Editing Essence (section)

===Existentialism===
[[Existentialism]] is often summed up by [[Jean-Paul Sartre]]'s statement that for human beings "[[existence precedes essence]]", which he understood as a repudiation of the philosophical system that had come before him. Instead of "is-ness" generating "actuality," he argued that existence and actuality come first, and the essence is derived afterward.

In this respect he breaks with [[Søren Kierkegaard]], who, although often described as a proto-existentialist, identified essence as "nature." For him, there is no such thing as "human nature" that determines how a human will behave or what a human will be. First, he or she exists, and then comes property. [[Jean-Paul Sartre]]'s more materialist and skeptical existentialism furthered this existentialist tenet by flatly refuting any metaphysical essence, any soul, and arguing instead that there is merely existence, with attributes as essence.

Thus, in existentialist discourse, essence can refer to:
* a physical aspect or property;
* the ongoing being of a person (the character or internally determined goals); or
* the infinite inbound within the human (which can be lost, can atrophy, or can be developed into an equal part with the finite), depending upon the type of existentialist discourse.