Moreno, Just in case your doubt is because of Sartre’s later work, let me mention that I was only describing what were Sartre’s views as he was writing Being and nothingness.
I’d like to use an analogy to show the difference between how I know that book and how one who had a thorough philosophical education may know that book. I know I wrote a lot, perhaps it would only be necessary to thoroughly read the paragraph in bold and the last paragraph. I simply wish to show why I may be considered to have a certain form of expertise on this subject and why my word on this matter may have more validity than one might expect (and I would also note that this subject and it alone is what I would claim I have philosophical expertise on).
I’ll first describe the differences between myself and the one who had a thorough philosophical education. The latter person studied many prior philosophers before arriving and Being and Nothingness, in many cases they were asked to do so at what I would consider an unnatural pace such as just a few years, for whatever philosophical work they read they were asked to read/hear a modern philosophers (one who had also had original studied philosophy in the same way) views including in many cases their instructor. They often did not have time to decide what they think of each philosophical work and simply had to defer to contemporary philosophers/their instructor, they certainly did not have the time to integrate the philosophies into a more broad perception of who they are. Then when they came to Being and Nothingness they had to levels of bias working against them, the fact that they may be inclined to take every piece they read and relate it to their vast prior education and the fact that with that book as the others they will be asked to study it while reading/listening to a contemporary philosopher’s/instructor’s views.
But, that is just their initial education. Those modern philosophers who would claim expertise may have spent the next forty years in continued study of that book, but I think we can both agree that many of the biases they were given while initially studying the book stayed with them and kept them from seeing the book in an entirely authentic manner (you may note the irony).
This is how I learned about Being and Nothingness. About three years ago ninety percent of what I had read was fiction and I had never read a complete philosophical work or modern philosopher’s review of one or heard an instructor’s views on one. In fact the only philosopher I had ever read was Dennet. I also simply knew nothing of the subject of the history of philosophy. The relevant background I had was years of spending hours at a time whenever I got the chance reflecting on philosophical concepts. But, it should be noted that they were antagonistic to Sartre’s views (at the time all I knew was that Sartre insisted we must find our own meaning and I still thought that meaning was set in stone and only need to be found, long some long lost treasure). But, I was drawn to his book after sampling many others simply because the writing style drew me in. For some reason I appreciated that it was not written in a way that would insult one’s intelligence, but went right into abstraction and rarely left.
I had to learn that book as if I was learning a new language; it was that incomprehensible at first. I read the book at least four times (throughout about one and a half of the next two years) before I ever discussed it with anyone. I couldn’t help but have an intuitive understanding of it after reading it that many times with nothing but the text itself for and a relatively few words from the translator. Sartre convinced me that that I wasn’t going to find the truth hidden somewhere. Sartre gave me a good way of explaining this dynamic of truth to myself. I still didn’t know the meaning of many of the words he was using including all the Greek and German for which the translator rarely bothered to translate and I never looked them up. So explaining the book to others has always been difficult, but one can be assured that I know what I’m saying.
The analogy between me and the one with the formal education in Sartre can be made between one with a formal education in the English language itself and one with an informal. Let’s say there are two adults from a culture mostly isolated from Western ideas. With a language that is about as far remove from English as possible. So neither had any formal western education. An English professor (let’s say an American) moved there and spent five years tutoring one of them; ‘A’. He taught him formal English and that was all that they spoke to each other. And he taught him an enormous vocabulary and the historical contexts of many of the English language’s words as well as the history of the language itself. And perhaps he even taught him some aspects of the cultures of the English speaking people, both historically and modern.
Then the other person; ‘B’, moved to America and lived and worked with a family that owned a small business, in a Midwest town that was mostly culturally homogeneous for whom they could be said to reflect the stereotypical American culture (I know that’s vague). He never learned to read and they never bothered to tell him much about the rest of the outside world. He became fluent in the exact form of English that was spoken in that family’s neighborhood and learned practically everything about their culture, simply by living and working amongst them.
Now let’s say that many people in the culture that both people are from immigrated to America including ‘A’. Perhaps a different part of the country than where ‘B’ was living. So ‘B’ moved to be with them. Let’s say they were the first of their culture to get established in America. So basically they had to heavily rely on the education that ‘A’ and ‘B’ had gotten. Both ‘A’ and ‘B’ could help teach them English, and translate for them initially. ‘A’ would be useful knowing how to read and he could teach others to read and tell them all the historical knowledge he has (should they be interested). ‘B’ would simply just know the culture through his prior emersion and would be of much more use. For people unfamiliar with the culture and who must do their best to find a place to live and work he would have knowledge that ‘A’ simply couldn’t help them with. And if someone from their culture should have a cultural misunderstanding and go to them for help, only ‘B’ would really be able to explain to them the problem (no matter how hard ‘A’ might try).