MERCADO, Rene Ricardo A.

Ethics
2M4 Reflection Paper: Existentialism
The movie Gattaca tackles about a distant world where genetic engineering
is considered to be a norm. A child can be conceived the natural way or using
genetic manipulation for the parents to have the ideal child. Upon birth it can
already foresaw possible health issues a child may occur by just one drop of his/her
blood just as what was presented in Vincent’s case where it was said that his
maximum life span would only last 30.2 years having a 60% manic depression,
32% probability, possible attention deficit disorder of 89% and a 99% chance of
having a Heart disorder. This resulted to his father Antonio, to be ashamed of his
son refusing to make Vincent be named after him. This kind of system violates the
existentialism since the life of a person is already planned and he/she has no say to
change it since society refuses to accept such act. Throughout the movie many
existentialist concepts can be seen in the following characters: Vincent Freedman,
Jerome Morrow and Antonio Freedman.

Vincent Freedman is the odd man out of the entire characters in the film
since he is the only one to refuse to accept the fact that his life is already decided.
He is the only one of the few who practice existentialism in the entire film he
chooses to create and shape his own path despite his many health complications
thus proving that our existence exceeds presence.

Jerome Morrow being the one of the elites then due to an accident caused
him to be crippled however no one knew about his condition. This resulted to his
personal dilemma of loosing his purpose in life since the system made him feel like
his purpose in this world has ended because of him being crippled.

Antonio Freedman on the other hand, fails to recognize that any meaning of
our life has is given to us by us alone. Deciding to just follow the path or system
created by someone such as society is your refusal to accept the absurd which
Sartre define as “bad faith”.