Article  "The Schopenhauerian Mind" (book review)

https://ndpr.nd.edu/reviews/the-schopenhauerian-mind/

INTRO: The Schopenhauerian Mind reflects the recent surge of interest in Arthur Schopenhauer’s philosophy and its influence on modern thought. The volume is divided into five main sections and includes thirty-eight chapters. The first three sections focus on Schopenhauer’s core philosophical domains: epistemology (“Part I: Knowledge and Reality”), aesthetics (“Part II: Aesthetics and the Arts”), and ethics (“Part III: Ethics, Politics, and Salvation”).

The collection offers some stimulating discussions of Schopenhauer’s thought, making it relevant for anyone interested in his philosophy. Yet, it is not without limitations.

The final two sections (“Part IV: Before Schopenhauer” and “Part V: After Schopenhauer”) comprise roughly 42 percent of the total work. This disproportionate focus on Schopenhauer’s connections and influence in European thought comes at the expense of a fuller treatment of his metaphysics—arguably the backbone of his system.

Schopenhauer was a system builder whose ethical and aesthetic views are inseparable from his metaphysics. The volume, however, offers few satisfactory analyses of these interconnections.

Notably, apart from Manja Kisner’s essay, the term “metaphysics” is absent from all section and chapter titles. Part I opens with Douglas McDermid’s “Realism and Its Discontents”, devoted to Schopenhauer’s rejection of metaphysical realism—the view that objects and properties exist independently of perception. McDermid attributes to Schopenhauer the following five theses:

T.1: The view that physical objects are mind-independent is not self-evident.
T.2: If metaphysical realism is true, then we can know only appearances, not things in themselves.
T.3: We cannot conceive of a mind-independent empirical world of objects apart from subjects.
T.4: Metaphysical realism conflicts with our a priori recognition of causality.
T.5: Metaphysical realism conflicts with our a priori recognition of space and time.

McDermid’s attribution of these theses to Schopenhauer warrants clarification... (MORE - details)

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/d8IZ0L5596s

In the book Maps of Meaning by Jordan B. Peterson, two quotes stand out: 1.] That the God of Islam, Judaism and Christianity, the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, places Himself beyond worldly change, and unites the temporal opposites in the great circle of His Being.

As you can see, anyone who denies this as a possibility is not only insincere in their disbelief, but fails to see how this can aid in providing one with a genuine and possibly correct concept of God.

And secondly, 2.] Christ pushes morality strictly beyond codified tradition. Not because codified tradition is unnecessary, but because it is insufficient.

God is the only thing we can think of when we confront death. As I have been known to say, we do not experience the horrors of oblivion when we die.

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https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/K7FVinfllWs

(Dec 6, 2025 11:58 PM)Ostronomos Wrote: God is the only thing we can think of when we confront death. As I have been known to say, we do not experience the horrors of oblivion when we die.

Yeah, I agree, we would not experience the horrors of oblivion. We would no longer exist to experience anything, which doesn't sound so bad. We spend most of our time trying to kill time. What in hell would we do with eternity?

We never realize eternity. Like most dreams, once we leave them they are soon forgotten. The same would be true of a past life. If your memory is effectively reset, everything is new all over again... every time.

Quote:In the book Maps of Meaning by Jordan B. Peterson, two quotes stand out: 1.] That the God of Islam, Judaism and Christianity, the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, places Himself beyond worldly change, and unites the temporal opposites in the great circle of His Being.

As you can see, anyone who denies this as a possibility is not only insincere in their disbelief, but fails to see how this can aid in providing one with a genuine and possibly correct concept of God.

Unless like in Taoism or process metaphysics the principle of change and novelty is itself the Divine principle, all things flowing apart and together in one universal and manifold urge to be.

(Dec 7, 2025 01:47 AM)Syne Wrote: We never realize eternity. Like most dreams, once we leave them they are soon forgotten. The same would be true of a past life. If your memory is effectively reset, everything is new all over again... every time.

Is that something that you really believe?

(Dec 7, 2025 04:41 PM)Secular Sanity Wrote:

(Dec 7, 2025 01:47 AM)Syne Wrote: We never realize eternity. Like most dreams, once we leave them they are soon forgotten. The same would be true of a past life. If your memory is effectively reset, everything is new all over again... every time.

Is that something that you really believe?

If we live multiple lives, yes.

(Dec 7, 2025 01:43 AM)Secular Sanity Wrote:

(Dec 6, 2025 11:58 PM)Ostronomos Wrote: God is the only thing we can think of when we confront death. As I have been known to say, we do not experience the horrors of oblivion when we die.

Yeah, I agree, we would not experience the horrors of oblivion. We would no longer exist to experience anything, which doesn't sound so bad. We spend most of our time trying to kill time. What in hell would we do with eternity?

This is the misconception that atheists peddle. It is false. Consciousness continues after death of the body.

Even in the context of some generic subjectivity that we either dissolve back into or are just a local component and instance of... It's not a continuance of this particular personal identity if the latter's memories are not retained. I mean, it's still equivalent to "absence of everything" after death for Jane Doe once the stored and utilized information constituting Jane Doe ceases, even if there is some grand manifestation behind the universe which persists that is inclusive of all specific or discrete manifestations of images, sounds, feelings, etc affiliated with a multitude of short-lived biological bodies. One "light" in the Overarching Experience just winked out in the collective, even if the others remain.

Which is to say, one really does need a simulation-like scenario where information about the life of _X_ digital person is retained, and then resurrected in a new body in either a similarly simulated afterlife or at the prior-in-rank stratum itself that makes the simulations possible. Reincarnation could even be possible in that scenario, too, but memories of all the former identities must be accessible during an "in-between" phase so that there can be any shared sense of it being the same infomorph persisting. Otherwise, it just becomes akin to the situation above -- where former identities like Lucy Lute and Timmy Trott and Drew Dinx are gone for good (at least in a presentism conception of time, not the eternalism view).

The lessons learned are retained without the lessons themselves remembered. It's like finding inspiration from a dream you don't remember. You retain the "feel" or the moment of inspiration/idea, but without any of the context. Or like knowing how to add without remembering exactly how you learned to.