Sartre's Lack Of Meaning In The World

According to Sartre, the existence of others complicates matters significantly because it disrupts the world of each individual. Sartre considers human beings nothing but consciousness of objects, the lack of a priori meaning in the world enables the freedom to create `33and confer meaning onto objects and determine significance on an individual basis. However, the existence of other people means that each individual is not the sole creator of meaning - that instead there is a multitude of meaning being created and clashes are inevitable. The complete freedom experienced is accompanied by the burden of taking absolute responsibility for one’s life. Often, people are overwhelmed by their burdensome freedom and attempt to escape it through self-deception,

People of bad faith escape the reality of their existence by subscribing to the disharmony between transcendence and facticity as demonstrated through using religion, science, social class, etc. as an excuse to deny their free will. The inclination to become an object can be a reaction in the form of bad faith. The existence of other subjects means that there will be transfigurations in identity occurring as a consequence of self-perception changing upon being perceived by others, the change from subject when perceiving to object when being perceived by other subjects. Sartre argues that neither becoming an object nor objectifying others is a permanently allows for the coexistence of the self with others. Sartre’s No Exit is a vehicle for bad faith as it vividly demonstrates the problem posed by the existence of other people. The play’s three main characters: Garcin, Inez, and Estelle have died and they are all stuck in a room together forever, unable to escape each other – a situation Sartre deemed hell. Initially there is confusion over the lack of torture devices and the usual stereotypes associated with hell, but as time passes it becomes evident that hell is other