Camus and Levinas: Embracing the Absurd While Finding Meaning

Abstract

Albert Camus’ idea of the absurd lands one in nihilism and the danger of rationally justified suicide. His attempt to solve this problem fails because it requires that one make an arbitrary choice to live without having good reasons to do so. By using Levinas’ ethics of an infinite responsibility and distinguishing between two types of meaning (cosmic and terrestrial), I propose that one can accept the condition of the absurd—where no cosmic meaning exists—and escape the problem of suicide by finding terrestrial meaning in our relations to others. Susana Camacho Plascencia Central Washington University camachopls@cwu.edu https://doi.org/10.7710/2155-4838.1176 Volume 9, Issue 1 Res Cogitans 2 | eP1176 Res Cogitans Should people live or commit suicide? This is what Camus considers the most important question in philosophy, and he sets out to answer it by discussing the absurd. The absurd is the desire to find meaning in a world that does not have any; but Camus tries to answer the basic question of life or suicide in favor of life by proposing that people choose to live despite the lack of meaning. His solution is not very convincing; the absurd leaves people without meaning or the possibility for ethics. By considering Levinas’ ethical relation of the one and the other, one can embrace the absurd and still have meaning in their lives. This way, there is a convincing answer that people should live. From the individualistic view he adopts, Camus focuses on cosmic meaning, which is meaning within the world. His rational approach prevents him from recognizing terrestrial meaning, which is found in people’s lives and is independent of the world. What Levinas describes as meaning in the relation of the one to the other is a type of terrestrial meaning, and one that is significant without being arbitrary. Camus’ claim that people can be happy living with the absurd fails to avoid suicide because the arbitrary choice that would bring someone happiness is inconsistent with the passivity of the absurd. Since meaning is necessary for life and happiness, one cannot genuinely live happily by accepting Camus’ idea of the absurd without any meaning. In addition to a lack of meaning, Camus’ idea of the absurd has no possibility for a valid ethics. I propose that instead of arbitrarily choosing to be happy while living without any meaning, people should embrace the absurd in relation to the world and recognize the possibility to find meaning in the ethical relation to others. In The Myth of Sisyphus (MS), Albert Camus introduces the idea of the absurd, which is the contrast between the reality of the meaninglessness of the world and the human desire to find meaning in it. He says that the world is not rational in a way that coincides with human reason, and “What is absurd is the confrontation of this irrational and the wild longing for clarity whose call echoes in the human heart” (MS 455). The world is indifferent to human beings, who are just another species residing within it; as much as people try to understand the world to manipulate it, they will not be able to. The longing for clarity is the desire to find a higher power that will give life purpose, as well as direction. Camus is referring to the idea of a higher power that will provide humans with objective meaning and instructions on how to live. The absurd is the desire to have such higher power when it does not exist and looking for meaning in the world in a world that has no meaning to give. Camus considers the study of the world through empirical science, and the fact that scientists can only come up with descriptions and nothing concrete no matter how much they study it. “That science that was to teach me everything ends up in a hypothesis, that lucidity founders in metaphor, that uncertainty is resolved in a work of art” (Camus, MS 454). ObservaPlascencia | Camus and Levinas commons.pacificu.edu/rescogitans eP1176 | 3 tions are made as objectively as possible, but to make sense of those observations their meaning has to be interpreted. In that case the only way to make sense of the data is to create a hypothesis that explains the observations. This process of learning about the world by proposing hypotheses fails to provide concrete knowledge about the world, and Camus takes this as the ratification of the absurd. “Hence the intelligence, too, tells me in its way that this world is absurd” (Camus, MS 454). Science shows the world can be interpreted as orderly, but that order is not established for the benefit of human beings. People wrongly interpret the universe as if it were another human; one with much more power, but with the same ability for conscious action. People’s need for meaning and moral order pushes them to such interpretation of the world, but Camus is pointing out why that is wrong. The world does not function based on reason as it is seen in people, and what generates absurdity is not the irrationality of the world. The world has to be understood as devoid of any human characteristics; it is indifferent (in an unintentional way) to the fate of human beings, and it cannot be called rational or irrational. Absurdity is the desire of human beings to find reasons and meaning in the world as if they were inherent properties of it, when they are not. In this indifferent world, science fails to give true knowledge of it, since it can only find causes but not purpose. With this interpretation, ordinary instances of life are seen under a new light. If it unexpectedly rains in a place where rain is scarce, and a person who hates rain is getting married, it does not mean the person is being punished by God or some other higher power. Nor is it an omen about the wedding or has anything to do with the people involved. It is purely due to chance; everything is up to chance in a world where things just happen without a reason—a world that just is and does not care about the humans in it. Camus’ idea of the absurd can be rationally accepted, especially after the death of the idea of God1; there is no higher power that defines human life as meaningful and gives them purpose. Not even empirical science can offer any respite; there is no inherent meaning in the world. This lack of meaning can lead to nihilism, which is “The apparent meaninglessness of life, brought about in recent Western history by the bankruptcy of the evaluative structures that previously gave life consistency and direction” (Woodward, 544). Those structures that guided the lives of people when the idea of God was highly influential crumbled with the loss of religious belief and the birth of the idea of the absurd. The death of God means that there is no more guidance on how humans should live; there is no higher purpose, and no guidelines on how to live to achieve it. This idea cannot easily be replaced with reason or another moral authority. The problem with nihilism is that because there is no mean1 This idea belongs to the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, who claimed that “God is dead” in The Gay Science. Volume 9, Issue 1 Res Cogitans 4 | eP1176 Res Cogitans ing, there is no reason to live and suicide becomes the best option. There is also the problem that without meaning there is no possibility for ethics. Simone de Beauvoir notes, “Absurdity challenges every ethics” (413). This is because in the absurd there is nothing to help one distinguish between good and bad. In the condition of the absurd distinguishing between good and bad becomes irrelevant because all actions and behaviors have the same meaning—which is none. Camus recognizes that nihilism may lead to rationally justified suicide, so he goes on to propose a way to avoid suicide while embracing the idea of the absurd. He says that the absurd person “can then decide to accept such a universe and draw from it his strength, his refusal to hope, and the unyielding evidence of a life without consolation” (BW 484). People should not try to avoid the absurdity of life by looking for meaning where there is none, nor by suicide. What they should do is embrace the idea of the absurd and choose to be happy despite the meaninglessness of the world. Because of the lack of meaning in life, for Camus one life is no better than another; what matters is not what type of life one lives, but the amount of it. “On the one hand the absurd teaches that all experiences are unimportant, and on the other it urges toward the greatest quantity of experiences” (Camus, BW 485). In short, Camus’ solution requires that one accept the absurd—the lack of meaning in life—and decide to be happy despite this lack of meaning. The problem with this solution is that it is asking that people choose to stay alive rather than commit suicide without giving a good reason to do so. This solution is inconsistent with the absurd; there is a passivity to the absurd in that it exists whether people choose to see it or not. It is inconsistent to urge people to embrace the absurd, and then tell them to use their free will and choose to be happy in an absurd world. Camus realizes that the absurd leaves one in a difficult situation when he writes, “I must admit that that struggle implies a total absence of hope (which has nothing to do with despair), a continual rejection (which must not be confused with renunciation), and a conscious dissatisfaction (which must not be compared to immature unrest)” (BW 462). Dealing with the absurd brings a hopelessness that prevents the acceptance of any meaning, and this lack of meaning is dissatisfying. Camus is saying that the hopelessness does not land one in despair, but the complete absence of hope is despair. He says that the rejection of this meaningless life is not the same as giving it up, and that being dissatisfied is not something temporary that one hopes will get better. But if one rejects all meaning, there is nothing to live for. If nothing matters, then staying alive does not matter either. Camus’ solution to the problem of