Existential Comics

Simone Weil was a 20th century philosopher who was greatly admired by her the existentialsts, who were contemporaries of her. Camus called her the "only great spirit of the age" because she lived a life 100% committed to the causes she believed it, to a far greater extent than perhaps any other philosopher in history, except maybe Diogenes. I went on Revolutionary Left Radio to discuss her life and philosophy. Last time I was on the show to discuss Sartre and Camus's split, I briefly mentioned that Simone Weil was the one who lived the real existential life. That's because she had the rarest trait that I know of among humans: she behaved as though she actually believed her ideas. In the episode on Weil we follow up with her biography, which I claim can be read as part II and III of The Brothers Karamazov, where Dostoyevsky planned for Alyosha to become a failed socialist revolutionary and experience real suffering, then, without naivety or ignorance, learns true religion. Simone Weil embodies perfectly Dostoyevky's idea of the existential hero: absolute commitment to their own ideas, full incorporation of science into the problems of life, a deep understand of the real human condition, and ultimately still retaining a faith in the transcendent. In her brief life she: - was one of only five women to get a philosophy degree at École Normale - hosted and debated Trotsky in France - worked for a year in a factory - fought in the Spanish Civil war - worked in the French resistance - became an influential Christian mystica All in all, she lived entirely the life of a Saint without contradictions, and always subjecting herself first to the suffering of the world, and is totally unique among all people that I know in that she lived as a saint for both the communists and the Christians.

Maybe we are authentic in our own way, alright? Maybe it is authentic to sacrifice nothing for your beliefs, okay?

"Just because every girl I've ever witnessed in the past has preferred Camus to me, doesn't mean they will in the future!"

Academic Philosophers: "actually we don't like most of that stuff either, it's more of an unfortunate side affect of the work we do trying to figure out if chairs exist or not."

Thales, after looking around and seeing how many things aren't water: "god damnit."

"Should I kill myself or have a slap fight with Sartre? In the end one needs more courage to get in petty feuds than to kill himself."

Yes, under communism, you won't have to degrade yourself to the rich to beg for a job. You will, however, have to still get along with the other workers, so it will be no paradise.