Empathy for Sartre

Listening to- Dropkick the Punks by The Faint (Check it out on the playlist at the bottom of this page)
Eating- Raw Spinach with Plain Yoghurt
Much to my perpetual chagrin, the philosophy class I’m taking has tickled my brain. Currently, this brain stimulation has taken the form of a strange sort of empathy for Sartre, in addition to incomprehensible vehement (and indubitably obnoxious) rants about how Bertrand Russell is irrevocably wrong. These rants are fueled by so much righteous indignation that even thinking about his theories about language pisses me off. Anyways, on to Sartre. We were watching this video about him on Youtube in class, and the narrator was discussing this metaphor Sartre had for his relationships with other humans. (Keep in mind that the quote, “Hell is other people,” is attributed to this angsty Frenchman.) Someone is pressed against a keyhole, mesmerized by whatever is happening inside the room. The watcher is totally absorbed in the scene to the point where they are unaware of their own existence (and their own capabilities with regards to interacting with others), until someone comes up the stairway behind them. Caught in the act, they are suddenly acutely self-conscious and ashamed of the impropriety of their actions. This metaphor succinctly encapsulates my issues with interacting with others- left to my own devices, I would love to press my eye to the keyhole and watch in privacy; however, as soon as someone comes up the stairs (or opens the door) I clam up, totally at a loss as to how to interact. It’s just so much more interesting to watch and produce pseudo-insightful thoughts about those in the room actively participating in life.
Since the aforestated metaphor was possibly less meaningful to everyone else, I’ll endeavor to explain the Bertrand Russell (aided by Joe Klein) vs. Lynn argument. The sentence, “The golden mountain does not exist,” is as good a jumping off point as any. Russell believes that there are only true and false statements; however, the above sentence is neither true nor false- it’s meaningless. In order to garner meaning, Russell breaks the sentence down in to three parts.
1. There is at least one thing that is a golden mountain.
2. There is at most one thing that is a golden mountain.
(These first statements compose the uniqueness clause, which basically means that there is only one thing being referred to)
3. The thing that is a golden mountain does not exist.
Russell claims that this statement breakdown is true if and only if every part is true- since the uniqueness clause is false, the entire statement is false.
Clearly, I wouldn’t be mentioning this if I didn’t disagree, so here’s my counter argument.
The above statement is only partially false, since the phrase “there is” is synonymous to the phrase “there exists” and Russell neglects to specify which meaning of existence he is attempting to disprove. Gold exists, as do mountains, and one can easily add these two concepts mentally, proving that the above statement still doesn’t really mean anything; however, the golden mountain can exist conceptually but not physically.
The second sentence Russell manipulates to attempt to convince unsuspecting women of the superior size of his… well, anyways, goes as follows, “The present king of France is bald.” The phrase “the present king of France” doesn’t refer to anything in the physical realm of our world, so Russell again claims that the sentence is meaningless unless it is subjected to his numbered breakdown and proven false. Russell, aided by Joe Klein, claims that the aforementioned addition of true concepts is delving in to Plato’s Universal Realm of Ideas, which Russell (and most other people) don’t believe.
Fair enough; however, what are numbers but referents to concepts? The statement, “Two plus three plus six equals nine,” is analogous to the aforementioned bald king statement- both sentences rely on the addition of concepts to refer to anything, even if the ultimate outcome is false.
Russell’s response, supposedly, would go something like this. “Math is the exception.”
Cop-out.