An Existential Argument for an After-Life

One thing I learned in my existentialism class last semester was the importance of being intersubjective. This means being with an other in a way that is real and sincere and not fake and shallow (read The Underground Man by Dostoevsky or The Stranger by Albert Camus on how not to be intersubjective). I argued that self-sacrifice is one of the most intersubjective ways one can be. As Jesus said, there is no greater love than that. But if being intersubjective is what is key to the existentialist, then refusing to be intersubjective is wrong, existentially. So, we come to a contradiction: self-sacrifice is a way to be intersubjective and not be intersubjective. A way to reconcile this is by including an after-life. Clearly, some acts of self-sacrifice are not wrong. To do something out of mere duty is, for a secular existentialist anyways, a grave sin. So, if there is life after death, you can give one's life for another that is still worthy of being a proper existential act. If there is no life after death, no act of self-sacrifice is praiseworthy since it extinguishes all acts of intersubjectivity.

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