According to Schopenhauer’s compensation argument for pessimism, the non-existence of the world is preferable to its existence because no goods can ever compensate for the mere existence of evil. Standard interpretations take this argument to be based on Schopenhauer’s thesis that all goods are merely the negation of evils, from which they assume it follows that the apparent goods in life are in fact empty and without value. This article develops a non-standard variant of the standard interpretation, which accepts the (...) relevance of the negativity thesis but rejects that the argument assumes that life’s goods are all empty and valueless. Instead, it argues that whatever value negative goods might possess, they do not have the kind of value to compensate for positive evils. This involves additional development of the negativity thesis and a defence of it against objections from Byron Simmons (2021). (shrink)

El presente artículo investiga de qué forma la centralidad del sufrimiento en la filosofía de Schopenhauer sirve para fundamentar su pesimismo. Tres son los argumentos analizados: el lugar del sufrimiento en el mundo, su lugar en la conciencia humana y su lugar frente a la felicidad. A la luz de estos tres argumentos, se destaca que el vínculo indisoluble entre el sufrimiento y la esencia del mundo, la determinación del sufrimiento en la conciencia, tanto en su génesis como en su (...) intensidad, y su anterioridad ontológica frente a la felicidad hacen del pesimismo una categoría necesaria. Finalmente, se señala una posible contribución del pesimismo schopenhaueriano a la crítica social contemporánea, considerando la idea de mundo que el capitalismo tardío promueve. (shrink)

In this thesis I offer an interpretation of Arthur Schopenhauer’s pessimism. I argue against interpreting Schopenhauer’s pessimism as if it were merely a matter of temperament, and I resist the urge to find a single standard argument for pessimism in Schopenhauer’s work. Instead, I treat Schopenhauer’s pessimism as inherently variegated, composed of several distinct but interrelated pessimistic positions, each of which is supported by its own argument. I begin by examining Schopenhauer’s famous argument that willing necessitates suffering, which I defend (...) against the misrepresentative interpretation advocated by Ivan Soll. I also offer a metaphysical reading of Schopenhauer’s claim that no amount happiness can compensate for the mere fact of suffering, based upon his negative conception of happiness. I proceed by analysing Schopenhauer’s criticisms of two prominent optimists, Leibniz and Rousseau. I attempt to salvage something of Schopenhauer’s counterargument against Leibniz that this is the worse of all possible worlds, and I also examine Schopenhauer’s claim that the optimistic metaphysics of a priori rationalistic philosophy cannot cope with the evidence of meaningless suffering. In the case of Rousseau, I interpret Schopenhauer’s brief objection to Rousseau’s assumption of original goodness, by means of an examination of Schopenhauer’s conception of the contrary doctrine, original sin. Next I consider the metaphysics of Schopenhauer’s account of eternal justice. After defending it against a number of objections, I argue that the nature of his version of eternal justice, which he admits constitutes a justification for suffering, does not conflict with the fact that he so strongly condemns Leibniz’s and Rousseau’s optimistic justifications for suffering. Finally I assess whether and to what extent Schopenhauer’s ethics of salvation are either pessimistic or optimistic. I conclude that the mere fact that salvation is possible is not necessarily a cause for optimism, but that Schopenhauer’s doctrine of salvation is made partly optimistic by the higher form of cognition that he describes as part of it. I also argue that Schopenhauer’s views on the essentially mystical nature of the state of salvation ultimately commit him to being neither positively optimistic nor positively pessimistic about salvation. I conclude overall with some brief remarks about the meaning of Schopenhauer’s pessimism, and how in spite of its diverse nature, it is able to lay down a singular challenge to all future philosophers concerned with the question of suffering. (shrink)

This entry is about the concept of vitalism. The currency of vitalism has reemerged in the context of the changes in the sciences, with the rise of ideas of uncertainty and complexity, and the rise of the global information society. This is because the notion of life has always favoured an idea of becoming over one of being, of movement over stasis, of action over structure, of flow and flux. The global information order seems to be characterized by ‘flow’. There (...) are three important generations of modern vitalists. There is a generation of 1840–45 including Nietzsche and the sociologist Tarde; the generation of 1860 including the philosopher Bergson and the sociologist Simmel; and the generation of 1925–33 including Deleuze, Foucault and Negri. Vitalist or neo-vitalist themes are particularly useful in the analysis of life itself, but thinkers such as Donna Haraway and Katharine Hayles put things in reverse. They understand not the media in terms of life, but life in terms of media. Thus a mediatic principle or algorithmic principle also structures life. If classical vitalism conceives of life as flow and in opposition to the structures that would contain and stop it, then neo-vitalism would seem to have its roots in something like a media or information heuristic. Thus there is talk today that ‘information is alive’. (shrink)

Pessimism today is poorly understood. Indeed, such is the disdain that pessimism engenders, that it often has difficulty being taken seriously as a theoretical position. Yet pessimism, which is distinct from skepticism and nihilism, has much to offer those who have discarded the Enlightenment's expectation of progress. Through an examination of Rousseau, Schopenhauer and Unamuno, this paper traces out some of the common themes of pessimistic thought. Pessimism, it is argued, is con-cerned with the burden of time and with the (...) problem of organizing the best kind of human life in the absence of a promise of progress, happiness, or salvation for society as a whole. But it need not urge passivity or resignation in response to these conditions. The figure of Don Quixote, first appealed to in this context by Unamuno, illustrates pessimism's capacity to craft a positive ethic of personal conduct for life in a disordered and disenchanted world. Key Words: Miguel de Cervantes • Don Quixote • history • nihilism • pessimism • progress • Jean-Jacques Rousseau • Arthur Schopenhauer • time • Miguel de Unamuno. (shrink)

My purpose in this essay is to clarify and evaluate Arthur Schopenhauer's grounds for the view that happiness is impossible. I shall distinguish two of his arguments for that view and argue that both of them are unsound. Both arguments involve premises grounded on a problematic view, namely, that desires have no objects. What makes this view problematic is that, in each of the two arguments, it conflicts with Schopenhauer's grounds for other premises in the argument. I shall then propose (...) a way of fixing both arguments. The solution involves substituting the view that desires have no objects with the view that we have a desire to have desires. The latter view, I shall argue, can do the grounding work that the former does in Schopenhauer's arguments but, unlike it, the view that we desire to desire is consistent with Schopenhauer's grounds for the rest of premises in those arguments. (shrink)

This article explores the notion of ‘perfect’ money that Simmel introduces in The Philosophy of Money. Its aim is twofold: first, to connect this idea to his more general arguments about the nature of society and the ambivalence of modernity, and, second, to assess its relevance for contemporary debates about the future of money, especially following the global financial crisis. I argue that Simmel’s concept of perfect money can be understood as utopian in two senses, conceptual and ethical, that correspond (...) to the two interpretations he develops, in Soziologie, of the idea of a perfect society. This sheds light on an aspect of Simmel’s writings that has attracted relatively little attention, namely his views on the relationship between money and socialism. Characterizing this relationship as a ‘formal affinity’, his remarks resonate with a long tradition of thought on monetary utopias that aim not for the abolition of money but its radical transformation as a means of improving society. This tradition is coming to the fore once again today, as the financial crisis has given new impetus to constructing forms of money – for example, LETS, Time Dollars, mutual credit, peer-to-peer lending and digital currencies such as Bitcoin – that provide viable alternatives to big banks. Understood in conjunction with his account of the ‘tragedy’ of individualism in modernity, such resonances demonstrate the enduring relevance of Simmel’s work to the empirical and theoretical investigation of money. (shrink)

German philosopher G. W. F. Hegel problematized the term “aesthetics” in his writings on art. This article attempts to capture the tension between Hegel's theory of art and philosophy of art and its impact on the subsequent theorization of art in the twentieth century as consumer or emancipatory. Music, poetry and plastic arts seem to resonate differently with philosophers such as Plato, Aristotle, Kant, Hegel and Adorno. Plato considered music soothing to the soul. In Aristotle, one could trace the oblique (...) beginnings of the tension between a theory of art and a philosophy of art as he questioned the role of art in philosophy. While Kant's approach is more formal and deals with concepts such as beauty, sublime, genius, and the status of aesthetic objects, Hegel grapples with the rational and emotional aspects of works of art which determine whether art is free or under the thralldom of nature. Both Kant and Hegel distinguished artistic from natural beauty. Critical theorists such as Adorno were also influenced by Hegel. Adorno's analysis of concepts such as mimesis forms an important part of his critique of culture industry. Adorno was also emphatic that classical art could only exist as a product of an epoch. Yet in its dialectical form, art serves as a critique of ideology. Progressively, from the nineteenth to the twentieth century, what began as a crevice between a philosophy of art and a theory of art became a chasm. Thus, begins a contentious relationship between art as a pursuit in itself and art for consumption, that is, art as an integral aspect of consumer culture. The new phenomenon of AI art also poses interesting questions about the paradigmatic shift in dynamics between human element and technology. This article would also attempt to trace how art continues to defy reification, while in the process being consumed constantly, recreating and reinventing itself. (shrink)

Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 55, Issue 1, Page 186-203, February 2021.

In this article I consider the normative and axiological dimension of Simmel’s thought. Building on previous interpretations, I argue that although Simmel cannot be interpreted as a systematic normative theorist, the issue of values and the normative standpoint can nevertheless be traced in various aspects of his multifarious work. This interpretive turn attempts to link Simmel’s obscure theory of value with his epistemological relationism. Relationism may offer a counterweight to Simmel’s value-pluralism, since it points to normative elements (e.g. internal teleology, (...) justice) that can contribute to the reconciliation between incommensurablity of forms and totality. Axiological and normative concerns (of a Hegelian source) survive also in his metaphysics of life, pointing beyond a merely Bergsonian and conservative Lebensphilosophie. I conclude with some thoughts on how this normative rethinking of Simmel’s thought can contribute towards more adequate appreciations of Simmel’s overall theory. (shrink)