How can material comfort fail to provide human fulfillment according to Gabriel Marcel?

According to French philosopher Gabriel Marcel, material comfort fails to provide human fulfillment because it is a byproduct of an obsession with technology and the "spirit of abstraction" that characterizes our "broken world" (le monde cassé).1

Marcel argued that modern society often seduces individuals into equating the accumulation of material possessions with their self-worth and overall life meaning. This focus on the category of "having"—which involves taking possession of objects and seeking conceptual mastery—distorts the nature of the self. By prioritizing material success and functional roles, individuals neglect their "ontological exigency," or the essential human need to develop the inner life of the spirit through creativity, freedom, and authentic intersubjective relationships.12

Ultimately, Marcel believed that when people equate comfort with fulfillment, they become alienated from the deeper realm of "being," leading to a loss of confidence in the meaningfulness of life and a sense of deep despair. True fulfillment, he suggested, requires rejecting the dominance of "having" in favor of an openness to transcendence and the mystery of existence.12