facticity

The quality or state of being a fact.

[F]rom the earliest times down to the middle of the last century the writers of the Jewish and Christian Churches, with the exception of the Deists in England and of some isolated views, unanimously held fast the facticity of the events recorded in this book [the Book of Jonah in the Bible].

In existentialism, the state of being in the world without any knowable reason for such existence, or of being in a particular state of affairs which one has no control over.

For as sure as the absolute knowledge (in the infinite facticity—actual existence—of each single knowledge) is only in the absolute form of the For-itself, so sure each knowledge goes also beyond itself; or, viewed from another point, is in its own Being absolutely outside of itself, and encircles itself entire.

In particular, we cannot choose the circumstances of our birth and our entire bodily condition. These "facticities" appear to us as having no foundation or justification. Why is one person born blind and another born with perfect vision? Facticities are thus contingent, they present themselves as simply "there."

A fact that is not changeable or that is assumed to be true without further evaluation.

Near-synonyms: given, axiom, postulate

It is important for those to ascribe to [Jean-Paul] Sartre a crude theory of "absolute freedom" to notice that he does acknowledge the existence of facticities which I did not originate and which I cannot change (e.g., the date of my birth). [...] [W]hile I can change some of my facticities (e.g., I can move to another city, I can get glasses, I can even, perhaps, get a sex-change operation), it is nonetheless true that these acts are all possible for me only insofar as I now, in fact, live in Chicago, have certain abilities and disabilities of eyesight, and am male. Freedom, then, always presupposes facticity, and a free act cannot occur, nor can the idea of a free act even be rendered intelligible, except against a background of facticity.