialism is a philosophy that emphasizes the uniqueness and isolation of the individual experience in a hostile or indifferent universe. It regards human existence as unexplainable, and stresses freedom of choice and responsibility for the consequences of one's acts. Soren Kierkegaard and Friedrich Nietzsche both felt that life is irrational. They were problem thinkers who chose not to follow the systematic approach to philosophy as their predecessors did. In this regard, they stood on common ground. Both realized that no system of philosophy operates in isolation of its creators inherent prejudices. Any subjective viewpoint is biased; therefore, objectivity is impossible in any moral example. They both recognized that God no longer exists in religion in present-day expression. Men and women go about their daily lives in a manner irreverent of the possibility that there is an all-powerful God governing their affairs. Surprisingly, they proclaim their devotion to God when questioned about it. However, in their attempts to resolve this moral affliction Nietzsche and Kierkegaard are different in their quest for a cure. The very foundations of their moral constitutions were built upon conflicting ideologies: Kierkegaard put his in Christianity, while Nietzsche’s in individualism and self-determination. Kierkegaard...
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...Chantae Irvin April 17th, 2016 Kierkgaard’s “3 Stages of Life (Aesthetic, Ethical and Religious) Soren Kierkegaard (1813–1855) emphasizes the stages of life’s way which includes aesthetic, ethical and religious. It is essentially stated that all persons pass through the three stages to come into themselves. However, the idea of aesthetics, ethical and religious matters does not always coincide with one another. These things all potentially hold different characteristics and are developed differently in each individual. Nonetheless, they will essentially conflict with one another as Kierkegaard describes their stages in a fictitious manner. Kierkegaard makes it rather intense to give his own particular standpoint on the stages of life, and he does not decree answers. On the other hand, he encourages individuals to make their own conclusions. My theory is that the stages on life’s way including aesthetics, ethical and religious stages are the infinite developments on life’s way for all individuals. However, these stages are not emphasized to have had chronological order. They are uniquely criticized differently as they all are developments of life’s way. These three stages were composed for everyone to analyze and evaluate their own situations distinctively. The answer to the three stages of life does imply the individual interpretation on particular stages rather than someone else’s interpretation. In theory, the uniqueness of aesthetics, ethical, and religious stages are...
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...Soren Kierkegaard’s quote on Soulmates I feel like a lot of people want to find their soulmate but don’t realize that it’s not easy to find your other half. You will not know who your other half is until you have time away from your other half. In my opinion, your other half is found after a long time away from each other. You must accept, know and love yourself before another can accept, know and love you. When you are in love with your other half it’s not all about the love, it’s about being with them and trying to do as much for each other as you can. Helping others and doing things together to benefit not only you two, but the world. I believe that you can feel when you are with your soulmate. You feel it from within and you can feel a change in the way your surrounds seem. Knowing who your soulmate is takes time. I believe that everyone has a soulmate and that we must not look for our soulmate, but wait. Waiting around and living life while waiting are two different things. Kierkegaard knows that soulmates are bound for somewhere after life. Kierkegaard believes that they will be joined with God. If the two souls were split in Heaven then they will be reunited on their way back to Heaven. Kierkegaard knows the delicate process of soulmates finding each other and joining. When soulmates are found it is often like a miracle-Kierkegaard describes the joining of two souls as a mystical, romantic experience from within. Whether you believe in God or not it doesn’t matter...
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...Assignment: Letter to a European Philosopher PHI/105 Dear Soren Kierkegaard, I have read your profile and philosophical views on several subjects in the Moore-Bruder, (2008) AXIA Reading Material Handbook. I have two arguments that I would like to present to you on your philosophical views and choices you make to please a God that is not proven to exist. First I would like to talk about the agony of choices you made between your God and the woman you were going to marry named Regine Olsen. The choice of committing yourself to God affected you profoundly, by denying yourself the true love you longed for. You cannot touch, smell, or see this God you believe in. It sounds like to me you cheated yourself out of the one thing you truly desired. My question is why your God would want to deny you of the happiness you deserve no matter what your past childhood was like. I have to argue with your view that God has to be first place in your life. I feel you should never put someone else before your own, it only cost you emotions which is something you have had to deal with by making the choices you have to please this God that is not proven to exist Mr. Kierkegaard. My second argument has to do with your view on “The Sickness-Unto-Death”. I disagree with the statement ‘His eventual conclusion was that nothing earthy can save a person from despair. Only a subjectivism commitment to the infinite and to God, not based on abstract intellectualizing or theoretical reasoning, can grant...
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...Letter to a European Philosopher 1 Letter to a European Philosopher Rose Fromm Axia College, University of Phoenix PHI/105 Letter to a European Philosopher 2 Letter to a European Philosopher To: Soren Kierkegaard Dear Soren Kierkegaard, I had sent this letter to you so that I may be able to express the way I feel about your work. I really would like you to know that I am really fond of your work and understand every effort that you have put into the science of philosophy. Recently I had been studying and learning so much about your work and was very intrigued in what I have read about you. I have read that you are a high believer in God. You have written that you believed in god and that dread and despair was the central problems of your life, and the only way of escaping was to make a commitment of faith to god and the infinite (Moore & Bruder, 2008, p. 168). I do not agree on what you have written because I think that having dread and despair is not the reason for not having any faith in God. I believe that loving him is very important as well as having so much faith in his love. The trust that I feel in God is very valuable to me especially when it comes down to having so many things happening in my life, but for me too have God as my only friend and comforter would make feel isolated, which this could bring me sorrow and misery. You were engaged to be married to Ms. Regine Olsen and had walked away from her because you had replied...
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...Existentialism can be defined as a philosophical and literary tendency that typically displays a dismal of abstract theories that seek to disguise the untidiness of actual human lives and emphasizes the subjective realties of individual existence, individual freedom, and individual choice. Runaway by Kanye West is a great example of this philosophical theory and many connections can be made to his work and the work of Soren Kierkegaard, Franz Kafka, and Albert Camus. These four artists apply existentialist themes in their literature and even their private lives. The two themes that I found preeminent in these artists work are isolation and death. The four artists have a very philosophical cohesion between them. They all have a sense of isolationism in their works which makes their creations so unique. In Runaway by Kanye West, a phoenix falls to earth like a meteor and doesn’t know where she has ended up. The phoenix attempts to fit in with our society but she doesn’t know how to act in front of all these people so she is isolated. When the phoenix is at Kanye West’s dinner party, she sees a turkey that is about to be served for dinner and she is shocked and shrieks obnoxiously in front of all the guests and they look at her very differently and isolate her. In Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, Gregor Samsa is portrayed as a bug and people look at him very differently. Gregor is isolated in his home and can’t leave because he doesn’t want his parents to look bad. “During the day...
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...Soren Kierkegaard was a Danish philosopher. Some say his ideas were ahead of his time, and that explains his low popularity in the world at the time. His works were very illustrative and sarcastic, which sometimes makes them hard to understand even nowadays, and raises a question of whether or not he is talking seriously, or makes fun of certain things. However, the common unclearness of the meanings of his work does not affect the fact that he is one of the very well-known and popular philosophers. According to Rosenstand, (and other sources) Kierkegaard’s work and life in general were very much influenced by his father, who was a very religious man and believed that God was punishing him by taking away his children’s lives. That idea was applied to little Soren as well. And apparently, was accepted by young Kierkegaard to such point, that after his father’s death he believed that God’s wrath had transferred to him. Despite all of these issues with fate and religious fear of judgment, Kierkegaard’s father was a good father after all. He is the one responsible for the deep imaginational ability of Soren. With his father they would regularly take walks to the beach, down the Main Street, into the woods – all in their living room. (Rosenstand, 2013) His father would describe everything they saw in details and ask Soren to participate. Even though it was exhausting for the little child, those types of intellectual and imagination exercises are one of the best things a parent...
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...that are frequently asked in our society. Is there a right or wrong answer? I don’t think we will ever know. There are many different beliefs, such as existentialist philosophies, scientific, and religious. Each one has a different answer to those questions. Some of the first true existentialist thinkers were a man named Soren Kierkegaard and Friedrich Nietzsche. They both challenged he foundations of Christianity and traditional morality. “Nietzsche was interested in the enhancement of individual and cultural health, and believed in life, creativity, power, and the realities of the world we live in, rather than those situated in a world beyond” (Nietzsche 1). I feel that he was right, many people get caught up in what is going to happen in the future that they miss out on present. Why live a life if all a person is going to worry about is the unknown? “Kierkegaard said that is it especially important for people to have a meaningful existence. And meaning, he said, comes from whether or not people sense that their lives have a permanent significance. The problem is, though, that most people believe that their lives have importance only temporarily” (Kierkegaard 1). I agree with this completely, I feel without having meaning in life we would have nothing to live for. Many people believe that our purpose of life is already chosen for us. I on the other hand don’t agree with that theory. I believe that our purpose of life is what we make it. The possibilities are endless, if someone...
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...Andrew Hall Faith and Critical Reasoning 12/10/2013 What is the Eschatological goal of existence? Since the beginning of human existence there has always been some type of battle about faith, belief, and the existence of god. When this class first began I didn’t know what to expect due to my own personal beliefs and spiritual upbringing, but as the course went on I was open to different views and ways to look at what has been taught for years. Even today there is still the constant battle on whom and what is the true belief and god. But one thing is for sure we all strive for a common goal and that is to be in the grace of whatever Deity you believe in when your time on earth is done. The first thing that comes to question is your belief in the existence of God. For many the belief in god is a very challenging issue. There will always be an ongoing controversial discussion whether or not God exist. It is not unusual for people to say that it is impossible to prove the existence of God. This impossibility derives from the idea that if the observable phenomena is absent, therefore, it does not exist. In truth, how can one presume to observe the divine, something that exists in the heavens? Mere observation is clearly not a possibility when dealing with a transcendent being. Evidence in the existence of God is in every cause and effect. We understand that nothing happens in and of itself. Every event originates from a preceding event. Those events, if traced back...
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...people respected them just for being Law Man. When the Sheriff, finds himself with the predicament of entering into the hotel where he believes Anton Chigurh is. Anton is an unstoppable psychopathic hit man who is willing to kill everyone who comes across him. The Sheriff is faced with the struggle of making a decision which may or may not cause his own death or the death of Anton which would cause him to put his soul at hazard. I believe the Sheriff decision to retire was mainly due to failing attempt to capture Anton, which left him feeling despaired discourage, defeated and overwhelm. Soren Kierkegaard, believed that for a practical level-headed person, despair was the unavoidable result of a person having to face critical and concrete ethical religious predicament, which a person would have to live with the result of the lasting significance of the choices he makes for himself. For Kierkegaard the most important attribute that one could posses was the will to do something not the idea of doing so, and ‘that truth lied not in what...
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...Analyze how humanistic theory affects individual personalities. Maslow felt if you reached this level of self-actualization, you have reached the highest of all levels of human psychological development. You had developed a strong sense of self with the ability to have control of your feelings, the internal self (self-esteem) even when others around you reject or put you down, and in extreme cases even turn their backs on you. You are independent of others to satisfy your feeling of love or self-esteem they are independent or separate, becoming independent from a lower level where they first originated. Rogers stated: “Not everyone becomes a psychologically healthy person. Rather, most people experience conditions of worth, incongruence, defensiveness, and disorganization” (Feist, Feist & Roberts, 2013 p.302). The basic theory is based on self-reliance, people are capable of doing what is needed to motivate and accomplish their own personal goals from within themselves, where no outside motivation is needed. Based on freedom and being responsible, you have the freedom to choose your actions, as long as you also claim responsibility for those same actions. (Being accountable for own actions) By opening this new door in psychology, it has allowed researchers to examine the questions we ask ourselves, such as: Who am I? Is life worth living? Does it have a meaning? What is my purpose here? We are responsible for who we are and who we have become, not our parents or guardians...
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...Soren Kierkegaard’s philosophy on the three movements to faith establishes itself as a recurring and major theme throughout the movie, “Breaking the Waves”. Without the knowledge of Kierkegaard’s philosophy, the average viewer would most likely miss the significance and understanding of what truly goes on. The underlying philosophy shines light on particular instances, which generates a better understanding of each character’s individual decision-making. In order to understand the movie in its entirety, one must first attempt to understand Kierkegaard’s three movements to faith. The first movement to faith is a commitment or appropriation to a singular wish. In this stage, a person loves someone to the point where they always want to be around that one person no matter what the circumstances are. The person wishes and prays in every case that no matter what happens, they can still be physically and finitely connected to that person in each other’s lifetime. In the case of the movie, the audience is shown the main character named Bess, whose singular wish to God is to fall mutually in love with a man. After she marries this man, she wants nothing else but to always be in direct contact with her husband, Jan. The audience is shown this with a scene in the movie that depicts Bess screaming and running up to Jan just before he is about to board the helicopter to return back to work. She never wanted to let him go and she explains this to God in multiple conversations....
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...Question: Existentialism has often been described as a protest philosophy. To what extent is this true? Illustrate your answer with reference to the view of two existentialist thinkers. A person who is literally or actually present in his surrounding and is totally conscious of being there and he also has the sense of being responsible for the choices he makes that moves him forward in identifying who he is. While living in the world he is engaged with a sense of profound anxiety or dread that arises when he the individual is engage in choosing, reflecting, thinking, acting and behaving in an actual situation and he clearly understand that he or she is clearly responsible for the choices that are made. With all the above in mind the philosophical term can be define as Existentialism. Existentialism is a philosophical movement that views the individual, the self, the individual’s experience and the uniqueness therein as the basis for understanding the nature of human existence. Existentialism is a highly diverse and wide-ranging philosophy. Even though it is so varied there are some common themes that can be found throughout it: Existence precedes Essence - In other words, you need existence to have essence. There is no predetermined “true thing”, it has to already exist in order to become what it is. Anxiety and Anguish - The fear or dread which is not directed at any specific object, it’s just there. Anguish is the dread of the nothingness of human existence, the...
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...concepts of Existential psychotherapy and their application to practice. To illustrate my discussions and reflections I must use a case from a helping relationship in everyday life. * Existential therapy is based on philosophy (Deurzen, 2012). The techniques used in this type of therapy is not specific, it is based on our existence in life. The conflicts that are experienced in life are based on the givens of existence. The therapeutic relationship is between the client and the therapist and most importantly it highlights the client’s personal freedom in deciding their own direction. 0 Some of the key figures regarding existential psychotherapy are Rollo May, Irvin Yalom, Martin Heidegger, Soren Kierkegaard, Friedrich Nietzsche, Viktor Frankl, Jean-Paul Sartre (Van Deurzen, 2012, May, 1969, Cox, 2012) 0 Some of the basic concepts of extentialism are freedom and responsibility, isolation, meaninglessness, nothingness, uncertainty, death, anxiety, just to name a few (Cox, 2012). In this essay three of these concepts will be discussed and illustrated followed by a case study to illustrate how these concepts relate to existence. 0 Freedom and Responsibility 0 The fact that we are responsible for ourselves mean that we have to make choices and to take responsibilities for our actions. In this respect we have to make decisions where we have to choose between alternatives and there are...
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...Realism in Ibsen’s A Doll’s House and Churchill’s Top Girls Nineteen-century Europe held rigid conventionalisms of class division, social order and gender roles. Society hid behind the mask of hypocrisy in an attempt to preserve bourgeoisie’s position of power. In that concern, conceptions of ‘liberty of the spirit’[1] and ‘liberty of thought and of the human condition’[2] came to question. Thus, Henrik Ibsen drew attention to the threat to ideas of freedom and public opinion by giving life to A Doll’s House (1879). He aimed to critique constraints of Victorian society rather than vindicating the rights of women. In that sense, in a speech given in his honour by the Norwegian Women’s Rights League on 26 May 1898 he stresses: ‘Whatever I have written has been without any conscious thought of making propaganda. […] To me it has seemed a problem of humanity in general.’[3] Ibsen clearly states he strove to expose the manipulation of individuals’ liberties as he worked for the human cause. In Caryl Churchill’s Top Girls (1982) the aim of the play is to reveal how the fulfilment of women’s self-realization needs in the personal and social spheres is achieved by compromising humanity and morality. In the end, what ‘The New Woman’ gets is disillusionment and loneliness as she finds herself in a predicament: mother or career woman, sensitive or hardened. In Top Girls what is represented is the price women pay to go up the corporate ladder in a male-dominant world. Thus, I will...
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