PHL314 Existentialism
Professor: Craig DeLancey
Office: Piez Hall 225
Email: delancey@oswego.edu


Current Assignments
I do not accept homeworks by email!

May 3
Read Heidegger's B&T section 65. The first two pages of this are a bit vague, but focus on the material that follows the proclamation that "Temporality reveals itself as the meaning of authentic care."

May 5
Read Heidegger's B&T sections 74 and 75.

Note we obviously aren't going to squeeze in another paper before the end of the semester! So, if there are no objections, I will change the grade distribution to be: paper 25%, exams 25% each, homeworks (4) and quizes (1) 25%.



Tentative/expected Assignments (subject to revision)
May 5, 7
More selections from Heidegger and Sartre.

May 10
Final exam. The exam will be from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. in class. Bring a pen. You may also bring B&T, The Plague, No Exit, The Flies, The Geneology of Morals, a copy of existentialism is a humanism, or even if you like a copy of Being and Nothingness. Consider the following as worthy of study, along with the study questions from the midterm and any study questions concerning our readings:
  • What does Heidegger mean by "anxiety"? What does anxiety reveal?
  • What does Sartre say all existentialists have in common? That is, how does he define existentialism? Would you agree with his definition? Why or why not?
  • How does Sartre interpret and explain "anguish" (which is a common translation for angst and anxiety), "abandonment" and "despair" ?
  • What does Orestes mean in The Flies when he says there is another way? What is his epiphany?
  • Why don't the characters of No Exit leave the room?
  • What would Sartre recommend the subjects in Milgram's experiment do? How should they understand their situation?
  • What are Vladimir and Estragon waiting for, in Waiting for Godot? Should they keep waiting? What does it mean (that is, what does Beckett appear to mean to assert by showing) that they wait without any result? Would Sartre recommend we wait? Would Heidegger? Would Nietzsche? Would Camus?
  • Why does Paneloux decide he will not accept the care of a doctor? Why does the death of Jacques Othun cause him to committ to this? Contrast his view with Rieux's notion that the job of a doctor is to resist the order of creation.
  • What does Tarrou mean when he says that he too suffered from plague? What kind of plague?
  • Nietzsche took as one of his tasks opposition to nihilism. What is nihilism? How do Heidegger, Sartre, Beckett, and Camus variously answer the possibility of nihilism?
  • What is existentialism? Of the philosophers and writers we've read, who is an existentialist, who is not, and why?