Maybe It’s Wishful thinking: On Self-Deception through Jean-Paul Sartre’s the Gaze

Self-deception is given a definition that hinders the Self from attaining authenticity, therefore, not free. Thus, it is commonly regarded as an epistemic and ethical defect. This research intends to prove the determination of self-deception as not inherently and intrinsically evil and may be ethical in utility through its specie, wishful thinking. To achieve this, Jean-Paul Sartre’s Gaze is used to justify a phenomenological-existential framework. The endeavor used the literature review section as a foundational threshold for the evaluation of existing theories of the variables in this paper, namely wishful thinking, self-deception, and justification. In the same manner that the arguments were presented in a manner that it would reinforce the conditions to justify wishful thinking. The exposition of the problem of Sartre’s Gaze was used as the central theory. This study attempted to answer the question “How is the Gaze an enabling factor for the allowability of Self-deception by wishful thinking?” Therefore, the explication of the theories of ethics are posited and will be the foundations of future pursuits on the facets and variations of Self-deception and wishful thinking. If properly qualified into disposition, wishful thinking may ascertain psychological resilience and guarding of epistemological identity.