Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

bobbyfiend t1_j04lfdt wrote

Reply to comment by buddhabillybob in Existence is infinitely richer than our descriptions of it. So, rather than cling to reductive explanations that only ‘close’ life’s possibilities, we should ‘open’ reality by seeing ourselves as perpetual students | Interview with Black Existentialist Lewis Gordon by philosophybreak

>I do, however, wonder how far existentialism is compatible with any form of “identity” in the normal sense of the word.

It works for me. Identity is always (seriously, always) strongly tied in with context/environment/circumstance. Those are filtered through our imperfect perceptions and memories, etc. but they are still there and still very powerful. I don't think any serious existentialist would suggest that everyone can just casually discard their lived experience. It's there, and it shapes identity. True, we have more choices about that than we are often led to believe, but it's not a binary: our context is a powerful force, whether we flow totally with it, try to swim against the current, or try to find some way to zig with/against it orthogonally or whatever. It's there and it will always matter.

5

buddhabillybob t1_j04v8mg wrote

Quite true, experience is the primary concern for existentialists; however, there may not be a simple relationship between experience and the labels we normally use for identity. The question “Who am I?” is at the heart of existentialism. The question “What is my identity?” isn’t quite same question, at least in the terms we usually use for identity—class, race, gender,etc.

At least, that’s where my thinking is at right now.

2

iiioiia t1_j073kv4 wrote

> I don't think any serious existentialist would suggest that everyone can just casually discard their lived experience. It's there, and it shapes identity. True, we have more choices about that than we are often led to believe, but it's not a binary

You can think of it as probability distributions across numerous variables, the population, and time. So in the case of racism (and various other -isms, experienced from a particular frame), as time progresses the whole distribution will retain approximately the same shape (reflecting the relative levels of the racism within the population) while the entire distribution can move towards less racism (absolute decrease in the aggregate).

0

bobbyfiend t1_j08kxtd wrote

That's a hypothesis, for sure. I don't know of any empirical evidence to suggest that the size and shape of the distribution of racism within a given population necessarily stays invariant while the mean changes.

2

iiioiia t1_j08tbd5 wrote

Agreed, that's why I used "approximately" - technically/tautologically, it changes to the degree that it changes, and that value is not known because there is no way to measure it accurately, so people tend to ~imagine a value (or, choose one from a wide variety of inaccurate representations) that aligns with their preconceived notions.

0