Was Schopenhauer Right?

[Demiurge]

Ok, I was just asking a question, please don't feel the need to talk down to me.

I wasn't talking down to you or at least was not attempting to.

 

[derek]

Fair enough. Came across a bit like that. Doesn't really matter though, I should have read more schopenhauer before posting - i've just always kinda avoided him.

 

[Blaphbee]

God I cant remember. But if I must, I will find it online. Its in World as Will and Idea. Im surprised you think this is nonsense oh enlightened Cythraul--the idea is essentially Buddhist. Schopenhauer "borrowed" it from them. Surely you've read the Dhammapadra etc?

Hm, its not easy finding his texts online. Here is a decent summary of his pessimism:



If reality is the blind will to live, and the world is the objectivation of such a blind will, life is painful misery. Schopenhauer makes a broad and acute analysis of all the various branches of existence, only to conclude that life is essentially pain and that it is a mistake to persevere in the will to live. According to him, everywhere in the world everything is desire, because all -- everywhere -- is will. To desire signifies suffering distress on account of the lack of what is desired. If the desire is not satisfied, the distress remains and increases; if it is satisfied, satiety and annoyance follow, and this in turn causes new desires and new distresses.

The will finds thousands of pretexts for perpetuating this unsatisfied hunger of the will to live. These pretexts only perpetuate the misery of life.

One such pretext and deceit is love. The will of the species masks itself under the pleasures of love with the purpose of perpetuating the desire for life in others. In so doing, it satisfies its own will to live.
Another pretext and deceit is egoism, which impels us to increase the pains of others in the hope of gaining some advantage in our own miserable life.
Still another deceit and illusion is progress which, in actuating itself, only makes more acute the sense of distress.
The Sacred Writer, in Schopenhauer's interpretation, says that increasing knowledge is only to increase distress. (Ref. Ecclesiastes 1:14, 18: I have seen all things that are done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a chase after wind...For in much wisdom there is sorrow and he who stores up knowledge stores up grief.)

The whole world is miserable because of the universal blind will to live. Man can avoid his share of misery by suppressing the will to live.

Schopenhauer's philosophy is the antithesis of that of Hegel. In Hegel, reality and rationality coincide. Struggle and injustice are nullified and are justified in the higher synthesis; and, finally, progress and history entirely justify evil in its extreme manifestations of war and national calamities. In Schopenhauer, on the contrary, reality is blind and therefore essentially irrational and evil. Love, progress, history do not justify and annul misery; they are deceits and illusions behind which the blind, unconscious will masks itself, for this will is never satisfied with living and suffering. The systems of Hegel and Schopenhauer represent different atheistic conceptions of the world and of life.

Before the human being comes onto the scene with its principle of sufficient reason (or principle of individuation) there are no individuals. It is the human being that, in its very effort to know anything, objectifies an appearance for itself that involves the fragmentation of the will and its breakup into a comprehensible set of individuals. The implication of this fragmentation, given the nature of the will, is terrible: the result of the epistemological fragmentation is a world of constant struggle, where each individual thing strives against every other individual thing; the result is a permanent “war of all against all” akin to what Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) characterized as the state of nature.

Kant concludes in the Critique of Pure Reason that we create the laws of nature (CPR, A125); similarly, Schopenhauer concludes in The World as Will and Representation that we create the violent state of nature, for he maintains that the individuation that the human being imposes upon things, is imposed upon a blind striving energy that, once it becomes individuated and objectified, turns against itself, consumes itself, and does violence to itself. His paradigm image is of the bulldog-ant of Australia, which when cut in half, struggles in a battle to the death between its head and tail. Our very quest for scientific and practical knowledge creates a world that feasts upon itself.

Hence derives Schopenhauer's renowned pessimism: he claims that as individuals, we are the unfortunate products of our own epistemological making, and that within the world of appearances that we ourselves structure, we are forever doomed to fight with other individuals, and to want more than we can ever have. On Schopenhauer's view, the world of daily life is essentially violent and frustrating; it is a world that, as long as our consciousness remains at that level where the principle of sufficient reason applies in its fourfold root, will never resolve itself into a condition of greater tranquillity. As he explicitly states, daily life “is suffering” (WWR, Section 56) and to express this, he employs images of frustration taken from classical Greek mythology, such as those of Tantalus and the Danaids, along with the suffering of Ixion on the ever-spinning wheel of fire.

I don't know where you culled this from, or if you dreamed it up yourself, but this is the single most idiotic representation of Schopenhauerian thought I've ever seen. It is completely false, full of misrepresentations, and overbearingly melodramatic.

Did whoever wrote the above even read The World as Will and Representation? They've done a magnificent spinjob of twisting the semantics around to fit their agenda. Schopenhauer certainly wasn't an optimist, but if you've read his main work, or any of his other works, without listening to the claptrap of simpletons who can't understand why philosophy and the world it describes isn't peachy keen, light and fluffy all the time, you quickly come to the determination that we was not a pessimist.

He drew more inspiration from Vedic scripture than he did from Buddhism, which are entirely separate philosophies.

If you're going to try to philosophize, don't gossip about the philosophers themselves. You just look like idiots.

 

[derek]

^All fair points, i suppose. If blunt.

 

[speed]

I don't know where you culled this from, or if you dreamed it up yourself, but this is the single most idiotic representation of Schopenhauerian thought I've ever seen. It is completely false, full of misrepresentations, and overbearingly melodramatic.

Did whoever wrote the above even read The World as Will and Representation? They've done a magnificent spinjob of twisting the semantics around to fit their agenda. Schopenhauer certainly wasn't an optimist, but if you've read his main work, or any of his other works, without listening to the claptrap of simpletons who can't understand why philosophy and the world it describes isn't peachy keen, light and fluffy all the time, you quickly come to the determination that we was not a pessimist.

He drew more inspiration from Vedic scripture than he did from Buddhism, which are entirely separate philosophies.

If you're going to try to philosophize, don't gossip about the philosophers themselves. You just look like idiots.

Well that was the best I could find on the Internet that was somewhat on point. Hell one part is from that Stanford Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy , and the other I forget, but something similar.

And whats wrong with a little gossip? Arent you gossiping when you state he drew more from Vedic scriptures than Buddhism? I remember his constant illusions to buddhism, and when I pick up a encyclopedia, it mentions he drew a large inspiriation from Buddhism. And whats so wrong with Buddhism anyway?

 

[ARC150]

I don't know where you culled this from, or if you dreamed it up yourself, but this is the single most idiotic representation of Schopenhauerian thought I've ever seen. It is completely false, full of misrepresentations, and overbearingly melodramatic.

Did whoever wrote the above even read The World as Will and Representation? They've done a magnificent spinjob of twisting the semantics around to fit their agenda. Schopenhauer certainly wasn't an optimist, but if you've read his main work, or any of his other works, without listening to the claptrap of simpletons who can't understand why philosophy and the world it describes isn't peachy keen, light and fluffy all the time, you quickly come to the determination that we was not a pessimist.

He drew more inspiration from Vedic scripture than he did from Buddhism, which are entirely separate philosophies.

If you're going to try to philosophize, don't gossip about the philosophers themselves. You just look like idiots.

Your point is unfortunately lost...or, more to the point, never made. As much as you disdain the claims made in speed's post, you offer blunt malfeasance in lieu of any contrary arguments. I happen to agree with your idea that "we was not a pessimist" [sic] (please refer to my earlier post); but it would be better of you to construct support of your ideas rather than simply degrade another's ideas.

/$0.02

 

[Blaphbee]

And whats wrong with a little gossip? Arent you gossiping when you state he drew more from Vedic scriptures than Buddhism? I remember his constant illusions to buddhism, and when I pick up a encyclopedia, it mentions he drew a large inspiriation from Buddhism. And whats so wrong with Buddhism anyway?

No. I'm being factually correct. If you've read the WaWaR, most of his citations stem from the Upanishads, not from Buddhism. There is a large discussion which arose because of someone mentioning buddhism, which has little to do with what Schopenhauer sought to achieve through this work.

Being correct is far more important than offering opinions about unrelated topics, when trying to philosophize.

Your point is unfortunately lost...or, more to the point, never made. As much as you disdain the claims made in speed's post, you offer blunt malfeasance in lieu of any contrary arguments. I happen to agree with your idea that "we was not a pessimist" [sic] (please refer to my earlier post); but it would be better of you to construct support of your ideas rather than simply degrade another's ideas.

My argument is this, dumbed down for comprehension: The main book itself refutes the points made in the introductory description of Schopenhauer's thought, copypasted earlier in this thread by speed. This is all I drew attention to. I'm trying to put an end to moronic discussion, and refocus discussion on his actual thought, not biased opinionated interpretations which are not correct. You have to have read the WaWaR to understand the support for the argument of the prior sentence.

I offer "blunt malfeasance" due to the wrongness of the opinion which does not correspond to fact. In philosophy, truth is what is sought. Not old maids gossiping about the personalities of the philosophers, or drawing on irrelevant foundations. I'm surprised no one's brought up the well-known misogyny yet, that's always good for derailment purposes!

 

[speed]

No. I'm being factually correct. If you've read the WaWaR, most of his citations stem from the Upanishads, not from Buddhism. There is a large discussion which arose because of someone mentioning buddhism, which has little to do with what Schopenhauer sought to achieve through this work.

Being correct is far more important than offering opinions about unrelated topics, when trying to philosophize.

My argument is this, dumbed down for comprehension: The main book itself refutes the points made in the introductory description of Schopenhauer's thought, copypasted earlier in this thread by speed. This is all I drew attention to. I'm trying to put an end to moronic discussion, and refocus discussion on his actual thought, not biased opinionated interpretations which are not correct. You have to have read the WaWaR to understand the support for the argument of the prior sentence.

I offer "blunt malfeasance" due to the wrongness of the opinion which does not correspond to fact. In philosophy, truth is what is sought. Not old maids gossiping about the personalities of the philosophers, or drawing on irrelevant foundations. I'm surprised no one's brought up the well-known misogyny yet, that's always good for derailment purposes!

Your criticisms are well taken. I hastily posted those clipped explanations, and it has been years since I read Schopenhauer.

However, Arc150 does have a point, you have offered nothing to this thread other than arguing SChopenhauer preferred Hinudism over BUddhism. Others like ARC150, and Demiurge discussed what Schopenhauer really postulated. You pretend to know a hell alot about him, but you have yet to illuminate upon this great knowledge. So please, oh great Blaphee, bring light to my clouded mind.

 

[derek]

The point about personalities was somewhat relevant. There really is no need for such a bad attitude, I was just curious about if Speed was drawn towards the seemingly pressimistic philosophy of Schopenhauer because of his mood.

(Speed, if you are indeed a lady, I apologise)

 

[speed]

The point about personalities was somewhat relevant. There really is no need for such a bad attitude, I was just curious about if Speed was drawn towards the seemingly pressimistic philosophy of Schopenhauer because of his mood.

(Speed, if you are indeed a lady, I apologise)

Well If I was, I think even transvestites would think I was ugly. He wasnt criticizing personalities though, just my second post where I cut and pasted articles that discussed Arthur's philosophy.

 

[derek]

There was some reference about personalities.

You posted some food for thought, which has led to this thread...I don't see anything particularly wrong with posting those clips.

 

[speed]

There was some reference about personalities.

You posted some food for thought, which has led to this thread...I don't see anything particularly wrong with posting those clips.

Well thank you. I am feeling self confident enough to post other crazy threads now. Its just my nature really-see the true philosophical journey--unlike most I really have no specific point of view or ideology I wish to convince everyone of, only questions upon questions.

 

[angelofdeath9308]

When ole' Arthur stated that the natural state of humankind is misery and suffering, and happiness and cheer is but a illusion--a negative illusion.

Seems like so many spend their whole days in drudgery all for a few moments of so-called happiness. And then there are those that love suffering, and seem to seek it out and revel in it. Thoughts?

I agree that Schopenhaur had pessimistic ideas, but I wouldn't say that's all he had. Just read this:
"The final refuge is suicide.... but this triumph is merely individual; the will continues in the species. Life laughs at suicide and smiles at death; for every deliberate death there are thousands of indeliberate births. 'Suicide, the willful destruction of the single phenomenal existence, is a vain and foolish act, for the thing-in-itself- the species, and life, and will in general, remains unaffected by it...' " How is that not pessimistic?
On the other hand, I believe he also said that there were ways to rid oneself of the strife and misery of the will, by devoting oneself to art.
And no, I'm not a Schopenhauer genius, I'm just saying what I learned from a book.

As to my point of view (at the moment), I try to live by Voltaire's quote that we must "cultivate our gardens." Yes, the universe is cold, mechanical, and soul-less, yes it is impersonal and does not care for the individual (as schopenhauer said), and yes it will continue after our insignificant death. But this does not mean we have to be depressed all the time. It means we have to find meaning ourselves (existential), and progress ourselves (humanist). I guess in shorter terms, it is up to us humans to make our own through life, to cultivate our gardens.