Schopenhauer on the animals

Posted on by leyoucis

Schopenhauer believes the world is as appearance, but he also posits a thing-in-itself. So the animals actually exist when you are not looking at them, unlike Berkeley, and they are as they appear. Thus, all of those beetles and insects really exist when you are not looking at them and they exist in a very grotesque form. What Schopenhauer is attempting to do is cut out any attempt by the sciences to elucidate a prettier picture of the animals. Back in the 1800s, it was looking like the sciences were potentially about to give a positive description of the nature on the animals and they are not really as bad as they seem. Perhaps the sciences would reveal, for example, that the animals do not cognate the same way as humans. However, Schopenhauer is maintaining that they are as they appear. What ended up happening was the sciences ended up going in a similar direction as Schopenhauer took it with survival of the fittest. Schopenhauer learned about Darwin’s origin of species on his death bed and he probably knew exactly what was happening. The sciences ended up giving a similar description of the animals as Schopenhauer’s theory. However, these theories are still slightly different. While Darwin is giving a specific description of the animals, Schopenhauer is simply maintaining that they are as they appear and that is grotesque. You can see the impact of Schopenhauer and Darwin on the national geographic channel.

Further Considerations

Is Schopenhauer determine how animals look? In which case, metaphysical speculation would be very powerful, indeed. You determine how animals look through metaphysical speculation. However, Schopenhauer is not determining how animals appear, he is simply saying that they are as they appear. Thus this is really a weaker claim. That’s all transcendental metaphysics is- something to subscribe to that may or may not be a correct description of reality. It may be a correct description of reality or it may reduce entirely to cognition, but either way it works.

German Idealism

Defense Against Beiser’s Transcendent Interpretation of Schelling

Posted on by leyoucis

In Frederick Beiser’s book German Idealism: the Struggle Against Subjectivism, he gives a transcendent interpretation of Schelling’s philosophy. Beiser produced a mammoth document that contains good material, but which has original insights that are a bit convoluted. Beiser was in his 60s when he wrote the book and this goes to show that with age your rational capabilities go downhill. Beiser wrote a very good book: on German philosophy between Kant and Fichte when he was a decade younger and it turned out very good. Beiser’s main insight is that German idealism was a struggle against subjectivism- which he believes he has demonstrated with recent documentation that has surfaced. However, this can be diverted if one places more of an emphasis on the structure of what the original philosophers are saying and placing less of an emphasis on side declarations made by the author. I agree with Beiser’s interpretation of Kant and the Romantics, but disagree with his interpretation of Fichte and Schelling.

Beiser claims that shelling is advancing past Fichte with his absolute ego, and making a mystical claim which has been made many times before. However, I believe Schelling is continuing under Fichte’s transcendental framework and once you look at the structure of what he is saying, a more neutral position is reached. Once you do that everything falls back into place and all of the developments that took place after German idealism in the early nineteen hundreds become bona fide developments. In particular Giovanni Gentile’s idealism was the definitive development in the metaphysical foundation of fascism and was not simply a reiteration of Schelling and certainly not Neoplatonism. I am not sure whether Gentile was continuing within a transcendental framework or leaping into the transcendent, but it was a bona fide development past what was reached in German idealism.

Defense against the transcendent interpretation of Schelling

It seems as though Schelling is hinting at a transcendent consciousness with his absolute ego given the wording he uses. However, once you look at the structure of what Schelling is actually saying, it becomes clear that he is describing a purely immanent consciousness.

For example, Beiser mentions how Schelling regards the absolute as not being found anymore inside oneself than outside oneself.1 This is Schelling hinting at his later Naturalphilosophie and is not representative of a transcendent ego. Schelling writes that the ego contains a being that precedes all thinking and representing.2 This is not hinting at a transcendent consciousness but can designate the cause of something purely immanent. Indeed, Beiser then says that Schelling’s ego begins to resemble mere existence- something purely immanent. Beiser claims that Schelling gives the absolute ego a constitutive and not a regulative status.3 According to my interpretation, Fichte gives the ego a constitutive status and Schelling is simply reiterating Fichte. This simply means he is making a Bona fide metaphysical claim that the world is contained in the mind and is not suggesting a transcendent consciousness.

Further, Schelling claims that the ego “exists absolutely, containing all being or reality within itself.” It is “infinite, the immanent cause of all things”, and has “absolute power and infinite attributes.”4 Again,  he is saying immanent here and the rest of his language is completely explainable by an immanent consciousness that holds the world in its place through other beings without relying on a transcendent consciousness. This is again reiterating Fichte. Indeed, Beiser then alludes to the idea that Schelling is probably describing something purely imminent. Schelling says that the I is more that merely the formal unity of our representations.5 The I is the cause of our experience in the Fichtean sense but not transcendent consciousness. He says we cannot conceive or describe the I6 suggesting something mystical but the Beiser says how this simply means that that is because it is the condition under which we apply concepts. We know that the I exists because it is the referent of the self-confirming proposition I am.7 This is simply intellectual intuition in the Fichtean sense suggesting free will.

Further Considerations

All of this shows that Schelling was simply reiterating Fichte’s ego in his absolute ego and the bona fide departure from Fichte was not made until Schelling made his Naturalphilsophie. There, Schelling is truly departing from Fichte where he places the source in nature as opposed to the subject and creates a metaphysical biological idealistic approach to the philosophy of nature.

Even if Schelling did posit a transcendent absolute ego, it can be argued that Schelling’s absolute ego still does not have the same robustness as Gentile’s actual idealism for a foundation for fascism. The absolute ego places the focus purely on the subject, while the actual idealism accounts for all of the minds within a totality. Thus, it probably would be naive to skip Gentile’s idealism and Gentile’s idealism is probably the bona fide metaphysical development in the foundation of fascism. However, Gentile was working off of German idealism in order to come up with his work so credit should be placed where credit is due. But Gentile, Croce, Evola, and the Italian idealists were intimately connected with the socialist and fascist scene of their time and probably should not be overlooked.

German Idealism; British and Continental Idealism

Fichte’s Ethics and Political Philosophy

Posted on by leyoucis

Ethics

Fichte’s ethics depends exclusively on Fichte’s conception of freedom and the relation of the I to the not-I. In particular, it deals with the conception of a free activity situated among things in relation to itself. One of the main relations between the I and the not-I used in Fichte’s ethics is his positing of the not-I as a limitation on the I. Fichte’s philosophy particularly deals with the notion of a “summons” that is issued forth by other I’s and calls for a limitation of the I’s behavior.

Fichte’s ethics is also equally about the ability to transform oneself into a free individual independent of empirical motives. One always has a “desire” in which there is a strong wish or wanting of something in the physical world. This is a accompanied by a “drive” or the person’s sensational experience of the desire and a “longing” which is a consciousness of this desire. There are two types of drives: the lower or empirical drive which is a person’s desire for something in the material world and the higher or pure drive which is the drive resulting directly from a person’s pure will. But Fichte does not believe that it is the pure drive that should take full precedence over the lower drive. It is the goal of the I to make his higher drive conform to his lower drive. People become aware of the ethical drive through the conviction that something is their duty; and this arises out of a person’s conscience. One can never be certain that their conscience is correct- i.e. our conscience is subject to fallacy- but one can know that he is not doing something wrong. And this is supplemented by the empirical drive.  

Political theory

Fichte advocates a unitary government in which to enforce laws. As such Fichte is against the splitting of the government into judicial, legislative, and executive branches.

Fichte’s advocates a property contract made in agreement between the state and the people. The property contact gives the person’s rights involving their body and their property. The person is given a set of rights in regards to their sphere of action and the limits on their sphere of action. This contract is mutually agreed upon by all. In addition, the individual signs a protection contract which prohibits their interference in the external sphere of others. In regards to personal rights, Fichte regards the home to be the personal property of the owner. As such, the state does not have the ability to enter except with permission. Although against Fichte’s ethics, the state cannot punish for things such as prostitution, adultery, fornication, and suicide. On Fichte’s view, the validity of a marriage comes from the woman. The woman’s love for a man decides the validity of a marriage. However, once the marriage is instantiated the woman’s rights are subordinated to the man.

Next, we turn to criminal law and economic justice. All crimes committed are in violation of the social contract and the criminals are thus removed of their rights in proportion to the magnitude of the crime; they are, however, given a chance to reenter society. Murder, being the most severe crime, leads to a removal of all rights; however, Fichte is against the death penalty. The property contract guarantees that the person will have a sufficient sphere of action in which to act freely. But if the person does not have enough money to support their household the government can redistribute the property. Fichte outlines other redistributive properties of the government, e.g., the ability to redistribute the wealth of a diseased person or the ability to redistribute trade and commerce. Fichte’s later political thought took on a nationalist direction that has had an impact but has been much criticized.

Fichte’s views on women

Fichte tends to have more liberal views toward women than some of his predecessors. For example, Fichte bases marriage on the woman and believes woman should have the right to vote. This is indicative of the shift toward feminism that occurred the modern and contemporary period. However, Fichte’s philosophy, like the rest of German idealism, tends to be male dominant- which is demonstrated with for example, Fichte’s famous doctrine of property where he believes women are not allowed to have property. This probably should not be adopted in the Western world today, but is an indicator of Fichte’s idealism in which things are as they appear. In other words, women according to the idealist appear to be less intelligent than men, therefore, they probably are so. Of course, women could appear to be more intelligent than men- in which case idealism would confirm that result. But the general idea is that idealism is removing the brain which would potentially allow empirical elucidations as to exactly what the women’s position in the world is. Additionally, Fichte is removing the neuroplastistic element of things meaning although women are given lower status than men, they are still expected to come up to the men as much as the men go up to the women.

German Idealism

Schopenhauer’s Philosophy of Music and Analysis

Posted on by leyoucis
Schopenhauer’s Philosophy of Music

Schopenhauer believes that poetry does in the idea what philosophy does in the concept. That is, poetry does in an a posteriori intuition what philosophy does in a priori reasoning. This makes poetry more suited for youth and philosophy more suited for old age. But Schopenhauer does not see music simply as an augmentation of poetry. The musical notes take on a significance in their own right. The words are not as important when it comes to music and take on a secondary quality. And in fact, most often, a good composer is matching the words to suit the melody and not vice versa. Thus, music and poetry form the perfect combination together- one invoking the idea and the other invoking the will itself.

Schopenhauer ranks music the highest of all of the fine arts, with architecture having the lowest ranking, and poetry, sculpture, and painting in between. Schopenhauer believes that music is the only art form that does not exhibit the idea, but exhibits the Will directly. Since music exhibits the will, the bass should be placed at a much lower interval than the higher voices of tenor, alto, and soprano. When a musical tone is at a rational distance from the previous tone these two tones are said to be in harmony. This represents a lack of tension in or satisfaction of the will. When two tones are at an irrational distance from each other, this is called dissonance, and represents tension in the will.  Rhythm forms the constitutive building blocks through which music is formed. Melody consists of the tones constantly entering discord and renewing itself. This takes place via rhythmic cycles, better often being obtained on “good beats.” Satisfaction consists in a discord resolving simultaneously with a good beat. For example, a melody goes about and is resolved first on a bad beat creating no satisfaction but then later on is resolved on a good beat creating greater satisfaction. In this case, the will is tinged with representation, making the effect pleasurable even in the case of tension in the will. That is, the will is not itself affected but an intellectual image of the will. As such we become nostalgic over the connection in our history we find between the music and our own will.

Music as isomorphism

I agree with Schopenhauer that music is not necessarily simply an extension of poetry. However, I give poetry a slightly higher evaluation that Schopenhauer as I believe there are wider array of ideas available than through there are concepts. The reason is that an a posteriori intuition has a wider array of ideas to draw on than through conceptual reasoning and need not necessarily subscribe to proper rational form. Not everything in the physical world reduces to philosophy.

However, I have a modification of the philosophy of music which I came up with as a teenager and that is that music is an isomorphic representation of emotional structure and mindset. This means that there is a one-to-one correspondence between the structure of emotion in the mind and the notes in music. The key is that every emotional structure in the mind is represented by a note pattern and every note pattern is represented by an emotion in the mind- i.e. it is an isomorphism. For example, certain dissonances can represent the emotional structure sadness/compassion, and a cluster of these can represent loose sadness/compassion. This transcends the one-dimensional mode advocated by Schopenhauer in which music simply represents tension or a lack of tension in the will. And under this guise there needs to be perhaps a bit less emphasis on the base. One should go at great lengths to obtain as unique and exotic of an emotional structure and mindset as possible.

The question now becomes what value does music have when one can be described the emotions by reading, for example, On the Passions by David Hume. However, there is a point of divergence and that is that music has access to direct qualitative features that are not available through reasoning alone. This can be demonstrated with arguments for qualia. As an example, suppose a person is born in a black in white room wearing black and white clothing and has never seen a color and spends their whole life reading about color. When that person finally sees a red apple, that person will probably have learned something new. Exotic timbre can help enhance music by inducing exotic mindsets. I’m sure this does not constitute the core of the musical experience and no one should substitute melody for timbre.  But developments in timbre can help induce very exotic and unique mindsets.  Timbre helps contribute to the mindset of the piece.

German Idealism

Schopenhauer on the planets

Posted on by leyoucis

Schopenhauer and Berkeley

Schopenhauer is an idealist. That is he believes the world is in a sense as it appears to the observer. However, Schopenhauer is not a Berkelean or a subjective idealist; he posits a thing-in-itself. For Berkeley, the world is contained in the mind and space is relative to the perceiver. This makes the stars in the sky specks in the sky. That is, they exist as they appear to the observer. If you can get closer pictures of the stars, they are simply big specks in the sky. This is further solidified by Berkeley’s instrumentalism, which says the abstraction of the sciences only has value as far as it wields practically results. That is, it is a fake abstraction that happens to work.

The nature of planets

However, Schopenhauer posits a thing-in-itself. Thus, the world in a sense exists independent of the perceiver. There is a world out there independent of the mind but it simply exists as a compactification point, i.e. something that exists as a unity without diversity. Thus, the planets really exist for Schopenhauer and you could theoretically travel to them. However, Schopenhauer still accepts the phenomenal world as appearance. This in essence cuts out anything that would potentially lead to alien life. You can go to the moon but the microbes on the planet don’t constitute life since you don’t see them under ordinary circumstances. When you look at them under the microscope they are simply specks in your vision. Organic compound doesn’t necessarily produce life and things are that way simply because they are that way on earth. Thus, the planets are simply balls of mass that exist in a spacial void. Another place where Schopenhauer deviates from materialism is that cosmologically earth is at the center of the universe. Humans are no more than animals but are distinct from animals as they are the highest grades of the wills manifestation.

German Idealism

German Idealism and the Enlightenment

Posted on by leyoucis

    German idealism is the philosophical movement arising in Germany between the late 1700s and mid-1800s. It was coming off of the heels of the enlightenment in which a devaluation was placed on organized religion and the esoteric organizations, and an emphasis was placed on rationalistic metaphysics and the scientific method. However German idealism after the works of Immanuel Kant really existed in a semi state between the enlightenment and the exiting out of the enlightenment that took place in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Although Immanuel Kant was an epistemologist, the German idealists after him were full-blown metaphysicians. Although there were transcendent metaphysicians in the enlightenment such as Leibniz with his doctrine of universal harmony, I am arguing that the German idealists in fact all dabbled in the esoteric. First of all, the German idealists shifted into a process metaphysics, which was not seen before. This takes place with, for example, Fichte’s positing of the world or Hegel’s Geist. Process metaphysics can be seen as bordering on the esoteric. In fact, Hegel drew inspiration from esoteric texts in order to come up with Geist. In addition to the process metaphysics, they further dabbled in the truly esoteric. Novalis, the Romantic, came up with his doctrine of spontaneous healing- an esoteric claim. Also, Schelling’s and Schopenhauer’s philosophy borders on the esoteric. Schelling affirms to a certain extent the reality of mythology, and Schopenhauer comes up with his conception of Will, in which an evil spirit can get caught and mess with the individual. I am not saying that that is the most central part of Schopenhauer’s philosophy, but it is a central part, nonetheless. Indeed, it is difficult for the average person to see all three parts of Schopenhauer’s philosophy: the scientific, the philosophical, and the esoteric. Thus, we see all of Fichte, Novalis, Schelling, Hegel, and Schopenhauer, who’s philosophy borders on the esoteric. Thus, we see a hinting at esotericism, in German idealism, but no new esoteric organizations.