HOMEWORK #5

So. Part IV of this lecture made me want to rip my hair out.

After telling us that we are absolute individuals, we cannot understand one another, we act in 'bad faith' and try to convince ourselves that external influences govern us, but true happiness is only found within, Banach suddenly asserts that "we must choose courses of action that we would wish all humans to take," and, to top it off, this:

"[To] act authentically [...] one must act in a way that ignores the differences between oneself and other people. These differences are merely external and do not affect our identity as free agents, within our islands of subjectivity."

Does not compute.

Am I just missing something here, or is Banach now stating that internally we are all essentially the same? How does this fit in with his idea of being an absolute individual, unable to feel what anyone else feels or vice versa? If we are to think of how we would want others to act before we act, doesn't that involve external influences?

Doesn't acting as I would have others act entail judging how others act based on my subjective morals or thoughts? Or would you be judging how closely their actions align with their ideals?

If we are individuals, is it even possible for us to look at our actions objectively and base them upon what we would have others do? Or is doing that inherently subjective? Is that subjectivity the point, is that what makes it authentic? But is it authentic to think about your actions universally?

What if what you personally want to do or think you should do is different from what you would have someone else do?

He also says that for a person to be free, "everyone must be free". Again, how does this support his prior rendering of individualism? If as he says an individual can find happiness from within, why not freedom? Wouldn't this imply that no one is free, because it's obviously impossible for everyone in the world to be free, or even to contemplate freedom? Who decides what freedom is? If someone finds freedom inside a cage, what does that mean?

Is it possible to be free but not happy, or happy but not free? Is one more important than the other?

Can we be truly be happy if others are unhappy? If true happiness comes only from within, does unhappiness, also? Is being unhappy a choice, a decision, a state you are resigning yourself to? "You say that I choose sadness, that it never once has chosen me." Or is unhappiness based upon external influence, and thus not 'true'? Is there any true unhappiness? Is unhappiness ultimately false, as we fool ourselves into thinking that there is no way we can make ourselves happy? Or is it perhaps the other way around?

...As usual, I'm left with more questions than answers.