How we can be is not bound by what life appears to be at any point in time, pessimistic or not. This applies to the moment we die as much as any other. — Possibility

Again, you either are not addressing or are failing to see how we are bound by the situatedness of historical contingency, physics, and socioeconomic realities. Unless or until you address that, we don't have much to talk about. I am not denying change happens in the context of these boundaries.. but that doesn't really mean much for my argument. Rather, it is the fact that our dissatisfaction-nature creates, manifested in the human animal as a historically-grounded, socioeconomic contextualized being, must do X, Y, Z, to survive (comply) or die.. Simple as that. You can pretend otherwise, you can speak soliloquies on whatever, but what you are doing now, after you get off this forum, and just about anything else you do is bound by these conditions.

Read it again in context. I was saying that to what you said here, somehow entailing lack with "individuality is false".. huh?
Lack is just an awareness that ‘individuality’ is false at any level of existence.
— Possibility — schopenhauer1

But it does go together. Lack - as an awareness of feeling I don’t have something - entails EITHER an expectation that I should have it - that there is a wholeness to be had as an ‘individual’ existence, OR an awareness that this feeling is false, and that ‘individuality’ as a whole concept is an illusion. So, which is it?

I’m not looking for a way out, just a more useful description of ‘the way’, because it’s obvious that ‘comply or die’ is NOT it...
— Possibility

Bullshit. You live in the situatedness of history, physics, socioeconomic reality. You can deny it, but I can deny gravity and that wouldn't mean jack shit on its truth. — schopenhauer1

I’m not denying the situatedness, only your claim of our incapacity in relation to it. Without denying that gravity exists, we can simulate a zero gravity situation. It’s a start. When we understand how to counteract its effects, we’re no longer ‘slaves’ to it - it only appears that we are. Once we understand how to simulate the effects of gravity in situations where it’s lacking, then we won’t be bound by it.

Same with this situatedness - understand how to counteract its effects, then understand how to simulate those effects where it’s lacking. We do this already, with language. All your carry-on about HR management and corporate motivation is exactly that. We’ve been spinning this cultural agenda bullshit to each other for so long now, we don’t even realise that we’re the ones doing it. We’ve drawn so many lines in the sand that we have no clear perspective of the full capacity available to a global humanity in relation to conceptual reality. Instead, we’ve been chasing this myth of ‘individual’ wholeness, as if it’s the answer to all our needs and wants.

Schopenhauer recognised the egoistic ‘individual’ as illusion, and saw interconnectedness or compassion, aesthetic contemplation and asceticism as ways to relate this world as representation (what appears to be) with the world as will (how to be). It is in these temporary, will-less states, free from striving and suffering, that we can perceive the potential of this world as will, and the way to be laid out before us. We then simply need the courage and understanding to choose that way despite the striving and suffering of what life appears to be. Easier said than done, granted. Still, the way isn’t hidden from us, and we’re not entirely incapable of following it.

Pessimism in its purest form, stated simply, is, the real neither is nor can ever become perfect, and that the ideal is always bound to remain unreal. It thus postulates a complete lack of harmony between the world of facts and the world of ideals. — skyblack

While these are good points, I think that the dissatisfactory nature of being is providing the why as to why the realities don't met the ideals. Rather, it was never going to be ideal. It was always set up for dissatisfaction from the start. In fact, our very being born itself was a result of dissatisfaction of a human not born previously, or perhaps a night of passion, again, drives of dissatisfaction pleasure not had now leads to a whole lifetime of dissatisfaction, and it continues.

We survive by manipulating tools and passing on these technologies through storage of this information through cultural means via language... Language itself applied with the general ape learning processes our ancestors inherited being the mechanism by which we can abstract concepts to make tools in the first place.. But somehow this confers that because of novel tricks (artistic genius, technological innovations, complexity itself in all our processes of social arrangements and how we interact with the environment), there is meaning in this beyond the dissatisfaction. Don't get tricked by the accidental and look at the essential nature.

But it does go together. Lack - as an awareness of feeling I don’t have something - entails EITHER an expectation that I should have it - that there is a wholeness to be had as an ‘individual’ existence, OR an awareness that this feeling is false, and that ‘individuality’ as a whole concept is an illusion. So, which is it? — Possibility

This is a false dichotomy.. so I don't buy the straw man you are knocking down.

I’m not denying the situatedness, only your claim of our incapacity in relation to it. — Possibility

Is this a justification for birthing more people? No. Because the agenda is real.

When we understand how to counteract its effects, we’re no longer ‘slaves’ to it - it only appears that we are. Once we understand how to simulate the effects of gravity in situations where it’s lacking, then we won’t be bound by it. — Possibility

So I think you are missing my point completely. Did. you. read. the. Willy. Wonka. discussion? The reason I ask, is that is basically my start with this particular argument we are having. There are options, but on closer inspection, those options are much more limited.. For example, I can't not comply with the dictates of life because I will die.. We are bound to a certain extent to the realities we are born into. The capacity for change or variety doesn't negate the boundaries that we are born into as humans. Don't sugar coat the picture. Don't romanticize it. Don't try to sublimate it. Certainly don't try to obfuscate it.

Schopenhauer recognised the egoistic ‘individual’ as illusion, and saw interconnectedness or compassion, aesthetic contemplation and asceticism as ways to relate this world as representation (what appears to be) with the world as will (how to be). It is in these temporary, will-less states, free from striving and suffering, that we can perceive the potential of this world as will, and the way to be laid out before us. We then simply need the courage and understanding to choose that way despite the striving and suffering of what life appears to be. Easier said than done, granted. Still, the way isn’t hidden from us, and we’re not entirely incapable of following it. — Possibility

Right right, be an ascetic monk/saint whatever. I admire Schopenhauer and agree with him on his general evaluation, but I said right in the OP this:

So what is one to do? If suicide isn't a real option, there is only the perpetual cycle. The illusion is that it can be broken. Schopenhauer deigned freedom by asceticism. That was a nice consolation-hope to provide, but it's simply training the mind to live with the existential striving-after more easily. That is all- a mental technique. It is not a metaphysical escape hatch. We are stuck until we are not. — schopenhauer1

So no, there is no where to go, nothing to do, nothing to see, nothing to be. But ironically, that includes the achievement of "no-thingness" of the whole ascetic enterprise, which I question as anything that is real or achievable or even necessary. Schopenhauer was an ardent platonist (infused with Kantian concepts). That is, there are some "grades" of "being" beyond the material. That brings up a whole other discussion on what "gnosis" is in ancient Platonic thinking, etc. He had ideas of "Ideas" that are somehow existent "beyond" material reality.. in the realm of pure Idea/form.. and that one can "access" this in some way through acts of will-lessness like "art", "compassion", and "ascetic practice". Yet, the whole scheme of "higher reality" I question.. As much an admirer I am oh Schopenhauer, it doesn't mean I think he is beyond questioning. He thought long and hard about the most important things (human condition, existential stuff, etc.) but this doesn't mean he is absolutely correct in all his conclusions.

In this case, I think he was too optimistic, oddly enough.. That Plato for him allowed an "escape hatch" whereby we can get "true glimpses" of some other "sublime reality".. if only temporary.. and that meditation and asceticism somehow will bring about even more "sublime glimpses" and for the ascetic who goes all the way (suicide via starvation?) they have achieved the ultimate escape.. Buddhist-parallels for sure. But this does not mean that this conception of "true glimpses" are correct. They seem to me to be romanticized ideas of feelings we get when we encounter certain things.. We might feel awe or a sense of amazement looking at something, or listening to something.. We might feel a sense of sincere compassion with someone's suffering, and we might have a sense of our own constant desires by meditation techniques.. But these I believe are not somehow connected through a higher gnosis of "will-lessness". They are just discrete feelings that are part of our reactions to various concepts and stimuli.. I don't give them any more divine status beyond that.

In my previous post I was simply making of note of what true pessimism postulates.Not arguing about its benefits or shortcomings. Nor giving any advice or prescriptions.

Maybe i will take the liberty of making a short note on the things you have said to @Possibility

Its good you are questioning and doubting everything, but hopefully you are also questioning and doubting yourself. Especially, the value/meaning/ "status" you give to everything and yourself. Both the values, and the e-valuer. Therein is the repository of tricks as well as the trickster.

Is this a justification for birthing more people? No. Because the agenda is real. — schopenhauer1

AGAIN - NOT arguing for birthing more people. There is no point in bringing this into our discussion.

So I think you are missing my point completely. Did. you. read. the. Willy. Wonka. discussion? The reason I ask, is that is basically my start with this particular argument we are having. There are options, but on closer inspection, those options are much more limited.. For example, I can't not comply with the dictates of life because I will die.. We are bound to a certain extent to the realities we are born into. The capacity for change or variety doesn't negate the boundaries that we are born into as humans. Don't sugar coat the picture. Don't romanticize it. Don't try to sublimate it. Certainly don't try to obfuscate it. — schopenhauer1

I’ve already commented on Willy Wonka. Go back and read what I’ve written. Your ‘closer inspection’ on these options is to view them as limits of being, and yet you won’t do the same for acts of compliance - which, by the way, are subject to the same limits. It’s the ‘because’ that implies a false relation. I will die, whether I comply with the dictates or not - that’s the reality of being. Compliance/non-compliance changes the overall arrangement or relational structures of being, not the limits. But our awareness of structures of potential enables us to rewrite the agenda, changing the conditions of our compliance. Our overall arrangement of being is much different now than it was a thousand years ago, because the agenda has changed. Human reasoning has changed it. And we’ll continue to change it.

What Schopenhauer argues is that this agenda increasingly prioritises the false notion of an ‘individual’ will, which leads us to strive and suffer for an ideal that is fundamentally unattainable. This priority is due to the conditions or limits of sufficient reason that Kant described. Schopenhauer proposed the world in itself as will: the faculty by which all actions are determined and initiated. Both Kant and Schopenhauer point to the need for an additional Copernican turn that Darwin’s work enables, de-centring the human experience of being (what appears to be) as a mere participant in the unfolding universe, rather than its central, invariable observer.

But neither Kant nor Schopenhauer were able to recognise that the tense-dependent structure of language, in describing the world as representation according to subject-predicate-object, is insufficient to accommodate a full correlation of the faculties of human reason (logic, ideas and affect) in developing a predictive relational structure of the potential world as will, without a reliance on being for empirical testing. It’s not our reasoning that limits us, but this reliance on an outmoded language structure that appears to ‘force’ the agenda, to produce more ‘individual’ observers in being.

Carlo Rovelli points out that grammar in language structure fails to account for an experience of reality in which ‘now’ for me might occur in the past for someone/something else. He proposes that the world as representation be more accurately described as interrelating events in potentiality, rather than as ‘individual’ subjects interacting with objects in ‘time’. No central, invariable observer, just events that change in relation to each other. The world as will - the faculty by which all actions are determined and initiated - makes sense in relation to how these events change in relation to each other, and can be arranged as a distribution of effort and attention over time, adhering to the ultimate limits of being without reference to an ‘individual’.

This only seems pessimistic if you’re hung up on the illusion of the ‘individual’, which it appears that you are.

Besides being a bunch of word salad this is just ridiculous. You are making a whole bunch of logical errors. You conflate what something might be composed of for what it is. For example, we may be just strings or subatomic particles and forces, that doesn’t mean that this, I’m not a body and mind because the “real bits” are “really” these smaller components. Same with the idea of social learning and cultural change. Just because “we” are part of a changing social arrangement or dynamic or that we learn by social means largely, doesn’t mean there is no individual whereby no one actually is doing the thinking, decision-making, who feels, who is the person writing this right now.

Don’t confuse the mechanisms for the phenomenon itself. That is something akin to or a kind of genetic fallacy.

I will die, whether I comply with the dictates or not - that’s the reality of being. Compliance/non-compliance changes the overall arrangement or relational structures of being, not the limits. — Possibility

No this is taking the point out of context. Rather the compliance is how we live when we are not dead. There can’t be non-compliance, lest death. Because we die eventually doesn’t negate how living works when still alive. Willy Wonkas Forced Game is also invariable to social relations…it is the same general thing…communism, capitalism, hunting gathering whatever.

Let's say I am Willy Wonka..
I have created this world and will force others to enter it... My only rule is people have the options of either working at various occupations which I have lovingly created many varieties of, free-riding (which can only be done by a few and has to be done selectively lest one get caught, it is also considered no good in this world), or living day-to-day homelessly. The last option is a suicide pill if people don't like the arrangement. Is Willy Wonka moral? I mean he is giving many options for work, and even allowing you to test your luck at homelessness and free riding. Also, hey if you don't want to be in his arrangement, you can always kill yourself! See how beneficial and good I am to all my contestants? — schopenhauer1

Whatever social contingency you are brought into, that is the agenda you are dealt. The agenda, no matter the current social arrangement is the same for the individual who has to survive within it.

Comparing Willy Wonker to the universe is kind of missing the mark. The universe does not appear to be moral. People don’t ask to come into existence - that would be contrary to suggest.

The context is people are here and more people will come. Eventually there will be no more people. None of this is ‘moral’.

We are alive. Life necessarily contains some degree of suffering/discomfort. To negate all suffering means to negate all life. I don’t view reality as ‘moral’ anymore than a view a rock as ‘moral’.

What does this have to do with ‘boredom’ anyway? We exist. You asked what we should do in the face of the existential crisis in the OP. What do you think we should do and why?

But not Jainism? What is the difference here? They both say the same thing and Buddhism would not exist without the ascetic Jains. — I like sushi

??

Where did you get that??

That depends on your interpretation. The idea of ‘getting through the gates of heaven’ seems to me a misunderstanding of enlightenment in the first place. The joke portrays an incongruity between the Buddhist notion of ‘no-self’ and a self-actualising perception of enlightenment. Given there is no consensus on this in Buddhism, I guess it depends on your perspective, doesn’t it? — Possibility

No. From what I've seen, insiders understand it immediately to be about the idea that one should "postpone" one's enlightenment in favor of "helping others".

It's a belief that the blind are nevertheless fully qualified to lead the blind and to be trusted (blindly).

Mahayana criticizes Theravada for being "selfish", for not caring about others, and only focusing on one's own development. Theravada points out the folly and the danger of the blind leading the blind.


I brought this up in reference to your proposition that we should help others, even at the expense of our own lives. It's an absurd proposition that serves no other purpose but to bolster one's ego.

I don't view evolution quite so cut-and-dry in humans regarding procreation. Procreation becomes a choice, unlike eating food or going to the bathroom. It's something we can choose to carry on. It is simply cultural reinforcement and personal preferences that perpetuate it. — schopenhauer1

It's certainly convenient to frame it that way, it makes it easy to criticize it.

The antinatalist's particular socio-economic situatedness makes the antinatalist unfit to procreate, but it says nothing about the procreative fitness of other people or about procreation per se.

Once we introduce particular socio-economic situatedness, all notions of egalitarianism or universalism (things that would be true for all people) are off the table, and we are firmly in eugenics.

There are people who have procreated and who really do not have any compunctions about it. People who are fit to live, fit to procreate.

The kind of general antinatalism you're advocating is not compatible with the Theory of Evolution.

Comparing Willy Wonker to the universe is kind of missing the mark. The universe does not appear to be moral. People don’t ask to come into existence - that would be contrary to suggest.

The context is people are here and more people will come. Eventually there will be no more people. None of this is ‘moral’.

We are alive. Life necessarily contains some degree of suffering/discomfort. To negate all suffering means to negate all life. I don’t view reality as ‘moral’ anymore than a view a rock as ‘moral’. — I like sushi

No I'm not comparing Willy Wonka to the universe, but procreating the agenda of what human affairs generally outlined consists of, onto another person. That is to say, don't force your agenda (to follow Willy Wonka's Forced Game) onto another person, because you deem it good or permissible. That is a forced agenda that others (the child born) must pay the consequences for. If you want to enact an agenda, do it on yourself.

And yes, to negate all suffering, negate all life.. But we can work at the margins.. To negate suffering for at least something we can prevent, we can prevent procreating another person.

What does this have to do with ‘boredom’ anyway? We exist. You asked what we should do in the face of the existential crisis in the OP. What do you think we should do and why? — I like sushi

This came out of what to do.. Part of the recommendation was preventing future suffering. The other half was building collective realization of our suffering.. Like non-religious communities of realization of the pessimism... It should be talked about all over.. and communities of consolation created post haste.. Instead of (tacitly) optimistic ones of X, Y, Z "project" we should have communities recognizing our existential position. As I was explaining to Possibility, it is about understanding our context and realizing it.

I brought this up in reference to your proposition that we should help others, even at the expense of our own lives. It's an absurd proposition that serves no other purpose but to bolster one's ego. — baker

:up:

I will die, whether I comply with the dictates or not - that’s the reality of being. Compliance/non-compliance changes the overall arrangement or relational structures of being, not the limits. — Possibility

No, it's about the limits. No matter what else you do, you're a lifeform that requires oxygen. There is no way around that. This is what living in this body is defined by, and it carries with it a number of other givens.

Our overall arrangement of being is much different now than it was a thousand years ago, because the agenda has changed.

No, the agenda has always been the same, only its external manifestation varies according to circumstances.

This only seems pessimistic if you’re hung up on the illusion of the ‘individual’, which it appears that you are.

Riiight, the good old "no man, no problem" solution to all of life's problems!

The antinatalist's particular socio-economic situatedness makes the antinatalist unfit to procreate, but it says nothing about the procreative fitness of other people or about procreation per se.

Once we introduce particular socio-economic situatedness, all notions of egalitarianism or universalism (things that would be true for all people) are off the table, and we are firmly in eugenics.

There are people who have procreated and who really do not have any compunctions about it. People who are fit to live, fit to procreate.

The kind of general antinatalism you're advocating is not compatible with the Theory of Evolution. — baker

Eugenics is people forcing certain groups not to procreate and forcing others to do so. Not quite the word to use. Antinatalts are not "eugenics"ing themselves. If this is about birth control, there are so many types and they are widely available all over the world. It may be more about education more than anything, as well as "traditional" values.

No, it's about the limits. No matter what else you do, you're a lifeform that requires oxygen. There is no way around that. This is what living in this body is defined by, and it carries with it a number of other givens. — baker

Yes!

No, the agenda has always been the same, only its external manifestation varies according to circumstances. — baker

Exactly.

Riiight, the good old "no man, no problem" solution to all of life's problems! — baker

Exactly... You see, you're not suffering, cause "you" don't exist :roll:.

Part of the recommendation was preventing future suffering. The other half was building collective realization of our suffering.. Like non-religious communities of realization of the pessimism... It should be talked about all over.. and communities of consolation created post haste.. Instead of (tacitly) optimistic ones of X, Y, Z "project" we should have communities recognizing our existential position. — schopenhauer1

In the past, and implicitly still now, there were whole categories of people who were not supposed to marry and/or procreate.
Soldiers and servants, monks and nuns, for example.

I think part of the problem is that we are now under the dictature of sameness, an absolute egalitarianism ("everyone is supposed to have the same basic goals in life, having children being one of them"), even though this is a historical novum.

I think part of the problem is that we are now under the dictature of sameness, an absolute egalitarianism ("everyone is supposed to have the same basic goals in life, having children being one of them"), even though this is a historical novum. — baker

Yeah good point. I mentioned earlier the idea of minutia-mongering. When focused on the minutia, the big picture becomes negated. The minutia can get over more convoluted. The only thing that is acknowledged for "big picture" are various goal-posts people set which vary somewhat depending on society.. but can be roughly the same.. some sort of education goal or community enculturation goal (in the last remaining real tribal societies that exist), career goals (or full community participation goals in tribal societies), relationship goals (marriage, long-term relationships), and personal growth goals (mostly modern societies really but perhaps something similar going on in tribal). Then within these, are simply minutia.. For the modern societies it is where you are going for vacation, how you are going to clear out the weeds in your garden, mow the lawn, meet a friend for drinks at poker night, and all the rest. For the homeless man, sure it's going to be more immediate needs (and possibly illicit addictions in some cases). So yeah, we are fucked in terms of some sort of coming together, even in small communities to recognize the pessimistic context. The minutia dominates many people's thoughts.

Oddly enough, religion acted to reorient people to big picture stuff, but using the wrong methods and often for the wrong reasons.

no-self — Possibility

Anatta.

:chin:

What is it exactly that's wallowing in ennui?

Pessimism would mean our worst fears would be realized. What's worse than finding out you (the self) are(is) but an illusion - the self doesn't exist (re Cotard's delusion)? If so, there's absolutely nothing that could ever gets bored!

Is boredom just another way of stating cogito ergo sum: In (broken) English, I bored, therefore I exist?

Pessimism would mean our worst fears would be realized. What's worse than finding out you (the self) are(is) but an illusion - the self doesn't exist (re Cotard's delusion)? If so, there's absolutely nothing that could ever gets bored!

Is boredom just another way of stating cogito ergo sum: In (broken) English, I bored, therefore I exist? — Agent Smith

Though it's addressed to Possibility.. I would like to reiterate again the fallacy of mixing the components of the phenomenon for the phenomenon itself. Even if "self" was an illusion, the reality of "self" in the construct of a human doesn't go away by simply "realizing" this (if that is even true in the first place that we are an illusion, whatever that means). Thus yes, the Cogito does make sense in this situation. There are certain realities that one can't, by fiat of argument, make go away, and thus try to push through as some proof of non-suffering (or "really suffering") for the sake of argument.

So no, there is no where to go, nothing to do, nothing to see, nothing to be. But ironically, that includes the achievement of "no-thingness" of the whole ascetic enterprise, which I question as anything that is real or achievable or even necessary. Schopenhauer was an ardent platonist (infused with Kantian concepts). That is, there are some "grades" of "being" beyond the material. That brings up a whole other discussion on what "gnosis" is in ancient Platonic thinking, etc. He had ideas of "Ideas" that are somehow existent "beyond" material reality.. in the realm of pure Idea/form.. and that one can "access" this in some way through acts of will-lessness like "art", "compassion", and "ascetic practice". Yet, the whole scheme of "higher reality" I question.. As much an admirer I am oh Schopenhauer, it doesn't mean I think he is beyond questioning. He thought long and hard about the most important things (human condition, existential stuff, etc.) but this doesn't mean he is absolutely correct in all his conclusions.

In this case, I think he was too optimistic, oddly enough.. That Plato for him allowed an "escape hatch" whereby we can get "true glimpses" of some other "sublime reality".. if only temporary.. and that meditation and asceticism somehow will bring about even more "sublime glimpses" and for the ascetic who goes all the way (suicide via starvation?) they have achieved the ultimate escape.. Buddhist-parallels for sure. But this does not mean that this conception of "true glimpses" are correct. They seem to me to be romanticized ideas of feelings we get when we encounter certain things.. We might feel awe or a sense of amazement looking at something, or listening to something.. We might feel a sense of sincere compassion with someone's suffering, and we might have a sense of our own constant desires by meditation techniques.. But these I believe are not somehow connected through a higher gnosis of "will-lessness". They are just discrete feelings that are part of our reactions to various concepts and stimuli.. I don't give them any more divine status beyond that. — schopenhauer1

I’m not talking about divine status or ‘higher reality’, only metaphysics. And I’m not talking about escape, either. It’s an opportunity to increase awareness of reality. I don’t see asceticism as an escape but a learning process - not to simply cope with the striving, but to understand it from a perspective beyond mere appearance, as we do with everything else.

Exploring the effects of non-compliance and suffering on being is a learning process. Deliberately approaching the limits of being confirms our capacity for non-compliance, and with that the variability of the agenda as it stands. Likewise, recognising the variability of our being, our capacity to be affected simply by looking at or listening to something, points to information available in experience that isn’t accurately subsumed under concepts such as ‘awe’ or ‘amazement’, and awaits to be understood.

The idea that what we feel in relation to the world has little to no bearing on our understanding of the world is ignorant, at best. Kant’s third critique showed that qualitative ideas and affect contribute to reason alongside logic, but this aspect of his work is too often ignored or dismissed. Schopenhauer’s writing on aesthetics, too, deserves far more serious attention than it gets. And your own tendency to legitimise negative feeling but dismiss any positive ones as ‘romanticised’ just goes to show how significant feeling is in philosophy, despite attempts to downplay it to suit the argument. Having excluded all positive affect (for no reason other than a preference for pessimism), your structure of potential appears binary, as arousal (comply) vs valence (die). But it’s literally only half the picture. Without positive valence, there is no attention to new information, and you really are stuck - in your intentional ignorance, isolation and exclusivity.

Though it's addressed to Possibility.. I would like to reiterate again the fallacy of mixing the components of the phenomenon for the phenomenon itself. Even if "self" was an illusion, the reality of "self" in the construct of a human doesn't go away by simply "realizing" this (if that is even true in the first place that we are an illusion, whatever that means). Thus yes, the Cogito does make sense in this situation. There are certain realities that one can't, by fiat of argument, make go away, and thus try to push through as some proof of non-suffering (or "really suffering") for the sake of argument. — schopenhauer1

Indeed, this is one of the many instances when the mind/brain is at war with itself. I sometimes feel that our brains/minds have installed on them a software package that's internally inconsistent/incompatible. Glitches like this are symptomatic of such.

no-self
— Possibility

Anatta. — Agent Smith

No, anatta is not "no self".
We've been over this.

not to simply cope with the striving, but to understand it from a perspective beyond mere appearance, as we do with everything else. — Possibility

I mean I did call it a technique to help cope, so you are building straw men for things I didn't say in my OP...So in that regard, I can kind of see it as a coping mechanism- a technique for the mind, as I mentioned in the OP.

Exploring the effects of non-compliance and suffering on being is a learning process. Deliberately approaching the limits of being confirms our capacity for non-compliance, and with that the variability of the agenda as it stands. Likewise, recognising the variability of our being, our capacity to be affected simply by looking at or listening to something, points to information available in experience that isn’t accurately subsumed under concepts such as ‘awe’ or ‘amazement’, and awaits to be understood. — Possibility

Yeah but ya know what.. you still have to eat, get comfortable, and entertain the mind. It's not, "thus these experiences and everything else in life is negated as a result". Again, no escape hatches.. So you are just reaffirming what Schopenhauer already explained, and not adding much. Since I already explained my position, this pretty much puts the argument back to nothing new advanced.. so moving on.

Having excluded all positive affect (for no reason other than a preference for pessimism), your structure of potential appears binary, as arousal (comply) vs valence (die). But it’s literally only half the picture. Without positive valence, there is no attention to new information, and you really are stuck - in your intentional ignorance, isolation and exclusivity. — Possibility

Again, just because one beholds what one deems as beautiful or listens to something that moves them (all things that are complicated phenomenon requiring a combination of cognitive faculties and cultural-related things at play.. not just something that automatically "elicits" feelings from the Platonic aether), doesn't negate Willy Wonka's Forced Agenda we all have to play. It's not a matter of "because there is positive, thus the other is justified".

No, anatta is not "no self".
We've been over this. — baker

Even if "self" was an illusion, the reality of "self" in the construct of a human doesn't go away by simply "realizing" this (if that is even true in the first place that we are an illusion, whatever that means). — schopenhauer1

Old habits die hard.

Old habits die hard. — Agent Smith

It's part of the development of the human animal to develop a "self". Unless you are trying to pose some sort of evidence of extreme Sapir-Worff hypothesis whereby societies can or have existed which somehow have gotten rid of the self, this would be universally wrong.. It is part of the human animal.. We have language which allows for self-reference.. I am doing this.. you are doing that we are doing this and that and on and on. The way we function is having selves that make decisions an operate in a social and physical environment. The self-referential part, seems to entail this division whereby this body with this experience is "doing stuff" in the environment that is not this body and experience, but interacts with this body and experience in ways often predictable, unpredictable, wanted, unwanted, etc.

There is standard Buddhist doctrine.

Forced Agenda we all have to play. — schopenhauer1

Life in this world is about dominance.
Antinatalists are simply losers, weaklings.

History.