Let's Get Existential! Oh that's hot... (NSR)

[bigtrubs]

Need help with a paper due tomorrow- looking at the theme of existentiality as seen in the films i heart huckabees and Waking Life. So, here is the challenge:

To help me gain a better understanding of existentiality so that I may get an A+, hook a sister up with your best layman's term definition of it!

Bring it on...

[Stoysluttie1]

Existentialism is ALbert Camus. Existentialism is the belief there is no right or wrong, good or bad, ugly or pretty. It all depends on the individual, and nothing else.

[splat]

Get a copy of Gestalt Therapy Verbatim by Fritz Perls.

[bigtrubs]

... YEAH! And then I can read it cover to cover, watch the 2 movies again and write the 8 page paper for tomorrow! SWEEEET!

Okay, I admit it- the stress is getting to me.

[powderhound]

Read The Alchemist

[splat]

... YEAH! And then I can read it cover to cover, watch the 2 movies again and write the 8 page paper for tomorrow! SWEEEET!

Okay, I admit it- the stress is getting to me.

Yeah, wtf, just hang out here all night and write about the shit that gets posted.

[SkiersLeft]

this might be helpful a helpful link, the text is way too long to simply cut and paste. the source is UVA's dictionary on the history of ideas. good luck.

http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/cgi-lo....cgi?id=dv2-22

[oosik]

The internet is your friend:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Existentialism

[Rippinsick]

My suggestion to you is to not wait till the night before to start writing your paper. A TGR education is a fine education; but not always the best education.

[bigtrubs]

Read The Alchemist

One of my fave books... still have trouble putting my understanding of it into words however.

As for the one lecturing me for not starting till the night before- I work well under pressure and I had a paper due last monday morning, two due today, two in-class final exams today and this paper due tomorrow- you think I had time to start it earlier?

[ill-advised strategy]

Existentialism is ALbert Camus. Existentialism is the belief there is no right or wrong, good or bad, ugly or pretty. It all depends on the individual, and nothing else.

Seems like it would be a fine example of existentialism if you turned in a blank page...being as how it wouldn't be right or wrong, good or bad..ect.

Kinda like the essay question: "what is courage" and the guy who turned in a one-word answer: "this"

[pointemstraight]

Do you REALLY trust a bunch of mags when your grade is riding on it??? ;-)

[ill-advised strategy]

irony = best advise of thread given by guy w/ custom user title "registered idiot"

[bigtrubs]

I have an A+ in the class, I'm not too concerned, he's giving A's willy nilly to people who handed in 3 min slide shows of poorly focused photos. The course was Fine Arts and Technology, we watched a DVD on the making of Pink Floyd's the dark side of the moon, he's the editor of Hobo magazine, he has an open mind for this sort of thing. I'm using peoples ideas as a stepping off point to develop my own ideas.

[ill-advised strategy]

...giving A's willy nilly....Pink Floyd...editor of Hobo magazine.....open mind...

yeah, what was I thinking with that bong rip graphic?

[bigtrubs]

right and right.

[Mach Looney]

Here's a good link for your paper: http://www.metaphilm.com/philms/wakinglife.html

Don't forget to mention that existence precedes essence. That's key.

[Slabmonger]

Waking life is a good movie--also I don't have much to add to this thread.
BUT, try Googling some Jean-Paul Sarte such as Existentialism Is a Humanism for a short essay where he lays out what some of the philosophy is as he advances it as opposed to the general public view at the time it was written.

Quotes:
"Man is nothing else but that which he makes of himself"
(that is the first principle of exitentialism he continues)

"Thus, the first effect of exitentialism is that it puts every man in possesision of himself as he is and places the entire responsibility for his existence squarely upon his own shoulders."


My favorite piece of thought from this or a similar essay is that ultimate freedom brings ultimate responsibility.

Eg:
Absolute freedom is thus ultimately translated into unlimited responsibility

Don't know how to relate the film too much though...perhaps the main character goes along his dream and realizes that he has ultimate freedom that is a metaphor for the freedom in his 'waking life' as the dream-like state ultimately is indistinguishable from other states in many ways. Realizing this freedom of the dreaming world perhaps comes with the consequent realization of the ultimate responsibility the person has, especially if viewing life like a dream that kind of presents itself to you but instead in the end, the person still has responsibility over all of it...

[50kLeg]

i heart huckabees was a great film. i have nothing else to add to what has already been said.

[Showtime06]

i just did an entire section on this over xmas... its pretty deep stuff but there's a lot of info on it... Kamus, Sartre are two main writers...some works that are pure existentialsim is the play "No Exit", the book "Metamorphasis" and we watched the movie "The Trial" its all based on the fact of life is what it is on earth and what you make out of it, there is no heaven or hell so basically they don't give a shit about anything...very dark and weird but you can find a lot of info on it...good luck

[snow_slider]

So, TGR existentialism is "I post, therefore I AM."?

But I thought we are all iceman?!?

[SkiEvil]

"A being in time"

I also like Sartre's book Nausea