If Schopenhauer's metaphysics is untenable, what else could explain the problems of life?

The problem with Schopenhauer's metaphysics, and the metaphysics of any rationalist philosopher it seems, is that it takes the human condition as an example of the entire enterprise of existence. The problems of human existence may be like a pimple on the overall purity of the world.

However, even if we take a naturalistic perspective on this (by naturalistic I mean scientific-oriented, especially in regards to physics...if apokrisis from old PF were reading this thread he'd be having a nightmare), we still need to explain why human existence seems so bad.

It will not do to impose a metaphysical picture of the world that contradicts or does not take into account the human condition. That would mean ignoring the most personal and obvious while being committed to a potentially unknowable doctrine.

Basically, we need to have a manifest image of humanity. We can say that humanity gradually evolved out of other species of organisms. We can say that life is a result of entropy-dissipation. We can say that the universe was created 7+ billion years ago.

But none of these by themselves explains why human existence is the way it is. It does not explain why we feel so much suffering, boredom, angst. So what is it?

I think it's the human mind. Being able to reflect, contemplate, predict, and critically examine things leads not only to a greater ability to survive but a crippling defect as well (Zapffe).

So I think, from a naturalistic perspective, it's not that the world is malevolent or malignantly uncaring, but that some of the residents of the world are aliens to it. This, of course, still begs the question as to how and why these residents became aliens. Which I believe is why Schopenhauer thought the only explanation of this was that life was a kind of cosmic punishment. And we're right back to rationalism.

(there are just enough breaths that the river gives you to believe that pulling your head above water is a sot of 'gift' that the river gives you, notwithstanding it's the river drowning you to begin with). — The Great Whatever

Romantic as this may be, it fails to explain pleasure. Deprivationalism is incoherent. The pleasures of life are not just breaths of air to maintain us from drowning.

Of course many times these pleasures accompany needs. But it's obvious that these are pleasurable experiences in themselves and that there are also pleasurable experiences that are not dependent upon reliefs.

Most antinatalists, imo, want their pain recognized.That's what it's about. — csalisbury

We shouldn't diminish this pain, however.

But I consider myself rather pessimistic and have issues with birth, and yet I haven't really experienced anything absolutely horrible, at least nothing that I couldn't internally repress and attempt to ignore. I hold these beliefs because I am acutely aware of the conditions of human existence.

I've mentioned that before, I think, here or on the other forum and I've also mentioned my favorite anecdote - Cioran's letter to someone or other about seeing Beckett on a park bench and being just bowled over with envy for how deeply he appeared to be in despair. Susan Sontag, apropos of Cioran, describes the pessimistic style as often veering dangerously close to a 'coquettishness of the void.' . One becomes invested in one's pose and routine, which begins earnestly, but which becomes a well-oiled machine that runs on examples and aestheticizations of suffering. To quote Beckett: ''I must have got embroiled in a kind of inverted spiral, I mean one the coils of which, instead of widening more and more, grew narrower and narrower and finally, given the kind of space in which I was supposed to evolve, would come to an end for lack of room" — csalisbury

This is interesting. I think, however, the reason Cioran, Beckett, or Schopenhauer were able to live somewhat normally but still have such pessimistic views on life is because they got used to the reality. Schopenhauer explicitly calls the world a prison. They live lives not of extreme depression but neither extreme elevation - a contemplative and melancholic existence.

The anecdote of Cioran is funny because Cioran, being aware of the problems of existence, was unable to really feel any angst about it because he seemed to have become numb to them. Life will beat you to a pulp, and you either die or survive. Those who survive have to numb themselves somehow. Cioran wishing he felt despair would have allowed him to write more on the problems of the world, the same problems he had become numb to.

There does seem to be a certain tone of romanticism in some of their thoughts, though. The romanticism however seems to be just simply that - a fantastic tragedy meant to entertain by a catharsis. But when life hits you, it's not romantic at all. It's stupid, pointless, and raw. There is no romanticism in despair. There is no romanticism in actual angst. There is no romanticism in intolerable pain. It sucks, plain and simple, unworthy of any aesthetic elevation.

This makes sense to me!

It's hard to be an antinatalist when your friends are all having kids though :’( — csalisbury

Shit, I accidentally flagged your post.

Anyway thanks for the remark. I suppose it is difficult to remain an antinatalist while everyone else is having children. It's especially difficult when you know that most relationships you get into will end when you tell them you don't want children because of certain reasons.

I don't see how 'other things being equal' applies here. Can you explain? — John

What I meant is that in an isolated, laboratory-like setting, we have a duty to give other people pleasure and take away their pain. This setting would make us omniscient, omnipotent, and not restricted by other things, such as our own desires. This is why we have an obligation to stop a child-kidnapping by an old man, but we don't have an obligation to immediately get involved in a child-kidnapping when the kidnapper is a physically-hefty giant of a man with a gun. All of these are variables that affect our judgement, and more often than not this judgement revolves around our own self-preservation.

But that's the whole point of why I said we have no right to intentionally bring millions of people into existence ( by mass-cloning, say?), because we cannot know whether their lives would be predominately pleasurable or painful.

It's bad enough that we indulge in mass-breeding of animals! — John

Right, we can't know this. But suppose we can know this. Then it would be, at the very least, morally good to bring people into good existences.

The very process of philosophy is at least partly anchored on intuitions. We believe things because of reasons, and intuitions are often these reasons. If I can show you that one or more of your intuitions are wrong, then you will hopefully take my position. It's what I'm doing right now.

Those who are in their respective camps aren't usually so steadfast that it's impossible to change their intuitions on things.

I don't think our intuitions vary to such a degree that we can't come to a unified consensus.

1) Why do you think morality is (at least partly) about consequences?
2) Why do you think pleasure is good and pain is bad?
3) In what sense is the problem with life "structural", given your responses to (1) and (2)? — Sinderion

1) (At least partly), what we do is largely caused by our reasons, and our reasons tend to be a prediction of the future end-state.

2) I take it to be a blunt primitive that what is good is what is pleasurable, and what is bad is what is painful.

3) I would refer you to the various pessimistic philosophers.

Is that what your argument rests on? An intuitive acceptance of your claim that we have a duty to not prevent pleasure and a duty to not impose pain?

Or are these claims something that can actually be supported? — Michael

It's not that simple, obviously. We have a duty not to prevent pleasure as long as this does not create more pain, for example.

I take it to be obvious that ethics is keenly related to intuitions, if not entirely formed from them.

I would say you have no obligation to either bring pleasure to, or remove pain from, others, your obligation is only to refrain from (to the best of your knowledge and ability) removing their pleasure or bringing their pain.

Of course this is not to say that you should not help someone who is suffering when it is within your power, or that you should not give someone what they want, if it is within your power to know what that is, as well as to give it to them, and if you judge that what they want will truly benefit them, and not harm others. — John

That's why I mentioned ceteris paribus cases.

You certainly have no right to bring millions of others into existence, regardless of whether it is to bring them to experience pleasure or pain. — John

I would argue that we have no right to bring millions of people into an existence of suffering, but we at the very least have no constraints upon bringing millions of people into an existence of pleasure. If these people go on to have an objectively good life, I see no reason to call this immoral. However we can't know if they will have a good life and we have to look at the worst-case scenario.

That's not what I said.

So my point stands. If you don't have a definition of what a p-zombie is, your entire argument is empty. And if you stand that p-zombies are entities without qualia, your argument is trivial and question-begging.

It's fine. I'm a little sick of all of it myself I feel like I've already 'graduated,' no one has anything interesting to say on the subject I haven't heard already,and I think the important insights can't be communicated anyway. — The Great Whatever

How is this any different from esoteric nonsense? If you can't communicate, or at least help someone understand what these insights are, they're only important to you. And unless you're about to claim that you're infallible, there is a concern about whether or not it's bullshit.

Come now, didn't you just define a p-zombie as a specimen that lacks qualia?

Aren't p-zombies just people with no qualia? — The Great Whatever

That's what I thought.

If you believe that the absence of qualia makes someone a p-zombie, then the conclusion is rather trivial. It's like saying the disbelief in god makes someone an atheist. Of course it makes them an atheist, it's the definition of atheism. So of course if you define p-zombies in such a way that it means they lack any and all qualia, then they become p-zombies.

P-zombies are only a thing for those who take qualia seriously. Dennett doesn't take qualia seriously and would find the entirely concept of a p-zombie incoherent and empty. To say that Dennett is a p-zombie would again beg the question that qualia is something coherent.

About as funny as claiming nobody else has minds.

This is as I suspected: the thread is going to devolve into a thread about qualia itself, since without arguing for qualia, we can't assert that Dennett is a p-zombie without begging the question.

I don't really get Dennett's position. He has some good points but overall they don't convince me. Like I said before, I think this shows that Dennett is hell-bent on materialism, not that he is a p-zombie.

Individual instances of subjective, conscious experience. If Dennett can succeed in deconstructing qualia, he must show that somehow there is no such thing as conscious experience (what it is like-ness) and that this concept is somehow fundamentally flawed.

We shouldn't think Dennett to be a p-zombie for suggesting this. We should think of him as a rather dogmatic materialist, though. Someone who has made up his mind about materialism without considering all the angles.

Of course we can't prove that Dennett has qualia, just as we can't prove that Dennett or anyone else outside of our own even have minds. This is Witty's box-beetle analogy all over again.

From a naive point of view, pain in the left big toe actually is in the big toe. But after contemplation we understand that there is no actual pain in the left big toe. It just seems that way. Should those who adhere to the naive point of view think that we don't actually feel pain in our left big toe when we stub our toe? Both camps feel pain, but identify them in different areas.

So Dennett "feels" (tongue in cheek) qualia but does not think there is actually any qualia at all. He does not assert this, he actually goes to great lengths attempting to show how our feelings of qualia are misguided. He attempts to deconstruct qualia.

Now, if we could adequately show or prove that qualia is a real thing, and Dennett still did not change his mind, then we would think him dogmatic or mentally compromised. We might even be able to claim that he is a p-zombie. But until we show the qualia is an actual thing, we're begging the question.

I'm not saying he's plugging his ears. I'm saying maybe he doesn't understand the concept because he has no qualia. — The Great Whatever

But this begs the question. Do we all have qualia? I'm apt to say that anything conscious does have qualia. But to say that Dennett is a p-zombie because he denies qualia is to beg the question that it is already proven that we have qualia.

Self-esteem, executive agency, praise, positive interactions, etc. -- all these things are pleasurable. — Bitter Crank

I will distinguish between the sensual pleasures and the higher-order pleasures. Sensual pleasures are like sugar, sex, a massage, etc. Higher-order pleasures often contain sensual pleasures but are distinct from them. These higher-order pleasures are dependent upon one's self-esteem.

But why do people want to feel worthy or significant? — csalisbury

Because they are people, capable of introspection and who have a distinct sense that they are finite beings in an infinite world. Those capabilities threaten the survival of the person, who is one organism in a long chain of organisms, all who have survived by having advantageous traits, some of them behavioral. Because these capabilities allow the organism to see the world as it actually is, the human comes to understand his own impending death - an unacceptable conclusion - and must harness these same capabilities to create a cozy psychological shelter away from this threat.

In other words, people desire to feel worthy and significant because it staves off the idea of death. If an organism did not fear death, it would not survive very long. Culture arises in human society, which is a perpetual drunken haze sublimating this global fear into sects that people can identify with and extend their existences to.

But philosophers claim precisely not to be able to understand it, or that it's fundamentally confused, mistaken, or unintelligible. Aren't you just helping my case? — The Great Whatever

You're equivocating not being familiar with something with not understanding what it is. Dennett, for example, is familiar with the concept of qualia, but does not seem to understand it in the way that qualia-supporters do.

If I give good reasons for denying the reality of color (say I create an argument that attempts to reduce color to something non-colorful in the same way Dennett attempts to reduce qualia to something non-qualitative), you wouldn't call me blind. I'm just arguing that color as an actual thing is a myth, better understood by appeals to reduction.

So Dennett isn't plugging his ears and claiming the elephant in the room doesn't exist. He's just claiming that the elephant (simpliciter) isn't an elephant but something else.

Subjective, qualitative experiences. Dennett uses intuition pumps to try to break down this qualia and make it seem like a concept of folk psychology. He doesn't deny the prima facie ontology of qualia, though. Qualia is just a myth, according to Dennett.

It's not as if when defenders of qualia try to point out flaws in Dennett's reasoning, Dennett is metaphorically plugging his ears "lalala I can't hear you!" It's not as if Dennett and his opponents are talking about two different things. Dennett seems to be able, like any other rational human being, to change his mind. Should we automatically think that those who believe qualia is non-real are p-zombies? Shouldn't we give them the benefit of the doubt?

A philosophical zombie wouldn't even be able to comprehend the very concept of qualia. It would be like a blind man denying the color spectrum. Dennett is not a philosophical zombie (from the perspective of a supporter of qualia) because he clearly understands what qualia is supposed to be, and tries to reduce qualia to something non-qualitative. To his opponents, Dennett does not lack qualia, and to his supporters, everyone lacks qualia because qualia is seen as a myth.

I happen to disagree with Dennett on his position, but I certainly don't think that just because Dennett thinks qualia isn't real means that Dennett somehow is a philosophical zombie. I just think he's missing some pieces, and I believe that if these pieces were adequately brought forth, he might change his mind on his position.

Trump is either lying or doesn't know what he is talking about. — Bitter Crank

Por que no los dos?

Sanders probably won't be nominated unless Hillary is indicted before the Democratic Convention. Hillary's indictment after the convention will look a lot like a conspiracy, but it will probably sink her candidacy. — Bitter Crank

If Sanders has any chance of winning if Hillary is indicted, then he needs to make his presence felt not as a second-choice, plan B candidate but one that literally rises from the ashes of the Democratic party.

What's wrong? The phenomenon is the existence of the world. The explanation or interpretation of this are various appeals to god (theism) or a rejection of these appeals (atheism).

Absurd. Those who believe in god are not so radically different from those who do not in the way that someone without qualia is different from someone with qualia. A belief regarding the ontology of qualia does not lead to you actually representing this ontology.

Right, so since this view is obviously false, one hypothesis is that Dennett thinks this because he has no qualitative experiences, so they're incomprehensible to him. — The Great Whatever

But Dennett is a typical human being with a similar structure to other human beings that profess having qualitative experiences. If those other people are right in that qualia is something, then Dennett most likely also experiences qualitative episodes. If those other people are wrong that qualia is something, then Dennett is right and everyone does not have qualia.

Should we think that those who believe in god are somehow structurally different than those who do not? No, one group just lacks a belief in what another group has. The phenomenon is the same, the interpretation is different. Otherwise it's basically begging to question.

I highly doubt there are actually p-zombies. It'd be begging the question to assume that a structurally similar human being doesn't have consciousness...just because.

Those who deny qualia don't deny the seduction of appeals to qualia. You need to understand what people are talking about when they refer to qualia in order to even argue against it. Dennett does not deny that there are prima facie qualitative experiences, for example.

I would like to know which philosophers claim they are p-zombies. P-zombies are entities that distinctively lack something, while philosophers like Dennett don't think they lack something while others have it - they think that qualitative experience as a whole is a myth.

What's up, I've seen you over at the other forum. Welcome to our little garage band - we're still waiting for the moment when we'll hit the front page of Google. 8-)

You can't really get that from a TV show, which only has time for the middle of the middle of the main plot, and so ends up feeling like more of an obvious contrivance, like a soap opera, where characters behave the way they do because the writers need them to, and not because they might be seen as part of a larger functioning world. — The Great Whatever

I agree. Although the show originally motivated me to read the books. It's not really the fault of the producers that they can't show every detail of the books - that's just the nature of television. It's always going to cut up the story into an easily-digestible 45 minute amount. The key to success it seems is to minimize the butchering, and personally I think that most of the time GoT does it better than other shows or movies.

I'm worried that if time looping is introduced to the book series this way, that will all go out the window. Time travel is prime a shark-jumping tool, and once it's in there, all bets are off, because anything can or could have happened.

I'm not too fond of the show and thought the latest episode was really bad character death porn. — The Great Whatever

I am half-way through AFFC right now but I jumped ahead in the show. I was not really impressed by the latest episode, but I think overall the show does a good service to the books. At the very least, it's entertaining in more than one way ;)

Does the time travel thing happen in the books or was that introduced by the producers?

Why would the Will create beings that can oppose the Will? If the Will's nature is to Live, then why would it even allow creatures that can counteract its nature?

Gravity for example keeps us rooted to the ground. But we still made airplanes and rockets that counteract this gravity. We have to work against gravity but we can still do it. But gravity is not a metaphysical, all-encompassing force. Gravity is within the world. So it is understandable that we can counteract gravity, for we are not objectifications of gravity. But if we are objectifications of the Will to Live, then it should be apparent that it should be impossible for us to have evolved cognitive capacities to counteract this Will to Live. It would be against the fundamental nature of the Will to create beings that do not Will.

The Will would presumably "want" to continue to Will for as long as possible. Creating beings that do not Will only hastens the end of the Will. Consciousness and the ability to reflect upon the pointlessness of the Will should not be possible if we are manifestations of the Will. Our consciousness and reflective ability must have come from something else if we are to take seriously this theory of the Will.

the laws are an objectification of it. — The Great Whatever

Then why is it possible to not strive for life? Why is it possible to meditate, enjoy aesthetics, commit suicide, etc? Surely these would also be objectifications of the Will?

It is outside those laws and all physical laws, because those laws are just objectifications of it. It isn't a metaphor because it's more real and concretely known than any physical or represented thing. — The Great Whatever

No offense but this is kind of a cop-out. If it's outside the laws, how can it act on them?

Why would the Will (to live) create something that would eventually lead to a rejection of the will to live? Why would it hasten its own demise?

A disturbing quote to this effect from Schop.: "...the will must live on itself, for there exists nothing beside it, and it is a hungry will." Schop's favored image of how the world works is one animal eating another. Since we are all objectifications of the same will, it is literally eating itself (and people in harming each other are aware in a vague and traumatic sense that they are harming themselves). — The Great Whatever

How does the Will live on itself without eventually running out of anything to feed on? Like an ouroboros, it cannot constantly eat itself. Unless of course the Will is outside of the laws of thermodynamics and energy conservation, in which case it just becomes a mystical metaphor with little actual explanatory power except for illuminating the human condition.

If life did not exist, would there be any Will to self-cannibalize? Are we talking entropy here?

I watched the episode and was thoroughly confused regarding that aspect. Bran time traveling back in time causing Hodor to lose his wits, which later caused Hodor in the future to be what he is, but Hodor in the future had to be what he is before Bran could warg into him...it's contradictory.