This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Chapter 3, The Positive Aspect of Ambiguity, Sections 1-3, The Aesthetic Attitude, Freedom and Liberation, The Antinomies of Action.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. In what sense does Beauvoir claim that every man is free?
(a) In the sense that only consequences affect his choices.
(b) In the sense that he is free to end or continue his existence.
(c) In the sense that he spontaneously casts himself into the world.
(d) In the sense that he can choose his own ethic.

2. What explanation does Beauvoir give to assert that existentialist thought helps to build community.
(a) Beauvoir asserts, "Existentialists, with their dogmatic adherence to solipsism, help to rally a wide range of theorists to disprove their irrationality."
(b) Beauvoir asserts, "...existentialism,...(is) the plurality of concrete particular men projecting themselves toward their ends on the basis of situations whose particularity is as radical and irreducible as subjectivity.
(c) Beauvoir asserts, "Despite their disparate views, existentialists easily welcome any detractor because they only see them as creations of their own minds."
(d) Beauvoir asserts, "Existentialists are more often inviting of debate since they do not consider any idea as wrong because they accept no idea as right."

3. Upon what does Beauvoir claim that a child's freedom is based?
(a) Upon his willingness to trust adults without question.
(b) Upon ignorance that makes all his decisions meaningless.
(c) Upon his inability to grasp the concept of cause and effect.
(d) Upon adults whom he is only to respect and obey.

4. Beauvoir claims that critics of existentialism claim that it is solipsistic. What is solipsism?
(a) The theory that life is replicated on many planets in many worlds.
(b) The theory that only the self (mind) exists or can be proven to exist.
(c) The theory that only the physical life exists and matter is eternal.
(d) The theory that life is nothing more than a creation in the mind of God.

5. Why does Beauvoir claim that some individuals have lives that slip into an infantile world?
(a) Because they discover they are incompetent in the direction they choose for their lives.
(b) Because they never leave the fanciful world they create in their minds.
(c) Because they are kept in a state of servitude and ignorance and have no means of breaking the ceiling which is over their heads.
(d) Because the labor they choose prevents them from using their minds.