GENERAL INTRODUCTION 0.

1 INTRODUCTION
In all of the different western cultural periods, suicide has been a phenomenon of fundamental concern although, there are varied degrees of importance and concerns to these epochs; not all have an equal reception of the discourse. Goethe seems to put this clearly, when he says suicide is an incident in human life which however much disputed and discussed, demands the sympathy of every man, and in every age must be dealt with anew.1 he discourse has not been limited only to the western region but reasons differ on the interest in suicide. !hile in "eudal #apan, suicide is an ultimate act of honour, redemption or union. In the western world it has always posed as fundamentally problematic, against the bac$ground that suicide is a voluntary self%destruction with no element of social constraint and obligation. &t the heart of these concerns, are e'istential characteristics; life and death, the relation of man to fellow man and the relation of man to himself. In the early eastern writings, the pre%occupation was primarily concerned with either suicide(s desirability or morality ta$ing cogni)ance of particular cases of suicide with strict reference to the intentions and situations. he fundamental thoughts of suicide to be studied as a normative action, concerned with the problem of man(s relation to God and man(s relation to man, develops in the nineteenth century. In the hierarchy of duty
1

he International *ncyclopaedia of the +ocial +cience, 1,-., ed., s.v +uicide by #ac$ /. /ouglas.

sequel to man(s obligation to his creator, is man(s right and duties to himself. "undamental and premier amongst these is that of self%preservation; self%security is deemed necessary which in fact is the direct and instinctual reaction to the basic drive for self%protection. +uicide qualifies as an antithesis to self%security and e'istentialism. 0ver the years, many have come to understand the problems suicide pose to the world. In the attempt to resolve the hitches, arguments in favour and against suicide have been advanced by great individuals of all times. 1rominent amongst them is a great philosopher of the 1,th century, &rthur +chopenhauer. &rthur +chopenhauer, born in the city of /an)ig, lived from 12.. to 1.-3. 4is thought too$ shape early in his life, in the decade from 1.13 to 1.53, yet until the 1.63s he was virtually un$nown, and the period in which he became a powerful influence began only in the second half of the nineteenth century. 5 7ertainly, he is one of the greatest philosophers of the nineteenth century and had more impact on literature and on people than concentrating on academic philosophy. 4e was greatly interested in the philosophy of 1lato and 8ant and these influenced his philosophy to a great e'tent. 4e retained 8ant(s notion of the thing%in%itself but recognised that it could not e'ist as a separate order of real ob9ects over and above the phenomenal ob9ects of e'perience. :nli$e 8ant, +chopenhauer maintained a careful use of the singular rather than plural when referring to the thing%in%itself and describes 8ant(s 7opernican
2

7hristopher #anaway, 1ress, 533-=, p.1

he 7ambridge 7ompanion to +chopenhauer ;7ambridge< 7ambridge :niversity

revolution as incomplete by describing the ordinary ob9ects of e'perience as phenomena but leaves the impression that things%in%themselves are the real ob9ects. 4e develops a strong sense of aesthetic value, coated with 1latonic cast and apprehended only by intuition. >eauty occupies a central place in his thought 9ust as other philosophers have done. 4is aesthetic realism is a great advance over 8ant?s moralistic denial of an ob9ective foundation for aesthetic reality. It is sometimes said of +chopenhauer that he was not a very systematic thin$er and many of his discussions of individual issues in his wor$s tend to wander and it is not always easy to see how different arguments fit together @. 1hilosophers upon whom +chopenhauer did have a strong effect, li$e Aiet)sche and even !ittgenstein, nevertheless could not put him to good use since they did not accept his moral, aesthetic, and religious realism. +chopenhauer is all but unique in intellectual history for being both an atheist and sympathetic to 7hristianity. +chopenhauer?s system, indeed, will not ma$e any sense e'cept in the conte't of 8ant?s metaphysics 4e was the first to spea$ of the suffering of the world, which visibly and glaringly surrounds us, similarly with confusion, passion, evil which are as a result of human desires and will. 4is metaphysical thought is also about the will, but now in terms of the denial of the will. he denial of will, self, and self%interest produce for +chopenhauer a theory both of morality and of holiness, the former by which self%interest is curtailed for the sa$e of others, the latter by which all will%to%live ceases. +chopenhauer?s greatest
3

/.! 4amyln +chopenhauer ;Bondon< Coutledge and 8egan 1aul Btd., 1,.3=,p.1

eloquence about the evils, sufferings, and futility of life, and its redemption through self% denial, occur there. 4e wrote a lot of wor$s and essays but his chief wor$ is his classic The World as Will and Representation ;/ie !elt als !ille und Dorstellung, 1.1., 1.EE, 1.6, %% *.".#. 1ayne?s *nglish translation, /over 1ublications, 1,--=, also On the Basis of Morality, trans. *. ". #. 1ayne ;0'ford< >erghahn >oo$s, 1,,6=.

0.2

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

Bife is such that everyone has to continually ma$e decisions; some of which are

trivial, others are very much important as to affect our entire life.

he conscious and

deliberate choices that characterise our behaviour are resultant from our will including suicidal acts. +uicide is an e'istential concern that ferociously stares at humanity right in the face as it threatens the co%e'istence of humanity starting from the individual in question. +chopenhauer did not believe in individual will rather he thin$s they are simply part of a vast and single will that pervades the universe as the driving force of endless striving. 4e adopts a pessimistic view to life as a painful misery therefore casting lots with death as the aim and purpose of life. /espite his profound pessimism, he vehemently re9ects suicide. It is obvious that there is a dis%harmony in this thought and that forms the cru' of the problem; how suicide can be re9ected from a pessimistic view that holds death in value.
4

0.3

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

his essays stands to ethically evaluate the issues of suicide basically as it is a

direct assault on e'istence, souring the value of life and man(s ultimate duty to himself, thus unravelling the silent and effective means of quelling this plague, which has not only rapidly accelerated in the eighteenth century, but wa' strongly even till date. & proper formation and restructure of individuals( conscience and ideology will be a veritable way to achieve the reduction and ultimately, the termination of suicidal acts, even in the worst of suffering world. his is to be done e'plicitly not neglecting to show various 9ustifications that ma$e e'istence and co%e'istence continually meaningful and eventually celebrate the requiem of suicide.

0.4

RELEVANCE OF STUDY
o all of humanity in the contemporary epoch, where the loss of sense of personal

security ramified in the acts of suicide has pervaded all facets of the world, the importance of this wor$ is invaluable. he wor$ more evidently is an epiphany of the

sacredness of human life to all and sundry by reinforcing in their consciousness that life is a gift from God and devoid of cultural or religious sentiments in moral decisions, individuals will preserve their lives and by e'tension help preserve the lives of others.

0.5

METHODOLOGY
he revelation of suicide in the light of +chopenhauerian pessimism of this essay

is catalogued into four chapters with the tripartite methodology of e'position, analysis and evaluation. he "irst 7hapter deals with the holistic understanding of suicide ta$ing into consideration, the problems and factors that interplay to create an ambiguous concept of suicide, nonetheless we shall develop a wor$ing definition of suicide as a guide through course of the pro9ect; the causes, the means and the development of the suicide through the different cultural epochs. he +econd 7hapter discusses the primacy of the will mainly as it is a sine qua non for an individual to issue an action. It e'poses the ne'us between the will and bodily actions focusing also on the question of freedom and determinism. he hird 7hapter handles the metaphysical thoughts, visions and values of

&rthur +chopenhauer against the bac$drop of 8ant(s metaphysics, ta$ing into consideration his ma9or step stone situated in his ontology of the will. he "ourth 7hapter evaluates suicide in the light of +chopenhauer alongside other philosophers, as well as basic ethical principle geared towards self%security.

CHAPTER ONE CHARACTERISING SUICIDE 1.1 PROBLEM OF DEFINITION

Cegardless of the persuasive arguments advanced to 9ustify the permissibility and morality of suicide which has intensified in recent times, infinitesimal attention has been paid to the development of an adequate definition of suicide. his is as a result of diverse and multifarious factors that interplay especially in determining the status of human actions that qualify as suicidal. 7onfusions are generated on the very nature of suicide because difficulties emerge when we even attempt to characteri)e suicide precisely and attempts to do so introduce intricate issues about how to describe and e'plain human actions. Fore so, identifying a set of necessary and sufficient conditions for suicide is especially challenging and it has compounded the tas$ right from the ancient to present times. &mong the many factors there are that affect the understanding of suicide, is the effect of social and traditional views essentially to the development of suicide within a culture. >eliefs raditions, Dalue system usually form the bond and the ideology of a his would mean that if suicide is not ac$nowledged by a

particular community.

community, then its definition obliterates any form of laudable action from the realm of suicide. >y way of e'plication if the termination of one(s life is vehemently repealed in a
7

society, while enormous merit is accorded being buried with one(s spouse, then, the act of ending one(s own life so as to be buried with one(s spouse may not be termed suicidal. E his point is predicated upon social convention and cultural relativism from which cultural relativists see morality as a product of culture hence other cultures are not wrong but different.6 &nother factor that fuels the definitional problematic of suicide is sub9ectivism which comes to the fore especially in assessing the intention for suicide. he intention for suicide is sub9ective and latent and this denies the possibility of a precise evaluation or $nowledge for suicide. &n act of self%termination for personal relief or one(s own sa$e is labelled as suicide while on the contrary if done for the sa$e of others, it assumes the state of sacrifice usually seen as heroic. he question that comes to fore is, what would be the status of the following actions either as suicide or sacrifice; a person who stops using life support machine in order to relieve the family of huge financial e'penses 0C a terrorist who decides to blow up himself in the midst of hostile powers for the sa$e of his cult or nation, 0C a confidant who ta$es lethal poison to avoid divulging information G secret to some e'ternal forceH he problem arises owing to the fact that the intention for suicide is not fully apprehended by any other person other than the individual involved in the very act, so to label an act as suicide or sacrifice is difficult.

om Cegan, ed. Fatters of Bife and /eath< Aew Introductory *ssays in Foral 1hilosophy, 5nd ed. ;Aew Ior$< Candom 4ouse, 1,.-=, p.2, 5 4arry #. Gensler, *arl !. +purgin and #ames 7. +windal, eds., *thics< 7ontemporary Ceadings ;Aew Ior$< Coutledge, aylor and "rancis, 5336=, p.1E

& third factor to consider here is supernaturalism. +upernaturalism allows a pride of place of an action if accepted by the /ivine.- his invariably means that JX is good because God desires X and bad if God detest X(. he appeal to the dictates of the divine especially as e'pressed in some $ind of /ivine law is responsible for the worthiness or worthlessness of an action and in this case if suicide would be encouraged or condemned, it would be determined by the acceptance of the /ivine. &usterity and self%denial are e'ceptional to religion as principled ways of life but if ta$en to the e'treme as in the case of fundamentalists or fanatics, it could consummate in the termination of one(s life. +o, if asceticism which is validated by supernaturalism, ta$en to the e'treme leads to death, would it count as suicide or natural deathH +acrifice is another way of life encouraged by religion and as we have tried to develop the problem above, the question would be the same if self%death under the guise of sacrifice would be e'cused as being suicidalH &ll of the above factors shape the problem of grasping the very nature of suicide. >e that as it may, we shall proceed in a conceptual fashion to analyse suicide and in the process attempt to provide a wor$ing definition.

1.2

CONCEPTUAL ANALYSIS OF SUICIDE

+uicide is an enigmatic and disconcerting phenomenon not devoid of conceptual

slipperiness. +uicide is a spinoff of two Batin words, J sui( which means Jof oneself( and

Ibid.

cide which means Ja $illing(.

he term indicates self%$illing usually meant to convey

self%professed or self%intended inclination to death.2 +uicide is an important issue in recent times for three reasons; firstly, contemporary, psychological and sociological studies of suicide raise serious moral questions about suicide, secondly, the idea that suicide is a way to avoid pain and indignities in life and thirdly, the attempt to give human beings absolute freedom.. 1erlin argues that suicide is not a disease but a form of behaviour that is influenced by historical, cultural, religious, social and personal relationship and no single psychological, social or medical theory suffices for its comprehension and prevention. , /efinitions of suicide tend to vary with the social approval or disapproval of suicide and the assessment of motives leading to the act.13 In an attempt to answer the question of what ma$es a person(s behaviour suicidal, one prevailing definition is that suicide occurs when there is an intentional or deliberate termination of one(s life. 7onsider the following cases; 1. #ames gambles away his fortune and shoots himself 5. #a$e climbs a roc$ without guide, he falls and dies @. #oe drin$s coffee and dies
7 8

he International *ncyclopaedia of the +ocial +cience, 1,-., ed., s.v +uicide by #ac$ /. /ouglas. Cegan, Fatters of Bife and /eath, p.2, 9 +eynour 1erlin, & 4andboo$ for the +tudy of +uicide ;Aew Ior$< 0'ford :niversity 1ress. 1,26=, p.1E2 10 Cegan, Fatters of Bife and /eath, p.2,

10

1resumably, we can agree that all three are cases of self%$illing but from the definition of suicide only ;1= is a case of suicide while the other two would count as accidental death. he first case clearly shows a profession of an intention to death because of a misfortune, hence the deliberate self%e'tinction while the other two cases are only a result of accident. here is the distinction between self%$illing as suicide and accidental death, thus what appears essential for a behaviour to be suicidal is the individual(s intention; the individual in question chooses to die. It follows thereof that suicide as an attempt to inflict death upon oneself is intentional rather than consequential in nature. 11 &pparently, an act would be suicidal if one acts ;or refrains from acting= in such a way as to bring about one(s own death. In other words, suicide should not be equitable with wrongful self%$illing in the way that murder is equated with wrongful $illing of another.15 he principle of intention and inclination to death is one that causes an action to bear as suicide. 7ontrary to this understanding and e'planation of suicide as an Jintentional and deliberate( act, is the definition issued by the renowned "rench sociologist, *milie /ur$heim. he term suicide is applied to all case of death resulting directly or indirectly from a positive or negative act of the victim himself which he $nows will produce this result.1@
11

Gavin "airbarin, 7ontemplating +uicide< he Banguage and *thics of +elf 4arm ;Bondon< Coutledge, 1,,6=, p.6. 12 he +tanford *ncyclopaedia of 1hilosophy, 533, ed., s.v +uicide by Fichael 7holbi 13 *milie /ur$heim, +uicide< & +tudy in +ociology, trans. #ohn &. +paulding and George +impson ;Aew Ior$< Coutledge, aylor and "rancis e%Bibrary, 5336=, p. 'lii

11

/ur$heim(s understanding of suicide is contrary to the first definition and re9ects it because it appeals to the presence of an intention to die. If we cast our minds bac$ to the problems of the definition of suicide, the intention for suicide is sub9ective and latent hence cannot be easily verified. his forms the basis for /ur$heim(s re9ection of the first definition. /ur$heim(s concept of suicide albeit it relinquishes the primacy of intention substitutes it for the $nowledge of self%death by the individual indulging in certain actions J... which he $nows will produce this result.( his substitution of epistemology for

intention by /ur$heim is highly contestable; nonetheless we can comprehend his premise for a modification of definition of the concept based on the fact that intentions cannot be accurately ascertained.1E >ut on the other hand an acceptance of this definition allows for a vulnerability to obvious counter e'amples. &n individual, who $nows the health ris$ of smo$ing or s$ydiving, engages in these behaviours and dies as a result could be said to be causally responsible for his G her death but not to have committed suicide. If /ur$heim(s concept of suicide is to be accepted, then the mere fact that the individual $nows the ris$ of such endeavour and goes ahead to parta$e in it, is suicide.

14

Cegan, Fatters of Bife and /eath, p..1

12

o consider a similar scenario, if #ac$ throws himself on a grenade to save his friends and the e'plosion $ills him in the process, it does not still count as suicide. he devastating and in9urious effect of a grenade cannot be underestimated especially as we see in wars or suicide bombings; but if #ac$ had thrown himself on the grenade, it was because he wanted to save his friends and does not propose to death. his rules out the action of #ac$ as suicidal because he may have believed that, it is not his death that saves his friends but his covering the grenade; perhaps with luc$ he might have survived while still achieving his goal. he first definition seems to serve the understanding of suicide as an intentional self%inflicted death, but it is really $notty and with shortcomings. "or what is it to intend by one?s behaviour that death resultH +cholars have argued that the nature of the intention, which has to do with the precise reason for the action, as well as the circumstances under which the intention was nurtured should be considered even though this definition does not ta$e that into consideration. "rom the above scenario, would it be the case that #ac$ committed suicideH :sually there is a distinction between intentional self%$illing for self serving purposes and self caused death for reasons other than the self. his arouses the problem of sacrificial death if it is indistinguishable from suicide or not mainly because both involve an intentional act. In an article om >eauchamp asserts that,

13

he $ey notion responsible for our not classifying some intentional self $illings as suicides may be sacrifice. 1erhaps those who sacrifice their lives are not conceived as suicides for an interesting reason< >ecause such actions have from the suicide point of view, plausible claim to 9ustification for other regarding, not self regarding reasons, we e'clude these sacrificial acts from the realm of the suicidal. !e may not regard them as actually 9ustified, but rather as 9ustified from the viewpoint of the agent who causes or perhaps fails to prevent his G her own death.16

In any case of self $illing therefore, the reason for the act is considered and following from >eauchamp(s assertion, J... other regarding not self regarding reasons( might possibly be a defining factor to discern between suicide and sacrificial death. >oth sacrificial death and suicide involve an intention but the difference lies in the motives or aims that drive that intention. It is clearly seen that, in suicide the intention is to e'terminate the self from its present e'istential state, thus having its ends for the ultimate purpose for the self. >ut this is antagonistic to sacrificial death which its intention is not to die per se for the self(s emancipation but for other selfless reasons. &nother challenge in the effort to cogni)e suicide is the problem of treatment refusal, which is apparent in hospital life. his problem is stimulated chiefly by the right to refuse treatment; well informed patients with decision ma$ing capacity have an autonomous right to refuse and forego recommended treatments. >ut following upon their decision, if death occurs, would this count as suicideH

15

Cichard >randt, he Forality and Cationality of +uicide, in +eynour 1erlin, ed., & 4andboo$ for the +tudy of +uicide ;0'ford< 0'ford :niversity 1ress, 1,26=, p.131

14

&ccording to >eauchamp, these acts can be suicides for the reason that any means productive of death can be used also to the ends of suicide. J1ulling the plug on one(s respirator is not relevantly different from plunging a $nife into one(s heart, if the reason for putting an end to life is identical in the two cases. 1- he point of >eauchamp is that, if ;for e'ample= a seriously wounded soldier turns his gun to himself and intentionally $ills himself, that would be suicide; and if a patient who suffers a terminal illness K ;renal failure=, refuses another dialysis and dies as a result, it would also be suicide. he logical underpinning here is the active and passive distinction of suicide. he former ta$es the active and the latter, passive. he terminally ill patient might be using the passive means as a socially acceptable way of ending it all because the passive means somewhat resembles a naturally caused death. Aonetheless, in view of the agent(s intention, not all naturally caused death can be eliminated from considerations as suicide. 12 hus the active as well as the passive means are cases of suicide, so people of this category cannot be e'culpated from suicidal act; the intention is present even in the passive means. &n act is not suicide if one is caused to die by a life threatening condition that is not brought about through one(s own actions. 1. o cause one(s own death in order to die is tantamount to $illing oneself, but to have death caused by some ailing predicament stands
16

#oel "einberg, Introduction to +anctity of Bife in om >eauchamp, !illiam >lac$stone and #oel "einberg ;eds.=, 1hilosophy and he 4uman 7ondition ;*nglewood 7liffs, A.#< 1rentice 4all, 1,.3=, p.5, 17 Cegan, Fatters of Bife and /eath, p..18 Ibid.

15

out from being suicide. In e'ercising the right to refuse treatment, the individual evidently causes his death and that fulfils the second element above, but it does not fully e'plain the individual(s intention to die. he refusal of treatment need not necessarily be for self

regarding reasons but other, and if this is the case, then the problem is complicated because, the refusal of treatment for other regarding reasons other than the self would transverse with the nature of sacrificial death. 0n the whole, a greater willingness is e'hibited to categori)e self $illings intended to avoid one(s misery as suicides than self $illing intended to benefit others.1, he death of a person is suicide if the individual(s death is intentionally caused by the individual in question for self reasons. >ut some scholars would li$e to add another element so as to get the concept clearly. &part from the individual causing his own death, the action would not be suicidal if the individual is coerced to bring about his own death. ypically, coercion denotes interference by others to carry out an action either through force or threat. >ased on the issue at hand, we can imagine a situation whereby a spy threatened with torture unless he relinquishes a vital military secret, would not be spared so he goes ahead to poison himself. +ome would vie that he did not commit suicide because his sub9ugator constrained him to ta$e his life. &lthough theorists about suicide often fail to divorce questions about whether an act was suicide from whether its motives were admirable or odious,53 >eauchamp upon
19 20

he +tanford *ncyclopaedia of 1hilosophy, 533, ed., s.v +uicide by Fichael 7holbi Ibid.

16

critical analysis avers that, the sacrificial nature of an action is not a legitimate reason for e'cluding it from suicide because there is an intention to die. he point here for

>eauchamp is the distinction between the acts as suicide from its motives; an act can be suicidal but its motives may be laudable or abhorrent. +uicide is an enigmatic and encyclopaedic concept which cannot be easily encapsulated in a one sentence definition. his brief attempt of conceptual analysis of

suicide illustrates the frustrations of such an endeavour owing to the unclear notions of suicide apparently replaced by the unclear notions of intention and coercion.51 0n the one hand is the principle of intention and on the other hand is the principle of coercion; not until these sub9ects are clarified, a seeming e'actitude in the conception of suicide might not be possible. 4owever, the imperative aspects of an adequate analysis of the ordinary language concept of suicide have been laid down to transmit the discussion on the assessment of suicide; an intentional and non%coerced self $illing in which the conditions causing death are self arranged.55

1.3

CAUSES OF SUICIDE
/eath is the fi'ed inevitable consequence of life, the moment we begin to be, we

have advanced one step towards that period we shall be no more. 5@ here are anomalies in
21 22

he +tanford *ncyclopaedia of 1hilosophy, 533, ed., s.v +uicide by Fichael 7holbi he Internet *ncyclopaedia of 1hilosophy, 1,,., ed., s.v +uicide by #ames "ieser, and >radley /owden 23 Cobert "ellowes, & >rief reatise on /eath< 1hilosophically, Forally and 1ractically 7onsidered ;Bondon, 1.36=, p.-

17

the usual length of life of a man and one factor among many that counts is suicide. he previous consideration centred on the concept of suicide, thus launches the present agenda of surveying the aetiology of suicide. he causes of suicide are multifarious but all of

these can be subsumed into two categories 1sychological cause +ociological cause

18

PSYCHOLOGICAL CAUSE
1sychological cause of suicide would involve individuals who suffer from mental or psychological chaos and often end up committing suicide. It is not the case that these disorders are directly productive of suicide but gradually and ultimately puts the individual in a state of imbalance; for e'ample, serious depression can lead to specific changes of the /A& in the human brain which leads to pathological or psychological disturbances. !hen the individual is at this stage he see$s for some $ind of immediate relief from the anguishing situation, thus a subscription to suicide. 1atients in mental hospital do have particularly high suicide rates especially those with depressive disorders.5E 1sychological problems that precipitate suicide are numerous if they be enlisted but these problems range mainly from /epression, Fanic /epression and Felancholic /isorder.

SOCIOLOGICAL CAUSE
*milie /ur$heim in his boo$, Suicide discusses the sociological tinge of suicide. he basic theme of /ur$heim(s wor$ is that suicide which appears to be a phenomenon relating to the individual is e'plainable aetiologically, with reference to the social structure and its ramifying functions.56 he currents of suicide would be related to social concomitants to understand and place any individual suicide in its proper aetiological

24 25

B. I /ublin, +uicide< & +ociological and +tatistical +tudy ;Aew Ior$< Conald 1ress, 1,-@=, p.121 /ur$heim, +uicide< & +tudy in +ociology, p. 'iii

19

setting. 7onsequently suicide as a social factor would be e'plained by means of other social factors K Celigion, Farriage, 7osmic factors and *conomy.

C*BIGI0A &A/ +:I7I/*

/ur$heim points out that religion plays an important role and has a great influence on suicide rates. his is evident in religions whose practitioners have ta$en their doctrines to the e'treme thus becoming fundamentalist or fanatics and would lay down their lives at any cost. +uicide rates have been noticed to be lowest in 7atholic countries but are at the pea$ among the 1rotestants. /ur$heim says< It is the repository of common sentiments, a well spring from which each individual conscience draws a moral sustenance. !here these common sentiments rigorously guide the individual as in 7atholicism and condemn the ta$ing of one(s own life, there the suicide rate is low; where the common sentiments lay great stress on individualism, innovation and free thought, the hold over the individual slac$ens, he is tenuously bound to society and can the more easily be led to suicide.5-

4is point is that, the stronger the forces that integrate the individual into the collective life ;the society=, the lesser the suicide rates compared to that of high sate of individualism. If religion protects man against the inclination for self destruction, it is because it is a society

26

Ibid., p.'vi

20

and this society is characteri)ed by the constellation of a certain number of beliefs and practices common to all the faithful, traditional and binding on them all.52

27

Ibid., p.156

21

*70A0FI &A/ +:I7I/*

he individual(s need and satisfaction is usually regulated by the society. +uicide rates tend to rise in times of economic recession and depression. /ur$heim noted first that financial crises led to an immediate rise in the suicide rates, documenting this with the e'amples from Dienna 1.2@, "ran$furt% on K main 1.2E and 1aris 1..5, and when the number of ban$ruptcies rose in a society the suicide rates also increased.5. 0n the other hand, civili)ation has brought not only progress and development but an'ieties, unattainable wants, into'ication religious cruelty which brings suicide nearer especially to those at the top stratum of economic system. +uicide rates rose during the world e'position in 1.2. and 1..,; they stimulate business, bring more money into the country and are thought to increase public prosperity, especially in the city where they ta$e place. Iet, quite possibly, they ultimately ta$e their toll in a considerably higher number of suicides 9ust as increased industriali)ation in Italy after its unification was accompanied by an increase in suicide rate.5, In point of fact, if voluntary deaths increased because life was becoming more difficult, they should diminish observably as comfort increases but this is not the case. /ur$heim detected that what proves more convincingly that economic anguish does not have the frustrating influence often attributed to it, is that it tends to produce the opposite
28

/avid Beister and >i9ou Iang, he *conomy and +uicide< *conomic 1erspective on +uicide ;Aew Ior$< Aova 1ublishers, 1,,2=, p.1E 29 /ur$heim, +uicide< & +tudy in +ociology, p.536

22

effect. here is very little suicide in Ireland, where the peasantry leads so wretched a life; 1overty%stric$en 7alabria has almost no suicides.@3 herefore in both times of economic disaster and prosperity, if there are increased suicide rates, it is because there are crises and the immediate result is usually a reduction in strength of social integration and order leading an increase in anomie. *very disturbance of equilibrium even though it achieves a greater comfort and a heightening of general vitality is an impulse to voluntary death.@1

F&CI &B + & :+ &A/ +:I7I/*

Farital status and suicide are presumed to be interrelated being that marriage is one of the social factors in the aetiology of suicide. he suicide rates of the unmarried persons are usually high than those of who are married. *vidently, marriage entails all sorts of burdens of which the single person is autonomous but marriage has a sheltering influence against suicide because it incorporates the individual into a stable social relationship. +uicide varies with the degree of integration of the individual into the social groups which he belongs; marriage is one means of attaining this integration and it strengthens the ties between the individual and the society. /ur$heim also noted that marriage generally has an advantage of physical and moral constitution somewhat better than that of unmarried persons although this is highly probable. &nthony Giddens in his remar$s on /ur$heim(s wor$ on suicide says suicide is used by /ur$heim as a means of demonstrating the $ey impact of social factors on our
30 31

/ur$heim, +uicide< & +tudy in +ociology, p.536 Ibid.

23

personal lives and even our most intimate motives. he society cannot be isolated as it is a strong determiner in the aetiology of suicide and the society is not only something attracting the sentiments and activities of individuals with an unequal force, it is also a power controlling them; there is a way this regulative action is performed and the social suicide rate.@5 here are countless of reasons for which people commit suicide; suffering, grief, unrequited love, to escape punishment, financial loss, to restore honour, belief that life has no inherent value ;pessimism, absurdity and nihilism= to mention a few. o bring about the actuali)ation of suicide, different methods are employed and usually vary from culture to culture. 4anging oneself amongst other means is the mostly used method hence assumes the leading method worldwide.@@

1.4

HIGHLIGHT OF HISTORICAL THOUGHT OF SUICIDE

1.E.1 &ncient and 7lassical views

1hilosophical discourse about suicide stretches bac$ to the time of 1lato. 1lato discussed about suicide in two of his wor$s K J Phaedo and La s. 4e claimed that suicide is disgraceful and shameful and that its perpetuators should be buried in unmar$ed graves and suicide is an act of cowardice or la)iness in managing life(s vicissitudes.

32 33

Ibid., p.531 Ficrosoft *ncarta, 533, ed., s.v. +uicide, by &lan B. >erman

24

he stoics, very well represented by +eneca and many others contend that whence the means to living a naturally flourishing life are not available to us, suicide may be 9ustified. +eneca argues that mere living is not good but living well. &ccordingly, the wise man will live as long as he ought, not as long as he can, he will always reflect concerning the quality and not the length of his life, as soon as there are events bedevilling and perturbing his internal peace, he sets himself free.@E 7entral to the ancient and classical views of suicide is the principle of autonomy, which has as its nucleus the verity that individuals should e'ercise their liberty and freedom, as well as to be self determining agents ma$ing personal evaluations and choices in all circumstances, probably, even when their interest is in 9eopardy, but most importantly is the absence of e'ternal constraints.

1.E.5

he Fedieval Interpretation
he advent of 7hristianity is perhaps the most important event in the philosophical

history of suicide. /espite the fact that no passage in the scriptures e'plicitly condemns suicide, 7hristian doctrine throughout the ages has held that suicide is morally wrong. Aotable personalities in the middle ages especially in the development of the 7hristian understanding and prohibition of suicide are +t. &ugustine and +t. whose thoughts continue to wa' stronger in influencing populace. homas &quinas,

34

#oseph 0moregbe, 8nowing 1hilosophy ;Bagos, #o9a 1ress Btd, 1,,3=, p.6-

25

+t. &ugustine ta$es leave from the fifth commandment as a natural e'tension to the prohibition of suicide. he law, rightly interpreted, even prohibits suicide, where it says J hou shall not $ill.( his is proven especially by the omission of the word Jthy

neighbour(@6 thus giving an elasticity to the application of the law to both the self and other beings. +uicide for him is an unrepentable sin. +t. homas &quinas, a renowned theologian also offered his thought about suicide specifically to the proscription of suicide on three grounds. 0n the first level, suicide is contrary to natural self love whose aim is to preserve us. +ince everything naturally loves itself, there is a resultant effect which is the natural preservation of the self but suicide is contrary to the inclination of nature and charity.@- +econdly, he commends that suicide in9ures the community which an individual is a part and thirdly, suicide violates our duty to God because 4e has given us life as a gift and in ta$ing our lives we violate his right to determine the duration of our earthly e'istence.@2

1.E.@ Fodern /evelopment

+ubsequent to the cognition of suicide in the medieval era, is the development of the modern and enlightenment thought on suicide. !hereas 7hristian theology has understood suicide as Lan affair between the devil and the individual sinnerL @.
35 36

he +tanford *ncyclopaedia of 1hilosophy, 533, ed., s.v +uicide by Fichael 7holbi homas &quinas, +umma heologiae, trans. "athers of the *nglish /ominican 1rovince, Dol 1 ;Aew Ior$< >en)iger >rothers Inc., 1,2E=, p.1E-, 37 Ibid. 38 Ibid., p.@33

26

*nlightenment philosophers tended to conceive of suicide in secular terms, as resulting from facts about individuals, their natural psychologies, and their particular social settings. his shift was not without the thoughts of notable personnel li$e /avid 4ume, Immanuel 8ant, #ean 1aul +artre and *milie /ur$heim. /avid 4ume collaborates with this new approach with a direct mugging on the homistic position in his unpublished essay On suicide. he thesis that suicide violates our duties to self because misfortunes and ill health can ma$e life sufficiently miserable, and continued e'istence is worse than death; thus suicide may be free of imputation of guilt and blame. he modern development was

definitely not univocal in its comparatively permissive attitudes towards suicide but also had another wing which had a severe carriage on suicide. his is clear in the contributions of the most clamorous opponent of suicide in this period, Immanuel 8ant. he gamut of the discourse so far has been to situate the concept of suicide especially within a common understanding, as an intentional murder of oneself. he

intention of the individual is informed by the autonomy of choice faculty otherwise called the Jwill( and this is also evident through the history; perhaps the most prominent theme in e'istentialist writing is that of choice, the freedom to choose in fulfilment of our intention. he +yrian Islamic scholar, Fuhyid%/in &bu Ma$ariyya ibn +haraf al%

Aawawi ;15@@ % 1522= says Intention is the measure for rendering actions true, so that where intention is sound, action is sound, and where it is corrupt then action is corrupt.
27

his sets the basis for the ne't agenda which is an e'amination of the !ill especially as it is non K negligible in human acts and allows for responsibility of actions carried out by us, thus a necessary entity inherent in the human being.

28

CHAPTER TWO PHENOMENOLOGY OF THE WILL

he German philosopher *dmund 4usserl founded the 53th%century movement called phenomenology and it bothers on the study of the structures of consciousness in reference to ob9ects outside itself; a reflection on the content of the mind to the e'clusion of everything else.@, he application of the term in affinity with the !ill already suggests what the whole discourse entails. herefore 1henomenology of the will centres on the study of the !ill in relation to its manifestation through human actions primarily as both do not belong to the same realm. he discourse is encapsulated in more vivid and strict terms as, an attempt to understand the essence of the will, and 9ust as modern e'istentialists would give us a hint that Jthere is no fi'ed human essence structuring our lives and that our choices are never determined by anything e'cept our own free will(.

2.1

NATURE OF THE WILL

he tas$ of defining or describing the will may possibly be thought of as having

no need of engaging in it being that the word is generally understood, but this would be the case if philosophers, metaphysicians had not given their words or thoughts about the

39

Ficrosoft *ncarta, 533, ed., s.v. 1henomenology, by 4ubert B. /reyfus

29

will, thus creating diverse ideologies about it. In tilting the sphere of clarity, which is the bac$ground of this discourse, it would be necessary to say a few things. #onathan *dwards contends that, the faculty of the will is that power or principle of the mind by which it is capable of choosing; the will therefore is that, by which the mind chooses anything.E3 :nli$e the body or other physical ob9ects which are rather concrete and can be perceived at least through the five senses, the will is abstract but is sensed through its e'pression in the choice of the mind; an act of the will is synonymous to an act of choosing 0C an act of re9ection. It is important to understand how the will transforms in the acts of choosing, re9ection, that is, the connectedness between the will and visible human actions. a$ing leave from the dualism of /escartes, when the mind and the body are divorced from each other, human actions fall apart conceptually thus it splits into acts of the will identifiable only in introspection. E1 >etween the will and human actions, there e'ists a causal relation such that the former which belongs to the sphere of the mind, informs the actions that are e'hibited through the body. he dualism of /escartes would not properly account for this relation because for him the mind and the body are two distinct substances K mental and physical which e'ist independently of each other and have completely different attributes.E5 his implies that willing which is a conscious act
40 41

#onathan *dwards, "reedom of the !ill ;Grand Capids FI< 7hristian 7lassics *thereal Bibrary, 533=, p.5 Ilham /ilman, "reewill< & 4istorical and 1hilosophical Introduction ;Aew Ior$< Coutledge, 1,,,=, p.11, 42 !illiam ". Bawhead, he Doyage of /iscovery< & 4istorical Introduction to 1hilosophy, 5nd ed. ;!adsworth Group< homas Bearning Inc. 5335=, p.5@2

30

remains in the mental state and finds no display through a physical substance. >ut it is evident that the wor$ings of the mind influences the wor$ings of the body and vice K versa, thus they are in constant interaction. he 1latonic account which was followed by /escartes, classifying the mind and the body as two complete substances, each of its own account and are contingently united, differs from the &ristotelian solution of the mind and the body as two incomplete substances in which their fusion originates a complete substance. he latter account

rightly e'plicates the mind(s perception of the body(s need or lac$ thus the will is the mental component that moves one into action. +o if an individual wills that a table be drawn close to her, she would not e'pect to do it mentally as to e'pect a physical effect, rather through an e!ternal o"#ect of the ill, which in this case could be her hand, the

table is drawn close to her and the will is manifested in this action. he point here is that, one(s will ;in the forms of resolutions and intentions= can only be seen from the outside, as well as not something the individual herself sees from the inside, although an intention can e'ist without the action e'ercised but without reference to the action, it is null and void. his gives a bac$ing to our understanding of suicide in the previous chapter as it clearly shows that the act self $illing is a manifestation of the individual(s will in question to terminate his own life; the will is something inward but finds its e'pression in the efforts and actions of the human person.

31

&quinas characteri)es the will as Jrational appetite( because, its desire is usually in response to the consideration of reason and reason e'ercises some 9udgement on our desires, li$e, is it rightH Is it prudentH !hat consequences will my pursuit of it haveH /o I want such consequencesHE@ Ceason can be understood as being synonymous to our convictions or commitments especially in the conte't of values or value system, and it is usually one set of values that weighs another, so in the option between alternatives, the 9udgment we e'ercise are resultant of our values ;reason= which thereof guides the will towards its ends; reason becomes an affective character.EE he will has the capacity to choose only that which reason independently of inclination cogni)es as practically necessary, that is as good, but if the case is contrary and the will is not in itself in conformity with reason, then actions that are considered as ob9ectively necessary become sub9ectively contingent.E6

2.2

AUTONOMY AND CAUSALITY

he problem of freewill and its opposing doctrine determinism is one of the $ey

issues in philosophy which has arisen in history especially whenever people suspected that their actions might be determined or necessitated by factors un$nown to them or beyond their control. 1eople have wondered at various times whether their actions might be determined by fate or God, by laws of physics or the laws of logic, by heredity or
43 44

Ilham /ilman, "reewill< & 4istorical and 1hilosophical Introduction, p.,1 Ibid., p.,5 45 Immanuel 8ant, Groundwor$ of the Fetaphysics of Forals trans. Fary Gregor ;7ambridge< 7ambridge :niversity 1ress, 1,,2=, p.5E

32

environment, by unconscious motives or hidden controllers, psychological or social conditioning.E- his has prompted questions as to what is the place of freewill in our lives if our actions are the result of some other cause. /o our desires ma$e us freeH In the attempt to address the question of freewill, it demands an understanding of the relationship between freedom and cause. "reedom is an e'emption either from some impediment to the performance of some acts or it is an e'emption from a limitation, confinement or compulsion to perform the act.E2 &lthough freedom is usually used in significations which seem to be widely different, its relation to the will is the conte't here, thus freewill is the ability of rational species to effect control over their actions, decisions or choices, to the point of being held responsible for their choice. here are no doubts about the reality of a will in every

individual especially as it bothers on the capacity to choose but the principle of causality accounts that every act has a cause and consequently has a necessary connection to its cause. "or the will to be free, means it must not be sub9ect to compulsion or causality but the will is sub9ect to it as being part of the natural order, then how do we come to terms with the freedom of the willH >. " +trawson presents the problem of the freewill debate in terms of the dilemma of determinism; the thesis of determinism as generally understood, is the claim that everything that happens in the world including all human thought and action is sub9ect to
46 47

#ohn Fartin "ischer et al. "our Diews on "reewill ;:+&< >lac$well 1ublishing Btd, 5332=, p.6 /. / !hedon, he "reedom of the !ill &s & >asis of 4uman Cesponsibility and & /ivine Government ;Aew Ior$< 7arlton and 1orter, 1.-E=, p.5@

33

causal laws and this involves the necessitation of effects by an antecedent causal condition.E. he difficulty that resides here follows from the fact that freewill seems

impossible if our actions are causally necessitated and at the same time it also seems impossible if our actions are not causally obliged, and if both claims are correct then freewill is impossible whatever stand is ta$en. hose who cast lots with determinism and re9ect freewill have their basic contention to be that, freedom of action is a voluntary behaviour as such freewill means that an individual must necessarily be the ultimate and originating cause of his actions and only then can we account for moral responsibility. If determinism is true and we have no freewill, then the agent who engages in suicide is only passive in his actions; but is determinism trueH & different account of the freewill debate is posed by those who are called the compatibilists and they maintain that freedom and moral responsibility are compatible with determinism. hey propose one of their core arguments that, it is only a mere

confusion to suppose that freedom implies the absence of causal necessitation but what freedom requires is the absence of compulsion and coercion. E, 7ompatibilism seems plausible because it loo$s so clear that we are sometimes free and morally responsible for

48

Fichael Fc8enna and 1aul Cussell ;eds.=, "reewill and Ceactive &ttitudes< 1erspectives on 1. " +trawson(s J"reedom and Cesentment( ;*ngland< &shgate 1ublishing Btd, 533.=, p.1 49 "ischer et al. "our Diews on "reewill, p.5

34

our actions and determinism could turn out to be factual basically because all events are a result of networ$ing of necessitating cause at least traced into the past.63 he reality of the freewill is our capacity to own our intentions, to be the author of our actions, to be responsible for what we do so that we can be blamed or praised for what we do.61 >ased on this, /escartes opines that, what the mind wills is determined by the mind itself in accordance with its own wishes and 9udgements, thus the will is self determined and free. 4ume(s answer centres on the conviction that being sub9ect to causality is not being sub9ect to compulsion. 8ant(s e'planation is that when the will is sub9ect to causality in the form of inclination, it is heteronymous and determined by something e'ternal as such it cannot be free; but once it is at one with reason and determined by it, it is self determined and therefore free. /espite causality which we are sub9ect to even though we are intentional beings, it is we who determine our actions rather than being understood as an effect of causes e'ternal to our will, so that the will itself is not sub9ect to any causality. o say we have freewill is to say that we are

intentional agents capable of choices and decisions, and G. * Foore insists that we have the capacity to choose and when we do so, it is we who determine our action. 4e argues that our conviction of freewill implies that there are many occasions when we could have done something other than what we did, that is, what we did not do 65. In li$e manner the individual who conceives of suicide and decides to actuali)e it has the option to act other
50 51

Ibid., p.EE Ilham /ilman, "reewill< & 4istorical and 1hilosophical Introduction, p.2@ 52 G.* Foore, *thics ;0'ford< 0'ford :niversity 1ress, 1,E2=, p.1@1

35

wise and not terminate his life because of the reality of freewill inherent in him; he ta$es responsibility for his action and has an e'planation why he chose not to commit suicide other than to commit suicide or vice versa.6@ *vidently, all that we have considered is to hold on to our persuasion of the reality of freewill in the face of an argument from causality that threatens it. +ince we opine for the reality and possibility of freewill and the acts of willing, then it is pertinent to question the source of all virtues and vices e'hibited by individual persons; where do they do originate from if not the willH !e have not ta$en a stand on the nature of suicide, whether it is a virtuous act or an evil act but whatever be its category, it must be determined by some prerequisite 9ust as the question demands.

2.3

THE GOOD WILL

Fanichaeanism taught that the world is an arena in which two opposing cosmic

forces contend; one good and the other evil such that when someone does a laudable action, the forces of good is thought to outweigh the forces of evil and vice%versa. In contrast to this understanding, is that of 8ant(s moral theory which shoots from the claim that nothing in the good
53

orld $$$ can possi"ly "e concei%ed

hich could "e called

ithout &ualification e!cept a good

ill$ 6E here are many qualities, concepts that

&lthough the individual be dead already, it does not e'clude the fact that he has an e'planation for his deeds; the only difference in this circumstance is that, there is no one to listen and comprehend his e'planation. 54 Bawhead, he Doyage of /iscovery< & 4istorical Introduction to 1hilosophy, p.@E3

36

worth to be called good but devoid of a good will, they cannot be any good. "or e'ample, we can imagine the case of a scoundrel who possesses qualities of intelligence, courage, power, would only augment the evil he could do rather than improve his goodness. :nli$e positive qualities, the goodwill is always good under any circumstances and since it is at the centre of morality, the question is how do we identify such a will especially in the evaluation of individuals( charactersH In the attempt to respond to the question, 8ant offers a guideline to accessing a good will; firstly, it should not be 9udged from what a person accomplishes. In a situation for e'ample, where #anet ris$s her life to save a drowning child but did not achieve her goal, the goodness of the will stimulating these action spar$les clearly despite the apparent failure. It supposedly means that the intention to produce good consequence will suffice to account for a good will since the actual endeavour did not serve the purpose. >ut a $een scrutiny of the intention based account also reveals its insufficiency to serve as good will because we can intend to do the right action for morally tainted reasons or self centred reasons, so merely intending the right action cannot be the basic criterion for moral goodness neither will acting on the basis of sentiments or feelings or what 8ant calls inclination especially that our feelings are not predictable and static. 4aving eliminated actual consequences, intended consequences and feelings or inclination, we can affirm that goodwill is a will that is moved to act from moral duty and concerned to do what is right from the sole motive that, it is the morally right action to
37

perform.66 his clearly shows the distinction between deontological ethics ;from duty or obligation= in contrast to eleological or 7onsequential ethics. hus the person of good will is precisely the one who performs good acts simply because it is his duty to perform them despite his inclination to do otherwise. In other words the source of all virtuous actions is nothing other than the Good will. &ugustine ma$es it clearer other than the dualism of the Fanicheans that evil must be conceived of as a defect, a corruption or perversion of what is good. It becomes apposite through logical reasoning to say that the source of all vices in human endeavour is a privation or distortion of the good will. *vil is not an independent reality but simply the absence of good, in li$e manner, an evil will is not substantial in itself but a dearth of goodness so that whatever is contrary to the good will is evil. It is not out of place to as$ how to be sure of the good will that is, against what bac$ground is the good will formedH &s we $now, the morally good will is one that performs actions out of a sense of duty but our duty is in conformity with a natural law, it lies in obedience to a particular principle regardless of inclination, self interest or consequences. 8ant calls this supreme principle, the 7ategorial Imperative with its first formulation as ' ought ne%er to act e!cept in such a ay that my ma!im should "ecome a uni%ersal la $() his means that for each act we are about to actuali)e, we can as$ K what is the rule authori)ing this act and can it become a universal rule for all human beings to followH "or e'ample if we deceive another into
55 56

Ibid., p.@E1 Immanuel 8ant, "oundations of the Fetaphysics of Forals, trans. Bewis !hite >ec$ ;Indianapolis< >obbs % Ferill, Bibrary of Biberal &rts, 1,6,=, p.@,

38

believing our story so as to get our ends, can deception be made a universal law that all human race can follow when in dire need of somethingH +urely, the answer is in the negative and since it cannot be universali)ed, it ceases to be a good act. "inally, the good will confers on everyone a challenge to act from moral duty in conformity with the natural principle towards others. In terms of our discourse, everyone has a duty towards the suicidal individual, to convince and counsel the agent on the value and worth of continued life and the call of this moral duty demands that this is done at all times so as to promote goodness. If at this point, without pre9udice we as$ a question, it is not out of place K do we not have a duty to ourselves, duty to preserve our livesH

2.4

AUTONOMY AND PERMISSIBILITY

he principal issue surrounding this section borders on the moral permissibility of

suicide ta$ing into consideration the conditions, if any, under which suicide is morally 9ustified or will the principle of rational autonomy satisfy as the condition for the permissibility of suicideH "or libertarians, suicide is morally permissible because individuals en9oy a right to suicide which is rightly called a right of non % interference 62 therefore others are morally barred from interfering in a suicidal behaviour. +ome are of the opinion that individuals have no moral duty not to commit suicide, that is, suicide violates no moral duty, and on the other hand others are morally obliged not to interfere in a person(s suicidal behaviour
57

he +tanford *ncyclopaedia of 1hilosophy, 533, ed., s.v +uicide by Fichael 7holbi

39

and are morally required to assist them. 6. & popular account for the claim that we en9oy a right to suicide is that we own our bodies, hence we are morally permitted to dispose of them as we wish and this follows from the freewill of the human person to choose and act freely accordingly. 0ur freewill is bound up with our living in a human world characteri)ed by the significance we find in them. Good and evil belong to this world and these form an integral part of the significance which characteri)es our actions and intentions, thus we choose to put up actions that are good or bad in how we choose to live and G or what we do in particular situations. &re there conditions under which suicide is morally 9ustified or in other words do we have a duty to preserve our livesH Is suicide rational or prudentH hese questions unfold as a result of the overemphasis on the human person to act freely as it is the case of libertarianism, but it is only rational to note the limitations of human freewill. he words of 8wame A$rumah ;1,3, %1,25=, Ghanaian 1resident that without discipline true freedom cannot survive become worthwhile. he discipline of our freewill can be understood especially with recourse to the universal principle ;the 7ategorial Imperative= and the good will, which will also serve as an arbiter to attempt an answer to the questions above. o preserve one(s life is a duty. It is evident that everyone has an immediate inclination to do so but if this is the case, the preservation of one(s life has no moral worth
58

1abst >attin, he /eath /ebate< *thical Issues in +uicide ;:pper +addle Civer A.#< 1rentice 4all, 1,,-=, p.1-@

40

because it is done in conformity with duty but not from duty6, and that is why when adversity and suffering should ta$e away the taste of life, death is subscribed to as some form of relief but Jif an unfortunate man, strong of soul and more indignant about his fate ... wishes for death and yet preserves his life without loving it, not from inclination or fear but from duty, then his ma'im has a moral content.-3 & suicidal act is not an action from duty especially because an action from duty has its moral worth not in the purpose to be attained by the act, but in the ma'im in accordance with which it is decided upon, from respect for the law K the categorial imperative. 0ur common human reason also agrees completely with the practical application of this law especially in determining the second question, is suicide rational or prudentH >y way of recapitulation, the universal law is JI ought never to act e'cept in such a way that I could also will that my ma'im should become a universal law( and this alone is to serve as the principle of the will. +uicide cannot be a universal law for it is an anti%thesis to the principle of the will and at the same time, a spinoff from a non%good will. If suicide were to be accepted by everyone such that at the slightest depression or suffering, the recourse should be to suicide then an uncontrollable outbrea$ of increasing death rate will be necessitated, disrespect for the sanctity of life and the thoughts and belief in hope and optimism is relinquished. If a deviation from the principle of duty is quite certainly evil, then it is not
59 60

Immanuel 8ant, Groundwor$ of the Fetaphysics of Forals, p.11 Ibid.

41

out of place to state that suicide shares in that status of evil. Given the way we abstract reason as having a grip on the will especially when faced with options, so as to choose the better of alternatives, and $nowing full well that good is the ob9ect of the will, then it is irrational to will evil.

42

CHAPTER THREE THE DOCTRINE OF SCHOPENHAUER

0ver time till the present day, it has been a perennial philosophical reflection that if one introspects deeply into oneself, one will discover not only one?s own essence, but also by e'tension the essence of the universe. &$in to this is the principle of self% consciousness which was the standard for German Idealist philosophers such as "ichte, +chelling and 4egel, +chopenhauer stands within the spirit of this tradition but he opposes these traditional German Idealists in their metaphysical elevation of self% consciousness. 4e believes that the ultimate principle of the universe is li$ewise apprehensible through introspection, and that we can philosophically understand the world as various manifestations of this general principle. "or +chopenhauer, however, this is not the principle of self%consciousness and rationally%infused will, but is rather what he calls simply !ill.-1 +chopenhauer believed that human beings were motivated only by their own basic desires or will to live ;Wille *um Le"en+, which directed all man$ind. "or +chopenhauer, human desire is futile, illogical, and by e'tension all actions in the world. :nli$e the understanding of the !ill as developed in the immediate previous chapter, his !ill is a metaphysical e'istence which controls not only the actions of individual agents but ultimately, all observable phenomena. "rom his ontology of the !ill he develops his
61

he +tanford *ncyclopaedia of 1hilosophy, 533, ed., s.v &rthur +chopenhauer by Cobert !ic$s

43

philosophical pessimism, the !ill as a mindless, aimless, non%rational urge at the foundation of our instinctual drives, and at the foundational being of everything. 4ow does he come about his doctrineH

3.1

SCHOPENHAUERIAN RE-CONCEPTION OF THE WILL

+chopenhauer develops his re%conception of the !ill ta$ing leave from 8ant(s

notion of the perceptible world as the bedroc$ of his thesis. 8ant(s greatest merit is in his distinction of the phenomena from the noumena, that is, the distinction between representation and the being%in%itself of things.-5 4owever, for +chopenhauer, the thing%in%itself is the !ill and 9ust a single one it is and he comes about this conception from his statement; ... I have stressed that we are not merely the $nowing sub9ect but that we ourselves are also among those realities or entities we require to $now, we are the thing%in%itself.-@

4e notes importantly that our body which is 9ust one among the many ob9ects in the world is given to us in two different ways< we perceive our body as a physical ob9ect among other physical ob9ects and we are aware of our body through our immediate awareness, as we consciously inhabit our body, intentionally move it, and feel directly our pleasures, pains, and emotional states. his implies that we can ob9ectively perceive our hand as an
62 63

Bawhead, he Doyage of /iscovery< & 4istorical Introduction to 1hilosophy, p.@@E &rthur +chopenhauer, he !orld as !ill and Cepresentation vol. 5, trans. by *. ". # 1ayne ;Aew Ior$< /over, 1,-,=, p.1,6

44

e'ternal ob9ect, 9ust as a friend might perceive it during a handsha$e, and we can also be sub9ectively aware of our hand as something we inhabit, li$e when we wilfully move, or we can feel its inner muscular wor$ings. "rom this observation, +chopenhauer asserts that our body is given in two entirely different ways, namely, as representation that is ob9ectively or e'ternally and as !ill, that is, sub9ectively or internally. o find the $ey to reality, we must loo$ within ourselves, in our consciousness through which we become aware that our bodily action which is thought to result from some motivational force is not something different from the act itself but the force and the action are one and the same thing.-E herefore our bodily actions are simply the ob9ectification of the !ill, but

translated into perception; this e'plains why +chopenhauer concludes the first chapter of his main wor$ with the phrase he !orld is my !ill. he notion of the !ill as +chopenhauer develops it thus far is the thing%in%itself, which is our way of apprehending the noumenal reality of all ob9ects in the world. his will is single, devoid of multiplicity since it does not belong to the sphere of the spatio K temporal world, but to the noumenal and omnipresent in nature. -6 "ollowing from this therefore, +chopenhauer regards the world as a whole as having two sides< the world is !ill and the world is Cepresentation. he world as !ill is the world as it is in itself, and the world as representation is the world of appearances, of our ideas, or of ob9ects.

3.2
64 65

METAPHYSICAL PESSIMISM

"rederic$ 7opleston, & 4istory of 1hilosophy, vol. 2 ;Bondon and Aew Ior$< 7ontinuum. 1,-@=, p.525 Ibid.

45

0ptimism is the overarching mental state wherein people believe that things will more li$ely go well for them than go badly. his can be compared with the valence effect of prediction, a tendency for people to overestimate the li$elihood of good things happening rather than bad things. In relation to the world, optimists usually thin$ of the world as a place that is hospitable to the aims and aspirations of human beings. 0n the contrary and the opposite, is pessimism, the tendency to see only the negative or worst of all things and to e'pect only bad or unpleasant things. 1essimists thin$ of the world as hostile and indifferent which allows no room for happiness as it is only a temporary phenomenon. >ased on this he says that optimism is a really wic$ed way that ma$es moc$ery of the unspea$able suffering of man$ind.-he prime proponent of this view is +chopenhauer, in his ma9or wor$ % The orld as Will and Representation, ta$es the stand that this is demonstrably the worst of all possible worlds and denies that life is ever worthwhile. -2 4is pessimism stems from his elevation of the will above reason as the main spring of human thought and behaviour and it does not belong solely to rational persons but to be found in everything as the wor$ing principle of all reality. he will is the agent in all the inner and unconscious bodily functions, the organism being in itself nothing but the will. In all natural forces the active impulse is identical with the will. In all instances we find any spontaneous movement or any primal forces, we must regard the inner
66

&rthur +chopenhauer, he !orld as !ill and Cepresentation vol. 1, trans. by *. ". # 1ayne ;Aew Ior$< /over, 1,-,=, p.@567 >arbara 4anna, he Ciddle of the !orld< & Ceconsideration of +chopenhauer(s 1hilosophy ;0'ford< 0'ford :niversity 1ress, 533,=, p.11,

46

most essence as will. he !ill reveals itself as a completely in a single oa$ tree as in a million.-.

"or the fact that the !ill is single and omnipresent in nature, it is manifested in the impulse of human desire, in animal instinct, attraction, repulsion or gravitation; instead of calling the pervasive force that permeates all of nature as Jforce( or Jenergy( he calls it the !ill because we gather its nature from our own e'perience of striving, therefore the metaphysical !ill is characterised as the J!ill to live( which for him is the same as the !ill.-, :pon the notice of nature(s concern for its species we immediately see how the insect for e'ample deposits its eggs where the larva may find nourishment 0C birds that build nest for their young which are not yet born; this whole series of animal instinct e'presses the omnipresence of the !ill to live. 23 Fan is not also left out of this basically within the milieu of modern inventions and technology, as all his strivings serve to sustain him and bring an amount of additional comfort to motivators such as hunger, the need to care for children, se'uality, shelter and personal security. +chopenhauer also considers the desire of the will to entail suffering because, these human desires, which for him are selfish, create constant conflict in the world and occur in a cyclical process, then if this is the case there can be no satisfaction or happiness. 4is supremacy of the !ill over reason 21
68

+amuel *noch +tumpf, 1hilosophy 4istory and 1roblems, 6th ed., ;Bondon< FcGraw 4ill Inc. 1,,E=, p.@63 69 7opleston, & 4istory of 1hilosophy, vol. 2, p.52@ 70 #ames 7ollins, & 4istory of Fodern *uropean 1hilosophy ; he >ruce 1ublishing 7ompany, 1,6E=,p.-.@ 71 +ee +amuel *noch +tumpf, 1hilosophy 4istory and 1roblems, 6th ed., p.@63. 4e contends that intellectual efforts can be sustained only for a short time and decline in strength but the will continues to without interruption to sustain and support life. /uring dreamless sleep, the intellect does not wor$, whereas all the organic functions of the body ;the manifestation of the !ill= continue.

47

results in his qualification of the !ill as a blind, irrational, directionless impulse, for this reason there is no supremacy of the human individual over the brute since both are guided and directed by the same impulse. &ll that +chopenhauer tries to do is to show the invincibility of the !ill in all of nature as it supersedes reason; it also forms the bac$ground for his pessimism. he will instead of being a sign of human freedom only illustrates how human beings are imprisoned in this phenomenal world and are forced to e'perience the world(s suffering and pain. his no doubt has practical consequences especially as it stands as an anti K thesis to e'istentialism.

3.3

ESSENCE OF LIFE
+chopenhauer(s ultimate question informs the reason for this section, and we can

immediately understand why he would as$ this question since he has been beclouded by his pessimism K what value does e'istence haveH 4e responds to this question of his by saying that, the value in e'istence is not and cannot be greater than non%e'istence would have. 4e says &s regards the life of the individual, every life history is a history of suffering for as a rule, every life is a continual series of mishaps, great and small... &t the end of his life, no man, if he be sincere and at the same tie in possession of his faculties will ever wish to go through it again, rather than this he will prefer to choose complete non%e'istence.25

72

+chopenhauer, he !orld as !ill and Cepresentation vol. 1, p.@5E

48

he primal drive in nature is to live and the will to live continually sustains the cycle of life by means of a fierce struggle where the will to live instigates a constant conflict and destruction, it $nows no cessation and +chopenhauer puts it we are li$e a man running downhill who cannot $eep on his legs unless he runs on, and will fall if he stops2@ meaning by that, we cannot reach a state of tranquillity or satisfaction. Fan see$s happiness, satisfaction, and en9oyment but cannot attain it even if he does, it is only temporary because no sooner will it re%assert itself again 9ust li$e someone ta$ing a drive at a roundabout will continue to meet his starting point unless he stops. here is no final satisfaction neither can there be endless desire or striving. &ll striving spring from want or deficiency, from dissatisfaction with one(s own state or condition and is therefore suffering so long as it is not satisfied. Ao satisfaction however is lasting; on the contrary it is always merely the starting point of a fresh striving... hat there is no ultimate aim of striving means that there is no end of suffering.2E

0ccasionally, there is great satisfaction and happiness upon the achievement of a large goal or long term pro9ect either in Aation building, industrial firm or individual engagement but the pessimist admits that the happiness in particular, does not last but those moments last, sweet and are made sweeter by the difficulty of their attainment. 26 *ven though life can be pleasant for long stretches of time we cannot escape from pain plagued by diseases, loneliness, in9ury, heartbrea$, fear which are part of life. If life
73

Idem, +tudies in 1essimism< & +eries of *ssays, Eth ed., trans. by . >ailey +aunders, F.& ;Bondon< +wan +onnenschein and 7o., 1.,@= p.@6 74 Idem, he !orld as !ill and Cepresentation vol. 1, pp. @3.%@3, 75 4anna, he Ciddle of the !orld< & Ceconsideration of +chopenhauer(s 1hilosophy p.15@

49

inevitably contains suffering, then why should we strive at all $nowing full well that it has no aimH 0n this +chopenhauer(s pessimism concludes that life is a bad bargain owing to the disproportion between pain and pleasure such that life becomes the investment of all our strength for something that has no value. +ince life is the hallmar$ of suffering +chopenhauer affirms unrest is the mar$ of e'istence2- and conceives of death as the cessation of all suffering in life. he concept of death is a fundamental ad9unct in his metaphysical pessimism and he interprets death as the aim and purpose of life, since to live is to suffer, the triumph of death is definitely inevitable and e'istence is a constant dying owing to the fact that every moment of life brings us one step closer to the abyss.22 &lthough he regards death as the purpose of life, he posits that death is only phenomenal and not an absolute annihilation; he is holding out the possibility for an afterlife but not an afterlife for the empirical self. Bife ... may certainly be regarded as a dream and death as an awa$ening. >ut then the personality, the individual, belongs to the dreaming and not to the wa$ing consciousness; and so death presents itself to the former as annihilation.2.

&ll life tends towards death and death is not an absolute e'tinction merely the end of individual consciousness but not the underlying entity; in light of this +chopenhauer postulates we need not fear death. +ince to live is to suffer, it gets to a point when
76 77

+chopenhauer, +tudies in 1essimism< & +eries of *ssays, p.@6 7hristopher #anaway, he 7ambridge 7ompanion to +chopenhauer ;7ambridge< 7ambridge :niversity 1ress, 533-=, p. 5,. 78 Ibid.

50

prolonged life eventually ma$es and individual lose interest in life, he believes that the acceptance of death is a form of release from this misery. &lthough his metaphysical thought gives supremacy to death, he vehemently re9ects suicide.

3.4

SUICIDE
If life has death as its aim and purpose, then why should not every enlightened

consciousness destroy itself in order to escape the suffering of the individual will and achieve life(s purpose more quic$ly and deliberatelyH In his essay On Suicide, +chopenhauer e'presses his temperament towards the monotheistic religion as having no logical grounds for the condemnation of suicide, he says &s far as I $now, none but the votaries of monotheistic, that is to say, #ewish religion loo$s upon suicide as crime. his is all the more stri$ing in as much as neither in the 0ld nor Aew estament is there to be found any prohibition or positive disapproval of it ... they have no biblical authority to boast of, as 9ustifying their condemnation of suicide nay not even philosophical arguments that will hold water; it must be understood that it is arguments that we want...2,

he Jwill to live( is the informant of all suffering there are in the world, so while death is a denial of the Jwill to live(, suicide for him is the contrary, being an unworthy affirmation
79

+chopenhauer, +tudies in 1essimism< & +eries of *ssays, pp.E@%EE

51

of the will to live. he individual who commits suicide does not cease willing but ceases to live and in ceasing to live, the will affirms itself through the cessation of its own phenomenon, total elimination of consciousness. If a person, driven by the burdens of e'istence see$s the termination of human misery in the phenomenal world, then suicide does not qualify as the proper method because for him, the death of the individual does not affect the !ill in any way. 4ow then does suicide affirm the will to liveH +uicide, the arbitrary doing away with the individual phenomenon differs most widely from the denial of the will to live... "ar from being denial, suicide is a phenomenon of the !ill(s strong affirmation, for denial has its essential nature in the fact that the pleasures of life not its sorrows are shunned. he suicide wills life and is dissatisfied merely with the conditions on which it has come to him. herefore he gives up by no means the will to live, but merely life since he destroys the individual phenomenon..3

+chopenhauer considers suicide as a foolish and unfounded action because whether we choose to bring death through suicide or not, the finality of life is an inevitable reality on the one hand, and on the other, suffering which the individual see$s to escape through death has the ability to confer salvation on the individual by quietening his desires, pleasures and withdrawing him from the false attachment to the phenomenal !ill. &t death, the phenomenal individual is destroyed but what remains unscathed is the single noumenal will; suicide fails to get at the root cause of the evils and sufferings of life.

80

#anaway, he 7ambridge 7ompanion to +chopenhauer, p.@3-

52

It is clear that the main principles that underlie +chopenhauer(s treatment of this matter is situated in his metaphysical pessimism definitely not without reference to 1latonic ideology as a $ey aspect of his ontology of the !ill which ma$es him conceive of suicide as an act attac$ing only particular circumstances K the frustrating conditions of suffering rather than the very !ill itself. In other that his thesis be complete, he offers the means by which individuals can actually see$ freedom from the sufferings of the will, which is not to will death and wilfully destroy the self but to continue to live while quelling the !ill. 4owH

3.5

TRANSCENDING THE HUMAN PREDICAMENT

4uman beings can achieve some moment of happiness if there is a way to

condense the passion of human desires. In the bid to relieve the frustrations of constant desire, +chopenhauer is of the view that a more universalistic perspective will heal the fleeting satisfaction that characteri)e daily life; he speculates a denial of the will to live as a reliever while still in e'istence. hrough *thics and &esthetics, that is, through

asceticism ;the denial of our passion and desires= on the one hand, and through aesthetic contemplation of artistic beauty on the other hand, +chopenhauer says, we will sedate the will to live.

@.6.1

C&A+7*A/*A7* 4C0:G4 &*+ 4* I7+

53

+chopenhauer considers fine arts in general including architecture, sculpture, painting, poetry and literature to represent 1latonic ideas which are aspects of the !ill itself that transcend the conditions of space and time and the domain of sufficient reason. If these 1latonic ideas transcend sufficient reason, then how possible can the cognitive sub9ect grasp these ideas through the spatio%temporal ob9ectsH o this, +chopenhauer says that, the quality of the sub9ect of e'perience must correspond to quality of the ob9ect of e'perience, therefore, in the state of aesthetic perception, where the ob9ects are universal, the sub9ects must li$ewise become universal. In that process, the sub9ect of perception abandons the principle of sufficient reason and approaches the ob9ect through intuition, then there is a sudden transformation of the sub9ect from a phenomenal individual into a pure sub9ect of $nowledge, that is, the ob9ect forgets about his individuality and becomes the clear mirror of the ob9ect; a pure, will%less, painless, timeless sub9ect of $nowledge..1 +chopenhauer believed that while all people were in thrall to the !ill, the quality and intensity of their sub9ection differed. 4e gives particular recognition to the personality of the artist because he is less sub9ect to !ill. he artist does not learn

through e'perience what is beautiful ;for e'ample= in nature so that he can imitate it but he has an a%priori $nowledge of a special $ind that ma$es him creative of a beautiful wor$. he artist is endowed with the capacity to remain in the state of pure perception and produces what is essential to an ob9ect, that is, the 1latonic ideas ;in this case the idea of beauty=. +uch a person was a +chopenhauerian genius, a person who can retain his
81

+chopenhauer, he !orld as !ill and Idea, vol. 5., p.513

54

contemplative attitude long enough to be so fi'ed on their art that they neglect the worries of life..5 he artist contemplates these 1latonic ideas, creates a wor$ that portrays them in a way that it is accessible and through this communicates the universalistic vision to Jthose who lac$ the power to see through and rise above the ordinary world of spatio% temporal ob9ects.(.@ "or every other individual to attain this state of pure perception they must appreciate and contemplate the wor$s of art; this means that the sub9ect in contemplation detaches himself from the individual will to concentrate on the ideal essence of the ob9ect. he contemplation on the ob9ect of aesthetic temporarily allows the sub9ect a respite from the strife of desire, and allows the sub9ect to enter a realm of purely mental en9oyment. .E Implicit in this opinion of +chopenhauer is the awesome perple'ity of how an individual whose essence is willing can cease to will and how a pure will%less contemplation is achieved through aesthetic perceptionH 4e states that although we are part of the will, it is possible to have a $ind of disconnection from willing which occurs momentarily in aesthetic e'perience and permanently in ascetic denial of the will. 0n how we become a will%less sub9ect during aesthetic contemplation, he says &s pure sub9ects of $nowing delivered from the miserable self we become entirely one with the ob9ects ... hen the world as representation alone remains and the world as will disappears..6

82

4elen Mimmern, &rthur +chopenhauer, 4is Bife and 4is 1hilosophy ;Bondon< Bongmans, Green and 7o., 1.2-=, p.,. 83 he +tanford *ncyclopaedia of 1hilosophy, 533, ed., s.v &rthur +chopenhauer by Cobert !ic$s 84 +chopenhauer, he !orld as !ill and Cepresentation vol. 1, p.5@@ 85 Ibid., p.1,,

55

he central point ramified in his teaching of the escape from the will through aesthetic e'perience is that, since the will is the inner nature of things and from his ontology of the will, it is the source of suffering in the world, through aesthetic contemplation, the world as will is eradicated and replaced by the world as representation. otal absorption in the world as representation prevents a person from suffering the world as will. &rt diverts the sub9ect(s attention from the grave everyday world and lifts him or her into a world that consists of mere play of images. &s constituting art, he has in mind the traditional five fine arts namely, Fusic, architecture, sculpture, painting, and poetry and his account of the visual and literary arts corresponds to the world as representation which had their value in the e'tent to which they incorporated pure perceptions. >ut, these forms of arts were inferior to music, which being purely abstract, was to +chopenhauer the highest and best form of human artistry. Fusic is given a special status in +chopenhauer?s aesthetics as it did not rely upon the medium of phenomenal representation and it artistically presents the will itself, not the way it appears to the observing individual. +chopenhauer?s aesthetics as an attempt to brea$ out from the suffering of this world is premised on his belief that what distinguished aesthetic e'periences from other e'periences is that the contemplation of the ob9ect of aesthetic appreciation temporarily allows the sub9ect a brea$ from the strife of desire. his happens only fleetingly and does not pose a total freedom from the source of suffering, not until this is achieved, the

56

individual continues to linger in the flames of pain in this phenomenal world, thus his second avenue which seems to be a total denial of the will e'humes.

@.6.5

ranscendence through &sceticism

&sceticism is usually associated with mon$s and monasteries focusing on the

essentials of self sacrifice, renunciation and detachment from bodily desires, inculcating spiritual discipline and self purification. he influence of >uddhism and 4induism spurs +chopenhauer to recognise that suffering can be reduced by minimi)ing one(s desires and not until the e'tinction of the ego is accomplished, the highest ethical goal cannot be attained. herefore as one of the ways to overcome suffering and to achieve a prolonged gratification, he advocates for asceticism, Jan austere life style that abates earthly pleasures and cravings. &sceticism separates us from all ob9ects of the individual will to live K desires and passion such that once we detach ourselves from our desires we render them useless and vain. hrough continuous disengagement from them we attain the )enith of detachment whence thereof we become Ja pure will%less sub9ect of $nowledge that regards the world in an unconcerned and uninvolved manner(..- +ince he subscribes to asceticism, he declares that the highest degree of asceticism is the voluntary death through starvation for the reason that asceticism completely renounces the Jwill to live( to the point that starvation becomes a choice in which the will cannot further e'press itself in the form of
86

Cobert !ic$s, +chopenhauer, ;:nited 8ingdom< >lac$well 1ublication Btd., 533.=, p.1@3

57

physical yearning or appetite. Aevertheless, asceticism quells the power of our desires and a feeling of freedom ensues upon the reali)ation that all these desires are but only an illusion. o deny the Jwill to live(, is not to say that the !ill is destroying itself, but only saying that a more universal manifestation of the !ill is overpowering a less universal manifestation, that is, the physically%embodied aspect; but the !ill as a whole is set against itself wherein one manifestation of the !ill fights against another manifestation, li$e the divided bulldog ant.2. "rom a related angle, the ascetic?s struggle is a struggle against the forces of violence and evil, which, owing to +chopenhauer?s acceptance and interpretation of 8ant?s epistemology, locates these forces significantly within human nature itself. !hen the ascetic transcends human nature, the ascetic resolves the problem of evil, pain and sorrow of this world. +chopenhauer, despite his earlier criticism, is highly delighted in 7hristianity because for him 7hristianity brings about the awareness that life is not good but essentially suffering e'emplified in the cross as a great symbol of torture and e'ecution. "or those who have tried to transform 7hristianity into a life affirming religion, they have mis%understood the essence of 7hristianity as a life denying religion. .. he one who li$e the saints and the enlightened ones in all religious traditions adopt asceticism, in order that by constant privation and suffering he may more and more brea$ down and $ill the
87 88

+ee Cobert !ic$s, +chopenhauer, p.,6 4anna, he Ciddle of the !orld< & Ceconsideration of +chopenhauer(s 1hilosophy, p.1@.

58

!ill that he recogni)es and abhors as the source of his own suffering and of the world(s.., 4owever the inconsistencies there in, the point +chopenhauer draws out is the intuitive conviction that our will in its e'pression through our manifold desires, is itself the source of all unhappiness and insatiability, so when the will is denied we become nothing, a will%less sub9ect. In ceasing to will the individual overcomes what he calls the original sin of e'istence ;suffering=, and becomes nothing even without dying.

89

+chopenhauer, he !orld as !ill and Cepresentation vol. 1, p.@.5

59

CHAPTER FOUR EVALUATION OF SCHOPENHAUER S REJECTION OF SUICIDE

his chapter is e'ceptionally concerned with raising ob9ections to the irregularities in +chopenhauer(s vision and to do this effectively, it is important to $eep in mind the bedroc$ of his thesis which is situated in his re%conceptuali)ation of J!ill(, as different from the understanding of !ill as the faculty of choice. !ith this in mind, a proper direction is enacted in order to tac$le the problem from the root firstly, before deconstructing the edifice.

4.1

SCHOPENHAUER S VICIOUS CIRCLE

he belief of +chopenhauer seems to be that the !ill is the thing%in%itself and that

humans can have a $ind of access to it through e'periencing their own acts of will; Jthe world is my will(. /oes +chopenhauer solve the problem of articulating the thing%in%itself as being identical to the willH It is clear that the acts of will are temporal events, while the thing%in%itself belongs to the a temporal realm ;beyond time=. If the will is identical to all individual wills, to 1latonic essences and ultimately to appearances, then there must be some way of clarifying the possibility of how an a-temporal unison becomes temporal; there must be accounts for the way a single a%temporal thing%in%itself brea$s into a plurality of temporal acts of will, but +chopenhauer does not solve this problem.
60

4is 1essimism consists of a descriptive claim that all of life is suffering and a consequent evaluative claim that life ought not to be. his shoots from his qualification of the will as a blind, irrational and evil impulse. >ut if we question this recommendation, can it actually be the case; is the will really blindH If the will is really blind, then it is directionless, purposeless, and fruitless. &lthough he asserts that the will is blind and dumb, he nonetheless evaluates it morally, meaning by that, the will must have some capacity for self direction and some goal in e'pressing itself in phenomena ,3 which is contrary to his earlier claims on the will. a$en from another perspective, it is also the case that human motives do require some $nowledge before they can issue an action, in the sense that, the individual must realise and be aware of the goal or ends which he see$s as satisfying the will(s demand. he interplay between reason and will is e'pressed in this process and through evaluative 9udgements the will ;depends on $nowledge= is purposively e'ecuted, therefore the will cannot entirely be blind or dumb.,1 &nother clear ob9ection to his pessimistic view dwells especially in the use of the terms, Jwilling( and Jsuffering(. 4e adduces that, satisfaction or happiness is always relative to prior dissatisfaction; satisfaction is temporary and leads to further discontent; the sum of feelings of displeasure is li$ely to be greater than the sum of pleasure. he whole point here is clearly made by Georg +immel that +chopenhauer fails to recognise

90 91

#ulian Ioung, +chopenhauer ;Bondon< Coutledge, aylor and "rancis, 5336=, p..@ Ibid.

61

that there is happiness along the route from striving to attainment before its terminus, when he says *'pected happiness is truly e'perienced ... and the will(s progress towards attainment is attended by a more pleasurable situation than a more painful one.,5

It is true we often feel positive en9oyment at the prospect of attaining something we actually lac$, ta$ing due consideration of the action through which we strive to eradicate this lac$, may also be pleasurable. 4appiness is therefore to be conceived as real rather than illusory for even +chopenhauer must have been happy upon the completion of his great wor$ or upon the revelation of the thing%in%itself or again to have found out that the source of all evil in the world is man(s own desire. &n implicit claim in his pessimism is the star$ form of hedonism which he adopts that only pleasures can give life any value K something adds value to life if and only if it involves a felt pleasure, while something adds negativity or no value to life if and only if it involves a felt pain. his is questionable in a number of ways thus we as$; are felt

pleasures and pains the determiners of contributors of valueH +chopenhauer(s view is that each suffering drains away some or even all of the values from life which nothing can restore but Aiet)sche(s attitude to the same description is diametrically opposed. Aiet)sche asserts that suffering is not an ob9ection to life but a sign of strength and
92

Georg +immel, +chopenhauer and Aiet)sche, trans. by 4elmunt Bois$andi, /eena !einstein and Fichael !einstein, ;&mherst< :niversity of Fassachusetts 1ress, 1,.-=, p.66

62

greatness of character to affirm one(s suffering as an integral element in one(s life. ,@ his suggests that people(s lives can ma$e sense to them partly because of their suffering not in spite of them.,E &lthough he claims that e'istence is never worth more that non%e'istence, his disapproval of suicide rests on the grounds that suicide is a phenomenon of the will(s strong affirmation and it gives up by no means the will to life. "irstly, the principle of contradiction ;or non%contradiction= faults +chopenhauer(s proposition because suicide is a form of death and should bring about the goal of life but the contrary is the case for him which already negates his first premise that the aim and purpose of life is death. 4e nevertheless tries to ma$e a point; instead of suicide we can live but in some sense become detached from willing K a denial of the will to live through asceticism and aesthetic contemplation. he ascetic starvation of the self to death occurs by no means other than an e'tra% ordinary act of the will but for +chopenhauer, it is a total suppression of the will. 4e later opts for determinism when he says *veryman being what he is and placed in the circumstance which for the moment obtain... can absolutely never do anything else than 9ust what at that moment he does. &ccordingly, the whole course of man(s life in all its incidents, great and small, is as necessarily pre%determined as the course of a cloc$.,6
93 94

#anaway, he 7ambridge 7ompanion to +chopenhauer, p.@@6 +ee "riedrich Aiet)sche >eyond Good and *vil, trans. by C. # 4ollingdale ;Bondon< 1enguin >oo$s, 1,,3=, p.6-

63

he individual empirical will or Jwill to live( is a representation of the will as thing%in% itself, then if this is true, nothing anyone chooses or chooses not to do can be attributed to the individual in question. his invariably means the denial of the will needed in order to starve to death cannot occur as a result of the wilful decision of the ascetic. he obvious ob9ection here surfaces because if the act ;denial of the will through starvation= is not deliberately chosen, if it were not the result of a conscious decision, then in what sense can it be meaningfully attributed to the character of the asceticH he primacy of freewill in the choice of available options is not inclusive in +chopenhauer(s ontology of the will which ma$es it difficult to ta$e responsibility of individual actions. +chopenhauer privileges the aesthetic state inhabited by artists and appro'imately by contemplative audiences because it provides access to essences of things. !hy he postulates this is because, individual consciousness is interested in grasping only those properties necessary for survival, but in aesthetic contemplation, consciousness loses itself in the ob9ect abandons its own purpose and discovers the essence of the ob9ect. ,- &rt therefore transcends passion and appetites, transforming its creator and audience into will% less, timeless sub9ect of $nowledge. Implicit in this conception is the awesome perple'ity of how an individual whose essence is wiling could cease to will and how a pure will%less, timeless contemplation is achieved through aesthetic perceptionH If we aesthetically
95

&rthur +chopenhauer, J"reewill and "atalism( in 0n 4uman Aature< *ssays ;Bondon< &llen and :nwin, 1,61=, p.E. 96 Ioung, +chopenhauer, pp.13. % 11@

64

contemplate a cup for e'ample, it becomes contradictory to maintain that our e'perience has no time element and it is implausible to claim that we are unaware of the cup(s particular details. !hile perceiving the cup(s essence, we cannot apprehend it in the blea$ or e' nihilo but through the individual cup that is before us. +ince individuality does not dissolve completely in aesthetic perception, it is only logical to conclude that no one can become a pure disembodied sub9ect or have a timeless e'perience,2. It appeals more to say that in aesthetic e'perience our individuality, pain and sense of time is somewhat submerged in the bac$ground during the e'perience than clinging to the fau' ideology of timeless, will%less sub9ects.,. o recall 8ant(s theory, we directly perceive an ob9ect that has inter sub9ectively invariant qualities ;for e'ample figure and motion= along with sub9ectively variable qualities ;colour, taste sound= within a spatio%temporal realm.,, +chopenhauer should have earlier seen the great ditch he dug for himself when he subscribed to determinism that eventually chains his theories of denial through asceticism and aesthetics in the dar$ of plausibility. 4is claim that character is determined is tantamount to asserting that people cannot transform themselves firstly by appreciating the wor$ of arts and secondly by withdrawing from the will through asceticism, how then does he e'pect them to bring about relief from this miseryH

97 98

!ic$s, +chopenhauer, p.,. Ibid. 99 Bawhead, he Doyage of /iscovery< & 4istorical Introduction to 1hilosophy, 5nd ed., pp.@@1%@@E

65

In conclusion, pessimism is a self fulfilling prophecy as it holds that, if something is bad, it is more li$ely to get worse in degree. &ccepting pessimism is an in9ury to hope either for us as individuals or for the human race as a whole by activating a stop to all forms of trials and strivings to actuali)e the better. +uicide is evenly perpetuated by a pessimistic view as it conceals in its pinions any and all element of hope postulating the only viable option as e'tinction.

4.2

EPISTEMOLOGICAL RESOLUTION
+hould suicide be re9ected because according to +chopenhauer, is not a denial of

the will to live but only a mere surrender of life 0C should it be re9ected on the basis of a natural lawH he obvious contention here is the metaphysical re9ection of suicide posed by +chopenhauer in contrast to the categorical imperative of 8ant. he former view has been 9ettisoned and it means that the latter option has to be subscribed to. 8ant believed in an ob9ective right and wrong based on reason, we should do the right thing 9ust because it is right and not because it promotes our desires or self%interest. !e $now what is right, not by relying on moral intuitions or facts about the world, but by reasoning about what we can consistently will. & good will is good, not because of its attainment of some proposed end, but simply by virtue of the volition; that is, it is good in itself. 8ant(s theory of the goodwill and the categorical imperative gives a more sound philosophical ground to the re9ection of suicide. !e recall the definition of suicide formulated in the first chapter, as an act devoid of coercion but resultant from
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intentionality, thus in the midst of all possible sufferings and pains, suicide cannot be a therapy for humanity to inculcate based on moral law. In an article J0n +uicide( published over the internet by &ndrey +hcherba$ov, upon observation he notes &bout -3,333 Cussians decide to bid farewell to life at their own will every year. he number of suicide incidents in Foscow alone reaches @3 occurrences daily, although they end with five or si' lethal outcomes, as a rule. It has been registered over the recent several years that the ma9ority of Cussian self%murderers are educated, intelligent and creative individuals. 1sychologists, fans and everyone else in general were shoc$ed to $now that creatively successful and financial secure persons decided to $ill themselves at the pea$ of their carriers. +pecialists tried to e'plain it with drug and alcohol addiction, as well as with psychological frustration and nervous brea$downs, which artists and writers could probably e'perience. 4owever, their deaths will remain mysterious forever133

0f great importance and worthy to note, is the reason why individuals who were not troubled by pain and misery would opt for suicide. +chopenhauer might be wrong on this when he claims that only those who were susceptible to suffering sought suicide as a means to an end, but even those who en9oy the comforts of life see$ the same Jplague(. &nother pointer is the immoral formation of the conscience and the will of those individuals who engage in suicide and this is e'actly what the moral theory of 8ant sets out to correct in totality. >oredom of life rather than suffering has been detected to be the
100

+ee the website lin$ http<GGenglish.pravda.ruGmainG1.G,3G@-3G16.E-Nsuicide.html

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leading cause of inconvenience in the case of the individuals cited above. his is the point where we can appreciate +chopenhauer(s theory of aesthetics and especially of music. In aesthetic contemplation, we for that moment eradicate all forms of boredom and lighten up the emotions to a state of ecstasy, but this is strictly to be done in the light of this essay as it re%understands +chopenhauer(s concept of aesthetic e'perience 131. phrase from above without ambiguity it reads< It appeals more to say that in aesthetic e'perience our individuality, pain and sense of time is somewhat submerged in the bac$ground during the e'perience than clinging to the fau' ideology of timeless, will%less sub9ects. o recall the

4aving attempted a resolution to the boredom, suffering and pain e'perienced in this phenomenal world by individuals as arousing the need for suicide, there is no logical and moral grounds for anyone to wilfully terminate his life. he sanctity and respect of life must be upheld as a duty of every individual to himself as espoused by the categorical imperative of 8ant.

101

+ee !ic$s +chopenhauer, pp.136%111

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CONCLUSION
!e have now reached the point of ma$ing the concluding remar$s. &ll along, the concern has been to situate our arguments against suicide on logical grounds other than sentiments of whatever $ind. +chopenhauer had done a great deal to the pro9ect of attempting to deconstruct the adherence and subscription to suicide as a means of relief to the sufferings of this world. 4e must be accredited for that singular act; despite his pessimism he intends to bring about some Jgood( by tendering arguments to flaw suicide as a therapy. &lthough he tries to do this, we have seen his vicious circle which robes him to a halt. he categorial imperative of 8ant calls for a recourse basically for the singular reason that +chopenhauerian metaphysics is generated against 8antian bac$ground but stands in opposition to it. Fetaphysical re9ection of suicide is unreal as e'pressed in +chopenhauer, on the contrary, moral reason allows realistic endeavour against suicide. *very human person with life has a purpose and role in the structure of reality which cannot be replaced by other mode of e'istence. :pon the treatment of life with scorn and disrespect, the call to duty, devoid of sentiments, utilitarian purpose or inclination sounds to form and transform the conscience of such an individual. *'ceptional about the categorial imperative is its sporadic power which not only announces the duty to oneself

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but also from oneself to others. !e therefore have a duty towards ourselves and to the suicidal. &lthough +chopenhauer(s metaphysics did not successfully con9ure tenable arguments, his ideologies have practical implications for the world, but firstly they have to be refined and re%understood. he world is plagued with materialism at a maddening level such that satiety is far from reach. 4e probably was right ;in a sense= when he says that our desires are the cause of the evils and pains. 4e should be accorded some dignity upon foreseeing this evil of materialism. 4is theory of detachment finds relevance in the milieu of materialism and secularism which prides itself in the acts of men to the detriment of values; this e'plains why he aligns with the saint(s ascetic denial. he global economic meltdown resulting from credit crunch from "ebruary 5332 to the present dispensation, is a problem triggered by liquidity crisis in the :nited +tates ban$ing system and caused by the overvaluation of assets. It has resulted in the collapse of large financial institutions, the bailout of ban$s by national governments and downturns in stoc$ mar$ets around the world. In many areas, the housing mar$et has also suffered, resulting in numerous evictions, foreclosures and prolonged vacancies. he individual(s

need and satisfaction is usually regulated by the society. +uicide rates tend to rise in times of economic recession and depression. /ur$heim noted first that financial crises led to an immediate rise in the suicide rates, documenting this with the e'amples from Dienna

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1.2@, and when the number of ban$ruptcies rose in a society the suicide rates also increased.135 In the final analysis, our temporal human desires which cannot be satisfied because they are simply insatiable especially in the midst of the economic crisis, is an affective factor to accentuate suicide predominantly in the western world. !ithin this mishap, where does this essay stand especially in relation to its pragmatic valueH hat is e'actly the point; the boredom and pains of this life are not enough to terminate e'istence instead it can be curbed. 0ptimism is a veritable theory to instil some measure of hope not 9ust at the mental level but at the practical level too by instigating one into the actions through which a better state of mind can be actualised. *'istentialism(s concentration is not so much of man(s achievements of institutions but focuses on the human person, the individual(s quandaries, choices and verdicts. *'istentialists assert the significance of personal e'istence and decisions even in the midst of the world that appears meaningless and absurd, therefore, men must at all times, create their own table of values for the determination of their course of action that it may be similar to 8ier$egaard(s notion of authentic life, which is made possible by human freedom and reasonable choice. "or the moment once again, the doctrine of aesthetics, ;if properly re% understood in its refined state as e'posed by this essay= temporarily eases off the misery in this world,
102

/avid Beister and >i9ou Iang, Ior$< Aova 1ublishers, 1,,2=, p.1E

he *conomy and +uicide< *conomic 1erspective on +uicide ;Aew

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thus we can situate +chopenhauer(s philosophy as of primal relevance to this pitiable state. herefore it is plausible to say that the categorial imperative of 8ant as issuing from a goodwill, in combination with the refined understanding of +chopenhauer(s denial and aesthetics, stand as a veritable measure to relinquish suicidal acts.

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