Date of Award
4-1984
Document Type
Dissertation - Restricted
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department
Philosophy
First Advisor
Thomas Anderson
Second Advisor
Keith Algozin
Third Advisor
Mary F. Rousseau
Fourth Advisor
Andrew Tallon
Fifth Advisor
Walter Stohrer
Abstract
Jean-Paul Sartre is famous for an analysis of human freedom which makes human beings thoroughly responsible for the condition of the social/historical world. This analysis of human freedom, first presented in Being and Nothingness, is used as the basis for the Critique of Dialectical Reason's understanding of the dialectic of history.
It is often claimed that the ontology on which Sartre's understanding of freedom is based vitiates any attempt to describe conflict-free human relations. Indeed, Sartre does state in Being and Nothingness that the free self is alienated in the presence of others and that human relations are relations of conflict. Yet in the Critique of Dialectical Reason, Sartre appears to deny this view of human relations. This dissertation will compare and contrast Sartre's theory of human relations in his two major philosophical works.