The World as Will and Idea

For my lit project, I read The World as Will and Idea by Schopenhauer.

The book is divided into four parts. In the first two, S describes his metaphysics, which separates the world into idea and will. For S, the distinction between the subject (the thinking person) and the object (the world the subject experiences), which philosophy has long maintained, is false; the object, says S, presupposes the subject and exists already as an idea which the subject comprehends. This argument becomes clearer as the book progresses.

S then describes the will, which we all have an intuitive understanding of; the will is, according to S, the being-in-itself of all things, humans, plants, and rocks alike. It is the fundamental force behind human actions and the laws of nature. It does not exist within the trappings of space, time, and causality, but rather exists outside these fundamental properties we perceptually experience. And since it exists beyond these trappings, it is unified, and as such the will we experience within ourselves is the same will which drives every other object we encounter.

Thus for S, there is the idea -- which is defined by space, time, and causality, and which we understand through our senses as the objective world -- and the will -- which is the metaphysical inner-nature of all these objects. Describing the world in this fashion, S compares his metaphysics to Plato’s; whereas Plato assigns particular objects (a chair, for instance) to generalized Ideas (that is to say, the particular chair is an expression of an Idea of chair, from which all chairs come to exist), S assigns particular ideas to a grade of the will. Properly speaking, the idea for S is the objectification of the will.

However brief and (undoubtedly) confusing this summary of S’s metaphysics may be, an understanding of S’s metaphysics is necessary before approaching the rest of his philosophy. S heavily reworks Kant, and his separating the world into two aspects is a twist of Kant’s insight into the difference between the phenomenal world (which we have access to) and the being-in-itself (which we do not have access to). The rest of S’s philosophy (which gets the more attention) is built on this.

Science, says S, is the study of the phenomenal idea defined by space, time, and causality; what, then, is the proper study of the will? S’s answer: art. S devotes the third section of his work to this topic and argues that in aesthetic contemplation (and rapture) we leave behind the will and enter into the world of idea. This argument is completed in the final section of the book --

The will, according to S, is forever striving, never satisfied. It is, as such, suffering. Midway through the final section, S gives a detailed exposition of the suffering of the human will (which I thought reminiscent of Lucretius) and lays out the portion of his philosophy which others have inevitably labeled “pessimistic.” S’s vision is bleak, but he is a transcendentalist: the striving of the will can be forgotten, even suppressed; we transcend the will through knowledge of the true nature of the universe (which happens to be S’s metaphysics). In art, we glimpse this truth and briefly forget the will as we contemplate pure objectivity (which art expresses). But this is not full understanding.

In the final section, S outlines his ethics. This is probably the most famous portion of his philosophy. He begins from the illusion people hold that they (as subjects) are separated from the objective world they experience; in this egoism, people recognize only their own wills, and in asserting their wills come to actively deny the wills of others. This person does wrong and borders on wickedness. Once, however, a person recognizes the truth -- that is, that his will is the same will which appears in others, and, consequently, that his suffering is tied to the suffering of other wills -- this person strives to become just by recognizing the equal rights of another’s will. Finally, a person comes to elevate the wills of others above his own and becomes willing to sacrifice his own will for the sake of others. This final person has escaped the sufferings of the will by suppressing his will entirely. For S, this is the ascetic, the saint.

Before reading this, I had heard a lot about Schopenhauer and his pessimism. Having read it, I would not call S a pessimist. He is greatly misrepresented. And though I found his discussions about art and ethics stimulating and fascinating, I think it is his metaphysics which is his important philosophical contribution. One cannot take his aesthetics or ethics without first swallowing his metaphysics. And his metaphysics is transcendental (re: not pessimistic).

S’s writing style is occasionally maddening. His sentences can get unruly. His paragraphs can continue on for pages. And yet he is surprisingly coherent; his clarity is sometimes startling. Though I never fully took to his philosophy, I at least took something from nearly everything he discussed and found my own philosophy becoming that much clearer through his words; I subscribe to none of his assertions yet feel his influence throughout my thoughts. This influence may not survive for long, but for now at least I feel this book has been an important step for my understanding of philosophy (as a subject). I plan to read more philosophy for my lit project in the near future.

Montaigne

For my lit project, I read the Essays of Michel de Montaigne.

I began reading Montaigne shortly after the start of the new year and have been coming back to him in intermittent bursts throughout these six months. The past few weeks have seen my longest and most intimate association with his work, and now, faced with writing about the Essays, I do not think I will be able to properly separate myself from them in order to fairly assay them. But here I go:

Montaigne's subject is himself. Following Apollo's inscription at Delphi ("Know Thyself") and the lead of history's sages, Montaigne examines his virtues and follies, his habits and experiences, his mind and his body. Montaigne's voice is direct, realistic, and mature. He does not hide his vices or shy from uncomfortable truth. He is temperate and relaxed. He ambles through his thoughts with unassuming ease, detailed yet disorganized, rambling yet apt. He borrows heavily from the Ancients, whole essays structured around lines of poetry, others indebted to the examples of a philosopher. Socrates and Epicurus, the Stoics and Sceptics, Virgil and Juvenal, Plutarch and Cicero, Caesar and Alexander -- an endless run of wisdom which Montaigne examines (sometimes to accept, sometimes to criticize) and applies. He is right to. No wisdom is as rich as Ancient wisdom.

Montaigne began writing his Essays late in life and, finding them worthwhile, dedicated himself to them till his end. He published three books. Reading them beginning to end, as I have, reveals a writer who becomes more comfortable and confident with time. His first essays are short, his topics less personal. His final essays are breathtaking in their aimless length and frankness.

As Montaigne changed over the course of his Essays as a writer, I changed as a reader. This has little to do with Montaigne and more to do with the circumstances of my life, which have altered me, sometimes radically, between bouts of reading. With each change, my appreciation for Montaigne grew. My first approach to Montaigne was as an intellectual; I examined his thoughts and tested his world view, comparing his philosophy with my own. I was disappointed. By the end of his Essays -- by today -- I learned to approach Montaigne as a person, a man like any other. Few of us will fail to recognize aspects of ourselves in this detailed auto-portrait. Montaigne, as is his project, fully displays his humanity; and in so doing he displays our own.

We set our stupidities in dignity when we set them in print.

From the start, I always read Montaigne with a pencil by my side. My book is now filled with faint markings, bracketing off passages and lines which struck me while I was reading. To read them now is an experience of its own. Some passages strike me as dull or bizarre, and I cannot imagine what crossed my mind when I first read them and found them worth highlighting; other passages strike me through the heart, onto which I am moved to inscribe such clear and simple wisdom. It is something when but a sentence is needed to question the virtue and depth of my soul; I have opened my book to find this modest line --

in an age when so many behave wickedly, it is almost praiseworthy merely to be useless.

I shall return to your Essays later in my life, Montaigne. Then will age be my aid.

Lucretius On the Nature of Things

For my lit project, I read On the Nature of Things by Lucretius.

Lucretius's project in On the Nature of Things is to banish from the minds of men the fear of gods and death. Lucretius does this by showing that the Nature of Things can be explained by Atomism, atoms being indivisible bodies flying through void. Each book of the poem is devoted to different aspects of nature, and each phenomenon is explained through Atomism/materialism in various ways. A reader, thoroughly absorbed in this work, concludes that since everything can be explained by atoms, gods do not participate in nature (and remain ever-serene, happy, aloof), and since humans are atoms and the atoms dissipate when the body dies, death is nothing to us (no Hades, just nothingness). If Order and Gods cause us pain, then Chaos and Void are our balm.

So say the Epicureans. This is the only major surviving work of Epicureanism (written 200 years after Epicurus). Before reading this, I had already been aware of my affinity with Epicureanism; I was an expert, in fact ... but I need not boast of my wisdom, which should be immediate to everyone. What follows are notes on what was most banal and most bizarre in this work--

Lucretius has a grand time insulting every major philosopher and philosophy before him. The only exceptions are Epicurus, Democritus, and Parmenides (he defies the first and borrows heavily from (while lightly criticizing) the latter two). He quite happily attacks everybody else, sometimes calling them by name, other times describing their ideas without approaching their character. He likes to show why they are wrong and he is right. He loves to call them idiots*. Not even Heraclitus is safe, though I do believe Lucretius is wrong for criticizing Heraclitus for not being "logical."

"Logic" raises a most bizarre trait of Lucretius's scientific method -- he demands logical rigor from philosophy while he asserts that sense perception is the basis for all truth. Presumably this is a counter to Parmenides, who brought logical consistency to the point of utterly denying sense perception; no, say the Epicureans, this is wrong. The senses are everything, and if you see it, it must be true. The Epicureans are thus proto-scientists, but before the age of experimental testing and observation; and so Lucretius, in explaining the Nature of Things, proposes bizarre hypothesis after bizarre hypothesis, offering multiple explanations for one phenomenon insofar as the explanations do not contradict themselves (logically). The sun, for example, is as large as we see it to be, a small blazing disc traveling a vast sky; greater animals are born from lesser animals (Ancient Evolution); earthquakes happen when subterranean mountains fall; &c.

Lucretius's many explanations are sometimes aligned with modern science, sometimes totally absurd. Modern readers ought to be surprised to discover Ancient theories of atoms, evolution, and light, while explanations of magnetism, lightning, and earthquakes will undoubtedly make modern readers smile because of their whimsy and naivete. Lucretius's Ancient earnestness is hard to fault.

The poetry itself has similar highs and lows. The final 250 lines of Book III are the boldest in the book and some of the boldest in Classical Lit. "Hell does exist on earth -- in the life of fools." Lucretius argues that the hellish afterlife humans so fear is present here in life, that life is a loan, and that Wisdom is necessary to banish this fear and suffering. Only a book later, however, at the end of Book IV, Lucretius is arguing a most curious argument against sex (as a cause of pain). There is nothing in the argument I do not agree with, but I cannot help but wonder how Lucretius could fall so far.

Bold, bizarre; few words describe this poem better.

On the Nature of Things lacks Epicurean ethics. This is disappointing. What little survives of Epicurus's writings remains the definitive work on the subject. Though Ancient Natural Science is interesting in its way, Epicurean ethics is what interests me most. It is misunderstood today. People drink expensive wine and eat expensive cheese and gossip and call themselves Epicureans while Epicurus sits in his corner and nibbles bread and sips water. I always hesitate to mention Epicurus to anyone who does not know Ancient philosophy. This has ruined a perfectly awful pun which I have never dared use but have always wanted to: Epicure-Ian.

Read more about Epicurus here: Epicurus.net
I recommend his surviving letters. Lucretius struggles to say in a poem what Epicurus says in a line. Lucretius is fine, though; everyone should read the end of Book III at least.

[*Lucretius is especially insistent about applying this to DG]