Does Anything Matter?

[Soul_of_Shu]

I agree with Papanca here, the overall tenor of Schopenhauer's philosophy is pessimistic. He views the Will as a force which is unavoidably oppressive in our lives of "mental images" and the only relief comes from deep meditation, music or perhaps death. None of our daily thoughtful activties can provide such relief. I applaud BK's effort but these sorts of ideas cannot be made optimistic or even neutral. Besides the obvious nihilism of Kantian divide, I think a big part of it is failure to see metamorphic progression. Ancient humanity, lets say 3000 years ago, also felt oppressed by developing will forces but found releif in basic life activities and interactions with nature. Turning back to remembrance of the undifferentiated past via ascetic practices was completely satisfactory. That numinous intensity of individual life is simply gone now, so we cannot expect the same practices to be satisfactory. What worked for the ancent Hindus will not work for us. Schopenhauer remained at level of abstract intellect and therefore did not perceive this living essence of Spirit progressively working through nature like, for ex., Goethe did and Hegel to a lesser extent. We need to come to terms with the fact that not all idealism is the same. The differences between these views for experience of meaning will soon be just as wide as between materialism and idealism.

Well, again, the point I'm making is that viewing Schopenhauer as a pessimist is beside the point, as it doesn't negate the fact of even such pessimism having significant meaning, even as others may not resonate it. But I concur that even those who profess to being proponents of idealism, in the most basic premise of the primacy of consciousness, will and ideation, don't truly grok the profound implications of that, e.g. in the way that Steiner understands and explicates idealism.

[AshvinP]

I agree with Papanca here, the overall tenor of Schopenhauer's philosophy is pessimistic. He views the Will as a force which is unavoidably oppressive in our lives of "mental images" and the only relief comes from deep meditation, music or perhaps death. None of our daily thoughtful activties can provide such relief. I applaud BK's effort but these sorts of ideas cannot be made optimistic or even neutral. Besides the obvious nihilism of Kantian divide, I think a big part of it is failure to see metamorphic progression. Ancient humanity, lets say 3000 years ago, also felt oppressed by developing will forces but found releif in basic life activities and interactions with nature. Turning back to remembrance of the undifferentiated past via ascetic practices was completely satisfactory. That numinous intensity of individual life is simply gone now, so we cannot expect the same practices to be satisfactory. What worked for the ancent Hindus will not work for us. Schopenhauer remained at level of abstract intellect and therefore did not perceive this living essence of Spirit progressively working through nature like, for ex., Goethe did and Hegel to a lesser extent. We need to come to terms with the fact that not all idealism is the same. The differences between these views for experience of meaning will soon be just as wide as between materialism and idealism.

Well, again, the point I'm making is that viewing Schopenhauer as a pessimist is beside the point, as it doesn't negate the fact of even such pessimism having significant meaning, even as others may not resonate it. But I concur that even those who profess to being proponents of idealism, in the most basic premise of the primacy of consciousness, will and ideation, don't truly grok the profound implications of that, e.g. in the way that Steiner understands and explicates idealism.

Ah ok I definitely misinterpreted the bolded part - I thought you were saying we can get significant meaning by adopting the pessimistic view. Yes the fact of the pessimism developing in the modern age is very meaningful, and helps verify that we are, in fact, living in a meaningful Cosmos where not only anything, but everything, matters. At least all of my misinterpretations are helping us elaborate more

[Soul_of_Shu]

Ah ok I definitely misinterpreted the bolded part - I thought you were saying we can get significant meaning by adopting the pessimistic view. Yes the fact of the pessimism developing in the modern age is very meaningful, and helps verify that we are, in fact, living in a meaningful Cosmos where not only anything, but everything, matters. At least all of my misinterpretations are helping us elaborate more

No doubt you'll be glad to know that this eclectic curiosity seeker has finally been enticed into listening to an audio version of PoF, this curiosity peaked by the alternate title "Intuitive Thinking As a Spiritual Path", so perhaps we'll be somewhat less prone to such misinterpretations going forward—even as I've already arrived, in my own intuitive way, at many of the same understandings.

[AshvinP]

Ah ok I definitely misinterpreted the bolded part - I thought you were saying we can get significant meaning by adopting the pessimistic view. Yes the fact of the pessimism developing in the modern age is very meaningful, and helps verify that we are, in fact, living in a meaningful Cosmos where not only anything, but everything, matters. At least all of my misinterpretations are helping us elaborate more

No doubt you'll be glad to know that this eclectic curiosity seeker has finally been enticed into listening to an audio version of PoF, this curiosity peaked by the alternate title "Intuitive Thinking As a Spiritual Path", so perhaps we'll be somewhat less prone to such misinterpretations going forward—even as I've already arrived, in my own intuitive way, at many of the same understandings.

Good to hear! If you are better than me at paying attention while listening to audio books, then I think you will find it very valuable and eye-opening. But if you find yourself getting distracted often like I do, I would recommend just reading the text online. I look forward to hearing your thoughts on it!

[Soul_of_Shu]

Good to hear! If you are better than me at paying attention while listening to audio books, then I think you will find it very valuable and eye-opening. But if you find yourself getting distracted often like I do, I would recommend just reading the text online. I look forward to hearing your thoughts on it!

Well, after overdosing on a glut of sporting events, the strategy is to do the listening as I while away hours sitting on the deck surrounded by flowers, where the only distraction will be the calls of birds, pausing only to succinctly contribute here when so inspired, a luxury that comes to retirees with a lot of time to fill.

[AshvinP]

Good to hear! If you are better than me at paying attention while listening to audio books, then I think you will find it very valuable and eye-opening. But if you find yourself getting distracted often like I do, I would recommend just reading the text online. I look forward to hearing your thoughts on it!

Well, after overdosing on a glut of sporting events, the strategy is to do the listening as I while away hours sitting on the deck surrounded by flowers, where the only distraction will be the calls of birds, pausing only to succinctly contribute here when so inspired, a luxury that comes to retirees with a lot of time to fill.

I hear you on that. I am still glued to the NBA finals and actually cannot wait until they are over and I am left with no worthwhile sports to watch. Then I get a break until (American) football season starts.

[Martin_]

I hear you on that. I am still glued to the NBA finals and actually cannot wait until they are over and I am left with no worthwhile sports to watch. Then I get a break until (American) football season starts.

Ummmm. The Tokyo Summer Olympics?
Starts on Friday.

[AshvinP]

I hear you on that. I am still glued to the NBA finals and actually cannot wait until they are over and I am left with no worthwhile sports to watch. Then I get a break until (American) football season starts.

Ummmm. The Tokyo Summer Olympics?
Starts on Friday.

Wow I had no idea... thanks!

[Papanca]

I don't necessarily think the two are related, one can believe in idealism and in the illusory nature of death without believing in any evolving relationnal process, Schopenhauer after all was both an idealist and a pessimist.

Regardless of whether or not Schopenhauer might be viewed as a pessimist—although a nuanced reading of his ideas, such as BK offers in DSM, might dispel this notion—that doesn't mean he thought that because a given subjectified 'personal' consciousness is transitory means that such a conscious entity is not meaningfully participating in a relational process of the evolution of transpersonal ideation, in which even some pessimism, say about the fate of mankind, plays a meaningful part, and indeed cannot be, nor would even happen, without meaning.

I'm not saying that Schopenhauer thought that " because a given subjectified 'personal' consciousness is transitory means that such a conscious entity is not meaningfully participating in a relational process of the evolution of transpersonal ideation", but that he didn't believe in any positive evolution of transpersonal ideation to begin with.

Here are some quotes from Schopenhauer, if he wasn't a pessimist then nobody in the history of humanity ever was and we might as well suppress philosophical pessimism from our vocabulary :

"That human life must be some kind of mistake is sufficiently proved by the simple observation that man is a compound of needs which are hard to satisfy; that their satisfaction achieves nothing but a painless condition in which he is only given over to boredom; and that boredom is a direct proof that existence is in itself valueless, for boredom is nothing other than the sensation of the emptiness of existence. For if life, in the desire for which our essence and existence consists, possessed in itself a positive value and real content, there would be no such thing as boredom: mere existence would fulfil and satisfy us. As things are, we take no pleasure in existence except when we are striving after something – in which case distance and difficulties make our goal look as if it would satisfy us (an illusion which fades when we reach it) – or when engaged in purely intellectual activity, in which case we are really stepping out of life so as to regard it from outside, like spectators at a play. Even sensual pleasure itself consists in a continual striving and ceases as soon as its goal is reached. Whenever we are not involved in one or other of these things but directed back to existence itself we are overtaken by its worthlessness and vanity and this is the sensation called boredom."

"In the simple and easily surveyed life of the brutes the emptiness and vanity of the struggle of the whole phenomenon is more easily grasped. The variety of the organisations, the ingenuity of the means, whereby each is adapted to its element and its prey contrasts here distinctly with the want of any lasting final aim; instead of which there presents itself only momentary comfort, fleeting pleasure conditioned by wants, much and long suffering, constant strife, bellum omnium, each one both a hunter and hunted, pressure, want, need, and anxiety, shrieking and howling; and this goes on in secula seculorum, or till once again the crust of the planet breaks."

"The state of human happiness, for the most part, is like certain groups of trees, which seen from a distance look wonderfully fine; but if we go up to them and among them, their beauty disappears; we do not know wherein it lay, for it is only trees that surround us. And so it happens that we often envy the position of others.""

“One simple test of the claim that the pleasure in the world outweighs the pain…is to compare the feelings of an animal that is devouring another with those of the animal being devoured.”

“Optimism, where it is not just the thoughtless talk of someone with only words in his flat head, strikes me as not only absurd, but even a truly wicked way of thinking, a bitter mockery of the unspeakable sufferings of humanity.”

"To some [people], particularly in moments of melancholy mood, the world may perhaps appear as a cabinet of caricatures when considered from the aesthetic angle, from the intellectual angle as a madhouse, and from the moral angle as a hostel for scoundrels."

“If, finally, we were to bring to the sight of everyone the terrible sufferings and afflictions to which his life is constantly exposed, he would be seized with horror...” (rest of the quote ) https://i.redd.it/a487c5o6sw251.png

"I suppose I shall have to be told again that my philosophy is cheerless and comfortless simply because I tell the truth, whereas people want to hear that the Lord has made all things very well. Go to your churches and leave us philosophers in peace! At any rate, do not demand that they should cut their doctrines according to your pattern! This is done by knaves and philosophasters from whom you can order whatever doctrines you like."

And that's just scratching the surface.

Pessimism is generally shunned and disliked, so i'm not surprised that people who like other aspects about Schopenhauer would try to debunk his pessimism. Bernardo Kastrup wasn't even the first, here is another similar attempt https://i.redd.it/amod31xfgva61.png , to me, it seems like mere projection.

[Ben Iscatus]

Pessimism is generally shunned and disliked, so i'm not surprised that people who like other aspects about Schopenhauer would try to debunk his pessimism. Bernardo Kastrup wasn't even the first

BK does not deny Schop's pessimism and misogyny. It's his metaphysics he approves of.