The main question that is hard to answer with Schopenhauer, is how it is that there are objects when there is only Will. — schopenhauer1
It isn't defined because it is gotten at indirect means. He can only gather that it strives, and thus there needs to be a playground for striving to take place... I guess?
He at the same time seems to want Will to be a double-aspect to reality, yet seems to also think it is prior in some sense. The Will, "wills life". But that implies that the Will was there first before the "will-to-live". But then again, I don't know. — schopenhauer1
I say: There are toothbrushes! — Banno
§ 1. “The world is my idea:”—this is a truth which holds good for everything that lives and knows, though man alone can bring it into reflective and abstract consciousness. If he really does this, he has attained to philosophical wisdom. It then becomes clear and certain to him that what he knows is not a sun and an earth, but only an eye that sees a sun, a hand that feels an earth; that the world which surrounds him is there only as idea, i.e., only in relation to something else, the consciousness, which is himself. If any truth can be asserted a priori, it is this: for it is the expression of the most general form of all possible and thinkable experience: a form which is more general than time, or space, or causality, for they all presuppose it; and each of these, which we have seen to be just so many modes of the principle of sufficient reason, is valid only for a particular class of ideas; whereas the antithesis of object and subject is the common form of all these classes, is that form under which alone any idea of whatever kind it may be, abstract or intuitive, pure or empirical, is possible and thinkable. No truth therefore is more certain, more independent of all others, and less in need of proof than this, that all that exists for knowledge, and therefore this whole world, is only object in relation to subject, perception of a perceiver, in a word, idea. This is obviously true of the past and the future, as well as of the present, of what is farthest off, as of what is near; for it is true of time and space themselves, in which alone these distinctions arise. All that in any way belongs or can belong to the world is inevitably thus conditioned through the subject, and exists only for the subject. The world is idea. — WWR
Of all systems of philosophy which start from the object, the most consistent, and that which may be carried furthest, is simple materialism. It regards matter, and with it time and space, as existing absolutely, and ignores the relation to the subject in which alone all this really exists. It then lays hold of the law of causality as a guiding principle or clue, regarding it as a self-existent order (or arrangement) of things,veritas aeterna, and so fails to take account of the understanding, in which and for which alone causality is. It seeks the primary and most simple state of matter, and then tries to develop all the others from it; ascending from mere mechanism, to chemism, to polarity, to the vegetable and to the animal kingdom. And if we suppose this to have been done, the last link in the chain would be animal sensibility—that is knowledge—which would consequently now appear as a mere modification or state of matter produced by causality.
Now if we had followed materialism thus far with clear ideas, when we reached its highest point we would suddenly be seized with a fit of the inextinguishable laughter of the Olympians. As if waking from a dream, we would all at once become aware that its final result—knowledge, which it reached so laboriously, was presupposed as the indispensable condition of its very starting-point, mere matter; and when we imagined that we thought matter, we really thought only the subject that perceives matter; the eye that sees it, the hand that feels it, the understanding that knows it.
Thus the tremendous petitio principii reveals itself unexpectedly; for suddenly the last link is seen to be the starting-point, the chain a circle, and the materialist is like Baron Münchausen who, when swimming in water on horseback, drew the horse into the air with his legs, and himself also by his cue. The fundamental absurdity of materialism is that it starts from the objective, and takes as the ultimate ground of explanation something objective, whether it be matter in the abstract, simply as it is thought, or after it has taken form, is empirically given—that is to say, is substance, the chemical element with its primary relations. Some such thing it takes, as existing absolutely and in itself, in order that it may evolve organic nature and finally the knowing subject from it, and explain them adequately by means of it; whereas in truth all that is objective is already determined as such in manifold ways by the knowing subject through its forms of knowing, and presupposes them; and consequently it entirely disappears if we think the subject away.
Thus materialism is the attempt to explain what is immediately given us by what is given us indirectly. All that is objective, extended, active—that is to say, all that is material—is regarded by materialism as affording so solid a basis for its explanation, that a reduction of everything to this can leave nothing to be desired (especially if in ultimate analysis this reduction should resolve itself into action and reaction). But we have shown that all this is given indirectly and in the highest degree determined, and is therefore merely a relatively present object, for it has passed through the machinery and manufactory of the brain, and has thus come under the forms of space, time and causality, by means of which it is first presented to us as extended in space and ever active in time. From such an indirectly given object, materialism seeks to explain what is immediately given, the idea (in which alone the object that materialism starts with exists), and finally even the will from which all those fundamental forces, that manifest themselves, under the guidance of causes, and therefore according to law, are in truth to be explained. — WWR
No ontology in the history of humankind has been or is more metaphysical than materialism. Unlike all spiritual or religious ontologies ... the strongly objective realm of materialism is, by definition, forever outside experience. It is pure abstraction. ... All the properties we attribute to reality – like solidity, palpability, concreteness – are qualities of experience and, as such, not applicable to the real world of materialism.
We stopped living the inner life of human beings and began living the ‘outer life’ of things and mechanisms. … All meaning must lie – we’ve come to assume – somewhere without and never within. I even dare to venture an explanation for how this came to pass: because of Western materialism, we believe that we are finite beings who will, unavoidably, eventually cease to exist. Only the ‘outside world’ will endure and have continuity.
He at the same time seems to want Will to be a double-aspect to reality, yet seems to also think it is prior in some sense. The Will, — schopenhauer1
There being no lawgiver, the universe must follow its own will. It dances wildly to its own song, and the will of physicists is to learn the tune. — unenlightened
the inexorable decrees of fate in Greek drama. — Wayfarer
Here, but, the above is not really an argument for will as being Kant's thing-in-itself....it seems only to establish will as the "inner side" of representations (he doesn't even mention thing-in-itself" in the above)... So he still needs to get from "will as inner side of representation" to thing-in-itself. How does he do that??
he later relates will and thing-in-itself? I would assume it would be soon thereafter (one would think). — KantDane21
How is that not an argument? — Wayfarer
How does... there is "no object without a subject" (and consequently "no subject without an object") establish that representations/appearances apart from my own body have a subjective side... ? — KantDane21
I myself didn't have an answer. — Wayfarer
If there is no object without a subject, then the existence of a tree, a table, a chair, etc. etc., requires a perceiving subject, but how does then entail that representations/appearances like a tree, table, chair, etc. also has an inner, subjective side? — KantDane21
Christopher Janaway characterizes Schopenahuer's metaphysical contentions as "something ridiculous" or "merely embarrassing," which should be "dismissed as fanciful" if interpreted in the way Schopenhauer clearly intended them to be. He claims that "Schopenhauer seems to stumble into a quite elementary difficulty" in an important passage of his argument. And so on. The freedom Janaway allows himself to bash Schopenhauer, and the arrogant, disrespectful tone with which he does it, are breathtaking. It is so easy to bash a dead man who can't defend himself, isn't it?
Ironically, all this actually accomplishes is to betray the utter failure of Janaway's attempt to grok Schopenhauer. Indeed, his apparent inability to comprehend even the most basic points Schopenhauer makes, and to think within the logic and premises of Schopenhauer's argument, is nothing short of stunning. Here is someone who just doesn't get it at all, and yet feels entitled not only to write books about Schopenhauer; not only to characterize Schopenhauer's argument as "ridiculous," "embarassing" and "fanciful" (Oh, the irony!); but even to edit Schopenhauer's own works! By now Schopenhauer has not only turned in his grave, but strangled himself to a second death.
Even more peculiar is Janaway's suggestion that it is Schopenhauer who is obtuse, for the "elementary difficulties" Janaway attributes to him couldn't be seriously attributed even to a high-school student today, let alone a renowned philosopher. At no point does Janaway seem to stop, reflect and ponder the glaringly obvious possibility that perhaps Schopenhauer does know what he is talking about and it is him (Janaway) who just doesn't get it. Instead, he portrays Schopenhauer as an idiot; how precarious, silly and conceited. He even accuses Schopenhauer of crass materialism, despite Schopenhauer's repeated ridiculing of materialism and the fact that Schopenhauer's whole argument consistently refutes it in unambiguous terms. I discuss all this in detail in DSM. Here it shall suffice to observe that, to be an expert on anything, it takes more than just study; for if one can't actually understand what one is studying, no amount of scholarly citations will turn vain nonsense into literature.
I richly substantiate my criticism of Janaway in DSM: I carefully take his contentions apart, while clarifying Schopenhauer's points in a way that should be clearly understandable even to Janaway. So if you think I am exaggerating in this post, please peruse DSM: it can be leisurely read in a weekend or, with focus, in a single sitting, so it won't cost you much time at all to see whether I actually have a valid point. — Bernardo Kastrup
I don't know if I agree that this is entailed by Schopenhauer's argument — Wayfarer
My understanding is that the use of the word 'will' can throw us off. Is it not the case that what S means by will is more like energy - a non-metacognitive, blind, instinctive force? — Tom Storm
It is a perennial philosophical reflection that if one looks deeply enough into oneself, one will discover not only one’s own essence, but also the essence of the universe. ...For that reason it is thought that one can come into contact with the nature of the universe if one comes into substantial contact with one’s ultimate inner being. — Schopenhauer, SEP
But then, I'm also sceptical of what Kastrup and his followers call the 'mind-at-large', which plays a role suspiciously like that of God in Berkeley's philosophy. — Wayfarer
Without the idea of a collective mind, how to explain the easily deduced fact that we all see the same things in their respective locations? — Janus
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