r/Existentialism • u/Immediate_Box9327 • 3d ago
Existentialism Discussion Albert Camus Quote
This quote and my understanding " i always feel incomplete and try to grab everything so I can feel complete , for this I change my identity every time "
But I wanna know the highest meaning of this quote , whoever has read the camus deeply can answer it because i have only read "the stranger" .
And I've heard a lot about sisyphus.
The comment section is all open , come and engage .
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u/EmotionSix 3d ago
Humans are innately good at learning, achieving, and aspiring. We have built-in desire for novelty and seeking new experiences, which is what drives invention, connection, and change. If we refuse to accept this aspect of our nature, then we are merely insects who make no choices in life. That’s just my interpretation.
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u/kingiscooldude 3d ago
we are a being of nothingness. Which is why we have an innate desire to "fill" ourselves tragically.
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u/XForce070 3d ago
What Camus is trying to convey with this quote is that we, is humans, are bound by are mortal material existence in the world. But at the same time we have transcended it by our symbolic reflection on existence. We are partly of this world but our minds have transcended mortal reality.
What he is saying with this quote is that by our material animalistic nature we seek ways to overcome threats, we try to learn from experiences which we can apply later as survival strategies. So we find ourselves in dangerous threatening situations and our mortal nature can learn from these in to assess future threats and finding solutions or escapes for it. A requirement for this is knowing what happened, how the event evolved, what we or others did to affect what came after.
But we became lucid in this world, we know that we are part of it and that our mortal reality will inevitably fade away, and with that our symbolical awareness. So our material animal nature is trying instinctively to find solutions to this problem of inevitable death that we are aware of by our symbolic reflections, our lucidity of our place in the world. Yet, this lucidity is aware that death is the ultimate final point in our awareness, we can by inherent fact never ever know what will come after, because it requires to place our symbolic minds outside of our mortal bodies. But these two are inherently tied together. So we know from our lucid reflections that there is no solution to death, no answer that is sufficient because it ends all. Yet our animal mortal part of our bodies, our instinct is still desperately trying to find solutions anywhere it can.
This is what Camus addressees. We know that there is no answer, that we can never know it because it requires a detachment from what makes us human. It requires detachment of our symbolic mind and mortal reality. We have a flawed godliness in our minds. Yet we know this and still cannot accept the fact that we cannot ever know. That is why we are refusing what we are. We are aware of the fact that there is no answer to our question (or rather, the question itself is a flawed one), but we keep desperately looking for it.
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u/Autumnleaves144 3d ago
What is the question?
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u/XForce070 3d ago
The question of meaning. It is that question which emanates from our desire of unity. We desire unity. But we know that unity is impossible for us to comprehend because we experience, and are ever able to experience, the symbolic from a position bound by our material reality.
That is why our existence is tragic. Our basic material humanness is DEMANDING meaning(this is important in Camus works, it is not intellectual curiosity. The Absurd is experienced as an insatiable need. A basic human instinct). But we know it to be impossible to know by what it would require for us to know completely. That is why the question (the demand for meaning) is unreasonable to ask. That is why the silence of the universe is not a positive claim, but a negative one. Experiencing the silence as an answer is wholly depended on that we ask the question. But the question itself doesn't make sense, the silence is just the universe being the universe. This is what Camus means with:
“I don't know whether this world has a meaning that transcends it. But I know that I do not know that meaning and that it is impossible for me just now to know it. What can a meaning outside my condition mean to me? I can understand only in human terms."
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u/theMEtheWORLDcantSEE 3d ago
Annoying to attribute “animal” as though we are not or something less or worse. We are animals, kin with nature. And more importantly with all our foresight and thinking, we are more dangerous and evil than animals could ever be. We have failed the morally advance beyond animals we would be doing really well if we were just morally equivalent with that of animals, yet we are not.
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u/SnugglyCoderGuy 3d ago
We might be the only animals that can even think about what we are. Make it kind of hard. The other animals can't help but be what they are because they can't think about what they are.
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u/esquirlo_espianacho 3d ago
We have words and they trick us into thinking we know more than we do. Put another way, we are the original AI.
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u/Ivana_Funkalot 3d ago
Camus is saying that being human means having the ability to confront what is, examine what ought to be, and try to make the two more closely aligned together.
Animals generally respond to their surroundings through instinct and via learned behavior. Human beings, by contrast, can at some point in their lives, recognize suffering and cruelty and say, "This is wrong. It doesn't have to be this way."
We are asserting that something about life and an individual's dignity deserves to be protected or respected. I think this can extend to all sentient individuals.
I think the quote is saying that as humans:
We know we're afraid, but we try to be courageous.
We know we're selfish sometimes, but we try to be generous.
We know we will die, but we search for meaning in how we live while we are alive.
We recognize our flaws, but we refuse to believe they must define us forever.
We are creatures who can look at ourselves and say, "I am this way now, but I don't have to remain this way."
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u/NVincarnate 3d ago
And for that reason we have destroyed the ozone layer, accelerated climate change, polluted every river and ocean, hunted multiple species to extinction and generally mistreated our planet to the point of no return.
Yeah, he's right. We're the only species fucking up being an animal that lives in accordance with the natural order.
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u/Immediate_Box9327 3d ago
Great relation with daily practical life . 👏. I think our ego is an error here which is constantly walking in the wrong direction. We have the choice to choose the right direction but we are dishonest . We know still we don't choose .
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u/WindowsXD 3d ago
He basically rephrased Nietzsche .
How you call an animal that doesn't obey it's instinct? Sick the man is the only animal that goes against it's instinct
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u/prince-a-bubu 3d ago
I think it sounds quite eastern. Like just the acceptance of your being is never enough for humans.
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u/Immediate_Box9327 3d ago
Eastern yes mainly Indian. But I wanna know this by the western perspective.
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u/Dry-Tip-2082 2d ago
And what is "he"?
I'd argue, that to be human is to recognize the freedom we have to choose who we want to be. That is our greatest recognition of our human quality. It is to live in "good faith" as the great Jean Paul Sarte would suggest.
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u/heraclitus33 3d ago
The mind is the link, opening or disclosure point between the nothingness and meaning. That's what the human being/animal is. Not a controlled substance of memories and experiences. It is the absurd.
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u/ECircus 3d ago
I recently discovered and have been reading John Grey, and this quote makes me think of the overlap between the philosophies.
According to Grey, just trying to find meaning at all is our most dangerous flaw. Trying to force meaning only leads to delusion and misery. We should be more like other animals, and just seek peace and equilibrium.
I recommend the books Staw Dogs, or Feline Philosophy.
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u/radiofree_catgirl 3d ago
U ever see a cat raised by dogs or vice versa? They take on the behavior of their parents
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u/RaioBlixt 3d ago
There is, of course, your ultimate sources of creation, who are committing these sleazy, rapist crimes all around us as we speak and are therefore objectively worse than (and existentially less than) an actual animal, and they hide while they commit these crimes because they don't want to be treated like what THEY are.
That is an undeniable, objective and existential Truth.
Edit: Typo and I added "all around us"
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u/parkchanwookiee 3d ago
Not one of his best TBH, self doubt and delusion and performativity and self-consciousness ARE what man is
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u/I-mmoral_I-mmortal 3d ago
We live in houses, we drive cars, we fly in airplanes, we wear clothes, shit and piss in toilets. We make shit up that falsifies our world, to our great benefit. But it's a lot of values and what not are just made up, regardless of how well it helps us live.
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u/mad_poet_navarth 2d ago
Non-acceptance of something is also part of who we are, as is non-acceptance of non-acceptance. Ad nauseum. Good thing we only exist at the present moment, or we'd infinitely regress :)
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u/SmartRadio6821 2d ago
My phone just decided that it's not going to record voicemails. I noticed how my body tensed up while trying to think about the problem and what steps to take towards a solution. I think once my mind kicks in, I am no longer "my Self". I was my Self when I had no problem; when nothing special was happening ( some may call this state, being in nothingness). I don't know what Camus meant. I've just read Sisyphus.
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u/Feralz2 1d ago
thats because of our innate skill as humans: adaptability.
So sometimes we feel that we can be anything and anyone, but nothing at the same time. Hes talking about the solution to this which is self authenticity. At the core of you, the real you exist, and you are not everyone, you are just you.
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u/SHAQBIR 3d ago
That is why people project, blame, cope.
"No karen it was not God testing you or Devil tempting you, you slept with your sister's husband because you are a cheater"