In contracts and legal documents, there is a concept of “separability” which means that clause A is connected to clause B in a way that cannot be undone.
The great twentieth century French philosopher, Gabriel Marcel, has a profound non-separability analysis of existence itself. Marcel wrote:
…We cannot really separate:—
Gabriel Marcel, Being and Having: An Existentialist Diary, Harper Torchbooks, 1965, page 10.
- Existence
- Consciousness of self as existing
- Consciousness of self as bound to a body, as incarnate.
This leads to saying things that are very deep aspects of existential thinking governed by the points above. For example, Marcel wrote, “As I have said elsewhere, the moment I treat my body as an object of scientific knowledge, I banish myself to infinity.” Consider the end of the previous phrase. The very notion that someone, within themselves could go down a route to “banish themselves” in this way, shows you a door into very deep psychological problems. In other words, Marcel is telling you that some psychological problems could have a philosophical or existential root cause and are a type of blunder.
This is not to say that one should avoid scientific thought. Taking a drop of your blood and viewing it under a microscope is not a blunder. However, if you take this to the extreme of trying to analyze everything scientifically, to the exclusion of philosophy in daily life, this is Marcel’s warning.
Marcel’s context for this thinking is given here:
Notes for a Paper to the Philosophical Society
Undated, written in 1927 or 19281
When I affirm that something exists, I always mean that I consider this something as connected with my body, as able to be put in contact with it, however indirect this contact may be. But note must be taken that the priority I thus ascribe to my body depends on the fact that my body is given to me in a way that is not exclusively objective, i.e. on the fact that it is my body. This character, at once mysterious and intimate, of the bond between me and my body (I purposely avoid the word relation) does in fact colour all existential judgments.
What it comes to is this. We cannot really separate:—
- Existence
- Consciousness of self as existing
- Consciousness of self as bound to a body, as incarnate.
From this several important conclusions would seem to follow:
- In the first place, the existential point of view about reality cannot, it seems, be other than that of an incarnate personality. In so far as we can imagine a pure understanding, there is, for such an understanding, no possibility of considering things as existent or non-existent.
- On the one hand, the problem of the existence of the external world is now changed and perhaps even loses its meaning; I cannot in fact without contradiction think of my body as non-existent, since it is in connection with it (in so far as it is my body) that every existing thing is defined and placed. On the other hand, we ought to ask whether there are valid reasons for giving my body a privileged metaphysical status in comparison with other things.
- If this is so, it is permissible to ask whether the union of the soul and body is, in essence, really different from the union between the soul and other existing things. In other words, does not a certain experience of the self, as tied up with the universe, underlie all affirmation of existence?
- Inquire whether such an interpretation of the existential leads towards subjectivism.
- Shew how idealism tends inevitably to eliminate all existential considerations in view of the fundamental unintelligibility of existence. Idealism versus metaphysics. Values detached from existence: too real to exist.
Existential and personalist interests closely linked. The problem of the immortality of the soul is the pivot of metaphysic.
Every existent is thought of like an obstacle by which we take our bearings—like something we could collide with in certain circumstances—resistent, impenetrable. We think of this impenetrability, no doubt, but we think of it as not completely thinkable.2 Just as my body is thought of in so far as it is a body, but my thought collides with the fact that it is my body.
To say that something exists is not only to say that it belongs to the same system as my body (that it is bound to it by certain connections which reason can define), it is also to say that it is in some way united to me as my body is.
Incarnation—the central ‘given’ of metaphysic. Incarnation is the situation of a being who appears to himself to be, as it were, bound to a body. This ‘given’ is opaque to itself: opposition to the cogito. Of this body, I can neither say that it is I, nor that it is not I, nor that it is for me (object). The opposition of subject and object is found to be transcended from the start. Inversely, if I start from the opposition, treating it as fundamental, I shall find no trick of logical sleight of hand which lets me get back to the original experience, which will inevitably be either eluded or (which comes to the same thing) refused. We are not to object that this experience shews a contingent character: in point of fact, all metaphysical enquiry requires a starting-point of this kind. It can only start from a situation which is mirrored but cannot be understood.
Inquire if incarnation is a fact; it does not seem so to me, it is the ‘given’ starting from which a fact is possible (which is not true of the cogito).
A fundamental predicament which cannot be in a strict sense mastered or analysed. It is exactly this impossibility which is being stated when I declare, confusedly, that I am my body; i.e. I cannot quite treat myself as a term distinct from my body, a term which would be in a definable connection with it. As I have said else-where, the moment I treat my body as an object of scientific know-ledge, I banish myself to infinity.
This is the reason why I cannot think of my death, but only of the standstill of that machine (illam, not banc). It would perhaps be more accurate to say that I cannot anticipate my death, that is, I cannot ask myself what will become of me when the machine is no longer working.3
[1] This paper was never delivered.
[2] It is thought of, but it is never resolved. The opacity of the world is in a certain sense insoluble. The link between opacity and Meinbeit. My idea is opaque to me personally in so far as it is mine. We think of it as an adherence. (Note written Feb. 24th, 1929.)
[3] ‘To be involved.’ (idée d’un engagement) Try to shew in what sense this implies the impossibility (or absolute non-validity of my representing my death. In trying to think of my death I break the rules of the game. But it is radically illegitimate to convert this impossibility into a dogmatic negation. (Note written Feb. 24th, 1929.)
It is evident that this whole train of thought is at the root of le Gouvernail: the first notes on the theme of le Gouvernail were composed a few days after these. (Note written April 13th, 1934.)
Gabriel Marcel, Being and Having: An Existentialist Diary, pages 10-12
The reader should not be afraid of converting this level of discussion to everyday life and everyday slang. For example, when Marcel uses phrases like, “I banish myself to infinity” that should resonate with phrases like “flipping out.”
Take this example from Kierkegaard. There’s a book-seller in Copenhagen and he greets a customer who has just entered his shop. The book-seller turns to his wife and says, “It is I who am speaking, isn’t it?” Kierkegaard’s book-seller seems to have “banished himself” and cannot return.