Into the root of Ethical Inquiry: The role of Sartre’s concept of the Other and Bad Faith

Abstract

The present research paper is primarily concerned with a critical inquiry into the root of ethical issues that arise in our lives. This is carried out through an ontological analysis of the other and bad faith from the Sartrean existential perspective. At the very heart of all three concepts: the other, bad faith, and ethics, freedom plays a significant role. Here, we examined how the freedom of an individual becomes meaningful, confronted by the objectification of the other. This analysis further identifies the other and bad faith as two genuine ontological grounds of the ethical issues of human existence, without interpreting them as intrinsically unethical. Here, we examine that ethics is not an ideal to achieve but a continuous endorsement of freedom. The paper ultimately examines authenticity as an ethical exposure that requires us to undergo the process of self-recovery, which consists of affirming the tension of the ontological interplay between freedom and facticity that structures human existence. It finds self-recovery as a continuous process that explores the notion of the ethics of imperfection.