JeanPaul_Sartre_JeanPaul_Sartre_Basic_Writing

92Jean-Paul Sartre: Basic Writings(1937) Sartre argues that consciousness constitutes itself in the face ofobjects. The presentation of objects is a necessary condition for the unity ofconsciousness. If there were no world, there could be no consciousness.Sartre’s realism therefore entails a kind of externalism. Whatconsciousness is depends upon the objects of consciousness that lieoutside it. Objects transcend consciousness, there is more to them thanboth the consciousness of them and what is directly presented in theconsciousness of them. Transcendence is the constitutive structure ofconsciousness. An object is transcendent if and only if it is not exhausted bythe consciousness of it. Sartre thinks consciousness is supported by abeing which is not itself. A necessary condition for the existence and natureof consciousness is the existence of objects for consciousness that existindependently of consciousness.It follows straightforwardly from this externalism that consciousness isnot a substance. If something is a substance then it depends on nothingoutside itself, but consciousness depends on its external objects, soconsciousness is not a substance. Sartre’s existential phenomenology isinconsistent with the Cartesian doctrine that consciousness is a mentalsubstance capable of existing independently of physical objects. Ifconsciousness is not any kind of substance then consciousness is not amental substance. If Sartre is right, Cartesian mind–body dualism is false.Nevertheless, Sartre’s realism is not immune to objection. Even if it ispart of common sense, and may be sustained by philosophical argument,that physical objects exist independently of the perception of them, this viewlooks far less plausible when applied to mental images, fictional characters,imaginary beings and perhaps abstract objects such as numbers. On theface of it these items are ‘internal’ rather than ‘external’. Arguably theirexistence depends upon consciousness rather than vice versa.Sartre’s reply is to draw attention to what he calls the illusion of immanencein The Psychology of Imagination. From the fact that there are mental imagesand abstract objects it does not follow that there are non-physical objectsthat exist within consciousness.In fact, according to Sartre, the mental image is not an object towardswhich acts of consciousness are directed. The image is itself a mental act,embedded by and embedding further mental acts. An image is not an objectof awareness, it is a kind of awareness, a way of being aware. It posits itsown object as non-existent, as absent or as existing elsewhere. It follows