Existentialist subject as a pillar of modern way of thinking – questioning Sartre’s existentialist postulate

Abstract

The problem of founding a subject which has been present since Descartes will be solved by the author on the ground of the existentialist philosophical thought, specifically through the work of the existentialist philosopher Jean – Paul Sartre. We will consider the influence of Descartes and awakening of the modern subject’s consciousness, and point to his decisive role in shaping consciousness of the modern subject, or pointing to his obscurity today. In this way, Descartes enabled Sartre to bring about the reversal of the essence-existence relation, and by following Sartre's definition of a man as a being who has assumed responsibility for his existence, we discover how the subject in modern philosophical thought outlived his modern predecessor. We begin with Descartes’ constitution of the subject of thought, we then go through the area of Sartre's determination of subjectivity, being and nothingness, to conclude with the qualification of a human in its existential determinants (precisely in Sartre's existentialist philosophy).