Schopenhauer Aff

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WHEN JOHN LENNON WAS 5 YEARS OLD, HIS TEACHER ASKED HIM WHAT HE
WANTED TO BE WHEN HE GREW UP. HAPPY, HE ANSWERED. THE TEACHER
TOLD HIM HE DIDNT UNDERSTAND THE ASSIGNMENT. LENNON RESPONDED
THAT THE TEACHER DIDNT UNDERSTAND LIFE1
JOHN LENNON WAS WRONG AND IF JUDGED BY HIS OWN GOAL JOHN
LENNON WAS A FAILURE.
STATUS QUO EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS HAVE BEEN CORRUPTED BY
SENTIMENTS EMPHASIZE TEACHING STUDENTS TO BE HAPPY. AGAINST THIS,
WE NEED TO TEACH STUDENTS ABOUT PAIN, SUFFERING, AND FAILURE.
Hyland 85 (J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in
Educational Studies, 11:3, 227-8)

The recent revival of interest in the education of the emotions in philosophy of

education is to be welcomed since questions concerned with the development of a
person's character, moral values and general life stance must, without doubt, be
accorded a central place in discussions about the educational enterprise. In this
respect, Bonnett's recommendations for the cultivation of the poetic and artistic
aspects of human nature, and the direction of the educator's attention to the "fluidity
and spontaneity of Being" (1983, p. 32) as a response to the threat of dehumanisation
and alienation posed by modern technological materialism are timely. Similarly,
Griffiths (1984) contends that the education of the emotions should inform all aspects
of the life and work of schools, and provides a much-needed reminder of the
importance of this sphere of educational endeavour. A primary shortcoming of all
such programmes of affective education, however, is the insufficient consideration
given to the darker and irrational aspects of the human condition. Thus, Dunlop's
account (1984) stresses the need for a balance between the social and individual
aspects of learning and explores the importance of the school's ethos, and we are left
with the impression that objectives in this area can be achieved fairly easily by means of
certain pedagogic and curriculum improvements. But there seems to be a systematic
avoidance of the realities of everyday life in such programmesa determination to
steer clear of the pain, adversity and strife which are characteristically part of every
human life and which, for many people, militate against the achievement of moral and
emotional stability. This overly optimistic picture needs to be challenged, and I submit
that Schopenhauer's vision of life can help educators to redress the balance in this
respect. "Neither the sun nor death can be looked at with a steady eye" noted La

1
Cf. I want to grow up to be happy, Huffington Post 2/13/2014 by Garrett Degraffenreid.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/garrett-degraffenreid/i-want-to-grow-up-to-be-h_b_4784143.html last
accessed 7/17/2017
Rochefoucauld, and it seems that a similar unsteadiness also distorts our perception of
other unpleasant aspects of life. What is required is a determination to explore the
sources and consequences of unhappiness in life, of that miserable striving which
Schopenhauer identified with the will to live. This would involve turning the critical
attention of pupils towards such issues as pain, illness, poverty, loneliness, depression
and aspects of death and dying, areas which, if they are discussed at all in schools, are
treated only superficially. The conventional approach to such topics needs to be
questioned and altered along the lines suggested by Schopenhauer, and the various
ways of dealing with the human predicament may then be outlined and explored. All
this is fundamental to and a prerequisite of the formulation of objectives and teaching
methods in this sphere. Literature comes to mind as, perhaps, the most apposite vehicle for this sort
of learning, and the excellent account offered by Hepburn (op. cit.) for the education of the emotions
through literature is difficult to improve upon. However, the traditional criteria of literature must not be
allowed to distract us from our primary objective which is, not the pursuit of literature for its own sake
(though, as mentioned above, aesthetics offers one way of escaping from the slavery of the will), but for
its ability to illuminate certain crucial features of the human condition. This objective is quite different
from the more orthodox objectives of literature teaching which (although there are signs of change in the
new examination proposals and in recent criticisms of the standard line, see Weldon, 1985) are overly
impersonal and predomi- nantly academic. I have been astonished to witness a discussion, for instance, of
the deep pessimism and nihilism of Hardy's Jude the Obscure conducted in a purely clinical fashion, as if
Hardy had not intended us to learn something from the story of the crushing tragedy and appalling
adversity of Jude Fawley's life and to apply this knowledge to our own circumstances. History and social
studies are also ideally suited to the re-appraisal of affective objectives that I am suggesting, though all
curriculum areas would benefit from a shaking of the foundations in this respect.
There are two main objectives of such a re-appraisal, both of which could be accepted
by educators who might not want to endorse the whole of Schopenhauer's thesis. First,
though we may not agree that the miserable striving and vicissitudes of the will are
quite as definitive of life as Schopenhauer says they are, we can still recognise that
they play a significant enough part in the lives of most of us to warrant rather more
attention than the curriculum typically gives them. The rationale here is that which
undergirds all educational activity, described by Schopenhauer as pure and genuine
philosophising, viz. the pursuit of truth and objectivity. It is just as intellectually
reprehensible to avoid or give only cursory treatment to the problems of terminal
illness or suicide as it would be to give a one-sided account of the French Revolution
or to discuss contemporary world politics without reference to Marxism. Just to clear up
a possible misconception, the particular interpretation of the pursuit of truth advocated here must not be
seen as an oblique way of pursuing happiness by learning from the misfortunes of others, counting
blessings or any other such homilies. In any case, I tend to agree with Von Wright (1963, pp. 93 ff.) that,
since unhappiness bears all the hallmarks of being a contrary not a contradictory of happiness, it might be
both a logical and an empirical mistake to try to achieve happiness in this roundabout manner. Dearden
was right to say that we cannot sensibly question the value of happiness. I have not been concerned at all
with this question but, rather, with other questions to which I think educators ought to give greater
consideration. The pursuit of objective knowledge is an intrinsic educational objective,
but it is here only a necessary preliminary to the all-important instrumental one of
providing pupils with the wherewithal to achieve that mastery over the will which
Schopenhauer described as the means of salvation. Expressed in different ways, this
has been a central aim of all philosophising since Socrates, and ought to inform all
areas of educational activity. Our vision will remain distorted and confused until we
have learned to recognise the forces which shape our thoughts and actions, and are
able to apply this knowledge to practical living. If clarity of vision sometimes renders
experience unpalatable, so be it. Although such knowledge may not always help us to
change the world in any concrete way, the refinement of our powers of reflection and
deliberation leads to the attainment of that self-knowledge which, as Hampshire
(1979) demonstrates, will always be a liberating and never a restricting possession.

SONG OF FUTILITY. FUTILITY PERVADES PESSIMISM. [] FAILURE IS A

BREAKAGE WITHIN THE HEART OF RELATIONS, A FISSURE BETWEEN CAUSE AND
EFFECT, A FISSURE HASTILY COVERED OVER BY TRYING AND TRYING AGAIN.
WITH FAILURE, THERE IS ALWAYS PLENTY OF BLAME TO GO ARROUND; ITS
NOT MY FAULT, ITS A TECHNICAL DIFFICULTY, ITS A MISCOMMUNICATION.
FOR THE PESSIMIST, FAILURE IS A QUESTION OF WHEN, NOT IF FAILURE AS
A METAPHYSICAL PRINCIPLE. EVERYTHING WITHERS AND PASSES INTO AN
OBSCURITY BLACKER THAN NIGHT, EVERYTHING FROM THE MELODRAMATIC
DECLINE OF A PERSONS LIFE TO THE BANAL FLICKERING MOMENTS THAT
CONSTITUTE EACH DAY. EVERYTHING THAT IS DONE IS UNDONE, EVERYTHING
SAID OR KNOWN DESTINED FOR A STELLAR OBLIVION.2
SUFERING IS NOT AN ACCIDENTAL FEATURE OF LIFE. SUFFERING PERMEATES
EXISTENCE AS SUCH. SATISFACTION IS NOTHING MORE THAN THE FLEETING
ABSENCE OF PAIN. AT BEST, SATISFACTION GIVES WAY TO THE TORMENTS OF
BOREDOM AT WORST, SATISFACTION IS NEVER FELT AS THE UNQUENCHABLE
THIRST OF WILLING KNOWS NO SATIETY AND REKINDLES SUFFERING ANEW AT
EVERY INSTANT. LIFE KNOWS NO VALUE AND IT WOULD BE BETTER IF WE
HADNT BEEN BORN.
Janawway 99 (Christopher, Professor of Philosophy at the University of South Hampton,
Schopenhauers Pessimism, in Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement, Vol.44, pp.
50-5)

Schopenhauer's pessimism is not reducible to any single argument. Nevertheless I want

to reconstruct one which relies on an intimate link between the human will and
suffering. Suffering is defined by Schopenhauer as 'the will's hindrance through an
obstacle placed between it and its temporary goal' (Wl, 309), while the opposite state,

2
Eugene Thacker. Cosmic Pessimism. Univocal 2015, p. 14
'satisfaction, well-being, happiness' consists in the will's attainment of its temporary
goal. Suffering, non-attainment of goals, will be a likely occurrence in the life of a being
that wills. But this alone is hardly grounds for pronouncing that non-existence should be
preferred to the life of a willing being. However, for Schopenhauer suffering is more
than just one ingredient in such a life: it is a permeating and necessary feature of it. To
see this let us consider the structure of willing in a schematic way (see figure 1). A being
will strive towards some goal, X, and will either attain Z or not attain X. The latter state,
marked as c in the diagram, is a state of suffering. It seems there are just three
subsequent possibilities once a goal is not attained. Having not attained a goal, I may
continue to strive for it nevertheless. This is the route looping back to the original
state of striving, which, repeated endlessly, is the night- mare of Tantalus and other
mythical figures whom Schopenhauer is prone to mention: so long as our consciousness
is filled by our will, so long as we are given up to the throng of desires with its constant
hopes and fears, so long as we are the subject of willing, we never obtain lasting
happiness or peace. ... Thus the subject of willing is constantly lying on the revolving
wheel of Ixion, is always drawing water in the sieve of the Danaids, and is the
eternally thirsting Tantalus. (Wl, 196) Powerful though the symbolism of this route is
for a pessimist, there are of course others: I may move on to another goal, or I may
cease for a while to strive towards any goals. What we have next to establish is that, for
Schopenhauer, both states a and d - both striv- ing itself and the absence of striving -
also constitute or presuppose forms of suffering. On the first point Schopenhauer
declares: 'all striving [Streberi] springs from want or deficiency, from dissatisfaction with
one's own state or condition, and is therefore suffering so long as it is not sat- isfied'
(Wl, 309). The assumption appears to be that a wholly self- sufficient state, a state of
lacking nothing (or at least registering no lack), would continue in principle perpetually,
without tending towards any change of state brought about by will. Thus any episode
which is a being's striving for a goal assumes that the being is, or at least registers itself
as, lacking something. Being aware of the lack of something is not sufficient to make me
suffer. The awareness of lack must present itself as painful as such. A clear example
would be a felt deficiency or incompleteness, such as a thirst or a feeling of
homesickness, in which the awareness of some- thing's being lacking is inseparable
from some degree of suffering. (But I suppose Schopenhauer must include cases where
one painfully feels a deficiency or incompleteness because one makes a rational
judgement of a situation as detrimental to oneself. Thirst is a form of suffering, but so is
recognising (while not feeling thirst) that one is in a desert without a sufficient water-
supply.) At any rate, Schopenhauer requires us to suppose that whenever we strive
after any goal, then we are aware of lacking something in some manner which
amounts to pain or suffering. Hence to be in a state of type a in the diagram
presupposes that one suffers. But because our ordi- nary life is, in its essence, a
manifestation of will, there is no end in ordinary life to the occurrence of states of type
a. So we must always return to some state of suffering. We have, perhaps, come a
small step nearer to pessimism. How plausible, though, is the claim that whenever we
strive for a goal, the striving presupposes an awareness of lack which amounts to
suffering? The American scholar David Cartwright finds this point unconvincing, saying
that having a desire does not entail being in misery. That is true. However, that is not
what Schopenhauer alleges. Rather the claim is that every episode of striving entails
some degree of painful lack or dissatisfaction. Let us look at this more closely. Firstly,
does striving always presuppose an awareness of lack, or a dissatisfaction, of any kind?
Cartwright sug- gests this is not always true for desiring: I may desire to retain my good
health which I believe I have rather than lack, and with which I am satisfied. However,
Schopenhauer's point (at least in the last quoted passage) was one about Streben,
striving or trying, (i) Striving, I take it, must be episodic rather than dispositional,
whereas the desires just mentioned may be construed as disposi- tions; and (ii) striving
must aim at change in a way that desire need not. So the question we must ask is: When
an episode of my behav- iour is describable as ray striving to retain good health - which
by hypothesis I do not lack - must I be experiencing some 'dissatisfac- tion with my own
state or condition' ? The answer, arguably, is Yes: part of what distinguishes striving
from mere wanting is that I regard the prior state of affairs (the state of affairs minus my
striving), as deficient in whatever it requires to ensure my goal. If I register the state of
affairs minus my striving as involving no such deficiency, it arguably becomes
unintelligible to describe me as striving or trying to retain my health. Even if we allow
that to strive for something presupposes some dissatisfaction, Cartwright makes
another objection: such dissatis- faction commonly 'lacks the vital tone which is
associated with mis- ery' (Cartwright, p. 59). This is correct. But it misses the mark as
regards Schopenhauer's argument. Schopenhauer does not hold that each episode of
willing involves the subject in misery; rather that, as a presupposition of there occurring
an episode of willing, dissatisfaction or painfully felt lack must be present in some
degree. Misery is, let us say, some prolonged frustration of what is willed, or massive
non-attainment of goals basic to well-being. Most lives contain some misery and some
lives contain mostly misery, facts which Schopenhauer has not forgotten and of which
he writes mov- ingly. But his point here is that all lives, even those free of misery,
inevitably contain numerous, if minuscule, dissatisfactions. Each occurrence of striving
presupposes a state with some degree of neg- ative value for the being that strives.
Hence, if we are looking for positive value within life, we shall not find it at any of the
states of type a. But it is time we mentioned other parts of the picture. First, con- sider
state d in the diagram. May we not hope that a lack of goals to strive for will indicate a
lack of the feeling that anything is lacking an absence of suffering, a respite that
counterbalances states a and c? Here is Schopenhauer's answer: The basis of willing ...
is need, lack, and hence pain, and by its very nature and origin [any animal] is
therefore destined to pain. If, on the other hand, it lacks objects of willing, because it
is at once deprived of them again by too easy a satisfaction, a fearful emptiness and
boredom come over it; in other words, its being and its existence itself become an
intolerable burden for it. Hence its life swings like a pendulum to and fro between
pain and bore- dom, and these two are in fact its ultimate constituents. (Wl, 312) This
is one of Schopenhauer's tragi-comic master-strokes. (Elsewhere he says: 'suppose the
human race were removed to a Utopia where everything grew automatically and
pigeons flew about ready roasted ... then people would die of boredom or hang
themselves' (P2, 293).) The state of having nothing to strive for readily becomes one in
which we suffer from not having anything whose lack we feel. We painfully miss the
differently painful state of having something to strive for. The grip of pessimism
tightens again. Either of the routes a-c-a contains only suffering. So now does route a-c-
d. Routes a-b-a and a-b-d contain satisfaction, but only sandwiched between two forms
of suffering. Satisfaction is thus never anything permanent, and always lapses again
into painful lack or painful boredom. Schopenhauer expresses the situation thus:
absolutely every human life continues to flow on between willing and attainment. Of its
nature the wish is pain; attainment quick- ly begets satiety. The goal was only apparent;
possession takes away its charm. The wish, the need, appears again on the scene under
a new form; if it does not, then dreariness, emptiness, and boredom follow, the struggle
against which is just as painful as is that against want. {Wl, 314). But why would such an
existence be one we should prefer not to have? Such an attitude might intelligibly be
occasioned by the complete shipwreck of all ones aims. But that is not the situation of
every human being, as Schopenhauer wisely concedes: This is the life of almost all men;
they will, they know what they will, and they strive after this with enough success to
protect them from despair, and enough failure to preserve them from boredom and its
consequences. {Wl, 327) If most lives are spiced with a sufficiently varied set of goals,
and if, as they shuffle between the different forms of suffering, they come round to the
state 'Attain X' sufficiently often then it is still unclear why that is a kind of existence
not to be chosen above non- existence. But Schopenhauer has one more vital point to
make: All satisfaction, or what is commonly called happiness, is really and essentially
always negative only, and never positive ... the satisfaction or gratification can never be
more than a deliverance from a pain, from a want... Nothing can ever be gained but
deliverance from suffering or desire; consequently, we are only in the same position as
we were before this suffering or desire appeared. {Wl, 319) We feel pain, not
painlessness; care, but not freedom from care; fear, but not safety and security. We
feel the desire as we feel hunger and thirst; but as soon as it has been satisfied, it is
like the mouthful of food that has been taken and which ceases to exist for our
feelings the moment it is swallowed. {W2, 575). The thesis here - call it 'the negativity
of satisfaction' - is that attainment of what one strives for is not accompanied by any
positive feeling. Satisfaction is merely the temporary absence of suffer- ing, which
soon yields again to suffering. If this is true, then state b in my diagram can do little to
counterbalance the sufferings which are presupposed at every other point. The
conclusion that non-exis- tence would have been preferable at least comes within
sight: 'all life is suffering', as Schopenhauer helpfully puts it (Wl, 310). Life is suffering of
different kinds, plus some neutral stretches where suffering is briefly absent before a
new suffering arrives.
SCHOPENHAUER, USING THE METAPHORS OF ASTRONOMY, ONCE NOTED THAT
THERE WERE THREE TYPES OF WRITERS: METEORS (THE FLARE OF FADS AND
TRENDS), PLANETS (THE FAITHFUL ROTATION OF TRADITION), AND THE FIXED
STARS (IMPERVEOUS AND UNWAVERING). BUT IN SCHOPENHAUERS OWN
WRITING [] ONE IS ACUTELY AWARE OF THE WAY THAT ALL WRITING
ULTIMATELY NEGATES ITSELF, EITHER TO BE FORGOTTEN OR TO HAVE BEEN SO
PRECISE THAT IT RESULTS IN SILENCE. WAS SCHOPENHAUER AWARE THAT HE
HIMSELF WAS A FOURTH TYPE OF WRITER THE BLACK HOLE?3
HISTORY KNOWS NO PROGRESS BECAUSE EXISTENCE IS WITHOUT PURPOSE
AND WITHOUT THE POSSIBILITY OF SATISFACTION. GOVERNMENTS CAN DO
NOTHING TO IMPROVE OUR LIVES. NO AMOUNT OF LEGISLATION WILL
REDEEM OUR MISERABLE LIVES. BUT BELIEVING THAT THE BUREAUCRATS CAN
SAVE US PROVIDES THE FODDER FOR NATIONALISM AND ITS VIOLENT
EXCESSES. BUT EVEN THIS IS FOR NOTHING; STATE-BASED EDUCATION CAN DO
NOTHING TO CHANGE OUR FUNDAMENTAL NATURE.

Slaboch 15 (Matthew. Professor of Political Philosophy at Indiana University, Ph.D. in

Political Science "Eadem, sed aliter: Arthur Schopenhauer as a Critic of Progress."
History of European Ideas 41.7 (2015): 931-947. http://www-tandfonline-
com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/doi/pdf/10.1080/01916599.2014.991143?needAccess=true)
A true philosophy of history, Schopenhauer insists, amounts to the recognition that in
spite of all the upsets and upheavals that historians have recorded, we yet always have
before us only the same, identical, unchangeable essence. 67 That essence is the will,
the guiding force of the world. In nature, the will manifests itself as magnetism, gravity,
and other such scientific occurrences. Among people, the will shows itself in each action
that an individual takes. Even life itselfthe act of existingis an instance of the wills
asserting itself in the world. But the will is unceasing and, ultimately, purposeless: while
every individual act has a purpose or end, the will itself has no end in view. 68 Lacking
a final end and the possibility of being satisfied, the will makes a Sisyphus of each of us:
we traipse through life looking for a contentment that we will never find. The will
underlies each of our actions; we can do as we want, but we want what we do because
of the will. When our wants are not satisfied, we feel deprived. But even when our
desires are fulfilled, the happiness that comes from such fulfilment is fleeting: almost as
soon as a desire is met, boredom arises and it remains until we have some new end to
pursue. The pursuit of a new end, however, brings with it new suffering. Thus,
Schopenhauer claims, life swings like a pendulum to and fro between pain and
boredom. 69 There is a constant transition from desire, pursuit, and attainment to new
desires and pursuits; each fulfilled need or want marks the transition to a new course.

3
Eugene Thacker. Cosmic Pessimism. Univocal 2015, p. 41
And because there is no ultimate aim of striving, we can likewise say that there is no
measure or end of suffering. 70 Suffering is a universal problem which optimistic
philosophies downplay. Such philosophies are not merely absurd, but wicked, making
a bitter mockery of the real and significant pains that humanity must endure.71 Chief
among the optimistic philosophers was Leibniz, against whom Schopenhauer takes
direct aim: But against the palpably sophistical proofs of Leibniz that this is the best of
all possible worlds, we may even oppose seriously and honestly the proof that it is the
worst of all possible worlds. For possible means not what we may picture in our
imagination, but what can actually exist and last. Now this world is arranged as it had to
be if it were to be capable of continuing with great difficulty to exist; if it were a little
worse, it would be no longer capable of continuing to exist. Consequently, since a worse
world could not continue to exist, it is absolutely impossible; and so this world itself is
the worst of all possible worlds.72 Schopenhauer, then, explicitly rejects metaphysical
optimism. In its place he proposes a metaphysical pessimism in which an aimless and
unquenchable will directs both the natural world and human existence. Unsparing in his
criticism of Leibnizs metaphysical optimism, Schopenhauer even more bluntly
condemns historical optimism. Leibnizs theodicy may have been sophistical, but at
least it was not pernicious and pestilential like Hegels was. Real harm comes less
from believing that ours is the best of all possible worlds than from the belief that our
world could become measurably better. Progress-minded historians and philosophers
imagine that something new and grand will emerge in the future, and so they look to
history for clues as to what might unfold. But only fools would concede to history a
principal place in their philosophy, and the belief that the future has something new in
store is ill-founded.73 In the nineteenth century, this nave belief fostered the growth of
the state and the rise of nationalism, two developments which Schopenhauer
attempted in vain to counteract. Schopenhauers expectations of the state are modest:
he plainly denies it a grand purpose, claiming that its sole purpose is to protect
individuals from one another and the whole from external foes. 74 Even in this limited
capacity, however, the state will fail: internal dissent can never be entirely eliminated,
and where it is stifled, the threat of cross-border conflict is never far off.75 Despite its
limitations, the state should nevertheless do its best to provide security. In a manner
reminiscent of Thomas Hobbes (15881679), Schopenhauer asks us to consider what
would happen if the coercive power of the state was cast aside, insisting that every
thinking man will recoil at the expected scene. 76 But beyond providing some order and
stability, there is not much that the state can or should do. Indeed, Schopenhauer
seems to concur with Edmund Burke (17291797), who declared that it is in the power
of government to prevent much evil but maintained that it can do very little positive
good. 77 He takes to task eudaemonistic optimists who believe that the state exists to
foster happiness. The governments job is not, contrary to some doctrines, to bring
about heaven on earth or to arrange society so that all men could gorge, guzzle,
propagate, and die, without effort and anxiety. 78 The belief that the state is capable of
bringing about such an arrangement is misguided. People often make this error in
judgement, however: everywhere and at all times, there has been much discontent with
governments, laws, and public institutions, but for the most part only because we are
always ready to make these responsible for the misery that is inseparably bound up with
human existence itself.79 But attempts to remake the world through the rejigging of
institutions are futile, Schopenhauer insists: the ceaseless efforts to banish suffering
achieve nothing more than a change in its form. 80 He does acknowledge that things
which in former times one could hardly afford are now obtainable at a low price and in
quantities, and even the life of the humblest classes has greatly gained in comfort. 81
However, the abundance of inexpensive goods cannot make people happy: people will
always desire more, no matter how much is already available to them. If the
government successfully alleviates one misery, new desires and new pains will emerge
to take the place of the old. In other words, the state can never eliminate the misery of
existence. Even if the state could diminish the suffering that stems from need and want,
boredom would simply arise to take the place of this other evil.82 The happiness that
we do see in the world is superficial: this so-called happiness is a hollow, deceptive,
frail, and wretched thing, out of which neither constitutions, legal systems, steam-
engines, nor telegraphs can ever make anything that is essentially better. 83 Just as we
are wrong if we think that governments can make the world something other than it
naturally is, we are misguided if we assume that the state can make man something
other than nature makes him. Schopenhauer recognises that a few German
philosophasters of this mercenary age would like to distort the State into an institution
for spreading morality and edifying instruction. 84 However, contra Fichte, Hegel and
their disciples, he maintains that the state is not an institution that exists to promote
morality.85 And the wish to make it such is problematic, for several reasons. The first
problem, again, is that the goal itself is unattainable; the state cannot succeed at
improving mans character. Education or instruction will not change a persons
innermost nature, which remains fixed throughout life.86 Moreover, if we regard the
state as a vehicle for promoting morality, then we conflate political goals with ethical
aims, lawfulness with morality. Even if some perfect state arose with the capacity to
prevent every crime, this state would still be unable to shape morality. The state, with
its threats of punishment and rewards, is able merely to shape behaviour; it lacks the
ability to change peoples dispositions.87 Thus, perhaps the state can mould us as
citizens and subjects. But we are more than mere instruments of the statewe are
individuals with moral worth, and moral worth is the principal thing in a mans life. 88
This being so, the working out of his salvation is something that should be left to the
individual alone, rather than dictated by the state. State-led attempts to bring about the
moral improvement of mankind are not only ineffectual, but dangerous. Behind the
seemingly noble objective of inculcating good character lies the more sinister goal of
robbing people of their personal freedom and capacity for self-development.
Schopenhauer argues that, rather than having a beneficent effect, the state actually
harms society when it seeks to make people moral. The state makes men mere wheels
of a Chinese machine of State and Religion when it tries to edify its citizenry. State-led
projects to improve morality lead not to such improvement, but instead along the
road that led to inquisitions and wars of religion.89 Because he believes that
individuals should work out their own salvation, Schopenhauer opposes state-sponsored
activities that would prevent them from doing so. However, he sees such activity taking
place on a grand scale: each of the governments with which he is familiar has taken
upon itself the provision for the metaphysical needs of its members. 90 One example
of overreach might be the states imposing itself in the sphere of education. Thomas
Nipperdey remarks on the establishment of compulsory education in the German-
speaking lands: Nineteenth-century Germany became a land of schools. Alongside
compulsory military service and compulsory taxation, compulsory education became
one of the basic duties for the modern citizen. It was the state which had established
this duty. It organised the schools, thereby intervening in the life of the individual and a
persons journey through life, as it had never done before.91 With compulsory
education came increased governmental regulation of the schools and the citizenry.
German state governments supervised the curricula of the gymnasia and they
established approved paths to higher education. Consequently, by the age of nine or
ten [] the most important decisions about a young persons educational future had
been made. 92 But compulsory education was established not merely so that the
German governments could control people. Rather, reforms were enacted in part
because many educational innovators had cherished the ideal of universal education as
a source of social progress and equality. 93 That is, educational reformers cared about
certain metaphysical needs of people, and the states took up their cause. Such anti-
nationalism was in part a legacy of Schopenhauers upbringing. Brian Magee recounts
that Schopenhauers father selected the name Arthur because the name is the same in
German, French, and English. Both of Schopenhauers parents were cosmopolitans who
travelled widely and brought their children on extended trips outside of the German-
speaking lands. Schopenhauer spent much of his youth in France and England.96
According to David Cartwright, Heinrich Floris Schopenhauer aimed to instil liberal and
cosmopolitan attitudes in a son [Arthur] who would be well connected to various
trading partners. 97 Whether Heinrich successfully implanted liberal ideas in his sons
mind is debatable. (I will argue in the concluding section that he did not.) Less debatable
is the younger Schopenhauers cosmopolitanism and lack of attachment to the German
nation. Schopenhauer freely and frequently expresses an aversion to nationalism in
several of his works. He manifests his lack of a national pride in several quips about his
fellow German-speakers. In The World as Will and Representation, for instance, he
writes that for a German it is even good to have somewhat lengthy words in his mouth,
for he thinks slowly, and they give him time to reflect. 98 In an essay on government,
he maintains that it is a characteristic failing of the Germans to look in the clouds for
what lies at their feet. 99 In no wise could Schopenhauer be proud of a nation which
revered Hegel, whose philosophy would serve as a lasting monument of German
stupidity. 100 But Schopenhauer did not single out the Germans as the only nation with
faults. Herder had posed the rhetorical question: Is not the good on the earth strewn
about?. 101 Schopenhauer might have turned this question around and asked whether
the bad on earth is limited to one particular group. We know what his answer to such a
question would have been: every nation ridicules the rest and all are right. 102 Behind
his caustic remarks about his own and other nationalities, Schopenhauer harboured real
concerns about history and society. Anticipating Benedict Andersons Imagined
Communities by more than a century,103 he refers to nations as mere abstractions,
and he argues that only the individuals and their course of life are real. 104 Histories,
focused as they are on national development, may be effective in teaching us about
particular groups of men, but they reveal less about man, i.e., about human nature.105
If we truly wished to understand mankind, we would do well to consult biographies
instead of histories, since they are richer in detail and allow us to understand multiple
facets of a mans existence.106 And, where histories pave the way for comfortable,
substantial, fat states which devise purely national, political solutions to problems
which are universal and moral, proper biographies show us the true route to salvation.
That path, according to Schopenhauer is a life of compassion and asceticism, which is an
individuals surest way of escaping the torments of the will.
YOU, THE NIGHT, AND THE MUSIC. [] SCHOPENHAUER ONCE NOTED THAT
MUSIC IS THE MELODY TO WHICH THE WORLD IS THE TEXT. GIVEN
SCHOPENHAUERS VIEW ON LIFE THAT LIFE IS SUFFERING, THAT HUMAN LIFE
IS ABSURD, THAT THE NOTHINGNESS BEFORE MY BIRTH IS EQUAL TO THE
NOTHINGNESS AFTER MY DEATH GIVEN ALL THIS, ONE WONDERS WHAT KIND
OF MUSIC SCHOPENHAUER HAD IN MIND WHEN HE DESCRIBED MUSTIC AS THE
MELODY TO WHICH THE WORLD IS THE TEXT. WAS IT OPERA, A REQUIUM MASS
[]? A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC FOR THE TWILIGHT OF THOUGHT, A SULLEN
NOCTURE FOR THE NIGHT-SIDE F LOGIC, AN ERA OF SAD WINGS SUNG BY A
SOLITARIY BANSHEE. PERHAPS THE MUSIC SCHOPENHAUER HAD IN MIND IS
MUSIC ELIMINATED TO NON-MUSIC. A WHISPER WOULD SUFFICE. PERHAPS A
SIGH OF FATIGUE OR RESIGNATION, PERHAPS A MOAN OF DESPAIR OR
SORROW. PERHAPS A SOUND JUST ARTICULATE ENGOUGH THAT IT COULD BE
HEARD TO DISSIPATE.4

4
Eugene Thacker. Cosmic Pessimism. Univocal 2015, pp. 31-2
[PLAY WAGNER LOUDLY WITHOUT READING FOR A TIME OF YOUR
CHOOSING]
WE MUST FREE OURSELVES FROM THE WILL. THIS CAN BE ACHIEVED THROUGH
ADOPTING THE STANDPOINT OF THE SUBJECT OF PURE COGNITION, WHO
TEMPORARILY ESCAPES FROM INDIVIDUATION. EACH OF US HAS THE CAPACITY
TO ACHIEVE THIS STATE BY APPRECIATING WORKS OF ART. MOREOVER, IN
DISSOLVING THE FETTERS OF OUR INDIVIDUAL WILL AND ACHIEVING WILL-
LESS-NESS, WE ADOPT AN ETHICAL RELATIONSHIP TO OTHERS. AN IMMANENT
SENSE OF BEAUTY COLORS EXISTENCE; FILLED WITH COMPASSION, WE
UNCOVER THE ESSENTIAL UNITY OF BEING.
Kossler 10 [Matthias - Better Consciousness: Schopenhauer's Philosophy of Value, Ch.6
Life is a Mirror p.85-89//AK]
In replacing the causal relationships between the subject of willing and action with the being in itself and phenomenon that which shows itself in the act of will exceeds

How is consciousness of
individuality. In other words: according to this new conception, the experience of character entails the experience of the world.

the world achieved? A precondition for it is, in Schopenhauers opinion, thoughtful awareness (Besonnenheit) which
enables [us] . . . to survey the whole of life.46 Without thoughtful awareness the intellect only
perceives singular presentations, which the intellect refers directly to the will, whereas the will itself does not
come into view.47 The animal neither has a world nor does it reflect on its will.48 The whole of the world as presentation becomes

conscious to humans in the aesthetic view of the Idea.49 Only when the thinking subject
forgets his interest in the particular and becomes a clear mirror of the object does the world
become comprehensible as a whole, not as infinity in space and time, but through perception of
the essence or Idea of the object.50 The world as infinite temporal-spatial expansion is a
presentation to us derived from the perception of the essence, since the world presupposes the
concept of a universal whole: and a universal whole is the Idea. If the adequate philosophical
interpretation of that which comes to light by the act of will is the will as being in itself, which is
as such necessarily related to the world, then it is only in aesthetic regard that an adequate
cognizance of this being in itself is to be found. This is why it is not until this point that
Schopenhauer talks of the wills self-cognizance.51 Aesthetic contemplation is achieved by a
high degree of awareness, through which the distance from the individual, body-related willing,
becomes so large that the object can demonstrate itself, in an objective manner. If, owing to thoughtful awareness, several
possible motives of the mind are weighed up, therefore considered, the following may occur: that not only the relation of the prevailing motive on the will, but also the relations

With increasing awareness the connection to ones

of the thoughts and presentations to each other are made objects of the mind.

own will diminishes. Under the exceptional circumstance of aesthetic contemplation the
relations between presentations no longer pertain to ones own interest at all. In that case the
relations must be understood as derived from the essence of the things themselves. If all such
objectively determined relations of a thing to others are summarised, they then express the
essence or character of the thing. What is being expressed here by manner of awarenessone
might sayis the character of the conceived and depicted object of awareness itself. This character is the
Idea. Life is but a Mirror 85 An Idea apprehended in such a way is of course not yet the essence of the thing in itself, precisely because it has proceeded from the cognizance of
mere relations. Nevertheless, as the result of the sum of all relations, it is the real character of the thing, and therefore the complete expression of the essence displaying itself
to perception as object, apprehended not in reference to an individual will, but as it expresses itself of itself, whereby indeed it determines all its relations, which were only
cognized until then.52 Within the perception of the Idea there is contained the knowledge of to how the being in itself of a thing is by virtue of itself related to the world as
presentation. The sum of all relations is the world as being entirely relative in terms of its structure in space and time,53 yet realized as an unfolding of the essence of the
perceived object it has real content. In the contemplation of an Idea the object is not present as part of the world before, and then related to, the embodied will. Instead the will
as the being in itself, perceived in an object, creates the relationships and definitions of the worldhowever not in terms of time or causality, but by being mirrored in
presentation.54 However, this cognizance still has to be related to the experience of selfconsciousness, since in viewing the Idea, the subject has lost itself in the object, or it
has forgotten that in its bodily existence it is itself the will which it perceives.55 To express this in terms of the underlying thesis of this essay, the character of a thing has been
realised, which is, as yet, different from the self. The distance has therefore been achieved through which that which occurs in the act of will can show itself as a being in itself,
yet the reflection, that it is the self of the act of will, has not been fully realised. The aesthetic view is therefore not yet the complete self-cognizance of the will. Accordingly, this
view can only be had for short moments, whereupon the subject again immediately falls prey to individual willing. What remains is the memory of the experience of the world as
a whole which, placed next to the disappearing singular transitory presentation, causes infinite expansion in space and time.56 The universal meaning (as world) and the
individual meaning of that which is called will are here combined in a way in which the unity of both is not comprehended. However, it is not only space and time, and other
forms of the Principle of Sufficient Ground connected to these, that are created by that way of combination, but also a specific type of human motivation and its consequences.
By virtue of the fact that this combination takes place in a condition of will-dependent cognizance, it is related to the individual will: the whole of the world is presented to the
individual will as desire (Wunsch), from which, however, the singular act of will detaches itself. There are consequences of this thesis in the insatiable needs humans have, which
create limitless suffering, as well as egoism, which is anchored in the individuality of character that the world as empirical reality is necessarily related to.57 In this instance one
must look back once more to the genuine doctrine of character, since character is defined by the completed act of will set against the background of desire. 86 Matthias Koler
Desire is therefore the sphere in which the world is viewed as a necessary point of relation for the experience of character. Desire merely indicates what man in general, not the
individual who is feeling the desire, would be capable of doing.58 What the human is capable of doing depends on what the motive of his action can be, and that is principally
everything that he can perceive and think, that he can make present by virtue of his experiences of the past, that he experiences through the stories of others and that he can
anticipate as future. This concerns all things which are possible in the world as presentation. Desire is therefore essentially universal and presents the relationship of the will to
the world. Indeed, desire only indicates this universality, since in desiring, depending on the capability of the intellect and the application of thoughtful awareness, only smaller

or larger parts of possible motives are presented to the subject. But the capacity for thoughtful awareness, which separates
humans from animals, and which, with regard to aesthetic contemplation, proves itself to be the
presupposition for the cognizance of world, potentially contains the relationship to the entire
field of possibility. Desire signifies the midpoint between objective cognizance of the essence in
itself in the idea and subjective knowledge in immediate self-consciousness. In this sense awareness is very much
the cause for the Velleitas not becoming an act of will,59 in other words the will is suppressed and therefore the cognizance of

objective relationships made possible; but as desires, presentations remain fixed upon the subjective will, and as potential acts of will constitute
the foundation upon which the individualisation of the will, the formation of character, is achieved. Schopenhauer described this function of desire, to indicate what man in
general is able to want, as an expression of the character of the species of the human.60 In contradiction to his statements concerning the character of the species of animals
and the possibility of placing them in parallel with average man,61 the character of the species of the human is, according to this idea, not to be understood through the
principal qualities62 of humans, which result from abstraction, but through the totality of the possibilities of being human.63 The character of the species is not therefore
simply common to all human beings owing to the fact that all human beings act more or less in the same way, but because individual character is only formed by virtue of the
choice between an infinite number of possible motives that make up the character of the species. The individual character is a certain realisation of the character of the species,
or being human as such, in so far as it has a specific individual character. In the realisation of the character of the species through the individual, the intelligible character is

The aspect of the individual points to the acts of will, in which the being
recognised in its relationship to the world.

in itself is experienced immediately. The aspect of being human in general points to the substantial unity of being in itself in strict contrast to
phenomenal appearance. Through the character of the species a unity of the essence of human beings is

brought into discussion, which is recognised as being compassion. This takes place where the
principium individuationis is seen through, i.e. when one sees through the individual characters to their unified essence. If in addition one
takes into Life is but a Mirror 87 account that the impediment of the will through thoughtful awareness that
makes desire possible means, de facto, a denial of the willsince in Schopenhauer will is tied to phenomenal actionthen substantial
elements of Schopenhauers ethics can be interpreted based on the experience of character. The thing that separates the human
being from animals in regard to motivation and that which makes up his intelligible character is that human beings are as a rule in control of their reason, are thus thoughtfully
aware (besonnen), i.e. make decisions in accordance with thought-out, abstract motives,64 in brief: that he acts with thoughtful awareness. According to Schopenhauer the
strongest motive leads to action, out of which character can be defined.
RATHER THAN TEACHING THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS, WE
MUST TEACH THE NEGATION OF THE WILL, THE REPUDIATION
OF ALL PARTICULARITY AND INDIVIDUATION. THIS IS BECAUSE
THE WILL IS THE SOURCE OF ALL PAIN, ALL SUFFERING. ONLY
BY RENOUNCING THE WILL CAN WE ESTABLISH AN ETHICAL
RELATIONSHIP TO OTHERS REALIZING THAT OUR PARTICULAR
SUFFERING IS, IN FACT, UNIVERSAL. MOREOVER, THE
RENUNCIATION OF THE WILL IS ALSO NECESSARY FOR ANY
HOPE OF FREEDOM FROM OUR MISERABLE EXISTENCE.
FORTUNATELY, OUR PURSUIT OF THIS HERCULEAN TASK IS
HELPED BY THE ARTS. AESTHETIC APPREICATION ENABLES THE
DISSOLUTION OF OUR INDIVIDUAL WILL SO THAT WE MAY RISE
OUT OF THE SWAMPS OF CONSCIOUSNESS AND REMOVE
OURSELVES FROM THE WORLD.

Hyland 85 (J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in
Educational Studies, 11:3, 224-7)

Schopenhauer proposes three ways (each related to a common object) in which we can offer
a response to the predicament he describes, two of which, I will suggest, are of special
relevance to education. (1) First, there is the way of asceticism which Schopenhauer derived
from his reading of the Upanishads and other Hindu and Buddhist literature, and which is
similar in many important respects to the practical ethics of the Greek Stoics and Cynics.
Since the will is the source and cause of all pain and suffering, it is argued, the remedy
lies in the total rejection and denial of the will in all its various manifestations. As
Schopenhauer puts it: My ethics ... candidly confesses the reprehensible nature of the
world and points to the denial of the will as the road to redemption from it. (1970, p.
63) It might be wondered, in the face of the blind, irrational striving of the will, how an
individual intellect could ever attain sufficient power to bring about such a redemption. For
the lower animals, who are pure will, this would, indeed, be impossible but, although the
separation between consciousness and will becomes more marked as intelligence increases,
even humans develop, in the main, only imperfect intellects, mere 'servants' of the will
which is 'always in command of the field' (1969, Vol. 2, pp. 136-7). How, then, can we
hope to achieve that mastery over the will which is a pre-requisite of the ascetic life? Our
intellects are imperfect insofar as we are capable only of subjective consciousness, a
level at which we simply respond to the dictates of the will. However, the more we are
able to approximate to "clearness of consciousness of the external world, the
objectivity of perception" the more our intellects approach that perfection of
knowledge which, as illustrated especially in the instances of genius so much admired by
Schopenhauer, is "wholly will-less knowledge" (ibid., p. 291). The attainment of
perfection in this sphere is described in a variety of ways by Schopenhauer, all of which
involve the ability to conceive the wholeness, interconnectedness and universality of
particular ideas or items of perception, and the process can be clearly discerned in the
epistemology of Plato and Kant. Schopenhauer's account of the way an individual may
come to understand the idea of suffering is an excellent illustration of the general
thesis. A person encountering great misfortune or deep sorrow will experience
suffering but may, on reflection, see this only as a particular phenomenon, as
something which happens to him alone. Such an individual "still continues to will
life, only not on the conditions that have happened to him". This predicament
invites our sympathy (and may even inspire awe) but such a sufferer is "really worthy
of reverence only when his glance has been raised from the particular to the
universal, and when he regards his own suffering merely as an example of the
whole". In an ethical respect, the person becomes "inspired with genius, one case
holds good for a thousand, so that the whole of life, conceived as essential suffering,
then brings him to resignation" (1969, Vol. 1, p. 396). This illustrates both the idea of
perfect knowledge and the source of Schopenhauer's ethical theory, and also serves
to explain why the most obvious solution to the human predicament, suicide, comes
to be rejected. Schopenhauer is by no means unsympathetic to suicideindeed, he is
severely critical of the conventional moral disapproval of this course of action (1970, pp. 77-
9)but, in the end, dismisses it as an intellectual mistake. The error can be located
in the failure to connect each individual will with the whole, the universal will, in the
way that perfect knowledge requires. Thus, suicide is a "quite futile and foolish act,
for the thing-in-itself remains unaffected by it"; suicide "denies merely the
individual, not the species" (1969, Vol. 1, p. 399). This is, perhaps, the most obscure
aspect of Schopenhauer's work and, as Sprigge (op. cit., pp. 86-7) points out, seems to be
based on his philosophy of mathematics, particularly his idea of numbers and counting. At
one level we might render it understandable by saying that the self-destruction of an
individual solves nothing, for the will, though destroyed in one particular objectified
representation, remains triumphant. The noumenon, the universal will (or, as we
might say in modern terminology, the gene pool) remains unaffected and survives the
deaths of individual suicides to continue the endless cycle of striving. What is less
understandable, unless we posit some kind of genetically-transmitted increment of perception, is how the
victory of individual ascetics over the will can be translated into a victory over the universal will. Sprigge
interprets this conception in terms of a "whittling away of the Cosmic will" (ibid., p. 92) so that, in the end, the
will ceases to individualise itself in humans. The denial of the will through the extinction of desires and needs is
a familiar solution to human strife, though it is rarely given such a full theoretical foundation as that which
Schopenhauer tries to provide. Viewed as an alternative to orthodoxy, asceticism of this
kind does provide a much-needed counterbalance to the crude and mindless
materialism which dominates popular culture and, as such, it does have a role to play
in moral education and the education of the emotions. Something less extreme than
Schopenhauer's ascetic philosophy is present, though often understated, in many religious
doctrines, and educators could do worse than give more emphasis to such ideas and
rather less to the pursuit of happiness. (2) Just as a certain form of intellectual
contemplation and discipline can provide that control over the will that makes asceticism
possible, so the disinterested pursuit of philosophical understanding can lead to
genuine knowledge of the world and mastery over our circumstances. The more we
move from self-consciousness to consciousness of others and the objective world, the
more the will is separated from the intellect, and knowledge becomes purer. In his
later essays, Schopenhauer's earlier idealism is tempered by a form of empiricism which was
intended to turn philosophy into a truly practical pursuit. Attacking the 'sophists' of his day,
Fichte, Schelling and Hegel, he eschews philosophy based only on abstract conceptual
subtlety, urging that "philosophy, just as much as art and poetry, must have its
source in perceptual comprehension of the world" (1970, p. 118). Although genuine
philosophising must be "truly disengaged" and must "prosecute no particular goal
or aim" if it is to be "free from the enticement of the will" (ibid., pp. 117-18).
Schopenhauer reveals his primary objective to be that which has motivated philosophy since
its beginnings, viz. to present as complete and veridical a picture of the world and man's
place in it as possible. The roots of metaphysics can be located in man's "knowledge of death
and therewith the consideration of the suffering and misery of life" (1969, Vol. 2, p. 161),
but the philosophical task is constantly frustrated by the will. The world will appear in its
"true colour and form, in its complete and correct significance, only when the intellect, freed
from willing, moves freely over objects"; the intellect is then "of the greatest purity, and
becomes the clear mirror of the world" (ibid., pp. 380-1). Schopenhauer here posits a notion
of philosophical enlightenment through intellectual purity that is remarkably similar to
Spinoza's doctrine that human freedom is to be sought, strangely enough, by acknowledging
the extent to which our actions are not free but determined by our characters and by the
natural order of things. Spinoza too argued that "Desire is the very essence of man, that is,
the endeavour wherewith man endeavours to persist in his being"; it is in desire that "lie the
causes of human impotence and inconstancy, and why men do not follow the precepts of
reason" (1959b, p. 154). Although Spinoza (in spite of his own exemplary life) repudiated
asceticism, he did urge us, not so much to deny desire, as to come to an 'adequate idea' of it
through the use of the active intellect. Thus, the "more an emotion becomes known to us,
the more it is within our power and the less the mind is passive to it" (ibid., p. 203).
Similarly, Schopenhauer exhorts us to discover all that we can about the roots of desire
grounded in the will. The objective employment of the intellect, as opposed to its subjective
application in the satisfaction of will-directed desires, makes all art and science possible.
Thus, we can achieve that 'free reflection' demonstrated most forcefully in works of genius.
There is no freedom in nature, however, for the 'entire empirical course of a man's
life is, in great things and in small, as necessarily determined as clockwork" (1970, p.
143). The freedom to be attained is a metaphysical freedom which consists in seeing
the world aright and understanding the nature of the will and the way it shapes our
behaviour. This philosophic understanding "snatches knowledge from the thraldom
of the will" and brings about "the painless state, prized by Epicurus as the highest good
and as the state of the gods; for the moment we are delivered from the miserable
pressure of the will" (1969, Vol. 1, p. 196). (3) In addition to philosophical activity, the
engagement in aesthetic pursuits and the contemplation of works of art was, for
Schopenhauer, amongst the highest of human endeavours since it was capable of
facilitating will-less behaviour. In our interaction with objects of art the "individual
will sets its associated power of imagination free for a while" and our perception
becomes completely objective, 'a faithful mirror of objects'. Thus, the intellect may
come to grasp the Platonic Idea and attain that "pure knowledge where will and its
aims have been completely removed from man" (1970, pp. 156-7). Music was the
medium especially favoured by Schopenhauer; he called it the "true universal
language" and "the most powerful of the arts" for it "acts directly on the will, i.e. the
feelings, passions and emotions of the hearer, so that it quickly raises these or even
alters them" (1969, Vol. 2, p. 448). The value of the arts lies in their ability to elevate
us above the strife and suffering of the world and, in so doing, to remove the intellect
from the servitude of the will. Through the perception of beauty we may become "a
pure intelligence without aims or intentions" for "when aesthetic perception occurs
the will completely vanishes from conscious- ness" (1970, p. 155). Thus,
Schopenhauer provides a powerful argument for the cultivation of the arts through
education, and one which is echoed in the prescriptions of contemporary proponents
of art education. Describing the 'gift of art', Papanoutsos (1978), for instance, refers to
the potential of the arts for "deepening the sense of life" in that participation in the
arts "enriches, ennobles and strengthens our humanity" (p. 93). In a similar vein,
Hepburn (1972) has recommended an approach to the education of the emotions through
the medium of art, suggesting that the arts can be "enhancers of freedom" which help us to
overcome "the dominance of emotion cliches" (pp. 493-5).
 1AC VERSION 2
Life is suffering and there is no escape. The kindles of desire burn bright with
their cravings, demanding more and more out of life. We endlessly strive to
sustain the destructive flames, but can only satisfy them for so long. Wood
chars to coal, and coal burns to dust, leaving nothing but embers, a flickering
flame hungry for more. Our temporary satisfactions will always flare up and die
in the blaze. We are bound to the fire, to serve it and fulfill its unfulfillable
desires as it eats away at our life. Without the flames our lives are plagued with
boredom, the desire to fulfill desires. Our life is condemned to serve the fire, to
try and satisfy its demands. Whats left are days suffering in the labors of
desires or nights anguishing in boredom.
Singh 10 (Singh, R. Raj. Schopenhauer: A Guide for the Perplexed. Bloomsbury Publishing,
2010.
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/lib/umichigan/reader.action?docID=601
950)

At all grades of its phenomenon, from lowest to the highest, the

will disposes entirely with an ultimate aim and
object. It always strives, because striving is its sole nature, to which no attained goal can put an
end. Such striving is therefore incapable of final satisfaction. (W-I, 308) According to Schopenhauer, human being
is a phenomenon of the will, just as other entities are, at all grades of Being, inanimate things, plants and animals also are.
The will is always goal oriented and has aims which it is striving to accomplish incessantly in all levels of its phenomenon.
Everything is striving to realize its nature. Since will brings aims, goals and dynamism to all things, it fills them with
endless striving. Thus man is a bundle of needs, wants and cravings which know no final
satisfaction, unless the will at the summit of its knowledge of itself, in the human existence alone, resolves to deny rather than
affirm itself. Striving is the kernel and in-itself of everything that exists which in case of human existence, manifests itself most
distinctly being endowed with a human consciousness superior to that of all other entities. This striving in man is appropriately
called will, by Schopenhauer a term indicative of resolve, process, goals, ends and endless desires. When the will is
hindered through obstacles between it and its temporary (immediate) goal, it is called
suffering. Thus suffering is defined as hindrances placed in the advance of the will towards its immediate and presumed aims.
The attainment of the temporary goal of the will is defined as satisfaction, well-being, and happiness by Schopenhauer. Thus both
suffering and temporary satisfaction do not deliver lasting happiness, since each so-called
satisfaction is the starting point of a new striving. Thus that there is no ultimate aim of striving
means that there is no measure or end of suffering (W-I, 309). Thus inevitability of striving that is part and
parcel of the will means that suffering is inevitable and ineradicable as a matter of course. This gives Schopenhauer the rationale for
his pessimistic judgement of life as such. Schopenhauer offers a graphic account of suffering in human life throughout his early and
later writings. Suffering is felt to the highest degree in human existence because in human existence, knowledge
is ever
more distinct than in any animal and in its enhanced consciousness, pain also increases.
Schopenhauer asserts that the more one knows the more one suffers; a genius suffers most of all. Although
suffering is more feebly expressed in animal world, it offers a mirror to the human to witness how all life is suffering, for life means
striving and striving never has a smooth sailing. Life
is also a constant warding-off of death, a prevented dying, an ever
deferred death. Knowing that there is death, struggling to nourish and preserve the body is another
reason for suffering. Thus the will is more appropriately named will-to-live. Willing and striving are the essence
of all living and the basis of willing is need, lack and hence pain. In case of the highest grade of wills
objectification, the human body appears as an objectified will-to-live, with an iron command to nourish it. Thus man is a bundle of
needs and wants. An additional task in-built in this concretized will-to-live is to propagate the species. As
Schopenhauer explains in his essay on sexual love, the purposes of the will-to-live are unknowingly carried out by those attached in
the bond of love and marriage. Furthermore, the needs and wants of romantic love have their own aspects of suffering.
Furthermore, when objects and activities of willing are temporarily missing, boredom strikes and
existence seems to become a burden. Hence life swings like a pendulum to and fro between
pain and boredom (W-I, 312). Ensuring and striving after their own existence is what keeps all living things engrossed and in
motion at all times. As soon as their existence is ensured to human beings or striving after existence
gets a respite, they are at a loss as to how to kill time this becomes a big issue. Being free of existential
cares at once makes humans burdens to themselves. Boredom is not to be taken lightly for it
imposes a compulsory sociability on people and obliges them to seek out one another, even
though at bottom due to deep-seated egoism, there is no love lost among them. At the same time,
human life is a continuous surge between willing and attainment. But the satisfactions of petty attainments are short-lived and
wishes appear under new versions and forms. Schopenhauer acknowledges that pure knowledge and genuine delight
in art transforms us to being pure spectators of existence. But since pure intellectual and aesthetic pleasure
require rare talent, they appear in very few. And these select few receive this higher satisfaction at the cost of feeling very lonely
among beings that are incapable of pure knowledge and aesthetic feeling. These moments of pure knowledge and art-experience
are also like fleeting dreams in an existence that is given over to willing and craving for the most part. It is the accidental nature of
the appearance of sufferings that accords them their power. Suffering is essential to life and it is really its various
forms that make their appearances subject to chance. But we frequently overlook the basic fact that
suffering is essential to life, therefore does not flow in upon us from outside, but everyone
carries around within himself its perennial source (W-I, 318). Thus all satisfaction or so-called happiness is
only negative. Every satisfaction is fulfilment of a wish, and a wish or lack or desire has to be the
precedent condition of every pleasure. Schopenhauer returns to the theme of the positive nature of suffering in all of
his early and later works. He is quick to point out the moral failings of human egoism in his graphic description of human miseries.
How the sight
or description of anothers sufferings brings us a feeling of satisfaction is described
by Schopenhauer with a quote from Lucretius: Not that it pleases us to watch another being
tormented, but that it is a joy to us to observe evils from which we ourselves are free (W-I, 320). An
evidence of Schopenhauers observation can be found in the reactions of the tourists to the plight of the poorer native populations
around the sun and sand destinations. Many tourists seem to draw a perverse feeling of joy at their own superior economic situation
and can hardly suppress their self-congratulatory satisfaction during their bouts of eating and drinking in their all-inclusive resorts.
As if the cares, anxieties and preoccupations of the actual world are not enough, human mind
has a tendency to
create an imaginary higher world for itself, a world of demons, gods and saints and a thousand superstitions. To
these conceived deities must be offered sacrifices, prayer, temple decorations, vows and their
fulfilment, pilgrimages, salutations, adornment of images and so on. Events of this life are accepted as the
counter-effects of these divine beings. Such religious activities fulfil a double need of people for help and support as well as for
activity and diversion. Schopenhauer points out that such spiritual
and religious innovation took place more
significantly among peoples whose lives were made easy by mildness of climate and fertility of
soil, first among the Hindus, then Greeks and Romans and later Italians, Spaniards and others.
Schopenhauer emphasizes that his account of lifes suffering is not just an a-posteriori accumulation of instances of human miseries
within history and experience. This could be deemed as a one-sided description lacking in universality which is required in a
philosophical analysis. He maintains that his account is a perfectly cold and philosophical demonstration of the inevitable suffering
at the very foundation of the nature of life; for it starts from the universal and is conducted a priori (W-I, 324). However, an a-
posteriori confirmation of this truth is to be found everywhere. What Schopenhauer means is that the
reality and primacy
of human suffering is not merely deduced from the various instances of pain and rejection in
human condition. Rather, suffering lies at the core of life as real and inevitable, part and parcel
of existence as such. All the instances of suffering which seem to be accidental occurrences are rather essential and
inevitable components of existence, a testimony to the truth of suffering residing in the core of life. Of course, there are
innumerable satisfactions felt at the realizations of the goals of our strivings. But these are short-lived and too few compared to the
widespread frustrations at the thwarting of the wills endless cravings that prompt ceaseless quests. Add to these frustrations of
wilful projects of human being, the tragic facts of the nature of existence, needs, wants and necessities of the basic demands of life,
the knowledge that death is certain but its timing is uncertain, the pains of human relationships, meetings and partings. All in all, the
nature of life and its manycoloured unfoldings contain an ocean of suffering. A significant part of it is lawful and inevitable aspect of
existence itself, another part is bound to subdue us even though there is a portion of it that we can possibly encounter and
overcome with heroism. Schopenhauer maintains that a happy life is impossible; a heroic life of compassion and fortitude is an
option. According to Schopenhauer, anyone whose judgement is not paralysed by prejudices of assured optimistic doctrines
will acknowledge that this world of humanity is the kingdom of chance and error. Folly and
wickedness are rampant in it. Schopenhauer continues to present a graphic account of the darker aspects of human life.
In this world, everything better and excellent struggles through as an exceptional occurrence, and
lasting creative works of great minds are those that have outlived the malice of their contemporaries. In the sphere of
thought, art and action, the absurd, the dull and the fraudulent are the order of the day,
disturbed only by brief interruptions of the contributions of the genuine heroes and genius
intellects. As far as the individuals are concerned, as a rule, every life is a continual series of mishaps great
and small, concealed as much as possible by everyone (W-I, 324). Everyone is aware that others will draw a
perverse satisfaction at the miseries of others from which they are at the moment free. How can anyone in ones right
mind call this unjust and miserable world the best of all possible worlds Schopenhauer
wonders. If we were to take the most hardened and callous optimists through hospitals,
prisons, torture-chambers, slave-hovels, battlefields and other abodes of misery, they would
have to give up their doctrines of the glories of human existence. But this hopeless and irreversible condition
of man is precisely the invincible and indomitable nature of his will, the objectivity of which is his person (W-I, 325). An
external power can never change or suppress this will, and no supernatural power can possibly
deliver him from the sufferings that are the consequence of the life which is a phenomenon of
the will. Everything depends on the individual left to himself; any possible deliverance depends on the will of man himself. In vain
does he make gods for himself, and seeks from them through prayer and flattery what can be brought about only by his own
willpower. As man does have the capacity to deny this will-to-live as exemplified by sanyasis (monks), martyrs and saints of all faiths.
But optimism,at a fundamental level as the basic judgement of the nature of life, remains a
bitter mockery of the unspeakable sufferings of mankind. Schopenhauer shows the atheistic tenor of his
thought and offers a scathing critique of ritualistic religion. However, he shows a great deal of admiration for saints and ascetics of
all major religions, for he views them as genuine practitioners of the denial of the will, a difficult but nobler way of life. The
acknowledgement of the suffering inherent in human life is the starting point of wisdom and higher life according to Schopenhauer.
He regards this pessimism as realism. To overlook and downplay the misery of others is both insensitive and immoral; to deny
suffering in ones own life shows shallow thinking. Suffering
is very real and continuous throughout lifes
various phases and at the same time delivered to us in totally unpredictable and staggering
modes, and changing realities are hard to handle. The respites from suffering, happy interludes
are far too few and short-lived. By no means are suffering and happiness equal and opposite. Suffering is fundamental;
the will and its allied cravings ensure inevitable hardship. All happinesses and satisfactions are temporary breaks from the ongoing
suffering essential to life. This is certainly a pessimistic and one-sided appraisal of life based on an interpretation of the character of
the will-to-live, both willing and living being ongoing quests and ongoing strivings, involving innumerable goals and innumerable
frustrations. Due to the fact that our bodies and our lives are the abodes and arenas of the will-to-live, life and suffering have to be
synonymous as two sides of the same coin. The evidence for this basic truth can be found everywhere in the human condition.
Schopenhauer cites instances of common woes and miseries, along with the meanness of human egoism, systemic exploitation of
the downtrodden and widespread heartlessness as sure signs of suffering that is part and parcel of life. Does Schopenhauer
deliberately and/or compulsively downplay the positive and the good in human life? He does acknowledge the good but only in a
heroic encounter with suffering, and in an impassioned contemplation of the nature of the world by a small number of thinkers,
artists and geniuses, and most of all in the saintly lives of those who say no to the wills commands and cravings. Any other
happiness or good has to be a temporary delusion according to him. The change, the striving and movement within life is taken to be
something negative, a pointless turmoil, the opposite of the calm of salvation. Thus the Buddhist dualism between samsara
(worldliness) and nirvana (salvation) seems to be embedded in Schopenhauers insight.
The history of progress, specifically in education, is an illusion as it cannot allow
the escape from the inherent pain and suffering of life Belief in the state to
make good citizens through education and the idea that it can make the world
measurably better is hedged in a destruction of individual salvation and is the
logic of nationalism justifying wars in the name of lawfulness confused with
morality every nation ridicules the rest and all are right
Slaboch 15 (Slaboch, Matthew. Professor of Political Philosophy at Indiana University, Ph.D. in
Political Science "Eadem, sed aliter: Arthur Schopenhauer as a Critic of Progress." History of
European Ideas 41.7 (2015): 931-947. http://www-tandfonline-
com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/doi/pdf/10.1080/01916599.2014.991143?needAccess=true)

A true philosophy of history, Schopenhauer insists, amounts to the recognition that in spite of all the upsets and upheavals that
historians have recorded, we yet always have before us only the same, identical, unchangeable essence .

67 That essence is the will, the guiding force of the world. In nature, the will manifests itself as magnetism, gravity, and other

such scientific occurrences. Among people, the will shows itself in each action that an individual takes. Even life itselfthe

act of existingis an instance of the wills asserting itself in the world. But the will is unceasing and,
ultimately, purposeless: while every individual act has a purpose or end, the will itself has no
end in view. 68 Lacking a final end and the possibility of being satisfied, the will makes a Sisyphus of
each of us: we traipse through life looking for a contentment that we will never find. The will underlies each of our actions; we can do as we
want, but we want what we do because of the will. When our wants are not satisfied, we feel deprived. But even

when our desires are fulfilled, the happiness that comes from such fulfilment is fleeting: almost as
soon as a desire is met, boredom arises and it remains until we have some new end to pursue. The pursuit of a new end, however, brings with it new
suffering. Thus, Schopenhauer claims, life swings like a pendulum to and fro between pain and boredom. 69
There is a constant transition from desire, pursuit, and attainment to new desires and pursuits; each fulfilled need or want marks

the transition to a new course. And because there is no ultimate aim of striving, we can likewise say that there is no
measure or end of suffering. 70 Suffering is a universal problem which optimistic philosophies downplay. Such
philosophies are not merely absurd, but wicked, making a bitter mockery of the real and significant pains that

humanity must endure.71 Chief among the optimistic philosophers was Leibniz, against whom Schopenhauer takes direct aim: But against
the palpably sophistical proofs of Leibniz that this is the best of all possible worlds, we may even oppose seriously and honestly the proof that it is

the worst of all possible worlds. For possible means not what we may picture in our imagination, but what can actually exist and last.
Now this world is arranged as it had to be if it were to be capable of continuing with great difficulty to exist; if it were a little worse, it would be no
longer capable of continuing to exist. Consequently, since a worse world could not continue to exist, it is absolutely impossible; and so this world itself
is the worst of all possible worlds.72 Schopenhauer, then, explicitly rejects metaphysical optimism. In its place he proposes a metaphysical pessimism in
which an aimless and unquenchable will directs both the natural world and human existence. Unsparing in his criticism of Leibnizs metaphysical
optimism, Schopenhauer even more bluntly condemns historical optimism. Leibnizs theodicy may have been sophistical, but at least it was not
pernicious and pestilential like Hegels was. Real harm comes less from believing that ours is the best of all possible worlds than from
the belief that our world could become measurably better. Progress-minded historians and philosophers
imagine that something new and grand will emerge in the future, and so they look to history for clues as to what might unfold. But
only fools would concede to history a principal place in their philosophy, and the belief that the future has something new

in store is ill-founded.73 In the nineteenth century, this nave belief fostered the growth of the state and
the rise of nationalism, two developments which Schopenhauer attempted in vain to counteract. Schopenhauers expectations of the state
are modest: he plainly denies it a grand purpose, claiming that its sole purpose is to protect individuals from one another and the whole from external
foes. 74 Even in this limited capacity, however, the state will fail: internal dissent can never be entirely eliminated, and where it is stifled, the threat of
cross-border conflict is never far off.75 Despite its limitations, the state should nevertheless do its best to provide security. In a manner reminiscent of
Thomas Hobbes (15881679), Schopenhauer asks us to consider what would happen if the coercive power of the state was cast aside, insisting that
every thinking man will recoil at the expected scene. 76 But beyond providing some order and stability, there is not much that the state can or should
do. Indeed, Schopenhauer seems to concur with Edmund Burke (17291797), who declared that it is in the power of government
to prevent much evil but maintained that it can do very little positive good. 77 He takes to task
eudaemonistic optimists who believe that the state exists to foster happiness. The governments job is not, contrary to some doctrines,

to bring about heaven on earth or to arrange society so that all men could gorge, guzzle, propagate, and die,

without effort and anxiety. 78 The belief that the state is capable of bringing about such an arrangement is misguided. People often
make this error in judgement, however: everywhere and at all times, there has been much discontent with governments,

laws, and public institutions, but for the most part only because we are always ready to make
these responsible for the misery that is inseparably bound up with human existence itself.79 But
attempts to remake the world through the rejigging of institutions are futile, Schopenhauer insists: the
ceaseless efforts to banish suffering achieve nothing more than a change in its form . 80 He does
acknowledge that things which in former times one could hardly afford are now obtainable at a low

price and in quantities, and even the life of the humblest classes has greatly gained in comfort.
81 However, the abundance of inexpensive goods cannot make people happy: people will always desire more, no

matter how much is already available to them. If the government successfully alleviates one
misery, new desires and new pains will emerge to take the place of the old. In other words, the state
can never eliminate the misery of existence. Even if the state could diminish the suffering that stems from need and want,
boredom would simply arise to take the place of this other evil.82 The happiness that we do see in the world is

superficial: this so-called happiness is a hollow, deceptive, frail, and wretched thing, out of
which neither constitutions, legal systems, steam-engines, nor telegraphs can ever make
anything that is essentially better. 83 Just as we are wrong if we think that governments can make the world something other than
it naturally is, we are misguided if we assume that the state can make man something other than nature makes him. Schopenhauer recognises that a
few German philosophasters of this mercenary age would like to distort the State into an institution for spreading morality and edifying instruction. 84
However, contra Fichte, Hegel and their disciples, he maintains that the state is not an institution that exists to promote morality.85 And the wish to
make it such is problematic, for several reasons. The first problem, again, is that the goal itself is unattainable; the state cannot succeed at improving
mans character. Education or instruction will not change a persons innermost nature, which remains
fixed throughout life.86 Moreover, if we regard the state as a vehicle for promoting morality, then we
conflate political goals with ethical aims, lawfulness with morality. Even if some perfect state arose with the
capacity to prevent every crime, this state would still be unable to shape morality. The state, with its threats of punishment

and rewards, is able merely to shape behaviour; it lacks the ability to change peoples dispositions.87 Thus, perhaps the
state can mould us as citizens and subjects. But we are more than mere instruments of the statewe are individuals with moral worth, and moral
worth is the principal thing in a mans life. 88 This being so, the working
out of his salvation is something that should
be left to the individual alone, rather than dictated by the state. State-led attempts to bring about the moral
improvement of mankind are not only ineffectual, but dangerous. Behind the seemingly noble objective of inculcating

good character lies the more sinister goal of robbing people of their personal freedom and capacity for
self-development. Schopenhauer argues that, rather than having a beneficent effect, the state actually harms

society when it seeks to make people moral. The state makes men mere wheels of a Chinese machine of State and Religion
when it tries to edify its citizenry. State-led projects to improve morality lead not to such improvement, but

instead along the road that led to inquisitions and wars of religion.89 Because he believes that individuals should
work out their own salvation, Schopenhauer opposes state-sponsored activities that would prevent them from doing so. However, he sees such activity
taking place on a grand scale: each of the governments with which he is familiar has taken upon itself the provision for the metaphysical needs of its
members. 90 One example of overreach might be the states imposing itself in the sphere of
education. Thomas Nipperdey remarks on the establishment of compulsory education in the German-speaking lands: Nineteenth-
century Germany became a land of schools. Alongside compulsory military service and compulsory taxation, compulsory education became one

of the basic duties for the modern citizen. It was the state which had established this duty. It organised the schools,
thereby intervening in the life of the individual and a persons journey through life, as it had never done
before.91 With compulsory education came increased governmental regulation of the schools and

the citizenry. German state governments supervised the curricula of the gymnasia and they
established approved paths to higher education. Consequently, by the age of nine or ten [] the most
important decisions about a young persons educational future had been made. 92 But compulsory
education was established not merely so that the German governments could control people. Rather, reforms were
enacted in part because many educational innovators had cherished the ideal of universal education

as a source of social progress and equality. 93 That is, educational reformers cared about
certain metaphysical needs of people, and the states took up their cause. Such anti-nationalism was in part
a legacy of Schopenhauers upbringing. Brian Magee recounts that Schopenhauers father selected the name Arthur because the name is the same in
German, French, and English. Both of Schopenhauers parents were cosmopolitans who travelled widely and brought their children on extended trips
outside of the German-speaking lands. Schopenhauer spent much of his youth in France and England.96 According to David Cartwright, Heinrich Floris
Schopenhauer aimed to instil liberal and cosmopolitan attitudes in a son [Arthur] who would be well connected to various trading partners. 97
Whether Heinrich successfully implanted liberal ideas in his sons mind is debatable. (I will argue in the concluding section that he did not.) Less
debatable is the younger Schopenhauers cosmopolitanism and lack of attachment to the German nation. Schopenhauer freely and frequently
expresses an aversion to nationalism in several of his works. He manifests his lack of a national pride in several quips about his fellow German-speakers.
In The World as Will and Representation, for instance, he writes that for a German it is even good to have somewhat lengthy words in his mouth, for
he thinks slowly, and they give him time to reflect. 98 In an essay on government, he maintains that it is a characteristic failing of the Germans to look
in the clouds for what lies at their feet. 99 In no wise could Schopenhauer be proud of a nation which revered Hegel, whose philosophy would serve as
a lasting monument of German stupidity. 100 But Schopenhauer did not single out the Germans as the only nation with faults. Herder had posed the
rhetorical question: Is not the good on the earth strewn about?. 101 Schopenhauer might have turned this question around and asked whether the
bad on earth is limited to one particular group. We know what his answer to such a question would have been: every nation ridicules
the rest and all are right. 102 Behind his caustic remarks about his own and other nationalities, Schopenhauer harboured real concerns
about history and society. Anticipating Benedict Andersons Imagined Communities by more than a century,103 he refers to nations as

mere abstractions, and he argues that only the individuals and their course of life are real. 104 Histories,
focused as they are on national development, may be effective in teaching us about particular groups of men, but they reveal less about man, i.e.,
about human nature.105 If we truly wished to understand mankind, we would do well to consult biographies instead of histories, since they are richer
in detail and allow us to understand multiple facets of a mans existence.106 And, where
histories pave the way for
comfortable, substantial, fat states which devise purely national, political solutions to problems
which are universal and moral, proper biographies show us the true route to salvation. That path,
according to Schopenhauer is a life of compassion and asceticism, which is an individuals surest way of escaping the torments of the will.

Education is fruitless without intuition. We must have intuitive perception and

common sense prior to acquiring abstract concepts. Without this, education
amounts to the impression of mistaken notions into shallow and
uncomprehending minds.
Schopenhauer 74 (Arthur, Parerga and Paralipomena: Short Philosophical Essays, Volume
Two, Translated from the German by E. F. J. Payne, Oxford: Clarendon Press, Parerga and
Paralipomena: Short Philosophical Essays, Volume Two, Translated from the German by E. F. J.
Payne, Oxford: Clarendon Press, sections 372-5)

In consequence of the nature of our intellect, concepts should arise through abstraction from intuitive perceptions, and hence the
latter should exist before the former. If this course is actually taken, as is the case with the man who has for his teacher and book
merely his own experience, then he knows quite well what intuitive perceptions there are which belong to, and are represented by,
each of his concepts. He knows both exactly, and accordingly deals accurately with everything that happens to him. We can call this
way the natural education. On the other hand, with
artificial education, the head is crammed full of
concepts by being lectured and taught and through reading, before there is yet any
extended acquaintance with the world of intuitive perception. Experience is then
supposed subsequently to furnish the intuitive perceptions to all those concepts; but
until then, the latter are falsely applied and accordingly people and things are judged
from the wrong point of view, seen in the wrong light, and treated in the wrong way. In
this manner, education produces distorted and biased minds, which is the reason why in our youth,
after much learning and reading, we enter the world partly as simpletons and partly as cranks, and then behave nervously at one
moment and rashly at another. For our
minds are full of concepts which we now attempt to apply,
but almost invariably introduce in an ill-judged and absurd way. This is the consequence of that
 whereby we obtain first of all concepts and last of all intuitive perception to
the natural course of our mental development. For instead of developing in the child the
capacity to discern, judge, and think for himself, teachers are merely concerned to
cram his head full of the ready-made ideas of others. A long experience has then to
correct all those judgements which have resulted from a false application of concepts.
Seldom is this entirely successful; and thus very few scholars have the ordinary common
sense that is frequently found among the quite illiterate. According to what has been said, the
chief point in education is that an acquaintance with the world, to obtain which can be
described as the purpose of all education, may be started at the right end. But this depends, as I have
shown, mainly on the fact that in each thing intuitive perception precedes the concept;
further that the narrower concept precedes the wider; and that the whole instruction
thus takes place in the order in which the concepts of things presuppose one another.
But as soon as in this sequence something is skipped, there result defective concepts
and from these come false ones and finally a distorted view of the world peculiar to
the individual, which almost everyone entertains for some time and many all their
lives. Whoever applies the test to himself will discover that a correct or clear understanding of many fairly simple things and
circumstances dawned on him only at a very mature age and sometimes quite suddenly. Till then there had been here in his
acquaintance with the world an obscure point which had arisen from his skipping the subject in the early period of his education,
whether such had been artificial through instructors or merely natural through his own experience. Accordingly, one
should
try to examine the really natural sequence of knowledge, so that children may be made
acquainted with the things and circumstances of the world methodically and in
accordance with that sequence, without getting into their heads absurd ideas which
often cannot again be dislodged. Here one would first have to prevent children from using words with which they
did not associate any clear concept. [* Even children frequently have the fatal tendency to be
satisfied with words instead of trying to understand things, and a desire to learn by
heart such words in order to get themselves out of a difficulty when the occasion
arises. Such tendency afterwards remains when they grow up, and this is why the
knowledge of many scholars is mere verbiage.] But the main point should be always that
intuitive perceptions precede concepts, and not vice versa, as is usually and
unfortunately the case; as if a child were to come into the world feet first, or a verse be written down rhyme first!
Thus while the childs mind is still quite poor in intuitive perceptions, concepts and
judgements, or rather prejudices, are impressed on it. He then applies this ready-made
apparatus to intuitive perception and experience. Instead of this, the concepts and
judgements should have crystallized out from intuitive perception and experience. Such
perception is rich and varied and, therefore, cannot compete in brevity and rapidity
with the abstract concept which is soon finished and done with everything; and so it
will be a long time in correcting such preconceived notions, or perhaps it may never
bring this to an end. For whichever of its aspects it shows to be contradictory to those
preconceived notions, its declaration is rejected in advance as being one-sided, or is
even denied; and people shut their eyes to it so that the preconceived notion may not
come to any harm. And so it happens that many a man carries round throughout his life
a burden of absurd notions, whims, crotchets, fancies, and prejudices that ultimately
become fixed ideas. Indeed, he has never attempted to abstract for himself fundamental
concepts from intuitive perception and experience, because he has taken over
everything ready-made; and it is just this that makes him and countless others so
shallow and insipid. Therefore instead of this, the natural course of forming knowledge
should be kept up in childhood. No concept must be introduced except by means of
intuitive perception; at any rate it must not be substantiated without this. The child
would then obtain few concepts, but they would be well grounded and accurate. He
would then learn to measure things by his own standard instead of with someone
elses. He would never conceive a thousand caprices and prejudices whose eradication
is bound to require the best part of subsequent experience and the school of life; and
his mind would once for all be accustomed to the thoroughness and clearness of its
own judgement and freedom from prejudice. Children generally should not become
acquainted with life in every respect from the copy before getting to know it from the
original. Therefore instead of hastening to place only books in their hands, let us make
them gradually acquainted with things and human circumstances . Above all, we should
endeavour to introduce them to a clear grasp of real life and to enable them to draw
their concepts always directly from the world of reality. They should form such concepts
in accordance with reality and not get them from anywhere else, from books, fairy-tales,
or the talk of others, and subsequently apply them ready-made to real life. For in that
case, their heads will be full of chimeras and to some extent they will falsely interpret
reality, or vainly attempt to remodel it in accordance with such chimeras and thus go
astray theoretically or even practically. For it is incredible how much harm is done by
early implanted chimeras and by the prejudices arising therefrom. The later education
which is given to us by the world and real life must then be used mainly for
eradicating such prejudices. Even the answer, given by Antisthenes according to Diogenes Laertius, rests on this (vi. 7):
is , , . (Interrogatus quaenam esset disciplina maxime necessaria,
Mala, inquit, dediscere.) Just because
early imbibed errors are often deeply engraved and
indelible and the power of judgement is the last thing to reach maturity, we should
keep children up to the age of sixteen free from all theories and doctrines where there
may be great errors. Thus they should be kept from all philosophy, religion, and
general views of all kinds and be allowed to pursue only those subjects where either
no errors are possible as in mathematics, or none is very dangerous as in languages,
natural science, history, and so on. Generally they should at every age study only those
branches of knowledge which are accessible and thoroughly intelligible thereto.
Childhood and youth are the time for collecting data and making a special and thorough
acquaintance with individual and particular things. On the other hand, judgement generally
must still remain suspended and ultimate explanations be deferred. As power of
judgment presupposes maturity and experience, it should not be left alone and care
should be taken not to anticipate it by inculcating prejudices, whereby it is for ever
paralysed. On the other hand, since memory is strongest and most tenacious in youth, it should be specially taxed; yet this
should be done with the most careful selection and scrupulous fore-thought. For what is well learnt in youth sticks for all time; and
so this precious faculty should be used for the greatest possible gain. If we call to mind how deeply engraved in our memory are
those whom we knew in the first twelve years of our life and how the events of those years and generally most of what we
experienced, heard, and learnt at the time, are also indelibly impressed on the memory, it is a perfectly natural idea to base
education on that receptivity and tenacity of the youthful mind by strictly, methodically, and systematically guiding all impressions
thereon in accordance with precept and rule. Now since
only a few years of youth are allotted to man
and the capacity of the memory generally, and even more so that of the individual, is
always limited, it is all-important to fill it with what is most essential and vital in any
branch of knowledge to the exclusion of everything else. This selection should be made and its results
fixed and settled after the most mature deliberation by the most capable minds and masters in every branch of learning. Such a
selection would have to be based on a sifting of what is necessary and important for a man to know generally and what is important
and necessary for him in any particular profession or branch of knowledge. Again, knowledge of the first kind would have to be
classified into graduated courses or encyclopedias, adapted to the degree of general education that is intended for everyone in
accordance with his external circumstances. It
would begin with a course limited to the barest primary
education and end with the comprehensive list of all the subjects taught by the
philosophical faculty. Knowledge of the second kind, however, would be left to the
selection of the real masters in each branch. The whole would provide a specially-worked-out canon of
intellectual education which would naturally need to be revised every ten years. Thus by such arrangements, youths power of
memory would be used to the greatest possible advantage and would furnish excellent material for the power of judgement when
this subsequently appeared. Maturity
of knowledge, that is, the perfection this can reach in every individual, consists
in the fact that a precise connection has been brought about between all his abstract
concepts and his intuitively perceiving faculty. Thus each of his concepts rests, directly
or indirectly, on a basis of intuitive perception and only through this does such a
concept have any real value. Moreover, this maturity consists in his being able to bring
under the correct and appropriate concept every intuitive perception that happens to
him; it is the work of experience alone and consequently of time. For as we often
acquire our knowledge of intuitive perception and our abstract knowledge separately,
the former in the natural way and the latter through instruction and what others tell
us whether good or bad, there is often in our youth little agreement and connection
between our concepts that are fixed by mere words and our real knowledge that has
been obtained through intuitive perception. Only gradually do the two approach and
mutually correct each other; and maturity of knowledge exists only when they have
completely grown together. Such maturity is quite independent of the other greater or
less perfection of everyones abilities which rests not on the connection between
abstract and intuitive knowledge, but on the intensive degree of both.

Only aesthetics accesses a consciousness of the world, otherwise we are

trapped into singular visions of the world
Kossler 10 [Matthias - Better Consciousness: Schopenhauer's Philosophy of Value, Ch.6
Life is a Mirror p.85-89//AK]
In replacing the causal relationships between the subject of willing and action with the being in itself and phenomenon that which shows itself in the act of will exceeds

How is consciousness of
individuality. In other words: according to this new conception, the experience of character entails the experience of the world.

the world achieved? A precondition for it is, in Schopenhauers opinion, thoughtful awareness (Besonnenheit) which
enables [us] . . . to survey the whole of life.46 Without thoughtful awareness the intellect only
perceives singular presentations, which the intellect refers directly to the will, whereas the will itself does not
come into view.47 The animal neither has a world nor does it reflect on its will.48 The whole of the world as presentation becomes

conscious to humans in the aesthetic view of the Idea.49 Only when the thinking subject
forgets his interest in the particular and becomes a clear mirror of the object does the world
become comprehensible as a whole, not as infinity in space and time, but through perception of
the essence or Idea of the object.50 The world as infinite temporal-spatial expansion is a
presentation to us derived from the perception of the essence, since the world presupposes the
concept of a universal whole: and a universal whole is the Idea. If the adequate philosophical
interpretation of that which comes to light by the act of will is the will as being in itself, which is
as such necessarily related to the world, then it is only in aesthetic regard that an adequate
cognizance of this being in itself is to be found. This is why it is not until this point that
Schopenhauer talks of the wills self-cognizance.51 Aesthetic contemplation is achieved by a
high degree of awareness, through which the distance from the individual, body-related willing,
becomes so large that the object can demonstrate itself, in an objective manner. If, owing to thoughtful awareness, several
possible motives of the mind are weighed up, therefore considered, the following may occur: that not only the relation of the prevailing motive on the will, but also the relations

With increasing awareness the connection to ones

of the thoughts and presentations to each other are made objects of the mind.

own will diminishes. Under the exceptional circumstance of aesthetic contemplation the
relations between presentations no longer pertain to ones own interest at all. In that case the
relations must be understood as derived from the essence of the things themselves. If all such
objectively determined relations of a thing to others are summarised, they then express the
essence or character of the thing. What is being expressed here by manner of awarenessone
might sayis the character of the conceived and depicted object of awareness itself. This character is the
Idea. Life is but a Mirror 85 An Idea apprehended in such a way is of course not yet the essence of the thing in itself, precisely because it has proceeded from the cognizance of
mere relations. Nevertheless, as the result of the sum of all relations, it is the real character of the thing, and therefore the complete expression of the essence displaying itself
to perception as object, apprehended not in reference to an individual will, but as it expresses itself of itself, whereby indeed it determines all its relations, which were only
cognized until then.52 Within the perception of the Idea there is contained the knowledge of to how the being in itself of a thing is by virtue of itself related to the world as
presentation. The sum of all relations is the world as being entirely relative in terms of its structure in space and time,53 yet realized as an unfolding of the essence of the
perceived object it has real content. In the contemplation of an Idea the object is not present as part of the world before, and then related to, the embodied will. Instead the will
as the being in itself, perceived in an object, creates the relationships and definitions of the worldhowever not in terms of time or causality, but by being mirrored in
presentation.54 However, this cognizance still has to be related to the experience of selfconsciousness, since in viewing the Idea, the subject has lost itself in the object, or it
has forgotten that in its bodily existence it is itself the will which it perceives.55 To express this in terms of the underlying thesis of this essay, the character of a thing has been
realised, which is, as yet, different from the self. The distance has therefore been achieved through which that which occurs in the act of will can show itself as a being in itself,
yet the reflection, that it is the self of the act of will, has not been fully realised. The aesthetic view is therefore not yet the complete self-cognizance of the will. Accordingly, this
view can only be had for short moments, whereupon the subject again immediately falls prey to individual willing. What remains is the memory of the experience of the world as
a whole which, placed next to the disappearing singular transitory presentation, causes infinite expansion in space and time.56 The universal meaning (as world) and the
individual meaning of that which is called will are here combined in a way in which the unity of both is not comprehended. However, it is not only space and time, and other
forms of the Principle of Sufficient Ground connected to these, that are created by that way of combination, but also a specific type of human motivation and its consequences.
By virtue of the fact that this combination takes place in a condition of will-dependent cognizance, it is related to the individual will: the whole of the world is presented to the
individual will as desire (Wunsch), from which, however, the singular act of will detaches itself. There are consequences of this thesis in the insatiable needs humans have, which
create limitless suffering, as well as egoism, which is anchored in the individuality of character that the world as empirical reality is necessarily related to.57 In this instance one
must look back once more to the genuine doctrine of character, since character is defined by the completed act of will set against the background of desire. 86 Matthias Koler
Desire is therefore the sphere in which the world is viewed as a necessary point of relation for the experience of character. Desire merely indicates what man in general, not the
individual who is feeling the desire, would be capable of doing.58 What the human is capable of doing depends on what the motive of his action can be, and that is principally
everything that he can perceive and think, that he can make present by virtue of his experiences of the past, that he experiences through the stories of others and that he can
anticipate as future. This concerns all things which are possible in the world as presentation. Desire is therefore essentially universal and presents the relationship of the will to
the world. Indeed, desire only indicates this universality, since in desiring, depending on the capability of the intellect and the application of thoughtful awareness, only smaller

or larger parts of possible motives are presented to the subject. But the capacity for thoughtful awareness, which separates
humans from animals, and which, with regard to aesthetic contemplation, proves itself to be the
presupposition for the cognizance of world, potentially contains the relationship to the entire
field of possibility. Desire signifies the midpoint between objective cognizance of the essence in
itself in the idea and subjective knowledge in immediate self-consciousness. In this sense awareness is very much
the cause for the Velleitas not becoming an act of will,59 in other words the will is suppressed and therefore the cognizance of

objective relationships made possible; but as desires, presentations remain fixed upon the subjective will, and as potential acts of will constitute
the foundation upon which the individualisation of the will, the formation of character, is achieved. Schopenhauer described this function of desire, to indicate what man in
general is able to want, as an expression of the character of the species of the human.60 In contradiction to his statements concerning the character of the species of animals
and the possibility of placing them in parallel with average man,61 the character of the species of the human is, according to this idea, not to be understood through the
principal qualities62 of humans, which result from abstraction, but through the totality of the possibilities of being human.63 The character of the species is not therefore
simply common to all human beings owing to the fact that all human beings act more or less in the same way, but because individual character is only formed by virtue of the
choice between an infinite number of possible motives that make up the character of the species. The individual character is a certain realisation of the character of the species,
or being human as such, in so far as it has a specific individual character. In the realisation of the character of the species through the individual, the intelligible character is

The aspect of the individual points to the acts of will, in which the being
recognised in its relationship to the world.

in itself is experienced immediately. The aspect of being human in general points to the substantial unity of being in itself in strict contrast to
phenomenal appearance. Through the character of the species a unity of the essence of human beings is

brought into discussion, which is recognised as being compassion. This takes place where the
principium individuationis is seen through, i.e. when one sees through the individual characters to their unified essence. If in addition one
takes into Life is but a Mirror 87 account that the impediment of the will through thoughtful awareness that
makes desire possible means, de facto, a denial of the willsince in Schopenhauer will is tied to phenomenal actionthen substantial
elements of Schopenhauers ethics can be interpreted based on the experience of character. The thing that separates the human
being from animals in regard to motivation and that which makes up his intelligible character is that human beings are as a rule in control of their reason, are thus thoughtfully
aware (besonnen), i.e. make decisions in accordance with thought-out, abstract motives,64 in brief: that he acts with thoughtful awareness. According to Schopenhauer the
strongest motive leads to action, out of which character can be defined.

Music is vital because its not simply an expression of something, but it is that
something in the abstract without accessories or variations. It is the most
direct expression of the will human being can experience. Because it is
something in an abstract, music gives one insight into substance of that
something.
Neill 2009 [Professor Alex Neill is the Vice-President (Education) and a Professor of Philosophy
at the University of Southampton. Before taking up his position at Southampton in 1999, Alex
Neill taught at the Pennsylvania State University, Harrisburg, Trinity University, San Antonio and
the University of St Andrews. Neill, Alex. Better Consciousness: Schopenhauer's Philosophy of
Value. Chichester, U.K.: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009. Pg. 65-67] //JW
In addition to the inner experience of ones own willing, there are other somewhat unusual kinds of experiences that afford
metonymical insight into the character of world as it is in itself, chief of which is aesthetic experience. Similar to Kant, there is an
attempt in Schopenhauers thought to gain sensible confirmation of the reality and character of the in-itself of the world by way of
the experience of beauty and the sublime, except that the symbolic relationship is interestingly changed. Consider the experience of
music for Schopenhauer:16 Music
does not express this or that particular and definite pleasure, this or
that affliction, pain, sorrow, horror, gaiety, merriment, or peace of mind, but joy, pain, sorrow,
horror, gaiety, merriment, peace of mind themselves, to a certain extent in the abstract, their
essential nature, without accessories, and so also without the motives for them. (WWR I 261) So in
music, one does not feel particular instantiations of emotions, in some subject or another,
under certain conditions or another, but rather, one resonates with and thus gains insight into
the essence of these emotionsregardless of where, when, why, and in whom they occur. The
experience of various feelings without accompanying intentional objects constitutes, for
Schopenhauer, as close an insight into the nature of the world as will as one can achieve, for: . . .
to the man who gives himself up entirely to the impression of the symphony, it is as if he saw all
the possible events of life and the world passing by within himself. Yet if he reflects, he cannot
assert any likeness between that piece of music and the things that passed through his mind.
For as we have said, music differs from all the other arts by the fact that it is not a copy of the
phenomenon, or, more exactly, of the wills adequate objectivity, but is directly a copy of the
will itself, and therefore expresses the metaphysical to everything physical in the world, the
thing-in-itself to every phenomenon. (WWR I 262) By gaining an insight into the blind will, in this
manner, through an experience of emotions, shorn of their particular contexts and relation to
the individuals will, one has a indirect sensible intuition of what by definition cannot be an
object of direct sensible intuition. The relationship here between what is sensible and what is supersensible is not
exactly analogical or symbolic, however. It is not that such symphonic music is felt upon reflection to be like or similar to the
vicissitudes of blind willing, just as Juliet is felt to be like Romeos sun, to play the kind of role in his life that the sun plays for all living
creatures. Rather,
music is, according to Schopenhauer, the most direct expression of the will a
human being can experience, seen through the lightest of veilsin time, but outside of space
and distinct from particular motives, and without the distortions created by the subjects own
willing.17 For Schopenhauer, the fundamental character of the genius is [a]lways to see the
universal in the particular . . . whereas the normal man recognizes in the particular only the
particular as such; for only as such does it belong to reality, which alone has interest for him, has
reference to his will. . . . In accordance with this, the real object of genius is only the essential
nature of things in general, the universal in them, the totality (WWR II 379). [Diesem entsprechend is auch
erhaupt, das Allgemeine in ihnen, das Ganze, der eigentliche Gegenstand des Genie . . . (31)].18 The
nur das Wesen der Dinge u b
key access to the supersensible through art, as seen above in the example from music, then, is
metonymical: through art one may gain a perceptual access to the whole via its parts. This
metonymic relation abounds in Schopenhauer. The subjective side of aesthetic experience itself,
the experience of being a will-less, objective knower, has a much more important role still:
Indeed, it is metonymically related to the ultimate denial of the will. In a very revealing passage,
Schopenhauer writes, [w]hat makes this state [aesthetic experience] difficult and therefore rare is that in it the accident (the
intellect), so to speak, subdues and eliminates the substance (the will), although only for a short time. Here also are to be found the
analogy and even relationship of this with the denial of the will (WWR II 369, emphasis added). [Was diesen Zustand erschwert und
daher selten macht, ist, da darin gleichsam das Accidenz (der Intellekt) die Substanz (den Willen) bemeistert und aufhebt, wenn
gleich nur auf eine kurze Weile. Hier liegt auch die Analogie und sogar Verwandtschaft desselben mit der am Ende des folgenden
Buches dargestellten Verneinung des Willens (30).] Although Schopenhauer does not say metony- mical relationship between
aesthetic experience and the denial of the will, he first calls it an analogy but then qualifies it, as even relationship [sogar
Verwandtschaft]. I think the concept he is moving toward, without fully enunciating it here, is metonymy, the mode of thinking in
which the (sensible) part stands for the (supersensible) whole. Indeed, grades or partial expressions of the whole Will pervade the
main work, and along with them come grades of subjective states which reflect levels of insight into the world as will. It might be
objected, however, that Ive simply slapped another name onto what is essentially the Kantian, symbolic relationship after all. Why
arent the relationships between the experience of music and the Will, the work of art and the Idea, and aesthetic will-lessness and
the denial of the will truly symbolic, and analogical, as in Kant, rather than metonymic? I believe it is a mistake to elide the very
interesting differences in these modes of aesthetic access to the in-itself of the phenomenal world: What is being presented sensibly
in Schopenhauers thought is not merely a profoundly felt similarity in the rules governing the symbol and the supersensible that is
symbolized; rather, what is presented in music, art and aesthetic experience itself is actual contiguity with the in-itself of the world.
The work of art presents the universal; and aesthetic experience affords insight into that same type of will-lessness to its highest
degree, in ascetic resignation. These sensible objects and experiences stand for the noumenal as a part stands for the whole.
Whereas Kants connection between what is knowable and what lies beyond the bounds of sense is analogical and symbolic,
Schopenhauers here is metonymic and thus picks up on what he sees as the true contiguity [Beru h rung] of the two spheres
alluded to in the Prolegomena. Recapping then, the relationship that Schopenhauer identifies between the aesthetic experience and
the supersensible is un-Kantian in two main ways: first,
in the Schopenhauerian relationship, music makes the
character of the Will sensible not by way of a felt similarity in the rules governing each domain
(the aesthetic and the moral as in Kant). Rather, music just is an embodiment of the Will in
time and is hence phenomenal, but it is a very close objectification of the Willan expression
or partial glimpse at the character of the Will that can be felt by a subject when she resonates
emotionally with great music. Second, in Schopenhauers relationship there is no explicit sense
in which the felt connection constitutes only practical rather than theoretical knowledge.
Indeed, it seems that Schopenhauer takes the knowledge of intuition or feeling to be genuine
theoretical knowledge, although he does believe that such knowledge of the world as Will may
(and perhaps should) have profound effects on a persons actions. So, what gives Schopenhauer the right to
make a greater claim to knowledge from feeling than Kant? Ultimately, Schopenhauers justification for departing from Kants
strictures in this way is that Kants subject resembles a disembodied, rational entity, a winged cherub without a body (WWR I 99).
The view of the subject, as a one-dimensional rational schematizer, cannot explain why human beings care so much about the
representations that dance before the minds eye. The Kantian subject may be able to account for our knowledge of the relations of
representations but it cannot account for the true significance we attach to those representations (WWR I 989). For Kant, there is
nothing theoretically that can be said which would constitute knowledge of the noumenal realm in meaningful terms, but neither is
there any tremendous urgency that anything be said about it. For Schopenhauer, because we are embodied, because we are active
participants in this world, and not just rational reflectors upon it, there is a sense that we must say something about the way the
world is, in itself, of which we are a part: It will be of special interest for us to obtain information about its real significance, that
significance, otherwise merely felt, by virtue of which these pictures or images do not march past us strange and meaningless ... but
speak to us directly, are understood, and acquire an interest that engrosses our whole nature (WWR I 95).
2AC Extensions
 Solvency
Music is a means of attaining a disinterested disposition where we are free
from the thrawl of the will. Hence music education is of critical importance.
Hyland 1985
(J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in Educational
Studies, 11:3, 226-7)

(3) In addition to philosophical activity, the engagement in aesthetic pursuits and the
contemplation of works of art was, for Schopenhauer, amongst the highest of human
endeavours since it was capable of facilitating will-less behaviour. In our interaction
with objects of art the "individual will sets its associated power of imagination free
for a while" and our perception becomes completely objective, 'a faithful mirror of
objects'. Thus, the intellect may come to grasp the Platonic Idea and attain that "pure
knowledge where will and its aims have been completely removed from man" (1970,
pp. 156-7). Music was the medium especially favoured by Schopenhauer; he called it
the "true universal language" and "the most powerful of the arts" for it "acts directly
on the will, i.e. the feelings, passions and emotions of the hearer, so that it quickly
raises these or even alters them" (1969, Vol. 2, p. 448). The value of the arts lies in
their ability to elevate us above the strife and suffering of the world and, in so doing,
to remove the intellect from the servitude of the will. Through the perception of
beauty we may become "a pure intelligence without aims or intentions" for "when
aesthetic perception occurs the will completely vanishes from conscious- ness" (1970,
p. 155). Thus, Schopenhauer provides a powerful argument for the cultivation of the
arts through education, and one which is echoed in the prescriptions of
contemporary proponents of art education. Describing the 'gift of art', Papanoutsos
(1978), for instance, refers to the potential of the arts for "deepening the sense of life"
in that participation in the arts "enriches, ennobles and strengthens our humanity"
(p. 93). In a similar vein, Hepburn (1972) has recommended an approach to the education of
the emotions through the medium of art, suggesting that the arts can be "enhancers of
freedom" which help us to overcome "the dominance of emotion cliches" (pp. 493-5).

We need to adopt a state of will-less-ness, de-individuating ourselves in an

aesthetic experience. Denial of the will is the only state that might deliver us
from suffering.
Janaway 1999 (Christopher, Professor of Philosophy at the University of South
Hampton, Schopenhauers Pessimism, in Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement,
Vol.44, pp. 58-9)
However, the issue does not end there. Schopenhauer's pessimism has, I believe, deeper foundations in his conception of the self.
Consider the following two questions: (1) Would
not suicide be the appropriate solution to the
predicament Schopenhauer alleges we are in? (2) If we could live but in some sense
become detached from willing, would that be another solution? To question (1)
Schopenhauer answers No: suicide is not a solution surprisingly perhaps. And he answers Yes
to question (2), which might also seem odd, if we recall the pain attaching to boredom. Should not perma- nent detachment
from all willing be a longueur in every sense? But Schopenhauer's view here rests on a contrasting
state, possible for at least some individuals, which he calls 'denial of the will', a state that
releases them from striving and suffering altogether . On the other hand, someone who
commits suicide fails to reach this state of release, and instead continues to affirm the
will. Some explanations are required. 'The will to life ... must be denied if salvation is to be attained
from an existence like ours' (Wl, 405), Schopenhauer writes. He remarks ironically that denial of the will is
the only state we might consider as candidate for 'highest good': if we wish to give that expression
an emeritus position, then figuratively the summum bonum is the complete self-effacement and denial of
the will, true will- lessness, which alone stills and silences for ever the craving of the
will; which alone gives that contentment that cannot again be dis- turbed; which alone
is world-redeeming. (Wl, 362) This would be, he acknowledges, 'self-denial or self-renunciation, abnegatio sui ipsius; for
the real self is the will to life' (W2, 606). (The 'real self or 'essence' as he often says.) So Schopenhauer advocates a
radical and difficult cure: denial of, or loss of identifi- cation with, our essence. If the
solution to pessimism lies in reject- ing one's real self, then the justification for this
must be that being what one is is not worthwhile. Schopenhauer writes with impressive intensity about
the tempo- rary state of will-lessness to be found in aesthetic experience. And he recalls this
experience in an attempt to convey the blessedness of prolonged will-lessness in 'denial of the
will': aesthetic pleasure consists, to a large extent, in the fact that, when we enter the state
of pure contemplation, we are raised for the moment above all willing, above all
desires and cares; we are, so to speak, rid of ourselves. We are no longer the individual
that knows in the interest of its constant willing ... but the eter- nal subject of knowing
purified of the will ... From this we can infer how blessed must be the life of a man
whose will is silenced, not for a few moments, as in the enjoyment of the beautiful,
but for ever, indeed completely extinguished, except for the last glimmering spark
that maintains the body and is extinguished with it. Such a man who, after many bitter struggles with his
own nature, has at last completely conquered, is then left only as pure knowing being ... Nothing can distress or
alarm him any more; nothing can any longer move him; for he has cut all the thousand
threads of willing which hold us bound to the world, and which as craving, fear, envy,
and anger drag us here and there in constant pain. {Wl, 390} As I see it, a contrasting pair of higher-order
evaluative attitudes has now entered the picture. One takes - explicitly or implicitly - some attitude of
acquiescence or refusal towards one's existence as an organic embodiment of the will to
life, caught in the cycle of willing and suffering. The ordinary person who registers wants
and strives to compensate for them adopts an implicit second-order atti- tude of
'affirmation' towards the body in which they arise. I say implicit because this attitude is the natural, more or
less unreflec- tive state of human beings. Schopenhauer says: 'The affirmation of the will is the persistent willing itself, undisturbed
by any knowl- edge, as it fills the life of man in general ... instead of affirmation of the will, we can also say affirmation of the body.'
{Wl, 326-7}. Humans
in general pursue goals dependent on the needs of the bod- ily
individual, but they also do something which other animals do not: they regard this
pursuit as the point of their existence. Denial of the will is release from identification
with the embodied individual one is.
The subject of pure cognition and the artist temporarily free themselves from
their will. Everyone has this capacity for thoughtful awareness and even if we
cannot ascend to it by becoming an artistic genius, we can temporarily attain
this state by appreciating works of art. Thus the artists use of imagination, in
combination with contemplation, is an ethical relationship to others; it allows
others to break free from the will to appreciate the worlds beauty in its
immanence.
Kossler 2011 (Matthais, professor of philosophy at the Johannes Gutenberg University
of Mainz, The Artist as a Subject of Pure Cognition, in A Companion to Schopenhauer,
pp. 201-4)
The main quality of the pure subject of cognition is the fact that it has withdrawn from the service of
will. This is expressed by Schopenhauer in writing that the cognition is will-less or that will is silent (WWR I, 218ff.).
Going by what we learned about the corporeality of the subject in Schopenhauer, it is clear that the subject as a whole
cannot be will-less, instead will-lessness signifies a state of it. That during the state of pure
cognition the subject in principle remains tied to body and will becomes manifest in the fact that it is
able to maintain this state only for a short time and then involuntar- ily falls back to ordinary
cognition. Pure cognition is like the flying of a flying fish which is able to stay in the air for a little while but
must return to the sea where it belongs natu- rally. In the artist the paradox occurs that he who is more capable of pure
cognition than others is at the same time as a rule a more distinct individual. He is
more passion- ate, more egocentric and he suffers more than others, in short, his will is stronger. The
conflicting character of the artist becomes explicable if we consider the descrip- tion of the transition from ordinary to pure cognition
mentioned at the end of the previ- ous section. In its normal function intellect cognizes mere relations,
first of all relations of objects to (individual) will. Yet, higher forms of intellect, i.e., human
intellect acquainted with the faculty of reason for the purpose of completeness of this
cogni- tion also perceives relations of things to one another. Perception of this kind already
takes place only indirectly in the service of will, and if it gets more and more weight: the
subjection of the intellect to will at the same time becomes more and more indirect and
limited. If the intellect has power enough to gain predominance and to abandon entirely the
relations of things to will, in order to apprehend instead of them the purely objective essence
of a phenomenon that expresses itself through all relations, then, simul- taneously with the
service of will, it also forsakes the apprehension of mere relations, and with this also really
that of the individual thing as such. (WWR II, 363) This explanation of a gradual transition from ordinary to pure
cognition does not nec- essarily contradict the claim that pure cognition occurs suddenly or at one stroke. Even if the service to
the will becomes more and more indirect, the moment the intellect tears away cognition
entirely from will is not derived from that movement and it signifies a different kind of
cognition. As indicated above, thoughtful awareness of the genius corresponds to pure cogni- tion
on the part of the subject. However, thoughtful awareness (Besonnenheit) is not only a faculty of genius but also of cognition in
the service of will. In regard to the latter it coincides with reason and signifies the effect that it is able to present much more motives and
circumstances to will than actually perceivable. While this is obviously a function serving will by multiplying and increasing desire and fear
and therewith indi- viduality, it has a side-effect which contradicts the service of will. For the
presentation of abstract
motives includes a hampering of the effect of motives presented by immedi- ate actual
perception, a quieting of an act of will for the time of consideration. This side-effect which
originally occurs for the purpose of the completion of cognition in service of will opens
the way to quieting will at all. Thoughtful awareness thus in its highest grade leads to
pure objective cognition and enables the painter to reproduce faithfully on canvas
the nature he has before his eyes, and the poet accurately to call up again by means
of abstract concepts the perceptual present by expressing it and thus bringing it to
distinct consciousness (WWR II, 382). The animal lives without any thoughtful awareness. It has consciousness, i.e., it
knows itself and its weal and woe, and in addition the objects that occasion these. Its cognition, however, always remains subjective; it
never becomes objective. Everything occurring therein seems to the animal to be a matter of course, and can therefore never become for it
a theme (object of description) or a problem (object of meditation). Its consciousness is therefore entirely
immanent. The consciousness of ordinary breed of people is certainly not of the same kind, but yet is of a kindred nature, since his
perception of things and of the world is also mainly subjective, and remains predominantly immanent. It perceives things in the world, but
not the world; its own actions and sufferings, but not itself. Now as
the distinctness of consciousness is
enhanced in infinite gradations, thoughtful awareness takes place more and more; in
this way it gradually comes about that occasionally, though rarely and again with
extremely different degrees of distinctness, the question passes through the mind
like a flash: What is all this? or How is it really constituted? If the first question
attains to great distinctness and is continuously present, it will make the
philosopher; and just in the same way the other question will make the artist or poet Up to the moment when
the relation of things to the will are cut off entirely, thoughtful awareness remains in the service of the will with the effect of increasing
individuality and passion. This is why artists often are over-excited, passionate, even immoral in their daily life (cf. WWR II, 384; 388ff.),
while at the same time calmly, carefully and selfless working on their creation. The fact that thoughtful awareness includes both effects
makes the paradox of the suffering genius comprehensible. However, if genius is explained merely by increasing thoughtful awareness this
may be satisfactory in regard to the contemplation of Idea but it is difficult to describe the act of producing works of art.
Thoughtful awareness is a faculty that belongs to every human being since man is
defined by reason. The capacity for becoming pure subject of cognition therefore
must be inherent to a lesser and different degree in all human beings, for otherwise
they would be as little capable of enjoying works of art as produc- ing them (WWR I,
194). And in fact, most people are capable of enjoying works of art and consequently of
becoming pure subject of cognition for a while. One could say that nearly every human
being is or has a genius to a certain degree. But this is not the sense in which Schopenhauer uses the term. In contrast,
genius is confronted with ordinary man, that factory-work of nature which it daily produces by the thousands (WWR I, 187) as its
opposite. The artist is provided with even a higher degree of thoughtful awareness as is necessary for will-less contemplation. It enables
him to maintain with it the thoughtful awareness required for repeating the thus known in a voluntary and intentional work, such repetition
being the work of art (WWR I, 195). On this view of the creation of a work of art, the artist is capable of keeping the Idea in mind while
he changes from pure cognition to cognition under the principle of reason in order to produce the work voluntarily and intentionally. In
the Parerga and Paralipomena Schopenhauer writes very clearly that the
original artistic cognition is one that is
entirely separate from, and independent of, the will, a will-free, will-less cognition . . . On the other
hand, with the execution of the work, where the purpose is to communicate and present what is known, the will can, indeed must, again be
active, just because there exists a purpose. Accordingly, the principle of sufficient reason here rules once more. (PP II, 418) If
the artist
is characterized by the capability to communicate to others the Idea he has grasped (WWR I,
195), thoughtful awareness seems to be a means for an end; and indeed Schopenhauer writes that the
work of art is merely a means of facilitating the cognition of Idea (WWR I, 195). Now, it is
hard to understand as to how the same faculty that in a very high degree leads to liberation
of cognition from the service of will in an even higher degree should become a means for
voluntary action. Another faculty therefore must be required in addition to thoughtful
awareness in order to explain the production of a work of art. This is imagination (Phantasie)
(WWR I, 186). The genius has need of imagination to see in things not what nature has actually formed but what it had striven to form
but failed to bring to pass (WWR I, 186). With this capability of imagination we are turning back to the Idea. According to our
interpretation it refers to the process of objectivation in such a way that a thing is apprehended as bringing forth its relations to other
things by itself independent of influences from outside. Since the Idea thus is no object in an ordinary sense but rather the process of
becoming such an object, or, in short, objectivization of the essence, the artist cannot communicate the Idea simply by replicating it in the
work of art. Or, in other words, what the artist produces voluntarily in time, space and matter cannot be an actual reproduction of the Idea.
Instead works of art are able to call forth aesthetic contemplation in us or to get the Idea
to come to us more easily. The artist lets us look into the world through his eyes
(WWR I, 195), so that we may see the beautiful prior to experience (WWR I, 221). Communication of
the Idea is made pos- sible by the artist through the Ideal which is the Idea in so far as it is cognized at least halfway a priori and, in that
it comes as such to meet and fill out what is given by nature a posteriori, becomes practical in art (WWR I, 222). The faculty which enables
the artist to show beauty as he has never seen it, and surpasses nature in his depiction (WWR I, 222), i.e., to model the Ideal is, as we
have seen, imagination. Thus it is not thoughtful awareness that distinguishes the artist but
imagination. Certainly this must be a special kind of imagination which as imagination with genius is set apart from common
imagination in service of will (WWR I, 187). Schopenhauer did not elaborate the special kind of imagination of the artist, maybe because
this would have put him too close to Schelling and German Romanticism. Be that as it may,
the conception of the artist
as pure subject of cognition is exceeded by the fact that the distinguishing quality of
the artist is not the ability for attaining pure cognition (this is what he shares with common man even if
he has the ability in a higher degree) but imagination that enables him to communicate pure
cognition. Imagination of the artist as a means for communicating the Idea points
out to the realm of ethics where the systematic thought continues. The end for which
the artist produces works of art is not at all related to his individual will.
Communication of Ideas does not serve ones own will but will in others to become
self-conscious. This is what it shares with ethics, namely compassion, even if the
artist has not to be moral since by aesthetic contemplation as pure cognition he is
not aware of will as the unified essence of all beings. From aesthetic contemplation
one has to go on to ethics, for pure cognition attains objectivity merely by ignoring
the aspect of subjectivity. But is the world, then, a peep-show (Guckkasten)? These things are certainly beautiful to behold,
but to be them is something quite different (WWR II, 581).

Freedom from the will and individuality allows peace and painlessness.
Singh 10 (R. Raj Singh is Professor (B.A., M.A., Panjab ; M.A. Brock ; Ph.D.
Ottawa) Department of Philosophy @ Brock University. From schopenhauer a guide for the
perplexed chapter 5.)

Being free from willing a state of peace and painlessness arrives. The moments in which one
enjoys the being or the performance of a work of art, the deliverance of knowledge from an
oppressive and demanding will produces such a joy that one has a magical feeling. It is as if one
has stepped into another world which is to say that one has stepped out of this familiar world.
Schopenhauer remarks that Happiness and unhappiness have vanished; we are no longer the
individual; that is forgotten; we are only pure subject of knowledge. We are only one eye of the
world which looks out from all knowing creatures, but which in man alone can be wholly free
from serving the will (W-I, 198). It is interesting that in ancient Buddhist sutras, the Buddha is
often described as the eye of the world due to his detached and dispassionate analysis of the
nature of things spelled out in the four noble truths. According to Schopenhauer, art experience
enables us to step out of the familiar world of desires and frustrations, projects and pragmata
and behold the Being (Ideas) of things, and look at our own being in the world in the face.
Schopenhauer points out that the essences of entities, usually hidden underneath the pragmatic
network of meanings, reveal themselves in the artwork creatively brought to the fore by the
genius artist. Art gives mundaneness an extraordinary twist that in its magical moments, the will
loosens its grip and the world is shaken out of its foundation. The serenity of pure
contemplation opens within the observer of art the power of objective knowledge free of
personal obsessions. Art experience opens the gateway to the reality and value of a will-less life,
which in its ideal form is called salvation. In his book Art Experience, the contemporary Indian
philosopher, Hiriyanna, in his exposition of Vedanta theories of art seems to echo
Schopenhauers view of art: The aesthetic attitude stands higher than that of common everyday
life, which is generally characterized by personal interests . . . It is for this reason that Indian
philosophers, especially Vedantins . . . compare the experience of art with that of the Ideal state
. . . as moksha (salvation). But the two experiences are only of the same order and not identical .
. . Art experience is (merely) transient, . . . seductive . . . and induced from outside. According to
Schopenhauer, aesthetic contemplation is not confined to just man-made artworks. The great
objects of nature too produce a feeling of the sublime. In encountering a magnificent spectacle
of nature we become subjects of pure knowing, and our intimacy with Being of all things reveals
itself. Natural objects of great spatial magnitude, and great antiquity, such as vast prairies of
North America, high mountains, immense cliffs, rushing, roaming masses of water, complete
deserts all arouse a feeling of the sublime. Against such a ghost of our own nothingness . . .
there arises the immediate consciousness that all these worlds exist. One gets a feeling of
belonging essentially to the Being of all that exists, as the obsession with ones individuality is
suppressed by a realization of ones own nothingness against the mighty and powerful
manifestations of nature. Schopenhauer explains the outcomes of the feeling of the sublime,
with a quote from the Upanishads: I am this creation collectively, and besides me there exists
no other Being (W-I, 206). In addition to reflecting on art and the artist in general,
Schopenhauer examines the natures and scopes of various fine arts, and shows his
comprehensive knowledge of prominent art forms. He thoroughly analyses their ranges of
activities and offers original aesthetic theories with respect to architecture, horticulture,
historical painting, sculpture, allegory, poetry, drama and finally music. Schopenhauers interest
in the arts was not just theoretical but he was deeply involved in various art forms. His writings
on aesthetics and the arts constitute a sizable portion of his total output.

Individuality is not fundamental and alienation of it is good.

Janaway 08. (Christopher Janaway is a philosopher and author. Before moving to
Southampton in 2005, Janaway taught at the University of Sydney and Birkbeck, University of
London. His recent research has been on Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and aesthetics. Better
Consciousness Edited by Jakob Lindgaard. P4-5.)
Schopenhauers distinction between the two aspects of the world, representation and will,
maps on to a contrast between individuation and nonindividuation. The world as it manifests
itself to us in ordinary experience consists of a multiplicity of distinct things. This experience is
necessarily in space and time, which together make up the principle of individuation (principium
individuationis). But what exists in itself (the world as will) must be without space and time,
hence without individuation. So the world as thing in itself is not divided up into distinct
individual entities, and our own individuality is not metaphysically fundamental. The
importance of this distinction for Schopenhauers philosophy of value can scarcely be over-
estimated. His accounts of aesthetic experience, morality, and the value of life all hinge around
the possibility of ceasing to separate oneself out from the whole, forgetting or detaching oneself
from ones existence as an individual human being and viewing things from a higher or more
universal standpoint. This is the legacy of his youthful idea of the better consciousness. Although
in a sense one never escapes the will, because it is the essence of everything, there are
nonetheless possible states in which our consciousness becomes alienated from the will as it
manifests itself in this particular living individual. Such forms of alienation are to be welcomed,
for Schopenhauer, because they enhance our capacity to understand reality, free us from the
misery of striving and suffering, and blunt the capacity for harm, for encroaching on the well-
being of others, that dwells in each individual through whom the will flows unhindered.

Abeyance is a state of will-less consciousness that temporary eliminates

suffering.
Janaway 08. (Christopher Janaway is a philosopher and author. Before moving to
Southampton in 2005, Janaway taught at the University of Sydney and Birkbeck, University of
London. His recent research has been on Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and aesthetics. Better
Consciousness Edited by Jakob Lindgaard. P5-6.)
In the Third Book of The World as Will and Representation Schopenhauer presents his account
of aesthetic experience. Here the notion of a transformed consciousness that removes us from
the everyday concerns of the will is at its clearest, as is the Platonic ancestry of Schopenhauers
thought. In aesthetic experience we perceive timeless Ideas, a series of grades at which the will
manifests itself throughout nature. To avoid confusion with Kantian or Hegelian uses of Idea
Schopenhauer typically refers to his conception as (Platonic) Ideas. They are universals that are
instantiated in nature, and in aesthetic experience we gain a privileged, objective cognition of
them, while perceptually experiencing some particular object, be it an art work or a thing in
nature. We see the universal in the particular object of intuitive perception rather than attaining
knowledge of it through concepts or abstract reasoning. So this kind of experience has a higher
cognitive value than that of ordinary everyday consciousness, which is taken up with particular
objects and their spatial, temporal and causal inter-connections. Indeed, for Schopenhauer,
aesthetic cognition reveals to us timeless realities common to all objects, and in that sense is
more objective even than that of science, which only makes inferences about the universal
forces of nature, and does not intuit them directly. Aesthetic experience has another great value
for Schopenhauer in that while it lasts, our will is in abeyance. We do not seek to understand the
object we perceive in relation to what it can do for us, whether we desire or need it, what
associations it has with other objects or with our emotions: we no longer consider the where,
the when, the why, and the whither of things, but simply and solely the what(WWR I: 178).
Thus we experience the exceptional state of a will-less consciousness. Nothing troubles us,
because no felt lack or need moves us at all. We are free of the will for some blissful moments,
attaining a peace without which, Schopenhauer tells us, true well-being would be impossible. In
the history of the philosophy of art, art has been assigned widely differing values.
Schopenhauers account is interesting partly because it appears, at least at first sight, to unite
two different conceptions of the value of art, one cognitive, the other to do with a disinterested
aesthetic attitude. Often with an aesthetic attitude type of theory art is said to attain its value
by virtue of its affording an experience of a kind that can in principle be had in response to any
kind of object. It looks as if Schopenhauer has some such view in mind when he talks of
experiencing things in nature, such as landscapes, trees and rocks, as examples of the pure, will-
less consciousness which art is also capable of giving us. At the same time Schopenhauer wants
a superior form of cognition or knowledge, that of universal Ideas, to be characteristic of all
aesthetic experience. He seems confident that whenever we enter the aesthetic state of will-
less, timeless consciousness we shall encounter universal Ideas, and that whenever we are in
contact with universal Ideas we shall be in a state of will-less consciousness. However, when he
comes to reflect on the many specific art forms, with which he shows considerable familiarity,
he admits that in some cases their value has more to do with will-less tranquillity and less to do
with cognition of any very important universals, and at the other end of the spectrum more to
do with the latter and less with tranquillity. A challenging case at this end of the spectrum is
tragedy, whose portrayal of a frightening universal aspect of humanity has its value in making us
shudder before the truth of what is, or could well be, our own life. It is at least not obvious how
the value of tragedy will also be found in its offering the bliss of will-less, painless
contemplation. The artistic genius for Schopenhauer is someone who commands a technique for
articulating his experiential grasp of the universal in such a way as to transmit it to the rest of
humanity, and has the ability to remain in the state of will-less objectivity for an abnormal
length of time, to experience the world continuously with a unique intensity of perception. Yet
even the artist must return to the life of willing and is not permanently inured to it.
 Life=Suffering
Existence is meaningless. Whatever goodness or value we find is always
localized and fleeting. That is, no matter what we accomplish, dissatisfaction
will result; the bottomless pit of our willing knows no satiety.
Janaway 1999 (Christopher, Professor of Philosophy at the University of South
Hampton, Schopenhauers Pessimism, in Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement,
Vol.44, pp.47-50)
In Book Five of The Gay Science Nietzsche writes that 'uncondi- tional and honest atheism' is 'the locus of Schopenhauer's whole
integrity' and 'the presupposition of the way he poses his problem'. If we reject the 'meaning' Christianity assigns to the world, then,
writes Nietzsche, 'Schopenhauer's question immediately comes to us in a terrifying way: Has existence any meaning
at all? (Gay Science, 357). Schopenhauer speaks of 'meaning' but more often uses the vocabulary of value. I shall take his
question to be: What is the value of my being what I am? or What value does the existence of
any of us have? For Schopenhauer, as Nietzsche implies, certain answers that were once
thinkable on the assumption that each of us was an immaterial substance or a pure,
rational soul, or part of some supernatural design, are not available. We have to face
the question of value as material, biological individuals; and Schopenhauer's response
is that the value in such existence is not - cannot be - greater than the value non-
existence would have had. Paradoxically, as he says, 'nothing else can be stated as the aim of
our existence except the knowledge that it would be better for us not to exist' (W2, 605).'
My guiding question is simply: How does Schopenhauer reach this predicament? Will to life Now Schopenhauer is clear that each
of us is a material thing, and an organism. For all organisms, to exist is to strive towards
some end or other, to be continually pointed in a direction. The direction or end that
governs all others is the perpetuation of life: its maintenance in the material individual one is, and the
generation of life in the form of offspring. As particular manifestations of Wille zum Leben, will to life, we tend towards survival and
reproduction, and this sets the common form of our existence: the fundamental theme of all the many different acts of the will is
the satisfaction of the needs inseparable from the body's existence in health; they have their expression in it, and can be reduced to
the maintenance of the individual and propagation of the species. (Wl, 326-7) Because we live, we must strive.
However the actual content of our striving may be elaborated, its form, set by the will to life, locates us always somewhere on a
cycle of willing and attaining. Any determinate episode of willing comes to an end, but not
willing itself. Nothing we achieve by willing could ever erase the will itself; as Schopenhauer
says, its desires are unlimited, its claims inexhaustible, and every sat- isfied desire gives birth to a new one. No possible
satisfaction in the world could suffice to still its craving, set a final goal to its demands,
and fill the bottomless pit of its heart. (W2, 573) Let us note two immediate points about this will which
Schopenhauer says constitutes our essence. Firstly, although the will to life operates in conscious and
rational life-forms, it is not essentially rational or conscious. The use of the term 'will' is thus
misleading. Schopenhauer begins his discussion of willing with the pursuit of ends in human action. But he contrives to extend the
same term to every instinctual or biological process, conceiving them as occurring because they fulfil some end for the organ- ism or
species. He does not incorporate all the features of human mental or conscious willing into his wider use of the term 'will'. Will
manifests itself 'blindly' - i.e. without consciousness or mentality of any kind - in the vast
majority of nature, including the human organism. So the will to life within me is not a quasi- mind, not a
consciousness, not something working rationally towards purposes. It is the principle that organises me, this
indi- vidual human being, just as it organises a snail or an oak tree, so that I tend
towards being alive and propagating the species I belong to. Secondly, life is an unchosen
goal of our striving. Later we rationally choose to live - or perhaps embrace an allegiance to life by some less explicit
process - but the will to life already inhabits us prior to any understanding or deliberation.
In a sense the primary will to life 'in' me is not my will. Schopenhauer would rather say the will to life
manifests itself as me (among other things). Georg Simmel puts it well in his classic lectures of 1907: 'I do not will
by virtue of values and goals that are posited by reason, but I have goals because I will
continuously and ceaselessly from the depth of my essence.' As an exercise in metaphysics
Schopenhauer's notion of the will is notoriously problematic: he appears to claim that the metaphysi- cal thing in itself underlies and
expresses itself in every process in nature, indeed that it is the world; that it transcends space, time, and causality, that it is
unknowable, and yet that we can securely attach to it the predicate 'will' which we understand from its application within the
knowable phenomenal world. I shall not here discuss the difficulties that beset this account. However, we should clarify one further
point about Schopenhauer's will, namely that it has no ulti- mate end or purpose to which it
tends. The will dispenses entirely with an ultimate aim and object. It always strives,
because striving is its sole nature, to which no attained goal can put an end. Such
striving is therefore incapable of final satisfaction; i t can be checked only by hindrance, but in itself it
goes on for ever. (Wl, 308) One consequence Schopenhauer draws is that there can be no absolute good. What
is good is by definition, for Schopenhauer, what satisfies an end for which some part of
reality strives, or towards which it naturally tends. An 'absolute good' or 'highest good ,
summum bonum' would be 'a final satisfaction of the will, after which no fresh willing would
occur', but 'such a thing cannot be conceived. The will can just as little through some
satisfaction cease to will always afresh, as time can end or begin; for the will there is
no permanent fulfilment which completely and forever satisfies its craving'. (Wl, 362).
Willing continues in the world in perpetuity. But since absolute value could be
possessed only by a state of affairs in which nothing more was willed, no state of
affairs can ever pos- sess absolute value - it would involve a contradiction to think oth-
erwise. There is value only locally, relative to some occurrence or state of willing.

Existence entails inevitable suffering and pain. This follows from the essence of
willing as consciousness of lack. Even when our will is satisfied, we immediately
succumb to a different kind of suffering, namely, boredom. Even if we do
everything we want in life, life is filled with suffering.
Soll 2011
(Ivan, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Madison-Wisconsin
Schopenhauer on the Inevitability of Unhappiness in A Companion to Schopenhauer, p. 301-2)

One of the most clear, concise and complete statements of Schopenhauers arguments
against the possibility of happiness in human life occurs in Book 4, 57, of The World as Will
and Representation: We have already seen in nature-without-knowledge her inner being as a
constant striving without aim and without rest, and this stands out much more distinctly
when we consider the animal or man. Willing and striving are its whole essence, and can
be fully compared to an unquenchable thirst. The basis of all willing, however, is
need, lack, and hence pain. If, on the other hand, it lacks objects of willing, because
it is at once deprived of them by too easy a satisfaction, a fearful emptiness and
boredom come over it; in other words, its being and existence become an intolerable
burden for it. Hence its life swings like a pen- dulum to and fro between pain and
boredom, and these two are in fact its ultimate con- stituents. This has been expressed
very quaintly by saying that, after man had placed all pains and torments in hell, there
was nothing left for heaven but boredom. (WWR I, 31112) By nature-without-knowledge
Schopenhauer seems to be referring to the part of nature that has no consciousness; the
realm of inorganic matter and perhaps also the world of plants. Even these, he argues, are to
be understood as constantly striving wills without aim and without rest, but
Schopenhauers problematic extension of the notions of willing and striving to the non-human
and non-animal realms is not our concern here, for our focus is primarily upon the question
of the happiness or unhap- piness of human beings. More relevant are two of
Schopenhauers claims in combination: (1) his claim that the inner being and indeed
whole essence of humans is a constant striving without aim and without rest, and (2)
that the basis of all willing is need, lack, and hence pain. If indeed our inner being and whole
essence is a constant striving without aim or rest, it does not seem that we can ever escape or
suspend this striving. And if to desire is ipso facto to suffer, then it seems that we are
condemned to constantly experience need, lack and thus pain. This is perhaps
Schopenhauers most central argument against the pos- sibility of happiness. This argument,
when it is unpacked, seems to be that, while one is striving for some- thing, one does not
yet, by definition, have what one wants; that striving by its very nature entails not having
what one strives for, at least while one is striving for it. For the argument to have any
cogency at all, it must be understood, though Schopenhauer neglects to state it, that one not
only need or lack what one is striving for but also feel this need or lack, because the
awareness of the need or lack is required both to motivate the striving and create the
suffering. One must be aware of a lack to suffer the lack in a way that seems to entail
that one thereby suffers, that is, experiences some sort of pain. Schopenhauer claims
that, if and when ones striving is successful and one attains the object of ones
striving, the satisfaction is fleeting and quickly passes over into boredom, which is
also a kind of suffering. Thus life, even according to the best possible scenario, in
which it consists of a series of successful strivings and fulfilled desires, appears to be
a dismal alternation between the suffering of feeling the lack of what one is trying to
attain and the suffering of the boredom that sets in promptly upon attaining it. In
constructing his unhappy vision of human life, Schopenhauer does not rely much upon the
fact that we do not always get what we want, and many people get very little of what they
want, because he wants to make the more radical point that, even if we did get everything
we wanted, our lives would still be filled with suffering.

Suffering is not an accidental feature of life it permeates all of existence.

Either we suffer through the dissatisfaction of our will, or we succumb to
painful boredom through an absence of willing. Satisfaction is nothing more
than the temporary absence of pain. There is no escape from suffering; life
knows no value; what is best of all would be to not-exist.
Janaway 1999 (Christopher, Professor of Philosophy at the University of South
Hampton, Schopenhauers Pessimism, in Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement,
Vol.44, pp. 50-5)
Schopenhauer's pessimism is not reducible to any single argument. Nevertheless I want to reconstruct one which relies on an
intimate link between the human will and suffering. Suffering is defined by Schopenhauer as 'the will's
hindrance through an obstacle placed between it and its temporary goal' (Wl, 309), while the
opposite state, 'satisfaction, well-being, happiness' consists in the will's attainment of its temporary goal. Suffering, non-
attainment of goals, will be a likely occurrence in the life of a being that wills. But this alone is
hardly grounds for pronouncing that non-existence should be preferred to the life of a willing being. However, for Schopenhauer
suffering is more than just one ingredient in such a life: it is a permeating and
necessary feature of it. To see this let us consider the structure of willing in a schematic way (see figure 1). A being
will strive towards some goal, X, and will either attain Z or not attain X. The latter state,
marked as c in the diagram, is a state of suffering. It seems there are just three subsequent possibilities once a goal is not
attained. Having not attained a goal, I may continue to strive for it nevertheless. This is
the route looping back to the original state of striving, which, repeated endlessly, is
the night- mare of Tantalus and other mythical figures whom Schopenhauer is prone to mention: so long as our
consciousness is filled by our will, so long as we are given up to the throng of desires with its constant hopes and fears, so long
as we are the subject of willing, we never obtain lasting happiness or peace. ... Thus
the subject of willing is constantly lying on the revolving wheel of Ixion, is always
drawing water in the sieve of the Danaids, and is the eternally thirsting Tantalus . (Wl,
196) Powerful though the symbolism of this route is for a pessimist, there are of course others: I may move on to
another goal, or I may cease for a while to strive towards any goals. What we have next to
establish is that, for Schopenhauer, both states a and d - both striv- ing itself and the absence of striving - also
constitute or presuppose forms of suffering. On the first point Schopenhauer declares: 'all striving
[Streberi] springs from want or deficiency, from dissatisfaction with one's own state or
condition, and is therefore suffering so long as it is not sat- isfied' (Wl, 309). The assumption
appears to be that a wholly self- sufficient state, a state of lacking nothing (or at least registering no lack), would continue in
principle perpetually, without tending towards any change of state brought about by will. Thus any
episode which is a
being's striving for a goal assumes that the being is, or at least registers itself as, lacking
something. Being aware of the lack of something is not sufficient to make me suffer. The awareness of lack must
present itself as painful as such. A clear example would be a felt deficiency or incompleteness,
such as a thirst or a feeling of homesickness, in which the awareness of some- thing's
being lacking is inseparable from some degree of suffering. (But I suppose Schopenhauer must
include cases where one painfully feels a deficiency or incompleteness because one makes a rational judgement of a situation as
detrimental to oneself. Thirst is a form of suffering, but so is recognising (while not feeling thirst) that one is in a desert without a
sufficient water-supply.) At any rate, Schopenhauer requires us to suppose that whenever we strive after any
goal, then we are aware of lacking something in some manner which amounts to pain
or suffering. Hence to be in a state of type a in the diagram presupposes that one suffers. But because our ordi- nary
life is, in its essence, a manifestation of will, there is no end in ordinary life to the occurrence of states of
type a. So we must always return to some state of suffering. We have, perhaps, come a small step nearer
to pessimism. How plausible, though, is the claim that whenever we strive for a goal, the striving presupposes an awareness of lack
which amounts to suffering? The American scholar David Cartwright finds this point unconvincing, saying that having a desire does
not entail being in misery. That is true. However, that is not what Schopenhauer alleges. Rather the claim is that every
episode of striving entails some degree of painful lack or dissatisfaction. Let us look at this more
closely. Firstly, does striving always presuppose an awareness of lack, or a dissatisfaction, of any kind? Cartwright sug- gests this is
not always true for desiring: I may desire to retain my good health which I believe I have rather than lack, and with which I am
satisfied. However, Schopenhauer's point (at least in the last quoted passage) was one about Streben, striving or trying, (i) Striving, I
take it, must be episodic rather than dispositional, whereas the desires just mentioned may be construed as disposi- tions; and (ii)
striving must aim at change in a way that desire need not. So the question we must ask is: When an episode of my behav- iour is
describable as ray striving to retain good health - which by hypothesis I do not lack - must I be experiencing some 'dissatisfac- tion
with my own state or condition' ? The answer, arguably, is Yes: part of what distinguishes striving from mere
wanting is that I regard the prior state of affairs (the state of affairs minus my striving), as deficient in
whatever it requires to ensure my goal. If I register the state of affairs minus my striving
as involving no such deficiency, it arguably becomes unintelligible to describe me as
striving or trying to retain my health. Even if we allow that to strive for something presupposes some dissatisfaction, Cartwright
makes another objection: such dissatis- faction commonly 'lacks the vital tone which is associated with mis- ery' (Cartwright, p. 59).
This is correct. But it misses the mark as regards Schopenhauer's argument. Schopenhauer does not hold that each episode of willing
involves the subject in misery; rather that, as a presupposition of there occurring an episode of willing, dissatisfaction or painfully
felt lack must be present in some degree. Misery is, let us say, some prolonged frustration of what is
willed, or massive non-attainment of goals basic to well-being. Most lives contain some
misery and some lives contain mostly misery, facts which Schopenhauer has not forgotten and of which he
writes mov- ingly. But his point here is that all lives, even those free of misery, inevitably contain
numerous, if minuscule, dissatisfactions. Each occurrence of striving presupposes a state with some degree of neg- ative value
for the being that strives. Hence, if we are looking for positive value within life, we shall not find it
at any of the states of type a. But it is time we mentioned other parts of the picture. First, con- sider state d in the diagram.
May we not hope that a lack of goals to strive for will indicate a lack of the feeling that
anything is lacking an absence of suffering, a respite that counterbalances states a and c? Here is
Schopenhauer's answer: The basis of willing ... is need, lack, and hence pain, and by its very
nature and origin [any animal] is therefore destined to pain. If, on the other hand, it lacks
objects of willing, because it is at once deprived of them again by too easy a
satisfaction, a fearful emptiness and boredom come over it ; in other words, its being and its
existence itself become an intolerable burden for it. Hence its life swings like a
pendulum to and fro between pain and bore- dom, and these two are in fact its
ultimate constituents. (Wl, 312) This is one of Schopenhauer's tragi-comic master-strokes. (Elsewhere he says:
'suppose the human race were removed to a Utopia where everything grew
automatically and pigeons flew about ready roasted ... then people would die of
boredom or hang themselves' (P2, 293).) The state of having nothing to strive for readily
becomes one in which we suffer from not having anything whose lack we feel. We
painfully miss the differently painful state of having something to strive for. The grip
of pessimism tightens again. Either of the routes a-c-a contains only suffering. So now does route a-c-d. Routes a-b-a
and a-b-d contain satisfaction, but only sandwiched between two forms of suffering. Satisfaction is thus never
anything permanent, and always lapses again into painful lack or painful boredom .
Schopenhauer expresses the situation thus: absolutely every human life continues to flow on between willing and attainment. Of its
nature the wish is pain; attainment quick- ly begets satiety. The goal was only apparent; possession takes away its charm. The wish,
the need, appears again on the scene under a new form; if it does not, then dreariness, emptiness, and boredom follow, the struggle
against which is just as painful as is that against want. {Wl, 314). But why would such an existence be one we should prefer not to
have? Such an attitude might intelligibly be occasioned by the complete shipwreck of all ones aims. But that is not the situation of
every human being, as Schopenhauer wisely concedes: This is the life of almost all men; they will, they know what they will, and they
strive after this with enough success to protect them from despair, and enough failure to preserve them from boredom and its
consequences. {Wl, 327) If most lives are spiced with a sufficiently varied set of goals, and if, as they shuffle between the different
forms of suffering, they come round to the state 'Attain X' sufficiently often then it is still unclear why that is a kind of existence
not to be chosen above non- existence. But Schopenhauer has one more vital point to make: All
satisfaction, or what is
commonly called happiness, is really and essentially always negative only, and never
positive ... the sat- isfaction or gratification can never be more than a deliverance from a
pain, from a want... Nothing can ever be gained but deliv- erance from suffering or
desire; consequently, we are only in the same position as we were before this suffering or desire appeared. {Wl, 319} We feel
pain, not painlessness; care, but not freedom from care; fear, but not safety and
security. We feel the desire as we feel hunger and thirst; but as soon as it has been
satisfied, it is like the mouthful of food that has been taken and which ceases to exist
for our feelings the moment it is swallowed. {W2, 575}. The thesis here - call it 'the negativity of satisfaction' -
is that attainment of what one strives for is not accompanied by any posi- tive feeling.
Satisfaction is merely the temporary absence of suffer- ing, which soon yields again to
suffering. If this is true, then state b in my diagram can do little to counterbalance the sufferings which are presupposed at
every other point. The conclusion that non-exis- tence would have been preferable at least comes
within sight: 'all life is suffering', as Schopenhauer helpfully puts it (Wl, 310). Life is suffering of different
kinds, plus some neutral stretches where suf- fering is briefly absent before a new
suffering arrives.

There is no ultimate satisfaction of the will, only suffering.

Janaway 08. (Christopher Janaway is a philosopher and author. Before moving to
Southampton in 2005, Janaway taught at the University of Sydney and Birkbeck,
University of London. His recent research has been on Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and
aesthetics. Better Consciousness Edited by Jakob Lindgaard. P2-3.)

At the heart of Schopenhauers philosophy is a vision of human beings as essentially driven by

will. To exist as a living being is to strive after ends, fundamentally those of staying alive and
producing new life, secondarily the many diverse means towards those ends, and then, in the
case of human beings, a vast array of other objects of desire or need corresponding to our
widening cognitive and cultural repertoire. It is built into all such existence that we suffer. We
have to pursue ends because we live, and not all ends can be satisfied. Striving towards some
end is itself a species of suffering because it arises from a feeling that something is lacking; but
attaining an end does not protect us from further feelings of want. What we achieve through
the action of our will does not stop us from willing and therefore suffering some more. Even a
person who regularly gets exactly what he or she wants is not safe from suffering: there lurks
the spectre of boredom, in which we painfully feel the absence of any lack that motivates us to
act. We have not chosen to live or to have the nature essential to all living things, that of
endlessly willing and endlessly being exposed to suffering. Nor does our suffering have any
ultimate redeeming point. Our existence and the existence of the world that is so ready to
frustrate our willing are not designed to achieve any good, nor are we capable of making any
progress towards perfection. In this fundamental part of Schopenhauers philosophy of value,
which has to do with the will as essence of the self and of the world, we ultimately find nothing
but an absence of value. Anything is good only if it satisfies the will of some being, but there
can be no ultimate satisfaction of the will as such, and so there is no absolute good. And if,
instead of pursuing the round of effort, aspiration and failure to which life condemns us, we
stand back and ask after the value of the whole show, we should by rights reach the extreme
verdict that nothing else can be stated as the aim of our existence except the knowledge that it
would be better for us not to exist (The World as Will and Representation (hereafter WWR) II:
605).
 Disinterested Pursuit of Philosophy Key to Solve
Disinterested pursuit of philosophical understanding is a means of attaining
freedom from the thrawls of the will.
Hyland 1985
(J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in Educational
Studies, 11:3, 225-6)

(2) Just as a certain form of intellectual contemplation and discipline can provide that control
over the will that makes asceticism possible, so the disinterested pursuit of philosophical
understanding can lead to genuine knowledge of the world and mastery over our
circumstances. The more we move from self-consciousness to consciousness of
others and the objective world, the more the will is separated from the intellect, and
knowledge becomes purer. In his later essays, Schopenhauer's earlier idealism is tempered
by a form of empiricism which was intended to turn philosophy into a truly practical pursuit.
Attacking the 'sophists' of his day, Fichte, Schelling and Hegel, he eschews philosophy
based only on abstract conceptual subtlety, urging that "philosophy, just as much as
art and poetry, must have its source in perceptual comprehension of the world"
(1970, p. 118). Although genuine philosophising must be "truly disengaged" and
must "prosecute no particular goal or aim" if it is to be "free from the enticement of
the will" (ibid., pp. 117-18). Schopenhauer reveals his primary objective to be that which
has motivated philosophy since its beginnings, viz. to present as complete and veridical a
picture of the world and man's place in it as possible. The roots of metaphysics can be
located in man's "knowledge of death and therewith the consideration of the suffering and
misery of life" (1969, Vol. 2, p. 161), but the philosophical task is constantly frustrated by the
will. The world will appear in its "true colour and form, in its complete and correct
significance, only when the intellect, freed from willing, moves freely over objects"; the
intellect is then "of the greatest purity, and becomes the clear mirror of the world" (ibid., pp.
380-1). Schopenhauer here posits a notion of philosophical enlightenment through
intellectual purity that is remarkably similar to Spinoza's doctrine that human freedom is to
be sought, strangely enough, by acknowledging the extent to which our actions are not free
but determined by our characters and by the natural order of things. Spinoza too argued that
"Desire is the very essence of man, that is, the endeavour wherewith man endeavours to
persist in his being"; it is in desire that "lie the causes of human impotence and inconstancy,
and why men do not follow the precepts of reason" (1959b, p. 154). Although Spinoza (in
spite of his own exemplary life) repudiated asceticism, he did urge us, not so much to deny
desire, as to come to an 'adequate idea' of it through the use of the active intellect. Thus, the
"more an emotion becomes known to us, the more it is within our power and the less the
mind is passive to it" (ibid., p. 203). Similarly, Schopenhauer exhorts us to discover all that
we can about the roots of desire grounded in the will. The objective employment of the
intellect, as opposed to its subjective application in the satisfaction of will-directed desires,
makes all art and science possible. Thus, we can achieve that 'free reflection' demonstrated
most forcefully in works of genius. There is no freedom in nature, however, for the
'entire empirical course of a man's life is, in great things and in small, as necessarily
determined as clockwork" (1970, p. 143). The freedom to be attained is a
metaphysical freedom which consists in seeing the world aright and understanding
the nature of the will and the way it shapes our behaviour. This philosophic
understanding "snatches knowledge from the thraldom of the will" and brings about
"the painless state, prized by Epicurus as the highest good and as the state of the gods;
for the moment we are delivered from the miserable pressure of the will" (1969, Vol.
1, p. 196).
 Disinterestedness K2 Solve Will and Become Ethical
We must attempt to dissolve the will as the source of all pain and suffering.
One way to do this is by conceiving of our particular suffering as universal.
Indeed, this is the condition for an ethical relationship to others. Rather than
teaching the pursuit of happiness, educators would do well to emphasize this
asceticism.
Hyland 1985
(J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in Educational
Studies, 11:3, 224-5)

Schopenhauer proposes three ways (each related to a common object) in which we can offer
a response to the predicament he describes, two of which, I will suggest, are of special
relevance to education. (1) First, there is the way of asceticism which Schopenhauer derived
from his reading of the Upanishads and other Hindu and Buddhist literature, and which is
similar in many important respects to the practical ethics of the Greek Stoics and Cynics.
Since the will is the source and cause of all pain and suffering, it is argued, the remedy
lies in the total rejection and denial of the will in all its various manifestations. As
Schopenhauer puts it: My ethics ... candidly confesses the reprehensible nature of the
world and points to the denial of the will as the road to redemption from it. (1970, p.
63) It might be wondered, in the face of the blind, irrational striving of the will, how an
individual intellect could ever attain sufficient power to bring about such a redemption. For
the lower animals, who are pure will, this would, indeed, be impossible but, although the
separation between consciousness and will becomes more marked as intelligence increases,
even humans develop, in the main, only imperfect intellects, mere 'servants' of the will
which is 'always in command of the field' (1969, Vol. 2, pp. 136-7). How, then, can we
hope to achieve that mastery over the will which is a pre-requisite of the ascetic life? Our
intellects are imperfect insofar as we are capable only of subjective consciousness, a
level at which we simply respond to the dictates of the will. However, the more we are
able to approximate to "clearness of consciousness of the external world, the
objectivity of perception" the more our intellects approach that perfection of
knowledge which, as illustrated especially in the instances of genius so much admired by
Schopenhauer, is "wholly will-less knowledge" (ibid., p. 291). The attainment of
perfection in this sphere is described in a variety of ways by Schopenhauer, all of which
involve the ability to conceive the wholeness, interconnectedness and universality of
particular ideas or items of perception, and the process can be clearly discerned in the
epistemology of Plato and Kant. Schopenhauer's account of the way an individual may
come to understand the idea of suffering is an excellent illustration of the general
thesis. A person encountering great misfortune or deep sorrow will experience
suffering but may, on reflection, see this only as a particular phenomenon, as
something which happens to him alone. Such an individual "still continues to will
life, only not on the conditions that have happened to him". This predicament
invites our sympathy (and may even inspire awe) but such a sufferer is "really worthy
of reverence only when his glance has been raised from the particular to the
universal, and when he regards his own suffering merely as an example of the
whole". In an ethical respect, the person becomes "inspired with genius, one case
holds good for a thousand, so that the whole of life, conceived as essential suffering,
then brings him to resignation" (1969, Vol. 1, p. 396). This illustrates both the idea of
perfect knowledge and the source of Schopenhauer's ethical theory, and also serves
to explain why the most obvious solution to the human predicament, suicide, comes
to be rejected. Schopenhauer is by no means unsympathetic to suicideindeed, he is
severely critical of the conventional moral disapproval of this course of action (1970, pp. 77-
9)but, in the end, dismisses it as an intellectual mistake. The error can be located
in the failure to connect each individual will with the whole, the universal will, in the
way that perfect knowledge requires. Thus, suicide is a "quite futile and foolish act,
for the thing-in-itself remains unaffected by it"; suicide "denies merely the
individual, not the species" (1969, Vol. 1, p. 399). This is, perhaps, the most obscure
aspect of Schopenhauer's work and, as Sprigge (op. cit., pp. 86-7) points out, seems to be
based on his philosophy of mathematics, particularly his idea of numbers and counting. At
one level we might render it understandable by saying that the self-destruction of an
individual solves nothing, for the will, though destroyed in one particular objectified
representation, remains triumphant. The noumenon, the universal will (or, as we
might say in modern terminology, the gene pool) remains unaffected and survives the
deaths of individual suicides to continue the endless cycle of striving. What is less
understandable, unless we posit some kind of genetically-transmitted increment of perception, is how the
victory of individual ascetics over the will can be translated into a victory over the universal will. Sprigge
interprets this conception in terms of a "whittling away of the Cosmic will" (ibid., p. 92) so that, in the end, the
will ceases to individualise itself in humans. The denial of the will through the extinction of desires and needs is
a familiar solution to human strife, though it is rarely given such a full theoretical foundation as that which
Schopenhauer tries to provide. Viewed as an alternative to orthodoxy, asceticism of this
kind does provide a much-needed counterbalance to the crude and mindless
materialism which dominates popular culture and, as such, it does have a role to play
in moral education and the education of the emotions. Something less extreme than
Schopenhauer's ascetic philosophy is present, though often understated, in many religious
doctrines, and educators could do worse than give more emphasis to such ideas and
rather less to the pursuit of happiness.
 Desire Bad
Fantastical desires are presentations, and the agent of willing can only know
what they want based on the decisions they make in relation to a certain
action. Accordingly, the desire, or presentation, that is the negative fails to find
the source of cause of the resolution. Only through an examination of the the
subject of willing actually works.
Koler (Kossler) 2010 [Matthias Koler is a German University professor focusing
on philosophy and Metaphysics, Ethics, and Epistomology. Koler, M. (2010) Life
is but a Mirror: On the Connection between Ethics, Metaphysics and Character in
Schopenhauer, in Better Consciousness: Schopenhauer's Philosophy of Value (eds
A. Neill and C. Janaway), Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford, UK. doi:
10.1002/9781444322866.ch6] //JW
Pivotal to the discussion of character is Schopenhauers use of the two Kantian terms11
intelligible character and empirical character. Character is defined for the first time in the
chapter concerning the Principle of Action in his dissertation of 1813. The Principle of Sufficient
Ground of Action stands in close relation to the later developed metaphysics of will. This holds
true not only because this principle relates to willing, but also because Schopenhauer already
discusses the miracle katexochen in relation to it; the determination of which Schopenhauer
later explains to be the entire content of his main work.12 In the second edition of his treatise
on the Principle of Sufficient Ground he points out that the manner in which the law of
motivation relates to the law of causality parallels the way in which will relates to presentation.
He states This insight is the cornerstone of the whole of my metaphysics.13. This also
corresponds with the fact that the Principle of the Ground of Action systematically follows the
Principle of the Ground of Becoming, whose objects constitute the world as presentation.14
Nowhere else in the Fourfold Root are the changes in the second edition so fundamental and
comprehensive as in the chapter on action. It is particularly noticeable that the doctrine of
character plays a central role in the first edition, whilst in the second there is only a short
reference remaining in chapter 8 of the general comments and results.15 In order to lend
sufficient credit to this development, which Schopenhauer later ignores when referring to his
disserta- tion as a preparatory thesis to the World as Will and Presentation, it is important first
of all to expound the principal theme of the dissertation.16 For the purpose of defining the
manner in which grounds are discussed in science, Schopenhauer points out in his dissertation
that there are four different modes of the Principle of Sufficient Ground in accordance with the
difference between the objects of science. As such they must, despite their differences, be able
to show the general fundamental form of the Principle of Sufficient Ground, which
Schopenhauer sees in the fact that all presentations to us stand related to one another in a
lawful, and with respect to its form, a priori determinable connection.17 In regard to the
Principle of Sufficient Ground of Action several complications arise; firstly, there is only one
object, i.e. the subject of willing. The relation sought can thus only pertain towards to objects
of another class.18 Secondly, the concept of an a priori definable law seems not to apply to acts
of willing. The first question is resolved through the acceptance of a causality of willing in
action.19 The causality of willing is dependent on the resolution and expresses itself in the
action. By contrast, desires define willing that does not become causal. Desires taken as
fantasies are presentations,20 in the same way as actions of the body are. Nevertheless, there
is no law governing a relationship between the two, since not only do human reactions to
particular given motives differ, but also the agent of the willing can only understand what he
actually wanted from the decision made on his action. The cause of the resolution is thus not
to be sought after in the presentation, the object, but in the subject of the willing. Thus the
second problem comes about, as to how one is to ascertain, at least in respect of its form, an a
priori definable law of resolutions in regard to the act of will. In order to be able to assert this
idea, Schopenhauer presupposes a so to speak permanent state of the subject of will,21 which
with reference to Kant and Schelling22 he entitles the intelligible character. To validate this
supposition he refers to the observation that the actions of individuals, and therefore their
individually differing manner of reacting to particular motives, have a certain regularity.
Character can therefore be inferred, to a certain degree, from empirical observation. Yet, since
it is only derived by means of fragmentary observations, there is a difference between the
empirical character and the intelligible character that can never be eliminated entirely. For the
intelligible character is to be understood as a pervasively determined condition. The intelligible
character is used by Schopenhauer in order that human action does not fall out of the range of
the Principle of Sufficient Groundso that one is then certainly entitled to ask: why did this
human action take place? If actions were to be taken out of that range, they would no longer be
able to be evaluated morally. In a similar way to Kant, the intelligible character is used in order
to show the possibility of morality, even if Schopenhauer emphasises in his dissertation that it
is not supposed to be about ethics.23 Accordingly, the intelligible character and causality of will
strongly reflect Kants theory of causality as resulting from freedom. But Schopenhauer has a
different concept of causality, confined strictly to phenomena, that in its very premise leads
away from the Kantian idea. Even if Schopenhauer speaks of the causality of will, the cause
within the law of motivation is not the will, but the motive.24 Character is most certainly a
presupposition of the moment of presentations becoming a motive for a resolution, that is, its
becoming a reason for action: and in this sense it can be seen as the actual reasonyet
Schopenhauer does not do thisoddly, it must be said, since the premise of the causality of
willing is therefore in many ways withdrawn. However at this point in the thesis a much stronger
differentiation is made than later between the moment of presentation and the motive, in so far
as the effect of willing, the resolution, must be contained within the motive.25 In addition,
Schopenhauer draws conclusions from the Kantian idea of the intelligible character as
something we cannot cognize and as independent of time. Once causality has been laid down as
a relationship between states26 (G 49 f.), will is consciously defined by Schopenhauer, in line
with the Principle of Sufficient Ground of Becoming, as a so to speak permanent state.
However he explicitly points out that this expression only concerns a comparative form of
speech, since permanence and state are determinations of time, and that contrary to this the
subject of willing and its intelligible character are not within time. After all, only the resolutions
as acts of will are within time, not the character which defines them. It is more correct to
express the intelligible character as a universal act of will outside time.27 After all,
Schopenhauer is forced to accept that the subject of will can only be termed as object with an
important limitation, since the immediate objects of inner perception are only the particular
acts of will within time. With this consideration in mind Schopenhauer then introduces the
radical changes in the second edition and in the metaphysics of will. If, for Schopenhauer, time is
the prototype28 of the Principle of Sufficient Ground, on which all its forms, including
causality, are based, and if character lies outside of time, then it is clear that one can no longer
talk of a causality of will. In place of the causal relationship between the subject of will and its
actions a relationship which is independent of time is introduced that Schopenhauer calls
visibility or mirroring. The subject of will is therefore no longer the cause of its own actions;
instead actions make the character of the subject visible. By presupposing character a law of
motivation can be expressed, which, so far as its determination is derived from its actions, can
only be defined very inexactly. However, since the causality of will is no longer applicable, the
law of motivation is no different from the law of causality in the Principle of the Sufficient
Ground of Becoming. In his dissertation Schopenhauer already presents the relationship
between the two laws by drawing a comparison in which visual metaphors are used extensively,
for example: The law of causality can be compared to . . . the law of optics, which states that a
ray of light has an effect on a colourless see-through body with parallel surfaces and on
colourless mirrors. It states that the emitted light will either pass through the surface without
any kind of change or will be reflected back to where it came from; where the light was before,
it will be afterwards, and from the constitutions at the onset the outcome can be foreseen. The
law of motivation however is comparable to the effect of light on coloured bodies, in which the
same ray reflects red light from the one body, green from the second, and if the third is black
does not reflect at all. In fact the way in which each different body reflects the light cannot be
predicted by knowledge of the constitution of the particular body, or of light. Instead, the result
can only be described by the actual appearance of the light on the body, yet how the body
reflects the light once, it will do again, since there is only one type of light.29 In terms of this
comparison, the law of causality and that of motivation are no longer different forms of the
Principle of Sufficient Ground that contain different types of regularities. The causality is
identical, only the medium is different, which leads Schopenhauer in the second edition and in
his main work to say: motivation is merely causality passing through cognition.30 In line with
these definitions, motivation is placed under the Principle of the Sufficient Ground of Becoming
as a subordinate aspect of causalitywith decisive repercussions for the development of the
metaphysics of will. Following on from here it becomes evident that motivation is no longer
dependent upon the self-consciousness of the human being and so therefore can also be said to
apply to animals, since they also have a cognitive faculty. In fact, in regard to motives, it is
enough to have the capacity for presentations; the resolution no longer plays a role. The
subjection of motivation to the Principle of Sufficient Ground of Becoming also introduces the
necessity of a differentiation between different forms of causality, which were not apparent in
the dissertation. In the three forms cause, stimulus and motive, specific moments of the
Principle of the Ground of Becoming are laid down. In the first edition such specific moments
only appeared as characters within the Principle of Sufficient Ground of Action. Analogous to the
relationship between the intelligible and empirical character, all presentations can be shown to
be phenomena of timeless characters spread out in space and time. It is therefore not just the
fact that motivation is grouped under the law of causality, but that causality is thought of in
analogy to motivation. The entire world of presentation is therefore only the becoming
visible of a will acting through certain characters; and Schopenhauers philosophy, as was
stated in one of his most famous notes from 1817, can be summarised in the one expression:
the world is the wills self-cognizance.31 This development towards his metaphysics of will,
which was already being applied in the final stages of his doctorate and was more or less
completed in the following year, is easily confirmed by reference to his handwritten
manuscripts. In the first manuscripts (1814) concerning the cognizance of the body and his
doctrine of Ideas within a philosophy of nature, will and intelligible character are used as
interchangeable synonyms. Continuing on from here life, then body and finally animals, plants
and inorganic phenomena are shown to be the visibility of will itself, the intelligible
character.32 In connection with this, the concept of will in the early phase of Schopenhauers
thinking is a moral one in the sense of his doctrine of better consciousness.33 However, I do
not want to delve further into this doctrine,34 although it was considerably influential in the
development of Schopenhauers philosophy. Instead I wish to point out that, by distancing
himself from the thoughts of the causality of will, a change in the moral meaning of better
consciousness was laid down. The change from a causal relationship between will and action to
a relationship which can only be expressed metaphorically by visibility and mirroring can be
termed as a Copernican revolution in moral philosophy. Kants conception of the Copernican
revolution in his theory of knowledge concerned the idea that knowledge is not defined by
objects, but instead the objects by knowledge. In a similar way, Schopenhauers will is not the
cause of actions, in fact character as the visibility of will is a result of action. Life is nothing but a
mirror of the essence outside of time; which outside of this mirror can only be defined as a
negation. The revolution is a change from a scientific ethic, that is, one which rests on the
principle of ground, to speculative ethics. In this sense the expression speculative is to be
understood as both viewing and mirroring; in quite the same way as it had developed in the
classical speculative thinking of antiquity and the Middle Ages.35 As far as Schopenhauer is
concerned, ethics can only be metaphysical, since all experience is bound by the Principle of
Sufficient Ground. The experience of life points to something that does not belong to
experience, but that is made visible by it; and within this relation to a metaphysical sphere, the
questions of ethics, of moral action and of the freedom of will are to be resolved. Even before
Schopenhauer had become acquainted with the Kantian distinction between the empirical and
intelligible character, he had put forward a fundamental idea of learning through life as an
interactive relationship between infinite essence and the finite phenomenon of will, ideas which
were later linked to the Kantian distinction. In one of the earliest handwritten notes he states:
Life is a language in which a teaching is given to us. If this teaching could be instilled in us in
another way, we would not live.36 And a little later, in 1812, these ethical connections suggest
the metaphysical concept of the world as phenomenon of the will. Here Schopenhauer writes
that the elements which make up the world have no reality and no meaning in themselves
except through the will that they stand for.37 In taking up some earlier elements, which stand
partly in connection with the so-called doctrine of better consciousness, this idea is then
connected to the theory of the intelligible and empirical character, which in turn is related to
the problem of causality introduced in the dissertation. The solution is to be found in a note
from 1814: Life is the intelligible characters becoming visible; in life this [character] does not
change, but it does outside life and outside time in consequence of the self-knowledge that is
given through life. Life is only the mirror into which we look not so that it may reflect
something, but so that we may recognize ourselves in it, may see what it reflects.38 The
examination of Schopenhauers handwritten manuscripts and the dissertation clarify that his
metaphysics of will was developed as consistent with and out of the doctrine of character as its
premise. Since the doctrine of character was used in his dissertation in order to prove the
possibility of ethics, it is possible to confirm what Schopenhauer said about his metaphysics in
his remarks quoted at the beginning of this chapter. Quite simply, that metaphysics is
fundamentally ethical and that the physical order of things is proven to be dependent on the
moral one, in that the first is nothing more than the mirror or the visibility of the latter. There is
no denying, however, that the concept of better consciousness was, from the very beginning,
connected with a thinking based on the contrast between temporal and eternal consciousness
that leads to the denial of the will; thus to an ethics which consists in the negation of the world
interpreted metaphysically. According to this line of thought morality exists in the affirmation of
a better consciousness outside time and in the negation of temporal or empirical consciousness.
In consideration of that basic idea, even before the completion of the dissertation,
Schopenhauer had established substantial features of the later ethics of the denial of will.39
With the concept of better consciousness this idea is also connected to the doctrine of character
and leads to the fact that moral freedom can no longer lie in the character-forming decision, but
solely in a complete nullification of character. Despite this, the idea that better consciousness is
achieved in the action of character is also applied in the main work: in the ethics of compassion
as well as in the action and the mode of conduct in the life of the saint and ascetic.40 When
Schopenhauer notes shortly before or perhaps during the completion of the dissertation: in my
hands and all the more so in my mind a piece of work has developed, a philosophy, which is to
be ethics and metaphysics in one . . .,41 it leads to two quite different interpretations. On the
one hand, this could be a play on the doctrine of redemption, i.e. the radical denial of the will.
Then however, as already stated, ethics would be in contradiction to metaphysics, since it only
takes place where the will, recognised as essence, does not exist. In the following therefore, the
other more probable and convincing interpretation is to be explained in short,42 in which ethics
and metaphysics are one; as with the opening quote from the essay on the will in nature, where
the physical order of things can be traced back to a moral one. This interpretation can be
developed from the idea that the metaphysics of will is derived from the doctrine of character,
that is from the statement that human life is a mirror of its essence, i.e. its intelligible character.
In this regard, it is to be shown that the relationship between the intelligible and empirical
character, which defines the experience of character and the doctrine that results from it, also
includes the relationship to the world as will and presentation.
 Education Should Focus on the Inevitability of Suffering
Education should focus on emotional cultivation via the arts. In particular, we
need to focus not just on the pursuit of happiness, but on the inevitability of
suffering.
Hyland 1985
(J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in Educational
Studies, 11:3, 227-8)

The recent revival of interest in the education of the emotions in philosophy of

education is to be welcomed since questions concerned with the development of a
person's character, moral values and general life stance must, without doubt, be
accorded a central place in discussions about the educational enterprise. In this
respect, Bonnett's recommendations for the cultivation of the poetic and artistic
aspects of human nature, and the direction of the educator's attention to the "fluidity
and spontaneity of Being" (1983, p. 32) as a response to the threat of dehumanisation
and alienation posed by modern technological materialism are timely. Similarly,
Griffiths (1984) contends that the education of the emotions should inform all aspects
of the life and work of schools, and provides a much-needed reminder of the
importance of this sphere of educational endeavour. A primary shortcoming of all
such programmes of affective education, however, is the insufficient consideration
given to the darker and irrational aspects of the human condition. Thus, Dunlop's
account (1984) stresses the need for a balance between the social and individual
aspects of learning and explores the importance of the school's ethos, and we are left
with the impression that objectives in this area can be achieved fairly easily by means of
certain pedagogic and curriculum improvements. But there seems to be a systematic
avoidance of the realities of everyday life in such programmesa determination to
steer clear of the pain, adversity and strife which are characteristically part of every
human life and which, for many people, militate against the achievement of moral and
emotional stability. This overly optimistic picture needs to be challenged, and I submit
that Schopenhauer's vision of life can help educators to redress the balance in this
respect. "Neither the sun nor death can be looked at with a steady eye" noted La
Rochefoucauld, and it seems that a similar unsteadiness also distorts our perception of
other unpleasant aspects of life. What is required is a determination to explore the
sources and consequences of unhappiness in life, of that miserable striving which
Schopenhauer identified with the will to live. This would involve turning the critical
attention of pupils towards such issues as pain, illness, poverty, loneliness, depression
and aspects of death and dying, areas which, if they are discussed at all in schools, are
treated only superficially. The conventional approach to such topics needs to be
questioned and altered along the lines suggested by Schopenhauer, and the various
ways of dealing with the human predicament may then be outlined and explored. All
this is fundamental to and a prerequisite of the formulation of objectives and teaching
methods in this sphere. Literature comes to mind as, perhaps, the most apposite vehicle for this sort
of learning, and the excellent account offered by Hepburn (op. cit.) for the education of the emotions
through literature is difficult to improve upon. However, the traditional criteria of literature must not be
allowed to distract us from our primary objective which is, not the pursuit of literature for its own sake
(though, as mentioned above, aesthetics offers one way of escaping from the slavery of the will), but for
its ability to illuminate certain crucial features of the human condition. This objective is quite different
from the more orthodox objectives of literature teaching which (although there are signs of change in the
new examination proposals and in recent criticisms of the standard line, see Weldon, 1985) are overly
impersonal and predomi- nantly academic. I have been astonished to witness a discussion, for instance, of
the deep pessimism and nihilism of Hardy's Jude the Obscure conducted in a purely clinical fashion, as if
Hardy had not intended us to learn something from the story of the crushing tragedy and appalling
adversity of Jude Fawley's life and to apply this knowledge to our own circumstances. History and social
all
studies are also ideally suited to the re-appraisal of affective objectives that I am suggesting, though
curriculum areas would benefit from a shaking of the foundations in this respect.There
are two main objectives of such a re-appraisal, both of which could be accepted by
educators who might not want to endorse the whole of Schopenhauer's thesis. First,
though we may not agree that the miserable striving and vicissitudes of the will are
quite as definitive of life as Schopenhauer says they are, we can still recognise that
they play a significant enough part in the lives of most of us to warrant rather more
attention than the curriculum typically gives them. The rationale here is that which
undergirds all educational activity, described by Schopenhauer as pure and genuine
philosophising, viz. the pursuit of truth and objectivity. It is just as intellectually
reprehensible to avoid or give only cursory treatment to the problems of terminal
illness or suicide as it would be to give a one-sided account of the French Revolution
or to discuss contemporary world politics without reference to Marxism. Just to clear up
a possible misconception, the particular interpretation of the pursuit of truth advocated here must not be
seen as an oblique way of pursuing happiness by learning from the misfortunes of others, counting
blessings or any other such homilies. In any case, I tend to agree with Von Wright (1963, pp. 93 ff.) that,
since unhappiness bears all the hallmarks of being a contrary not a contradictory of happiness, it might be
both a logical and an empirical mistake to try to achieve happiness in this roundabout manner. Dearden
was right to say that we cannot sensibly question the value of happiness. I have not been concerned at all
with this question but, rather, with other questions to which I think educators ought to give greater
consideration. The pursuit of objective knowledge is an intrinsic educational objective,
but it is here only a necessary preliminary to the all-important instrumental one of
providing pupils with the wherewithal to achieve that mastery over the will which
Schopenhauer described as the means of salvation. Expressed in different ways, this
has been a central aim of all philosophising since Socrates, and ought to inform all
areas of educational activity. Our vision will remain distorted and confused until we
have learned to recognise the forces which shape our thoughts and actions, and are
able to apply this knowledge to practical living. If clarity of vision sometimes renders
experience unpalatable, so be it. Although such knowledge may not always help us to
change the world in any concrete way, the refinement of our powers of reflection and
deliberation leads to the attainment of that self-knowledge which, as Hampshire
(1979) demonstrates, will always be a liberating and never a restricting possession.

Gaining objective knowledge requires the madness and will-lessness of art.

Singh 10 (R. Raj Singh is Professor (B.A., M.A., Panjab ; M.A. Brock ; Ph.D.
Ottawa) Department of Philosophy @ Brock University. From schopenhauer a guide for the
perplexed chapter 5.)

According to Schopenhauer, human life under the subjection of the will is for the most part full
of striving and suffering interspersed with brief interludes of satisfactions of trivial achievements
which result in pursuits of newer and newer worldly goals. But art experience is something that
pulls one out of the matter of course oscillation between suffering and illusory satisfaction. In a
contemplation of an object (or a specific set of objects) free from its ties with other objects, that
is, in contemplation if its Idea, a detachment is achieved by the artist and passed on to the art
connoisseur. Schopenhauer maintains that in this mode of detachment, art experience leads
one to a state of will-lessness or a self-transformation as well as endows one with a truly
objective knowledge of the Ideas of things. One becomes a pure will-less subject of knowledge
as one gains a truly objective knowledge. These moments of art experience, as long as they
last, usher one to a state of liberation from the network of worldly interconnections of things, a
network which is consumed with personal agendas, temporary satisfactions leading to newer
lacks and newer sufferings. In art experience ones personal stakes and agendas to manipulate
and use things is temporarily suspended and one is able to stare at the thing itself to
contemplate its Idea. According to Schopenhauer, art experience brings both an extraordinary
knowledge and an extraordinary self-transformation. It gives us intimations of what a life of the
denial of the will and salvation referred to in great religions like Christianity, Hinduism and
Buddhism must be like. Schopenhauer maintains that great art is produced by a genius. Great
art is not produced by merely talented or trained individuals but a genius who alone is capable
of pure contemplation of Ideas. A genius is pre-eminently able to detach himself from his
personality and personal considerations, and to absorb himself entirely in the object. The gift of
genius is nothing but the most complete objectivity (W-I, 185). Genius is the ability and
tendency to remain in a state of perception, to immerse oneself in perception and to remove
ones knowledge from the matter-of-course service to the will. According to Schopenhauer, a
genius has a superfluity of knowledge in contrast to other mortals, an amount of knowledge that
far exceeds what is normally required for the service of an individual will. The knowledge of the
Ideas contemplated by the genius is obtained through an especially keen perception. It is not
abstract or conceptual knowledge. The perception of a genius is more penetrating in contrast to
the typical perception of an ordinary man who can direct his attention to things only in so far as
they have some relation to his will . . . he does not linger long over the mere perception . . .
quickly looks merely for the concept under which it is to be brought, just as the lazy man looks
for a chair, which then no longer interests him (W-I, 187). On the other hand, the genius is often
so absorbed in contemplation of life itself and Ideas of things that he is invariably forgetful of his
self-interest and lacks in practical life skills that the ordinary man of the world possesses. The
issue of the genius was of great interest to Schopenhauer as he paints portraits of the genius in
several of his works. One of the themes he dwells over is the connection between genius and
madness. The genius is one who has the capacity of bypassing in his sight worldly inter-
connections of things, that is, the mundane knowledge according to the principle of sufficient
reason, in order to focus on the thing as such to discover its Idea. He is able to grasp the real
inner nature of a thing and how that thing represents its whole species. At the same time the
genius has the power to be a correlative of the Idea. That is, he becomes a pure subject of
knowing, and ceases to be an individual in the mode of contemplation. That which exists in the
actual individual thing, only imperfectly and weakened by modifications, is enhanced to
perfection, to the Idea of it, by the method of contemplation used by the genius (W-I, 194).
 The Will
Although the will is fundamentally evil it is not the thing in itself The choice
for death is not between heaven and hell but between a demonic nature and
the salvation of the denial of the will
Young 10 (Young, J. (2010) Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Death and Salvation, in Better
Consciousness: Schopenhauer's Philosophy of Value (eds A. Neill and C. Janaway), Wiley-
Blackwell, Oxford, UK)

Schopenhauers doctrine of salvation, as we have noted, is really the provision of a consolation for death. Its
foundation lies in the evident consequence of idealism that the true self, the dreamer of the dream of life, is
untouched by death. The question, though, is whether this doctrine is really consoling at all. For if the claim, repeatedly
made in Book II, that the thing in itself is the will is true, than the real self has to be the will, the one and only ultimately real entity.
But, Schopenhauer holds, the will is both the bearer39 of all the worlds pains, past, present and
future, and also their source: as the only reality, it has to be the source of everything and is therefore responsible for the
fact that life is suffering, for the fact that the world is the worst of all possible worlds40 since it possesses the
character of a concentration camp. The Will is, therefore, fundamentally evil: at bottom, Schopenhauer says,
nature is not divine but demonic, devilish.41 There is therefore, an eternal justice in the world; an exact balance
between the wickedness of its essence and the wretchedness of its fate.42 But if that is what our true self is then, far from receiving
consolation in the face of death, to realise the character of ones true self is to descend into a realm of cosmic self-disgust.
Acceptance of Schopenhauers philosophy then becomes a descent into a terrible kind of madness. Life
is suffering and so
not worth living. But suicide is not worth contemplating either, since death merely transforms
personal into cosmic sufferingwhich one thoroughly deserves on account of being
fundamentally evil. So ones choice is between hell and hell. In a word, if the will is the thing in itself then
there can be no doctrine of salvation in Schopenhauers philosophy.43 But, of course, there is such a doctrine. The mystics, as we
have seen (p. 312 above), know about it, know that the reality beyond the dream is divine, the object of ecstatic, pantheistic
consciousness. So Nietzsche is absolutely right: at the heart of The World as Will is a crippling contradiction, a contradiction
between the conclusion of Book II and the conclusion of Book IV. At the end of Book II reality is at bottom demonic. At the end of
Book IV it is at bottom divine. Only the fact that several hundred pages separate the two conclusions makes it possible to miss this
contradiction. Nietzsche, as we saw, reports that in old age Schopenhauer admitted that his philosophy had not solved the most
difficult problems of philosophy (p. 316 above). This is correct. What Nietzsche is referring to is the fact that in the later, expanded,
1844 edition of the masterwork Schopenhauer begins to severely qualify the earlier, bald assertion, made in the intoxication of
youth, that the will is the thing in itself: he now begins to pepper the works new, second volume with remarks like the
question of what that will which manifests itself in the world and as the world is ultimately and
absolutely in itself . . . can never be answered.44 But given the avidity with which Nietzsche and his fellow disciples
pounced upon any scrap of information they could discover about the master, he may also have known of a letter Schopenhauer
wrote to his literary executor, Julius Frauenstadt, eight years before his death, in which he says that his philosophy only
seeks to describe the thing in itself in relation to [i.e. as] appearance. What the thing in itself is
apart from that relation Schopenhauer continues, he does not say because I do not know what
it is.45 The effect of this is to withdraw will to the appearance side of the appearance/reality dichotomy. Though will
provides a deeper account of the world than its description in terms of material bodies, the
world it describes remains in the realm of appearance. Will is, then, as one might loosely put it, a description of
penultimate rather than of ultimate reality. In the final analysis, the willas willbelongs to the dream. In the end, then,
Schopenhauer reaffirms Kants position that the thing
in itself is, to philosophy at least, unknowable. And this
resolves the contradiction in his thinking, makes genuine room for the doctrine of salvation. (It is,
perhaps, not without significance that he did this towards the end of his life; at a time, that is, when he himself would have been in
increasing need of consolation in the face of death.) And it is this position which, under Langes influence, Nietzsche endorsed;
happily endorsed, since, it allowed him to find in Schopenhauer, after all, the satisfaction of his metaphysical need for comfort in
the face of death, a comfort he could no longer find in Christianity.
The Will is egoistic and compels those aware of their individuality to work
toward protecting it Compassion is the one form of good character and is only
possible when the knowledge of the illusion of individuality is embodied This
denies the will and only happens in art and in death
Winkler 13 (Winkler, Robin. "SCHOPENHAUER'S CRITIQUE OF MORALISTIC THEORIES OF THE
STATE." History of Political Thought 34.2 (2013): 296-323.)

The analytical starting point of Schopenhauers moral theory was his empirical observation that the main and fundamental
driving force in man, just as in animals, is egoism, i.e. the drive towards existence and well-being.21 In Schopenhauers
view, the magnitude and scope of human egoism was subject to virtually no constraints. Throughout
his career, he devoted large parts of his philosophical oeuvre to showing empirically that egoism, being the individuated
manifestation of the will to live that constitutes the metaphysical essence of the world, consisted in the disposition to disregard the
will to life of other individuals and to be willing to sacrifice their existence and well-being. In one of the darkest, yet also most
cynically cheerful passages in his writings, Schopenhauer suggested that the infinite degree to which egoism manifests itself in
human beings was epitomized by the hyperbole that many
a human being would be ready to strike another
dead simply to smear his boots with the others fat.22 In his typically ironic manner, he added to this that a
scruple still remains in me as to whether it really is a hyperbole.23 This psychological axiom shaped the
formation of Schopenhauers philosophical thinking and recurred in his writings from his early youth onwards, though he expressed
it most clearly in his later Preisschrift ber die Grundlage der Moral. While Schopenhauer considered egoism to be the dominant
character trait in almost all beings, he also maintained that in some human beings this egoistic disposition was coupled with pure
malice, i.e. the desire to harm others without thereby accruing any benefit for oneself. The distinction between egoism and pure
malice is straightforward: Egoism
can lead to crimes and misdeeds of all kinds: but the harm and pain
of others that is thereby caused is merely a means for egoism, not an end, and thus occurs only
accidentally.24 By contrast, for malice . . . the sufferings and pains of others are an end in
themselves and achieving them is a pleasure.25 Egoism and malice, then, were the two anti-moral or,
synonymously, amoral springs of human behaviour. In juxtaposition with his descriptions of this dark side of human nature,26
Schopenhauer stipulated the existence of a positive moral spring which was equally innate in human character. It is important that
Schopenhauer, unlike other thinkers of the period, did not conceive of human beings as being universally malicious or egoistic.
Medieval and early modern Christian thinkers in particular had claimed that people were innately egoistic or bad, and that their
nature needed to be restrained through some external force or motives. This contradicted Schopenhauers immanentist conception
of the moral good. He stressed that the
force for human good had been identified for too long with a
machinery from another world,27 that is, with gods and their commands. For Schopenhauer, all
actions called forth by motives of such a kind would always be rooted in sheer egoism.28 And
egoism is an amoral spring for potentially morally reprehensible acts. Rather, therefore, moral philosophy had to look for an
immanent moral spring, such as sympathy or compassion (Mitleid).29 Mitleid was the psychological source of virtuous behaviour.
Thus far, the explication of Schopenhauers moral theory has followed what he called the analytical derivation. This analytic
derivation, according to him, was premised on facts either of outer experience or of consciousness.30 It was sufficient in
formalizing common sense morality, but Schopenhauer admitted that the whole explanation remains a merely psychological
one.31 The question as to why egoism should be amoral, and why compassion, out of all sentiments, should be moral, remains
inconclusive if answered with exclusive reference to common morals as empirically observed. Schopenhauer knew that the
analytical derivation was insufficient and would not convince German metaphysicians who, despite repeated claims to
the contrary, were his target audience. He thus proffered a synthetic argument by way of grounding his moral theory
metaphysically: The
grounding fact that egoism was amoral would itself be able to be grounded in
turn, if one were permitted to treat metaphysics first and, proceeding synthetically, to derive
ethics from it.32 Schopenhauer was aware, however that this metaphysical proof would require the construction of a
comprehensive philosophical system.33 Schopenhauer worked on this system throughout his life, and the argument linking his
ethics with his metaphysics is rather complex. Fortunately, the essay on Die Grundlage der Moral contains a succinct prcis of the
metaphysical foundations of his ethics, even though Schopenhauer admitted that these merely amounted to quite general sketches,
allusions rather than expositions, to show the path that leads to the destination here, but not follow it right to the end.34According
to Schopenhauer, egoism depends on individuation. Individuation requires a plurality of individuals
who perceive themselves as separate from other individuals.35 The concept of a plurality, further,
depends on the existence of space and time: It is possible through these alone, since the many can only be thought
and represented either as alongside one another, or as after one another.36 Schopenhauer posits that time and
space are forms of our own faculty of intuition, belong to it and not to the things cognized
through it, and so can never be a determination of things in themselves, but rather pertain only
to the appearance of them, this being possible solely in our consciousness of the external world
limited by physiological conditions.37 Schopenhauer thus follows Kants transcendental idealism in arguing that time
and space are alien to the thing in itself, i.e. to the true essence of the world. And if space and time defy the
metaphysical essence of the world, then necessarily plurality is foreign to it also: consequently in the countless
appearances of this world of the senses it can really be only one, and only the one and identical essence can manifest itself in all of
these.38 Since thenotion of individuality, on which egoism hinges, is therefore an intellectual illusion
which fails to represent the true essence of the world, it follows conversely that the metaphysical basis
of ethics . . . would consist in the individuals recognition of himself, his true essence, in the
other.39 This true essence is the will. Schopenhauer devoted the first book of Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung to demonstrating
that an epistemology that seeks to grasp the truth of the world intellectually cannot possibly
comprehend this metaphysics, and thus its ethical implications, since the intellect is necessarily caught in
the principle of individuation. For it cannot think outside the categories of causality, time and
space. The select few, however, saints and artists, have access to this metaphysical truth thanks to
their ethical disposition or intuition, and they are thus capable of effacing the purely intellectual
distinction between their own interests and those of others: they are compassionate. Those who are
caught in the illusory principle of individuation, by contrast, see the world from the point of view of their own egocentric
individuality, and are therefore egoistic or even malicious. The predominance of one or the other of these two modes of knowledge
that is, recognizing
the world as having the will as its unitary essence versus being stuck in the
illusion of plurality, in which form the world represents itself to the intellect shows itself not
only in particular actions, but in the overall type of consciousness or mood, which in the good
character is so essentially different from that in the bad. The latter senses everywhere a strong
dividing wall between himself and everything outside him.40 Character, then, is the link between
the world as will and the world as representation. In the latter, the will manifests itself in the innate character of
individuals. Behaviour is then determined by character and the cognitive motives interacting with character in a deterministic world
of representation. It is crucial to note that only motives pertain to the world of representation, i.e. the realm of space and time;
the ethical disposition of individuals, is determined by the objectification of the will
character, i.e.
and has no roots in the world of representation. It stands outside time, space and causality.

The aesthetic experience requires abolition of the individual will.

Neill 08 (Professor Alex Neill is the Vice-President (Education) and a Professor of Philosophy
at the University of Southampton. Better Consciousness Edited by Jakob Lindgaard.
P)s
Understanding Schopenhauers conception of aesthetic experience (and indeed his aesthetic
theory as a whole) thus depends on getting clear about just what he takes the abolition of
individuality to involve. To begin with, we should note that he understands individuality in terms
of the embodiment of a knowing subject: as he puts it at first, the subject of knowing . . .
appears as an individual only through his identity with his body (WWR I: 100). A few pages later,
he refines this claim, stating that The knowing subject is an individual precisely by reason of this
special relation to the one body which, considered apart from this, is for him only a
representation among all his representations (WWR I: 103, my emphasis). The special relation
between knowing subject and body that Schopenhauer refers to here is not that of identity, but
rather concerns the way in which an individual knowing subject is conscious of his body; it is an
epistemological, rather than a logical, relation. To summarise very briefly, his thesis is that we
have double knowledge of our own body. On the one hand, an individuals body appears as
mere representation of the knowing subject, like all the other objects of this world of
perception. However, it also occurs in consciousness in quite another way, toto genere
different: the individual is conscious of his body as an expression or manifestation of his will.
My body, as he puts it, is the objectivity of my will (ibid.). And it is by reason of my
consciousness of my body as the objectification of my will that I am conscious of myself as
indeed, that I aman individual. Schopenhauers argument on this matter is fraught with
difficulties. But for my purposes here, what is important is the conclusion that he wants to
establish, which is that an individual comprises a knowing subject and a willing subject, or, more
prosaically, an intellect and a will.3 For it is the nature of the relationship between intellect and
will, as Schopenhauer understands it, that restricts the individual as such to knowledge
structured by the forms of the principle of sufficient reason, and that makes knowledge of the
Ideasand hence aesthetic experienceunattainable for the subject who knows as an
individual. In contrast to the familiar philosophical thought that the true and real inner nature
or kernel of man is his knowing consciousnessthe thought, that is, that man is essentially a
rational animal, or a soul, or res cogitansSchopenhauer holds that at the core of individuality
is the individual will, which is related to consciousness, in other words to knowledge, [to
intellect,] as substance to accident, as something illuminated to light, as the string to the
sounding board (WWR II: 199). Intellect, he maintains, turns out to be what is secondary,
subordinate, and conditioned (WWR II: 198): it is both dependent on and subservient to the
individual will. And that will has, so to speak, limited interests: what it aims at and attains in
man is essentially the same as . . . what its goal is in the animal, nourishment and propagation
(WWR II: 27980). The individual will, in short, is concerned with other things only insofar as
they have anything to do with its own maintenance and survival, which is to say, with things as
they stand in relation to it. Thus an intellect working in subordination or subservience to an
individual willwhich is just what it is for a knowing subject to know as an individualreally
knows mere relations of things, primarily their relations to the will itself, to which it belongs, . . .
but also, with a view to the completeness of this knowledge, the relations of things to one
another (WWR II: 363). Again, As it is the principle of sufficient reason that places . . . objects in
. . . relation to the body and so to the will, the sole endeavour of knowledge, serving this will,
will be to get to know concerning objects just those relations that are laid down by the principle
of sufficient reason, and thus to follow their many different connexions in space, time and
causality. For only through these is the object interesting to the individual, in other words, has it
a relation to the will. (WWR I: 177) Schopenhauers thought, then, is that the individual knowing
subject is restricted to knowledge governed by the forms of the principle of sufficient reason
inasmuch as in such a subject intellect is subordinate to and conditioned by an individual will
that is concerned only with things constituted under the forms of that principle. We are now in a
position to see what Schopenhauer is getting at in his talk of the abolition of individuality as a
precondition of intuitive knowledge of the Ideas and thus of aesthetic experience. His argument,
in effect, is this: in order to have intuitive knowledge of the Ideas, which do not enter into
the principle of sufficient reason, intellect must be capable of cognition that is not conditioned
by the forms of that principle; intellect functioning in subordination to an individual will is
restricted to cognition that is so conditioned; only for a subject in whom ntellect is not
functioning in subordination to an individual will, therefore, will knowledge of the Ideas be
available. What the abolition of individuality must amount to, thenwhat intuitive knowledge
of the Ideas, and hence aesthetic experience, depends onis the functioning of intellect
unconstrained by the demands of an individual will: the emancipation, so to speak, of intellect
from its subordination to the individual will. An essential characteristic of aesthetic experience,
as Schopenhauer conceives it, is thus its will-lessnessthis is his distinctive take on the familiar
thought that aesthetic experience is defined in terms of its disinterestedness. Whether or not
the conception of aesthetic experience as fundamentally will-less is remotely plausible is an
issue that has been taken up by a number of commentators.4 Less often consideredor indeed,
even noticedis that it is questionable whether this idea, whatever its plausibility, is one to
which Schopenhauer is really entitled. This latter question becomes unignorable, however,
when we look more closely at the theoretical underpinnings of his conception of intellect as
essentially conditioned by, or subordinate to, will. For in light of these, it is far from clear how
Schopenhauer can consistently regard the functioning of intellect unconstrained by the
demands of an individual willand hence aesthetic experience, as he conceives itas so much
as possible. The thought that underlies Schopenhauers conception of the relation between an
individual will and intellect is that the former, like everything else in the world of representation,
is a manifestation or objectification of Will, the innermost essence of the world.5 He argues
that the higher the grade of objectification, or Idea, that an individual will represents or
instantiates (that is to say, the more complete or adequate an expression of the nature of Will
it is), the more various will be that wills needs, and the more complex the conditions required
for its maintenance and flourishing. And Schopenhauers hypothesis is that intellect evolved, as
it were, in order to meet those needs and help satisfy those conditions.

Suffering good, leads to denial of the will.

Singh 10 (R. Raj Singh is Professor (B.A., M.A., Panjab ; M.A. Brock ; Ph.D.
Ottawa) Department of Philosophy @ Brock University. From schopenhauer a guide for the
perplexed chapter 5.)

Schopenhauer says that most people who choose the path of the denial of the will very often do
so after encountering personal sufferings. A major loss or disappointment can be a catalyst for a
spiritual conversion that prompts a complete resignation and ascetic life. Only a chosen few are
lead by pure knowledge to practise the denial of the will. These are the persons who are greatly
affected by the sufferings of the world in general and are able to see through the principium
individuationis and be overwhelmed by universal love of mankind. They recognize in the
sufferings of others their own suffering and, through a vision of their universal self, they want
no better life for themselves than the lot of the bulk of suffering humanity. Whether one is
converted by personal suffering and hopelessness or through empathy with the sufferings of
others, the denial of the will is related to suffering and its practice involves voluntary embracing
of selfdenial and rejection of what the world calls the good life. This practice has been aptly
called the practice or the rehearsal of death or a true philosophical life by Socrates.
Schopenhauer describes such a practitioner of the wills denial as follows: We see him know
himself and the world, change his whole nature, rise above himself and all suffering, as if
purified and sanctified by it, in inviolable peace, bliss and sublimity, willingly renounce
everything he formerly desired with the greatest vehemence, and gladly welcome death. (W-I,
393) In many cases, the experience of suffering serves as a catalyst for a life of the wills
denial. For some, death being near at hand and hopelessness is the cause of their renunciation.
For some others, it can be a sudden misfortune or setback that leads them to realize the vanity
of all endeavour. Sometimes kings, heroes and adventurers, suddenly convert to being hermits
and monks. Schopenhauer cites the cases of two such conversions: Raymond Lull, who after
suddenly witnessing the cancer-eaten bosom of his ladylove, gave up royalty and went on to a
hermits life; Abbe de Rance, whose youth was spent in pursuit of pleasures, suddenly stumbled
against the severed head of his beloved Madame de Montebazon, later became the chief
reformer of La Trappe monastic order in France. He revitalized this group of ascetics, whose
monks are known to this day for severe austerities and utmost humility. Such examples of
conversions are not confined to the previously rich and powerful, but at times even the
hardened criminals, convert to a spiritual outlook while face to face with their impending
execution. Schopenhauer records several socalled gallows-sermons delivered by such convicts
shortly before their execution, remarkable for their spiritual insight (W-II, 631). These accounts
were obviously culled by Schopenhauer from his daily readings of The Times and other English
newspapers. This shows how down-to-earth and directly related to everyday life
Schopenhauers philosophy is. Suffering contains within it a sanctifying force, according to
Schopenhauer. This is because suffering makes one humble and resigns oneself to reality. But
the sufferer . . . is worthy of reverence only when his glance has been raised from the particular
to the universal, and when he regards his own suffering merely as an example of the whole . . .
so that the whole of life conceived as essential suffering, thus brings him to resignation (W-I,
396).
 Compassion
Compassion causes humans to do good things.
CARTWRIGHT 11. (David E. Cartwright is a professor in the department of Philosophy and Religious Studies,
University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, and he is the Director of the North American Division of the Schopenhauer
Society. From A Companion to Schopenhauer chapter 17.)

Schopenhauer argued that compassionate agents come to treat anothers woe as their own,
only through the other person becoming the ultimate object of my will in the same way I myself
otherwise am, and hence through my directly desiring his weal and not his woe just
Schopenhauer on the value of compassion as immediately as I ordinarily do only my own. But
this necessarily presupposes that, in the case of his woe as such I suffer directly with him [ ich
geradezu mit leide], I feel his woe just as I ordinarily feel only my own . . . But this requires that I
am in some way identied with him, in other words, that this entire difference between me and
everyone else, which is the very basis of my egoism, is eliminated, to a certain extent at least...
However, the process here analyzed is not one that is imagined or invented; on the contrary, it
is perfectly real and indeed by no means infrequent. It is the everyday phenomenon of
compassion, of the immediate participation [ Teilnahme], independent of all ulterior
considerations, primarily in the suffering of another, and thus in the prevention or elimination of
it; for all satisfaction and wellbeing and happiness consist in this. (BM, 143 44) Schopenhauers
conception of compassion can be detailed by the following analytical model, which I have
presented in an altered form elsewhere (Cartwright 1 982, 63): A has compassion for B, if and
only if i) A and B are sentient beings; ii) A cognizes that B will be or is suffering; iii) A feels sorrow
for B; iv) A participates immediately in B s suffering; v) A desires B s well - being; and vi) A is
disposed to prevent or eliminate B s suffering, and other things being equal, A will act to
prevent or eliminate B s suffering. With the exception of iv), the features he attributed to
compassion are relatively uncontroversial and straightforward. Before I turn to his claim that A
participates immediately in Bs suffering, I will make some brief supporting remarks for the
other ve features. Condition i), that compassion is a relationship between sentient beings, is
uncontroversial. One could not have compassion for a mountain, nor could a mountain have it
for you; nor could you have compassion for a rose or a rose for you. Nonsentient beings lack
both the cognitive and affective capacities to be an agent or patient for this fellow feeling. It
would be an extreme form of anthropomorphism to think that members of inorganic nature and
the plant kingdom could suffer or respond to suffering. But, because nonhuman animals can
suffer, Schopenhauer includes them as patients of compassion, and a novel feature of his view is
that he held that higher nonhuman animals can be compassionate agents (BM, 151). That
compassion involves some type of cognition of anothers suffering, condition ii), also seems
uncontroversial. To respond compassionately to another requires some recognition of another
and that the other will be or is suffering. It would also appear that compassion must involve the
cognition of anothers suffering and that it would be misplaced to have compassion for
anothers happiness, unless it portended the others future suffering. For example, it is not the
drunks euphoric state that I compassionate, but it is for the terrible cost and toil it is taking on
his liver and the future suffering the drunk will face because of this vice. That a compassionate
agent is emotionally affected by the others suffering and that this is something like sorrow,
condition iii), is necessary, since compassion must be distinguished from the mere indifferent
recognition of suffering, and this response must be negative in tone, otherwise you have an
affective response like Schadenfreude. Condition v), that a compassionate agent desires the
patients well- being, which is exactly Schopenhauers description of the incentive of
compassion, captures the conative element of compassion, explaining why condition vi) is the
case. It is because compassion involves the desire for anothers well- being that a
compassionate agent is disposed to prevent or relieve suffering. Both of these last two
conditions distinguish compassion from sympathy (Sympathie) and empathy ( Einf hlung) ,
which both lack the conation to aid another and can be felt towards either another s joy or
pain. C ondition iv), that a compassionate agent participates immediately in anothers suffering,
is the problematic feature of Schopenhauers view of the nature of compassion. He rejected any
attempt to explain this phenomenon psychologically, and he explicitly repudiated that of the
Italian philosopher Ubaldo Cassina, who argued in Saggio analytico sulla compassione (1788)
that compassion arises from an instantaneous deception of the imagination in which
compassionate people put themselves in the position of the sufferer, having the idea that they
are suffering the other s pain in their person. Schopenhauer rejected Cassinas claims that
compassionate people imagine others suffering and they experience the others suffering in
their own bodies. Instead, he argued: This is no means the case; on the contrary, at every
moment we remain clearly conscious that he is the sufferer, not we; and it is precisely in his
person, not in ours, that we feel the suffering, to our grief and sorrow. We suffer with him and
in him [ Wir leiden mit ihm, also in ihm]; we feel his pain as his , and do not imagine that it is
ours. (BM, 147) In rejecting Cassina, Schopenhauer claimed that compassion involves the
extraordinary experience of anothers pain in the others body. Due to this extraordinary
experience, he called compassion the great mystery of ethics, and he claimed that it requires a
metaphysical explanation (BM, 144). Employing a term that he took from Goethe, he called
compassion the primary phenomenon [ Urph nomen] of morally worthwhile actions; that
which explains all such actions but which cannot be explained by any of these actions.
Metaphysics provides, he argued, a nal explanation of primary phenomena as such, and,
when taken collectively, of the world (BM, 199). Schopenhauer did not present any evidence
for the existence of this extraordinary experience of another s pain in anothers body. How is it
possible to experience anothers pain in the others body? It would seem that what makes the
experience of pain my experience of pain is that I alone immediately experience it, and if this is
the case, I cannot have the experience of anothers pain. Moreover, if I experience pain and
claim to experience this pain in anothers body, Cassina is probably correct that this is some sort
of deceptive idea. Certainly, I could have an experience of pain like that of another. For example,
we may both suffer grief at the loss of the same loved one, or we could have our right legs
broken in the same car crash. Yet our pains, while analogous and suffered at the same time, are
distinct events. I have argued that an adequate account of compassion does not require this sort
of extraordinary experience and that by including it in his analysis of compassion, Schopenhauer
cannot derive the virtue of justice from this fellow feeling (Cartwright 1 982). Compassion, he
argued, inhibits us from doing something that would harm another that would cause another s
woe. But, this woe is in the future and does not exist. If it does not exist, it is impossible for me
to feel it in another s body. It would seem that if it is compassion for anothers future suffering
that moves me not to act in a certain way, it is because I can imagine what the other would feel
if I were to act in that way, or I know, based on past experience, that others were harmed when
I acted as I planned. Moreover, Schopenhauer recognized what could be called compassion at a
distance, feeling compassion for others beyond ones immediate experience, such as
compassionating victims of a natural disaster in some distant land. One could imagine how one
would feel in such circumstances to have a sense of their suffering and this could awaken one s
compassion and move one to contribute resources for aiding the victims. Schopenhauer,
moreover, recognized the role of the imagination in evoking compassion in his analysis of the
phenomenon of weeping, which he viewed as the response of compassion for ourselves
(WWR I, 377), and in his analysis of the means by which righteous people can maintain their
resolve to follow principles by reawakening compassion: Nothing will bring us back to the path
of justice so readily as the idea [ Vorstellung ] of the trouble, grief, and lamentation of the loser
(BM, 152). Schopenhauer's account of compassion would be more adequate if he dropped the
claim that it involves the agent literally suffering with another by experiencing anothers pain in
the others body, and if he viewed the experience of anothers woe, in some instances, as
something imagined.
2AC A2s
 No Solvency

Thinking about death only produces anguish at the thought of our limited
existence the only way to break free is to realize that our existence and death
are limited to our individuality. The Will is eternal and everlasting accessing it
is key
Vasalou 13 (Sophia Vasalou is Research Fellow at New York University Abu Dhabi and
Honorary Research Associate at Oxford Brookes University. Schopenhauer and the Aesthetic
Standpoint. 2013. Pg 41-45)//jl

In the last chapter, I suggested that an inward turn defined the standpoint of philosophy for
Schopenhauer in two related senses. Philosophy was inward-looking in turning to the subject to
understand the mode of appearance of external objects. But philosophy was also inward-looking
in turning to the self-experience of the subject to find a pathway that led beyond appearances,
and to the thing-in-itself. In both cases, doing philosophy meant turning inward: away from the
representation; into the depths of what lies within.

Yet that, I will be suggesting in this chapter, cannot provide us with the whole story about how
philosophy is done. To find the sharp point of a wedge into a fuller account, there can be no
better way of proceeding than by turning back to consider the moment that gives philosophy its
beginning. And this is a moment that Schopenhauer, remaining faithful to the experiential
commitments of his philosophy, would identify in profoundly existential terms. The search for
an understanding of reality, it has sometimes been said, is grounded in the sense of human
vulnerability. The search for certainty and for the ultimate ground, as Leszek Koakowski
remarks for a world of which the origin, rules and destiny we can grasp is the expression
of the experience of human fragility.1

It was this intuition that Schopenhauer was expressing in his turn when he put down the origin
of metaphysics to the problem of suffering; and more specifically, to the anguish produced by
the prospect of our own death (WWR ii:161). Standing behind our fear of death of our non-
being as the ground of its possibility was the crucial human ability, both blessing and curse, to
be surprised at our own being. No beings, with the exception of man, Schopenhauer opens his
essay On Mans Need for Metaphysics to say, feel surprised at their own existence, but to all
of them it is so much a matter of course that they do not notice it. It is only as the will the
inner being of nature reaches reflection in human being that this surprise becomes possible to
it. Nature then marvels at its own works, and asks itself what it itself is. And its wonder is the
more serious, as here for the first time it stands consciously face to face with death (WWR
ii:160).

It was this existential confrontation that Schopenhauer placed at the root of metaphysical
inquiry, and implicitly his own. It has been said indeed that the problem of death constituted
Schopenhauers deepest motivating concern, and the problem against which his philosophy was
measured for its success. It is death, Michael Fox writes, that ultimately preoccupied
Schopenhauer, forming the hub of the wheel from which all of his various doctrines radiate
like spokes The confidence with which Schopenhauer assessed his own contribution to
philosophy can and should be seen as giving expression, in part, to his satisfaction at having
overcome the fear of death through systematic, rational reflection.2

How, then, had the fear of death been overcome? Yet in approaching this question, something
more needs to be said concerning the presence of this fear in our lives. For the fear of death
may provide philosophy with its starting point when it arises; yet how often does it in fact do
so? Death, for all the engrossing interest philosophy has historically taken in it, in other ways
appears to be singularly absent from the concrete present of our ordinary experience. We go
about everyday life as if death simply did not concern us. As if this internal human relation to
mystery to that which resists comprehension3 was not internal at all; as if, to use
Schopenhauers phrase, we were eternal: everyone lives on as though he is bound to live for
ever (WWR i:281). Other philosophers, like the Epicurean Lucretius, might have here proposed
subtle psychological interventions for discerning the fear of death that pervades our seemingly
carefree everyday existence.4 More recent philosophers might offer the thought that this fear,
or its conditioning awareness of death for all its constitutive role as an internal relation
must be an achievement. But for Schopenhauer, the next step lies elsewhere.

There is in fact a noticeable tension that runs through Schopenhauers remarks concerning the
epistemic availability of the notion of our own non-existence. At times, Schopenhauer speaks of
this prospect as a firm epistemic possession: man alone carries about with him in abstract
concepts the certainty of his own death. Yet this, he immediately continues, can frighten
him only very rarely and at particular moments. And in the next moment, the initial positive
affirmation has given way to something far weaker: it might be said that no one has a really
lively conviction of the certainty of his own death (WWR i:281). This denial assumes more
categorical tones elsewhere, as when Schopenhauer refers to our deep conviction of the
impossibility of our extermination by death a conviction so deep that our own death may
indeed be for us at bottom the most incredible thing in the world (WWR ii:487). If we can
represent our death at all, this is because of the temporal nature of our consciousness. Yet this
representation seems to constitute not only an extraordinary event, but indeed a veritably
unattainable one. The prospect of our own death is fundamentally inconceivable to us.

Yet it is precisely by attending to this tension more closely that the resolution to the fear that
stimulates philosophical inquiry can be identified. For a fear of death may indeed only
supervene at extraordinary moments and all we can say is that this is when philosophy will
need to be done. Yet philosophy will respond to our need in a manner that calls precisely upon
the truths already reflected in our resistance to being provoked to this fear, and our limited
capacity to fully assent to our representation of this eventuality. If we ordinarily live in a state of
unquestioning absorption in the present, and if everything in our phenomenology suggests an
absence of doubt concerning our continued existence, this phenomenology can be subjected to
interpretation. On closer examination an examination that raises mere feeling to
reflectively appropriated insight according to philosophical procedure it turns out to contain
precisely the metaphysical truth we require for our consolation. For our phenomenology,
Schopenhauer would suggest or rather, that aspect of our phenomenology that registers as
the dominant chord is simply an expression of our true inner nature. Our sense of
endlessness reflects a primitive certainty that there is something positively imperishable and
indestructible in us and a consciousness of our original and eternal nature (WWR ii:496,
487). And this, of course, is in the first place our inner nature as will; and on another level, our
nature as representing subjects whose supra-individual consciousness conditions the world.5

It is not, thus, that one lives as though he is bound to live for ever but rather it is in fact the
case that one does. For our true nature does not reside in our character as individuals, which
can be affected by temporal events. Individuals, indeed, have no real existence; they exist only
in the knowledge of a representing subject, which is conditioned by time, space, and causality.
Untouched by the course of time and underlying the succession of appearances, by contrast,
our being-in-itself exists in an everlasting present (WWR ii:479). When we suddenly call up
a larger temporal perspective and the representation of our death impresses us with its
inevitability, the anguish we experience belongs to us in our identity as individual beings that
are phenomena of the will. The tension between the two certainties the certainty that we
will die, the certainty that we cannot thus turns out to be a tension between two different
ways of experiencing ourselves: as individual phenomena, and as will. Appreciating this
distinction involves recognising that the greatest equivocation lies in the word I According
as I understand this word, I can say: Death is my entire end; or else: This my personal
phenomenal appearance is just as infinitely small a part of my true inner nature as I am of the
world (WWR ii:491).

Our astonishment at the finitude of our consciousness, which arises only infrequently due to
the inertia of our truer nature, is ultimately grounded in an illusion the illusion of the
principium individuationis. To that extent, ones horror at ones prospective non-existence is as
ill-founded as the wonder with which every new individual greets his present existence, finding
himself so fresh and original, that he broods over himself in astonishment (WWR ii:501). From
the true metaphysical perspective, there is neither freshness to be found nor decay; the
concepts of duration and extinction themselves are borrowed from time that is merely the
form of the phenomenon, so that the constant arising of new beings and the perishing of
those that exist are to be regarded as an illusion (PP ii:269).

Dispelling this illusion thus involves an appropriation or indeed reappropriation of our true
identity, which can be framed as a rediscovery of the experience of endlessness interrupted by
the reflective representation of death. When this experience is disturbed through the intrusion
of a temporal perspective one deeply steeped in the illusions of individuality philosophy rises
to a higher perspective from which it can interpret the interrupted experience and
reappropriate its meaning at the level of reflection. Having come to grasp the true nature of the
world, we can now think, and not just feel, that we are endless.6 This involves shifting our
viewpoint to realise that our true identity lies not in our individual consciousness but in the
will of which it is a manifestation, and in the supra-individual subjectivity no less eternal in
kind through which this manifestation is achieved in its purest form.7
We dont have to explain solvency attempting to translate intuitive
knowledge into conceptual knowledge fails to capture the true state of the
aesthetic experiences
Shapshay 12 (Sandra Shapshay is Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at Indiana University. May 9,
2012. Schopenhauers Aesthetics, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Summer 2012
Edition, https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/schopenhauer-aesthetics/, Accessed July 14,
2017)//jl

In order to preserve for ourselves or to communicate intuitive knowledge to others, we may

try to show it or say it. If one is an artist, one might show such knowledge by attempting to
embody it in a work of art. But for non-artists, trying to say this knowledge means attempting
to capture it propositionally, and in so doing, for Schopenhauer, we translate intuitive into
conceptual knowledge by a process of abstraction. Unfortunately, something is inevitably lost
in the translation. Thus, Schopenhauer concludes, Kant's starting pointthe aesthetic
judgmentis already at one remove from true aesthetic experience. And since this remove is
not innocuous, insofar as the judgment does not faithfully transmit the richness of the
experience, the aesthetic judgment constitutes the wrong focus for aesthetic theorizing.
 Music Bad
Music is the best way to access and express the will
Shapshay 12 (Sandra Shapshay is Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at Indiana University. May 9,
2012. Schopenhauers Aesthetics, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Summer 2012
Edition, https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/schopenhauer-aesthetics/, Accessed July 14,
2017)//jl

No wonder that Schopenhauer was the darling of composers in the 19th and 20th centuries, for
he argued that music has a truly exceptional status among the arts and uniquely reveals the
essence of the in itself of the world. Music that affords such insightthe only music he deems
worthy of the nameis Classical/Romantic, non-programmatic music without a text, or what
was termed late in the 19th century, absolute music. Unlike all of the other arts, which
express or copy the Ideas (the essential features of the phenomenal world), Schopenhauer
affirmed that music expresses or copies the will qua thing in itself, bypassing the Ideas
altogether. This puts music and the Ideas on a par in terms of the directness of their expression
of the thing in itself (WWR I, 285). In order to understand Schopenhauer's reasoning for this
rather stunning view of the cognitive significance of music, one needs to pay attention to the
role of feeling in Schopenhauer's epistemology, and especially to the feeling of embodiment
that a subject can experience by attending to ordinary acts of volition.

It is the feeling of embodimentthe intuitive, immediate knowledge that one wills when, for
instance, one wills to raise one's armthat is monumentally significant for Schopenhauer in his
identification of the Kantian thing in itself with will. First-personal knowledge that one wills is
immediate, rather than inferred from observation, according to Schopenhauer, and is shorn of
all of the forms of the PSR (including space, causality, and even being-an-object-for-a-subject)
with one exception, the form of time.

Similarly, Schopenhauer holds that the experience of absolute music (music that does not
seek to imitate the phenomenal world and is unaccompanied by narrative or text), occurs in
time, but does not involve any of the other cognitive conditions on experience. Thus, like the
feeling of embodiment, Schopenhauer believes the experience of music brings us epistemically
closer to the essence of the world as willit is as direct an experience of the will qua thing in
itself as is possible for a human being to have. Absolutely direct experience of the will is
impossible, because it will always be mediated by time, but in first-personal experience of
volition and the experience of music the thing in itself is no longer veiled by our other forms of
cognitive conditioning. Thus, these experiences are epistemically distinctive and
metaphysically significant.

Since the will expresses itself in Ideas as well as in music, Schopenhauer reasons that there must
be analogies between them. Indeed, he draws out many such structural analogies: between the
bass notes of harmony and the lower grades of objectification of the will in inorganic nature;
between melody and the human being's most secret story, that is, every emotion, every
striving, every movement of the will, everything that reason collects under the broad and
negative concept of feeling (WWR I, 287); rhythms such as those of dance music are analogous
to easy, common happiness, while the allegro maestoso corresponds to grand, noble strivings
after distant goals; the inexhaustibility of possible melodies is analogous to the
inexhaustibility of nature in the variety of individuals, physiognomies and life histories. (WWR
I, 288).

Notwithstanding these and many other analogies Schopenhauer draws between music and the
Ideas, he underscores the notion that music does not imitate appearances, but rather
expresses the will as directly as possible. It does this predominantly by expressing universal
feelings:

it does not express this or that individual or particular joy, this or that sorrow or pain or horror
or exaltation or cheerfulness or peace of mind, but rather joy, sorrow, pain, horror, exaltation,
cheerfulness and peace of mind as such in themselves, abstractly, (WWR I, 289)

He supports this account of music first as an inference to the best explanation. By the third book
of his main work, Schopenhauer takes for granted that the reader has been at least somewhat
convinced by the metaphysics for which he has argued. In addition, Schopenhauer holds that
people often feel that music is the most powerful of all the arts, affording a profound pleasure
with which we see the deepest recesses of our nature find expression. And he draws our
attention to what today we might call, the soundtrack effect, i.e.,

the fact that, when music suitable to any scene, action, event, or environment is played, it
seems to disclose to us its most secret meaning, and appears to be the most accurate and
distinct commentary on it. (WWR I, 262)

Finally, for Schopenhauer, to the man who gives himself up entirely to the impression of a
symphony, it is as if he saw all the possible events of life and of the world passing by within
himself yet without being able to pinpoint any likeness of events in life to the music he has
experienced. Given all of this, Schopenhauer believes his explanationmusic is a copy of the
will qua thing in itselfis justified as an inference to the best explanation of the experience,
power and significance of music in the lives of serious listeners. He believes that his metaphysics
of music finally does justice to the profound pleasure and significance that the musically
sensitive experience when listening to truly great music.

In addition to this inference to the best explanation, Schopenhauer also appeals to readers of
his theory to check it against their own experiences of music. And it is with respect to this
second way of supporting his account of music that, with admirable frankness, he confronts the
limits of his theorizing:

I recognize, however, that it is essentially impossible to demonstrate this explanation

[Aufschlu], for it assumes and establishes a relation of music as a representation to that
which of its essence can never be representation, and claims to regard music as the copy of an
original that can itself never be directly represented. Therefore, I can do no more than state
here at the end of this third book, devoted mainly to a consideration of the arts, this explanation
of the wonderful art of tones which is sufficient for me. I must leave the acceptance or denial of
my view to the effect that both music and the whole thought communicated in this work have
on each reader. Moreover, I regard it as necessary, in order that a man may assent with genuine
conviction to the explanation of the significance of music here to be given, that he should often
listen to music with constant reflection on this; and this again requires that he should be already
very familiar with the whole thought I expound. (WWR I, 257)

If a serious and sensitive listener heeds Schopenhauer's advice and listens often to music with
Schopenhauer's philosophy firmly in mind, and this listener is still not convinced by his theory,
what then? Schopenhauer concedes that in this case there is nothing more he can say.

Music, more so than the other arts, expresses the nature of all existence. It is an
expression of the innernature and essence of the world.
Hall 2012 [Robert Hall was a professor at the University of Vermont Hall, R. W.
(2012) Schopenhauer's Philosophy of Music, in A Companion to Schopenhauer
(ed B. Vandenabeele), Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford, UK.
doi: 10.1002/9781444347579.ch11
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/store/10.1002/97814443475
79.ch11/asset/ch11.pdf?v=1&t=j54bf7hx&s=029335224d042597ea9185e95fa1f9
64601ef637] //JW

Some may contend that Schopenhauers definition of philosophy precluded his having a
philosophy of music. According to the German philosopher, philosophys task was to reproduce
knowledge of perception which was concrete in the abstract; to present to rational knowledge
the whole manifold of the world in general, according to its nature, condensed and summarized
into a few abstract concepts (WWR I, 82). But Schopenhauer noted that the fine arts, like
philosophy work at bottom towards the solution of the problem of existence (WWR II, 406).
But unlike the arts, philosophy sought to understand the problem of existence through the
language of reflection, relying on the attainment of permanent universal knowledge, that
condensed the whole manifold of the world into a few abstract concepts (WWR I, 82). Apart
from music, the fine arts answered the question What is life? through the nai ve and child-
like perception which was a fleeting image and was not the permanent universal knowledge
which philosophy sought. In contrast to the fragmentary character of the answer the fine arts
gave to the question, What is life?, Music also answers it, more profoundly . . . than do all
the other arts, since in a language intelligible with absolute directness, yet not capable of
translation into that of our faculty of reason, it expresses the innermost nature of all life and
existence (WWR II, 406). In a sense, then, the fine arts and philosophy were answers to the
same question. Because of this they were radically the same. In their capacity to deal with the
question What is life? the fine arts and philosophy differed. Schopenhauer asserted that music
could have had a phi- losophy if there had been success in realizing a detailed, accurate and
complete expla- nation of music which resulted in the repetition in concepts of what music
expressed. Such a success, however, was not achievable. Schopenhauer parodied Leibnizs
statement that music was an unconscious exer- cise in arithmetic in which the mind does not
know it is counting (WWR I, 256n.). Unlike Leibnizs lower point of view about music, music
considered empirically and externally as merely a means of grasping immediately and in the
concrete, larger numbers and more complex numerical ratios (WWR 1, 265), Schopenhauer
took a higher view of music. He affirmed that music is an unconscious exercise in metaphys- ics
in which the mind does not know it is philosophizing (WWR I, 264n.). Schopen- hauer clearly
implied that music had a philosophic character because it was a universal language and was
concerned for the being of the world; music if regarded as an expression of the world, is in
the highest degree a universal language (WWR I, 262). Further, music was an expression of
the inner nature of the world and offers a true and complete picture of the nature of the
world (WWR I, 260, 261; WWR II, 450). These expressions of the universality of music in
presenting the essence of the world came from an immediate, intuitive understanding without
any abstract, rational con- ception. Music was a copy of the will itself so that the world could
be termed embodied music as well as embodied will, although Schopenhauer believed that
music could exist apart from the world. Before dealing with the analogy between the universal
language of music and that of concepts which brings out their fundamental difference and
presents Schopenhau- ers conception of the essence of music, his treatment of the analogies
between the Ideas and music should be considered. Ideas, the direct objectification of the will
were copied by the fine arts, while music copied the will. Because both music and the Ideas in
different ways exemplified the will, Schopen- hauer introduced analogies between them to
explain his account of music. Unlike the Ideas, music never expressed the phenomenon, but only
its own inner nature as will. Music had but an indirect relation to phenomena. The analogies
revealed not musics essence, but only some of its external features, tones, imitative aspects of
melody and rhythm which were related to phenomena, and especially to the actions and
emotions of individuals. Schopenhauer warned that his explanation of music and its manifesta-
tion of the Ideas in the phenomenal world was not to be taken as a demonstration of the nature
of music and its meaning. It was impossible to demonstrate that music was a copy of what could
not be represented. But Schopenhauer believed that one could acquire a genuine conviction
about the meaning of music by constantly reflecting on his explanation while listening to music
and being very familiar with the whole thought he was expounding. The first analogy between
music and the Ideas turned on the correspondence between the classification of the Ideas and
the scales and tones of music. The ground bass corresponded to the Idea of organic matter, the
crudest mass from which eve- rything in the organic world developed. Schopenhauer extended
this analogy according to the laws of harmony which stipulated that the bass note could only be
accompanied by high notes which sounded simultaneously and automatically. This was parallel
to affirming that the natural world, its bodies and organizations, gradually developed into an
existence out of the planets mass. Those voices or notes close to the bass corre- sponded to the
Ideas of inorganic matter, those higher up on the scale, the tenor and alto, the plant and animal
kingdom. Completing the analogy between the classification of the Ideas and the scales and
tones of music, Schopenhauer likened the significant connections of one thought which
expressed the whole which melody brought with its high, single, principal voice, the soprano,
leading the whole, to the highest grade of the objectification of the will in the Idea of man.
Melody expressed the intellectual life and endeavor of man. Only man with his reasoning
capability could chart a life that looked at the past and considered the countless possibilities
before him and achieved a course of life which was therefore intellectual and connected as a
whole. In a second analogy, Schopenhauer revealed how melody showed the stresses, joys, and
disappointments that fell to man as the highest objectification of the Ideas. Melody . . .
portrays every agitation, every effort, every movement of the will which the faculty of reason
summarizes under . . . feeling and which cannot be further taken up into the abstraction of
reason (WWR I, 259). In addition to the different kinds of effort exerted by the will, melody also
expressed the will by ultimately finding again a harmonious interval and still more the keynote
(WWR I, 260). Different tempo changes in melody indicated different forms of the wills effort
and the pains and pleas- ures that resulted. Rapid melodies without significant changes were
cheerful. They paralleled the quick transition from wish to satisfaction, and then to a new wish
which constituted happiness and well being. Satisfaction won only after long delay was
likened to sad, slow melodies which strike painful discords and returned to the home key or
keynote only through many bars. Ordinary happiness easily obtained was reflected in the short,
intelligible phrases of rapid dance music. Through great phrases, long passages, and wide
deviations, the allegro maestoso reached a far-off goal through a greater, nobler effort.
Paralleling human boredom or languor was the sustained keynote. This intolerable effect
was approximated by very monotonous and meaningless melodies which were hardly musical.
Except for the last example of languor, these analogies between melody and different aspects of
human life offered a different view of the world of phenomena. Instead of misery, conflict, and
dissatisfaction, the melodies described by Schopenhauer speak of one satisfaction leading to
another, even of a final satisfaction when sooner or later a melody wound up at the home key.
Corresponding to the adagio, human suffering was not mean or ignominious but was a great
and noble endeavor. Because dissonances were disquieting and almost painful, they must be
resolved into consonance. The competitive and turbulent activity of the will as it appeared in the
individuality of phenomenal existence was not mirrored in these analogies. In them, music
expressed a relatively optimistic view of the world of appearance in contrast to the pessimism of
phenomenal existence discussed elsewhere in The World as Will and Representation.

We should enjoy music in its purity instead of trying to break it down, which
distorts it and adds something arbitrary, similar to putting pineapple on pizza. It
has more grounding in our nature than other arts.
Green 1930 Green, L. Dunton. Schopenhauer and Music. The Musical Quarterly,
vol. 16, no. 2, 1930, pp. 199206. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/738446.

Among the former the Ancients were pre-occupied with music's ethical (Plato), or its purely
scientific side (Aristoxenus), or both (Aristotle), rather than with its aesthetic aspect, and up to
the 19th century music receives much the same treatment. Rousseau inclines to technical,
Leibniz to mathematical explanations; Diderot to the fringe of an aesthetic solution of its
mysteries; Feuer Schelling, Hegel, tried but failed to come to grips with its fu mental principles.
Hegel might have succeeded, but the v vagueness and verbosity of his language, far from
illuminati obscured and confounded the issue. The one and only clearly worded, yet profound
and supremely artistic, that is, intuitive philosophy of music, comes from th man who wrote: The
true philosopher will always seek after light and clearness, and will endeavour to resemble a
Swiss lake, which through its peacefulness is able to unite great depth with great clearness, the
depth revealing itself precisely by the clearness, rather than a turbid, impetuous moun tain
torrent.' This man who in one sentence so admirably and tersely described his own style and
method and condemned those of his opponent, Hegel, was Arthur Schopenhauer. He was
singularly well-equipped for his task. From his father, a fairly wealthy and successful business
man-who, significantly for the pessimistic tendencies of his son, committed suicide under the
obsession that his business was going to wreck and ruin-he inherited the clarity of thought
without which it is impossible to succeed in trade. His artistic intuition came from his mother,
whose salon in Weimar was frequented by the greatest writers and artists of the day, men such
as Goethe, Schlegel, Grimm, Wieland, all of whom Schopen- hauer met in his youth. After
Weimar, four years at Dresden brought him contact with the world of music: the capital of Saxo
already known for its operatic and concert perform in Berlin, and lastly in Frankfurt, opera and
conce his chief distractions, and not a day passed without of practising the flute, his favourite
instrument, and only one he played efficiently. Here, then, was a philosopher for whom music w
an occasional pastime, but an integrant part of his l daily meditations. A mind so trained could
not fai by the immense and immediate effect of music on t and by the unmistakable nature and
the precision of on those who are sensitive to the art of sound, notw the complete absence of
any object in nature or an concept such as give birth to the other arts, paintin architecture or
poetry. Schopenhauer came to the conclusion that music must have deeper roots in human
nature than the other arts, and that whilst these are representations of external phenomena,
themselves symbols of the real essence of things is the representation of this essence itself, a
parallel fore, of the World as our intellect perceives it. The essence of things" for
Schopenhauer was the Will inherent in various forms in all visible objects, inorganic or organic,
the Will considered as unconscious impulse, exemplified by brute, sternly regulated striving
(as between gravitation and inertia) in the inorganic world, and in the organic by the infinitely
diversified manifestations of human volition. For Schopenhauer, then, direct representation of
Will. As he himself says:1 I admit that it is quite impossible to prove this prosposition. It posits
and assumes a relation of Music, considered as a representation with something the essence of
which cannot be represen Music itself the reflexion of an image which can never be
represented. But if we grant the hypothesis or, as Schopenhauer puts it, the analogy, it is
fraught with luminous aesthetic consequences. Schopenhauer himself, it is true, continues the
analogy in the manner of the mediaeval mystics, and I am afraid that however much we may
admire his ingenuity, we can hardly subscribe to the results as a credo of musical aesthetics. In a
long parenthesis he describes the bass or, as he puts it, the "groundbass," as comparable to the
lowest degree of the manifestation of Will in Nature-to the inorganic mass, the mass of the
Planet. "For that reason," he says a little later and, of course, quite wrongly, "the bass moves
only in large intervals, in thirds, fourths, and fifths, never in seconds (!?) except in the case of a
reversal of parts in double counterpoint (!)" and "a quick run or a trill in the low register cannot
even be imagined." It is a quaint example of the irresistible impulse of systematic philosophers
to imitate the methods of Procrustes and mercilessly remodel facts to fit in with their system.
We shall find similar instances as we go on. The next analogy is more illuminating and conforms
to musical theory such as Schopenhauer found it: 'The higher notes,' he goes on to say, 'are
formed by the harmonics of the fundamental tone; they sound simultaneously with that note
and it is a law of Harmony that only such notes may coincide with a bass note which in the
shape of harmonics contain that bass note. This is analogous to the fact that all bodies and
organisations of Nature must be considered as evolved by gradual development from the mass
of the Planet. The bass being the inorganic mass in Nature, it follows that the parts between
bass and soprano, alto and tenor, represent in a general way the steps along which inorganic
develops into organic life, even as within the musical fabric the definite intervals are parallel to
the definite steps of the objectivation of the Will-the definite species of Nature. The deviation
from the mathematical exactness of the intervals (by equal temperament or the tonality chosen
by the composer) is anal- ogous to the deviation of the individual from the type of the species.'
Schopenhauer, who loved analogies no less dearly than abstract reasoning, could not be
expected to stop half-way, and so he adds: 'Yea, the impure sounds which yield no definite
interval may be compared to the monstrous abortions resulting from two different species of
animals or from man and beast.' Further than that it seems impossible to go! These lowest and
inner parts which constitute Harmony, however, lack the cohesion and freedom which are the
privilege of Melody, "which alone moves rapidly and easily in modulations and runs"; and in
Melody, at last, Schopenhauer recognises the highest form of the objectivation of Will-the
conscious life and strife of Man. It will be seen at once that Schopenhauer's outlook on music
was specifically harmonic, a curious sign of the times in which he conceived and wrote his
"World as Will and Represen- tation," between the years 1814 and 1818. Beethoven was still
alive, Weber already well-known, Haydn only just dead; the time, therefore, in which the swing
over from polyphony to homophony, that dimly began with Bach, had made even greater strides
with the great heroes of the end of the 18 Ph. Emanuel Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven him its
zenith. Counterpoint was no longer an end in itself; musical minds considered it as a discipline,
but no longer terms; and although Schopenhauer, as we have see double counterpoint, it is
clear from what he say the passage quoted,1 that he was quite hazy as to what it meant. The
triumph of homophony explains Schopenhau session for pure melody, by which he meant what
w music with a simple accompaniment. Indeed, altho not go so far as to say that Rossini is the
greatest c ever lived, one feels from what he does say about composer gave him greater
pleasure. We shall see this later when we come to consider Schopenhauer's attitude towards
opera. I have said that our philosopher's hypothesis as to the essential nature of music is fraught
with illuminating aesthetic consequences. Listen to what he has to say about the essence of
melody: As the essence of man consists in this, that his will strives, is satis- fied and strives
anew and so on ad infinitum; as, indeed his happiness and well-being merely consist in the
rapid transition from desire to fulfilment and from fulfilment to new desire, because non-
fulfilment means suffering, non-desire empty yearning, languor, tedium-so melody is
essentially a constant deviation from the tonic . . . to which it always ultimately returns. Thus in
a thousand ways melody expresses the multifarious strivings of Will, but also their
assuagement through the return to an interval within the harmony, or to the tonic itself. No
less ingenious is the application of his hypothesis to the question of programme-music: 'It must
not be forgotten,' he warns us, 'that music expresses not the visible world, the phenomenon,
but the essence of it, Will itself. It expresses, therefore, not a single, specific joy, sadness,
terror, jubila- tion, merriness, equanimity, but the joy, sadness etc., so to speak, in the
abstract, their essence without any by-play, therefore also without their cause. 'Thence it
comes that our imagination is so easily roused by music, and endeavours to give form to this
spiritual invisible, is very much alive and speaks to us in no uncertain manner, to endow it with
flesh and bone, in other words, analogous example. This is the origin of the so finally of opera.'
1In another (ibidem II, 524) he says, "the melody can if it is given to the bass, it can only be
through the use of transposed bass: one of the upper-parts becomes lowered a A little later he
adds: The reason why it is possible to relate a musical composition to a representative
visualisation is that both are only different expressions of the same inner essence of the World.
If in a specific case such a relation really exists, if, therefore, the composer has succeeded in ren-
dering the impulses which are the core of a certain happening, the melody of the song, or the
music of the opera are really 'expressive.' The analogy between the music and the event
discovered by the composer must, however, proceed from this immediate perception of the
essence of the World, unbeknown to his reason, and must not be an imitation obtained through
the agency of his intellect; otherwise his music does not express the essence of things, Will
itself, but merely (and insufficiently) its reflexion, as does all imitative music, such as Haydn's
'Seasons' or his 'Creation' in many places, where phenomena of the visible world are directly
imitated; the same applies to all battle-pieces, which are to be condemned entirely. Our views
on programme-music have changed, and we are fully aware that one cannot condemn a musical
genre on purely theoretical grounds-it must stand or fall by its musical qualities- but one cannot
deny the strength of Schopenhauer's argument in a much debated point of musical aesthetics, if
one grant his initial premise. His theoretical objection against programme-music applies with
equal force to a certain imaginative way of listening to music, and with still greater force to
listening to opera. Speaking about a Beethoven symphony, "a faithful and perfect image of the
essence of the World, which rolls through space and renews itself in the confusion of
innumerable forms and through constant destruction," he adds: "It is true that we are prone
to bring its contents to life, and to see in it all manner of scenes of life and nature. But this
does not, on the whole, increase our compre- hension nor our enjoyment, but rather adds
something foreign and arbitrary to the music: it is better therefore to apprehend it in its
immediacy and purity." Opera, Schopenhauer, the theorist, is inclined to treat with exceeding
severity, but here he finds himself in the dilemma which has been the difficulty of all
aestheticians since opera made its first appearance. For there is no denying that, all theory
notwithstanding, there are a number of musically satisfying operas and, on the other hand,
Schopenhauer, who was nothing if not honest with himself and his reader. found-like most
people-that however much opera might be condemned on pure philosophical grounds, it
occasionally gave him a vast amount of pleasure. Let us see how he contrives to conciliat
practice. First as to the theory: Grand opera is not, properly speaking, a product of of art, but
rather of the somewhat barbaric idea of hei ment by accumulation of means, simultaneousness
of gruous impressions, and reinforcement of effect by mult mass and strength of the executants;
yet music, the mightiest of the arts, is capable of filling a receptive mind solely by its ow its
highest products, in order to be adequately apprehend demand a mind wholly undivided and
undistracted, so that the mind may deliver itself up and steep itself in music and unde incredibly
enthralling language. And again: Speaking rigorously, one might call opera invention for
unmusical minds, into which music must be drilled in through an alien medium, say as an
accompaniment to a long spun-out love story and its poetical bathos. An operatic text cannot do
with concise, thoughtful poetry, which the composition could not possibly follow. To enslave
music entirely to bad verse is the mistake into which Gluck has fallen, whose operatic music,
apart from the overtures, it is therefore quite impossible to enjoy without the words. Indeed,
one might say that opera has ruined music. Yet it is partly in this very matter of good or bad
poetry that Schopenhauer finds means to conciliate theory and practice. For after saying that it
is natural for our imagination to give form to the spiritual world of music, he declares that for
this very reason "the text should never leave its subordinate position in order to play the
principal part, and make music a mere means of express- ing it, which is a grave faux-pas and a
big mistake." Yet he admits that music should avail itself of the human voice which, it so
happens, is both a musical instrument and the vehicle of speech, but still the spoken word
should remain servient to the music, and concentrate only upon the gene expression of verses
that are essentially bad poetry. And praises Rossini both for the contemptuous manner in whic
treats his text, and for keeping his music from speaking a lang foreign to it. The irony of this
rather reluctant defense of opera lies in fact that Schopenhauer's theories were in flagrant
contradicti with the one philosopher among musicians who not only had greatest admiration for
Schopenhauer, but became his most a propagandist, and the cause of a revival of interest in the
osopher's writings which, during thirty years, had remained fectly unheeded by the World at
large. (Indeed, the first edit of "Welt als Wille und Vorstellung" had been used by a despai
publisher as "Makulatur"-scrap-paper.) It was in 1854 that Wagner wrote to Franz Liszt: "Besides
slowly proce my music I have been occupied exclusively with a m come into my solitude as a gift
from Heaven, albeit literary gift. It is Arthur Schopenhauer, the greatest since Kant, whose
thought he has-as he puts it-'tho to the end."' This was in 1854, the year of the "Wal of
"Tristan!" It is necessary to insist on the date be often repeated fallacy that Wagner was
influenced hauer, and the still greater error that he was influe philosophers' theories on Music.
The truth is that a wrote and said many a time, he found in Schopenh the confirmation of his
own conception of the Wo suffering, and as he went on reading "Welt als Will stellung," he was
further encouraged to tread the p chosen-if not for himself (no more, indeed, than Sc did),' then
at least for the creatures of his imaginat in "Tannhiiuser," in "The Flying Dutchman," in the of
the "Ring," annihilation, renunciation in Death has been the conclusion at which his heroes
voluntarily arrived, this ultimate goal, to which the hero and the heroin expressed still more
clearly and unmistakably. It w hauer's pessimism, ending in Nirvana, that held Wagner while the
unexpected parallelism of their views asto And it was Schopenhauer's general explanation of
music, not the application of his hypothesis to particular points of musical technique, that
fascinated Wagner. Indeed, while recallin hauer's theories in his abstruse but exceedingly
interest on "Beethoven," he expressly says that a non-musician be expected to draw practical
conclusions from his speculations. Wagner knew positively that Schopen very low opinion of his
music, and his operas. A pa "Parerga" did not escape his notice-it could hardly a music of the day
but his: The wrong turning which music has taken is analogous which Roman architecture lost
itself under the later em its heavy ornamentation partly hid the essential simple and partly even
destroyed them: even so our music offers many instruments, much art, but few clear, penetratin
thoughts. One finds in the shallow, inexpressive, tuneless c 1Schopenhauer was quite conscious
of this contradiction between teaching. It is just as little needful, he would say, that a saint
should as that a philosopher should be a saint. It is a strange demand that a m teach no other
virtue than that which he himself possesses ("Sch Margrieta Beer). of to-day the same taste of
the times which inspires the tating, nebulous, enigmatic and even senseless literary st due to
that miserable Hegelianism and its charlatanism positions of to-day harmony occupies the chief
place, however, am of the contrary opinion, and consider melo of music, to which harmony
stands in the same relati meat. Wagner could afford to laugh at judgments such as these: hour
had struck and he preferred to remember the words wh shall form a fitting conclusion to these
considerations on Schop hauer and Music: No art affects man so immediately as music, as none
other revea to us the essence of the Universe so profoundly and so immediate Listening to
great, full-voiced and beautiful music is like bathing the mind: it drains off all that is impure,
petty and bad, and lifts eve one to the highest spiritual plane to which his Nature can attain, a as
he listens to great music man perceives clearly what he is worth, o rather, what he might be
worth.
 Schopenhauer Indicts

Schopenhauer was flawed but so is everyone. It doesnt mean we shouldnt

listen to him.
Fox, Michael Allen A (2006). "Boundless Compassion: The Contemporary Relevance of
Schopenhauer's Ethics". The European legacy, toward new paradigms (1084-8770), 11 (4), p. 369

Before we look at his contribution to ethics from a contemporary perspective, however, we

might as well be upfront
about the fact that Schopenhauer is a rather peculiar figure from whom to seek any kind of
leadership in this arena. He was a very flawed individual, and prima facie a poor exemplar of moral behaviour. He
could be mean-spirited in the extreme, and was misanthropic, misogynistic, anti-Semitic, and vengeful; he engaged in slanderous
verbal assaults on other philosophers and, on one occasion, a physical assault on his rooming house neighbour brought a court
settlement against him for disabling her. So the question arises: why should we (or anyone) listen to what Schopenhauer has to say
about ethics? He evidently didnt practice what he preached, and wouldnt it be better for us to spend our precious time listening
instead to someone who does? This issue needs to be addressed, and several
things can be said in defence of
taking Schopenhauer seriously. To start with, if we begin probing the biographies of famous
people in any field, skeletons pour forth from many closets and a wealth of unsavoury deeds
and personalities parades before us. We then have to make a choice whether to assess each
accomplishment in its own right or deny its value and importance because we disapprove of, or
are offended by, facts about the life of the one who produced it. As a matter of fact, most of us
do not dismiss Descartes because he tortured animals in experiments; Hemingway because he was a
philanderer and committed suicide; Wagner for being viciously anti-Semitic; Picasso on account of his
misogyny and admiration for Stalin; Janis Joplin because she was an alcoholic and drug addict;
Heidegger because of his Nazism; or Sartre for his communism.2 We dont necessarily consider Camus a greater thinker
than Heidegger or Sartre because he didnt share their extreme politics, or Wilde, who endured sensational trials and a prison
sentence for his homosexuality, a greater writer than Proust, who didnt, for his. What
a creative individual leaves to
the world gets judged on its merits. In the case of philosophy, which is based on arguments, this
legacy either convinces or fails to convince according to criteria that are more or less identifiable
and agreed upon. Normative ethical theorizing seems to be unique, however, in that it is about conduct, and that tends to
make us feel that the proponent should behave consistently with what he or she propounds. Here we are confronted by
Schopenhauers famous remark that it
is . . . just as little necessary for the saint to be a philosopher as for
the philosopher to be a saint; just as it is not necessary for a perfectly beautiful person to be a
great sculptor, or for a great sculptor to be himself a beautiful person. In general, it is a strange
demand on a moralist that he should commend no other virtue than that which he himself
possesses.3

Sure, Schopenhauer was a jerk. But ad hominem fallacies dont actually address
the core claims of his philosophy.
Hyland 1985
(J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in Educational
Studies, 11:3, 222)

Most readers of Schopenhauer are so appalled and unsettled by this relentlessly pessimistic
picture of the human condition that they either produce some form of psychological or
sociological rationalisation to try to explain away such a jaundiced vision, or simply dismiss
such ideas as the ravings of a madman. Very little in the way of sustained analysis of the
central thesis is attempted, and even otherwise respectable philosophers are not immune
from criticism in this respect. After a fairly cavalier review of Schopenhauer's main
arguments, Russell (1946), for instance, dismisses what he takes to be the central doctrine
(summarised as the destruction of evil by weakening its source, the will) largely on the
grounds that it was not held sincerely. Schopenhauer, we are told, was "exceedingly
quarrelsome", "unusually avaricious" and "completely selfish". Moreover, it is "difficult to
believe that a man who was profoundly convinced of the virtue of asceticism and resignation
would never have made any attempt to embody his convictions in practice" (p. 786). Will
Durant (1926) discusses the philosopher in a similar fashion and, after a lengthy exposition
of Schopenhauer's writings, admits that the "natural response to such a philosophy is a
medical diagnosis, of the age and of the man". This is followed up by a number of references
to Schopenhauer's character; he was a "capricious soul", a "listless man" whose unhappiness
lay in his "rejection of the normal life". Furthermore, it is "quite likely that the particular
product of the intellect which we know as the philosophy of Schopenhauer was the cover
and apology of a diseased and indolent will" (pp. 343, 344, 348). Such comments are not
only monstrously unprofessional, but also come perilously close to committing ad
hominem fallacies. It is the case, by all accounts, that Schopenhauer was a most
unprepossessing character; he was absurdly vain, and an outrageous misogynist whose
private life left much to be desired. But we are, surely, able to examine his philosophical
writings independently of such personal considerations. It is because of its very
unsavouriness that we know so much about Schopenhauer's life, but this ought not to lead
us to make judgments about his philosophy by applying standards that we would never
dream of applying to the work of other thinkers. Amidst all such pseudo-criticism of
Schopenhauer there has been a tendency to lose sight of the main points at issue.
The central question, surely, is whether there is anything of philosophical value in
Schopenhauer's description of the world and the life of humans. I would argue that
much of value can be learned, both from Schopenhauer's conception of the human
condition, and from his suggestions for coping with life in the light of this condition.

We dont have to defend all of Schopenhauers beliefs the aff uses pieces of
his theories as the building blocks for a new ethical position and orientation
towards the world
Vasalou 13. [Sophia, Senior Lecturer of Theology and Religion at the University of Birmingham and Birmingham Fellow in
philosophical theology, Schopenhauer and the Aesthetic Standpoint: Philosophy as a Practice of the Sublime, Cambridge University
Press, 2013] //CEB

This is the background, I would suggest, in which we may locate the seeds of Dienstags positive reading of Schopenhauer, and
potentially the reading of several others for whom this late work has served as the main portal to Schopenhauers philosophy. And
granted that this positive reading may not be grounded in a fully judicious interpretative grasp, it is high time to ask why an
interpretative grasp should after all be our principal concern. Writing in a related context, Nietzsche would remark: The
philosopher believes that the value of his philosophy lies in the whole, in the building: posterity
discovers it in the bricks with which he built and which are then often used again for better building: in the fact, that
is to say, that the building can be destroyed and nonetheless possess value as material.25 The
significance of this point for our context will be clear. For to the extent that we approach philosophers with a concern for their
relevance for the ways in which their work can service our philosophical or more narrowly ethical needs there is after all nothing
to prevent us from approaching the total edifice in an eclectic manner. We are under no obligation to imprison
ourselves within Schopenhauers terms or his intentions whether his determinism or his
negative ideal of resignation, whether his denial of the power of reflection or his deeper
metaphysical explanations and we may simply isolate those of its bricks that seem to us to
have enduring value as material. In this spirit, we might isolate the local edifice that is the Aphorisms, and
appropriate it as a source of normative ethical guidance that speaks to our needs. The result, as
Dienstag suggests in his discussion, would be an ethical framework with distinct affinities to Stoicism. My
argument will be that this proposal does not bear good fruit. But a closer consideration of the reasons for its
unfruitfulness can offer us the very resources we need for an alternative way of making the leap to
the ethical that we have been seeking.

Schopenhauers ethics preclude any sort of division, dichotomy or otherization;

identifying with the suffering of those around us is the ultimate act of
compassion.
Cartwright, David E (08/2008). "Compassion and Solidarity with Sufferers: The Metaphysics
of Mitleid". European journal of philosophy (0966-8373), 16 (2), p. 292/AK

But, have I lost the sense of unity, solidarity, and identity that undergirds Schopenhauer's conception of compassion by rejecting its
metaphysical support? I think notwell, I hope not.
Schopenhauer's ethics of compassion acknowledges
solidarity with those who suffer without resignation and the denial of the will to life. As Christopher
Janaway has observed, Schopenhauer's ethics recognized a genuine intersubjectivity of the morally
good, nonegoistic view of life.23 This intersubjectivity is expressed by compassionate agents'
ability to transcend an egocentric standpoint by making the suffering of another an object of
concern and by disposing them to treat it as their own. Thus, just as our own suffering generally
provides a sufficient motive to act to prevent or relieve it, another's suffering generally provides
a compassionate person with a sufficient motive to act to prevent or relieve another's woes.
Since Schopenhauer defined the good as that which is in agreement with one's will, the well-
being of another becomes a good for a compassionate person. Conversely, if the bad or evil is
that which is contrary to the will, compassionate agents view another's woe as an evil to
prevent or relieve. And, insofar as compassion leads to beneficent actions, as Schopenhauer said, 'Since I do not exist inside
the other person's skin, then only by means of the cognition I have of him, that is, the idea [Vorstellung] in my head, can I identify
myself with him to such an extent that my deed declares the differences abolished' (BM 144/208). And
as it is suffering
that makes one an object of compassion, it is unconcerned with a being's species, race,
ethnicity, nationality, class, sex, and other factors that could separate us.
 Metaphysics and Ethics
Negation of the will is key to feel real human experience of the world
Atzert 5 [Stephan Atzert, The University of Queensland Concepts of Liberation:
Schopenhauer between Freud, the Buddha and Idealist Aesthetics. P.6-8]
Another significant parallel between Schopenhauer's philosophy and Buddhismis their ethical foundation, which results from
the understanding that there is kinship in universal suffering this promotes compassion. This
ethical component of Schopenhauer's philosophy alone has had a profound influence on
German thought, as is evident from the following statement by the social philosopher and founder of the influential Frankfurt School, Max
Horkheimer: Schopenhauer's pessimistic teaching is a comfort. In contrast to the convictions today

his metaphysics offers the deepest justification of morals. At the same time it is not in conflict
with the results of exact investigation and it is free from the supernatural, holy ghosts, good and
bad spirits. The notion of death is not associated with the certain extinction of the "I" alone, but
with the concern [...] to return as a being, a plant [...] in accordance with the non-extinct desire
to live. This notion refers to the identity of all life and enables solidarity with all creatures long before
death. (Horkheimer, 1972, 154)[3] According to Horkheimer, the deepest justification of morals lies in the
appreciation of the identity of all life. Horkheimer's description supports the assessment of the Orientalists and Comparativists
listed above and is summarised by Welbon: In its constant ethical and soteriological drive, 9/10/2015 Articles

https://blackboard.lincoln.ac.uk/bbcswebdav/users/dmeyerdinkgrafe/archive/atzert.html 8/17 Schopenhauer's presentation is in

absolute accord with the Buddhist outlook. (Welbon, 1968, 161) Yet Welbon's reference to Schopenhauer's soteriology is true
only if we consider as constant drive Schopenhauer's insistence on suffering and the necessity to aspire towards liberation by negation of the will. If
soteriology is taken to mean a practical system or a mystical path to achieve liberation, then a fundamental difference between early forms of
Buddhism and Schopenhauer becomes apparent: the teachings in the Pali Canon focus on a soteriology, i.e. on a detailed practical discipline. The
discursive explanations of numerous points and their later philosophical systematisation are only facets of an essentially contemplative, mystical
approach. Schopenhauer's
effort, on the other hand, is that of philosophical explanation, even
though asceticism and selftorture are referred to as valid means for negating the will in the
fourth part of The World as Will and Representation. But these crude self-mortifications are
more sensibly understood as explicit metaphors for the negation of the will (Neeley, 1994, 123).
Schopenhauer sought to provide a consistent explanation of the human experience in the world,
not a soteriology or a path of mystical yoga. Indeed, Schopenhauer was convinced that he had provided the one philosophical systematisation which
can account for all aspects of human experiences, including those of mysticism and saintliness. However, Schopenhauer
does link the
concept of liberation from the will to the special role he accords to art, in terms of both
production and reception. In fact, Schopenhauer's theory of art contains a more concrete
soteriology than his descriptions of ascetic practices. But in that respect Schopenhauer also differs greatly from the
teachings of the Buddha. This will be discussed in the next section

Our kritik is necessary to find moral value in our lives

Cartwright in 88 [Cartwright, David E. "Schopenhauers compassion and
Nietzsches pity." Schopenhauer Jahrbuch p.561-563]
Schopenhauer's ethical theory is purely descriptive. Rather than prescribing what we ought to do, how we ought to do it,and the
moral ideals we should adopt for a good life, his ethics is designed to answer the question, "What moves individuals

to perform actions of a particular moral value?" By answering this question he claimed to have uncovered the "foundations of morality
[Fundament der Moral]" (B, 130; E11, 195). Actions have one of three particular moral values, according to

Schopenhauer. They are either morally indifferent [moralisch indifferent], morally reprehensible [moralisch
verwerflich] or possess moral worth [moralischen Werth] (B,145; E11,210). Schopenhauer argued that all human actions
are intentional and directed ultimately to something that is either inagreement withthe willor
contrary to the will. Since he believed that those things which are agreeable to the will are good,
and those contrary to the willare bad, actions ultimately are directed towards an end that is
either good or Schopenhauer's Mitleids-Moral 561 bad. 8 He also identified "good" as well-being [Wohl] and "bad"
withmisfortune [Wehe]. Because our actions may involve someone else's well-being or misfortune,
Schopenhauer deduced four possible ends of our actions, i.c., another's well-being, our own
well-being, another's misfortune, and our own misfortune. 9Desiring orwillingthese four
separate ends become four different motives or incentives [Triebfedern] for actions directed towards these four ends: Mitleid, a
desire for another's well-being; egoism [Egoismus], a desire for one's own well-being; malice [Bosheit], a desire for another's misfortune; and

an unnamed incentive, a desire for one's own misfortune. Schopenhauer concluded that Mitleid is the motive for morally
worthwhile actions, egoism for morally indifferent actions, and malice for morally reprehensible actions. He

never discussed the moral value of the unnamed incentive. Thus we find that Schopenhauer viewed compassion as the motive for

morally valuable actions. He also saw it as the only motive which conferred moral worth on an action. The ultimate end ofMitleid is another's well-being.
One of the problems that Schopenhauer's Mitleids-Moral faced was to explain how itis possible for me to pursue another's well-being given the central significance of egoism
inhis analysis of human behavior. Schopenhauer had argued that egoism is our "chief and fundamental incentive" (B,131; E11, 196)in the sense that our self-regarding interests

As a rule, therefore,
motivate most of our actions; that humans are such that "egoism is most ultimately connected withtheir innermost core and essence. [. .]

all human actions spring from egoism, and wemust always first tryto explain a given action
withthis inmind" (B,131; Eli,196). Schopenhauer provided two answers to the problem of egoism. One is
based onhis metaphysics and the ultimate unity of being. That is, Mitleid is possible because the
separation between individuals is only apparent; metaphysically we are Wille. For the purposes
ofthis paper, his second answer is more important. How does Mitleid occur? His answer to this
question reveals his conception of Mitleid. Schopenhauer argued that Mitleid as a desire for another's well-
being is possible only ifanother's misery becomes directly the same sort of incentive as my
ownmisery. That is, just as experiences contrary to my willare painful and move me inways torelieve
my pain, inhaving Mitleid towards another's misery the other's misery assumes the same status
as my ownbymoving me torelieve it. Since Schopenhauer had a negative theory of well-being, to act to relieve misery is
identical to acting to secure well-being. 10 Thus in individuals disposed to Mitleid,the
apprehension of another's suffering involves "[...]the immediate participation [Theilnahme],
independent of all ulterior considerations, primarily in the suffering of another, and thus in the
prevention or elimination of it;[. .]As soon as their compassion [Mitleid]is aroused, the weal
[Wohl] and woe [Wehe] of another are nearest to my heart in exactly the same way, although
not always in the same degree, as otherwise only my own are. Hence the difference between
him and me is no longer absolute" (B,144; E11,208). Because wc leiden mit others, we have an interest in pursuing the good of another. Thus
Schopenhauer's concept of Mitleid corresponds to our notion of compassion. 11 Itis an emotion
that is directed towards another's suffering, such 562 that itprovides an incentive for the agent to
pursue the other's well-being by relieving this suffering. Mitleidfor Schopenhauer is altruistic;its ultimate end is another's well-
being. Itputs individuals at par insofar as itis an incentive that recognizes that others have vitalinterests in not suffering and that these interests warrant concern intheir own
right.

Morality isnt rooted in ethics, its rooted in metaphysics. Compassion is not a

question of psychology but instead the natural state of beings.
Came 12 (A Companion to Schopenhauer edited by Bart Vandenabeele. Chapter 16 Part IV:
Compassion, Resignation and Sainthood, Daniel Came. Pages 243-245)//jl
The fundamental imperative of morality is: Neminem laede, immo omnes, quantum potes,
iuva Hurt no one, rather help everyone as much as you can (BM, 69). This dictum
indicates Schopenhauer s conception of the fundamental concept of ethics: compassion. In
Schopenhauer s view, morality has its roots in natural compassion. But this itself is an
undeniable fact of human consciousness, is essential to it, and does not depend on
presuppositions, concepts, religions, dogmas, myths, training and education. On the contrary it
is original and immediate, it resides in human nature itself and, for this very reason, it endures in
all circumstances and appears in all countries at all times (BM, 44). Compassion is an
immediate participation in the suffering of others. Schopenhauer regards this natural human
capacity as essentially astonishing, indeed mysterious . . . it is the great mystery of ethics, the
boundary mark beyond which only metaphysical speculation can venture to step (BM, 144).
Hence Schopenhauer ultimately regards the foundation of morality not as a problem of ethics
, but rather, like everything that exists as such , of metaphysics (BM, 144 45). Just as art
involves a miraculous transcendence of ordinary consciousness, so compassion involves a
transcendence of the natural standpoint of egoism. Given that egoistic action is the norm of
human behavior, the question arises as to how compassion is possible. That is, how is it possible
for another s weal and woe to move my will immediately, that is to say, in exactly the same
way as it is usually moved only by my own? (BM, 143). He describes compassion itself as:

the immediate participation , independent of all ulterior considerations, primarily in the

suffering of another, and thus in the prevention or elimination of it; for all satisfaction and well
- being and happiness consists in this . . . As soon as this compassion is aroused, the weal and
woe of another are nearest to my heart in exactly the same way, although not always in exactly
the same degree, as otherwise are only my own. Hence the difference between him and me is
now no longer absolute.

Schopenhauer s claim that in compassion we experience directly other s suffering is at the

core of his conception of compassion, and it is that for which his metaphysics provides a
putative explanation. He argues from moral phenomena to their primary phenomena and then
seeks to provide a metaphysical explanation of those phenomena. He rejects a psychological
explanation of how it is possible for one person to experience directly another s suffering. In
particular, he argues against the naturalistic claim (found, for example, in Hume) that
compassionate agents are motivated by another s suffering, since they imagine themselves in
the position of the sufferer and have the idea that they are suffering that person s pain in their
own person. Schopenhauer claims that this is by no means the case; on the contrary, at every
moment we remain clearly conscious that he is the sufferer, not we ; and it is precisely in his
person, not in ours, that we feel the suffering, to our sorrow. We suffer with him and hence in
him; we feel his pain as his , and do not imagine that it is ours (BM, 147). This experience of
another s pain cannot be explained psychologically; it can be explained only metaphysically.

Schopenhauer s theory of compassion is embedded in his metaphysics, and in particular his

revision of Kant s notion of the thing - in - itself. In what to many has seemed a genuine
advance on Kant s agnosticism regarding things - in - themselves, Schopenhauer argues that
since the intuitions of space and time are merely the forms of our experience and do not have
any application at the level of the thing - in - itself, noumenal reality must be one. 2 It is only in
our spatio - temporally structured experience, that the world appears divided into separate
individuals. Hence although we ordinarily think of ourselves in terms of our private egos, this is
an illusion. An awareness of this has dawned on the moral person who identifi es with the
interests of others. That is the metaphysical explanation of compassion: according to the true
nature of things everyone has all the sufferings of the world as his own (WWR I, 353). Thus it is
possible for compassion to extend to the totality of suffering, in the infi nite past and the infi
nite future; this is an experience which Schopenhauer cites as a possible precursor of
pessimistic insight and resignation or the denial of the will.
 Aesthetics Bad
Aesthetics dont contribute to knowledge but, instead, separate the object from
its connetions with other objects. The Negs attempt at desire makes in
impossible for them to access any ideas. Only elevating oneself above desire
allows them to appeal ideas.
Neill 2009 [Professor Alex Neill is the Vice-President (Education) and a Professor of Philosophy
at the University of Southampton. Before taking up his position at Southampton in 1999, Alex
Neill taught at the Pennsylvania State University, Harrisburg, Trinity University, San Antonio and
the University of St Andrews. Neill, Alex. Better Consciousness: Schopenhauer's Philosophy of
Value. Chichester, U.K.: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009. Pg. 65-67] //JW
However, this does not mean that the significance and the role of the Ideas in Schopenhauers
philosophy of art are derived exclusively from Platos doctrine of Ideas. Kants theory of the
aesthetic ideas in the Critique of the Power of Judgment has also undoubtedly influenced
Schopenhauers theory. An important differ- ence remains, though, with Kants aesthetic ideas,
for the latter are the product of the artists imagination, whereas the Ideas that artworks
express are the timeless paradigms of natural things and complete in themselves (WWR I 211).
However, Schopenhauers romantic account of genius is often closer to Kants conception of the
creative genius than is assumed, and there is definitely some tension in Schopenhauers account
between the metaphysical status of the Ideas and the creative capacities of the artistic genius.
Still, one important divergence cannot be overlooked: aesthetic imagination in Kant is
productive: it invents intuitions and produces new configurations, whereas for Schopenhauer
the artists imagination discovers eternal Ideas. Anyhow, in the light of Schopenhauers struggle
with Platos theory of Ideas, it suffices to say that we can definitely dismiss the view that the
Platonic Ideas are ad hoc extras and agree with Janaway that, despite Schopenhauers un-
Platonic beliefs that the Ideas are perceptible by the senses, and that the blind will, rather than
the Idea, is ontologically fundamental, Schopenhauers aspiration is much closer to Plato.8
Nevertheless, important differences with Platos theory of Ideas remain. Schopenhauer
surprisingly excludes many of the classic examples that Plato gives of the Ideasespecially in
the middle dialogues, such as Phaedo, Symposium, Republic and Phaedrus. Although
Schopenhauer believes that the artist communicates his pure knowledge (or intuition) of Ideas
and not of conceptsin this sense his view of the artist is extremely close to Platos divine
creator in the Timaeushe does not hold that beauty is itself an Idea. The beauty of a painting
or a landscape consists in its capacity to give rise to the knowledge of an Idea, but is not itself an
Idea. A beautiful flower is not beautiful because it expresses the Idea of beauty, but because it
expresses the Idea of the flower. Although Schopenhauers view of the beautiful is here again
remarkably close to Platos in the Timaeus,9 he will nonetheless insist that there is no such thing
as an Idea of the beautiful. As already noted, Schopenhauer attaches great importance to the
distinction between concept and Idea. He even claims that we are entirely satisfied by the
impression of a work of art only when it leaves behind something that, in spite of all our
reflection on it, we cannot bring down to the distinctness of a concept (WWR II 409). The
transition to a clearly defined concept is in Schopenhauers view obviously a sign of degradation.
An aesthetic intuition does not in any way contribute to conceptual knowledge, but isolates
the perceived object from its merely empirical and practical connections with other objects.
This kind of perception is particularly the work of the imagination, and depends on liberation
from the limitations of the principle of sufficient reason that dominates logical reasoning.
Perceiving an Idea provides no abstract knowledge, since when a subject intuits the Idea,
perceiving the particular object does not end: one perceives a Platonic Idea in and through a
particular objectwhether this is a natural object or a work of art does not really matter.11
Ideas can only appeal to someone who has elevated himself above all individual desiring and
has become a pure subject of knowing. Schopenhauers deeper motives seem to be Platonic,
because he insists on the strict separation of empirical and pure knowledgealthough, again,
Kant too recognises the possibility of a pure intuition, viz. of space and time. Janaway is also
right to emphasise the Platonic distinction of will-bound versus will-free modes of apprehending
the world in Schopenhauers theory. Like Schopenhauer, Plato thinks that the body fills us up
with lusts and desires, with fears and fantasies of very kind, and with any amount of trash, and
pure knowledge of the eternal Forms is only possible, once one has purified the soul and freed
oneself from its contamination by the body (Phaedo 66 a-b).12 Schopenhauer also often
deplores the connection of the mind with the body. Although Janaway is right that there is at
least one drastic divergence from Plato that we cannot ignore,13 namely that in
Schopenhauers account the Ideas are revealed by artworks in aesthetic experience, there are
also more relevant similarities with Platos philosophy of art than Janaway (and Schopenhauer
himself) allows. To begin with, although Plato attacks art, and especially mimetic poetry, in the
notorious tenth book of his Republic, there are really striking parallels between Schopenhauers
account of the artist as a pure subject of knowledge who intuits timeless Ideas and
communicates these in and through works of art, and Platos divine creator in Timaeus, who is
also a pure knower and also models his creations on eternal Ideas. Secondly, Platos notorious
attack on poetry in Republic is contradicted many times in his other dialogues and, in this sense
too, Schopenhauers reverence of the artists pure knowledge and the significance of the arts is
really more Platonic than is often acknowledged. To give but a few examples: in the Lysis,
Socrates says that the poets are to us in a manner the fathers and authors of wisdom (213 e
214 a); in Phaedrus, Socrates refers to a third form of possession or madness, of which the
Muses are the source. This seizes a gentle, pure soul and stimulates it to rapt passionate
expression, especially in lyric poetry, glorifying the countless deeds of ancient times for the
instruction of posterity (Phaedrus 245a); and in Platos Symposium, poets like Homer or Hesiod
are called the begetters of wisdom and the rest of virtue (209ad). More important than the
mentioned striking similarities, however, is the divergence in their views on beauty. Janaway
rightly claims that Schopenhauer borrows the idea of a timeless consciousness from Platos pure
knowledge of the soul, and Schopenhauers account of aesthetic experience would not have
been the same without the Platonic inspiration: both share the idea of tranquil, disembodied
contemplation. For Plato, however, an experience of beauty is a kind of festive celebration of
Being: it is to feel alive.14 Beauty confers peace and completion on eros.15 But Schopenhauer
proffers us an altogether different account of the experience of beauty: the element of
tranquillity is definitely there, but Plato characterises beauty as conferring peace and
satisfaction upon our desire, whereas Schopenhauer views the experience of beauty as will-less,
i.e. without desire at all. Aesthetic experience is, according to Schopenhauer, an awareness of
pure objectivity, and without this capacity for pure objectivity there would be no aesthetic
experience, and hence no beauty. Furthermore, whereas Plato believes that beauty is a motive
for our desire and even ultimately satisfies it, Schopenhauer argues that the experience of
beauty basically offers us salvation from the torments of desire: beauty consists in a way of
considering things without interest, without subjectivity, purely objectively; it is entirely given
up to them in so far as they are merely representations and not motives (WWR I 196; italics
added). Schopenhauer sees beauty as mainly offering alleviation of the misery that our
existence as willing individuals inevitably engenders. Desire cannot ever be fulfilled, not even in
the contemplation of beauty. Contemplating the Ideas in and through beautiful objects does
not so much offer ultimate satisfaction for our restless desire as freedom from the thraldom
of endless blind willing. Although Schopenhauer acknowledges that the peace of aesthetic
experience is not merely absence of pain, but also revives and comforts, he nevertheless
holds that the will can never be satisfied, not even through a pure experience of true beauty.
That the aesthetic state of mind cheers and comforts is at least partly due to the achievement of
a will-less and painless state of mind, through which our desire is momentarily stilled instead of
definitively fulfilled. Moreover, the Ideas are nothing less than the objectifications of the primal
will, which, by its nature, will always inevitably lack an object of satisfaction. There is no ultimate
object that can satisfy the will: as William Desmond suggests, Schopenhauers will resembles
Don Juans desire more than Platos eros: desire hurrying from particular conquest to conquest,
each taken as absolute in turn, only to breed disillusion at every turn, and forcing desire to set
out in search again, forever.16 The Platonic tranquillity of the soul, which finds in the
experience of beauty its ultimate fulfilment, is very different from Schopenhauers will-less
objectivity, which cannot ever be a kind of ultimate fulfilment, not only because, as he says, for
one wish that is fulfilled there remain at least ten that are denied, but mainly since it is a
capacity . . . to lose oneself in perception, to remove from the service of the will the knowledge
which originally existed only for this service, and the ability to leave entirely out of sight our
own interest, our willing, and our aims, and consequently to discard our own personality for a
time, in order to remain pure knowing subject, the clear eye of the world (WWR I 185186).
Thus, despite Schopenhauers Platonic aspirations and his obsession with the better
consciousness, which has much in common with Platos account of the pure timeless
knowledge of the soul, there are crucial differences between Platos eros and Schopenhauers
will. And because of their different conceptions of desire, Plato holds that the experience of
beauty is the culmination of desire, whereas for Schopenhauer beauty offers a temporary relief
from desire. In this sense, Platos account of aesthetic experience is, psycholo- gically speaking,
closer to the feeling of satisfaction after an excellent meal, whereas Schopenhauers is closer to
the feeling of having conquered the desire to feel hungry at all. Only in his evaluation of music
does Schopenhauer come closer to Platos description of the experience of beauty, since
enjoying music is really rejoicing in being part of being itself, and even celebrating being as such:
here, the experiences value is clearly no longer merely relief from suffering and pain, but
positive rapture: music expresses the inner being of the world and, paradoxically, we enjoy this
experience of being one with the will of the world, not just because we feel freed from desire,
but because we are able to identify positively with the deepest core of the universe, i.e. the will.
This idea of positive pleasure (or exaltation) does not only undermine the mainstream
hypothesis that, for Schopenhauer, aesthetic pleasure is completely reducible to absence of
pain, but also hints at a connection with Kants aesthetics in general, and especially his
conception of the sublime.

Aesthetic consciousness removes our individuality and allows us to exist as

pure subjects
Came 12 (A Companion to Schopenhauer edited by Bart Vandenabeele. Chapter 16 Part IV:
Compassion, Resignation and Sainthood, Daniel Came. Pages 240-241)//jl

In empirical consciousness, the intellect is constrained in its natural condition of servitude to

the will. In this activity, the intellect knows only relations of objects, primarily their relations to
the will, but also the relations of objects to one another. Now, according to Schopenhauer, the
knowledge of the reciprocal relations that obtain between objects exists only indirectly in the
service of the will. That is, such knowledge is parasitic on ordinary empirical consciousness, the
apprehending of relations, but at the same time surpasses the level or scope of knowledge of
relations that is necessary for the projects of the will. In other words, such knowledge is not
practical knowledge. It is for this reason that Schopenhauer regards scientifi c knowledge as
forming the transition to a purely objective mode of knowledge that is entirely independent of
the will. Knowledge of the relations that obtain between objects is scientifi c knowledge.
Knowledge of an object that is entirely non - relational i.e., its content does not include any
of the object s relational properties is aesthetic knowledge. Both forms of knowledge exist
on a continuum of disinterestedness or objectivity which increases the more the intellect is able
to free itself from the demands of the will. In scientifi c knowledge, a multiplicity of relations
pertaining to an object are apprehended and the object s nature thereby appears more fully
and distinctly than, say, when the object appears only in relation to the individual will. But
although in scientifi c knowledge the real nature of the object appears more distinctly, it itself is
entirely different from these relational facts. In this mode of cognition, the servitude of the
intellect to the will becomes increasingly indirect. But if the intellect has suffi cient power to
gain dominance over the will and thereby abandon entirely the relations of objects to the will, in
order to apprehend instead their purely objective nature, then the intellect . . . freely soars
aloft and no longer belongs to a will. In the particular thing, it knows merely the essential, and
therefore its whole species; consequently, it now has for its object the Ideas (WWR II, 363
64).

3. Aesthetic Consciousness

Aesthetic consciousness consists in the dissolution of the subject s sense of his own
individuality and subjectivity and the ensuing cessation of desire - driven suffering. When we are
absorbed in contemplation of an object aesthetically, that is, when we are perceiving beauty,
we lose ourselves entirely in the object . . . we forget our individuality, our will, and continue
to exist only as pure subject, as clear mirror of the object, so that it is as though the object
alone existed without anyone to perceive it, and thus we are no longer able to separate the
perceiver from the perception, but the two have become one, since the entire consciousness is
fi lled and occupied by a single image of perception (WWR I, 179). According to Schopenhauer,
as we have seen, ordinary empirical consciousness apprehends objects in relation to the will
that is, interestedly . By contrast, in aesthetic consciousness, because subjectivity along with its
subtracting effects on the appearance of the object recedes, the subject, to the extent that one
can still speak of a subject, becomes a clear mirror of the object. And because subjectivity has
receded, so has one s desires and one s interested way of engaging with objects and
construing them in relation to one s subjective interests and desires. Consequently, one s
engagement with an object in aesthetic experience is disinterested and painless. Since
subjectivity has receded, we no longer relate the object of aesthetic attention to our will, from
which it follows that in this state nothing can be an object of desire. Given Schopenhauer s
view of the nature of suffering as caused by desire, the absence of desire in aesthetic
consciousness entails an absence of suffering. Hence we attain a painless state . . . for a
moment we are delivered from the miserable pressure of the will. We celebrate the Sabbath of
the penal servitude of willing; the wheel of Ixion stands still (WWR I, 196).

The aesthetic subject, then, undergoes a fundamental transformation. It becomes the pure
will - less, painless, timeless subject of knowing. In addition, the object of aesthetic attention
undergoes a radical change. Since the subjectivity of empirical consciousness has receded, so
too have the subject - dependent categories of space and time. It follows, clearly, that the object
is not apprehended in space and time. Schopenhauer says that space and time are the
principium individuationis ( the principle of individuation ). For something to be an individual
it must be located in space and time. We separate objects one from another in terms of their
spatio - temporal locations. 1 So the object of aesthetic attention is not an individual. Rather, it
is, in Schopenhauer s term, the Platonic Idea of the species of the particular thing it is.
 Life/Value/Affirmation
Our use of Schopenhauers philosophy fuels self-affirmation and offers a point
of catharsis in the face of suffering
Vasalou 13. [Sophia, Senior Lecturer of Theology and Religion at the University of Birmingham and Birmingham Fellow in
philosophical theology, Schopenhauer and the Aesthetic Standpoint: Philosophy as a Practice of the Sublime, Cambridge University
Press, 2013] //CEB

Yet ifSchopenhauers philosophical vision was not intended to enter fruitfully into the way we
lead our lives if Israel Knox was thus right in suggesting that Schopenhauer could have been among the greatest and most
beneficent philosophers had he not failed to formulate a normative ethics14 then it may come as a surprising
discovery to find that Nietzsche has cut a far from lonely figure in looking to Schopenhauer for
ethical guidance, and in deeming himself to have found it. For he has been joined by a larger group of
readers who at different times have acclaimed the life-changing effects of Schopenhauers
philosophy. In his intellectual biography of Schopenhauer, Arthur Hbscher already provides some interesting evidence in this
regard. Describing the impact of Schopenhauers philosophy on his first acolytes, he calls attention to the fact that its dominant
effect was not withdrawal, but engagement a more forceful re-engagement of life on new
terms. Schopenhauers first disciples are neither escapists, hermits nor any other sort of
pessimists inept at the business of life Following Schopenhauers direction, they march along their lives
paths undaunted and self-assured. They view their troubles, their sufferings not as a unique
misfortune, and gain from it not only catharsis and consolation, but a genuine elixir of life, a
stimulus to selfless deeds and to a courageous mastering of their lifes mission. In contact with
Schopenhauer and his work, the gentlest and most susceptible of these early followers, Adam von Doss, gains strength and zest for
life. He says that henceforth he moves forward, not despondently and unwilling, but proudly and
joyfully.15 The focus here is on the de facto effect of Schopenhauers philosophy. Yet Hbscher puts the point more strongly
when he turns to speak of an intended effect the aim of Schopenhauers philosophy being to have a direct
effect on our life, so that it is meant to be, just as the great thinkers of antiquity wanted it, a signpost to the
formation and mastery of life.16

Life is meaningless pain but art acts as a palliative to remedy this for at least a
fleeting moment Music is the most effective art form because it speaks
directly to the Will without the interlocutor of the fancy
Barry 1925 (Barry, Elizabeth Wendell. "What Wagner Found in Schopenhauer's Philosophy."
The Musical Quarterly 11.1 (1925): 124-137.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/738390?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents)

Impelled by Will every living thing works feverishly for something of no value. Happiness, accordingly,
always lies in the future, or else in the past, and the present may be compared to a small dark
cloud which the wind drives across the sunny plain; before and behind all is bright, only it itself always
casts a shadow.3 Life, thus far, does not seem worth living, but Schopenhauer offers us a palliative in the shape of
Art. There seems to be an inconsistency in Schopenhauer's system at this point. Critics have not been able to reconcile the relations
of the Will and the Platonic Ideas. Having said that everything was Will, something other than and different from Will suddenly
appears on the scene-the Platonic ideas which the Will seeks to reproduce. This is the interpretation of one section; elsewhere the
Ideas appear to be stages that the Will has reached in objectifying itself. The Will continually seeks to objectify itself after the
pattern of the universal types or "Platonic Ideas" which have their existence outside of the phenomenal world. By pure
contemplation of the objects in which the Will has objectified itself Art
seeks to see the Ideas that lie behind the
objects and to reproduce them more purely, more perfectly. Art has its beginning in the knowledge
of the Ideas and its sole purpose is to communicate them. The tormented human soul in
contemplating a work of Art loses all sense of his existence in time and space, frees himself from
his tyrannical Will and in a state of pure perception gazes and becomes lost in the Platonic Idea
that is mirrored in the masterpiece. In order to have the true aesthetic experience a man must view the art object
disinterestedly and without relation to his will. Contemplation must be free from desire: If, ceasing to consider the when, why, what
and whither of things, we concentrate upon the what; not
allowing abstract thought with its concepts to
possess our consciousness, but sinking ourselves wholly in perception of the object; then we
escape our individuality and will, and continue to exist only as the pure mirror of the object, with
which we become identified; so that what is known is no longer the particular thing, but the Idea, and the knower is no longer an
individual but the pure knowing subject.' Schopenhauer is careful to state how the work of art produces this effect: Every
work
of art can only produce its effect through the medium of the fancy; therefore it must excite this
and can never allow it to be left out of the play and remain inactive. This is a condition of the aesthetic
effect, and therefore a fundamental law of the fine arts. Everything must not be directly given to the senses, but rather only so much
as is demanded to lead the fancy on to the right path; something and indeed the ultimate thing, must always be left for the fancy to
do. We are only perfectly satisfied by the impression of a work of art when it leaves something which, with all our thinking about it,
we cannot bring down to the distinctness of a conception.' Schopenhauer, by fancy, evidently means a play of the intellect which is
for the moment released from bondage to the Will. The intellect forgets its origin, is for the moment its own master, and hearkening
to the summons of the work of art, joyfully loses itself in an aesthetic experience. The fancy is a part of the intellect that slumbers as
long as the intellect is the slave of the Will, It wakes under the kiss of Art. As long as the work of art can charm the fancy, so long
does the exquisite aesthetic experience last. But the moment the Will reasserts itself, perhaps in a desire to possess the object, then
fancy sinks back into her sleep for another hundred years, or at any rate until Prince Charming again appears. The work of art is
incomplete without the contributions of the fancy. We
must give as well as absorb beauty from the art object.
The aesthetic experience involves giving as well as receiving, indeed it would seem that we must
contribute the larger part. What we receive in an aesthetic experience is in proportion to what
we can give. Of the origin of the fine arts Schopenhauer says: The mother of the useful arts is
necessity; that of the fine arts superfluity. As their father, the former have understanding; the latter, genius, which is
itself a kind of superfluity, that of the powers of know- ledge beyond the measure which is required for the service of the Will.2
Schopenhauer gives to Music the highest place of honor among the fine arts. Poetry, painting
and the plastic arts merely represent the Ideas, but Music can express the Will directly: In the
language of music, which is understood with absolute direct- ness, but which is yet untranslatable into that of reason, the inner
nature of all life and existence expresses itself.3 As expressive of the Will it can act upon the individual will
and exercise a cathartic effect: That music acts directly upon the will, or the feelings, passions and emotions of the
hearer, so that it quickly raises or changes them, may be explained from the fact that, unlike the other arts, it does not express the
Ideas, or grades of the objectification of the will, but the will itself. Music
transfers the movements of the will over
to the province of the mere idea. Music never causes us actual sorrow, but ever in its most
melancholy strains is still pleasing, and we gladly hear in its language the secret history of our will, and all its emotions
and strivings with their manifold protractions, hindrances and griefs, even in the saddest melodies. When, on the other hand, it is
our will itself that is aroused and tormented, we have not then to do with tones and their
musical relation, but are rather now ourselves the trembling string that is stretched and
twanged.

Instrumental music explains and expresses the nature of emotion in ways that
language never can where words stand as insufficient and limiting displays of
the creators emotions, instrumental music allows the listener to feel and
interpret emotions separate from the creators personal discourse
Ahlberg 94. [Lars-Olof, Professor of Aesthetics at Uppslala University, SUSANNE LANGER ON REPRESENTATION AND
EMOTION IN MUSIC, British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 34, No.1, January, 1994] //CEB
The self-expression theory cannot, Langer argues, account for the creation of artistic form, in this case musical form, because
'[s]heer self-expression requires no artistic form', she says. The history of music, she adds, 'has been a history of more and more
integrated, disciplined, and articulated forms, much like the history of language'. If a composer expressed his real emotions in his
music, it would, Langer argues, be impossible for him to work in accordance with a programme. It
is clear that Langer
interprets the self-expression theory in terms of venting one's feelings and not as objectifying
one's emotions. There are, however, more interesting versions of the expression theory than this version of the self-
expression theory. Philosophers such as Collingwood and Dewey, for example, have explicitly distinguished between direct and
indirect expression, claiming that only the latter is relevant as regards art. In their view emotions are objectified or embodied in the
work of art. But even the theory that a work of art expresses 'emotion recollected in tranquillity'
treats the work of art as an expression of the emotional experiences of its creator, and art is
therefore still considered to be essentially autobiographical. Langer's arguments against the self-
expression theory of music could easily be transposed so as to fit other varieties of expression
theories as well. She also rejects the theory that music is basically a kind of language, a language
with conceptual powers. On this semantic theory of music, instrumental music is capable of
describing reality and of conveying a message. Schopenhauer is singled out as an exponent of this view: 'The
assumption that music is a kind of language, not of the here-and-now, but of genuine conceptual
content, is widely entertained, though perhaps not as universally as the emotive-symptom
theory. The best-known pioneer in this field is Schopenhauer'. For Schopenhauer, musicin
contrast to other art forms represents and expresses the nature of the metaphysical Will
itself. It reveals the nature of the worldnot by expressing or describing any particular
emotions felt by the composer or by anybody elsebut by expressing the nature of particular kinds of
emotions: joy as such or grief as such. The essence of joy or grief is for Schopenhauer the proper subject-matter of instrumental
music. Langer thinks that Schopenhauer's theory of music is an advance on most previous theories of
musical meaning, mainly because he regards music 'as an impersonal, . . . real semantic, a
symbolism with a content of ideas'. She introduces her own theory of music in the following way: 'If music has
any significance, it is semantic, not symptomatic. Its "meaning" is evidently not that of a stimulus to evoke
emotions, nor that of a signal to announce them; if it has an emotional content, it "has" it in the same sense that language "has" its
conceptual content symbolically'. Music, in her view then, is
neither the cause nor the cure of feelings, but
their 'logical expression'. Music is therefore a peculiar kind of symbolism, capable of expressing the
nature of our emotional experience. However, it is not a discursive symbolism or a real language
with a vocabulary and a syntax: it is 'an unconsummated symbol',* she claims. Therefore
'[a]rticulation is its life, but not assertion; expressiveness, not expression. Instrumental music is
not a language; it is not a discursive symbolism because it lacks a vocabulary with fixed
meanings. There is, however, an unexplored possibility of genuine semantic beyond the limits of
discursive language, she believes, and instrumental music belongs to that category. If music does not
describe anything extra-musical or refer to an extra-musical reality, what then is articulated and formulated in and through music?
'A composer', says Langer, 'articulates subtle complexes of feeling that language cannot even name, let alone set forth'. Does this
imply that a composer who has acquired a deep knowledge of a particular complex of feeling articulates that very complex of feeling
and not another one? I think this is what she is saying at times although it is inconsistent with her thesis that music is capable of
reflecting and presenting only the general structure of the emotions, not the structure or nature or whatever of particular emotions
and feelings.
 Wagner bad
Wagner was influenced by Schopenhauer his music reflects the ideal aesthetic
process for opening the listener to intuition and pure cognition As a person he
didnt deny the will which allowed him to become a Nazi his music on the
other hand was a complete channel for intuition and entirely separate from his
character that was both his philosophy of music and our use of his music
Barry 1925 (Barry, Elizabeth Wendell. "What Wagner Found in Schopenhauer's Philosophy."
The Musical Quarterly 11.1 (1925): 124-137.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/738390?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents)

It was in the capacity of elucidator that Schopenhauer

was most valuable to Wagner, it seems to me. He
expressed in clear language theories that Wagner had employed in his works, but had never
formulated for himself. Wagner, guided by an artist's intuition, which often anticipates and
overleaps his reason, had evolved characters whose actions were incomprehensible to his
understanding, but were felt to be inevitable by his poetic intuition. In an artist's mind, swift-footed
intuition is chosen in preference to rational knowledge as a guide in expressing the "concrete universal." But
intuition can never be conscious of the steps along the way; rational knowledge can proudly
trace its course from start to finish. Rational knowledge is useful in corroborating the conclusion reached by intuitive
knowledge. An aesthetic theory is usually propounded upon completion of the art work; to reverse
the procedure is dangerous, for then emphasis is laid too strongly upon method and style.
Bellerophon clips his winged steed and confines him to earthly pastures. It is safer for an outsider to formulate an aesthetic theory
from contemplation of the work of art. He may succeed in seeing the, theory that was merely an intuition in the artist's mind, and,
by expressing it in definite form, do him a great service. This is, I believe, the value of the aesthetic philosopher-to discover the
theories of art that lie back of works of art and thus help the artist to understand his intuitions, to show him and others the why and
how, as well as the what of his production. The artist, thus encouraged by a clear understanding of his art problems, freed from
perplexity as to what he was actually doing, why he was doing it, and how, goes confidently forth to conquer new worlds. Wagner
freely acknowledges his debt to Schopenhauer in this capacity: For many years afterwards that book never
left me, and by the summer of the following year I had already studied it for the fourth time. The effect thus gradually wrought upon
me was extraordinary, and certainly exerted a decisive influence on the whole course of my life. In forming my judgment upon all
those matters which I had hitherto acquired solely through the senses, I
had gained pretty much the same power as
I had formerly won in music-after abandoning the teaching of my old master Weinlich-by an
exhaustive study of counterpoint. If, therefore, in later years I again expressed opinions in my casual writings on matters
pertaining to that art which so particularly interested me, it is certain that traces of what I had learned from my study of
Schopenhauer's philosophy were clearly perceptible.'
 Examples From Life
Experience is not a good indication of metaphysical truth. We should appraise
the validity of Schopenhauers philosophy based on the benefits it accrues for
life.
Hyland 1985
(J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in Educational
Studies, 11:3, 223-4)

One way of taking Schopenhauer's philosophy seriously might be to ask whether his
pessimistic assertions about the negativity of happiness and about the characteristic misery
of human existence are at all verified by experience. But is such verification possible or,
using Popper's preferred terminology, is it possible to 'corroborate' the main arguments of
Schopenhauer by subjecting statements deduced from them to tests of falsifiability? At first
blush, such corroboration does seem feasible for are we not being presented here with a
world-view which can be tested against experience? Thus, although it would obviously be
unreasonable to expect to be able to assess certain metaphysical theories, say Plato's Theory of Forms or
Berkeley's dictum 'esse est percipi', solely in the light of empirical considerations, the concrete immediacy of
Schopenhauer's ideas seems to render them more amenable in this respect. Yet metaphysical theories,
though naturally connected in some sense with everyday experience, are patently not
intended to be straightforward descriptions of the world in the way that certain
scientific theories are. However, such theories, though less literal and task-specific
than scientific ones, are like them in that they attempt to construct general
explanatory frameworks within which our understanding and experience of the world
can be placed and ordered. The difference between the two is brought out well in the discussion by
Wilson & Cowell (1985) of different ways in which philosophy itself can be applied. We may, for instance,
think of 'applied philosophy' in the way that we think of applied science, as a way of solving practical problems.
But we are still applying philosophy (and the application may be just as 'practical') when we are inspecting our
experience in the light of some general metaphysical theory. I suggest that it is in this latter sense, the
sense in which a philosophical theory can make us feel differently or come to view
the world in a certain way, that we ought to approach Schopen- hauer's metaphysics.
Consequently, though the asking of it is irresistible, the question of whether
Schopenhauer's picture of the world is accurate or not is unlikely to produce any
satisfactory answers. The standard response would be to admit that the features of human
existence picked out by Schopenhauer are present in life, but to claim that they have been
grossly exaggerated and are nothing like as dominant or influential as they are said to be. This
common reply is, of course, entirely understandable and is reflected in the assessments of Russell and Durant
referred to above. This is where psychological considerations do become relevant for it does seem to be the
case (indeed, utilitarianism is built on this very foundation) that we are predisposed to avoid and avert our
attention from pain and suffering. Yet the most ambitious optimism could hardly seek to deny the
existence of widespread pain and misery in the world, and even the most blinkered theist can
no longer hope to escape from the problem of evil by denying that evil exists. Schopenhauer
was, of course, fully aware of the resistance there would be to his philosophy and, it must be
said, sometimes sought to overcome this by deliberate hyperbole. The obstinate refusal to
examine certain features of existence is an integral part of the malaise he wished to treat, and
it might be argued that a degree of one-sidedness was demanded by the nature of the task.
The determination to alter false conceptions and eradicate illusory prejudices is creditable
and, as I suggest later, can itself be regarded as a legitimate and worthy philosophical and
educational objective. However, in the light of these considerations, it is unrealistic to expect
to be able to evaluate Schopenhauer's thesis solely in terms of the perspicacity or otherwise
of his vision. A much more sensible line, and one which accords with the notion of applied
philosophy sketched above, is to try to assess the relative benefits of holding such a theory
of existence.
 Nietzsche
Turn - Schopenhauers denial of the will is not suicidal or
nihilist but Nietzsches notion of tragedy is suicidal in the
sense that it demands sacrifice
Sanderson 07 (Matthew Walter, PhD dissertation Southern Illinois University,
RELIGIOUS SUBLIMITY AND THE TRAGIC VIEW OF LIFE IN KANT,
SCHOPENHAUER AND NIETZSCHE, August, ProQuest)
Implicit then in Nietzsches rejection of traditional forms of mystical experience is his
belief that mystical will-denial is essentially identical to suicide indeed, even deicide
and therefore only intensifies the meaninglessness of life. However, as Schopenhauer
argues, suicide and mysticism are far from the same form of tragic resignation. In
particular, Schopenhauer argues that, while mysticism desires a better, higher form of
life, suicide seeks this life, only in another form. The suicide wills life, Schopenhauer
says, and is dissatisfied merely with the conditions on which it has come to him (WWR
I, 398). For this reason, Schopenhauer condemns suicide as a deluded form of escape
from this existence since, rather than seek to transcend this world, it merely seeks a
different version of it. Looked at in this way, it is in fact Nietzsches notion of tragedy
which amounts to a form of suicide, for by means of the tragic we simulate sacrificing
ourselves in order to identify with a transfigured form of life, one supposedly better than
we currently experience. Furthermore, Nietzsche is mistaken to identify traditional
mysticism as the desire for pure self-annihilation, oblivion and nothingness. For, as
Schopenhauer rightly points out, mysticism does not deny the self simply for its own
sake, but instead in order to experience that which transcends the self. Also, the reality
experienced by mystics is only a form of epistemological nothingness, not an absolute or
ontological nothingness or void. Schopenhauer writes, for instance, that we freely
acknowledge that what remains after the complete abolition of the will is, for all who are
still full of the will, assuredly nothing. But also conversely, to those in whom the will has
turned and denied itself, this very real world of ours with all its suns and galaxies, is
nothing (WWR I, 411-412). While Nietzsche believes that the mystical realm is nihilistic,
the mystic argues that, when viewed from the perspective of ultimate reality, it is the
everyday world which lacks all value. This is because, according to Schopenhauer,
mystical nothingness is not a groundless abyss or oblivion but rather what the mystic
understands as ultimate reality or God, and what, from a philosophical or conceptual
perspective, can only be said to be nothing, the absence of a particular entity limited by
space and time. Schopenhauer accepts as valid, in other words, the narrative of the
mystics account of his intuitive experience of God, but insists that philosophy must
remain silent regarding the extra-conceptual content of this experience. Nietzsche is
wrong, then, to conclude that, just because what the mystic experiences is mysterious
and exceeds our conceptual grasp, it must be equivalent to death and therefore nihilistic.

Nietzsches affirmation of life is fundamentally cruel and

encourages indifference to the plight of humanity.
Sanderson 07 (Matthew Walter, PhD dissertation Southern Illinois University,
RELIGIOUS SUBLIMITY AND THE TRAGIC VIEW OF LIFE IN KANT,
SCHOPENHAUER AND NIETZSCHE, August, ProQuest)
One final problem with Nietzsches optimism is that it leads him to recommend an
inhumane form of redemption based on the idea that death and suffering are justified
only from a perspective that of the will according to which human life appears
completely insignificant. However, as Schopenhauer implicitly argues, we want to see the
world as meaningful and justified according to human standards, specifically the desire
for immortality and liberation from suffering. And while seeing the individuals suffering
and death from the perspective of the will makes it meaningful in the sense that we are
able to say that everything happens for a reason it is not our meaning, but instead that
of the will, and this is not ultimately comforting from the human perspective since the
wills reasons are so often opposed to the goals of humanity. In particular, if we identify
with the Dionysian we can only look back upon finite humanity with cruel indifference,
just as the whole of nature sees the human. But overcoming death is not an end so great
that it justifies any means, including affirming the horrific Dionysian; instead, it is
desirable only to become one with an object that, from the human perspective, is deemed
eternal and peaceful, free from both death and suffering. In other words, though it is
necessary, for the purposes of escaping the tragic, to identify with something beyond
humanity, the object must not be opposed to humanity. The object of redemption must
be extra-human, but not therefore anti-human. Thus, Schopenhauer calls any view
crude which asserts that the living being does not suffer any absolute annihilation
through death, but continues to exist in and with the whole of nature (WWR I, 473).
For, in Schopenhauers estimation, the idea that we ought to identify with forces hostile
to humanity is based upon a fundamental lack of sympathy for the suffering of humans.
Nietzsches aesthetic metaphysics is then a metaphysics of cruelty that leads to a feeling
of horror rather than comfort. To summarize, Schopenhauers conception of religious
sublimity is superior to Nietzsches for several reasons. First, Schopenhauers notion of
infinity as the mysterious thing-in-itself is more metaphysically and epistemologically
defensible. Secondly, his grounding sublime comfort in the thing-in-itself is
phenomenologically superior since this allows him to argue that the will-lessness of
aesthetic experience symbolizes the willlessness of ultimate reality and this
interpretation best explains the feeling of peaceful calm occasioned by sublimity. Thirdly,
Schopenhauers view is existentially preferable because it is based on the human need for
redemption from death and suffering and provides an account of the sublime that
satisfies both these needs.
 Suicide
Suicide cant offer a true freedom from the will; on the contrary, it is to admit
that the Will to Live has defeated us.
Margrieta, Beer, 8 Schopenhauer (1-4051-3480-1, 978-1-4051-3480-4).//AK

Suicide is no solution of the problem of life. It is not to be regarded as a crime, as in the code of
modern society. But there is a valid moral reason against it, in that it substitutes for the real
emancipation from the world of suffering, a merely apparent one. So far from being a denial of
the will, suicide is indeed a strong assertion of the will. The suicide destroys merely the
individual manifestation of life. The willful destruction of the single existence is a vain and
foolish act. The suicide gives up living, because he cannot give up willing. He denies the
individual only, not the species. There is a more adequate way of conquering life than by
destroying it, which Schopenhauer expounds when he deals with the ethical aspect of his
philosophy.

Suicide is unacceptable; it does nothing to diminish the force of the will which
causes endless suffering.
Hyland 1985
(J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in Educational
Studies, 11:3, 224-5)

This illustrates both the idea of perfect knowledge and the source of Schopenhauer's
ethical theory, and also serves to explain why the most obvious solution to the
human predicament, suicide, comes to be rejected. Schopenhauer is by no means
unsympathetic to suicideindeed, he is severely critical of the conventional moral
disapproval of this course of action (1970, pp. 77-9)but, in the end, dismisses it as an
intellectual mistake. The error can be located in the failure to connect each
individual will with the whole, the universal will, in the way that perfect knowledge
requires. Thus, suicide is a "quite futile and foolish act, for the thing-in-itself
remains unaffected by it"; suicide "denies merely the individual, not the species"
(1969, Vol. 1, p. 399). This is, perhaps, the most obscure aspect of Schopenhauer's work
and, as Sprigge (op. cit., pp. 86-7) points out, seems to be based on his philosophy of
mathematics, particularly his idea of numbers and counting. At one level we might render it
understandable by saying that the self-destruction of an individual solves nothing, for
the will, though destroyed in one particular objectified representation, remains
triumphant. The noumenon, the universal will (or, as we might say in modern
terminology, the gene pool) remains unaffected and survives the deaths of individual
suicides to continue the endless cycle of striving.
Suicides dont solve- individual actions can only affect life itself not the will to
life- the taking of ones own life fails to affect that of the species-only the
coming extinction of the status quo solves our suffering.
Schopenhauer, Late German philosopher, 1844 (Arthur, The World as Will and
Representation Fourth Book, Second Edition, Translated by Richard Burdon Haldane and J.
Kemp,
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_World_as_Will_and_Representation/Fourth_Book//AK)
A very noble character we always imagine with a certain trace of quiet sadness, which is anything but a constant fretfulness at daily
annoyances (this would be an ignoble trait, and lead us to fear a bad disposition), but is a consciousness derived from knowledge of
the vanity of all possessions, of the suffering of all life, not merely of his own. But such knowledge may primarily be awakened by the
personal experience of suffering, especi ally some one great sorrow, as a single unfulfilled wish brought Petrarch to that state of
resigned sadness con cerning the whole of life which appeals to us so patheti cally in his works ; for the Daphne he pursued had to
flea from his hands in order to leave him, instead of herself, the immortal laurel. When
through some such great and
irrevocable denial of fate the will is to some extent broken, almost nothing else is desired, and
the character shows itself mild, just, noble, and resigned. When, finally, grief has no definite
object, but extends itself over the whole of life, then it is to a certain extent a going into itself, a
withdrawal, a gradual disappearance of the will, whose visible manifestation, the body, it
imperceptibly but surely undermines, so that a man feels a certain loosening of his bonds, a mild
foretaste of that death which promises to be the abolition at once of the body and of the will.
There fore a secret pleasure accompanies this grief, and it is this, as I believe, which the most
melancholy of all nations has called " the joy of grief." But here also lies the danger of sentimentality, both in life
itself and in the representa tion of it in poetry ; when a man is always mourning and THE ASSERTION AND DENIAL OF THE WILL. 513
lamenting without courageously rising to resignation. In this way we lose both earth and heaven, and retain merely a watery
sentimentality. Only if suffering assumes the form of pure knowledge, and this, acting as a quieter of the will, brings about
resignation, is it worthy of reverence. In this regard, however, we feel a certain respect at the sight of every great sufferer which is
akin to the feeling excited by virtue and nobility of character, and also seems like a reproach of our own happy condition. We cannot
help regarding every sorrow, both our own and those of others, as at least a potential advance towards virtue and holiness, and, on
the contrary, pleasures and worldly satis factions as a retrogression from them. This goes so far, that every man who endures a great
bodily or mental suffering, indeed every one who merely performs some physical labour which demands the greatest exertion, in
the sweat of his brow and with evident exhaustion, yet with patience and without murmuring, every such man, I say, if we consider
him with close attention, appears to us like a sick man who tries a painful cure, and who willingly, and even with satisfaction,
endures the suffering it causes him, because he knows that the more he suffers the more the cause of his disease is affected, and
that therefore the present suffering is the measure of his cure. According to what has been said, the denial of the will to live, which
is just what is called absolute, entire resignation, or holiness, always proceeds from that quieter of the will which the knowledge of
its inner conflict and essential vanity, expressing themselves in the suffer ing of all living things, becomes. The difference, which we
have represented as two paths, consists in whether that knowledge is called up by suffering which is merely and purely known, and
is freely appropriated by means of the penetration of the principium individuationis, or by suffering which is directly felt by a man
himself. True salvation, deliverance from life and suffering, cannot even be imagined without complete denial of the will. Tilliv. then,
every one is simply this will itself, whose manifesta tion is an ephemeral existence, a constantly vain and empty striving, and the
world full of suffering we have represented, to which all irrevocably and in like manner belong. For we found above that life is
always assured to the will to live, and its one real form is the present, from which they can never escape, since birth and death reign
in the phenomenal world. The Indian mythus expresses this by saying " they are born again." The great ethical difference of
character means this, that the bad man is infinitely far from the attainment of the knowledge from which the denial of the will
proceeds, and therefore he is in truth actually exposed to all the miseries which appear in life as possible; for even the present
fortunate condition of his personality is merely a phenomenon produced by the prindpium individuationis, and a delusion of Maya,
the happy dream of a beggar. The sufferings which in the vehemence and ardour of his will he inflicts upon others are the measure
of the suffering, the experience of which in his own person cannot break his will, and plainly lead it to the denial of itself. All true and
pure individuationis, which, if it appears with its full power, results in perfect sanctification and salvation, the love, on the other
hand, and even all free justice, proceed from the penetration of the prindpium phenomenon of which is the state of resignation
described above, the unbroken peace which accompanies it, and the greatest delight in death. 1 69. Suicide, the actual doing away
with the indivi dual manifestation of will, differs most widely from the denial of the will to live, which is the single outstanding act of
free-will in the manifestation, and is therefore, as Asmus calls it, the transcendental change. This last has been fully considered in
the course of our work. Far from being denial of the will, suicide is a phenomenon of strong assertion of will ; for the essence of
negation lies 1 Cf Cli. xlviii. of the Supplement. THE ASSERTION AND DENIAL OF THE WILL. 515 in this, that the joys of life are
shunned, not its sorrows. The
suicide wills life, and is only dissatisfied with the conditions under which
it has presented itself to him. He therefore by no means surrenders the will to live, but only life,
in that he destroys the individual mani festation. He wills life wills the unrestricted existence and
assertion of the body ; but the complication of circum stances does not allow this, and there
results for him great suffering. The very will to live finds itself so much hampered in this
particular manifestation that it cannot put forth its energies. It therefore comes to such a
determination as is in conformity with its own nature, which lies outside the conditions of the
principle of suffi cient reason, and to which, therefore, all particular mani festations are alike
indifferent, inasmuch as it itself remains unaffected by all appearing and passing away, and is
the inner life of all things; for that firm inward assurance by reason of which we all live free from
the constant dread of death, the assurance that a phenomenal existence can never be wanting
to the will, supports our action even in the case of suicide. Thus the will to live appears just as much in suicide
(Siva) as in the satisfaction of self-preservation (Vishnu) and in the sensual pleasure of procreation (Brahma). This is the inner
meaning of the unity of the Trimurtis, which is embodied in its entirety in every human being, though in time it raises now one, now
another, of its three heads. Suicide stands in the same relation to the denial of the will as the individual thing does to the Idea. The
suicide denies only the individual, not the species. We have already seen that as life is always
assured to the will to live, and as sorrow is inseparable from life, suicide, the wilful destruction
of the single phenomenal existence, is a vain and foolish act ; for the thing-in-itself remains
unaffected by it, even as the rainbow endures however fast the drops which support it for the moment may change. But, more
than this, it is also the masterpiece of Maya, as the most 5i6 THE WORLD AS WILL. BK. iv. flagrant example of the contradiction of
the will to live with itself. As we found this contradiction in the case of the lowest manifestations of will, in the permanent struggle
of all the forces of nature, and of all organic individuals for matter and time and space ; and as we saw this antagonism come ever
more to the front with terrible distinctness in the ascending grades of the objec- tification of the will, so at last in the highest grade,
the Idea of man, it reaches the point at which, not only the individuals which express the same Idea extirpate each other, but even
the same individual declares war against itself. The vehemence with which it wills life, and revolts against what hinders it, namely,
suffering, brings it to the point of destroying itself ; so that the individual will, by its own act, puts an end to that body which is
merely its particular visible expression, rather than permit suffering to break the will. Just because the suicide cannot give up willing,
he gives up living. The will asserts itself here even in putting an end to its own manifestation, because it can no longer assert itself
otherwise. As, however, it was just the suffering which it so shuns that was able, as mortification of the will, to bring it to the denial
of itself, and hence to freedom, so in this respect the suicide is like a sick man, who, after a painful operation which would entirely
cure him has been begun, will not allow it to be completed, but prefers to retain his disease. Suffering approaches and reveals itself
as the possibility of the denial of will; but the will rejects it, in that it destroys the body, the manifestation of itself, in order that it
may remain unbroken. This is the reason why almost all ethical teachers, whether philosophical or re ligious, condemn suicide,
although they themselves can only give far-fetched sophistical reasons for their opinion. But if a human being was ever restrained
from commit ting suicide by purely moral motives, the inmost meaning of this self-conquest (in whatever ideas his reason may THE
ASSERTION AND DENIAL OF THE WILL, si- have clothed it) was this : " I will not shun suffering, in order that it may help to put an end
to the will to live, whose manifestation is so wretched, by so strengthening the knowledge of the real nature of the world which is
already beginning to dawn upon me, that it may become the final quieter of my will, and may free me for ever."

Freedom from the pains of life can only be obtained by submissively accepting
suffering not actively seeking an end to it
Jacquette, 2k. (Dale, Department of Philosophy at The Pennsylvania State University,
Schopenhauer on the Ethics of Suicide, Continental Philosophy Review,
http://www.springerlink.com/content/v1t57741140lm108/fulltext.pdf/ak)

If we reach the level of Schopenhauers insight into the world as Will and representation, and if
we see individual willing as inherently a life of suffering, then we cannot be satisfied with suicide
as a philosophical solution to the predicament of life. The objection is that there is a kind of
contradiction, different in force and content from the inconsistency that Kant recognizes in
applying the categorical imperative to the question of suicide, in the individual wills willfully
seeking to exterminate itself as a way of escaping the wretchedness of willing.11 Suicide ends life,
but, as the result of a willful decision in the service of the individual will to life, it cannot by its
very nature altogether transcend willing.12 The ascetics indifference to life and death is not the
means whereby the will is denied. Rather, the ascetic sets out to break and tame the will to life
through a regimen of discipline and suffering, which in turn is meant to lead to the sort of
knowledge or enlightenment that more permanently quiets the will. The only logically coherent
freedom to be sought from the sufferings of the will is not to will death and willfully destroy
the self, but to continue to live while quieting the will, in an ultra ascetic submissive attitude
of sublime indifference toward both life and death.13

The suicide has not achieved the dissolution of the will. They will life and,
experiencing inevitable suffering, seek to satisfy the will by negating life. In
other words, the suicidal individual ceases to live because they cannot cease to
will.
Janaway 1999 (Christopher, Professor of Philosophy at the University of South
Hampton, Schopenhauers Pessimism, in Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement,
Vol.44, pp. 59-60)
Back to suicide. Schopenhauer's discussion of suicide is often found puzzling. For not only does he disapprove of it why, if exis-
tence is never worth more than non-existence? but his disapproval rests on the grounds that 'suicide is a
phenomenon of the will's strong affirmation', and that the suicide 'by no means gives
up the will to life' {Wl, 398). The explanation is that the suicide is the ordinary person whose
attitude concerning the point of life is unre- vised, but whose actual life has not
delivered enough of the out- comes which are considered - wrongly - to give it its
point. The suicide wills life, and is dissatisfied merely with the condi- tions on which it
has come to him. ... He wills life, wills the unchecked existence and affirmation of the
body, but the combi- nation of circumstances does not allow of these, and the result
for him is great suffering. (Wl, 398) The assessment that leads to suicide faults the
circumstances of the individual's actual life for failing to permit a sufficiently smooth
transition from felt deficiency to its removal, or from striving to sat- isfaction. But
Schopenhauer's point is that the person who makes this assessment still does so from a
standpoint of identification with the individual: this person's attitude is that of 'willing
the unchecked existence and affirmation of the body'. Because of this self-
identification the suicide remains caught within the cycle of lacks and replenishments .
But once suffering overwhelmingly gains the upper hand, this cycle seems to have let the individual down. 'Just because the
suicide cannot cease willing, he ceases to live.' The suicide is no different in principle
from any ordinary individual, in affirming the will to life. The hopelessness of the
suicide, who has not 'conquered his own nature', is quite opposed to the state of
denial of the will to life. Similarly, the will-lessness attained in this state cannot be equated
with the aimlessness of boredom. The bored person still wrongly acquiesces in his or her
bodily, striving existence and thinks that existence can gain value from goals pur- sued
and needs satisfied. He or she suffers from the lack of goals because he or she continues
in what I have called a 'higher order' attitude - to affirm the pursuing and attaining of
such goals as the locus of value.
To achieve detachment from our bodily self, to dissolve our individuation and
the will which underlies it we must identify with the transcendental subject of
knowledge. This entails distancing ourselves to the whole domain of willing,
with all of its promises of happiness and all of its aversion to suffering.
Janaway 1999 (Christopher, Professor of Philosophy at the University of South
Hampton, Schopenhauers Pessimism, in Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement,
Vol.44, pp. 60-2)
Thus 'denial of the will' stands opposed to ordinary affirmation, to boredom, and to the
view of the suicide. It does so by virtue of a re-orientation in one's self-identification. The
self for Schopenhauer has unusual complexity. Each human individual is an organism that is part of the
world of objects, but he or she is also the subject of knowledge: 'That which knows all
things and is known by none is the subject ... Everyone finds himself as this sub- ject, yet only so far as he
knows, not in so far as he is an object of knowledge. But his body is already object' (Wl, 5). What is this subject? It
is not part of the spatio-temporal world, but the extensionless point from which
experience of a spatio-temporal world is had, and which that experience presupposes ,
in the manner of Kant's transcendental unity of apperception. 'Subject' is not a kind of thing that occurs
within the world. This subject which I am (or find myself as) is not the individual, which by
definition is a spatio- temporal entity for Schopenhauer (space and time being the principie of individuation).
Elsewhere Schopenhauer discusses the relationship between this subject or T and the organic individual, say- ing that the I is
the 'focus of brain activity': objectively, states of the brain occur, but the T is what the
human organism 'finds itself as' from the point of view of its own experience. Since the
organism is in turn a manifestation of the will to life, he is able to say this: This knowing and
conscious I is related to the will ... as the image in the focus of a concave mirror is
related to that mirror itself; and, like that image, it has only a conditioned, in fact, prop- erly speaking, a
merely apparent reality. Far from being the absolutely first thing (as, e.g., Fichte taught) it is at
bottom ter- tiary, since it presupposes the organism, and the organism pre- supposes
the will. (W2, 278) We are accustomed to regarding this knowing I as our real self, but in
so doing we are in error: the real self is the will (W2, 239). While rational thought and the
subject's self-consciousness are instruments of the will to life and of the organism,
they also give rise to a curious split in our self-conception. For this will to life can
confront consciousness as something distinct from the thinking, knowing subject of
consciousness. It is as if the motor which propels me, the primuni mobile from which I am inseparable
indeed which is me must present itself to me, the thinking, rational subject, as an agency alien to myself. Schopenhauer portrays
the knowing subject as lacking autonomy vis-a-vis the will. That I am a being that wills
life and must strive for other mediate goals, and hence must suffer, does not issue
from my choices. Furthermore no contrivance of rationality, no episode of conscious
willing, no steps I take, even when successful, can make it the case that the willing in
me ceases. This means that it is not within our power whether or not we strive and are open
to suffering. The self-conscious subject is a kind of victim of its underlying real self, the
will to life. The life of willing in non-self-conscious animals has the same pattern as in human life (though it lacks some kinds of
suffering for which conceptual thought is necessary: for instance, anxiety about the future, remorse about the past). But since they
do not have this I as a competing locus of self-hood, other animals cannot see themselves as victims of the will to life as humans can.
Schopenhauer says that our nature accounts for the 'inborn error' of thinking we exist in order
to be happy: 'our whole being is only the paraphrase' of this error, 'indeed our body is
its monogram' (W2, 634). The will to life is also what Christianity calls the 'natur- al man' (Wl, 404-405). It is what we
are that is the problem. The solution, then, is to reach a state in which one becomes
indifferent to happiness and unhappiness, unattached to the body, not wedded to the
furtherance of any goals which an individual willing being might pursue. The threat of
suffering is neutralised if one stands in an attitude of renunciation towards the whole
round of willing and attainment. One must still exist in order to take this attitude , and
Schopenhauer's thought is that one can do so while identifying one- self wholly with the pure
subject of knowledge, that fiction cast up by the organism, which yet we 'find
ourselves to be'. Thus free from our allegiance to the individual, the body, we can have a
kind of pure knowledge, which is had from the perspective of no place within the
world, and stands no closer to the needs and goals of any one individual as opposed to
others. Elsewhere Schopenhauer allies himself with Plato's view in the Phaedo, saying that the notion of liberating
the soul from the body is better expressed as liberating oneself from the will (see W2, 608-
9).
 FW
Turn---education causes suffering
Schopenhauer in 1851 (Arthur [philosopher] THE ESSAYS OF ARTHUR SCHOPENAUER; STUDIES IN PESSIMISM,
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/10732/10732-8.txt //AK)

The human intellect is said to be so constituted that _general ideas_ arise by abstraction from _particular observations_, and
therefore come after them in point of time. If this is what actually occurs, as happens in the case of a man who has to depend solely
upon his own experience for what he learns--who has no teacher and no book,--such a man knows quite well which of his particular
observations belong to and are represented by each of his general ideas. He has a perfect acquaintance with both sides of his
experience, and accordingly, he treats everything that comes in his way from a right standpoint. This might be called the _natural_
method of education. Contrarily, the _artificial_ method is to hear what other people say, to learn
and to read, and so to get your head crammed full of general ideas before you have any sort
of extended acquaintance with the world as it is, and as you may see it for yourself. You will be told that
the particular observations which go to make these general ideas will come to you later on in the
course of experience; but until that time arrives, you apply your general ideas wrongly, you judge
men and things from a wrong standpoint, you see them in a wrong light, and treat them in a
wrong way. So it is that education perverts the mind.

No Impact to education
Schopenhauer in 1851 (Arthur [philosopher] THE ESSAYS OF ARTHUR SCHOPENAUER; STUDIES IN PESSIMISM,
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/10732/10732-8.txt//AK)

It follows that an attempt should be made to find out the strictly natural course of knowledge, so that
education may proceed methodically by keeping to it; and that children may become acquainted with the ways of the world,
without getting wrong ideas into their heads, which very often cannot be got out again. If this plan were adopted, special care would
have to be taken to prevent children from using words without clearly understanding their meaning and application. The
fatal
tendency to be satisfied with words instead of trying to understand things--to learn phrases by
heart, so that they may prove a refuge in time of need, exists, as a rule, even in children; and the
tendency lasts on into manhood, making the knowledge of many learned persons to consist in
mere verbiage.
 Suffering Isnt Inevitable

Suffering is inevitable- attempts to throw off a specific form of suffering like the
affirmative merely changes the form of suffering in a dance that will inevitably
bring us back to the same place. Even lower amounts of sadness occur solely
due to random internal acts-only a stoic view towards our well-being, like our
embrace of the coming extinction in the status quo, can thwart our world of
pain and suffering.
Schopenhauer, Late German philosopher, 1844 (Arthur, The World as Will and
Representation Fourth Book, Second Edition, Translated by Richard Burdon Haldane and J.
Kemp, http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_World_as_Will_and_Representation/Fourth_Book)

whoever a man be and whatever he may possess, the pain

But whatever nature and fortune may have done,

which is essential to life cannot be thrown off : F[T]\I&TI<; & &)//,o>fey, i$wv ei? ovpavov evpvv (Pelidcs autcm cjulavit, intuit
us in cesium latum). And again : Zyvos /zez> Trat? 770, Kpoviovos, avrap oifyv ei^ov aTreipeairjv (Jovis quidem filius cram Saturnii ; vcrum ccrumnam
habebam inftnitam). The ceaseless efforts to banish suffering ac complish no more than to make it
change its form. It is essentially deficiency, want, care^jfor _ the mainte nance of life. If we succeed, which is very difficult, in
removing pain in this form, it immediately assumes a thousand others, varying according to age
and circum stances, such as lust, passionate love, jealousy, envy, hatred, anxiety, ambition,
covetousness, sickness, &a, &c. If at last it can find entrance in no other form, it comes in the sad, grey garments of tediousness and
ennui, against which we then strive in various ways. If finally we succeed in driving this away, we shall hardly do so

without letting pain enter in one of its earlier forms, and the dance begin again from the
beginning ; for all human Ijfojsjossed backwards and forwards between pain and ennui. Depressing as this view of life is, I will draw attention, by
the way, to an aspect of it from which con solation may be drawn, and perhaps even a stoical indif ference to one s own present ills may be attained.
For our impatience at these arises for the most part from the fact that we regard them as brought about by a chain of causes which might easily be
different. We do not gene rally grieve over ills which are directly necessary and quite universal ; for example, the necessity of age and of THE
ASSERTION AND DENIAL OF THE WILL. 407 death, and many daily inconveniences. It is rather the consideration of the accidental nature of the circum
stances that brought some sorrow just to us, that gives it its sting. // But
if we have recognised that pain, as such, is
inevitable and essential to life, and that nothing de pends upon chance but its mere fashion, the
form under which it presents itself, that thus our present sorrow fills a place that, without it,
would at once be occupied by another which now is excluded by it, and that therefore fate can
affect us little in what is essential ; such a reflection, if it were to become a living conviction,
might produce a considerable degree of stoical equanimity, and very much lessen the anxious
care for our own well-being. But, in fact, such a powerful control of reason over directly felt suffering seldom or never occurs.//
Besides, through this view of the inevitableness of pain, of the supplanting of one pain by another, and the intro duction of a new pain through the
passing away of that which preceded it, one might be led to the paradoxical but not absurd hypothesis, that i measure nfjjiAjTg.jr pssp.nti a.1 fcLliJni
Wf>fi HptArmJnftH once for__all Jby_his nature, a measure which could neither remain empty, nor be more than filled, however ; muchjbhe form of
the suffering mjght^change. Thus his suffering and well-being would by no means be determined from without, but only through that measure, that
natural_dis r Dosition, which indeed might experience certain additions and diminutions from the physical condition at different times, but yet, on the
whole, would remain the same, and would just be what is called the temperament, or, more accurately, the degree in which he might be euKoXo? or
SvovcoXo?, as Plato expresses it in the First Book of the Republic, i.e., in an easy or difficult mood. This hypo thesis is supported not only by the well-
known experi ence that great suffering makes all lesser ills cease to be felt, and conversely that freedom from great suffering makes even the most
trifling inconveniences torment us. BK. iv. and put us out of humour ; but experience also teaches that it a great misfortune, at the mere thought of
which we shuddered, actually befalls us, as soon as we have overcome the first pain of it, our disposition remains for the most part unchanged ; and,
conversely, that after the attainment of some happiness we have long desired, we do not feel ourselves on the whole and permanently very much
better off and agreeably situated than before. Only the moment at which these changes occur affects us with unusual strength, as deep sorrow or
exulting joy, out both soon pass away, for they are based upon illu sion. For they do not spring from the exulting joy, out both soon pass away, for they
are based upon illu sion. For they do not spring from the immediately present pleasure or pain, but only from the opening up of a new future which is
anticipated in them. Only by borrowing from the future could pain or pleasure bo heightened so abnormally, and of suffering and of welL- being would
be subjective and determined a priori, fc as_is the case with knowing: consequently not endur- ingly. It would follow, from the hypothesis advanced,
that a lartre part of the feeling and we may add the following remarks as evidence in favour of it. Human cheerful ness or dejection are manifestly not
determined by external circumstances, such as wealth and position, for we see at least as many glad faces among the poor as among the rich. Further,
the motives which induce suicide are so very different, that we can assign no motive that is so great as to bring it about, even with great probability, in
every character, and few that would be so small that the like of them had never caused it. Now although
the degree of our serenity or
sadness is not at all times the same, yet, in consequence of this view, we shall not attribute it to the change of
outward circumstances, but to that of the inner condition, ^hejhysical state. For when an actual,
though only temporary, increase of our serenity, even to the extent of joyfulness, takes place, it
usually appears without any external occasion. It is true that THE ASSERTION AND DENIAL OF THE WILL. 409 we often
see our pain arise only from some definite ex ternal relation, and are visibly oppressed and
saddened by this only. Then we believe that if only this were taken away, the greatest contentment would necessarily ensue. But this is
illusion. The measure of our pain and our happiness is on the whole, according to our hypothesis, subjectively determined for each point of time, and
the motive for sadness is related to that, just as a blister which draws to a head all the bad humours other wise distributed is related to the body. The
pain which is at that period of time essential to our nature, and therefore cannot be shaken off, would, without the definite external cause of our
suffering, be divided at a hundred points, and appear in the form of a hundred little annoy ances and cares about things which we now entirely over
look, because our capacity for pain is already filled by that chief evil which has concentrated in a point all the suffering otherwise dispersed. This
corresponds also to the observation that if a great and pressing care is lifted from our breast by its fortunate issue, another imme diately takes its place,
the whole material of which was already there before, yet could not come into conscious ness as care because there was no capacity left for it, and
therefore this material of care remained indistinct and unobserved in a cloudy form on the farthest horizon of consciousness. But now that there is
room, this prepared material at once comes forward and occupies the throne of the reigning care of the day (Trpv-ravevovaa). And if it is very much
lighter in its matter than the material of the care which has vanished, it knows how to blow itself out so as apparently to equal it in size, and thus, as
the chief care of the day, completely fills the throne
 Progress
(this is probably also an A2 cap/most Ks that hinge on a reading of history) The
idea of a progression of history is ridiculous in itself but more laughable when
applied to politics Revolutions are replacing power with the same the evils
they decry in the state or even individual actions speak to a deeper
metaphysical evil of the world and therefore attempting to change these
essential evils with actions in the phenomenal world is absurd
Winkler 13 (Winkler, Robin. "SCHOPENHAUER'S CRITIQUE OF MORALISTIC THEORIES OF THE
STATE." History of Political Thought 34.2 (2013): 296-323.)

If history were of any philosophical value at all, it would have to give us access to the world as
will; it would have to tell us something about the essence of the world. Yet although history shows
us mankind just as a view from a high mountain shows us nature,143 the impossibility to possess all the
data, to have registered everything, or to have explored everything144 makes this view a rather blurred one: nothing becomes
distinct or recognizable according to the whole of its essence.145 For this reason, history is not even a science, let
alone philosophy, but merely knowledge, for nowhere does it recognize the particular by means of the universal,
rather it must always comprehend the particular directly,146 and even the most universal ideas in history concern only something
unique and individual, namely a long period of time or a principal incident.147 Schopenhauer not only rejected the ideas of progress
and of a historical science. More interestingly, and coming full circle with his criticism of the Hegelian theory of the state, he
thought it laughable that artificially construed histories, guided by shallow optimism, always
ultimately end with a cozy, well-nourished, fat state, with a well-regulated constitution, good
justice and police, good technology and industry, and mostly intellectual perfection.148 This,
Schopenhauer thought, was simply utopian, if not inconsistent with his own theory of the state. What he most angrily
objected to, however, was the Hegelian notion that such a state would also imply moral progress and
perfection. For in his own ethics morality remains essentially unchangeable.149 The idea of a philosophy of
history, such as Hegels, was simply nonsensical in Schopenhauers eyes. The Hegelians, he wrote, who conjure up
such constructions of the course of the world . . . have not grasped the principal truth of all
philosophy, that the same is at any time [sic], that all becoming and unfolding is only
apparent.150 The will is the essence of the world, and since it manifests itself objectively as ethical disposition, to which alone
free will attaches, morality cannot be subject to any progress or change. The goodness of the world more
generally is unchangeable. The Hegelian fools, by contrast, opine that something is yet to come into existence, namely something
better, a state more moral and free.151 This must be wrong if goodness,
morality, freedom do not pertain to the
world as representation, in which things are causally related in space and time. Only because of their misunderstanding of
the nature of history did the Hegelians concede to history a principal place in their philosophy, and construct it on an assumed plan
of the world, according to which everything is directed towards the good.152 In response to this, Schopenhauer argued that the
true philosophy of history consists in the insight that, amid all the manifold changes and chaos,
one yet always has before one the same, constant, and unalterable essence, namely the
fundamental qualities of the human heart and mind many bad, few good.153 Hence,
Schopenhauers underlying anti-Hegelianism resulted to a significant extent from his opposition to the Hegelian view of the state as
the basis of morality. It cannot be denied that frustration with the lack of recognition of his own work also fuelled Schopenhauers
contempt for Hegel. Moreover, Paul Gottfried has argued that the attack on Hegels notion of history was more of an addendum to
the general shafts against the stupidity of the general system of thought of his rival: At first [Schopenhauer] aimed his shafts against
a hated rival, then against the rivals system of thought, and finally against the root assumptions from which that system sprang, i.e.,
the ideas of historical progress and the rational nature of reality.154 Although it is certainly true that political philosophy and
history were not at the core of Schopenhauers criticisms of Hegel, the political and historical dimensions of Hegels system had
always attracted Schopenhauers criticism since his earliest encounter with it. Hbscher attributes most of Schopenhauers
bitterness about Hegel to a radical denial of historicism.155 Ausmus concurs with Hbscher that one cannot conclude that
Schopenhauer changed his position on the nature of history concomitantly with his increasing charges of Hegelian fraud.156
Schopenhauers view of history as merely rational knowledge about events located in time and space was held early in life.157 The
Left Hegelians and their notions of social progress were another nemesis of Schopenhauers. To his mind, they had all been
bred in Hegels barn of charlatans.158 He mocked them for spouting on about history as the process of the
absolute.159 In a sense, they were even worse than Hegel: for Hegel, philosophy of history was entirely retrospective;
according to the Young Hegelians, however, the progress of history could be advanced so as to
bring about justice in the present. To Schopenhauer, they failed to understand that the many
injustices of the social world were eternal injustices, rooted in the intrinsically unjust nature
of most men. As a result of this, they blamed the state, politics, for social injustices, they attribute
entirely to governments the crying and colossal evils of the world: for if only governments did their duty,
there would be heaven on earth, i.e. everyone would gorge, guzzle, propagate, and die without any effort or sorrows: for this is the
paraphrase of their end in itself and the goal of the endless progress of mankind which they tirelessly proclaim in their pompous
phrases.160 For example, having been introduced to Feuerbachs writings by his disciple Frauenstdt, Schopenhauer concluded that
Feuerbachs oafish, bigoted materialism was simply another fruit of Hegelianism.161 In 1848, the year of the revolution,
Schopenhauer intimated to a friend that the optimism of the Hegelians was as suited to his own worldview as a pork fricassee to a
Jewish wedding.162 Schopenhauer despised the practical
revolutionaries and anarchists of the 1848/49
revolutions as much as the nonsense-scribbling Left Hegelian intellectuals. According to Thomas Mann,
Schopenhauer had no time for the idea of progress, and he had even less time for the political
agitation of the people, the revolutions. His behaviour in 1848 was grimly comic . . . He had not even the slightest
sympathies for those who, admittedly optimistically, were hoping to give German public life a new direction.163 As already
mentioned, Mann was not so superficial as to consider Schopenhauers fear of losing his personal fortune as the main rationale
underlying his contempt for the revolutionaries. Rather, he argued, Schopenhauers anti-revolutionary attitude was grounded in his
worldview, not only logically-conceptually, but also spiritually: it was a fundamental disposition that belonged to his moralism, his
ethical pessimism.164 Yet Schopenhauers pessimism his faustische Duft, Kreuz, Tod und Gruft,165 in Nietzsches famous words
equally provides an idiosyncratic and under-rated perspective on the dominant traditions of German political philosophy in the
nineteenth century.
 State
State cant make people ethical leads to net more egoism even in the best
possible scenario
Jordan 9 (Jordan, Neil. "Schopenhauer's Politics: Ethics, Jurisprudence and the State." Better
Consciousness: Schopenhauer's Philosophy of Value (2009): 171-188.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/doi/10.1002/9781444322866.ch11/pdf)
There is, however, an additional concern here, bound to the nature of virtue itself, which would surely prevent the state from ever being capable of
enforcing it. Schopenhauers statement that legislation can be enforced to bring about a state of justice25 discloses
the reason for which any attempt to impose morality must fail. In such a state of justice, everyone would act justly and

would desist from harming others, but not from compassion or genuine personal virtue. Rather,
they would respect the rights of others only from a self-interested fear of the punishments with
which acts of wrong are met. As such, irrespective of appearances, even the most effective of states relies
upon and perpetuates egoism. If the State attains its object completely, it will produce the same
phenomenon as if perfect justice of disposition everywhere prevailed; but the inner nature and
origin of both phenomena will be the reverse. Thus in the latter case, it would be said that no one wished to do wrong, but in
the former that no one wished to suffer wrong (WWRI: 346). Since, for Schopenhauer, real virtue is a matter of disposition and

is characterized by selflessness,26 there is surely something paradoxical in the idea that it could be
enforced under threat of punishment. As such, the nature of virtue itself means that ethics can never be imposed
by the state, whose only means of motivation is appeal to self-interest. It seems, then, that the state
can have no moral role at all, for to attribute such to it would not only be contrary to the
purpose of its existence, but also dangerous and futile. Schopenhauer appears to have drawn a very sharp distinction
between the spheres of legislation and ethics, whereupon the former, in the face of the weakness of natural morality as a motive, simply makes a very
particular use of ethical doctrine in order to act as an institution of protection, rendered necessary by the manifold attacks to which man is exposed
(WWR II: 594). However, the very fact that the state is concerned with the suffering of wrong (even if not
so much with the doing of wrong) surely suggests some kind of moral purpose. What, after all, would be wrong with the suffering
of wrong were it not wrong? However, Schopenhauers view of the states foundation reveals that he does not consider the

states protective function to be moral in character at all.

Education currently overemphasizes the pursuit of happiness. Against this, we

must also emphasize the inevitability of pain, misery, and suffering if we are
prepare students for the world.
Hyland 1985
(J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in Educational
Studies, 11:3, 219-20)

In the rather strange final section of the Tractatus in which Wittgenstein discusses God,
death, the will and the mystical, we come across the following remark: "The world of the
happy man is a different one from that of the unhappy man" (1922, p. 72). Like many other
thoughts of Wittgenstein this is tantalisingly eliptical, but enough is said in the surrounding
context of propositions to give clues to interpretation. The will, as the subject of ethical
attributes, cannot alter the world but only its limits, that is, its totality as framed by
experience. Our perspective, our stance in relation to the world, is constructed out of the
given data of experience subject to the limitations of human understanding. Differences in
understanding result in different world pictures. Spinoza's quest for the "faculty of enjoying
throughout eternity continual supreme happiness" was guided by similar considerations.
Spinoza had learned that "all things which frequently take place in ordinary life are vain and
futile", and concluded that "all the things I feared and which feared me had nothing good or
bad in them save in so far as the mind was affected by them" (1959a, p. 277). The search for
the supreme good was to be conducted according to certain 'rules of life', through the
development of the best mode of perception, and by paying attention to, amongst other
things, "moral philosophy and the theory for the education of children" (ibid, p. 231). Both
Wittgenstein and Spinoza are alluding to matters of the first importance in life, concerns
which, as Spinoza suggests, are inextricably linked with educational development. In the
context of discussions about moral education and the education of the emotions,
educators have naturally shown a great interest in such questions, and a number of well-
established perspectives have been developed for the purpose of guiding practice. However,
in all such discussions inordinate emphasis has been placed on the notion of
happiness, references to which seem irresistible as soon as educators turn their
attention to ultimate aims. Bantock (1967) has taken child-centred educators to task for
their obsession with happiness, and Dearden (1972) has tried to make sense of the
obsession, concluding that, although we cannot sensibly question its value, happiness
cannot simply be the aim of education without qualification, but must be balanced
against other "final ends constitutive of the good of man" (p. 111). None of these caveats seem
to have affected Barrow's longstanding preoccupation with happiness as an ultimate educational aim. After
reviewing a formidable body of writings on the topic, he concludes that, although happiness is not logically tied
to any particular conditions or linked with any particular feeling, 'it is something to be valued and schools
should show a concern for it'. Such concern should take the form of providing pupils with a secure
environment, nurturing their self-esteem, offering alternatives to the dominant competitive model of social and
economic organisation, and there should also be some attempt made to teach pupils about 'the nature of
happiness itself (1980, pp. 138-140). I am not sure what such teaching would consist in but I want to suggest an
alternative to this rather one-sided and undiscriminating approach. It has always seemed to me that a defect
of utilitarianism is its failure to come to grips with unhappiness. Although officially
concerned with its avoidance or diminution, utilitarians have generally been content
to state this formal principle then go on to concentrate almost exclusively on the
pursuit or maximisation of its opposite number, happiness. In his Moral Thinking, for
instance, Hare (1981) founds a complete system of practical moral reasoning on the maximisation of desire and
preference satisfaction but, apart from a brief chapter on evil desires, pays scant attention to the countless ways
in which preferences are thwarted and desires frustrated in ordinary life. Attention needs to be
concentrated on this understated aspect of the utilitarian formula, unhappiness in all
its forms. In particular, I wish to suggest that educators ought to show more interest in
areas of human life and experience that have been traditionally neglectedthe roots
and consequences of the misery, pain and suffering in the worldif they are to
achieve that most general of educational aims, what Whitehead (1932) called the only
subject-matter of education, that is, 'Life in all its manifestations' (p. 10). Few
philosophers have considered these aspects of human nature as deeply and systematically as
Schopenhauer, and I want to try to show how Schopenhauer's writings in this area can
help to clarify our thinking about questions which are fundamental to considerations
of the nature and purpose of education.
The will is the noumenal realm beyond all phenomena. It is a blind pursuit of
life that undergirds the whole of existence. It knows no satisfaction. We need
to orient ourselves toward life as a penal colony of endless suffering.
Hyland 1985
(J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in Educational
Studies, 11:3, 220-2)

To Kant's world of phenomena, of appearances and representations, Schopenhauer

added the central all-embracing notion of 'the will' which, he argued, was the
noumenon, the thing- in-itself, that Kant claimed could never be directly known to
us. There was, indeed, some equivocation by Kant on this matter since it seemed that there
was at least one special sphere, namely, our immediate knowledge of ourselves and our
thoughts, feelings and desires, in which we might achieve knowledge of the thing-in-itself. It
was this aspect that Schopenhauer took up and gave pride of place in his philosophical
system. Knowledge of ourselves is both subjective and objective; objectively, we know
ourselves as extended objects in the way that we know other physical phenomena, but we
also have subjective knowledge of an inner world of feelings and desires. It is this inner
world which Schopenhauer calls the will, and it is this which gives an individual "the key to
his own phenomenon, reveals to him the significance and shows him the inner mechanism
of his being, his actions, his movements". The physical body is nothing but "the objectified
will, i.e. will that has become representation" (1969, Vol. 1, p. 100). This contention is repeated over
and over again, and elaborated with intriguing illustrations taken from every conceivable sphere of human
experience. Schopenhauer leaves us in little doubt that this insight provides the solution to the most
fundamental problems of philosophy. Thing-in-itself signifies that which exists independently of perception,
that which actually is. To Democritus it was matter; fundamentally that is what it still was to Locke; to Kant it
was = x; to me it is will. (1970, p. 55) This conception of the will is used by Schopenhauer as a basis
for an elaborate metaphysical system which is itself a foundation for the investigation of the
operation of the will in all spheres of human activity and experience. Although we can arrive
at knowledge of the will, the will, considered purely in itself, is devoid of knowledge and is
merely a 'blind, irresistible urge'. The phenomenal world is the mirror, the objectivity of the
will; it is a world of representation through which the will obtains knowledge of its own
willing. And what it wills is simply life, its own continued existence; the will is the 'will-to-
live' and this is the 'noumenon' of the whole of physical nature (1969, Vol. 1, p. 275). The
striving of the will, however, appears to be blind and irrational. Without any definite aim
or object, it constantly struggles to survive and assert its own nature but, since that
nature is itself only a striving, the whole enterprise seems incapable of any final
satisfaction. The will, seen most forcefully in the sexual impulse and reproductive urge,
struggles to survive at all costs but also seeks satisfaction through the attainment of quietus,
a form in which it does not have to struggle any more. Since a satisfied will is a
contradiction in terms, the whole process is doomed to failure. Sprigge (1984) provides
an excellent account of this aspect of Schopenhauer, referring to the restlessness of the
will as a kind of 'yearning or longing, or restless itching to be rid of one's present
state'. And, since each individual will is compelled to recognise and compete with
the other wills which make up the world of representation, the whole inner nature of
physical reality can be seen as "innumerable different feelings of yearning which
somehow impinge on each other and struggle against each other" (p. 82). The lower
animals are pure will, nothing but the constant striving after existence, but even the highly
developed intelligence and consciousness of humans finds difficulty in completely subverting
the force of the will. Indeed, man, "as the most complete objectification of this will, is
accordingly the most necessitous of all beings"; man is a "concrete willing and needing
through and through; he is a concretion of a thousand wants and needs" (1969, Vol. 1, p.
312). Since it is the motivating and sustaining force of the whole of nature, the will is, thus,
responsible for the way the world is, and it is in his description of this world that
Schopenhauer displays the most systematic and thoroughgoing pessimism of any Western
philosopher. The blind striving of the will is without aim and without rest, a thirst
which cannot be quenched and, once we have observed and understood this, we will
be convinced that "all life is suffering" (1969, ibid., p. 310). Just as history shows the
life of nations to be one of constant wars and tumults, so the life of the individual "is
a constant struggle against want or boredom" (1970, p. 42). For Schopenhauer, the
world is "Hell, and men are on the one hand the tormented souls and on the other
the devils in it". Not even the faintest glimmer of hope is given when the philosopher
offers us the following advice: As a reliable compass for orientating yourself in life
nothing is more useful than to accustom yourself to regarding this world as a place of
atonement, a sort of penal colony. When you have done this you will order your
expectations of life according to the nature of things and no longer regard the
calamities, sufferings, torments and miseries of life as something irregular... but will
find them entirely in order, (ibid., pp. 48-9) All this suffering is a natural and logical
consequence of the affirmation of the will to live that the world is the way it is, is thus
not a contingent fact but one which necessarily follows from the nature of the will. So
convinced is Schopenhauer that he has presented us with an accurate and definitive account
of the lot of humankind that he suggests a re-writing of the world's history to purge it
of that optimism which "is not only a false but also a pernicious doctrine, for it
presents life as a desirable state and man's happiness as its aim and object' (1969,
Vol. 2, p. 584). Conceptions of good and evil, pain and pleasure are, constantly, all in
need of re-appraisal. I therefore know of no greater absurdity than that absurdity which
characterises almost all metaphysical systems: that of explaining evil as something negative.
For evil is precisely that which is positive, that which makes itself palpable; and
good, on the other hand, i.e. all happiness and all gratification, is that which is
negative, the mere abolition of a desire and extinction of a pain. (1970, pp. 41-2)
 Extinction
Extinction is inevitable multiple warrants
FHE 17 (The FHE Team of scientists, Future Human Extinction: Natural
Disasters, Future Human Evolution, 2017, http://futurehumanevolution.com/future-
human-extinction-risks/future-human-extinction-natural-disasters)//glen

Asteroid impact The explosion in the popularity of astronomy in the last few decades has paved the way for artistic representations of the end of the world. Novels like Lucifers
Hammer and films like Armageddon make it seem like a catastrophic asteroid impact is not only possible, but probable. And while the odds are infinitesimal that an impact event will happen in our lifetime,

there is no question a cosmic interloper will hit Earth we wont have to wait
that , and

millions of years for it to happen. In 1908 a 200-foot-wide comet fragment slammed into the atmosphere and exploded over the Tunguska region in Siberia, Russia, with nearly 1,000
times the energy of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Astronomers estimate similar-sized events occur every one to three centuries. Benny Peiser, an anthropologist-cum-pessimist at Liverpool John
Moores University in England, claims that impacts have repeatedly disrupted human civilization. As an example, he says one killed 10,000 people in the Chinese city of Chiing-yang in 1490. Many scientists
question his interpretations: Impacts are most likely to occur over the ocean, and small ones that happen over land are most likely to affect unpopulated areas. But with big asteroids, it doesnt matter much
where they land. Objects more than a half-mile wide- which strike Earth every 250,000 years or so- would touch off firestorms followed by global cooling from dust kicked up by the impact. Humans would

An asteroid five miles wide would cause extinction like the

likely survive, but civilization might not. major s,

one that marked the end of the age of dinosaurs.

may have For a real chill, look to the Kuiper belt, a zone just beyond Neptune

one of the big ones

that contains roughly 100,000 ice-balls more than 50 miles in diameter. The Kuiper belt sends a steady rain of small comets earthward. If headed right for us,

would be it for pretty much all forms of life

that Gamma-ray Burst higher , even cockroaches. If you could watch the
sky with gamma-ray vision, you might think you were being stalked by cosmic paparazzi. Once a day or so, you would see a bright flash appear, briefly outshine everything else, then vanish. These

gamma-ray bursts are unfathomably powerful-

, astrophysicists recently learned, originate in distant galaxies and as much as 10
quadrillion (a one followed by 16 zeros) times as energetic as the sun. The bursts probably result from the merging of two collapsed stars.
Before the cataclysmal event, such a double star might be almost completely undetectable, so wed likely have no advance notice if one is lurking nearby. Once the burst begins, however, there would be no
missing its fury. At a distance of 1,000 light-years- farther than most of the stars you can see on a clear night- it would appear about as bright as the sun. Earths atmosphere would initially protect us from

The potent radiation would cook the atmosphere,

most of the bursts deadly X rays and gamma rays, but at a cost.

creating nitrogen oxides that would destroy the ozone layer. Without the ozone layer,

ultraviolet rays from the sun would reach the surface at nearly full force, causing skin

killing off the photosynthetic plankton in the ocean that provide

cancer and, more seriously, tiny

oxygen to the atmosphere and bolster the bottom of the food chain. All the gamma-ray bursts
observed so far have been extremely distant, which implies the events are rare. Scientists understand so little about these explosions, however, that its difficult to estimate the likelihood of one detonating in
our galactic neighborhood. Collapse of the Vacuum In the book Cats Cradle, Kurt Vonnegut popularized the idea of ice-nine, a form of water that is far more stable than the ordinary kind, so it is solid at
room temperature. Unleash a bit of it, and suddenly all water on Earth transforms to ice-nine and freezes solid. Ice-nine was a satirical invention, but an abrupt, disastrous phase transition is a possibility. Very
early in the history of the universe, according to a leading cosmological model, empty space was full of energy. This state of affairs, called a false vacuum, was highly precarious. A new, more stable kind of
vacuum appeared and, like ice-nine, it quickly took over. This transition unleashed a tremendous amount of energy and caused a brief runaway expansion of the cosmos. It is possible that another, even more
stable kind of vacuum exists, however. As the universe expands and cools, tiny bubbles of this new kind of vacuum might appear and spread at nearly the speed of light. The laws of physics would change in
their wake, and a blast of energy would dash everything to bits. It makes for a beautiful story, but its not very likely, says Piet Hut of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Princeton, New Jersey. He says he

worries more about threats that scientists are more certain of- such as rogue black holes. Rogue Black Holes Our galaxy is full of black
holes , collapsed stellar corpses just a dozen miles wide. How full? Tough question. After all, theyre called black holes for a reason. Their gravity is so strong they swallow everything, even the light
that might betray their presence. David Bennett of Notre Dame University in Indiana managed to spot two black holes recently by the way they distorted and amplified the light of ordinary, more distant stars.

Based on such observations, and even more on theoretical arguments, researchers guesstimate there are about 10 million black holes in the
Milky Way. These objects orbit just like other stars, meaning that it is not terribly likely that one is headed our way. But if a normal star were moving toward us, wed know it. With a black
hole there is little warning. A few decades before a close encounter, at most, astronomers would observe a strange perturbation in the orbits of the outer planets. As the effect grew larger, it would be

The black hole wouldnt have to come

possible to make increasingly precise estimates of the location and mass of the interloper. all that

close to Earth to bring ruin; just passing through the solar system would distort
all the planets orbits. Earth might get drawn into an elliptical path that would
of

cause extreme climate swings, or be ejected from the solar system and go it might

hurtling to a frigid fate in deep space. Giant Solar Flares Solar flares- more properly known as coronal mass ejections-
are enormous magnetic outbursts on the sun that bombard Earth with a torrent of high-speed subatomic particles. Earths atmosphere and magnetic field negate the potentially lethal effects of ordinary
flares. But while looking through old astronomical records, Bradley Schaefer of Yale University found evidence that some perfectly normal-looking, sunlike stars can brighten briefly by up to a factor of 20.

Schaefer believes these stellar flickers are caused by superflares, millions of times more powerful than their common cousins. Within a few hours, a
superflare on the sun could fry Earth and begin disintegrating the ozone layer (see
#2). Although there is persuasive evidence that our sun doesnt engage in such excess, scientists dont know why superflares happen at all, or whether our sun could exhibit milder but still disruptive behavior. And
while too much solar activity could be deadly, too little of it is problematic as well. Sallie Baliunas at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics says many solar-type stars pass through extended quiescent
periods, during which they become nearly 1 percent dimmer. That might not sound like much, but a similar downturn in the sun could send us into another ice age. Baliunas cites evidence that decreased solar

Reversal of Earths Magnetic Field Every few hundred

activity contributed to 17 of the 19 major cold episodes on Earth in the last 10,000 years.

thousand years Earths magnetic field dwindles almost to nothing for perhaps a century, then gradually reappears with the
north and south poles flipped. The last such reversal was 780,000 years ago, so we may be overdue. Worse, the

strength of our magnetic field has decreased about 5 percent in the past century. Why worry in an age when GPS
has made compasses obsolete? Well, the magnetic field deflects particle storms and cosmic rays from the sun, as

well as even more energetic subatomic particles from deep space. Without magnetic protection,
these particles would strike Earths atmosphere, eroding the already beleaguered ozone layer (see
#5). Also, many creatures navigate by magnetic reckoning. A magnetic reversal might cause serious ecological mischief. One big caveat: There are no identifiable fossil effects from previous flips, says Sten
Odenwald of the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. This is most curious. Still, a disaster that kills a quarter of the population, like the Black Plague in Europe, would hardly register as a blip in fossil records.

Flood-Basalt Volcanism In 1783, the Laki volcano in Iceland erupted, spitting out three cubic miles of lava. Floods, ash, and fumes wiped out 9,000 people and 80 percent of the
livestock. The ensuing starvation killed a quarter of Icelands population. Atmospheric dust caused winter temperatures to plunge by 9 degrees in the newly independent United States. And that was just a babys
burp compared with what the Earth can do. Sixty-five million years ago, a plume of hot rock from the mantle burst through the crust in what is now India. Eruptions raged century after century, ultimately
unleashing a quarter-million cubic miles of lava- the Laki eruption 100,000 times over. Some scientists still blame the Indian outburst, not an asteroid, for the death of the dinosaurs. An earlier, even larger event in

Sulfurous
Siberia occurred just about the time of the Permian-Triassic extinction, the most thorough extermination known to paleontology. At that time 95 percent of all species were wiped out.

volcanic gases produce acid rains. Chlorine-bearing compounds present yet another threat to
the fragile ozone layer- a noxious brew all around. While they are causing short-term
destruction, volcanoes also release carbon dioxide that yields long-term greenhouse-effect
warming.The last big pulse of flood-basalt volcanism built the Columbia River plateau about 17 million years ago. Were ripe for another. Global
Epidemics If Earth doesnt do us in, our fellow organisms might be up to the task. Germs and people have always coexisted, but occasionally the balance gets out of whack. The Black Plague killed one
European in four during the 14th century; influenza took at least 20 million lives between 1918 and 1919; the AIDS epidemic has produced a similar death toll and is still going strong. From 1980 to 1992, reported
the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, mortality from infectious disease in the United States rose 58 percent. Just about a decade ago, Infectious diseases killed 1/3 worldwide; AIDS was the top cause of

Old diseases such as cholera and measles have developed new resistance to
death in developing regions.

antibiotics. Intensive agriculture and land development is bringing humans closer to animal
pathogens. International travel means diseases can spread faster than ever. Michael Osterholm, an infectious disease
expert who formerly worked at the Minnesota Department of Health, described the situation as like trying to swim against the current of a raging river. The grimmest possibility

would be the emergence of a strain that spreads so fast we are caught off guard or that resists
all chemical means of control, perhaps as a result of our stirring of the ecological pot. About
12,000 years ago, a sudden wave of mammal extinctions swept through the Americas. Ross MacPhee of the
American Museum of Natural History argues the culprit was extremely virulent disease, which humans helped transport as they migrated into the New World.

Allowing the human race to go extinct destines humanity for nobility.

The Economist 1998 (The Economist, Sui Genocide December 17, 1998,
http://www.economist.com/node/179963)
Consider, in this connection, a question so obvious, and so important, that it has rarely if ever been
posed: Why should there always be a next generation? Of course parents will make one, at least for the foreseeable future, but to
say they have no choice in the affair is a reply suitable for a bacillus or a slime mould or a tumour, not for a thinking being. The command to make children and

grandchildren, to be fruitful and multiply for ever and ever, is an imperative of the genes, not the mind.

Humans will be the slaves of two little coils of nucleotide bases so long as they fail to take into
their own hands the ultimate question, which is how long the People Show should go on. An exit
chosen, not ordained It is clear that human history will end; the only mystery is when. It is also clear that if

the timing is left to nature (or, if you prefer, to God) and humans hang on until the bloody end, the race's
final exit will be ignoble. If future generations escape the saurian agony of extermination by a wandering chunk of rock or ice, the sun's unavoidable growth
to gianthood will still incinerate their last successors: only cinders and gases and dust will remain. Far future generations might prolong the process by posting colonies beyond
the earth's orbit, but these would be sad outposts at the end of the solar system's long day, clutching memories of a lost planet and of billions of immolated souls. The
difficultiesfantastic difficultiesof interstellar travel might be overcome, but the mightiest of starships could do no more than defer the dies irae. An ignoble existence
hopping from planet to planetclinging to each clod until it, in its turn, was vaporised or frozenmight still be bearable were it not for the knowledge of its final futility. In the

end, there is only death by gravity or entropy, the fiery quantum pit or the heatless grey soup. The great violinist Jascha Heifetz was great not
leastbecause he quit the concert stage at his peak, before the show became stale or the audience
drifted away. To exit gracefully is sublime, as Heifetz understood. And only one species is capable of
choosing a similarly graceful exit; all others march on like robots. To call time on the human race
by choice, not necessity, would be the final victory of the human spirit over animal nature, an absolute
emancipation from the diktat of DNA. Precisely because no other known life-form could do or
even conceive such a thing, humanity must. More: science has revealed only one place in the universe that is hospitable to intelligent life,
and humans are the only intelligence that, as far as is known, has ever enjoyed the opportunity to occupy it. If people left the stage after a

reasonable run, in the fullness of time intelligence could evolve again (dolphin-people? chimp-people? orchid
people?). And then, in due course, when this new species deciphered human books or reached the marker

that might be left for them on the windless moon, they would know that man ended his
dominion so that theirs might begin. Imagine, then, how they will regard us. It is, far and away,
the greatest act of goodness ever contemplated, the ennoblement of a whole species; an act, almost, of
angels. By departing the scene humanity will leave much undiscovered, much unexplored and

unfinished. Perhaps in the reaches of space there is life, or even intelligence: a pity to extinguish the race before meeting it. Yet the future is always
an unwritten page, and the nobility of voluntary extinction resides precisely in shutting the book
at a time of our own choosing. To make contact with an alien race while still alive would be interesting, for a while; but mankind will doubtless make a
better impression posthumously. Then the aliens will know the ancients of earth as a legendary race that gave

itself back to the dust and the stars. They will speak of us with awe to their children for as long as, ignoring
our example, they continue to have any. Imagine the poetry, the music, of those last few human generations;

imagine the moral exaltation of those last few souls, the pregnant richness of sound and light
and colour and even of thought in the last months of humanity's twilight. Who would not give
everything to know the ineffable sadness and nobility of being among the last? Then, at last, the
lights will go out, and the world will begin anew, and the sand will cover our name. That would
be a finale worthy of a great race. It is hard, indeed, to imagine any reason to be against voluntary human extinction. The tricky question is not
whether to extinguish, but when. Certainly not right away, if only because, as yet, we can't. As Mr Knight himself says, Convincing 6 billion people to stop breeding is indeed a
daunting task. But there need be no rush. Look at it this way. For humans to reach a state of such collective rational consensus that they become capable of choosing their end
may take a few millennia, or a few dozen or a few hundred millennia; but this decision need only be made once. When even the last few men and women left holding out
answer the call to the sublime, and choose to bear no more childrenthen that will be the species' finest hour. And so that will be the time to leave. The timetable of

Let this article be a hopeful obituary, then, for a race

voluntarism is perfect: it provides ample time, but not a day too much of it.

that may yet hurl its defiance into the teeth of the cosmos, and surpass itself as no earthly
creature has ever done before. Let Homo sapiens' epitaph say that nothing in our career
became us like the ending of it.

Space colonization is a cowardly and depressing postponement of the

inevitable
The Economist 1998 (The Economist, Sui Genocide December 17, 1998,
http://www.economist.com/node/179963)//glen
Far future generations might prolong the process by posting colonies beyond the earth's orbit,
but these would be sad outposts at the end of the solar system's long day, clutching memories
of a lost planet and of billions of immolated souls. The difficultiesfantastic difficultiesof interstellar
travel might be overcome, but the mightiest of starships could do no more than defer the dies
irae. An ignoble existence hopping from planet to planetclinging to each clod until it, in its
turn, was vaporised or frozenmight still be bearable were it not for the knowledge of its final
futility. In the end, there is only death by gravity or entropy, the fiery quantum pit or the
heatless grey soup.
Consciousness is the root cause of all suffering.
Ligotti 10 (Thomas, The Conspiracy Against the Human Race: A Contrivance of
Horror, Hippocampus Press, June 25th 2010)
Wide - Awake Our want of any natural birthright except to die, in most cases without assistance is not a matter of tragedy, but
only one of truth. Coming at last to the pith of Zapffes thought as it is contained in The Last Messiah, what the Norwegian phi -
osopher saw as the
tragedy of human existence had its beginnings when at some stage in our
evolution we acquired a damning surplus of consciousness. (Indulgence is begged in advance for the
present works profuse entreaties for assent, or at least suspension of disbelief, in this matter.) Naturally, it must be owned that
there are quarrels among cognitive psychologists, philosophers of mind, and neuroscientists about what consciousness is. The fact
that this question has been around since at least the time of the ancient Greeks and early Buddhists sugge sts there is an assumption
of consciousness in the human species and that consciousness has had an effect on the way we exist. For Zapffe, the effect
was A breach in the very unity of life, a biological paradox, an abomination, an absurdity, an exaggeration of
disastrous nature. Life had overshot its target, blowing itself apart. A species had been armed
too heavily by spirit made almighty without, but equally a menace to its own well - being. Its weapon was
like a sword without hilt or plate, a two - edged bla de cleaving everything; but he who is to
wield it must grasp the blade and turn one edge toward himself. Despite his new eyes, man was
still rooted in matter, his soul spun into it and subordinated to its blind laws. And yet he could see
matter as a strang er, compare himself to all phenomena, see through and locate his vital processes. He comes to nature as
an unbidden guest, in vain extending his arms to beg conciliation with his maker: Nature
answers no more; it performed a miracle with man, but later did not know him. He has lost his right of residence
in the universe, has eaten from the Tree of Knowledge and been expelled from Paradise. He is
mighty in the near world, but curses his might as purchased with his harmony of soul, his innocence, his inner pe ace in lifes
embrace. Could there be anything to this pessimistic verbiage, this tirade against the evolution of consciousness? Millennia had
passed without much discussion one way or the other on the subject, at least in polite society. Then suddenly thi s barrage from an
obscure Norwegian philosopher. What is one to say? For con -trast, here are some excerpts from an online interview with the
eminent British multidisciplinary thinker Nicholas Humphrey (A Self Worth Having: A Talk with Nicolas Humphr ey, 2003):
Consciousness phenomenal experience seems in many ways too good to be true. The way we experience the world seems
unnecessarily beautiful, unnecessarily rich and strange.... Phenomenal experience, surely, can and does provide the basis for creati
ng a self worth having. And just see what becomes possible even natural once this new self is in place! As subjects of
something so mysterious and strange, we humans gain new confidence and interest in our own survival, a new interest in other
people too. We begin to be interested in the future, in immortality, and in all sorts of issues to do with ... how far consciousness
extends around us.... [T]he more I try to make sense of it, the more I come back to the fact that weve evolved to regard
consciousness as a wonderfully good thing in its own right which could just be because consciousness is a wonderfully good thing
in its own right! Could
there be anything to this optimistic verbiage in which consciousness is not a
breach in the very unity of life, a biolo gical paradox, an
abomination, an absurdity, an exaggeration of
disastrous nature but something that is unnecessarily beautiful, unnecessarily rich and strange and a wonderfully
good thing in its own right, something that makes human existence an unbe lievably desirable adventure? Think about it
a British thinker thinks so well of the evolution of consciousness that he cannot contain his gratitude for this turn of events. What is
one to say? Both Humphrey and Zapffe are equally passionate about what the y have to say, which is not to say that they have said
anything credible. Whether
you think consciousness to be a benefit or a horror, this is only what you
think and nothing else. But even though you cannot demonstrate the truth of what you think, you can at least put it on
show and see what the audience thinks. Brainwork Over the centuries, assorted theories about the nature and workings of
consciousness have been put forth. The theory Zapffe implicitly accepted is this: Consciousness is connected to the human brain in a
way that makes the world appear to us as it appears and makes us appear to ourselves as we appear that is, as selves or a
persons strung together by memories, sensations, emotions, and so on. No one knows exactly how the conscious ness - brain
connection is made, but all
evidence supports the non - dualistic theory that the brain is the source of
consciousness and the only source of consciousness. Zapffe accepted consciousness as a given and moved on
from there, since he was not interes ted in the debates surrounding this phenomenon as such but only in the way it determines the
nature of our species. This was enough for his purposes, which were wholly existential and careless of seeking technical explanations
for the workings of conscious ness. Anyway, how consciousness happened, since it was not always
present in our species, remains as much a mystery in our time as it was in Zapffes, just as the process of how life
came about from materials that were not living remains a mystery. First there was no life, and then there was life nature, as it
came to be called. As nature proliferated into more complex and various forms, human organisms eventually entered the world as
part of this process. After
a time, consciousness happened for these or ganisms (and a few others at
much lower amplitudes). And it kept on gaining steam as we evolved. On this all theorists of
consciousness agree. Billions of years after earth made a jump from being lifeless to having life, human beings made
a jump from not b eing conscious, or very much conscious, to being conscious enough to esteem
or condemn this phenomenon. No one knows either how the jump was made or how long it took, although there are
theories about both, as there are theories about all mutat ions from one state to another. The mutations must be considered
blind, Zapffe wrote. They work, are thrown forth, without any contact of interest with their environment. As mentioned, how the
mutation of consciousness originated was of no concern to Z apffe, who focused entirely on demonstrating the tragic effect of this
aptitude. Such projects are typical among pessimistic philosophers. Non- pessimistic philosophers either have an
impartial attitude about consciousness or, like Nicholas Humphrey, think of it as a marvelous
endowment. When non - pessimistic philosophers even notice the pessimists attitude, they
reject it. With the world on their side in the conviction that being alive is all right, non -
pessimists are not disposed to musing that human exist ence is a wholesale tragedy. They only
argue the fine points of whatever it is about human existence that grabs their attention, which
may include the tragic but not so much that they lose their commitment to the proposition that
being alive is all right. And they can do this until the day they die, which is all right by them. Mutation Established:
Consciousness is not often viewed as being an instrument of tragedy in human life. But to Zapffe, consciousness
would long past have proved fatal for human being s if we did not do something about it. Why, Zapffe asked, has mankind not
long ago gone extinct during great epidemics of madness? Why do only a fairly minor number of individuals perish because they fail
to endure the strain of living because cognition gives them more than they can carry? Zapffes answer: Most people
learn to save themselves by artificially limiting the content of consciousness. From an evolutionary
viewpoint, in Zapffes observation, consciousness was a blunder that required correct ions for its ef -fects.
It was an adventitious outgrowth that made us into a race of contradictory beings uncanny things that have nothing to do with
the rest of creation. Because of consciousness, parent of all horrors, we became susceptible to
thoughts that were startling and dreadful to us, thoughts that have never been equitably
balanced by those that are collected and reassuring. Our minds now began dredging up horrors,
flagrantly joyless possibilities, enough of them to make us drop to the g round in paroxysms of
self - soiling consternation should they go untrammeled. This potentiality necessitated that
certain defense mechanisms be put to use to keep us balanced on the knife - edge of vitality as a
species. While a modicum of consciousness may h ave had survivalist properties during an immemorial chapter of our
evolution so one theory goes this faculty soon enough became a seditious agent working against us. As
Zapffe concluded, we need to hamper our consciousness for all we are worth or it will i mpose upon
us a too clear vision of what we do not want to see, which, as the Norwegian philosopher saw it, along with
every other pessimist, is the brotherhood of suffering between everything alive. Whether or not one agrees
that there is a brotherhood of suffering between everything alive, we can all agree that human beings are the only
organisms that can have such a conception of existence, or any conception period. That we can
conceive of the phenomenon of suffering, our own as well as that of other organisms, is a
property unique to us as a dangerously conscious species. We know there is suffering, and we
do take action against it, which includes downplaying it by artificially limiting the content of
consciousness. Between taking action against an d downplaying suffering, mainly the latter, most of
us do not worry that it has overly sullied our existence. As a fact, we cannot give suffering precedence in either
our individual or collective lives. We have to get on with things, and those who give pre cedence to suffering will be left behind. They
fetter us with their sniveling. We have someplace to go and must believe we can get there, wherever that may be. And to conceive
that there is a brotherhood of suffering between everything alive wou ld disable us from getting anywhere. We are
preoccupied with the good life, and step by step are working toward a better life. What we do, as a
conscious species, is set markers for ourselves. Once we reach one marker, we advance to the
next as if we were playing a board game we think will never end, despite the fact that it will, like it or
not. And if you are too conscious of not liking it, then you may conceive of yourself as a biological paradox that
cannot live with its consciousness and cannot live wi thout it. And in so living and not living, you
take your place with the undead and the human puppet. Undoing I For the rest of the earths
organisms, existence is relatively uncomplicated. Their lives are about three things: survival,
reproduction, death a nd nothing else. But we know too much to content ourselves with surviving, reproducing,
dying and nothing else. We know we are alive and know we will die. We also know we will suffer during

our lives before suffering slowly or quickly as we draw near to de ath. This is the knowledge we enjoy as the most intelligent
organisms to gush from the womb of nature. And being so, we feel shortchanged if there is nothing
else for us than to survive, reproduce, and die. We want there to be more to it than that, or to think there is.
This is the tragedy: Consciousness has forced us into the paradoxical position of striving to be
unself - conscious of what we are hunks of spoiling flesh on disintegrating bones. Nonhuman
occupants of this planet are unaware of death. But we are susceptible to startling and dreadful thoughts, and we

need some fabulous illusions to take our minds off them. For us, then, life is a confidence trick
we must run on ourselves, hoping we do not catch on to any monkey business that would leave
us stripped of our defense mechanisms and standing stark naked before the silent, staring void.
To end this self - deception, to free our species of the paradoxical imperative to be and not to be conscious, our backs breaking by degrees upon a
wheel of lies, we must cease reproducing. Nothing less will do, per Zapffe, although in The Last Messiah the character after whom the essay is named
does all the talking about human extinction. Elsewhere Zapffe speaks for himself on the subject. The sooner human ity dares to harmonize itself with its
biological predicament, the better. And this means to willingly withdraw in contempt for its worldly terms, just as the heat - craving species went
extinct when temperatures dropped. To us, it is the moral climate of th e cosmos that is intolerable, and a two - child policy could make our
discontinuance a pain - free one. Yet instead we are expanding and succeeding everywhere, as necessity has taught us to mutilate the formula in our
hearts. Perhaps
the most unreasonable effe ct of such invigorating vulgarization is the doctrine
that the individual has a duty to suffer nameless agony and a terrible death if this saves or
benefits the rest of his group. Anyone who declines is subjected to doom and death, instead of
revulsion b eing directed at the world - order engendering of the situation. To any independent
observer, this plainly is to juxtapose incommensurable things; no future triumph or
metamorphosis can justify the pitiful blighting of a human being against his will. It is u pon a
pavement of battered destinies that the survivors storm ahead toward new bland sensations
and mass deaths. (Fragments of an Interview, Aftenposten, 1959)

Extinction is inevitable and the Will to Live is suffering Will animates tortured,
ephemeral life
Ligotti 10 (Thomas, The Conspiracy Against the Human Race: A Contrivance of
Horror, Hippocampus Press, June 25th 2010)
Blundering Consciousness is an existential liability, as every pessimist agrees a blunder of blind nature, according to Zapffe,
that has taken humankind down a black hole of logic. To make it th rough this life, we must
make believe that we are not what we are contradictory beings whose continuance only
worsens our plight as mutants who embody the contorted logic of a paradox. To correct this blunder, we should
desist from procreating. What could be more judicious or more urgent, existentially speaking, than our self

- administered oblivion? At the very least, we might give some regard to this theory of the blunder as a thought - experiment. All civilizations
become defunct. All species die out. Ther e is even an expiration date on the universe itself.
Human beings would certainly not be the first phenomenon to go belly up. But we could be the
first to precipitate our own passing, abbreviating it before the bodies really started to stack up.
Could we k now to their most fine - grained details the lives of all who came before us, would we bless them for the care they took to keep the race blundering along? Could we
exhume them alive, would we shake their bony, undead hands and promise to pass on the favor o f living to future generations? Surely that is what they would want to hear, or
at least that is what we want to think they would want to hear. And just as surely that is what we would want to hear from our descendents living in far posterity, strangers th
ough they would be as they shook our bony, undead hands. Nature proceeds by blunders; that is its way. It is also ours. So if we have blundered by regarding consciousness as a

Our self - removal from this planet would still be a magnificent move, a feat so
blunder, why make a fuss over it?

luminous it would bedim the sun. What do we have to lose? No evil would attend our departure
from this world, and the many evils we have known would go extinct along with us. So why put
off what would be the most laudable masterstroke of our existence, and the only one? Of course,
phenomena other than consciousness have been thought to be blunders, beginning with life itself. For example, in a novel titled At the Mountains of Madness (1936), the
American writer H. P. Lovecraft has one of his characters mention a primal myth about Great Old Ones who filtered down from the stars and concocted earth life as a joke or
mistake. Schopenhauer, once he had drafted his own mythology that everything in the universe is energi zed by a Will - to - live, shifted to a commonsense pessimism to

[L]ife presents itself by no means as a gift for enjoyment, but as a task,

represent life as a congeries of excruciations.

a drudgery to be performed; and in accordance with this we see, in great and small, universal
need, ceaseless cares, constant pressure, endless strife, compulsory activity, with extreme
exertion of all the powers of body and mind. Many millions, united into nations, strive for the
common good, each individual on account of his own; but many thousands fall as a sacrifice for
it. Now senseless delusions, now intriguing politics, incite them to wars with each other; then the sweat and the blood of the great multitude must flow, to carry out the ideas
of individuals, or to expiate their faults. In peace industry and trade are active, inventions work miracles, seas are navigated, delicacies are collected from all ends of the world,

But the ult imate aim of it all, what is it? To

the waves engulf thousands. All push and drive, others acting; the tumult is indescribable.

sustain ephemeral and tormented individuals through a short span of time in the most fortunate
case with endurable want and comparative freedom from pain, which, however, is at once
attended with ennui; then the reproduc tion of this race and its striving. In this evident
disproportion between the trouble and the reward, the will to live appears to us from this point of view, if taken
objectively, as a fool, or subjectively, as a delusion, seized by which everything living works with the utmost

exertion of its strength for some thing that is of no value. But when we consider it more closely, we shall find here also that it is
rather a blind pressure, a tendency entirely without ground or motive. ( The World as Will and Repre sentation, trans. R. B. Haldane and J. Kemp) Schopenhauer is here

for human beings, existence is a state of demonic mania, with the Will
straightforward in limning his awareness that,

- to - live as the possessing spirit of ephemeral and tormented individuals. Elsewhere in his works, he
denominates consciousness as an accident of life. A blunder. A mistake. Is there really anything behind our smiles and tears but an evolutionary slip - up? Analogies
Schopenhauers is a great pessimism, not least becaus e it reveals a signature motif of the pessimistic imagination. As indicated,
Schopenhauers insights are yoked to a philosophical superstructure centered on the Will, or the Will - to - live
a blind, deaf, and dumb force that rouses human beings to their detri ment. While Schopenhauers
system of thought is as impossible to swallow as that of any other systematic philosopher, no intelligent person can fail to see

that every living thing behaves exactly in conformity with his philosophy in its liberal articulation . Wound
up like toys by some force call it Will, lan vital, anima mundi, physiological or psychological processes, nature, or whatever
organisms go on running as they are bidden until they run down. In pessimistic philosophies only the force is real,
not the things activated by it. They are only puppets, and if they have consciousness may mistakenly

believe they are self - winding persons who are making a go of it on their own. Here, then, is the signature
motif of the pessimistic imagination that Schopenhau er made discernible: Behind the scenes of life there is something

pernicious that makes a nightmare of our world. For Zapffe, the evolutionary mutation of
consciousness tugged us into tragedy. For Michelstaedter, individuals can exist only as unrealities t hat are made as they are
made and that cannot make themselves otherwise because their hands are forced by the god of philopsychia (self - love) to accept

positive illu -sions about themselves or not accept themselves at all. For Mainlnder, a Will - to - die, not
Schopenhauers Will - to - live, plays the occult master pulling our strings, making us dance in fitful motions like marionettes caught in a turbulent wake
left by the passing of a self - murdered god. For Bahnsen, a purposeless force breathes a bla ck life into everything and feasts upon it part by part,
regurgitating itself into itself, ever - renewing the throbbing forms of its repast. For all others who suspect that something is amiss in the lifeblood of
being, something they cannot verbalize, there are the malformed shades of suffering and death that chase them into the false light of contenting lies.
 Answers

Schopenhauers theory of the will is wrong; not all willing requires lack and not
all lacking makes us suffer.
Soll 2011
(Ivan, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Madison-Wisconsin
Schopenhauer on the Inevitability of Unhappiness in A Companion to Schopenhauer, p. 302-4)

The first point in Schopenhauers argument that requires critical scrutiny is the claim that we
can only desire or strive for what we feel that we lack. This claim seems at first glance cogent
and plausible, since one cannot meaningfully strive to achieve what one has already achieved.
Yet though it seems incoherent to strive to achieve what is already the case, it not as clear that
we cannot want or desire what is already the case. We often say that we are just where we want
to be, or doing exactly what we want to be doing, or spending our time with just the person
with whom we want to be spending our time. But if Schopenhauers thesis holds only for
striving, and not for wanting and desiring, then it does not hold for all cases of willing, and
thus does not support his argument that all willing springs from a sense of lack. If one can
want, will, or desire what is already the case, then it does not seem that all willing arises from
a lack, and thus not all willing can be tied to the suffering of a lack and thus to suffering.
Defenders of Schopenhauers view might try to interpret statements of wanting what is the
case as elliptical expressions for the idea of wanting to continue to do what one is doing. This
would allow one to try to save the idea that one can only want something that is not now the
case, by pointing out, that, in these sorts of examples, what one wants is not yet the case: that
all desires about the future, even desires that it remain in certain ways like the present, aim at
ends that are not yet present.
There are, however, at least two serious difficulties with this defense: First, being exactly
where one wants to be at the present time, or doing exactly what one wants to be doing at
the present time, or being with just the person one wants to be with at the present time, does
not necessarily mean that one wants these situations to continue into the future. To want to
be where I am does not mean that I necessarily want to stay here; I may be halfway through
a task or a journey on schedule and want to move on. To be now doing exactly what I want
to be doing now does not mean that I want to continue doing it; I may be finishing up an
enjoyable task that I want to bring to a close. To want to be with the person one is with now
does not mean that one necessarily wants to stay with that person; he or she may be the best
person one can imagine to be with the present situation, but not someone with whom one
wants to spend ones entire life or even a lot of ones life.
Second, even in those cases, in which I do want to continue in a present condition, to stay in
my present location, occupation or relationship, this wish may not emerge from a lack, but
from a present state of satisfaction. When a person enjoying excellent health desires to
remain in excellent health, or when a wealthy person, presently enjoy- ing his wealth, wishes
to remain wealthy, what is supposed to be the lack that motivates the desire? It has been
argued that the desire to be as healthy in the future as I am now does not emerge from a lack
(see Cartwright 1988, 58, n.9). A defender of the Schopenhauerian view might counter,
however, that it is the lack of what is not yet the case that motivates the desire. To this reply,
it might be objected that this is an extremely tenuous sense of lack, not a lack that exists now
or even will necessarily exist in the future, but only a future contingency, something that only
may be the case in the future. But in the context of our concerns, we need not become
involved in abstruse debates about whether an as yet unrealized future contingency
constitutes a present lack. For even if an only possible future lack were still to be considered
a lack, if only in some extremely tenuous sense, it does not seem to be the sort of lack that
would or should cause us any suffering.

More importantly, we do not necessarily suffer even from present lacks. There is, admittedly,
a non-experiential sense of suffering a lack, in which one suffers any lack, but this is
irrelevant, and misleading with respect to the issue at hand. To say, in this sense, that one
suffers a lack of something means nothing more than that one lacks something. Perhaps
because we do really and regularly experience suffering from many sorts of lacks, we have taken
to using the expression, to suffer a lack, when we mean nothing more than to lack. This
usage unfortunately begs the philosophical issue facing us: while it is incontestable that we
often really suffer our lacks, in that we really suffer from them or suffer because of them, it seems not
to be true that we really suffer from all of our lacks, or that to lack anything is necessarily to
suffer because of this lack.
Often our lacks cause us no real suffering. First, there are those lacks of which we never
even become aware. During an automobile trip I may lack the protection of a spare tire
because mine is flat, but I do not know this and have no occasion to make use of it. Since I
do not even experience such lacks, I do not suffer from them in any experiential sense, that is,
in any sense that is directly relevant to my happiness. Then, there are those of my lacks of
which I become aware, but which do not cause me to desire their removal. After reading
about a man who has the ability to ingest a gro- tesquely large quantity of sausages in one
hour, it occurs to me that I lack the capacity to do that, but this thought in no way leads me
to wish that I had that capacity and clearly not to any suffering because I lack that capacity.
However, these sorts of cases do not present any great difficulties to Schopenhauers
position. He only has to show that those lacks of which we are aware and do give rise to
desires are necessarily expe- rienced with suffering. Therefore, he could easily rule out those
lacks of which we are unaware or which do not motivate us to remove them. The question
remains: do we always suffer in experiencing those lacks of ours that we want to remove?
Think about all of those experiences in which we are making good progress toward some
goal. Do we necessarily, or even usually, suffer during the process simply because we are not
yet at our goal? When taking a pleasant walk from one place to another, do we in any way
suffer during the walk simply from the fact that we are not yet at our desired destination?
With respect to any journey to a desired destination, getting there is (or can be) half the
fun. Schopenhauers view would have the absurd consequence that there would be no
pleasant journeys, only the satisfaction of reaching ones destination. Admittedly, we do tend
to suffer in striving for goals when this striving occurs under certain negative conditions:
when the goal proves to be unattainable, or achieving it reveals itself to be unlikely, or our
progress toward it seems insignificant, or painfully slow, or disproportionately laborious or
costly. Schopenhauers claim, that all striving toward a goal, directly entails suffering,
depends upon an unjustified generalization from these negative cases of willing to all cases
of willing. Whatever initial plausibility his thesis may possess depends upon unjustifiably
taking the negative scenarios of desir- ing and striving as typical of all cases. Schopenhauers
position entails that all willed action directed toward a goal, even action that proceeds with
so little effort that we would probably not consider it to be striving, is experienced as a
sort of pain. His thesis, that all willing is suffering, is patently implausible with respect to the
cases of willed action that do not entail a sig- nificant amount of resistance and effort. Again
his argument relies on an unjustified assumption that all of willed action can be viewed as a
kind of striving. But even with respect to cases of striving in its proper sense, that is, action in
which substantial effort is required, the effort is not necessarily experienced as suffering. As
Nietzsche was wont to point out repeatedly, we often enjoy the experience of achieving ends
that require effort and overcoming difficulties, not only despite the effort endured and
difficulties overcome, but often because of them. For it is principally through the experience
of doing what we find difficult, that we experience the extent of our powers, and the expe-
rience of our powers certainly seems to be at least one of our basic satisfactions.

Schopenhauers conception of satisfaction is mistaken. Satisfaction does not

require the cessation of all future desiring. In fact, desire itself is sometimes
satisfying.
Soll 2011
(Ivan, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Madison-Wisconsin
Schopenhauer on the Inevitability of Unhappiness in A Companion to Schopenhauer, p. 305-6)

To argue that human life, which is essentially a life of desiring and striving, is inevitably and
unrelievedly unhappy, Schopenhauer must argue not only that the state of desiring and
striving is always one of suffering, but also that there can be no real satisfaction of this
desiring: All willing springs from lack, from deficiency, and thus from suffering. . . . No
attained object of willing can give a satisfaction that lasts and no longer declines; but it is
always like the alms thrown to a beggar, which reprieves him today so that his misery may be
prolonged until tomorrow. Therefore, so long as our consciousness is filled by our will, so
long as we are given up to the throng of desires with its constant hopes and fears, so long as
we are the subject of willing, we never obtain lasting happiness or peace. . . . care for the
constantly demanding will, no matter in what form, constantly fills consciousness; but
without peace and calm, true well being is absolutely impossible. Thus the subject of
willing is constantly lying on the revolving wheel of Ixion, is always drawing water in
the sieve of the Danaids, and is the eternally thirsting Tantalus. (WWR I, 196)
Schopenhauers argument relies upon equating the real satisfaction of desire with lasting
satisfaction. This idea possesses an initial plausibility: when considering particular cases of
desires, strivings, and satisfactions, some putative satisfactions of desires may be too fleeting
to deserve to be considered as real satisfactions of these desires. For example, if after having
long desired to visit Rome, I manage to go there; but, because of a medical emergency, I am
forced to return home after just one day, it makes to consider my truncated visit too brief to
be a true satisfaction of my desire. If I spend months or years fully occupied in the process
of winning the love of someone, who indeed does come to love me but only for a week or
a weekend, I might justifiably feel that this does not really satisfy my desire. What counts,
however, as long enough or too short with respect to such purported satisfactions of desires is
obviously going to vary from case to case. It will depend both upon how long the particular
satisfaction lasts and how long I wanted or expected it to last. These two considerations will
clearly vary from case to case, and they will depend upon what sort of goal it is and the
amount of time, effort and resources invested in its pursuit. The notion of a satisfaction of a
desire that is too brief to be a real satisfaction is a meaningful one, but its meaningfulness is
dependent upon the particulars of the case. The meaningfulness of our notion of a
satisfaction that is too short to be a real satisfaction also depends upon there actually being
some satisfactions that last long enough to count as real satisfactions. And there are many
that do even though they do not last forever. It makes more sense to complain that half an
hour after eating a meal I was hungry again than it does to complain that I was hungry again
the next day. Relying upon the cogency of this legitimate, context-bound notion of a
satisfaction that is too brief to be a real satisfaction, Schopenhauer tries to de-contextualize
it, sug- gesting that any satisfaction that ever comes to an end, no matter how long it
lasts, is not a lasting or real satisfaction. On Schopenhauers view, a lasting and thus
real satisfaction is one that never ends. Surely this is an inflexible, hyperbolic and
unjustified extension of the much more modest, flexible and realistic demand for duration
that we place upon what is to count as the satisfaction of our desires. Schopenhauer claims
that the satisfaction that one finally gets is only apparent, because the wish fulfilled at once
makes way for a new one (WWR I, 196). He thus implies that the satisfaction we hope for
in every desire is one that will remove all further wants and desires. The inevitable occurrence of
further desires is supposed to reveal that what appears to be the satisfaction of a desire is
only a delusion. This idea is wildly at odds with our actual attitudes and reactions.
Sometimes we may harbor the foggy and unrealistic notion that the fulfillment of a
particular desire would somehow make us content and happy forever. I might think
that, if only I had that wonderful job, or that wonderful mate, I would have everything
necessary to my contentment and happiness. Such notions are usually ill-conceived, and they
are not typically attached to our desires. Normally we do not expect the satisfaction of a
single desire to put an end to all of our desiring, nor even to desires of the same sort. Even
if, as Schopenhauer claims, no attained object of willing can give a satisfaction that lasts
[forever] and no longer declines (WWR I, 196), there are, nevertheless, some
satisfactions that last long enough to be really satisfying. One might try to save
Schopenhauers patently implausible view by distinguishing between what we expect and what
we really want, that is, what we would want if only it were possible. One could then attempt to
defend Schopenhauers thesis as representing what we really want as the ideal outcome as
opposed to what we realistically expect and settle for. This more modest variant cannot
represent Schopenhauers actual view, for it is only if we actually expected each satisfaction
to last forever, that the appearance of further desires would reveal the previous apparent
satisfaction to have been, as he claims, a delusion. Moreover, even the more modest
version is indefensible. It is simply not true that we would want ideally that the
satisfaction of our desire would prevent the occurrence of further desires or even of
the same sort of desire. Would we really want if it were possible to satisfy our
hunger for food so that we were never hungry again? Would we want, even if it were
possible, to satisfy our desire for sex, or for travel, or for seeing beautiful works of art,
or for many other things, so that our interest in and desire for these things was
permanently assuaged and we never again had any desire for them? Clearly not! What
these thought experiments show is that, contrary to Schopenhauer, we do not view our
desires simply as negative conditions, like cancerous tumors, which we simply want
to remove, and, if possible, to remove permanently. Although we can be tor- mented by
desires that cannot be satisfied, or satisfied regularly and easily enough, even in the normal,
modest, non-Schopenhauerian sense of satisfaction, we still generally prize our desires
themselves, and not just their satisfaction. We regularly lament the loss of our
appetite for food, or sex, or other human involvements. Though on Scho- penhauers
view it seems impossible, perverse, or wildly imprudent, we clearly do find our desires
themselves desirable and justifiably so (see Soll 1989). Schopenhauer might respond that
any positive attitude toward our desires them- selves, even if common, is totally mistaken.
This would be consonant with his broader thesis that the common idea that a happy life is
possible and is a life in which one pursues ones desires with a fair amount of success, is
totally mistaken. To see more clearly that our prizing of our desires themselves is not
mistaken, we must realize that Schopenhauers tendency to equate the satisfaction of a
desire with its removal, is untenable. Although satisfying a desire most often entails
removing the desire, at least temporarily, the satisfaction of a desire cannot be equated
with its removal. My hunger for food or sex can be removed not only by its satisfaction but
also in other ways, for example, by stress, fear, or diversion of attention. To experience the
satisfaction of a desire, the desire must first exist and then be removed specifically by
satisfying it and not in some other way. This is the reason we are not obviously
mistaken in valuing our desires, or in having a positive attitude toward a life of
desire, that is, a life which is constituted, in great part, by the pursuit of ones desires,
and in which one values and enjoys ones desires as well as their satisfaction.
Schopenhauer is mistaken; not all satisfaction immediately causes boredom.
Soll 2011
(Ivan, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Madison-Wisconsin
Schopenhauer on the Inevitability of Unhappiness in A Companion to Schopenhauer, p. 306-7)

In claiming that boredom inevitably follows upon the satisfaction of too easy a
satis- faction, Schopenhauer begs the crucial question. He really needs to argue that
boredom soon sets in upon any satisfaction. What could too easy a satisfaction
possibly mean in this context? Only a satisfaction that is obtained so easily that it causes
boredom. Thus, the introduction of the formulation too easy a satisfaction reduces
Schopen- hauers claim to an empty tautology. I believe that one should not, however,
simply reject Schopenhauers claim because of its unfortunate, self-trivializing formulation.
Instead, one should address the claim that he actually needs to defend to make his case for
the inevitability of human unhappiness, and which he probably also held to be true, namely,
that all satisfaction of desire is rapidly followed by boredom with the object of the just
satisfied desire. Although we are certainly sometimes soon bored upon attaining a desire, and,
more- over, bored by the very object we had so ardently desired, do we really always react to
the attainment of a desire with an almost immediately occurring boredom? Do we even react
that way even to all easily occurring satisfactions? Although we are sometimes disappointed
in the depth and duration of our satisfaction upon achieving some desired goal, is this always
the case? And even when we are disappointed, does this necessarily lead to boredom?
Careful examination of our experience does not show that the satis- faction of desire always
leads immediately (or even eventually) to boredom with the attained object of the desire.
Schopenhauer seems to suggest that the rapid recurrence of desire after what we normally
take to be the satisfaction of desire, shows both that the satisfaction was insubstantial, and
that it led to boredom, for boredom is the matrix out of which all new desires spring. This
view rests in part upon his failure to distinguish sufficiently between the satisfaction of a
particular desire and the satisfaction of all desire. And this confusion rests in turn upon his
untenable view that in satisfying any desire we really hope to bring an end to all desire. In
satisfying a particular desire we do not expect or hope to remove or even assuage all other
sorts of desires. In eating I do not usually expect or want to satisfy my sexual desires. Nor, as
I have already argued, do we even expect or want to prevent the recurrence of desires of the
same sort. Moreover, the onset of new desires soon after satisfaction of a particular desire
does not itself show that boredom followed upon the satisfaction, for the simple reason that
desires are not born only of boredom. Even when boredom after the satisfaction of a desire
does occur, it does not show that one is bored with the object of desire that has been
attained. To become bored eventually, after the satisfaction of a desire, does not show that
we have become bored with that satisfaction but only that we can become bored despite that
satisfaction. Even the rapid recurrence of desires of the sort just satisfied does not
necessarily signify that the putative satisfaction was not a real satisfaction or that boredom
followed the satisfaction. Sometimes we want to repeat an experience or have another one of
the same sort, just because it was so satisfying. Satisfaction is not the same as satiation though
Schopenhauer tends to confuse them.
Note:

The Nietzsche agonism good file, in its entirety, also answers Schopenhauer by
arguing (a) that suffering is a means for making existence valuable and (b) that the
will is productive rather than merely mired in suffering.
Schopenhauer Neg
 1NC Version 1
WHEN JOHN LENNON WAS 5 YEARS OLD, HIS TEACHER ASKED HIM WHAT HE
WANTED TO BE WHEN HE GREW UP. HAPPY, HE ANSWERED. THE TEACHER
TOLD HIM HE DIDNT UNDERSTAND THE ASSIGNMENT. LENNON RESPONDED
THAT THE TEACHER DIDNT UNDERSTAND LIFE5
JOHN LENNON WAS WRONG AND IF JUDGED BY HIS OWN PURSUIT JOHN
LENNON WAS A FAILURE.
STATUS QUO EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS HAVE BEEN CORRUPTED BY
SENTIMENTS SUCH AS LENNONS. TOO MUCH EMPHASIS IS PLACED ON
TEACHING STUDENTS TO BE HAPPY. AGAINST THIS, WE NEED TO TEACH
STUDENTS ABOUT PAIN, SUFFERING, AND FAILURE.
Hyland 85 (J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in
Educational Studies, 11:3, 227-8)

The recent revival of interest in the education of the emotions in philosophy of

education is to be welcomed since questions concerned with the development of a
person's character, moral values and general life stance must, without doubt, be
accorded a central place in discussions about the educational enterprise. In this
respect, Bonnett's recommendations for the cultivation of the poetic and artistic
aspects of human nature, and the direction of the educator's attention to the "fluidity
and spontaneity of Being" (1983, p. 32) as a response to the threat of dehumanisation
and alienation posed by modern technological materialism are timely. Similarly,
Griffiths (1984) contends that the education of the emotions should inform all aspects
of the life and work of schools, and provides a much-needed reminder of the
importance of this sphere of educational endeavour. A primary shortcoming of all
such programmes of affective education, however, is the insufficient consideration
given to the darker and irrational aspects of the human condition. Thus, Dunlop's
account (1984) stresses the need for a balance between the social and individual
aspects of learning and explores the importance of the school's ethos, and we are left
with the impression that objectives in this area can be achieved fairly easily by means of
certain pedagogic and curriculum improvements. But there seems to be a systematic
avoidance of the realities of everyday life in such programmesa determination to
steer clear of the pain, adversity and strife which are characteristically part of every
human life and which, for many people, militate against the achievement of moral and
emotional stability. This overly optimistic picture needs to be challenged, and I submit
that Schopenhauer's vision of life can help educators to redress the balance in this

5
Cf. I want to grow up to be happy, Huffington Post 2/13/2014 by Garrett Degraffenreid.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/garrett-degraffenreid/i-want-to-grow-up-to-be-h_b_4784143.html last
accessed 7/17/2017
respect. "Neither the sun nor death can be looked at with a steady eye" noted La
Rochefoucauld, and it seems that a similar unsteadiness also distorts our perception of
other unpleasant aspects of life. What is required is a determination to explore the
sources and consequences of unhappiness in life, of that miserable striving which
Schopenhauer identified with the will to live. This would involve turning the critical
attention of pupils towards such issues as pain, illness, poverty, loneliness, depression
and aspects of death and dying, areas which, if they are discussed at all in schools, are
treated only superficially. The conventional approach to such topics needs to be
questioned and altered along the lines suggested by Schopenhauer, and the various
ways of dealing with the human predicament may then be outlined and explored. All
this is fundamental to and a prerequisite of the formulation of objectives and teaching
methods in this sphere. Literature comes to mind as, perhaps, the most apposite vehicle for this sort
of learning, and the excellent account offered by Hepburn (op. cit.) for the education of the emotions
through literature is difficult to improve upon. However, the traditional criteria of literature must not be
allowed to distract us from our primary objective which is, not the pursuit of literature for its own sake
(though, as mentioned above, aesthetics offers one way of escaping from the slavery of the will), but for
its ability to illuminate certain crucial features of the human condition. This objective is quite different
from the more orthodox objectives of literature teaching which (although there are signs of change in the
new examination proposals and in recent criticisms of the standard line, see Weldon, 1985) are overly
impersonal and predomi- nantly academic. I have been astonished to witness a discussion, for instance, of
the deep pessimism and nihilism of Hardy's Jude the Obscure conducted in a purely clinical fashion, as if
Hardy had not intended us to learn something from the story of the crushing tragedy and appalling
adversity of Jude Fawley's life and to apply this knowledge to our own circumstances. History and social
studies are also ideally suited to the re-appraisal of affective objectives that I am suggesting, though all
curriculum areas would benefit from a shaking of the foundations in this respect.
There are two main objectives of such a re-appraisal, both of which could be accepted
by educators who might not want to endorse the whole of Schopenhauer's thesis. First,
though we may not agree that the miserable striving and vicissitudes of the will are
quite as definitive of life as Schopenhauer says they are, we can still recognise that
they play a significant enough part in the lives of most of us to warrant rather more
attention than the curriculum typically gives them. The rationale here is that which
undergirds all educational activity, described by Schopenhauer as pure and genuine
philosophising, viz. the pursuit of truth and objectivity. It is just as intellectually
reprehensible to avoid or give only cursory treatment to the problems of terminal
illness or suicide as it would be to give a one-sided account of the French Revolution
or to discuss contemporary world politics without reference to Marxism. Just to clear up
a possible misconception, the particular interpretation of the pursuit of truth advocated here must not be
seen as an oblique way of pursuing happiness by learning from the misfortunes of others, counting
blessings or any other such homilies. In any case, I tend to agree with Von Wright (1963, pp. 93 ff.) that,
since unhappiness bears all the hallmarks of being a contrary not a contradictory of happiness, it might be
both a logical and an empirical mistake to try to achieve happiness in this roundabout manner. Dearden
was right to say that we cannot sensibly question the value of happiness. I have not been concerned at all
with this question but, rather, with other questions to which I think educators ought to give greater
consideration. The pursuit of objective knowledge is an intrinsic educational objective,
but it is here only a necessary preliminary to the all-important instrumental one of
providing pupils with the wherewithal to achieve that mastery over the will which
Schopenhauer described as the means of salvation. Expressed in different ways, this
has been a central aim of all philosophising since Socrates, and ought to inform all
areas of educational activity. Our vision will remain distorted and confused until we
have learned to recognise the forces which shape our thoughts and actions, and are
able to apply this knowledge to practical living. If clarity of vision sometimes renders
experience unpalatable, so be it. Although such knowledge may not always help us to
change the world in any concrete way, the refinement of our powers of reflection and
deliberation leads to the attainment of that self-knowledge which, as Hampshire
(1979) demonstrates, will always be a liberating and never a restricting possession.

SONG OF FUTILITY. FUTILITY PERVADES PESSIMISM. [] FAILURE IS A

BREAKAGE WITHIN THE HEART OF RELATIONS, A FISSURE BETWEEN CAUSE AND
EFFECT, A FISSURE HASTILY COVERED OVER BY TRYING AND TRYING AGAIN.
WITH FAILURE, THERE IS ALWAYS PLENTY OF BLAME TO GO ARROUND; ITS
NOT MY FAULT, ITS A TECHNICAL DIFFICULTY, ITS A MISCOMMUNICATION.
FOR THE PESSIMIST, FAILURE IS A QUESTION OF WHEN, NOT IF FAILURE AS
A METAPHYSICAL PRINCIPLE. EVERYTHING WITHERS AND PASSES INTO AN
OBSCURITY BLACKER THAN NIGHT, EVERYTHING FROM THE MELODRAMATIC
DECLINE OF A PERSONS LIFE TO THE BANAL FLICKERING MOMENTS THAT
CONSTITUTE EACH DAY. EVERYTHING THAT IS DONE IS UNDONE, EVERYTHING
SAID OR KNOWN DESTINED FOR A STELLAR OBLIVION.6
SUFERING IS NOT AN ACCIDENTAL FEATURE OF LIFE. SUFFERING PERMEATES
EXISTENCE AS SUCH. SATISFACTION IS NOTHING MORE THAN THE FLEETING
ABSENCE OF PAIN. AT BEST, SATISFACTION GIVES WAY TO THE TORMENTS OF
BOREDOM AT WORST, SATISFACTION IS NEVER FELT AS THE UNQUENCHABLE
THIRST OF WILLING KNOWS NO SATIETY AND REKINDLES SUFFERING ANEW AT
EVERY INSTANT. LIFE KNOWS NO VALUE AND IT WOULD BE BETTER IF WE
HADNT BEEN BORN.
Janawway 99 (Christopher, Professor of Philosophy at the University of South Hampton,
Schopenhauers Pessimism, in Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement, Vol.44, pp.
50-5)

Schopenhauer's pessimism is not reducible to any single argument. Nevertheless I want

to reconstruct one which relies on an intimate link between the human will and
suffering. Suffering is defined by Schopenhauer as 'the will's hindrance through an

6
Eugene Thacker. Cosmic Pessimism. Univocal 2015, p. 14
obstacle placed between it and its temporary goal' (Wl, 309), while the opposite state,
'satisfaction, well-being, happiness' consists in the will's attainment of its temporary
goal. Suffering, non-attainment of goals, will be a likely occurrence in the life of a being
that wills. But this alone is hardly grounds for pronouncing that non-existence should be
preferred to the life of a willing being. However, for Schopenhauer suffering is more
than just one ingredient in such a life: it is a permeating and necessary feature of it. To
see this let us consider the structure of willing in a schematic way (see figure 1). A being
will strive towards some goal, X, and will either attain Z or not attain X. The latter state,
marked as c in the diagram, is a state of suffering. It seems there are just three
subsequent possibilities once a goal is not attained. Having not attained a goal, I may
continue to strive for it nevertheless. This is the route looping back to the original
state of striving, which, repeated endlessly, is the night- mare of Tantalus and other
mythical figures whom Schopenhauer is prone to mention: so long as our consciousness
is filled by our will, so long as we are given up to the throng of desires with its constant
hopes and fears, so long as we are the subject of willing, we never obtain lasting
happiness or peace. ... Thus the subject of willing is constantly lying on the revolving
wheel of Ixion, is always drawing water in the sieve of the Danaids, and is the
eternally thirsting Tantalus. (Wl, 196) Powerful though the symbolism of this route is
for a pessimist, there are of course others: I may move on to another goal, or I may
cease for a while to strive towards any goals. What we have next to establish is that, for
Schopenhauer, both states a and d - both striv- ing itself and the absence of striving -
also constitute or presuppose forms of suffering. On the first point Schopenhauer
declares: 'all striving [Streberi] springs from want or deficiency, from dissatisfaction with
one's own state or condition, and is therefore suffering so long as it is not sat- isfied'
(Wl, 309). The assumption appears to be that a wholly self- sufficient state, a state of
lacking nothing (or at least registering no lack), would continue in principle perpetually,
without tending towards any change of state brought about by will. Thus any episode
which is a being's striving for a goal assumes that the being is, or at least registers itself
as, lacking something. Being aware of the lack of something is not sufficient to make me
suffer. The awareness of lack must present itself as painful as such. A clear example
would be a felt deficiency or incompleteness, such as a thirst or a feeling of
homesickness, in which the awareness of some- thing's being lacking is inseparable
from some degree of suffering. (But I suppose Schopenhauer must include cases where
one painfully feels a deficiency or incompleteness because one makes a rational
judgement of a situation as detrimental to oneself. Thirst is a form of suffering, but so is
recognising (while not feeling thirst) that one is in a desert without a sufficient water-
supply.) At any rate, Schopenhauer requires us to suppose that whenever we strive
after any goal, then we are aware of lacking something in some manner which
amounts to pain or suffering. Hence to be in a state of type a in the diagram
presupposes that one suffers. But because our ordi- nary life is, in its essence, a
manifestation of will, there is no end in ordinary life to the occurrence of states of type
a. So we must always return to some state of suffering. We have, perhaps, come a
small step nearer to pessimism. How plausible, though, is the claim that whenever we
strive for a goal, the striving presupposes an awareness of lack which amounts to
suffering? The American scholar David Cartwright finds this point unconvincing, saying
that having a desire does not entail being in misery. That is true. However, that is not
what Schopenhauer alleges. Rather the claim is that every episode of striving entails
some degree of painful lack or dissatisfaction. Let us look at this more closely. Firstly,
does striving always presuppose an awareness of lack, or a dissatisfaction, of any kind?
Cartwright sug- gests this is not always true for desiring: I may desire to retain my good
health which I believe I have rather than lack, and with which I am satisfied. However,
Schopenhauer's point (at least in the last quoted passage) was one about Streben,
striving or trying, (i) Striving, I take it, must be episodic rather than dispositional,
whereas the desires just mentioned may be construed as disposi- tions; and (ii) striving
must aim at change in a way that desire need not. So the question we must ask is: When
an episode of my behav- iour is describable as ray striving to retain good health - which
by hypothesis I do not lack - must I be experiencing some 'dissatisfac- tion with my own
state or condition' ? The answer, arguably, is Yes: part of what distinguishes striving
from mere wanting is that I regard the prior state of affairs (the state of affairs minus my
striving), as deficient in whatever it requires to ensure my goal. If I register the state of
affairs minus my striving as involving no such deficiency, it arguably becomes
unintelligible to describe me as striving or trying to retain my health. Even if we allow
that to strive for something presupposes some dissatisfaction, Cartwright makes
another objection: such dissatis- faction commonly 'lacks the vital tone which is
associated with mis- ery' (Cartwright, p. 59). This is correct. But it misses the mark as
regards Schopenhauer's argument. Schopenhauer does not hold that each episode of
willing involves the subject in misery; rather that, as a presupposition of there occurring
an episode of willing, dissatisfaction or painfully felt lack must be present in some
degree. Misery is, let us say, some prolonged frustration of what is willed, or massive
non-attainment of goals basic to well-being. Most lives contain some misery and some
lives contain mostly misery, facts which Schopenhauer has not forgotten and of which
he writes mov- ingly. But his point here is that all lives, even those free of misery,
inevitably contain numerous, if minuscule, dissatisfactions. Each occurrence of striving
presupposes a state with some degree of neg- ative value for the being that strives.
Hence, if we are looking for positive value within life, we shall not find it at any of the
states of type a. But it is time we mentioned other parts of the picture. First, con- sider
state d in the diagram. May we not hope that a lack of goals to strive for will indicate a
lack of the feeling that anything is lacking an absence of suffering, a respite that
counterbalances states a and c? Here is Schopenhauer's answer: The basis of willing ...
is need, lack, and hence pain, and by its very nature and origin [any animal] is
therefore destined to pain. If, on the other hand, it lacks objects of willing, because it
is at once deprived of them again by too easy a satisfaction, a fearful emptiness and
boredom come over it; in other words, its being and its existence itself become an
intolerable burden for it. Hence its life swings like a pendulum to and fro between
pain and bore- dom, and these two are in fact its ultimate constituents. (Wl, 312) This
is one of Schopenhauer's tragi-comic master-strokes. (Elsewhere he says: 'suppose the
human race were removed to a Utopia where everything grew automatically and
pigeons flew about ready roasted ... then people would die of boredom or hang
themselves' (P2, 293).) The state of having nothing to strive for readily becomes one in
which we suffer from not having anything whose lack we feel. We painfully miss the
differently painful state of having something to strive for. The grip of pessimism
tightens again. Either of the routes a-c-a contains only suffering. So now does route a-c-
d. Routes a-b-a and a-b-d contain satisfaction, but only sandwiched between two forms
of suffering. Satisfaction is thus never anything permanent, and always lapses again
into painful lack or painful boredom. Schopenhauer expresses the situation thus:
absolutely every human life continues to flow on between willing and attainment. Of its
nature the wish is pain; attainment quick- ly begets satiety. The goal was only apparent;
possession takes away its charm. The wish, the need, appears again on the scene under
a new form; if it does not, then dreariness, emptiness, and boredom follow, the struggle
against which is just as painful as is that against want. {Wl, 314). But why would such an
existence be one we should prefer not to have? Such an attitude might intelligibly be
occasioned by the complete shipwreck of all ones aims. But that is not the situation of
every human being, as Schopenhauer wisely concedes: This is the life of almost all men;
they will, they know what they will, and they strive after this with enough success to
protect them from despair, and enough failure to preserve them from boredom and its
consequences. {Wl, 327) If most lives are spiced with a sufficiently varied set of goals,
and if, as they shuffle between the different forms of suffering, they come round to the
state 'Attain X' sufficiently often then it is still unclear why that is a kind of existence
not to be chosen above non- existence. But Schopenhauer has one more vital point to
make: All satisfaction, or what is commonly called happiness, is really and essentially
always negative only, and never positive ... the satisfaction or gratification can never be
more than a deliverance from a pain, from a want... Nothing can ever be gained but
deliverance from suffering or desire; consequently, we are only in the same position as
we were before this suffering or desire appeared. {Wl, 319) We feel pain, not
painlessness; care, but not freedom from care; fear, but not safety and security. We
feel the desire as we feel hunger and thirst; but as soon as it has been satisfied, it is
like the mouthful of food that has been taken and which ceases to exist for our
feelings the moment it is swallowed. {W2, 575). The thesis here - call it 'the negativity
of satisfaction' - is that attainment of what one strives for is not accompanied by any
positive feeling. Satisfaction is merely the temporary absence of suffer- ing, which
soon yields again to suffering. If this is true, then state b in my diagram can do little to
counterbalance the sufferings which are presupposed at every other point. The
conclusion that non-exis- tence would have been preferable at least comes within
sight: 'all life is suffering', as Schopenhauer helpfully puts it (Wl, 310). Life is suffering of
different kinds, plus some neutral stretches where suffering is briefly absent before a
new suffering arrives.
THE ABYSS OF A BOOK. SCHOPENHAUER, USING THE METAPHORS OF
ASTRONOMY, ONCE NOTED THAT THERE WERE THREE TYPES OF WRITERS:
METEORS (THE FLARE OF FADS AND TRENDS), PLANETS (THE FAITHFUL
ROTATION OF TRADITION), AND THE FIXED STARS (IMPERVEOUS AND
UNWAVERING). BUT IN SCHOPENHAUERS OWN WRITING [] ONE IS ACUTELY
AWARE OF THE WAY THAT ALL WRITING ULTIMATELY NEGATES ITSELF, EITHER
TO BE FORGOTTEN OR TO HAVE BEEN SO PRECISE THAT IT RESULTS IN SILENCE.
WAS SCHOPENHAUER AWARE THAT HE HIMSELF WAS A FOURTH TYPE OF
WRITER THE BLACK HOLE?7
HISTORY KNOWS NO PROGRESS BECAUSE EXISTENCE IS WITHOUT PURPOSE
AND WITHOUT THE POSSIBILITY OF SATISFACTION. GOVERNMENTS CAN DO
NOTHING TO IMPROVE OUR LIVES. NO AMOUNT OF LEGISLATION WILL
REDEEM OUR MISERABLE LIVES. BUT BELIEVING THAT THE BUREAUCRATS CAN
SAVE US PROVIDES THE FODDER FOR NATIONALISM AND ITS VIOLENT
EXCESSES. BUT EVEN THIS IS FOR NOTHING; STATE-BASED EDUCATION CAN DO
NOTHING TO CHANGE OUR FUNDAMENTAL NATURE.

Slaboch 15 (Matthew. Professor of Political Philosophy at Indiana University, Ph.D. in

Political Science "Eadem, sed aliter: Arthur Schopenhauer as a Critic of Progress."
History of European Ideas 41.7 (2015): 931-947. http://www-tandfonline-
com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/doi/pdf/10.1080/01916599.2014.991143?needAccess=true)
A true philosophy of history, Schopenhauer insists, amounts to the recognition that in
spite of all the upsets and upheavals that historians have recorded, we yet always have
before us only the same, identical, unchangeable essence. 67 That essence is the will,
the guiding force of the world. In nature, the will manifests itself as magnetism, gravity,
and other such scientific occurrences. Among people, the will shows itself in each action
that an individual takes. Even life itselfthe act of existingis an instance of the wills
asserting itself in the world. But the will is unceasing and, ultimately, purposeless: while
every individual act has a purpose or end, the will itself has no end in view. 68 Lacking
a final end and the possibility of being satisfied, the will makes a Sisyphus of each of us:
we traipse through life looking for a contentment that we will never find. The will
underlies each of our actions; we can do as we want, but we want what we do because
of the will. When our wants are not satisfied, we feel deprived. But even when our
desires are fulfilled, the happiness that comes from such fulfilment is fleeting: almost as
soon as a desire is met, boredom arises and it remains until we have some new end to
pursue. The pursuit of a new end, however, brings with it new suffering. Thus,
Schopenhauer claims, life swings like a pendulum to and fro between pain and
boredom. 69 There is a constant transition from desire, pursuit, and attainment to new

7
Eugene Thacker. Cosmic Pessimism. Univocal 2015, p. 41
desires and pursuits; each fulfilled need or want marks the transition to a new course.
And because there is no ultimate aim of striving, we can likewise say that there is no
measure or end of suffering. 70 Suffering is a universal problem which optimistic
philosophies downplay. Such philosophies are not merely absurd, but wicked, making
a bitter mockery of the real and significant pains that humanity must endure.71 Chief
among the optimistic philosophers was Leibniz, against whom Schopenhauer takes
direct aim: But against the palpably sophistical proofs of Leibniz that this is the best of
all possible worlds, we may even oppose seriously and honestly the proof that it is the
worst of all possible worlds. For possible means not what we may picture in our
imagination, but what can actually exist and last. Now this world is arranged as it had to
be if it were to be capable of continuing with great difficulty to exist; if it were a little
worse, it would be no longer capable of continuing to exist. Consequently, since a worse
world could not continue to exist, it is absolutely impossible; and so this world itself is
the worst of all possible worlds.72 Schopenhauer, then, explicitly rejects metaphysical
optimism. In its place he proposes a metaphysical pessimism in which an aimless and
unquenchable will directs both the natural world and human existence. Unsparing in his
criticism of Leibnizs metaphysical optimism, Schopenhauer even more bluntly
condemns historical optimism. Leibnizs theodicy may have been sophistical, but at
least it was not pernicious and pestilential like Hegels was. Real harm comes less
from believing that ours is the best of all possible worlds than from the belief that our
world could become measurably better. Progress-minded historians and philosophers
imagine that something new and grand will emerge in the future, and so they look to
history for clues as to what might unfold. But only fools would concede to history a
principal place in their philosophy, and the belief that the future has something new in
store is ill-founded.73 In the nineteenth century, this nave belief fostered the growth of
the state and the rise of nationalism, two developments which Schopenhauer
attempted in vain to counteract. Schopenhauers expectations of the state are modest:
he plainly denies it a grand purpose, claiming that its sole purpose is to protect
individuals from one another and the whole from external foes. 74 Even in this limited
capacity, however, the state will fail: internal dissent can never be entirely eliminated,
and where it is stifled, the threat of cross-border conflict is never far off.75 Despite its
limitations, the state should nevertheless do its best to provide security. In a manner
reminiscent of Thomas Hobbes (15881679), Schopenhauer asks us to consider what
would happen if the coercive power of the state was cast aside, insisting that every
thinking man will recoil at the expected scene. 76 But beyond providing some order and
stability, there is not much that the state can or should do. Indeed, Schopenhauer
seems to concur with Edmund Burke (17291797), who declared that it is in the power
of government to prevent much evil but maintained that it can do very little positive
good. 77 He takes to task eudaemonistic optimists who believe that the state exists to
foster happiness. The governments job is not, contrary to some doctrines, to bring
about heaven on earth or to arrange society so that all men could gorge, guzzle,
propagate, and die, without effort and anxiety. 78 The belief that the state is capable of
bringing about such an arrangement is misguided. People often make this error in
judgement, however: everywhere and at all times, there has been much discontent with
governments, laws, and public institutions, but for the most part only because we are
always ready to make these responsible for the misery that is inseparably bound up with
human existence itself.79 But attempts to remake the world through the rejigging of
institutions are futile, Schopenhauer insists: the ceaseless efforts to banish suffering
achieve nothing more than a change in its form. 80 He does acknowledge that things
which in former times one could hardly afford are now obtainable at a low price and in
quantities, and even the life of the humblest classes has greatly gained in comfort. 81
However, the abundance of inexpensive goods cannot make people happy: people will
always desire more, no matter how much is already available to them. If the
government successfully alleviates one misery, new desires and new pains will emerge
to take the place of the old. In other words, the state can never eliminate the misery of
existence. Even if the state could diminish the suffering that stems from need and want,
boredom would simply arise to take the place of this other evil.82 The happiness that
we do see in the world is superficial: this so-called happiness is a hollow, deceptive,
frail, and wretched thing, out of which neither constitutions, legal systems, steam-
engines, nor telegraphs can ever make anything that is essentially better. 83 Just as we
are wrong if we think that governments can make the world something other than it
naturally is, we are misguided if we assume that the state can make man something
other than nature makes him. Schopenhauer recognises that a few German
philosophasters of this mercenary age would like to distort the State into an institution
for spreading morality and edifying instruction. 84 However, contra Fichte, Hegel and
their disciples, he maintains that the state is not an institution that exists to promote
morality.85 And the wish to make it such is problematic, for several reasons. The first
problem, again, is that the goal itself is unattainable; the state cannot succeed at
improving mans character. Education or instruction will not change a persons
innermost nature, which remains fixed throughout life.86 Moreover, if we regard the
state as a vehicle for promoting morality, then we conflate political goals with ethical
aims, lawfulness with morality. Even if some perfect state arose with the capacity to
prevent every crime, this state would still be unable to shape morality. The state, with
its threats of punishment and rewards, is able merely to shape behaviour; it lacks the
ability to change peoples dispositions.87 Thus, perhaps the state can mould us as
citizens and subjects. But we are more than mere instruments of the statewe are
individuals with moral worth, and moral worth is the principal thing in a mans life. 88
This being so, the working out of his salvation is something that should be left to the
individual alone, rather than dictated by the state. State-led attempts to bring about the
moral improvement of mankind are not only ineffectual, but dangerous. Behind the
seemingly noble objective of inculcating good character lies the more sinister goal of
robbing people of their personal freedom and capacity for self-development.
Schopenhauer argues that, rather than having a beneficent effect, the state actually
harms society when it seeks to make people moral. The state makes men mere wheels
of a Chinese machine of State and Religion when it tries to edify its citizenry. State-led
projects to improve morality lead not to such improvement, but instead along the
road that led to inquisitions and wars of religion.89 Because he believes that
individuals should work out their own salvation, Schopenhauer opposes state-sponsored
activities that would prevent them from doing so. However, he sees such activity taking
place on a grand scale: each of the governments with which he is familiar has taken
upon itself the provision for the metaphysical needs of its members. 90 One example
of overreach might be the states imposing itself in the sphere of education. Thomas
Nipperdey remarks on the establishment of compulsory education in the German-
speaking lands: Nineteenth-century Germany became a land of schools. Alongside
compulsory military service and compulsory taxation, compulsory education became
one of the basic duties for the modern citizen. It was the state which had established
this duty. It organised the schools, thereby intervening in the life of the individual and a
persons journey through life, as it had never done before.91 With compulsory
education came increased governmental regulation of the schools and the citizenry.
German state governments supervised the curricula of the gymnasia and they
established approved paths to higher education. Consequently, by the age of nine or
ten [] the most important decisions about a young persons educational future had
been made. 92 But compulsory education was established not merely so that the
German governments could control people. Rather, reforms were enacted in part
because many educational innovators had cherished the ideal of universal education as
a source of social progress and equality. 93 That is, educational reformers cared about
certain metaphysical needs of people, and the states took up their cause. Such anti-
nationalism was in part a legacy of Schopenhauers upbringing. Brian Magee recounts
that Schopenhauers father selected the name Arthur because the name is the same in
German, French, and English. Both of Schopenhauers parents were cosmopolitans who
travelled widely and brought their children on extended trips outside of the German-
speaking lands. Schopenhauer spent much of his youth in France and England.96
According to David Cartwright, Heinrich Floris Schopenhauer aimed to instil liberal and
cosmopolitan attitudes in a son [Arthur] who would be well connected to various
trading partners. 97 Whether Heinrich successfully implanted liberal ideas in his sons
mind is debatable. (I will argue in the concluding section that he did not.) Less debatable
is the younger Schopenhauers cosmopolitanism and lack of attachment to the German
nation. Schopenhauer freely and frequently expresses an aversion to nationalism in
several of his works. He manifests his lack of a national pride in several quips about his
fellow German-speakers. In The World as Will and Representation, for instance, he
writes that for a German it is even good to have somewhat lengthy words in his mouth,
for he thinks slowly, and they give him time to reflect. 98 In an essay on government,
he maintains that it is a characteristic failing of the Germans to look in the clouds for
what lies at their feet. 99 In no wise could Schopenhauer be proud of a nation which
revered Hegel, whose philosophy would serve as a lasting monument of German
stupidity. 100 But Schopenhauer did not single out the Germans as the only nation with
faults. Herder had posed the rhetorical question: Is not the good on the earth strewn
about?. 101 Schopenhauer might have turned this question around and asked whether
the bad on earth is limited to one particular group. We know what his answer to such a
question would have been: every nation ridicules the rest and all are right. 102 Behind
his caustic remarks about his own and other nationalities, Schopenhauer harboured real
concerns about history and society. Anticipating Benedict Andersons Imagined
Communities by more than a century,103 he refers to nations as mere abstractions,
and he argues that only the individuals and their course of life are real. 104 Histories,
focused as they are on national development, may be effective in teaching us about
particular groups of men, but they reveal less about man, i.e., about human nature.105
If we truly wished to understand mankind, we would do well to consult biographies
instead of histories, since they are richer in detail and allow us to understand multiple
facets of a mans existence.106 And, where histories pave the way for comfortable,
substantial, fat states which devise purely national, political solutions to problems
which are universal and moral, proper biographies show us the true route to salvation.
That path, according to Schopenhauer is a life of compassion and asceticism, which is an
individuals surest way of escaping the torments of the will.
YOU, THE NIGHT, AND THE MUSIC. [] SCHOPENHAUER ONCE NOTED THAT
MUSIC IS THE MELODY TO WHICH THE WORLD IS THE TEXT. GIVEN
SCHOPENHAUERS VIEW ON LIFE THAT LIFE IS SUFFERING, THAT HUMAN LIFE
IS ABSURD, THAT THE NOTHINGNESS BEFORE MY BIRTH IS EQUAL TO THE
NOTHINGNESS AFTER MY DEATH GIVEN ALL THIS, ONE WONDERS WHAT KIND
OF MUSIC SCHOPENHAUER HAD IN MIND WHEN HE DESCRIBED MUSTIC AS THE
MELODY TO WHICH THE WORLD IS THE TEXT. WAS IT OPERA, A REQUIUM MASS
[]? A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC FOR THE TWILIGHT OF THOUGHT, A SULLEN
NOCTURE FOR THE NIGHT-SIDE F LOGIC, AN ERA OF SAD WINGS SUNG BY A
SOLITARIY BANSHEE. PERHAPS THE MUSIC SCHOPENHAUER HAD IN MIND IS
MUSIC ELIMINATED TO NON-MUSIC. A WHISPER WOULD SUFFICE. PERHAPS A
SIGH OF FATIGUE OR RESIGNATION, PERHAPS A MOAN OF DESPAIR OR
SORROW. PERHAPS A SOUND JUST ARTICULATE ENGOUGH THAT IT COULD BE
HEARD TO DISSIPATE.8
[PLAY WAGNER LOUDLY WITHOUT READING FOR A TIME OF YOUR
CHOOSING]
WE MUST FREE OURSELVES FROM THE WILL. THIS CAN BE ACHIEVED THROUGH
ADOPTING THE STANDPOINT OF THE SUBJECT OF PURE COGNITION, WHO
TEMPORARILY ESCAPES FROM INDIVIDUATION. EACH OF US HAS THE CAPACITY
TO ACHIEVE THIS STATE BY APPRECIATING WORKS OF ART. MOREOVER, IN
DISSOLVING THE FETTERS OF OUR INDIVIDUAL WILL AND ACHIEVING WILL-
LESS-NESS, WE ADOPT AN ETHICAL RELATIONSHIP TO OTHERS. AN IMMANENT
SENSE OF BEAUTY COLORS EXISTENCE; FILLED WITH COMPASSION, WE
UNCOVER THE ESSENTIAL UNITY OF BEING.
Kossler 10 [Matthias - Better Consciousness: Schopenhauer's Philosophy of Value, Ch.6
Life is a Mirror p.85-89//AK]

8
Eugene Thacker. Cosmic Pessimism. Univocal 2015, pp. 31-2
In replacing the causal relationships between the subject of willing and action with the being in itself and phenomenon that which shows itself in the act of will exceeds

How is consciousness of
individuality. In other words: according to this new conception, the experience of character entails the experience of the world.

the world achieved? A precondition for it is, in Schopenhauers opinion, thoughtful awareness (Besonnenheit) which
enables [us] . . . to survey the whole of life.46 Without thoughtful awareness the intellect only
perceives singular presentations, which the intellect refers directly to the will, whereas the will itself does not
come into view.47 The animal neither has a world nor does it reflect on its will.48 The whole of the world as presentation becomes

conscious to humans in the aesthetic view of the Idea.49 Only when the thinking subject
forgets his interest in the particular and becomes a clear mirror of the object does the world
become comprehensible as a whole, not as infinity in space and time, but through perception of
the essence or Idea of the object.50 The world as infinite temporal-spatial expansion is a
presentation to us derived from the perception of the essence, since the world presupposes the
concept of a universal whole: and a universal whole is the Idea. If the adequate philosophical
interpretation of that which comes to light by the act of will is the will as being in itself, which is
as such necessarily related to the world, then it is only in aesthetic regard that an adequate
cognizance of this being in itself is to be found. This is why it is not until this point that
Schopenhauer talks of the wills self-cognizance.51 Aesthetic contemplation is achieved by a
high degree of awareness, through which the distance from the individual, body-related willing,
becomes so large that the object can demonstrate itself, in an objective manner. If, owing to thoughtful awareness, several
possible motives of the mind are weighed up, therefore considered, the following may occur: that not only the relation of the prevailing motive on the will, but also the relations

With increasing awareness the connection to ones

of the thoughts and presentations to each other are made objects of the mind.

own will diminishes. Under the exceptional circumstance of aesthetic contemplation the
relations between presentations no longer pertain to ones own interest at all. In that case the
relations must be understood as derived from the essence of the things themselves. If all such
objectively determined relations of a thing to others are summarised, they then express the
essence or character of the thing. What is being expressed here by manner of awarenessone
might sayis the character of the conceived and depicted object of awareness itself. This character is the
Idea. Life is but a Mirror 85 An Idea apprehended in such a way is of course not yet the essence of the thing in itself, precisely because it has proceeded from the cognizance of
mere relations. Nevertheless, as the result of the sum of all relations, it is the real character of the thing, and therefore the complete expression of the essence displaying itself
to perception as object, apprehended not in reference to an individual will, but as it expresses itself of itself, whereby indeed it determines all its relations, which were only
cognized until then.52 Within the perception of the Idea there is contained the knowledge of to how the being in itself of a thing is by virtue of itself related to the world as
presentation. The sum of all relations is the world as being entirely relative in terms of its structure in space and time,53 yet realized as an unfolding of the essence of the
perceived object it has real content. In the contemplation of an Idea the object is not present as part of the world before, and then related to, the embodied will. Instead the will
as the being in itself, perceived in an object, creates the relationships and definitions of the worldhowever not in terms of time or causality, but by being mirrored in
presentation.54 However, this cognizance still has to be related to the experience of selfconsciousness, since in viewing the Idea, the subject has lost itself in the object, or it
has forgotten that in its bodily existence it is itself the will which it perceives.55 To express this in terms of the underlying thesis of this essay, the character of a thing has been
realised, which is, as yet, different from the self. The distance has therefore been achieved through which that which occurs in the act of will can show itself as a being in itself,
yet the reflection, that it is the self of the act of will, has not been fully realised. The aesthetic view is therefore not yet the complete self-cognizance of the will. Accordingly, this
view can only be had for short moments, whereupon the subject again immediately falls prey to individual willing. What remains is the memory of the experience of the world as
a whole which, placed next to the disappearing singular transitory presentation, causes infinite expansion in space and time.56 The universal meaning (as world) and the
individual meaning of that which is called will are here combined in a way in which the unity of both is not comprehended. However, it is not only space and time, and other
forms of the Principle of Sufficient Ground connected to these, that are created by that way of combination, but also a specific type of human motivation and its consequences.
By virtue of the fact that this combination takes place in a condition of will-dependent cognizance, it is related to the individual will: the whole of the world is presented to the
individual will as desire (Wunsch), from which, however, the singular act of will detaches itself. There are consequences of this thesis in the insatiable needs humans have, which
create limitless suffering, as well as egoism, which is anchored in the individuality of character that the world as empirical reality is necessarily related to.57 In this instance one
must look back once more to the genuine doctrine of character, since character is defined by the completed act of will set against the background of desire. 86 Matthias Koler
Desire is therefore the sphere in which the world is viewed as a necessary point of relation for the experience of character. Desire merely indicates what man in general, not the
individual who is feeling the desire, would be capable of doing.58 What the human is capable of doing depends on what the motive of his action can be, and that is principally
everything that he can perceive and think, that he can make present by virtue of his experiences of the past, that he experiences through the stories of others and that he can
anticipate as future. This concerns all things which are possible in the world as presentation. Desire is therefore essentially universal and presents the relationship of the will to
the world. Indeed, desire only indicates this universality, since in desiring, depending on the capability of the intellect and the application of thoughtful awareness, only smaller

or larger parts of possible motives are presented to the subject. But the capacity for thoughtful awareness, which separates
humans from animals, and which, with regard to aesthetic contemplation, proves itself to be the
presupposition for the cognizance of world, potentially contains the relationship to the entire
field of possibility. Desire signifies the midpoint between objective cognizance of the essence in
itself in the idea and subjective knowledge in immediate self-consciousness. In this sense awareness is very much
the cause for the Velleitas not becoming an act of will,59 in other words the will is suppressed and therefore the cognizance of
objective relationships made possible; but as desires, presentations remain fixed upon the subjective will, and as potential acts of will constitute
the foundation upon which the individualisation of the will, the formation of character, is achieved. Schopenhauer described this function of desire, to indicate what man in
general is able to want, as an expression of the character of the species of the human.60 In contradiction to his statements concerning the character of the species of animals
and the possibility of placing them in parallel with average man,61 the character of the species of the human is, according to this idea, not to be understood through the
principal qualities62 of humans, which result from abstraction, but through the totality of the possibilities of being human.63 The character of the species is not therefore
simply common to all human beings owing to the fact that all human beings act more or less in the same way, but because individual character is only formed by virtue of the
choice between an infinite number of possible motives that make up the character of the species. The individual character is a certain realisation of the character of the species,
or being human as such, in so far as it has a specific individual character. In the realisation of the character of the species through the individual, the intelligible character is

The aspect of the individual points to the acts of will, in which the being
recognised in its relationship to the world.

in itself is experienced immediately. The aspect of being human in general points to the substantial unity of being in itself in strict contrast to
phenomenal appearance. Through the character of the species a unity of the essence of human beings is

brought into discussion, which is recognised as being compassion. This takes place where the
principium individuationis is seen through, i.e. when one sees through the individual characters to their unified essence. If in addition one
takes into Life is but a Mirror 87 account that the impediment of the will through thoughtful awareness that
makes desire possible means, de facto, a denial of the willsince in Schopenhauer will is tied to phenomenal actionthen substantial
elements of Schopenhauers ethics can be interpreted based on the experience of character. The thing that separates the human
being from animals in regard to motivation and that which makes up his intelligible character is that human beings are as a rule in control of their reason, are thus thoughtfully
aware (besonnen), i.e. make decisions in accordance with thought-out, abstract motives,64 in brief: that he acts with thoughtful awareness. According to Schopenhauer the
strongest motive leads to action, out of which character can be defined.

RATHER THAN TEACHING THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS, WE

MUST TEACH THE NEGATION OF THE WILL, THE REPUDIATION
OF ALL PARTICULARITY AND INDIVIDUATION. THIS IS BECAUSE
THE WILL IS THE SOURCE OF ALL PAIN, ALL SUFFERING. ONLY
BY RENOUNCING THE WILL CAN WE ESTABLISH AN ETHICAL
RELATIONSHIP TO OTHERS REALIZING THAT OUR PARTICULAR
SUFFERING IS, IN FACT, UNIVERSAL. MOREOVER, THE
RENUNCIATION OF THE WILL IS ALSO NECESSARY FOR ANY
HOPE OF FREEDOM FROM OUR MISERABLE EXISTENCE.
FORTUNATELY, OUR PURSUIT OF THIS HERCULEAN TASK IS
HELPED BY THE ARTS. AESTHETIC APPREICATION ENABLES THE
DISSOLUTION OF OUR INDIVIDUAL WILL SO THAT WE MAY RISE
OUT OF THE SWAMPS OF CONSCIOUSNESS AND REMOVE
OURSELVES FROM THE WORLD.

Hyland 85 (J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in
Educational Studies, 11:3, 224-7)

Schopenhauer proposes three ways (each related to a common object) in which we can offer
a response to the predicament he describes, two of which, I will suggest, are of special
relevance to education. (1) First, there is the way of asceticism which Schopenhauer derived
from his reading of the Upanishads and other Hindu and Buddhist literature, and which is
similar in many important respects to the practical ethics of the Greek Stoics and Cynics.
Since the will is the source and cause of all pain and suffering, it is argued, the remedy
lies in the total rejection and denial of the will in all its various manifestations. As
Schopenhauer puts it: My ethics ... candidly confesses the reprehensible nature of the
world and points to the denial of the will as the road to redemption from it. (1970, p.
63) It might be wondered, in the face of the blind, irrational striving of the will, how an
individual intellect could ever attain sufficient power to bring about such a redemption. For
the lower animals, who are pure will, this would, indeed, be impossible but, although the
separation between consciousness and will becomes more marked as intelligence increases,
even humans develop, in the main, only imperfect intellects, mere 'servants' of the will
which is 'always in command of the field' (1969, Vol. 2, pp. 136-7). How, then, can we
hope to achieve that mastery over the will which is a pre-requisite of the ascetic life? Our
intellects are imperfect insofar as we are capable only of subjective consciousness, a
level at which we simply respond to the dictates of the will. However, the more we are
able to approximate to "clearness of consciousness of the external world, the
objectivity of perception" the more our intellects approach that perfection of
knowledge which, as illustrated especially in the instances of genius so much admired by
Schopenhauer, is "wholly will-less knowledge" (ibid., p. 291). The attainment of
perfection in this sphere is described in a variety of ways by Schopenhauer, all of which
involve the ability to conceive the wholeness, interconnectedness and universality of
particular ideas or items of perception, and the process can be clearly discerned in the
epistemology of Plato and Kant. Schopenhauer's account of the way an individual may
come to understand the idea of suffering is an excellent illustration of the general
thesis. A person encountering great misfortune or deep sorrow will experience
suffering but may, on reflection, see this only as a particular phenomenon, as
something which happens to him alone. Such an individual "still continues to will
life, only not on the conditions that have happened to him". This predicament
invites our sympathy (and may even inspire awe) but such a sufferer is "really worthy
of reverence only when his glance has been raised from the particular to the
universal, and when he regards his own suffering merely as an example of the
whole". In an ethical respect, the person becomes "inspired with genius, one case
holds good for a thousand, so that the whole of life, conceived as essential suffering,
then brings him to resignation" (1969, Vol. 1, p. 396). This illustrates both the idea of
perfect knowledge and the source of Schopenhauer's ethical theory, and also serves
to explain why the most obvious solution to the human predicament, suicide, comes
to be rejected. Schopenhauer is by no means unsympathetic to suicideindeed, he is
severely critical of the conventional moral disapproval of this course of action (1970, pp. 77-
9)but, in the end, dismisses it as an intellectual mistake. The error can be located
in the failure to connect each individual will with the whole, the universal will, in the
way that perfect knowledge requires. Thus, suicide is a "quite futile and foolish act,
for the thing-in-itself remains unaffected by it"; suicide "denies merely the
individual, not the species" (1969, Vol. 1, p. 399). This is, perhaps, the most obscure
aspect of Schopenhauer's work and, as Sprigge (op. cit., pp. 86-7) points out, seems to be
based on his philosophy of mathematics, particularly his idea of numbers and counting. At
one level we might render it understandable by saying that the self-destruction of an
individual solves nothing, for the will, though destroyed in one particular objectified
representation, remains triumphant. The noumenon, the universal will (or, as we
might say in modern terminology, the gene pool) remains unaffected and survives the
deaths of individual suicides to continue the endless cycle of striving. What is less
understandable, unless we posit some kind of genetically-transmitted increment of perception, is how the
victory of individual ascetics over the will can be translated into a victory over the universal will. Sprigge
interprets this conception in terms of a "whittling away of the Cosmic will" (ibid., p. 92) so that, in the end, the
will ceases to individualise itself in humans. The denial of the will through the extinction of desires and needs is
a familiar solution to human strife, though it is rarely given such a full theoretical foundation as that which
Schopenhauer tries to provide. Viewed as an alternative to orthodoxy, asceticism of this
kind does provide a much-needed counterbalance to the crude and mindless
materialism which dominates popular culture and, as such, it does have a role to play
in moral education and the education of the emotions. Something less extreme than
Schopenhauer's ascetic philosophy is present, though often understated, in many religious
doctrines, and educators could do worse than give more emphasis to such ideas and
rather less to the pursuit of happiness. (2) Just as a certain form of intellectual
contemplation and discipline can provide that control over the will that makes asceticism
possible, so the disinterested pursuit of philosophical understanding can lead to
genuine knowledge of the world and mastery over our circumstances. The more we
move from self-consciousness to consciousness of others and the objective world, the
more the will is separated from the intellect, and knowledge becomes purer. In his
later essays, Schopenhauer's earlier idealism is tempered by a form of empiricism which was
intended to turn philosophy into a truly practical pursuit. Attacking the 'sophists' of his day,
Fichte, Schelling and Hegel, he eschews philosophy based only on abstract conceptual
subtlety, urging that "philosophy, just as much as art and poetry, must have its
source in perceptual comprehension of the world" (1970, p. 118). Although genuine
philosophising must be "truly disengaged" and must "prosecute no particular goal
or aim" if it is to be "free from the enticement of the will" (ibid., pp. 117-18).
Schopenhauer reveals his primary objective to be that which has motivated philosophy since
its beginnings, viz. to present as complete and veridical a picture of the world and man's
place in it as possible. The roots of metaphysics can be located in man's "knowledge of death
and therewith the consideration of the suffering and misery of life" (1969, Vol. 2, p. 161),
but the philosophical task is constantly frustrated by the will. The world will appear in its
"true colour and form, in its complete and correct significance, only when the intellect, freed
from willing, moves freely over objects"; the intellect is then "of the greatest purity, and
becomes the clear mirror of the world" (ibid., pp. 380-1). Schopenhauer here posits a notion
of philosophical enlightenment through intellectual purity that is remarkably similar to
Spinoza's doctrine that human freedom is to be sought, strangely enough, by acknowledging
the extent to which our actions are not free but determined by our characters and by the
natural order of things. Spinoza too argued that "Desire is the very essence of man, that is,
the endeavour wherewith man endeavours to persist in his being"; it is in desire that "lie the
causes of human impotence and inconstancy, and why men do not follow the precepts of
reason" (1959b, p. 154). Although Spinoza (in spite of his own exemplary life) repudiated
asceticism, he did urge us, not so much to deny desire, as to come to an 'adequate idea' of it
through the use of the active intellect. Thus, the "more an emotion becomes known to us,
the more it is within our power and the less the mind is passive to it" (ibid., p. 203).
Similarly, Schopenhauer exhorts us to discover all that we can about the roots of desire
grounded in the will. The objective employment of the intellect, as opposed to its subjective
application in the satisfaction of will-directed desires, makes all art and science possible.
Thus, we can achieve that 'free reflection' demonstrated most forcefully in works of genius.
There is no freedom in nature, however, for the 'entire empirical course of a man's
life is, in great things and in small, as necessarily determined as clockwork" (1970, p.
143). The freedom to be attained is a metaphysical freedom which consists in seeing
the world aright and understanding the nature of the will and the way it shapes our
behaviour. This philosophic understanding "snatches knowledge from the thraldom
of the will" and brings about "the painless state, prized by Epicurus as the highest good
and as the state of the gods; for the moment we are delivered from the miserable
pressure of the will" (1969, Vol. 1, p. 196). (3) In addition to philosophical activity, the
engagement in aesthetic pursuits and the contemplation of works of art was, for
Schopenhauer, amongst the highest of human endeavours since it was capable of
facilitating will-less behaviour. In our interaction with objects of art the "individual
will sets its associated power of imagination free for a while" and our perception
becomes completely objective, 'a faithful mirror of objects'. Thus, the intellect may
come to grasp the Platonic Idea and attain that "pure knowledge where will and its
aims have been completely removed from man" (1970, pp. 156-7). Music was the
medium especially favoured by Schopenhauer; he called it the "true universal
language" and "the most powerful of the arts" for it "acts directly on the will, i.e. the
feelings, passions and emotions of the hearer, so that it quickly raises these or even
alters them" (1969, Vol. 2, p. 448). The value of the arts lies in their ability to elevate
us above the strife and suffering of the world and, in so doing, to remove the intellect
from the servitude of the will. Through the perception of beauty we may become "a
pure intelligence without aims or intentions" for "when aesthetic perception occurs
the will completely vanishes from conscious- ness" (1970, p. 155). Thus,
Schopenhauer provides a powerful argument for the cultivation of the arts through
education, and one which is echoed in the prescriptions of contemporary proponents
of art education. Describing the 'gift of art', Papanoutsos (1978), for instance, refers to
the potential of the arts for "deepening the sense of life" in that participation in the
arts "enriches, ennobles and strengthens our humanity" (p. 93). In a similar vein,
Hepburn (1972) has recommended an approach to the education of the emotions through
the medium of art, suggesting that the arts can be "enhancers of freedom" which help us to
overcome "the dominance of emotion cliches" (pp. 493-5).
 1NC Version 2
The history of progress, specifically in education, is an illusion as it cannot allow
the escape from the inherent pain and suffering of life Belief in the state to
make good citizens through education and the idea that it can make the world
measurably better is hedged in a destruction of individual salvation and is the
logic of nationalism justifying wars in the name of lawfulness confused with
morality every nation ridicules the rest and all are right
Slaboch 15 (Slaboch, Matthew. Professor of Political Philosophy at Indiana University, Ph.D. in
Political Science "Eadem, sed aliter: Arthur Schopenhauer as a Critic of Progress." History of
European Ideas 41.7 (2015): 931-947. http://www-tandfonline-
com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/doi/pdf/10.1080/01916599.2014.991143?needAccess=true)

A true philosophy of history, Schopenhauer insists, amounts to the recognition that in spite of all the upsets and upheavals that
historians have recorded, we yet always have before us only the same, identical, unchangeable essence.
67 That essence is the will, the guiding force of the world. In nature, the will manifests itself as magnetism, gravity, and other

such scientific occurrences. Among people, the will shows itself in each action that an individual takes. Even life itselfthe

act of existingis an instance of the wills asserting itself in the world. But the will is unceasing and,
ultimately, purposeless: while every individual act has a purpose or end, the will itself has no
end in view. 68 Lacking a final end and the possibility of being satisfied, the will makes a Sisyphus of
each of us: we traipse through life looking for a contentment that we will never find. The will underlies each of our actions; we can do as we
want, but we want what we do because of the will. When our wants are not satisfied, we feel deprived. But even

when our desires are fulfilled, the happiness that comes from such fulfilment is fleeting: almost as
soon as a desire is met, boredom arises and it remains until we have some new end to pursue. The pursuit of a new end, however, brings with it new
suffering. Thus, Schopenhauer claims, life swings like a pendulum to and fro between pain and boredom. 69
There is a constant transition from desire, pursuit, and attainment to new desires and pursuits; each fulfilled need or want marks

the transition to a new course. And because there is no ultimate aim of striving, we can likewise say that there is no
measure or end of suffering. 70 Suffering is a universal problem which optimistic philosophies downplay. Such
philosophies are not merely absurd, but wicked, making a bitter mockery of the real and significant pains that

humanity must endure.71 Chief among the optimistic philosophers was Leibniz, against whom Schopenhauer takes direct aim: But against
the palpably sophistical proofs of Leibniz that this is the best of all possible worlds, we may even oppose seriously and honestly the proof that it is

the worst of all possible worlds. For possible means not what we may picture in our imagination, but what can actually exist and last.
Now this world is arranged as it had to be if it were to be capable of continuing with great difficulty to exist; if it were a little worse, it would be no
longer capable of continuing to exist. Consequently, since a worse world could not continue to exist, it is absolutely impossible; and so this world itself
is the worst of all possible worlds.72 Schopenhauer, then, explicitly rejects metaphysical optimism. In its place he proposes a metaphysical pessimism in
which an aimless and unquenchable will directs both the natural world and human existence. Unsparing in his criticism of Leibnizs metaphysical
optimism, Schopenhauer even more bluntly condemns historical optimism. Leibnizs theodicy may have been sophistical, but at least it was not
pernicious and pestilential like Hegels was. Real harm comes less from believing that ours is the best of all possible worlds than from
the belief that our world could become measurably better. Progress-minded historians and philosophers
imagine that something new and grand will emerge in the future, and so they look to history for clues as to what might unfold. But
only fools would concede to history a principal place in their philosophy, and the belief that the future has something new

in store is ill-founded.73 In the nineteenth century, this nave belief fostered the growth of the state and
the rise of nationalism, two developments which Schopenhauer attempted in vain to counteract. Schopenhauers expectations of the state
are modest: he plainly denies it a grand purpose, claiming that its sole purpose is to protect individuals from one another and the whole from external
foes. 74 Even in this limited capacity, however, the state will fail: internal dissent can never be entirely eliminated, and where it is stifled, the threat of
cross-border conflict is never far off.75 Despite its limitations, the state should nevertheless do its best to provide security. In a manner reminiscent of
Thomas Hobbes (15881679), Schopenhauer asks us to consider what would happen if the coercive power of the state was cast aside, insisting that
every thinking man will recoil at the expected scene. 76 But beyond providing some order and stability, there is not much that the state can or should
do. Indeed, Schopenhauer seems to concur with Edmund Burke (17291797), who declared that it
is in the power of government
to prevent much evil but maintained that it can do very little positive good. 77 He takes to task
eudaemonistic optimists who believe that the state exists to foster happiness. The governments job is not, contrary to some doctrines,

to bring about heaven on earth or to arrange society so that all men could gorge, guzzle, propagate, and die,

without effort and anxiety. 78 The belief that the state is capable of bringing about such an arrangement is misguided. People often
make this error in judgement, however: everywhere and at all times, there has been much discontent with governments,

laws, and public institutions, but for the most part only because we are always ready to make
these responsible for the misery that is inseparably bound up with human existence itself.79 But
attempts to remake the world through the rejigging of institutions are futile, Schopenhauer insists: the
ceaseless efforts to banish suffering achieve nothing more than a change in its form . 80 He does
acknowledge that things which in former times one could hardly afford are now obtainable at a low

price and in quantities, and even the life of the humblest classes has greatly gained in comfort.
81 However, the abundance of inexpensive goods cannot make people happy: people will always desire more, no

matter how much is already available to them. If the government successfully alleviates one
misery, new desires and new pains will emerge to take the place of the old. In other words, the state
can never eliminate the misery of existence. Even if the state could diminish the suffering that stems from need and want,
boredom would simply arise to take the place of this other evil.82 The happiness that we do see in the world is

superficial: this so-called happiness is a hollow, deceptive, frail, and wretched thing, out of
which neither constitutions, legal systems, steam-engines, nor telegraphs can ever make
anything that is essentially better. 83 Just as we are wrong if we think that governments can make the world something other than
it naturally is, we are misguided if we assume that the state can make man something other than nature makes him. Schopenhauer recognises that a
few German philosophasters of this mercenary age would like to distort the State into an institution for spreading morality and edifying instruction. 84
However, contra Fichte, Hegel and their disciples, he maintains that the state is not an institution that exists to promote morality.85 And the wish to
make it such is problematic, for several reasons. The first problem, again, is that the goal itself is unattainable; the state cannot succeed at improving
mans character. Education or instruction will not change a persons innermost nature, which remains
fixed throughout life.86 Moreover, if we regard the state as a vehicle for promoting morality, then we
conflate political goals with ethical aims, lawfulness with morality. Even if some perfect state arose with the
capacity to prevent every crime, this state would still be unable to shape morality. The state, with its threats of punishment

and rewards, is able merely to shape behaviour; it lacks the ability to change peoples dispositions.87 Thus, perhaps the
state can mould us as citizens and subjects. But we are more than mere instruments of the statewe are individuals with moral worth, and moral
worth is the principal thing in a mans life. 88 This being so, the working
out of his salvation is something that should
be left to the individual alone, rather than dictated by the state. State-led attempts to bring about the moral
improvement of mankind are not only ineffectual, but dangerous. Behind the seemingly noble objective of inculcating

good character lies the more sinister goal of robbing people of their personal freedom and capacity for
self-development. Schopenhauer argues that, rather than having a beneficent effect, the state actually harms

society when it seeks to make people moral. The state makes men mere wheels of a Chinese machine of State and Religion
when it tries to edify its citizenry. State-led projects to improve morality lead not to such improvement, but

instead along the road that led to inquisitions and wars of religion.89 Because he believes that individuals should
work out their own salvation, Schopenhauer opposes state-sponsored activities that would prevent them from doing so. However, he sees such activity
taking place on a grand scale: each of the governments with which he is familiar has taken upon itself the provision for the metaphysical needs of its
members. 90 One example of overreach might be the states imposing itself in the sphere of
education. Thomas Nipperdey remarks on the establishment of compulsory education in the German-speaking lands: Nineteenth-
century Germany became a land of schools. Alongside compulsory military service and compulsory taxation, compulsory education became one

of the basic duties for the modern citizen. It was the state which had established this duty. It organised the schools,
thereby intervening in the life of the individual and a persons journey through life, as it had never done
before.91 With compulsory education came increased governmental regulation of the schools and
the citizenry. German state governments supervised the curricula of the gymnasia and they
established approved paths to higher education. Consequently, by the age of nine or ten [] the most
important decisions about a young persons educational future had been made. 92 But compulsory
education was established not merely so that the German governments could control people. Rather, reforms were
enacted in part because many educational innovators had cherished the ideal of universal education

as a source of social progress and equality. 93 That is, educational reformers cared about
certain metaphysical needs of people, and the states took up their cause. Such anti-nationalism was in part
a legacy of Schopenhauers upbringing. Brian Magee recounts that Schopenhauers father selected the name Arthur because the name is the same in
German, French, and English. Both of Schopenhauers parents were cosmopolitans who travelled widely and brought their children on extended trips
outside of the German-speaking lands. Schopenhauer spent much of his youth in France and England.96 According to David Cartwright, Heinrich Floris
Schopenhauer aimed to instil liberal and cosmopolitan attitudes in a son [Arthur] who would be well connected to various trading partners. 97
Whether Heinrich successfully implanted liberal ideas in his sons mind is debatable. (I will argue in the concluding section that he did not.) Less
debatable is the younger Schopenhauers cosmopolitanism and lack of attachment to the German nation. Schopenhauer freely and frequently
expresses an aversion to nationalism in several of his works. He manifests his lack of a national pride in several quips about his fellow German-speakers.
In The World as Will and Representation, for instance, he writes that for a German it is even good to have somewhat lengthy words in his mouth, for
he thinks slowly, and they give him time to reflect. 98 In an essay on government, he maintains that it is a characteristic failing of the Germans to look
in the clouds for what lies at their feet. 99 In no wise could Schopenhauer be proud of a nation which revered Hegel, whose philosophy would serve as
a lasting monument of German stupidity. 100 But Schopenhauer did not single out the Germans as the only nation with faults. Herder had posed the
rhetorical question: Is not the good on the earth strewn about?. 101 Schopenhauer might have turned this question around and asked whether the
bad on earth is limited to one particular group. We know what his answer to such a question would have been: every nation ridicules
the rest and all are right. 102 Behind his caustic remarks about his own and other nationalities, Schopenhauer harboured real concerns
about history and society. Anticipating Benedict Andersons Imagined Communities by more than a century,103 he refers to nations as

mere abstractions, and he argues that only the individuals and their course of life are real. 104 Histories,
focused as they are on national development, may be effective in teaching us about particular groups of men, but they reveal less about man, i.e.,
about human nature.105 If we truly wished to understand mankind, we would do well to consult biographies instead of histories, since they are richer
in detail and allow us to understand multiple facets of a mans existence.106 And, where
histories pave the way for
comfortable, substantial, fat states which devise purely national, political solutions to problems
which are universal and moral, proper biographies show us the true route to salvation. That path,
according to Schopenhauer is a life of compassion and asceticism, which is an individuals surest way of escaping the torments of the will.

Life is suffering there is no escape temporary satisfaction of a desire is

immediately replaced by a new desire, and if not that it is replaced by the
second order desire of boredom, the desire to have desire to fulfill this is not
an external force, but essential to the nature of life as willing itself
Singh 10 (Singh, R. Raj. Schopenhauer: A Guide for the Perplexed. Bloomsbury Publishing,
2010.
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/lib/umichigan/reader.action?docID=601
950)

At all grades of its phenomenon, from lowest to the highest, the

will disposes entirely with an ultimate aim and
object. It always strives, because striving is its sole nature, to which no attained goal can put an
end. Such striving is therefore incapable of final satisfaction. (W-I, 308) According to Schopenhauer, human being
is a phenomenon of the will, just as other entities are, at all grades of Being, inanimate things, plants and animals also are.
The will is always goal oriented and has aims which it is striving to accomplish incessantly in all levels of its phenomenon.
Everything is striving to realize its nature. Since will brings aims, goals and dynamism to all things, it fills them with
endless striving. Thus man is a bundle of needs, wants and cravings which know no final
satisfaction, unless the will at the summit of its knowledge of itself, in the human existence alone, resolves to deny rather than
affirm itself. Striving is the kernel and in-itself of everything that exists which in case of human existence, manifests itself most
distinctly being endowed with a human consciousness superior to that of all other entities. This striving in man is appropriately
called will, by Schopenhauer a term indicative of resolve, process, goals, ends and endless desires. When
the will is
hindered through obstacles between it and its temporary (immediate) goal, it is called
suffering. Thus suffering is defined as hindrances placed in the advance of the will towards its immediate and presumed aims.
The attainment of the temporary goal of the will is defined as satisfaction, well-being, and happiness by Schopenhauer. Thus both
suffering and temporary satisfaction do not deliver lasting happiness, since each so-called
satisfaction is the starting point of a new striving. Thus that there is no ultimate aim of striving
means that there is no measure or end of suffering (W-I, 309). Thus inevitability of striving that is part and
parcel of the will means that suffering is inevitable and ineradicable as a matter of course. This gives Schopenhauer the rationale for
his pessimistic judgement of life as such. Schopenhauer offers a graphic account of suffering in human life throughout his early and
later writings. Suffering is felt to the highest degree in human existence because in human existence, knowledge
is ever
more distinct than in any animal and in its enhanced consciousness, pain also increases.
Schopenhauer asserts that the more one knows the more one suffers; a genius suffers most of all. Although
suffering is more feebly expressed in animal world, it offers a mirror to the human to witness how all life is suffering, for life means
striving and striving never has a smooth sailing. Life
is also a constant warding-off of death, a prevented dying, an ever
deferred death. Knowing that there is death, struggling to nourish and preserve the body is another
reason for suffering. Thus the will is more appropriately named will-to-live. Willing and striving are the essence
of all living and the basis of willing is need, lack and hence pain. In case of the highest grade of wills
objectification, the human body appears as an objectified will-to-live, with an iron command to nourish it. Thus man is a bundle of
needs and wants. An additional task in-built in this concretized will-to-live is to propagate the species. As
Schopenhauer explains in his essay on sexual love, the purposes of the will-to-live are unknowingly carried out by those attached in
the bond of love and marriage. Furthermore, the needs and wants of romantic love have their own aspects of suffering.
Furthermore, when objects and activities of willing are temporarily missing, boredom strikes and
existence seems to become a burden. Hence life swings like a pendulum to and fro between
pain and boredom (W-I, 312). Ensuring and striving after their own existence is what keeps all living things engrossed and in
motion at all times. As soon as their existence is ensured to human beings or striving after existence
gets a respite, they are at a loss as to how to kill time this becomes a big issue. Being free of existential
cares at once makes humans burdens to themselves. Boredom is not to be taken lightly for it
imposes a compulsory sociability on people and obliges them to seek out one another, even
though at bottom due to deep-seated egoism, there is no love lost among them. At the same time,
human life is a continuous surge between willing and attainment. But the satisfactions of petty attainments are short-lived and
wishes appear under new versions and forms. Schopenhauer acknowledges that pure
knowledge and genuine delight
in art transforms us to being pure spectators of existence. But since pure intellectual and aesthetic pleasure
require rare talent, they appear in very few. And these select few receive this higher satisfaction at the cost of feeling very lonely
among beings that are incapable of pure knowledge and aesthetic feeling. These moments of pure knowledge and art-experience
are also like fleeting dreams in an existence that is given over to willing and craving for the most part. It is the accidental nature of
the appearance of sufferings that accords them their power. Suffering
is essential to life and it is really its various
forms that make their appearances subject to chance. But we frequently overlook the basic fact that
suffering is essential to life, therefore does not flow in upon us from outside, but everyone
carries around within himself its perennial source (W-I, 318). Thus all satisfaction or so-called happiness is
only negative. Every satisfaction is fulfilment of a wish, and a wish or lack or desire has to be the
precedent condition of every pleasure. Schopenhauer returns to the theme of the positive nature of suffering in all of
his early and later works. He is quick to point out the moral failings of human egoism in his graphic description of human miseries.
How the sight
or description of anothers sufferings brings us a feeling of satisfaction is described
by Schopenhauer with a quote from Lucretius: Not that it pleases us to watch another being
tormented, but that it is a joy to us to observe evils from which we ourselves are free (W-I, 320). An
evidence of Schopenhauers observation can be found in the reactions of the tourists to the plight of the poorer native populations
around the sun and sand destinations. Many tourists seem to draw a perverse feeling of joy at their own superior economic situation
and can hardly suppress their self-congratulatory satisfaction during their bouts of eating and drinking in their all-inclusive resorts.
As if the cares, anxieties and preoccupations of the actual world are not enough, human mind has a tendency to
create an imaginary higher world for itself, a world of demons, gods and saints and a thousand superstitions. To
these conceived deities must be offered sacrifices, prayer, temple decorations, vows and their
fulfilment, pilgrimages, salutations, adornment of images and so on. Events of this life are accepted as the
counter-effects of these divine beings. Such religious activities fulfil a double need of people for help and support as well as for
activity and diversion. Schopenhauer points out that such spiritual
and religious innovation took place more
significantly among peoples whose lives were made easy by mildness of climate and fertility of
soil, first among the Hindus, then Greeks and Romans and later Italians, Spaniards and others.
Schopenhauer emphasizes that his account of lifes suffering is not just an a-posteriori accumulation of instances of human miseries
within history and experience. This could be deemed as a one-sided description lacking in universality which is required in a
philosophical analysis. He maintains that his account is a perfectly cold and philosophical demonstration of the inevitable suffering
at the very foundation of the nature of life; for it starts from the universal and is conducted a priori (W-I, 324). However, an a-
posteriori confirmation of this truth is to be found everywhere. What Schopenhauer means is that the
reality and primacy
of human suffering is not merely deduced from the various instances of pain and rejection in
human condition. Rather, suffering lies at the core of life as real and inevitable, part and parcel
of existence as such. All the instances of suffering which seem to be accidental occurrences are rather essential and
inevitable components of existence, a testimony to the truth of suffering residing in the core of life. Of course, there are
innumerable satisfactions felt at the realizations of the goals of our strivings. But these are short-lived and too few compared to the
widespread frustrations at the thwarting of the wills endless cravings that prompt ceaseless quests. Add to these frustrations of
wilful projects of human being, the tragic facts of the nature of existence, needs, wants and necessities of the basic demands of life,
the knowledge that death is certain but its timing is uncertain, the pains of human relationships, meetings and partings. All in all, the
nature of life and its manycoloured unfoldings contain an ocean of suffering. A significant part of it is lawful and inevitable aspect of
existence itself, another part is bound to subdue us even though there is a portion of it that we can possibly encounter and
overcome with heroism. Schopenhauer maintains that a happy life is impossible; a heroic life of compassion and fortitude is an
option. According to Schopenhauer, anyone whose judgement is not paralysed by prejudices of assured optimistic doctrines
will acknowledge that this world of humanity is the kingdom of chance and error. Folly and
wickedness are rampant in it. Schopenhauer continues to present a graphic account of the darker aspects of human life.
In this world, everything better and excellent struggles through as an exceptional occurrence, and
lasting creative works of great minds are those that have outlived the malice of their contemporaries. In the sphere of
thought, art and action, the absurd, the dull and the fraudulent are the order of the day,
disturbed only by brief interruptions of the contributions of the genuine heroes and genius
intellects. As far as the individuals are concerned, as a rule, every life is a continual series of mishaps great
and small, concealed as much as possible by everyone (W-I, 324). Everyone is aware that others will draw a
perverse satisfaction at the miseries of others from which they are at the moment free. How can anyone in ones right
mind call this unjust and miserable world the best of all possible worlds Schopenhauer
wonders. If we were to take the most hardened and callous optimists through hospitals,
prisons, torture-chambers, slave-hovels, battlefields and other abodes of misery, they would
have to give up their doctrines of the glories of human existence. But this hopeless and irreversible condition
of man is precisely the invincible and indomitable nature of his will, the objectivity of which is his person (W-I, 325). An
external power can never change or suppress this will, and no supernatural power can possibly
deliver him from the sufferings that are the consequence of the life which is a phenomenon of
the will. Everything depends on the individual left to himself; any possible deliverance depends on the will of man himself. In vain
does he make gods for himself, and seeks from them through prayer and flattery what can be brought about only by his own
willpower. As man does have the capacity to deny this will-to-live as exemplified by sanyasis (monks), martyrs and saints of all faiths.
But optimism,at a fundamental level as the basic judgement of the nature of life, remains a
bitter mockery of the unspeakable sufferings of mankind. Schopenhauer shows the atheistic tenor of his
thought and offers a scathing critique of ritualistic religion. However, he shows a great deal of admiration for saints and ascetics of
all major religions, for he views them as genuine practitioners of the denial of the will, a difficult but nobler way of life. The
acknowledgement of the suffering inherent in human life is the starting point of wisdom and higher life according to Schopenhauer.
He regards this pessimism as realism. To overlook and downplay the misery of others is both insensitive and immoral; to deny
suffering in ones own life shows shallow thinking. Suffering is very real and continuous throughout lifes
various phases and at the same time delivered to us in totally unpredictable and staggering
modes, and changing realities are hard to handle. The respites from suffering, happy interludes
are far too few and short-lived. By no means are suffering and happiness equal and opposite. Suffering is fundamental;
the will and its allied cravings ensure inevitable hardship. All happinesses and satisfactions are temporary breaks from the ongoing
suffering essential to life. This is certainly a pessimistic and one-sided appraisal of life based on an interpretation of the character of
the will-to-live, both willing and living being ongoing quests and ongoing strivings, involving innumerable goals and innumerable
frustrations. Due to the fact that our bodies and our lives are the abodes and arenas of the will-to-live, life and suffering have to be
synonymous as two sides of the same coin. The evidence for this basic truth can be found everywhere in the human condition.
Schopenhauer cites instances of common woes and miseries, along with the meanness of human egoism, systemic exploitation of
the downtrodden and widespread heartlessness as sure signs of suffering that is part and parcel of life. Does Schopenhauer
deliberately and/or compulsively downplay the positive and the good in human life? He does acknowledge the good but only in a
heroic encounter with suffering, and in an impassioned contemplation of the nature of the world by a small number of thinkers,
artists and geniuses, and most of all in the saintly lives of those who say no to the wills commands and cravings. Any other
happiness or good has to be a temporary delusion according to him. The change, the striving and movement within life is taken to be
something negative, a pointless turmoil, the opposite of the calm of salvation. Thus the Buddhist dualism between samsara
(worldliness) and nirvana (salvation) seems to be embedded in Schopenhauers insight.

We need to adopt a state of will-less-ness, de-individuating ourselves in an

aesthetic experience. Denial of the will is the only state that might deliver us
from suffering.
Janaway 1999 (Christopher, Professor of Philosophy at the University of South
Hampton, Schopenhauers Pessimism, in Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement,
Vol.44, pp. 58-9)
However, the issue does not end there. Schopenhauer's pessimism has, I believe, deeper foundations in his conception of the self.
Consider the following two questions: (1) Would not suicide be the appropriate solution to the
predicament Schopenhauer alleges we are in? (2) If we could live but in some sense
become detached from willing, would that be another solution? To question (1)
Schopenhauer answers No: suicide is not a solution surprisingly perhaps. And he answers Yes
to question (2), which might also seem odd, if we recall the pain attaching to boredom. Should not perma- nent detachment
from all willing be a longueur in every sense? But Schopenhauer's view here rests on a contrasting
state, possible for at least some individuals, which he calls 'denial of the will', a state that
releases them from striving and suffering altogether . On the other hand, someone who
commits suicide fails to reach this state of release, and instead continues to affirm the
will. Some explanations are required. 'The will to life ... must be denied if salvation is to be attained
from an existence like ours' (Wl, 405), Schopenhauer writes. He remarks ironically that denial of the will is
the only state we might consider as candidate for 'highest good': if we wish to give that expression
an emeritus position, then figuratively the summum bonum is the complete self-effacement and denial of
the will, true will- lessness, which alone stills and silences for ever the craving of the
will; which alone gives that contentment that cannot again be dis- turbed; which alone
is world-redeeming. (Wl, 362) This would be, he acknowledges, 'self-denial or self-renunciation, abnegatio sui ipsius; for
the real self is the will to life' (W2, 606). (The 'real self or 'essence' as he often says.) So Schopenhauer advocates a
radical and difficult cure: denial of, or loss of identifi- cation with, our essence. If the
solution to pessimism lies in reject- ing one's real self, then the justification for this
must be that being what one is is not worthwhile. Schopenhauer writes with impressive intensity about
the tempo- rary state of will-lessness to be found in aesthetic experience. And he recalls this
experience in an attempt to convey the blessedness of prolonged will-lessness in 'denial of the
will': aesthetic pleasure consists, to a large extent, in the fact that, when we enter the state
of pure contemplation, we are raised for the moment above all willing, above all
desires and cares; we are, so to speak, rid of ourselves. We are no longer the individual
that knows in the interest of its constant willing ... but the eter- nal subject of knowing
purified of the will ... From this we can infer how blessed must be the life of a man
whose will is silenced, not for a few moments, as in the enjoyment of the beautiful,
but for ever, indeed completely extinguished, except for the last glimmering spark
that maintains the body and is extinguished with it. Such a man who, after many bitter struggles with his
own nature, has at last completely conquered, is then left only as pure knowing being ... Nothing can distress or
alarm him any more; nothing can any longer move him; for he has cut all the thousand
threads of willing which hold us bound to the world, and which as craving, fear, envy,
and anger drag us here and there in constant pain. {Wl, 390) As I see it, a contrasting pair of higher-order
evaluative attitudes has now entered the picture. One takes - explicitly or implicitly - some attitude of
acquiescence or refusal towards one's existence as an organic embodiment of the will to
life, caught in the cycle of willing and suffering. The ordinary person who registers wants
and strives to compensate for them adopts an implicit second-order atti- tude of
'affirmation' towards the body in which they arise. I say implicit because this attitude is the natural, more or
less unreflec- tive state of human beings. Schopenhauer says: 'The affirmation of the will is the persistent willing itself, undisturbed
by any knowl- edge, as it fills the life of man in general ... instead of affirmation of the will, we can also say affirmation of the body.'
{Wl, 326-7). Humans
in general pursue goals dependent on the needs of the bod- ily
individual, but they also do something which other animals do not: they regard this
pursuit as the point of their existence. Denial of the will is release from identification
with the embodied individual one is.
Links
 State
State cant make people ethical leads to net more egoism even in the best
possible scenario
Jordan 9 (Jordan, Neil. "Schopenhauer's Politics: Ethics, Jurisprudence and the State." Better
Consciousness: Schopenhauer's Philosophy of Value (2009): 171-188.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/doi/10.1002/9781444322866.ch11/pdf)
There is, however, an additional concern here, bound to the nature of virtue itself, which would surely prevent the state from ever being capable of
enforcing it. Schopenhauers statement that legislation can be enforced to bring about a state of justice25 discloses
the reason for which any attempt to impose morality must fail. In such a state of justice, everyone would act justly and

would desist from harming others, but not from compassion or genuine personal virtue. Rather,
they would respect the rights of others only from a self-interested fear of the punishments with
which acts of wrong are met. As such, irrespective of appearances, even the most effective of states relies
upon and perpetuates egoism. If the State attains its object completely, it will produce the same
phenomenon as if perfect justice of disposition everywhere prevailed; but the inner nature and
origin of both phenomena will be the reverse. Thus in the latter case, it would be said that no one wished to do wrong, but in
the former that no one wished to suffer wrong (WWRI: 346). Since, for Schopenhauer, real virtue is a matter of disposition and

is characterized by selflessness,26 there is surely something paradoxical in the idea that it could be
enforced under threat of punishment. As such, the nature of virtue itself means that ethics can never be imposed
by the state, whose only means of motivation is appeal to self-interest. It seems, then, that the state
can have no moral role at all, for to attribute such to it would not only be contrary to the
purpose of its existence, but also dangerous and futile. Schopenhauer appears to have drawn a very sharp distinction
between the spheres of legislation and ethics, whereupon the former, in the face of the weakness of natural morality as a motive, simply makes a very
particular use of ethical doctrine in order to act as an institution of protection, rendered necessary by the manifold attacks to which man is exposed
(WWR II: 594). However, the very fact that the state is concerned with the suffering of wrong (even if not
so much with the doing of wrong) surely suggests some kind of moral purpose. What, after all, would be wrong with the suffering
of wrong were it not wrong? However, Schopenhauers view of the states foundation reveals that he does not consider the

states protective function to be moral in character at all.

 Suffering
Suffering is a catalyst for denial of the will.
Singh 10 (R. Raj Singh is Professor (B.A., M.A., Panjab ; M.A. Brock ; Ph.D.
Ottawa) Department of Philosophy @ Brock University. From schopenhauer a guide for the
perplexed chapter 5.)

Schopenhauer says that most people who choose the path of the denial of the will very often do
so after encountering personal sufferings. A major loss or disappointment can be a catalyst for a
spiritual conversion that prompts a complete resignation and ascetic life. Only a chosen few are
lead by pure knowledge to practise the denial of the will. These are the persons who are greatly
affected by the sufferings of the world in general and are able to see through the principium
individuationis and be overwhelmed by universal love of mankind. They recognize in the
sufferings of others their own suffering and, through a vision of their universal self, they want
no better life for themselves than the lot of the bulk of suffering humanity. Whether one is
converted by personal suffering and hopelessness or through empathy with the sufferings of
others, the denial of the will is related to suffering and its practice involves voluntary embracing
of selfdenial and rejection of what the world calls the good life. This practice has been aptly
called the practice or the rehearsal of death or a true philosophical life by Socrates.
Schopenhauer describes such a practitioner of the wills denial as follows: We see him know
himself and the world, change his whole nature, rise above himself and all suffering, as if
purified and sanctified by it, in inviolable peace, bliss and sublimity, willingly renounce
everything he formerly desired with the greatest vehemence, and gladly welcome death. (W-I,
393) In many cases, the experience of suffering serves as a catalyst for a life of the wills
denial. For some, death being near at hand and hopelessness is the cause of their renunciation.
For some others, it can be a sudden misfortune or setback that leads them to realize the vanity
of all endeavour. Sometimes kings, heroes and adventurers, suddenly convert to being hermits
and monks. Schopenhauer cites the cases of two such conversions: Raymond Lull, who after
suddenly witnessing the cancer-eaten bosom of his ladylove, gave up royalty and went on to a
hermits life; Abbe de Rance, whose youth was spent in pursuit of pleasures, suddenly stumbled
against the severed head of his beloved Madame de Montebazon, later became the chief
reformer of La Trappe monastic order in France. He revitalized this group of ascetics, whose
monks are known to this day for severe austerities and utmost humility. Such examples of
conversions are not confined to the previously rich and powerful, but at times even the
hardened criminals, convert to a spiritual outlook while face to face with their impending
execution. Schopenhauer records several socalled gallows-sermons delivered by such convicts
shortly before their execution, remarkable for their spiritual insight (W-II, 631). These accounts
were obviously culled by Schopenhauer from his daily readings of The Times and other English
newspapers. This shows how down-to-earth and directly related to everyday life
Schopenhauers philosophy is. Suffering contains within it a sanctifying force, according to
Schopenhauer. This is because suffering makes one humble and resigns oneself to reality. But
the sufferer . . . is worthy of reverence only when his glance has been raised from the particular
to the universal, and when he regards his own suffering merely as an example of the whole . . .
so that the whole of life conceived as essential suffering, thus brings him to resignation (W-I,
396).
Thinking about death only produces anguish at the thought of our limited
existence the only way to break free is to realize that our existence and death
are limited to our individuality. The Will is eternal and everlasting accessing it
is key
Vasalou 13 (Sophia Vasalou is Research Fellow at New York University Abu Dhabi
and Honorary Research Associate at Oxford Brookes University. Schopenhauer
and the Aesthetic Standpoint. 2013. Pg 41-45)//jl
In the last chapter, I suggested that an inward turn defined the standpoint of philosophy for
Schopenhauer in two related senses. Philosophy was inward-looking in turning to the subject to
understand the mode of appearance of external objects. But philosophy was also inward-looking
in turning to the self-experience of the subject to find a pathway that led beyond appearances,
and to the thing-in-itself. In both cases, doing philosophy meant turning inward: away from the
representation; into the depths of what lies within.

Yet that, I will be suggesting in this chapter, cannot provide us with the whole story about how
philosophy is done. To find the sharp point of a wedge into a fuller account, there can be no
better way of proceeding than by turning back to consider the moment that gives philosophy its
beginning. And this is a moment that Schopenhauer, remaining faithful to the experiential
commitments of his philosophy, would identify in profoundly existential terms. The search for
an understanding of reality, it has sometimes been said, is grounded in the sense of human
vulnerability. The search for certainty and for the ultimate ground, as Leszek Koakowski
remarks for a world of which the origin, rules and destiny we can grasp is the expression
of the experience of human fragility.1

It was this intuition that Schopenhauer was expressing in his turn when he put down the origin
of metaphysics to the problem of suffering; and more specifically, to the anguish produced by
the prospect of our own death (WWR ii:161). Standing behind our fear of death of our non-
being as the ground of its possibility was the crucial human ability, both blessing and curse, to
be surprised at our own being. No beings, with the exception of man, Schopenhauer opens his
essay On Mans Need for Metaphysics to say, feel surprised at their own existence, but to all
of them it is so much a matter of course that they do not notice it. It is only as the will the
inner being of nature reaches reflection in human being that this surprise becomes possible to
it. Nature then marvels at its own works, and asks itself what it itself is. And its wonder is the
more serious, as here for the first time it stands consciously face to face with death (WWR
ii:160).

It was this existential confrontation that Schopenhauer placed at the root of metaphysical
inquiry, and implicitly his own. It has been said indeed that the problem of death constituted
Schopenhauers deepest motivating concern, and the problem against which his philosophy was
measured for its success. It is death, Michael Fox writes, that ultimately preoccupied
Schopenhauer, forming the hub of the wheel from which all of his various doctrines radiate
like spokes The confidence with which Schopenhauer assessed his own contribution to
philosophy can and should be seen as giving expression, in part, to his satisfaction at having
overcome the fear of death through systematic, rational reflection.2
How, then, had the fear of death been overcome? Yet in approaching this question, something
more needs to be said concerning the presence of this fear in our lives. For the fear of death
may provide philosophy with its starting point when it arises; yet how often does it in fact do
so? Death, for all the engrossing interest philosophy has historically taken in it, in other ways
appears to be singularly absent from the concrete present of our ordinary experience. We go
about everyday life as if death simply did not concern us. As if this internal human relation to
mystery to that which resists comprehension3 was not internal at all; as if, to use
Schopenhauers phrase, we were eternal: everyone lives on as though he is bound to live for
ever (WWR i:281). Other philosophers, like the Epicurean Lucretius, might have here proposed
subtle psychological interventions for discerning the fear of death that pervades our seemingly
carefree everyday existence.4 More recent philosophers might offer the thought that this fear,
or its conditioning awareness of death for all its constitutive role as an internal relation
must be an achievement. But for Schopenhauer, the next step lies elsewhere.

There is in fact a noticeable tension that runs through Schopenhauers remarks concerning the
epistemic availability of the notion of our own non-existence. At times, Schopenhauer speaks of
this prospect as a firm epistemic possession: man alone carries about with him in abstract
concepts the certainty of his own death. Yet this, he immediately continues, can frighten
him only very rarely and at particular moments. And in the next moment, the initial positive
affirmation has given way to something far weaker: it might be said that no one has a really
lively conviction of the certainty of his own death (WWR i:281). This denial assumes more
categorical tones elsewhere, as when Schopenhauer refers to our deep conviction of the
impossibility of our extermination by death a conviction so deep that our own death may
indeed be for us at bottom the most incredible thing in the world (WWR ii:487). If we can
represent our death at all, this is because of the temporal nature of our consciousness. Yet this
representation seems to constitute not only an extraordinary event, but indeed a veritably
unattainable one. The prospect of our own death is fundamentally inconceivable to us.

Yet it is precisely by attending to this tension more closely that the resolution to the fear that
stimulates philosophical inquiry can be identified. For a fear of death may indeed only
supervene at extraordinary moments and all we can say is that this is when philosophy will
need to be done. Yet philosophy will respond to our need in a manner that calls precisely upon
the truths already reflected in our resistance to being provoked to this fear, and our limited
capacity to fully assent to our representation of this eventuality. If we ordinarily live in a state of
unquestioning absorption in the present, and if everything in our phenomenology suggests an
absence of doubt concerning our continued existence, this phenomenology can be subjected to
interpretation. On closer examination an examination that raises mere feeling to
reflectively appropriated insight according to philosophical procedure it turns out to contain
precisely the metaphysical truth we require for our consolation. For our phenomenology,
Schopenhauer would suggest or rather, that aspect of our phenomenology that registers as
the dominant chord is simply an expression of our true inner nature. Our sense of
endlessness reflects a primitive certainty that there is something positively imperishable and
indestructible in us and a consciousness of our original and eternal nature (WWR ii:496,
487). And this, of course, is in the first place our inner nature as will; and on another level, our
nature as representing subjects whose supra-individual consciousness conditions the world.5
It is not, thus, that one lives as though he is bound to live for ever but rather it is in fact the
case that one does. For our true nature does not reside in our character as individuals, which
can be affected by temporal events. Individuals, indeed, have no real existence; they exist only
in the knowledge of a representing subject, which is conditioned by time, space, and causality.
Untouched by the course of time and underlying the succession of appearances, by contrast,
our being-in-itself exists in an everlasting present (WWR ii:479). When we suddenly call up
a larger temporal perspective and the representation of our death impresses us with its
inevitability, the anguish we experience belongs to us in our identity as individual beings that
are phenomena of the will. The tension between the two certainties the certainty that we
will die, the certainty that we cannot thus turns out to be a tension between two different
ways of experiencing ourselves: as individual phenomena, and as will. Appreciating this
distinction involves recognising that the greatest equivocation lies in the word I According
as I understand this word, I can say: Death is my entire end; or else: This my personal
phenomenal appearance is just as infinitely small a part of my true inner nature as I am of the
world (WWR ii:491).

Our astonishment at the finitude of our consciousness, which arises only infrequently due to
the inertia of our truer nature, is ultimately grounded in an illusion the illusion of the
principium individuationis. To that extent, ones horror at ones prospective non-existence is as
ill-founded as the wonder with which every new individual greets his present existence, finding
himself so fresh and original, that he broods over himself in astonishment (WWR ii:501). From
the true metaphysical perspective, there is neither freshness to be found nor decay; the
concepts of duration and extinction themselves are borrowed from time that is merely the
form of the phenomenon, so that the constant arising of new beings and the perishing of
those that exist are to be regarded as an illusion (PP ii:269).

Dispelling this illusion thus involves an appropriation or indeed reappropriation of our true
identity, which can be framed as a rediscovery of the experience of endlessness interrupted by
the reflective representation of death. When this experience is disturbed through the intrusion
of a temporal perspective one deeply steeped in the illusions of individuality philosophy rises
to a higher perspective from which it can interpret the interrupted experience and
reappropriate its meaning at the level of reflection. Having come to grasp the true nature of the
world, we can now think, and not just feel, that we are endless.6 This involves shifting our
viewpoint to realise that our true identity lies not in our individual consciousness but in the
will of which it is a manifestation, and in the supra-individual subjectivity no less eternal in
kind through which this manifestation is achieved in its purest form.7
 Science
Gaining objective knowledge necessary for scientific achievement requires the
madness and will-lessness of art.
Singh 10 (R. Raj Singh is Professor (B.A., M.A., Panjab ; M.A. Brock ; Ph.D.
Ottawa) Department of Philosophy @ Brock University. From schopenhauer a guide for the
perplexed chapter 5.)

According to Schopenhauer, human life under the subjection of the will is for the most part full
of striving and suffering interspersed with brief interludes of satisfactions of trivial achievements
which result in pursuits of newer and newer worldly goals. But art experience is something that
pulls one out of the matter of course oscillation between suffering and illusory satisfaction. In a
contemplation of an object (or a specific set of objects) free from its ties with other objects, that
is, in contemplation if its Idea, a detachment is achieved by the artist and passed on to the art
connoisseur. Schopenhauer maintains that in this mode of detachment, art experience leads
one to a state of will-lessness or a self-transformation as well as endows one with a truly
objective knowledge of the Ideas of things. One becomes a pure will-less subject of knowledge
as one gains a truly objective knowledge. These moments of art experience, as long as they
last, usher one to a state of liberation from the network of worldly interconnections of things, a
network which is consumed with personal agendas, temporary satisfactions leading to newer
lacks and newer sufferings. In art experience ones personal stakes and agendas to manipulate
and use things is temporarily suspended and one is able to stare at the thing itself to
contemplate its Idea. According to Schopenhauer, art experience brings both an extraordinary
knowledge and an extraordinary self-transformation. It gives us intimations of what a life of the
denial of the will and salvation referred to in great religions like Christianity, Hinduism and
Buddhism must be like. Schopenhauer maintains that great art is produced by a genius. Great
art is not produced by merely talented or trained individuals but a genius who alone is capable
of pure contemplation of Ideas. A genius is pre-eminently able to detach himself from his
personality and personal considerations, and to absorb himself entirely in the object. The gift of
genius is nothing but the most complete objectivity (W-I, 185). Genius is the ability and
tendency to remain in a state of perception, to immerse oneself in perception and to remove
ones knowledge from the matter-of-course service to the will. According to Schopenhauer, a
genius has a superfluity of knowledge in contrast to other mortals, an amount of knowledge that
far exceeds what is normally required for the service of an individual will. The knowledge of the
Ideas contemplated by the genius is obtained through an especially keen perception. It is not
abstract or conceptual knowledge. The perception of a genius is more penetrating in contrast to
the typical perception of an ordinary man who can direct his attention to things only in so far as
they have some relation to his will . . . he does not linger long over the mere perception . . .
quickly looks merely for the concept under which it is to be brought, just as the lazy man looks
for a chair, which then no longer interests him (W-I, 187). On the other hand, the genius is often
so absorbed in contemplation of life itself and Ideas of things that he is invariably forgetful of his
self-interest and lacks in practical life skills that the ordinary man of the world possesses. The
issue of the genius was of great interest to Schopenhauer as he paints portraits of the genius in
several of his works. One of the themes he dwells over is the connection between genius and
madness. The genius is one who has the capacity of bypassing in his sight worldly inter-
connections of things, that is, the mundane knowledge according to the principle of sufficient
reason, in order to focus on the thing as such to discover its Idea. He is able to grasp the real
inner nature of a thing and how that thing represents its whole species. At the same time the
genius has the power to be a correlative of the Idea. That is, he becomes a pure subject of
knowing, and ceases to be an individual in the mode of contemplation. That which exists in the
actual individual thing, only imperfectly and weakened by modifications, is enhanced to
perfection, to the Idea of it, by the method of contemplation used by the genius (W-I, 194). This
is why the
 Progress
(this is probably also an A2 cap/most Ks that hinge on a reading of history) The
idea of a progression of history is ridiculous in itself but more laughable when
applied to politics Revolutions are replacing power with the same the evils
they decry in the state or even individual actions speak to a deeper
metaphysical evil of the world and therefore attempting to change these
essential evils with actions in the phenomenal world is absurd
Winkler 13 (Winkler, Robin. "SCHOPENHAUER'S CRITIQUE OF MORALISTIC THEORIES OF THE
STATE." History of Political Thought 34.2 (2013): 296-323.)

If history were of any philosophical value at all, it would have to give us access to the world as
will; it would have to tell us something about the essence of the world. Yet although history shows
us mankind just as a view from a high mountain shows us nature,143 the impossibility to possess all the
data, to have registered everything, or to have explored everything144 makes this view a rather blurred one: nothing becomes
distinct or recognizable according to the whole of its essence.145 For this reason, history is not even a science, let
alone philosophy, but merely knowledge, for nowhere does it recognize the particular by means of the universal,
rather it must always comprehend the particular directly,146 and even the most universal ideas in history concern only something
unique and individual, namely a long period of time or a principal incident.147 Schopenhauer not only rejected the ideas of progress
and of a historical science. More interestingly, and coming full circle with his criticism of the Hegelian theory of the state, he
thought it laughable that artificially construed histories, guided by shallow optimism, always
ultimately end with a cozy, well-nourished, fat state, with a well-regulated constitution, good
justice and police, good technology and industry, and mostly intellectual perfection.148 This,
Schopenhauer thought, was simply utopian, if not inconsistent with his own theory of the state. What he most angrily
objected to, however, was the Hegelian notion that such a state would also imply moral progress and
perfection. For in his own ethics morality remains essentially unchangeable.149 The idea of a philosophy of
history, such as Hegels, was simply nonsensical in Schopenhauers eyes. The Hegelians, he wrote, who conjure up
such constructions of the course of the world . . . have not grasped the principal truth of all
philosophy, that the same is at any time [sic], that all becoming and unfolding is only
apparent.150 The will is the essence of the world, and since it manifests itself objectively as ethical disposition, to which alone
free will attaches, morality cannot be subject to any progress or change. The goodness of the world more
generally is unchangeable. The Hegelian fools, by contrast, opine that something is yet to come into existence, namely something
better, a state more moral and free.151 This must be wrong if goodness,
morality, freedom do not pertain to the
world as representation, in which things are causally related in space and time. Only because of their misunderstanding of
the nature of history did the Hegelians concede to history a principal place in their philosophy, and construct it on an assumed plan
of the world, according to which everything is directed towards the good.152 In response to this, Schopenhauer argued that the
true philosophy of history consists in the insight that, amid all the manifold changes and chaos,
one yet always has before one the same, constant, and unalterable essence, namely the
fundamental qualities of the human heart and mind many bad, few good.153 Hence,
Schopenhauers underlying anti-Hegelianism resulted to a significant extent from his opposition to the Hegelian view of the state as
the basis of morality. It cannot be denied that frustration with the lack of recognition of his own work also fuelled Schopenhauers
contempt for Hegel. Moreover, Paul Gottfried has argued that the attack on Hegels notion of history was more of an addendum to
the general shafts against the stupidity of the general system of thought of his rival: At first [Schopenhauer] aimed his shafts against
a hated rival, then against the rivals system of thought, and finally against the root assumptions from which that system sprang, i.e.,
the ideas of historical progress and the rational nature of reality.154 Although it is certainly true that political philosophy and
history were not at the core of Schopenhauers criticisms of Hegel, the political and historical dimensions of Hegels system had
always attracted Schopenhauers criticism since his earliest encounter with it. Hbscher attributes most of Schopenhauers
bitterness about Hegel to a radical denial of historicism.155 Ausmus concurs with Hbscher that one cannot conclude that
Schopenhauer changed his position on the nature of history concomitantly with his increasing charges of Hegelian fraud.156
Schopenhauers view of history as merely rational knowledge about events located in time and space was held early in life.157 The
Left Hegelians and their notions of social progress were another nemesis of Schopenhauers. To his mind, they had all been
bred in Hegels barn of charlatans.158 He mocked them for spouting on about history as the process of the
absolute.159 In a sense, they were even worse than Hegel: for Hegel, philosophy of history was entirely retrospective;
according to the Young Hegelians, however, the progress of history could be advanced so as to
bring about justice in the present. To Schopenhauer, they failed to understand that the many
injustices of the social world were eternal injustices, rooted in the intrinsically unjust nature
of most men. As a result of this, they blamed the state, politics, for social injustices, they attribute
entirely to governments the crying and colossal evils of the world: for if only governments did their duty,
there would be heaven on earth, i.e. everyone would gorge, guzzle, propagate, and die without any effort or sorrows: for this is the
paraphrase of their end in itself and the goal of the endless progress of mankind which they tirelessly proclaim in their pompous
phrases.160 For example, having been introduced to Feuerbachs writings by his disciple Frauenstdt, Schopenhauer concluded that
Feuerbachs oafish, bigoted materialism was simply another fruit of Hegelianism.161 In 1848, the year of the revolution,
Schopenhauer intimated to a friend that the optimism of the Hegelians was as suited to his own worldview as a pork fricassee to a
Jewish wedding.162 Schopenhauer despised the practical
revolutionaries and anarchists of the 1848/49
revolutions as much as the nonsense-scribbling Left Hegelian intellectuals. According to Thomas Mann,
Schopenhauer had no time for the idea of progress, and he had even less time for the political
agitation of the people, the revolutions. His behaviour in 1848 was grimly comic . . . He had not even the slightest
sympathies for those who, admittedly optimistically, were hoping to give German public life a new direction.163 As already
mentioned, Mann was not so superficial as to consider Schopenhauers fear of losing his personal fortune as the main rationale
underlying his contempt for the revolutionaries. Rather, he argued, Schopenhauers anti-revolutionary attitude was grounded in his
worldview, not only logically-conceptually, but also spiritually: it was a fundamental disposition that belonged to his moralism, his
ethical pessimism.164 Yet Schopenhauers pessimism his faustische Duft, Kreuz, Tod und Gruft,165 in Nietzsches famous words
equally provides an idiosyncratic and under-rated perspective on the dominant traditions of German political philosophy in the
nineteenth century.
 Education
Education currently overemphasizes the pursuit of happiness. Against this, we
must also emphasize the inevitability of pain, misery, and suffering if we are
prepare students for the world.
Hyland 1985
(J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in Educational
Studies, 11:3, 219-20)

In the rather strange final section of the Tractatus in which Wittgenstein discusses God,
death, the will and the mystical, we come across the following remark: "The world of the
happy man is a different one from that of the unhappy man" (1922, p. 72). Like many other
thoughts of Wittgenstein this is tantalisingly eliptical, but enough is said in the surrounding
context of propositions to give clues to interpretation. The will, as the subject of ethical
attributes, cannot alter the world but only its limits, that is, its totality as framed by
experience. Our perspective, our stance in relation to the world, is constructed out of the
given data of experience subject to the limitations of human understanding. Differences in
understanding result in different world pictures. Spinoza's quest for the "faculty of enjoying
throughout eternity continual supreme happiness" was guided by similar considerations.
Spinoza had learned that "all things which frequently take place in ordinary life are vain and
futile", and concluded that "all the things I feared and which feared me had nothing good or
bad in them save in so far as the mind was affected by them" (1959a, p. 277). The search for
the supreme good was to be conducted according to certain 'rules of life', through the
development of the best mode of perception, and by paying attention to, amongst other
things, "moral philosophy and the theory for the education of children" (ibid, p. 231). Both
Wittgenstein and Spinoza are alluding to matters of the first importance in life, concerns
which, as Spinoza suggests, are inextricably linked with educational development. In the
context of discussions about moral education and the education of the emotions,
educators have naturally shown a great interest in such questions, and a number of well-
established perspectives have been developed for the purpose of guiding practice. However,
in all such discussions inordinate emphasis has been placed on the notion of
happiness, references to which seem irresistible as soon as educators turn their
attention to ultimate aims. Bantock (1967) has taken child-centred educators to task for
their obsession with happiness, and Dearden (1972) has tried to make sense of the
obsession, concluding that, although we cannot sensibly question its value, happiness
cannot simply be the aim of education without qualification, but must be balanced
against other "final ends constitutive of the good of man" (p. 111). None of these caveats seem
to have affected Barrow's longstanding preoccupation with happiness as an ultimate educational aim. After
reviewing a formidable body of writings on the topic, he concludes that, although happiness is not logically tied
to any particular conditions or linked with any particular feeling, 'it is something to be valued and schools
should show a concern for it'. Such concern should take the form of providing pupils with a secure
environment, nurturing their self-esteem, offering alternatives to the dominant competitive model of social and
economic organisation, and there should also be some attempt made to teach pupils about 'the nature of
happiness itself (1980, pp. 138-140). I am not sure what such teaching would consist in but I want to suggest an
alternative to this rather one-sided and undiscriminating approach. It has always seemed to me that a defect
of utilitarianism is its failure to come to grips with unhappiness. Although officially
concerned with its avoidance or diminution, utilitarians have generally been content
to state this formal principle then go on to concentrate almost exclusively on the
pursuit or maximisation of its opposite number, happiness. In his Moral Thinking, for
instance, Hare (1981) founds a complete system of practical moral reasoning on the maximisation of desire and
preference satisfaction but, apart from a brief chapter on evil desires, pays scant attention to the countless ways
in which preferences are thwarted and desires frustrated in ordinary life. Attention needs to be
concentrated on this understated aspect of the utilitarian formula, unhappiness in all
its forms. In particular, I wish to suggest that educators ought to show more interest in
areas of human life and experience that have been traditionally neglectedthe roots
and consequences of the misery, pain and suffering in the worldif they are to
achieve that most general of educational aims, what Whitehead (1932) called the only
subject-matter of education, that is, 'Life in all its manifestations' (p. 10). Few
philosophers have considered these aspects of human nature as deeply and systematically as
Schopenhauer, and I want to try to show how Schopenhauer's writings in this area can
help to clarify our thinking about questions which are fundamental to considerations
of the nature and purpose of education.
Education is fruitless without intuition. We must have intuitive perception and
common sense prior to acquiring abstract concepts. Without this, education
amounts to the impression of mistaken notions into shallow and
uncomprehending minds.

(If youre younger than 16, you arent allowed to read this argument.)

Schopenhauer 74 (Arthur, Parerga and Paralipomena: Short Philosophical Essays,

Volume Two, Translated from the German by E. F. J. Payne, Oxford: Clarendon Press,
Parerga and Paralipomena: Short Philosophical Essays, Volume Two, Translated from
the German by E. F. J. Payne, Oxford: Clarendon Press, sections 372-5)

In consequence of the nature of our intellect, concepts should arise through abstraction from intuitive
perceptions, and hence the latter should exist before the former. If this course is actually taken, as is the
case with the man who has for his teacher and book merely his own experience, then he knows quite well
what intuitive perceptions there are which belong to, and are represented by, each of his concepts. He
knows both exactly, and accordingly deals accurately with everything that happens to him. We can call this
way the natural education. On the other hand, with artificial education, the head is crammed full
of concepts by being lectured and taught and through reading, before there is yet any
extended acquaintance with the world of intuitive perception. Experience is then
supposed subsequently to furnish the intuitive perceptions to all those concepts; but until
then, the latter are falsely applied and accordingly people and things are judged from the
wrong point of view, seen in the wrong light, and treated in the wrong way. In this
manner, education produces distorted and biased minds, which is the reason why in
our youth, after much learning and reading, we enter the world partly as simpletons and
partly as cranks, and then behave nervously at one moment and rashly at another. For our
minds are full of concepts which we now attempt to apply, but almost invariably
introduce in an ill-judged and absurd way. This is the consequence of that
whereby we obtain first of all concepts and last of all intuitive perception to the
natural course of our mental development. For instead of developing in the child the
capacity to discern, judge, and think for himself, teachers are merely concerned to
cram his head full of the ready-made ideas of others. A long experience has then to
correct all those judgements which have resulted from a false application of
concepts. Seldom is this entirely successful; and thus very few scholars have the
ordinary common sense that is frequently found among the quite illiterate.
According to what has been said, the chief point in education is that an acquaintance
with the world, to obtain which can be described as the purpose of all education, may
be started at the right end. But this depends, as I have shown, mainly on the fact that in
each thing intuitive perception precedes the concept; further that the narrower
concept precedes the wider; and that the whole instruction thus takes place in the
order in which the concepts of things presuppose one another. But as soon as in this
sequence something is skipped, there result defective concepts and from these come
false ones and finally a distorted view of the world peculiar to the individual, which
almost everyone entertains for some time and many all their lives. Whoever applies
the test to himself will discover that a correct or clear understanding of many fairly
simple things and circumstances dawned on him only at a very mature age and sometimes
quite suddenly. Till then there had been here in his acquaintance with the world an
obscure point which had arisen from his skipping the subject in the early period of his
education, whether such had been artificial through instructors or merely natural through
his own experience. Accordingly, one should try to examine the really natural sequence
of knowledge, so that children may be made acquainted with the things and
circumstances of the world methodically and in accordance with that sequence,
without getting into their heads absurd ideas which often cannot again be dislodged.
Here one would first have to prevent children from using words with which they did not
associate any clear concept. [* Even children frequently have the fatal tendency to be
satisfied with words instead of trying to understand things, and a desire to learn by
heart such words in order to get themselves out of a difficulty when the occasion
arises. Such tendency afterwards remains when they grow up, and this is why the
knowledge of many scholars is mere verbiage.] But the main point should be always
that intuitive perceptions precede concepts, and not vice versa, as is usually and
unfortunately the case; as if a child were to come into the world feet first, or a verse be
written down rhyme first! Thus while the childs mind is still quite poor in intuitive
perceptions, concepts and judgements, or rather prejudices, are impressed on it. He then
applies this ready-made apparatus to intuitive perception and experience. Instead of this,
the concepts and judgements should have crystallized out from intuitive perception and
experience. Such perception is rich and varied and, therefore, cannot compete in
brevity and rapidity with the abstract concept which is soon finished and done with
everything; and so it will be a long time in correcting such preconceived notions, or
perhaps it may never bring this to an end. For whichever of its aspects it shows to be
contradictory to those preconceived notions, its declaration is rejected in advance as
being one-sided, or is even denied; and people shut their eyes to it so that the
preconceived notion may not come to any harm. And so it happens that many a man
carries round throughout his life a burden of absurd notions, whims, crotchets, fancies,
and prejudices that ultimately become fixed ideas. Indeed, he has never attempted to
abstract for himself fundamental concepts from intuitive perception and experience,
because he has taken over everything ready-made; and it is just this that makes him and
countless others so shallow and insipid. Therefore instead of this, the natural course of
forming knowledge should be kept up in childhood. No concept must be introduced
except by means of intuitive perception; at any rate it must not be substantiated
without this. The child would then obtain few concepts, but they would be well
grounded and accurate. He would then learn to measure things by his own standard
instead of with someone elses. He would never conceive a thousand caprices and
prejudices whose eradication is bound to require the best part of subsequent
experience and the school of life; and his mind would once for all be accustomed to
the thoroughness and clearness of its own judgement and freedom from prejudice.
Children generally should not become acquainted with life in every respect from the
copy before getting to know it from the original. Therefore instead of hastening to
place only books in their hands, let us make them gradually acquainted with things
and human circumstances. Above all, we should endeavour to introduce them to a clear
grasp of real life and to enable them to draw their concepts always directly from the
world of reality. They should form such concepts in accordance with reality and not get
them from anywhere else, from books, fairy-tales, or the talk of others, and subsequently
apply them ready-made to real life. For in that case, their heads will be full of chimeras
and to some extent they will falsely interpret reality, or vainly attempt to remodel it in
accordance with such chimeras and thus go astray theoretically or even practically. For it
is incredible how much harm is done by early implanted chimeras and by the
prejudices arising therefrom. The later education which is given to us by the world
and real life must then be used mainly for eradicating such prejudices. Even the
answer, given by Antisthenes according to Diogenes Laertius, rests on this (vi. 7):
is , , . (Interrogatus
quaenam esset disciplina maxime necessaria, Mala, inquit, dediscere.) Just because
early imbibed errors are often deeply engraved and indelible and the power of
judgement is the last thing to reach maturity, we should keep children up to the age
of sixteen free from all theories and doctrines where there may be great errors.
Thus they should be kept from all philosophy, religion, and general views of all
kinds and be allowed to pursue only those subjects where either no errors are
possible as in mathematics, or none is very dangerous as in languages, natural
science, history, and so on. Generally they should at every age study only those
branches of knowledge which are accessible and thoroughly intelligible thereto.
Childhood and youth are the time for collecting data and making a special and thorough
acquaintance with individual and particular things. On the other hand, judgement
generally must still remain suspended and ultimate explanations be deferred. As power of
judgment presupposes maturity and experience, it should not be left alone and care
should be taken not to anticipate it by inculcating prejudices, whereby it is for ever
paralysed. On the other hand, since memory is strongest and most tenacious in youth, it should be
specially taxed; yet this should be done with the most careful selection and scrupulous fore-thought. For
what is well learnt in youth sticks for all time; and so this precious faculty should be used for the greatest
possible gain. If we call to mind how deeply engraved in our memory are those whom we knew in the first
twelve years of our life and how the events of those years and generally most of what we experienced,
heard, and learnt at the time, are also indelibly impressed on the memory, it is a perfectly natural idea to
base education on that receptivity and tenacity of the youthful mind by strictly, methodically, and
systematically guiding all impressions thereon in accordance with precept and rule. Now since only a
few years of youth are allotted to man and the capacity of the memory generally, and
even more so that of the individual, is always limited, it is all-important to fill it with
what is most essential and vital in any branch of knowledge to the exclusion of
everything else. This selection should be made and its results fixed and settled after the most mature
deliberation by the most capable minds and masters in every branch of learning. Such a selection would
have to be based on a sifting of what is necessary and important for a man to know generally and what is
important and necessary for him in any particular profession or branch of knowledge. Again, knowledge of
the first kind would have to be classified into graduated courses or encyclopedias, adapted to the degree of
general education that is intended for everyone in accordance with his external circumstances. It would
begin with a course limited to the barest primary education and end with the
comprehensive list of all the subjects taught by the philosophical faculty. Knowledge of
the second kind, however, would be left to the selection of the real masters in each
branch. The whole would provide a specially-worked-out canon of intellectual education
which would naturally need to be revised every ten years. Thus by such arrangements,
youths power of memory would be used to the greatest possible advantage and would
furnish excellent material for the power of judgement when this subsequently appeared.
Maturity of knowledge, that is, the perfection this can reach in every individual, consists
in the fact that a precise connection has been brought about between all his abstract
concepts and his intuitively perceiving faculty. Thus each of his concepts rests, directly
or indirectly, on a basis of intuitive perception and only through this does such a concept
have any real value. Moreover, this maturity consists in his being able to bring under the
correct and appropriate concept every intuitive perception that happens to him; it is the
work of experience alone and consequently of time. For as we often acquire our
knowledge of intuitive perception and our abstract knowledge separately, the
former in the natural way and the latter through instruction and what others tell us
whether good or bad, there is often in our youth little agreement and connection
between our concepts that are fixed by mere words and our real knowledge that has
been obtained through intuitive perception. Only gradually do the two approach and
mutually correct each other; and maturity of knowledge exists only when they have
completely grown together. Such maturity is quite independent of the other greater or less
perfection of everyones abilities which rests not on the connection between abstract and
intuitive knowledge, but on the intensive degree of both.
 Desire
The Affs attempt at desire makes in impossible for them to access any ideas.
Only elevating oneself above desire allows them to appeal ideas.
Neill 2009 [Professor Alex Neill is the Vice-President (Education) and a Professor
of Philosophy at the University of Southampton. Before taking up his position at
Southampton in 1999, Alex Neill taught at the Pennsylvania State University,
Harrisburg, Trinity University, San Antonio and the University of St Andrews. Neill,
Alex. Better Consciousness: Schopenhauer's Philosophy of Value. Chichester, U.K.:
Wiley-Blackwell, 2009. Pg. 65-67] //JW
However, this does not mean that the significance and the role of the Ideas in Schopenhauers
philosophy of art are derived exclusively from Platos doctrine of Ideas. Kants theory of the
aesthetic ideas in the Critique of the Power of Judgment has also undoubtedly influenced
Schopenhauers theory. An important differ- ence remains, though, with Kants aesthetic ideas,
for the latter are the product of the artists imagination, whereas the Ideas that artworks
express are the timeless paradigms of natural things and complete in themselves (WWR I 211).
However, Schopenhauers romantic account of genius is often closer to Kants conception of the
creative genius than is assumed, and there is definitely some tension in Schopenhauers account
between the metaphysical status of the Ideas and the creative capacities of the artistic genius.
Still, one important divergence cannot be overlooked: aesthetic imagination in Kant is
productive: it invents intuitions and produces new configurations, whereas for Schopenhauer
the artists imagination discovers eternal Ideas. Anyhow, in the light of Schopenhauers struggle
with Platos theory of Ideas, it suffices to say that we can definitely dismiss the view that the
Platonic Ideas are ad hoc extras and agree with Janaway that, despite Schopenhauers un-
Platonic beliefs that the Ideas are perceptible by the senses, and that the blind will, rather than
the Idea, is ontologically fundamental, Schopenhauers aspiration is much closer to Plato.8
Nevertheless, important differences with Platos theory of Ideas remain. Schopenhauer
surprisingly excludes many of the classic examples that Plato gives of the Ideasespecially in
the middle dialogues, such as Phaedo, Symposium, Republic and Phaedrus. Although
Schopenhauer believes that the artist communicates his pure knowledge (or intuition) of Ideas
and not of conceptsin this sense his view of the artist is extremely close to Platos divine
creator in the Timaeushe does not hold that beauty is itself an Idea. The beauty of a painting
or a landscape consists in its capacity to give rise to the knowledge of an Idea, but is not itself an
Idea. A beautiful flower is not beautiful because it expresses the Idea of beauty, but because it
expresses the Idea of the flower. Although Schopenhauers view of the beautiful is here again
remarkably close to Platos in the Timaeus,9 he will nonetheless insist that there is no such thing
as an Idea of the beautiful. As already noted, Schopenhauer attaches great importance to the
distinction between concept and Idea. He even claims that we are entirely satisfied by the
impression of a work of art only when it leaves behind something that, in spite of all our
reflection on it, we cannot bring down to the distinctness of a concept (WWR II 409). The
transition to a clearly defined concept is in Schopenhauers view obviously a sign of degradation.
An aesthetic intuition does not in any way contribute to conceptual knowledge, but isolates the
perceived object from its merely empirical and practical connections with other objects. This
kind of perception is particularly the work of the imagination, and depends on liberation from
the limitations of the principle of sufficient reason that dominates logical reasoning. Perceiving
an Idea provides no abstract knowledge, since when a subject intuits the Idea, perceiving the
particular object does not end: one perceives a Platonic Idea in and through a particular
objectwhether this is a natural object or a work of art does not really matter.11 Ideas can only
appeal to someone who has elevated himself above all individual desiring and has become a
pure subject of knowing. Schopenhauers deeper motives seem to be Platonic, because he
insists on the strict separation of empirical and pure knowledgealthough, again, Kant too
recognises the possibility of a pure intuition, viz. of space and time. Janaway is also right to
emphasise the Platonic distinction of will-bound versus will-free modes of apprehending the
world in Schopenhauers theory. Like Schopenhauer, Plato thinks that the body fills us up with
lusts and desires, with fears and fantasies of very kind, and with any amount of trash, and pure
knowledge of the eternal Forms is only possible, once one has purified the soul and freed
oneself from its contamination by the body (Phaedo 66 a-b).12 Schopenhauer also often
deplores the connection of the mind with the body. Although Janaway is right that there is at
least one drastic divergence from Plato that we cannot ignore,13 namely that in
Schopenhauers account the Ideas are revealed by artworks in aesthetic experience, there are
also more relevant similarities with Platos philosophy of art than Janaway (and Schopenhauer
himself) allows. To begin with, although Plato attacks art, and especially mimetic poetry, in the
notorious tenth book of his Republic, there are really striking parallels between Schopenhauers
account of the artist as a pure subject of knowledge who intuits timeless Ideas and
communicates these in and through works of art, and Platos divine creator in Timaeus, who is
also a pure knower and also models his creations on eternal Ideas. Secondly, Platos notorious
attack on poetry in Republic is contradicted many times in his other dialogues and, in this sense
too, Schopenhauers reverence of the artists pure knowledge and the significance of the arts is
really more Platonic than is often acknowledged. To give but a few examples: in the Lysis,
Socrates says that the poets are to us in a manner the fathers and authors of wisdom (213 e
214 a); in Phaedrus, Socrates refers to a third form of possession or madness, of which the
Muses are the source. This seizes a gentle, pure soul and stimulates it to rapt passionate
expression, especially in lyric poetry, glorifying the countless deeds of ancient times for the
instruction of posterity (Phaedrus 245a); and in Platos Symposium, poets like Homer or Hesiod
are called the begetters of wisdom and the rest of virtue (209ad). More important than the
mentioned striking similarities, however, is the divergence in their views on beauty. Janaway
rightly claims that Schopenhauer borrows the idea of a timeless consciousness from Platos pure
knowledge of the soul, and Schopenhauers account of aesthetic experience would not have
been the same without the Platonic inspiration: both share the idea of tranquil, disembodied
contemplation. For Plato, however, an experience of beauty is a kind of festive celebration of
Being: it is to feel alive.14 Beauty confers peace and completion on eros.15 But Schopenhauer
proffers us an altogether different account of the experience of beauty: the element of
tranquillity is definitely there, but Plato characterises beauty as conferring peace and
satisfaction upon our desire, whereas Schopenhauer views the experience of beauty as will-less,
i.e. without desire at all. Aesthetic experience is, according to Schopenhauer, an awareness of
pure objectivity, and without this capacity for pure objectivity there would be no aesthetic
experience, and hence no beauty. Furthermore, whereas Plato believes that beauty is a motive
for our desire and even ultimately satisfies it, Schopenhauer argues that the experience of
beauty basically offers us salvation from the torments of desire: beauty consists in a way of
considering things without interest, without subjectivity, purely objectively; it is entirely given
up to them in so far as they are merely representations and not motives (WWR I 196; italics
added). Schopenhauer sees beauty as mainly offering alleviation of the misery that our
existence as willing individuals inevitably engenders. Desire cannot ever be fulfilled, not even in
the contemplation of beauty. Contemplating the Ideas in and through beautiful objects does not
so much offer ultimate satisfaction for our restless desire as freedom from the thraldom of
endless blind willing. Although Schopenhauer acknowledges that the peace of aesthetic
experience is not merely absence of pain, but also revives and comforts, he nevertheless
holds that the will can never be satisfied, not even through a pure experience of true beauty.
That the aesthetic state of mind cheers and comforts is at least partly due to the achievement of
a will-less and painless state of mind, through which our desire is momentarily stilled instead of
definitively fulfilled. Moreover, the Ideas are nothing less than the objectifications of the primal
will, which, by its nature, will always inevitably lack an object of satisfaction. There is no ultimate
object that can satisfy the will: as William Desmond suggests, Schopenhauers will resembles
Don Juans desire more than Platos eros: desire hurrying from particular conquest to conquest,
each taken as absolute in turn, only to breed disillusion at every turn, and forcing desire to set
out in search again, forever.16 The Platonic tranquillity of the soul, which finds in the
experience of beauty its ultimate fulfilment, is very different from Schopenhauers will-less
objectivity, which cannot ever be a kind of ultimate fulfilment, not only because, as he says, for
one wish that is fulfilled there remain at least ten that are denied, but mainly since it is a
capacity . . . to lose oneself in perception, to remove from the service of the will the knowledge
which originally existed only for this service, and the ability to leave entirely out of sight our
own interest, our willing, and our aims, and consequently to discard our own personality for a
time, in order to remain pure knowing subject, the clear eye of the world (WWR I 185186).
Thus, despite Schopenhauers Platonic aspirations and his obsession with the better
consciousness, which has much in common with Platos account of the pure timeless
knowledge of the soul, there are crucial differences between Platos eros and Schopenhauers
will. And because of their different conceptions of desire, Plato holds that the experience of
beauty is the culmination of desire, whereas for Schopenhauer beauty offers a temporary relief
from desire. In this sense, Platos account of aesthetic experience is, psycholo- gically speaking,
closer to the feeling of satisfaction after an excellent meal, whereas Schopenhauers is closer to
the feeling of having conquered the desire to feel hungry at all. Only in his evaluation of music
does Schopenhauer come closer to Platos description of the experience of beauty, since
enjoying music is really rejoicing in being part of being itself, and even celebrating being as such:
here, the experiences value is clearly no longer merely relief from suffering and pain, but
positive rapture: music expresses the inner being of the world and, paradoxically, we enjoy this
experience of being one with the will of the world, not just because we feel freed from desire,
but because we are able to identify positively with the deepest core of the universe, i.e. the will.
This idea of positive pleasure (or exaltation) does not only undermine the mainstream
hypothesis that, for Schopenhauer, aesthetic pleasure is completely reducible to absence of
pain, but also hints at a connection with Kants aesthetics in general, and especially his
conception of the sublime.
Impacts
 Suffering inevitable

There is no ultimate satisfaction of the will, only suffering.

Janaway 08. (Christopher Janaway is a philosopher and author. Before moving to
Southampton in 2005, Janaway taught at the University of Sydney and Birkbeck,
University of London. His recent research has been on Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and
aesthetics. Better Consciousness Edited by Jakob Lindgaard. P2-3.)

At the heart of Schopenhauers philosophy is a vision of human beings as essentially driven by

will. To exist as a living being is to strive after ends, fundamentally those of staying alive and
producing new life, secondarily the many diverse means towards those ends, and then, in the
case of human beings, a vast array of other objects of desire or need corresponding to our
widening cognitive and cultural repertoire. It is built into all such existence that we suffer. We
have to pursue ends because we live, and not all ends can be satisfied. Striving towards some
end is itself a species of suffering because it arises from a feeling that something is lacking; but
attaining an end does not protect us from further feelings of want. What we achieve through
the action of our will does not stop us from willing and therefore suffering some more. Even a
person who regularly gets exactly what he or she wants is not safe from suffering: there lurks
the spectre of boredom, in which we painfully feel the absence of any lack that motivates us to
act. We have not chosen to live or to have the nature essential to all living things, that of
endlessly willing and endlessly being exposed to suffering. Nor does our suffering have any
ultimate redeeming point. Our existence and the existence of the world that is so ready to
frustrate our willing are not designed to achieve any good, nor are we capable of making any
progress towards perfection. In this fundamental part of Schopenhauers philosophy of value,
which has to do with the will as essence of the self and of the world, we ultimately find nothing
but an absence of value. Anything is good only if it satisfies the will of some being, but there
can be no ultimate satisfaction of the will as such, and so there is no absolute good. And if,
instead of pursuing the round of effort, aspiration and failure to which life condemns us, we
stand back and ask after the value of the whole show, we should by rights reach the extreme
verdict that nothing else can be stated as the aim of our existence except the knowledge that it
would be better for us not to exist (The World as Will and Representation (hereafter WWR) II:
605).
 Compassion and freedom from the will
Compassion causes humans to do good things.
CARTWRIGHT 11. (David E. Cartwright is a professor in the department of Philosophy and Religious Studies,
University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, and he is the Director of the North American Division of the Schopenhauer
Society. From A Companion to Schopenhauer chapter 17.)

Schopenhauer argued that compassionate agents come to treat anothers woe as their own,
only through the other person becoming the ultimate object of my will in the same way I myself
otherwise am, and hence through my directly desiring his weal and not his woe just
Schopenhauer on the value of compassion as immediately as I ordinarily do only my own. But
this necessarily presupposes that, in the case of his woe as such I suffer directly with him [ ich
geradezu mit leide], I feel his woe just as I ordinarily feel only my own . . . But this requires that I
am in some way identied with him, in other words, that this entire difference between me and
everyone else, which is the very basis of my egoism, is eliminated, to a certain extent at least...
However, the process here analyzed is not one that is imagined or invented; on the contrary, it
is perfectly real and indeed by no means infrequent. It is the everyday phenomenon of
compassion, of the immediate participation [ Teilnahme], independent of all ulterior
considerations, primarily in the suffering of another, and thus in the prevention or elimination of
it; for all satisfaction and wellbeing and happiness consist in this. (BM, 143 44) Schopenhauers
conception of compassion can be detailed by the following analytical model, which I have
presented in an altered form elsewhere (Cartwright 1 982, 63): A has compassion for B, if and
only if i) A and B are sentient beings; ii) A cognizes that B will be or is suffering; iii) A feels sorrow
for B; iv) A participates immediately in B s suffering; v) A desires B s well - being; and vi) A is
disposed to prevent or eliminate B s suffering, and other things being equal, A will act to
prevent or eliminate B s suffering. With the exception of iv), the features he attributed to
compassion are relatively uncontroversial and straightforward. Before I turn to his claim that A
participates immediately in Bs suffering, I will make some brief supporting remarks for the
other ve features. Condition i), that compassion is a relationship between sentient beings, is
uncontroversial. One could not have compassion for a mountain, nor could a mountain have it
for you; nor could you have compassion for a rose or a rose for you. Nonsentient beings lack
both the cognitive and affective capacities to be an agent or patient for this fellow feeling. It
would be an extreme form of anthropomorphism to think that members of inorganic nature and
the plant kingdom could suffer or respond to suffering. But, because nonhuman animals can
suffer, Schopenhauer includes them as patients of compassion, and a novel feature of his view is
that he held that higher nonhuman animals can be compassionate agents (BM, 151). That
compassion involves some type of cognition of anothers suffering, condition ii), also seems
uncontroversial. To respond compassionately to another requires some recognition of another
and that the other will be or is suffering. It would also appear that compassion must involve the
cognition of anothers suffering and that it would be misplaced to have compassion for
anothers happiness, unless it portended the others future suffering. For example, it is not the
drunks euphoric state that I compassionate, but it is for the terrible cost and toil it is taking on
his liver and the future suffering the drunk will face because of this vice. That a compassionate
agent is emotionally affected by the others suffering and that this is something like sorrow,
condition iii), is necessary, since compassion must be distinguished from the mere indifferent
recognition of suffering, and this response must be negative in tone, otherwise you have an
affective response like Schadenfreude. Condition v), that a compassionate agent desires the
patients well- being, which is exactly Schopenhauers description of the incentive of
compassion, captures the conative element of compassion, explaining why condition vi) is the
case. It is because compassion involves the desire for anothers well- being that a
compassionate agent is disposed to prevent or relieve suffering. Both of these last two
conditions distinguish compassion from sympathy (Sympathie) and empathy ( Einf hlung) ,
which both lack the conation to aid another and can be felt towards either another s joy or
pain. C ondition iv), that a compassionate agent participates immediately in anothers suffering,
is the problematic feature of Schopenhauers view of the nature of compassion. He rejected any
attempt to explain this phenomenon psychologically, and he explicitly repudiated that of the
Italian philosopher Ubaldo Cassina, who argued in Saggio analytico sulla compassione (1788)
that compassion arises from an instantaneous deception of the imagination in which
compassionate people put themselves in the position of the sufferer, having the idea that they
are suffering the other s pain in their person. Schopenhauer rejected Cassinas claims that
compassionate people imagine others suffering and they experience the others suffering in
their own bodies. Instead, he argued: This is no means the case; on the contrary, at every
moment we remain clearly conscious that he is the sufferer, not we; and it is precisely in his
person, not in ours, that we feel the suffering, to our grief and sorrow. We suffer with him and
in him [ Wir leiden mit ihm, also in ihm]; we feel his pain as his , and do not imagine that it is
ours. (BM, 147) In rejecting Cassina, Schopenhauer claimed that compassion involves the
extraordinary experience of anothers pain in the others body. Due to this extraordinary
experience, he called compassion the great mystery of ethics, and he claimed that it requires a
metaphysical explanation (BM, 144). Employing a term that he took from Goethe, he called
compassion the primary phenomenon [ Urph nomen] of morally worthwhile actions; that
which explains all such actions but which cannot be explained by any of these actions.
Metaphysics provides, he argued, a nal explanation of primary phenomena as such, and,
when taken collectively, of the world (BM, 199). Schopenhauer did not present any evidence
for the existence of this extraordinary experience of another s pain in anothers body. How is it
possible to experience anothers pain in the others body? It would seem that what makes the
experience of pain my experience of pain is that I alone immediately experience it, and if this is
the case, I cannot have the experience of anothers pain. Moreover, if I experience pain and
claim to experience this pain in anothers body, Cassina is probably correct that this is some sort
of deceptive idea. Certainly, I could have an experience of pain like that of another. For example,
we may both suffer grief at the loss of the same loved one, or we could have our right legs
broken in the same car crash. Yet our pains, while analogous and suffered at the same time, are
distinct events. I have argued that an adequate account of compassion does not require this sort
of extraordinary experience and that by including it in his analysis of compassion, Schopenhauer
cannot derive the virtue of justice from this fellow feeling (Cartwright 1 982). Compassion, he
argued, inhibits us from doing something that would harm another that would cause another s
woe. But, this woe is in the future and does not exist. If it does not exist, it is impossible for me
to feel it in another s body. It would seem that if it is compassion for anothers future suffering
that moves me not to act in a certain way, it is because I can imagine what the other would feel
if I were to act in that way, or I know, based on past experience, that others were harmed when
I acted as I planned. Moreover, Schopenhauer recognized what could be called compassion at a
distance, feeling compassion for others beyond ones immediate experience, such as
compassionating victims of a natural disaster in some distant land. One could imagine how one
would feel in such circumstances to have a sense of their suffering and this could awaken one s
compassion and move one to contribute resources for aiding the victims. Schopenhauer,
moreover, recognized the role of the imagination in evoking compassion in his analysis of the
phenomenon of weeping, which he viewed as the response of compassion for ourselves
(WWR I, 377), and in his analysis of the means by which righteous people can maintain their
resolve to follow principles by reawakening compassion: Nothing will bring us back to the path
of justice so readily as the idea [ Vorstellung ] of the trouble, grief, and lamentation of the loser
(BM, 152). Schopenhauer's account of compassion would be more adequate if he dropped the
claim that it involves the agent literally suffering with another by experiencing anothers pain in
the others body, and if he viewed the experience of anothers woe, in some instances, as
something imagined.

Freedom from the will and individuality allows peace and painlessness.
Singh 10 (R. Raj Singh is Professor (B.A., M.A., Panjab ; M.A. Brock ; Ph.D.
Ottawa) Department of Philosophy @ Brock University. From schopenhauer a guide for the
perplexed chapter 5.)

Being free from willing a state of peace and painlessness arrives. The moments in which one
enjoys the being or the performance of a work of art, the deliverance of knowledge from an
oppressive and demanding will produces such a joy that one has a magical feeling. It is as if one
has stepped into another world which is to say that one has stepped out of this familiar world.
Schopenhauer remarks that Happiness and unhappiness have vanished; we are no longer the
individual; that is forgotten; we are only pure subject of knowledge. We are only one eye of the
world which looks out from all knowing creatures, but which in man alone can be wholly free
from serving the will (W-I, 198). It is interesting that in ancient Buddhist sutras, the Buddha is
often described as the eye of the world due to his detached and dispassionate analysis of the
nature of things spelled out in the four noble truths. According to Schopenhauer, art experience
enables us to step out of the familiar world of desires and frustrations, projects and pragmata
and behold the Being (Ideas) of things, and look at our own being in the world in the face.
Schopenhauer points out that the essences of entities, usually hidden underneath the pragmatic
network of meanings, reveal themselves in the artwork creatively brought to the fore by the
genius artist. Art gives mundaneness an extraordinary twist that in its magical moments, the will
loosens its grip and the world is shaken out of its foundation. The serenity of pure
contemplation opens within the observer of art the power of objective knowledge free of
personal obsessions. Art experience opens the gateway to the reality and value of a will-less life,
which in its ideal form is called salvation. In his book Art Experience, the contemporary Indian
philosopher, Hiriyanna, in his exposition of Vedanta theories of art seems to echo
Schopenhauers view of art: The aesthetic attitude stands higher than that of common everyday
life, which is generally characterized by personal interests . . . It is for this reason that Indian
philosophers, especially Vedantins . . . compare the experience of art with that of the Ideal state
. . . as moksha (salvation). But the two experiences are only of the same order and not identical .
. . Art experience is (merely) transient, . . . seductive . . . and induced from outside. According to
Schopenhauer, aesthetic contemplation is not confined to just man-made artworks. The great
objects of nature too produce a feeling of the sublime. In encountering a magnificent spectacle
of nature we become subjects of pure knowing, and our intimacy with Being of all things reveals
itself. Natural objects of great spatial magnitude, and great antiquity, such as vast prairies of
North America, high mountains, immense cliffs, rushing, roaming masses of water, complete
deserts all arouse a feeling of the sublime. Against such a ghost of our own nothingness . . .
there arises the immediate consciousness that all these worlds exist. One gets a feeling of
belonging essentially to the Being of all that exists, as the obsession with ones individuality is
suppressed by a realization of ones own nothingness against the mighty and powerful
manifestations of nature. Schopenhauer explains the outcomes of the feeling of the sublime,
with a quote from the Upanishads: I am this creation collectively, and besides me there exists
no other Being (W-I, 206). In addition to reflecting on art and the artist in general,
Schopenhauer examines the natures and scopes of various fine arts, and shows his
comprehensive knowledge of prominent art forms. He thoroughly analyses their ranges of
activities and offers original aesthetic theories with respect to architecture, horticulture,
historical painting, sculpture, allegory, poetry, drama and finally music. Schopenhauers interest
in the arts was not just theoretical but he was deeply involved in various art forms. His writings
on aesthetics and the arts constitute a sizable portion of his total output.
 Singular visions of the world
Without aesthetics we are trapped into singular visions of the world
Koler 10 [Matthias - Better Consciousness: Schopenhauer's Philosophy of Value, Ch.6
Life is a Mirror p.85-89//AK]
In replacing the causal relationships between the subject of willing and action with the being in itself and phenomenon that which shows itself in the act of will exceeds

How is consciousness of
individuality. In other words: according to this new conception, the experience of character entails the experience of the world.

the world achieved? A precondition for it is, in Schopenhauers opinion, thoughtful awareness (Besonnenheit) which
enables [us] . . . to survey the whole of life.46 Without thoughtful awareness the intellect only
perceives singular presentations, which the intellect refers directly to the will, whereas the will itself does not
come into view.47 The animal neither has a world nor does it reflect on its will.48 The whole of the world as presentation becomes

conscious to humans in the aesthetic view of the Idea.49 Only when the thinking subject
forgets his interest in the particular and becomes a clear mirror of the object does the world
become comprehensible as a whole, not as infinity in space and time, but through perception of
the essence or Idea of the object.50 The world as infinite temporal-spatial expansion is a
presentation to us derived from the perception of the essence, since the world presupposes the
concept of a universal whole: and a universal whole is the Idea. If the adequate philosophical
interpretation of that which comes to light by the act of will is the will as being in itself, which is
as such necessarily related to the world, then it is only in aesthetic regard that an adequate
cognizance of this being in itself is to be found. This is why it is not until this point that
Schopenhauer talks of the wills self-cognizance.51 Aesthetic contemplation is achieved by a
high degree of awareness, through which the distance from the individual, body-related willing,
becomes so large that the object can demonstrate itself, in an objective manner. If, owing to thoughtful awareness, several
possible motives of the mind are weighed up, therefore considered, the following may occur: that not only the relation of the prevailing motive on the will, but also the relations

With increasing awareness the connection to ones

of the thoughts and presentations to each other are made objects of the mind.

own will diminishes. Under the exceptional circumstance of aesthetic contemplation the
relations between presentations no longer pertain to ones own interest at all. In that case the
relations must be understood as derived from the essence of the things themselves. If all such
objectively determined relations of a thing to others are summarised, they then express the
essence or character of the thing. What is being expressed here by manner of awarenessone
might sayis the character of the conceived and depicted object of awareness itself. This character is the
Idea. Life is but a Mirror 85 An Idea apprehended in such a way is of course not yet the essence of the thing in itself, precisely because it has proceeded from the cognizance of
mere relations. Nevertheless, as the result of the sum of all relations, it is the real character of the thing, and therefore the complete expression of the essence displaying itself
to perception as object, apprehended not in reference to an individual will, but as it expresses itself of itself, whereby indeed it determines all its relations, which were only
cognized until then.52 Within the perception of the Idea there is contained the knowledge of to how the being in itself of a thing is by virtue of itself related to the world as
presentation. The sum of all relations is the world as being entirely relative in terms of its structure in space and time,53 yet realized as an unfolding of the essence of the
perceived object it has real content. In the contemplation of an Idea the object is not present as part of the world before, and then related to, the embodied will. Instead the will
as the being in itself, perceived in an object, creates the relationships and definitions of the worldhowever not in terms of time or causality, but by being mirrored in
presentation.54 However, this cognizance still has to be related to the experience of selfconsciousness, since in viewing the Idea, the subject has lost itself in the object, or it
has forgotten that in its bodily existence it is itself the will which it perceives.55 To express this in terms of the underlying thesis of this essay, the character of a thing has been
realised, which is, as yet, different from the self. The distance has therefore been achieved through which that which occurs in the act of will can show itself as a being in itself,
yet the reflection, that it is the self of the act of will, has not been fully realised. The aesthetic view is therefore not yet the complete self-cognizance of the will. Accordingly, this
view can only be had for short moments, whereupon the subject again immediately falls prey to individual willing. What remains is the memory of the experience of the world as
a whole which, placed next to the disappearing singular transitory presentation, causes infinite expansion in space and time.56 The universal meaning (as world) and the
individual meaning of that which is called will are here combined in a way in which the unity of both is not comprehended. However, it is not only space and time, and other
forms of the Principle of Sufficient Ground connected to these, that are created by that way of combination, but also a specific type of human motivation and its consequences.
By virtue of the fact that this combination takes place in a condition of will-dependent cognizance, it is related to the individual will: the whole of the world is presented to the
individual will as desire (Wunsch), from which, however, the singular act of will detaches itself. There are consequences of this thesis in the insatiable needs humans have, which
create limitless suffering, as well as egoism, which is anchored in the individuality of character that the world as empirical reality is necessarily related to.57 In this instance one
must look back once more to the genuine doctrine of character, since character is defined by the completed act of will set against the background of desire. 86 Matthias Koler
Desire is therefore the sphere in which the world is viewed as a necessary point of relation for the experience of character. Desire merely indicates what man in general, not the
individual who is feeling the desire, would be capable of doing.58 What the human is capable of doing depends on what the motive of his action can be, and that is principally
everything that he can perceive and think, that he can make present by virtue of his experiences of the past, that he experiences through the stories of others and that he can
anticipate as future. This concerns all things which are possible in the world as presentation. Desire is therefore essentially universal and presents the relationship of the will to
the world. Indeed, desire only indicates this universality, since in desiring, depending on the capability of the intellect and the application of thoughtful awareness, only smaller

or larger parts of possible motives are presented to the subject. But the capacity for thoughtful awareness, which separates
humans from animals, and which, with regard to aesthetic contemplation, proves itself to be the
presupposition for the cognizance of world, potentially contains the relationship to the entire
field of possibility. Desire signifies the midpoint between objective cognizance of the essence in
itself in the idea and subjective knowledge in immediate self-consciousness. In this sense awareness is very much
the cause for the Velleitas not becoming an act of will,59 in other words the will is suppressed and therefore the cognizance of

objective relationships made possible; but as desires, presentations remain fixed upon the subjective will, and as potential acts of will constitute
the foundation upon which the individualisation of the will, the formation of character, is achieved. Schopenhauer described this function of desire, to indicate what man in
general is able to want, as an expression of the character of the species of the human.60 In contradiction to his statements concerning the character of the species of animals
and the possibility of placing them in parallel with average man,61 the character of the species of the human is, according to this idea, not to be understood through the
principal qualities62 of humans, which result from abstraction, but through the totality of the possibilities of being human.63 The character of the species is not therefore
simply common to all human beings owing to the fact that all human beings act more or less in the same way, but because individual character is only formed by virtue of the
choice between an infinite number of possible motives that make up the character of the species. The individual character is a certain realisation of the character of the species,
or being human as such, in so far as it has a specific individual character. In the realisation of the character of the species through the individual, the intelligible character is

The aspect of the individual points to the acts of will, in which the being
recognised in its relationship to the world.

in itself is experienced immediately. The aspect of being human in general points to the substantial unity of being in itself in strict contrast to
phenomenal appearance. Through the character of the species a unity of the essence of human beings is

brought into discussion, which is recognised as being compassion. This takes place where the
principium individuationis is seen through, i.e. when one sees through the individual characters to their unified essence. If in addition one
takes into Life is but a Mirror 87 account that the impediment of the will through thoughtful awareness that
makes desire possible means, de facto, a denial of the willsince in Schopenhauer will is tied to phenomenal actionthen substantial
elements of Schopenhauers ethics can be interpreted based on the experience of character. The thing that separates the human
being from animals in regard to motivation and that which makes up his intelligible character is that human beings are as a rule in control of their reason, are thus thoughtfully
aware (besonnen), i.e. make decisions in accordance with thought-out, abstract motives,64 in brief: that he acts with thoughtful awareness. According to Schopenhauer the
strongest motive leads to action, out of which character can be defined.
Alt
 Music
Music is vital because its not simply an expression of something, but it is that
something in the abstract without accessories or variations. It is the most
direct expression of the will human being can experience. Because it is
something in an abstract, music gives one insight into substance of that
something. (you should play actually music after reading this card and should
not read over it)
Neill 2009 [Professor Alex Neill is the Vice-President (Education) and a Professor
of Philosophy at the University of Southampton. Before taking up his position at
Southampton in 1999, Alex Neill taught at the Pennsylvania State University,
Harrisburg, Trinity University, San Antonio and the University of St Andrews. Neill,
Alex. Better Consciousness: Schopenhauer's Philosophy of Value. Chichester, U.K.:
Wiley-Blackwell, 2009. Pg. 65-67] //JW

In addition to the inner experience of ones own willing, there are other somewhat unusual
kinds of experiences that afford metonymical insight into the character of world as it is in itself,
chief of which is aesthetic experience. Similar to Kant, there is an attempt in Schopenhauers
thought to gain sensible confirmation of the reality and character of the in-itself of the world
by way of the experience of beauty and the sublime, except that the symbolic relationship is
interestingly changed. Consider the experience of music for Schopenhauer:16 Music does not
express this or that particular and definite pleasure, this or that affliction, pain, sorrow, horror,
gaiety, merriment, or peace of mind, but joy, pain, sorrow, horror, gaiety, merriment, peace of
mind themselves, to a certain extent in the abstract, their essential nature, without accessories,
and so also without the motives for them. (WWR I 261) So in music, one does not feel particular
instantiations of emotions, in some subject or another, under certain conditions or another, but
rather, one resonates with and thus gains insight into the essence of these emotions
regardless of where, when, why, and in whom they occur. The experience of various feelings
without accompanying intentional objects constitutes, for Schopenhauer, as close an insight into
the nature of the world as will as one can achieve, for: . . . to the man who gives himself up
entirely to the impression of the symphony, it is as if he saw all the possible events of life and
the world passing by within himself. Yet if he reflects, he cannot assert any likeness between
that piece of music and the things that passed through his mind. For as we have said, music
differs from all the other arts by the fact that it is not a copy of the phenomenon, or, more
exactly, of the wills adequate objectivity, but is directly a copy of the will itself, and therefore
expresses the metaphysical to everything physical in the world, the thing-in-itself to every
phenomenon. (WWR I 262) By gaining an insight into the blind will, in this manner, through an
experience of emotions, shorn of their particular contexts and relation to the individuals will,
one has a indirect sensible intuition of what by definition cannot be an object of direct sensible
intuition. The relationship here between what is sensible and what is supersensible is not
exactly analogical or symbolic, however. It is not that such symphonic music is felt upon
reflection to be like or similar to the vicissitudes of blind willing, just as Juliet is felt to be like
Romeos sun, to play the kind of role in his life that the sun plays for all living creatures. Rather,
music is, according to Schopenhauer, the most direct expression of the will a human being can
experience, seen through the lightest of veilsin time, but outside of space and distinct from
particular motives, and without the distortions created by the subjects own willing.17 For
Schopenhauer, the fundamental character of the genius is [a]lways to see the universal in the
particular . . . whereas the normal man recognizes in the particular only the particular as such;
for only as such does it belong to reality, which alone has interest for him, has reference to his
will. . . . In accordance with this, the real object of genius is only the essential nature of things in
general, the universal in them, the totality (WWR II 379). [Diesem entsprechend is auch nur das
Wesen der Dinge u b erhaupt, das Allgemeine in ihnen, das Ganze, der eigentliche Gegenstand
des Genie . . . (31)].18 The key access to the supersensible through art, as seen above in the
example from music, then, is metonymical: through art one may gain a perceptual access to the
whole via its parts. This metonymic relation abounds in Schopenhauer. The subjective side of
aesthetic experience itself, the experience of being a will-less, objective knower, has a much
more important role still: Indeed, it is metonymically related to the ultimate denial of the will. In
a very revealing passage, Schopenhauer writes, [w]hat makes this state [aesthetic experience]
difficult and therefore rare is that in it the accident (the intellect), so to speak, subdues and
eliminates the substance (the will), although only for a short time. Here also are to be found the
analogy and even relationship of this with the denial of the will (WWR II 369, emphasis added).
[Was diesen Zustand erschwert und daher selten macht, ist, da darin gleichsam das Accidenz
(der Intellekt) die Substanz (den Willen) bemeistert und aufhebt, wenn gleich nur auf eine kurze
Weile. Hier liegt auch die Analogie und sogar Verwandtschaft desselben mit der am Ende des
folgenden Buches dargestellten Verneinung des Willens (30).] Although Schopenhauer does
not say metony- mical relationship between aesthetic experience and the denial of the will, he
first calls it an analogy but then qualifies it, as even relationship [sogar Verwandtschaft]. I
think the concept he is moving toward, without fully enunciating it here, is metonymy, the mode
of thinking in which the (sensible) part stands for the (supersensible) whole. Indeed, grades or
partial expressions of the whole Will pervade the main work, and along with them come grades
of subjective states which reflect levels of insight into the world as will. It might be objected,
however, that Ive simply slapped another name onto what is essentially the Kantian, symbolic
relationship after all. Why arent the relationships between the experience of music and the
Will, the work of art and the Idea, and aesthetic will-lessness and the denial of the will truly
symbolic, and analogical, as in Kant, rather than metonymic? I believe it is a mistake to elide the
very interesting differences in these modes of aesthetic access to the in-itself of the
phenomenal world: What is being presented sensibly in Schopenhauers thought is not merely a
profoundly felt similarity in the rules governing the symbol and the supersensible that is
symbolized; rather, what is presented in music, art and aesthetic experience itself is actual
contiguity with the in-itself of the world. The work of art presents the universal; and aesthetic
experience affords insight into that same type of will-lessness to its highest degree, in ascetic
resignation. These sensible objects and experiences stand for the noumenal as a part stands for
the whole. Whereas Kants connection between what is knowable and what lies beyond the
bounds of sense is analogical and symbolic, Schopenhauers here is metonymic and thus picks
up on what he sees as the true contiguity [Beru h rung] of the two spheres alluded to in the
Prolegomena. Recapping then, the relationship that Schopenhauer identifies between the
aesthetic experience and the supersensible is un-Kantian in two main ways: first, in the
Schopenhauerian relationship, music makes the character of the Will sensible not by way of a
felt similarity in the rules governing each domain (the aesthetic and the moral as in Kant).
Rather, music just is an embodiment of the Will in time and is hence phenomenal, but it is a very
close objectification of the Willan expression or partial glimpse at the character of the Will
that can be felt by a subject when she resonates emotionally with great music. Second, in
Schopenhauers relationship there is no explicit sense in which the felt connection constitutes
only practical rather than theoretical knowledge. Indeed, it seems that Schopenhauer takes the
knowledge of intuition or feeling to be genuine theoretical knowledge, although he does believe
that such knowledge of the world as Will may (and perhaps should) have profound effects on a
persons actions. So, what gives Schopenhauer the right to make a greater claim to knowledge
from feeling than Kant? Ultimately, Schopenhauers justification for departing from Kants
strictures in this way is that Kants subject resembles a disembodied, rational entity, a winged
cherub without a body (WWR I 99). The view of the subject, as a one-dimensional rational
schematizer, cannot explain why human beings care so much about the representations that
dance before the minds eye. The Kantian subject may be able to account for our knowledge of
the relations of representations but it cannot account for the true significance we attach to
those representations (WWR I 989). For Kant, there is nothing theoretically that can be said
which would constitute knowledge of the noumenal realm in meaningful terms, but neither is
there any tremendous urgency that anything be said about it. For Schopenhauer, because we
are embodied, because we are active participants in this world, and not just rational reflectors
upon it, there is a sense that we must say something about the way the world is, in itself, of
which we are a part: It will be of special interest for us to obtain information about its real
significance, that significance, otherwise merely felt, by virtue of which these pictures or images
do not march past us strange and meaningless ... but speak to us directly, are understood, and
acquire an interest that engrosses our whole nature (WWR I 95).
Will-lessness
 Pure Cognition
The subject of pure cognition and the artist temporarily free themselves from
their will. Everyone has this capacity for thoughtful awareness and even if we
cannot ascend to it by becoming an artistic genius, we can temporarily attain
this state by appreciating works of art. Thus the artists use of imagination, in
combination with contemplation, is an ethical relationship to others; it allows
others to break free from the will to appreciate the worlds beauty in its
immanence.
Kossler 2011 (Matthais, professor of philosophy at the Johannes Gutenberg University
of Mainz, The Artist as a Subject of Pure Cognition, in A Companion to Schopenhauer,
pp. 201-4)
The main quality of the pure subject of cognition is the fact that it has withdrawn from the service of
will. This is expressed by Schopenhauer in writing that the cognition is will-less or that will is silent (WWR I, 218ff.).
Going by what we learned about the corporeality of the subject in Schopenhauer, it is clear that the subject as a whole
cannot be will-less, instead will-lessness signifies a state of it. That during the state of pure
cognition the subject in principle remains tied to body and will becomes manifest in the fact that it is
able to maintain this state only for a short time and then involuntar- ily falls back to ordinary
cognition. Pure cognition is like the flying of a flying fish which is able to stay in the air for a little while but
must return to the sea where it belongs natu- rally. In the artist the paradox occurs that he who is more capable of pure
cognition than others is at the same time as a rule a more distinct individual. He is
more passion- ate, more egocentric and he suffers more than others, in short, his will is stronger. The
conflicting character of the artist becomes explicable if we consider the descrip- tion of the transition from ordinary to pure cognition
mentioned at the end of the previ- ous section. In its normal function intellect cognizes mere relations,
first of all relations of objects to (individual) will. Yet, higher forms of intellect, i.e., human
intellect acquainted with the faculty of reason for the purpose of completeness of this
cogni- tion also perceives relations of things to one another. Perception of this kind already
takes place only indirectly in the service of will, and if it gets more and more weight: the
subjection of the intellect to will at the same time becomes more and more indirect and
limited. If the intellect has power enough to gain predominance and to abandon entirely the
relations of things to will, in order to apprehend instead of them the purely objective essence
of a phenomenon that expresses itself through all relations, then, simul- taneously with the
service of will, it also forsakes the apprehension of mere relations, and with this also really
that of the individual thing as such. (WWR II, 363) This explanation of a gradual transition from ordinary to pure
cognition does not nec- essarily contradict the claim that pure cognition occurs suddenly or at one stroke. Even if the service to
the will becomes more and more indirect, the moment the intellect tears away cognition
entirely from will is not derived from that movement and it signifies a different kind of
cognition. As indicated above, thoughtful awareness of the genius corresponds to pure cogni- tion
on the part of the subject. However, thoughtful awareness (Besonnenheit) is not only a faculty of genius but also of cognition in
the service of will. In regard to the latter it coincides with reason and signifies the effect that it is able to present much more motives and
circumstances to will than actually perceivable. While this is obviously a function serving will by multiplying and increasing desire and fear
and therewith indi- viduality, it has a side-effect which contradicts the service of will. For the
presentation of abstract
motives includes a hampering of the effect of motives presented by immedi- ate actual
perception, a quieting of an act of will for the time of consideration. This side-effect which
originally occurs for the purpose of the completion of cognition in service of will opens
the way to quieting will at all. Thoughtful awareness thus in its highest grade leads to
pure objective cognition and enables the painter to reproduce faithfully on canvas
the nature he has before his eyes, and the poet accurately to call up again by means
of abstract concepts the perceptual present by expressing it and thus bringing it to
distinct consciousness (WWR II, 382). The animal lives without any thoughtful awareness. It has consciousness, i.e., it
knows itself and its weal and woe, and in addition the objects that occasion these. Its cognition, however, always remains subjective; it
never becomes objective. Everything occurring therein seems to the animal to be a matter of course, and can therefore never become for it
a theme (object of description) or a problem (object of meditation). Its consciousness is therefore entirely
immanent. The consciousness of ordinary breed of people is certainly not of the same kind, but yet is of a kindred nature, since his
perception of things and of the world is also mainly subjective, and remains predominantly immanent. It perceives things in the world, but
not the world; its own actions and sufferings, but not itself. Now as
the distinctness of consciousness is
enhanced in infinite gradations, thoughtful awareness takes place more and more; in
this way it gradually comes about that occasionally, though rarely and again with
extremely different degrees of distinctness, the question passes through the mind
like a flash: What is all this? or How is it really constituted? If the first question
attains to great distinctness and is continuously present, it will make the
philosopher; and just in the same way the other question will make the artist or poet Up to the moment when
the relation of things to the will are cut off entirely, thoughtful awareness remains in the service of the will with the effect of increasing
individuality and passion. This is why artists often are over-excited, passionate, even immoral in their daily life (cf. WWR II, 384; 388ff.),
while at the same time calmly, carefully and selfless working on their creation. The fact that thoughtful awareness includes both effects
makes the paradox of the suffering genius comprehensible. However, if genius is explained merely by increasing thoughtful awareness this
may be satisfactory in regard to the contemplation of Idea but it is difficult to describe the act of producing works of art.
Thoughtful awareness is a faculty that belongs to every human being since man is
defined by reason. The capacity for becoming pure subject of cognition therefore
must be inherent to a lesser and different degree in all human beings, for otherwise
they would be as little capable of enjoying works of art as produc- ing them (WWR I,
194). And in fact, most people are capable of enjoying works of art and consequently of
becoming pure subject of cognition for a while. One could say that nearly every human
being is or has a genius to a certain degree. But this is not the sense in which Schopenhauer uses the term. In contrast,
genius is confronted with ordinary man, that factory-work of nature which it daily produces by the thousands (WWR I, 187) as its
opposite. The artist is provided with even a higher degree of thoughtful awareness as is necessary for will-less contemplation. It enables
him to maintain with it the thoughtful awareness required for repeating the thus known in a voluntary and intentional work, such repetition
being the work of art (WWR I, 195). On this view of the creation of a work of art, the artist is capable of keeping the Idea in mind while
he changes from pure cognition to cognition under the principle of reason in order to produce the work voluntarily and intentionally. In
the Parerga and Paralipomena Schopenhauer writes very clearly that the
original artistic cognition is one that is
entirely separate from, and independent of, the will, a will-free, will-less cognition . . . On the other
hand, with the execution of the work, where the purpose is to communicate and present what is known, the will can, indeed must, again be
active, just because there exists a purpose. Accordingly, the principle of sufficient reason here rules once more. (PP II, 418) If
the artist
is characterized by the capability to communicate to others the Idea he has grasped (WWR I,
195), thoughtful awareness seems to be a means for an end; and indeed Schopenhauer writes that the
work of art is merely a means of facilitating the cognition of Idea (WWR I, 195). Now, it is
hard to understand as to how the same faculty that in a very high degree leads to liberation
of cognition from the service of will in an even higher degree should become a means for
voluntary action. Another faculty therefore must be required in addition to thoughtful
awareness in order to explain the production of a work of art. This is imagination (Phantasie)
(WWR I, 186). The genius has need of imagination to see in things not what nature has actually formed but what it had striven to form
but failed to bring to pass (WWR I, 186). With this capability of imagination we are turning back to the Idea. According to our
interpretation it refers to the process of objectivation in such a way that a thing is apprehended as bringing forth its relations to other
things by itself independent of influences from outside. Since the Idea thus is no object in an ordinary sense but rather the process of
becoming such an object, or, in short, objectivization of the essence, the artist cannot communicate the Idea simply by replicating it in the
work of art. Or, in other words, what the artist produces voluntarily in time, space and matter cannot be an actual reproduction of the Idea.
Instead works of art are able to call forth aesthetic contemplation in us or to get the Idea
to come to us more easily. The artist lets us look into the world through his eyes
(WWR I, 195), so that we may see the beautiful prior to experience (WWR I, 221). Communication of
the Idea is made pos- sible by the artist through the Ideal which is the Idea in so far as it is cognized at least halfway a priori and, in that
it comes as such to meet and fill out what is given by nature a posteriori, becomes practical in art (WWR I, 222). The faculty which enables
the artist to show beauty as he has never seen it, and surpasses nature in his depiction (WWR I, 222), i.e., to model the Ideal is, as we
have seen, imagination. Thus
it is not thoughtful awareness that distinguishes the artist but
imagination. Certainly this must be a special kind of imagination which as imagination with genius is set apart from common
imagination in service of will (WWR I, 187). Schopenhauer did not elaborate the special kind of imagination of the artist, maybe because
this would have put him too close to Schelling and German Romanticism. Be that as it may,
the conception of the artist
as pure subject of cognition is exceeded by the fact that the distinguishing quality of
the artist is not the ability for attaining pure cognition (this is what he shares with common man even if
he has the ability in a higher degree) but imagination that enables him to communicate pure
cognition. Imagination of the artist as a means for communicating the Idea points
out to the realm of ethics where the systematic thought continues. The end for which
the artist produces works of art is not at all related to his individual will.
Communication of Ideas does not serve ones own will but will in others to become
self-conscious. This is what it shares with ethics, namely compassion, even if the
artist has not to be moral since by aesthetic contemplation as pure cognition he is
not aware of will as the unified essence of all beings. From aesthetic contemplation
one has to go on to ethics, for pure cognition attains objectivity merely by ignoring
the aspect of subjectivity. But is the world, then, a peep-show (Guckkasten)? These things are certainly beautiful to behold,
but to be them is something quite different (WWR II, 581).
2NC A2s
 Perm
Music must be enjoyed in its purity. Adding something arbitrary to it like the aff
distorts it.
Green 1930 Green, L. Dunton. Schopenhauer and Music. The Musical Quarterly,
vol. 16, no. 2, 1930, pp. 199206. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/738446.

Among the former the Ancients were pre-occupied with music's ethical (Plato), or its purely
scientific side (Aristoxenus), or both (Aristotle), rather than with its aesthetic aspect, and up to
the 19th century music receives much the same treatment. Rousseau inclines to technical,
Leibniz to mathematical explanations; Diderot to the fringe of an aesthetic solution of its
mysteries; Feuer Schelling, Hegel, tried but failed to come to grips with its fu mental principles.
Hegel might have succeeded, but the v vagueness and verbosity of his language, far from
illuminati obscured and confounded the issue. The one and only clearly worded, yet profound
and supremely artistic, that is, intuitive philosophy of music, comes from th man who wrote: The
true philosopher will always seek after light and clearness, and will endeavour to resemble a
Swiss lake, which through its peacefulness is able to unite great depth with great clearness, the
depth revealing itself precisely by the clearness, rather than a turbid, impetuous moun tain
torrent.' This man who in one sentence so admirably and tersely described his own style and
method and condemned those of his opponent, Hegel, was Arthur Schopenhauer. He was
singularly well-equipped for his task. From his father, a fairly wealthy and successful business
man-who, significantly for the pessimistic tendencies of his son, committed suicide under the
obsession that his business was going to wreck and ruin-he inherited the clarity of thought
without which it is impossible to succeed in trade. His artistic intuition came from his mother,
whose salon in Weimar was frequented by the greatest writers and artists of the day, men such
as Goethe, Schlegel, Grimm, Wieland, all of whom Schopen- hauer met in his youth. After
Weimar, four years at Dresden brought him contact with the world of music: the capital of Saxo
already known for its operatic and concert perform in Berlin, and lastly in Frankfurt, opera and
conce his chief distractions, and not a day passed without of practising the flute, his favourite
instrument, and only one he played efficiently. Here, then, was a philosopher for whom music w
an occasional pastime, but an integrant part of his l daily meditations. A mind so trained could
not fai by the immense and immediate effect of music on t and by the unmistakable nature and
the precision of on those who are sensitive to the art of sound, notw the complete absence of
any object in nature or an concept such as give birth to the other arts, paintin architecture or
poetry. Schopenhauer came to the conclusion that music must have deeper roots in human
nature than the other arts, and that whilst these are representations of external phenomena,
themselves symbols of the real essence of things is the representation of this essence itself, a
parallel fore, of the World as our intellect perceives it. The essence of things" for Schopenhauer
was the Will inherent in various forms in all visible objects, inorganic or organic, the Will
considered as unconscious impulse, exemplified by brute, sternly regulated striving (as between
gravitation and inertia) in the inorganic world, and in the organic by the infinitely diversified
manifestations of human volition. For Schopenhauer, then, direct representation of Will. As he
himself says:1 I admit that it is quite impossible to prove this prosposition. It posits and assumes
a relation of Music, considered as a representation with something the essence of which cannot
be represen Music itself the reflexion of an image which can never be represented. But if we
grant the hypothesis or, as Schopenhauer puts it, the analogy, it is fraught with luminous
aesthetic consequences. Schopenhauer himself, it is true, continues the analogy in the manner
of the mediaeval mystics, and I am afraid that however much we may admire his ingenuity, we
can hardly subscribe to the results as a credo of musical aesthetics. In a long parenthesis he
describes the bass or, as he puts it, the "groundbass," as comparable to the lowest degree of the
manifestation of Will in Nature-to the inorganic mass, the mass of the Planet. "For that reason,"
he says a little later and, of course, quite wrongly, "the bass moves only in large intervals, in
thirds, fourths, and fifths, never in seconds (!?) except in the case of a reversal of parts in double
counterpoint (!)" and "a quick run or a trill in the low register cannot even be imagined." It is a
quaint example of the irresistible impulse of systematic philosophers to imitate the methods of
Procrustes and mercilessly remodel facts to fit in with their system. We shall find similar
instances as we go on. The next analogy is more illuminating and conforms to musical theory
such as Schopenhauer found it: 'The higher notes,' he goes on to say, 'are formed by the
harmonics of the fundamental tone; they sound simultaneously with that note and it is a law of
Harmony that only such notes may coincide with a bass note which in the shape of harmonics
contain that bass note. This is analogous to the fact that all bodies and organisations of Nature
must be considered as evolved by gradual development from the mass of the Planet. The bass
being the inorganic mass in Nature, it follows that the parts between bass and soprano, alto and
tenor, represent in a general way the steps along which inorganic develops into organic life,
even as within the musical fabric the definite intervals are parallel to the definite steps of the
objectivation of the Will-the definite species of Nature. The deviation from the mathematical
exactness of the intervals (by equal temperament or the tonality chosen by the composer) is
anal- ogous to the deviation of the individual from the type of the species.' Schopenhauer, who
loved analogies no less dearly than abstract reasoning, could not be expected to stop half-way,
and so he adds: 'Yea, the impure sounds which yield no definite interval may be compared to
the monstrous abortions resulting from two different species of animals or from man and beast.'
Further than that it seems impossible to go! These lowest and inner parts which constitute
Harmony, however, lack the cohesion and freedom which are the privilege of Melody, "which
alone moves rapidly and easily in modulations and runs"; and in Melody, at last, Schopenhauer
recognises the highest form of the objectivation of Will-the conscious life and strife of Man. It
will be seen at once that Schopenhauer's outlook on music was specifically harmonic, a curious
sign of the times in which he conceived and wrote his "World as Will and Represen- tation,"
between the years 1814 and 1818. Beethoven was still alive, Weber already well-known, Haydn
only just dead; the time, therefore, in which the swing over from polyphony to homophony, that
dimly began with Bach, had made even greater strides with the great heroes of the end of the
18 Ph. Emanuel Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven him its zenith. Counterpoint was no longer an
end in itself; musical minds considered it as a discipline, but no longer terms; and although
Schopenhauer, as we have see double counterpoint, it is clear from what he say the passage
quoted,1 that he was quite hazy as to what it meant. The triumph of homophony explains
Schopenhau session for pure melody, by which he meant what w music with a simple
accompaniment. Indeed, altho not go so far as to say that Rossini is the greatest c ever lived,
one feels from what he does say about composer gave him greater pleasure. We shall see this
later when we come to consider Schopenhauer's attitude towards opera. I have said that our
philosopher's hypothesis as to the essential nature of music is fraught with illuminating
aesthetic consequences. Listen to what he has to say about the essence of melody: As the
essence of man consists in this, that his will strives, is satis- fied and strives anew and so on ad
infinitum; as, indeed his happiness and well-being merely consist in the rapid transition from
desire to fulfilment and from fulfilment to new desire, because non-fulfilment means suffering,
non-desire empty yearning, languor, tedium-so melody is essentially a constant deviation from
the tonic . . . to which it always ultimately returns. Thus in a thousand ways melody expresses
the multifarious strivings of Will, but also their assuagement through the return to an interval
within the harmony, or to the tonic itself. No less ingenious is the application of his hypothesis
to the question of programme-music: 'It must not be forgotten,' he warns us, 'that music
expresses not the visible world, the phenomenon, but the essence of it, Will itself. It expresses,
therefore, not a single, specific joy, sadness, terror, jubila- tion, merriness, equanimity, but the
joy, sadness etc., so to speak, in the abstract, their essence without any by-play, therefore also
without their cause. 'Thence it comes that our imagination is so easily roused by music, and
endeavours to give form to this spiritual invisible, is very much alive and speaks to us in no
uncertain manner, to endow it with flesh and bone, in other words, analogous example. This is
the origin of the so finally of opera.' 1In another (ibidem II, 524) he says, "the melody can if it is
given to the bass, it can only be through the use of transposed bass: one of the upper-parts
becomes lowered a A little later he adds: The reason why it is possible to relate a musical
composition to a representative visualisation is that both are only different expressions of the
same inner essence of the World. If in a specific case such a relation really exists, if, therefore,
the composer has succeeded in ren- dering the impulses which are the core of a certain
happening, the melody of the song, or the music of the opera are really 'expressive.' The
analogy between the music and the event discovered by the composer must, however, proceed
from this immediate perception of the essence of the World, unbeknown to his reason, and
must not be an imitation obtained through the agency of his intellect; otherwise his music does
not express the essence of things, Will itself, but merely (and insufficiently) its reflexion, as does
all imitative music, such as Haydn's 'Seasons' or his 'Creation' in many places, where phenomena
of the visible world are directly imitated; the same applies to all battle-pieces, which are to be
condemned entirely. Our views on programme-music have changed, and we are fully aware that
one cannot condemn a musical genre on purely theoretical grounds-it must stand or fall by its
musical qualities- but one cannot deny the strength of Schopenhauer's argument in a much
debated point of musical aesthetics, if one grant his initial premise. His theoretical objection
against programme-music applies with equal force to a certain imaginative way of listening to
music, and with still greater force to listening to opera. Speaking about a Beethoven symphony,
"a faithful and perfect image of the essence of the World, which rolls through space and renews
itself in the confusion of innumerable forms and through constant destruction," he adds: "It is
true that we are prone to bring its contents to life, and to see in it all manner of scenes of life
and nature. But this does not, on the whole, increase our compre- hension nor our enjoyment,
but rather adds something foreign and arbitrary to the music: it is better therefore to
apprehend it in its immediacy and purity." Opera, Schopenhauer, the theorist, is inclined to treat
with exceeding severity, but here he finds himself in the dilemma which has been the difficulty
of all aestheticians since opera made its first appearance. For there is no denying that, all theory
notwithstanding, there are a number of musically satisfying operas and, on the other hand,
Schopenhauer, who was nothing if not honest with himself and his reader. found-like most
people-that however much opera might be condemned on pure philosophical grounds, it
occasionally gave him a vast amount of pleasure. Let us see how he contrives to conciliat
practice. First as to the theory: Grand opera is not, properly speaking, a product of of art, but
rather of the somewhat barbaric idea of hei ment by accumulation of means, simultaneousness
of gruous impressions, and reinforcement of effect by mult mass and strength of the executants;
yet music, the mightiest of the arts, is capable of filling a receptive mind solely by its ow its
highest products, in order to be adequately apprehend demand a mind wholly undivided and
undistracted, so that the mind may deliver itself up and steep itself in music and unde incredibly
enthralling language. And again: Speaking rigorously, one might call opera invention for
unmusical minds, into which music must be drilled in through an alien medium, say as an
accompaniment to a long spun-out love story and its poetical bathos. An operatic text cannot do
with concise, thoughtful poetry, which the composition could not possibly follow. To enslave
music entirely to bad verse is the mistake into which Gluck has fallen, whose operatic music,
apart from the overtures, it is therefore quite impossible to enjoy without the words. Indeed,
one might say that opera has ruined music. Yet it is partly in this very matter of good or bad
poetry that Schopenhauer finds means to conciliate theory and practice. For after saying that it
is natural for our imagination to give form to the spiritual world of music, he declares that for
this very reason "the text should never leave its subordinate position in order to play the
principal part, and make music a mere means of express- ing it, which is a grave faux-pas and a
big mistake." Yet he admits that music should avail itself of the human voice which, it so
happens, is both a musical instrument and the vehicle of speech, but still the spoken word
should remain servient to the music, and concentrate only upon the gene expression of verses
that are essentially bad poetry. And praises Rossini both for the contemptuous manner in whic
treats his text, and for keeping his music from speaking a lang foreign to it. The irony of this
rather reluctant defense of opera lies in fact that Schopenhauer's theories were in flagrant
contradicti with the one philosopher among musicians who not only had greatest admiration for
Schopenhauer, but became his most a propagandist, and the cause of a revival of interest in the
osopher's writings which, during thirty years, had remained fectly unheeded by the World at
large. (Indeed, the first edit of "Welt als Wille und Vorstellung" had been used by a despai
publisher as "Makulatur"-scrap-paper.) It was in 1854 that Wagner wrote to Franz Liszt: "Besides
slowly proce my music I have been occupied exclusively with a m come into my solitude as a gift
from Heaven, albeit literary gift. It is Arthur Schopenhauer, the greatest since Kant, whose
thought he has-as he puts it-'tho to the end."' This was in 1854, the year of the "Wal of
"Tristan!" It is necessary to insist on the date be often repeated fallacy that Wagner was
influenced hauer, and the still greater error that he was influe philosophers' theories on Music.
The truth is that a wrote and said many a time, he found in Schopenh the confirmation of his
own conception of the Wo suffering, and as he went on reading "Welt als Will stellung," he was
further encouraged to tread the p chosen-if not for himself (no more, indeed, than Sc did),' then
at least for the creatures of his imaginat in "Tannhiiuser," in "The Flying Dutchman," in the of
the "Ring," annihilation, renunciation in Death has been the conclusion at which his heroes
voluntarily arrived, this ultimate goal, to which the hero and the heroin expressed still more
clearly and unmistakably. It w hauer's pessimism, ending in Nirvana, that held Wagner while the
unexpected parallelism of their views asto And it was Schopenhauer's general explanation of
music, not the application of his hypothesis to particular points of musical technique, that
fascinated Wagner. Indeed, while recallin hauer's theories in his abstruse but exceedingly
interest on "Beethoven," he expressly says that a non-musician be expected to draw practical
conclusions from his speculations. Wagner knew positively that Schopen very low opinion of his
music, and his operas. A pa "Parerga" did not escape his notice-it could hardly a music of the day
but his: The wrong turning which music has taken is analogous which Roman architecture lost
itself under the later em its heavy ornamentation partly hid the essential simple and partly even
destroyed them: even so our music offers many instruments, much art, but few clear, penetratin
thoughts. One finds in the shallow, inexpressive, tuneless c 1Schopenhauer was quite conscious
of this contradiction between teaching. It is just as little needful, he would say, that a saint
should as that a philosopher should be a saint. It is a strange demand that a m teach no other
virtue than that which he himself possesses ("Sch Margrieta Beer). of to-day the same taste of
the times which inspires the tating, nebulous, enigmatic and even senseless literary st due to
that miserable Hegelianism and its charlatanism positions of to-day harmony occupies the chief
place, however, am of the contrary opinion, and consider melo of music, to which harmony
stands in the same relati meat. Wagner could afford to laugh at judgments such as these: hour
had struck and he preferred to remember the words wh shall form a fitting conclusion to these
considerations on Schop hauer and Music: No art affects man so immediately as music, as none
other revea to us the essence of the Universe so profoundly and so immediate Listening to
great, full-voiced and beautiful music is like bathing the mind: it drains off all that is impure,
petty and bad, and lifts eve one to the highest spiritual plane to which his Nature can attain, a as
he listens to great music man perceives clearly what he is worth, o rather, what he might be
worth.

The aesthetic experience requires abolition of the individual will. The affs
desire to change the world makes this impossible.
Neill 08 (Professor Alex Neill is the Vice-President (Education) and a Professor of Philosophy
at the University of Southampton. Better Consciousness Edited by Jakob Lindgaard.)

Understanding Schopenhauers conception of aesthetic experience (and indeed his aesthetic

theory as a whole) thus depends on getting clear about just what he takes the abolition of
individuality to involve. To begin with, we should note that he understands individuality in terms
of the embodiment of a knowing subject: as he puts it at first, the subject of knowing . . .
appears as an individual only through his identity with his body (WWR I: 100). A few pages later,
he refines this claim, stating that The knowing subject is an individual precisely by reason of this
special relation to the one body which, considered apart from this, is for him only a
representation among all his representations (WWR I: 103, my emphasis). The special relation
between knowing subject and body that Schopenhauer refers to here is not that of identity, but
rather concerns the way in which an individual knowing subject is conscious of his body; it is an
epistemological, rather than a logical, relation. To summarise very briefly, his thesis is that we
have double knowledge of our own body. On the one hand, an individuals body appears as
mere representation of the knowing subject, like all the other objects of this world of
perception. However, it also occurs in consciousness in quite another way, toto genere
different: the individual is conscious of his body as an expression or manifestation of his will.
My body, as he puts it, is the objectivity of my will (ibid.). And it is by reason of my
consciousness of my body as the objectification of my will that I am conscious of myself as
indeed, that I aman individual. Schopenhauers argument on this matter is fraught with
difficulties. But for my purposes here, what is important is the conclusion that he wants to
establish, which is that an individual comprises a knowing subject and a willing subject, or, more
prosaically, an intellect and a will.3 For it is the nature of the relationship between intellect and
will, as Schopenhauer understands it, that restricts the individual as such to knowledge
structured by the forms of the principle of sufficient reason, and that makes knowledge of the
Ideasand hence aesthetic experienceunattainable for the subject who knows as an
individual. In contrast to the familiar philosophical thought that the true and real inner nature
or kernel of man is his knowing consciousnessthe thought, that is, that man is essentially a
rational animal, or a soul, or res cogitansSchopenhauer holds that at the core of individuality
is the individual will, which is related to consciousness, in other words to knowledge, [to
intellect,] as substance to accident, as something illuminated to light, as the string to the
sounding board (WWR II: 199). Intellect, he maintains, turns out to be what is secondary,
subordinate, and conditioned (WWR II: 198): it is both dependent on and subservient to the
individual will. And that will has, so to speak, limited interests: what it aims at and attains in
man is essentially the same as . . . what its goal is in the animal, nourishment and propagation
(WWR II: 27980). The individual will, in short, is concerned with other things only insofar as
they have anything to do with its own maintenance and survival, which is to say, with things as
they stand in relation to it. Thus an intellect working in subordination or subservience to an
individual willwhich is just what it is for a knowing subject to know as an individualreally
knows mere relations of things, primarily their relations to the will itself, to which it belongs, . . .
but also, with a view to the completeness of this knowledge, the relations of things to one
another (WWR II: 363). Again, As it is the principle of sufficient reason that places . . . objects in
. . . relation to the body and so to the will, the sole endeavour of knowledge, serving this will,
will be to get to know concerning objects just those relations that are laid down by the principle
of sufficient reason, and thus to follow their many different connexions in space, time and
causality. For only through these is the object interesting to the individual, in other words, has it
a relation to the will. (WWR I: 177) Schopenhauers thought, then, is that the individual knowing
subject is restricted to knowledge governed by the forms of the principle of sufficient reason
inasmuch as in such a subject intellect is subordinate to and conditioned by an individual will
that is concerned only with things constituted under the forms of that principle. We are now in a
position to see what Schopenhauer is getting at in his talk of the abolition of individuality as a
precondition of intuitive knowledge of the Ideas and thus of aesthetic experience. His argument,
in effect, is this: in order to have intuitive knowledge of the Ideas, which do not enter into
the principle of sufficient reason, intellect must be capable of cognition that is not conditioned
by the forms of that principle; intellect functioning in subordination to an individual will is
restricted to cognition that is so conditioned; only for a subject in whom ntellect is not
functioning in subordination to an individual will, therefore, will knowledge of the Ideas be
available. What the abolition of individuality must amount to, thenwhat intuitive knowledge
of the Ideas, and hence aesthetic experience, depends onis the functioning of intellect
unconstrained by the demands of an individual will: the emancipation, so to speak, of intellect
from its subordination to the individual will. An essential characteristic of aesthetic experience,
as Schopenhauer conceives it, is thus its will-lessnessthis is his distinctive take on the familiar
thought that aesthetic experience is defined in terms of its disinterestedness. Whether or not
the conception of aesthetic experience as fundamentally will-less is remotely plausible is an
issue that has been taken up by a number of commentators.4 Less often consideredor indeed,
even noticedis that it is questionable whether this idea, whatever its plausibility, is one to
which Schopenhauer is really entitled. This latter question becomes unignorable, however,
when we look more closely at the theoretical underpinnings of his conception of intellect as
essentially conditioned by, or subordinate to, will. For in light of these, it is far from clear how
Schopenhauer can consistently regard the functioning of intellect unconstrained by the
demands of an individual willand hence aesthetic experience, as he conceives itas so much
as possible. The thought that underlies Schopenhauers conception of the relation between an
individual will and intellect is that the former, like everything else in the world of representation,
is a manifestation or objectification of Will, the innermost essence of the world.5 He argues
that the higher the grade of objectification, or Idea, that an individual will represents or
instantiates (that is to say, the more complete or adequate an expression of the nature of Will
it is), the more various will be that wills needs, and the more complex the conditions required
for its maintenance and flourishing. And Schopenhauers hypothesis is that intellect evolved, as
it were, in order to meet those needs and help satisfy those conditions.
 Alt doesnt solve/ Schopenhauer is bad
We dont have to explain solvency attempting to translate intuitive
knowledge into conceptual knowledge fails to capture the true state of the
aesthetic experiences
Shapshay 12 (Sandra Shapshay is Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at Indiana
University. May 9, 2012. Schopenhauers Aesthetics, The Stanford Encyclopedia
of Philosophy, Summer 2012 Edition,
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/schopenhauer-aesthetics/, Accessed July 14,
2017)//jl
In order to preserve for ourselves or to communicate intuitive knowledge to others, we may
try to show it or say it. If one is an artist, one might show such knowledge by attempting to
embody it in a work of art. But for non-artists, trying to say this knowledge means attempting
to capture it propositionally, and in so doing, for Schopenhauer, we translate intuitive into
conceptual knowledge by a process of abstraction. Unfortunately, something is inevitably lost
in the translation. Thus, Schopenhauer concludes, Kant's starting pointthe aesthetic
judgmentis already at one remove from true aesthetic experience. And since this remove is
not innocuous, insofar as the judgment does not faithfully transmit the richness of the
experience, the aesthetic judgment constitutes the wrong focus for aesthetic theorizing.

Sure, Schopenhauer was a jerk. But ad hominem fallacies dont actually address
the core claims of his philosophy.
Hyland 1985
(J.T. PhD, Unhappiness and Education: some lessons from Schopenhauer, in Educational
Studies, 11:3, 222)

Most readers of Schopenhauer are so appalled and unsettled by this relentlessly pessimistic
picture of the human condition that they either produce some form of psychological or
sociological rationalisation to try to explain away such a jaundiced vision, or simply dismiss
such ideas as the ravings of a madman. Very little in the way of sustained analysis of the
central thesis is attempted, and even otherwise respectable philosophers are not immune
from criticism in this respect. After a fairly cavalier review of Schopenhauer's main
arguments, Russell (1946), for instance, dismisses what he takes to be the central doctrine
(summarised as the destruction of evil by weakening its source, the will) largely on the
grounds that it was not held sincerely. Schopenhauer, we are told, was "exceedingly
quarrelsome", "unusually avaricious" and "completely selfish". Moreover, it is "difficult to
believe that a man who was profoundly convinced of the virtue of asceticism and resignation
would never have made any attempt to embody his convictions in practice" (p. 786). Will
Durant (1926) discusses the philosopher in a similar fashion and, after a lengthy exposition
of Schopenhauer's writings, admits that the "natural response to such a philosophy is a
medical diagnosis, of the age and of the man". This is followed up by a number of references
to Schopenhauer's character; he was a "capricious soul", a "listless man" whose unhappiness
lay in his "rejection of the normal life". Furthermore, it is "quite likely that the particular
product of the intellect which we know as the philosophy of Schopenhauer was the cover
and apology of a diseased and indolent will" (pp. 343, 344, 348). Such comments are not
only monstrously unprofessional, but also come perilously close to committing ad
hominem fallacies. It is the case, by all accounts, that Schopenhauer was a most
unprepossessing character; he was absurdly vain, and an outrageous misogynist whose
private life left much to be desired. But we are, surely, able to examine his philosophical
writings independently of such personal considerations. It is because of its very
unsavouriness that we know so much about Schopenhauer's life, but this ought not to lead
us to make judgments about his philosophy by applying standards that we would never
dream of applying to the work of other thinkers. Amidst all such pseudo-criticism of
Schopenhauer there has been a tendency to lose sight of the main points at issue.
The central question, surely, is whether there is anything of philosophical value in
Schopenhauer's description of the world and the life of humans. I would argue that
much of value can be learned, both from Schopenhauer's conception of the human
condition, and from his suggestions for coping with life in the light of this condition.
 Ethics
Morality isnt rooted in ethics, its rooted in metaphysics. Compassion is not a
question of psychology but instead the natural state of beings.
Came 12 (A Companion to Schopenhauer edited by Bart Vandenabeele. Chapter
16 Part IV: Compassion, Resignation and Sainthood, Daniel Came. Pages 243-
245)//jl
The fundamental imperative of morality is: Neminem laede, immo omnes, quantum potes,
iuva Hurt no one, rather help everyone as much as you can (BM, 69). This dictum
indicates Schopenhauer s conception of the fundamental concept of ethics: compassion. In
Schopenhauer s view, morality has its roots in natural compassion. But this itself is an
undeniable fact of human consciousness, is essential to it, and does not depend on
presuppositions, concepts, religions, dogmas, myths, training and education. On the contrary it
is original and immediate, it resides in human nature itself and, for this very reason, it endures in
all circumstances and appears in all countries at all times (BM, 44). Compassion is an
immediate participation in the suffering of others. Schopenhauer regards this natural human
capacity as essentially astonishing, indeed mysterious . . . it is the great mystery of ethics, the
boundary mark beyond which only metaphysical speculation can venture to step (BM, 144).
Hence Schopenhauer ultimately regards the foundation of morality not as a problem of ethics
, but rather, like everything that exists as such , of metaphysics (BM, 144 45). Just as art
involves a miraculous transcendence of ordinary consciousness, so compassion involves a
transcendence of the natural standpoint of egoism. Given that egoistic action is the norm of
human behavior, the question arises as to how compassion is possible. That is, how is it possible
for another s weal and woe to move my will immediately, that is to say, in exactly the same
way as it is usually moved only by my own? (BM, 143). He describes compassion itself as:

the immediate participation , independent of all ulterior considerations, primarily in the

suffering of another, and thus in the prevention or elimination of it; for all satisfaction and well
- being and happiness consists in this . . . As soon as this compassion is aroused, the weal and
woe of another are nearest to my heart in exactly the same way, although not always in exactly
the same degree, as otherwise are only my own. Hence the difference between him and me is
now no longer absolute.

Schopenhauer s claim that in compassion we experience directly other s suffering is at the

core of his conception of compassion, and it is that for which his metaphysics provides a
putative explanation. He argues from moral phenomena to their primary phenomena and then
seeks to provide a metaphysical explanation of those phenomena. He rejects a psychological
explanation of how it is possible for one person to experience directly another s suffering. In
particular, he argues against the naturalistic claim (found, for example, in Hume) that
compassionate agents are motivated by another s suffering, since they imagine themselves in
the position of the sufferer and have the idea that they are suffering that person s pain in their
own person. Schopenhauer claims that this is by no means the case; on the contrary, at every
moment we remain clearly conscious that he is the sufferer, not we ; and it is precisely in his
person, not in ours, that we feel the suffering, to our sorrow. We suffer with him and hence in
him; we feel his pain as his , and do not imagine that it is ours (BM, 147). This experience of
another s pain cannot be explained psychologically; it can be explained only metaphysically.

Schopenhauer s theory of compassion is embedded in his metaphysics, and in particular his

revision of Kant s notion of the thing - in - itself. In what to many has seemed a genuine
advance on Kant s agnosticism regarding things - in - themselves, Schopenhauer argues that
since the intuitions of space and time are merely the forms of our experience and do not have
any application at the level of the thing - in - itself, noumenal reality must be one. 2 It is only in
our spatio - temporally structured experience, that the world appears divided into separate
individuals. Hence although we ordinarily think of ourselves in terms of our private egos, this is
an illusion. An awareness of this has dawned on the moral person who identifi es with the
interests of others. That is the metaphysical explanation of compassion: according to the true
nature of things everyone has all the sufferings of the world as his own (WWR I, 353). Thus it is
possible for compassion to extend to the totality of suffering, in the infi nite past and the infi
nite future; this is an experience which Schopenhauer cites as a possible precursor of
pessimistic insight and resignation or the denial of the will.