This room of An Existential Philosopher's Museum
is now mainly of historical interest.
It has been replaced by an updated version:
http://www.tc.umn.edu/%7Eparkx032/CY-AX.html
A Presentation by James Park---------------------Our Existential Predicament

Existential Anxiety: Angst

SYNOPSIS:

    Have you ever felt the nameless dread?
Terror and anguish without a cause?
This talk gives a name and careful description to the nameless threat,
the free-floating anxiety we have all felt but perhaps not faced.
First we will distinguish existential anxiety from simple fear in 5 ways.
Then—capitalizing on insights provided by
Martin Heidegger, Søren Kierkegaard, and Ludwig Binswanger—
we will proceed to unpack and examine many dimensions of this experience:
our ordinary ways of trying to manage anxiety;
the option of channeling it creatively as the impetus for Authenticity;
and finally the possibility of living without angst.

OUTLINE:

I. SIMPLE FEAR
    Five Dimensions of Fear
        1. Description: Psychological Responses to Danger.
        2. Cause: Caused by Specific Threat.
        3. Duration: Temporary, While the Danger is Present.
        4. Scope: Limited to the Values the Peril Can Reach.
        5. Cure: Fight or Flight.

II. EXISTENTIAL ANXIETY
    Five Dimensions of Existential Anxiety
        1. Description: Irrational, Free-Floating Terror.
        2. Cause: No Intelligible Basis or Source.
        3. Duration: Permanent, Does Not Pass Away.
        4. Scope: Pervades Our Whole Being.
        5. Cure: Nothing We Do Will Overcome Angst.

III. MOMENTS OF DISCLOSURE OF EXISTENTIAL ANXIETY
    A. Exaggerated Fears.
    B. Phantom Fears.
    C. Plain, Ordinary, Everyday Anxiety.
    D. When Normal Securities Disappear.
    E. Fear of the Future.
    F. Fear of the 'Nothing'.
    G. Ontological Anxiety.

IV. ATTEMPTING TO HANDLE EXISTENTIAL ANXIETY

V. FOCUSING ANXIETY FOR AUTHENTIC EXISTENCE

VI. FREEDOM FROM EXISTENTIAL ANXIETY

    James Park is an existential philosopher.
This presentation is based on a chapter in his longest book,
Our Existential Predicament: Loneliness, Depression, Anxiety, & Death,
called "Existential Anxiety: Angst".

    A three-page version of this sermon appears here:
Existential Anxiety: Angst.

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