Artur Schopenhauer 1788 was born in Danzig, now Gdansk, Poland. His father is a wealthy businessman and banker who is good at business. He is withdrawn, irritable, severe and melancholy. His mother is a famous novelist, 20 years younger than his father. She is beautiful, intelligent, cheerful, lively and sociable. Schopenhauer said he inherited his father's character. Really, he has been withdrawn and depressed since childhood, and likes to meditate. Schopenhauer was arranged by his father to be educated in France and England. He also traveled to European countries under the leadership of his parents many times. These experiences made him not have strong nationalist thoughts like many Germans, and Schopenhauer claimed that his thoughts were "cosmopolitan".

1805, 17-year-old Schopenhauer entered a commercial office in Hamburg as an intern in accordance with his father's will. Father hopes that he can inherit his career. However, Schopenhauer is not interested in accounting, bookkeeping and banking. He often takes time out to read or meditate. How much he wants to engage in academic research! Soon, his father suddenly fell into the canal outside his house and drowned. The death of his father made Schopenhauer more withdrawn, melancholy and pessimistic. However, without his father's control, he is free to choose his own life path.

Schopenhauer entered the University of G? ttingen on 1809. He was in the medical department first, and then transferred to the philosophy department. Here, he is very interested in physics, chemistry, botany, anatomy, physiology, astronomy, meteorology and other natural sciences. 18 1 1 transferred to Berlin university to study philosophy. But when he listened to the lectures by famous professors Fichte and schleiermacher, he was disappointed. He hates Fichte's mysterious eloquence and arrogant attitude. Schopenhauer also found fault with Fichte's mistakes in his lectures and argued with him endlessly.

Soon, the war of liberation broke out, but Schopenhauer was indifferent. He left Berlin, hid further away from the battlefield and began to write his thesis. 18 13 completed the dissertation "Four Roots of Manchu Law", submitted it to the University of Jena, and obtained the doctorate certificate. Then he returned to Weimar's mother's residence, where he met the great poet and writer Goethe and made friends with him. Goethe commissioned him to study color, and his research result was the paper Vision and Color published by 18 16. Because his personality was incompatible with his mother, his mother's debauchery made him even more dissatisfied, so he moved to Dresden on 18 14.

In Dresden, he worked hard and persevered, and finally spent four years writing the main work of establishing the system, The World as Will and Representation. 1865438+On March 28th, 2008, Schopenhauer wrote in a letter to the publisher: "My work is a new philosophical system, and it is a new system to the letter, because it is not a new exposition of an existing philosophical system, but a new philosophical system that combines a series of thoughts that have not been thought of so far, and this work is definitely different from the new philosophical school. 18 19 At the beginning of this year, Schopenhauer's book was published and was warmly praised by Goethe.

Schopenhauer was accepted as an additional lecturer by Berlin University on 1820. At that time, rationalism philosophy represented by Hegel was in vogue. However, Schopenhauer opposed this philosophy and dared to despise Hegel and other philosophical authorities. At the same time, he is confident in his philosophy and wants to compete with Hegel. He proposed to hold lectures at the same time on the same day as Hegel's lectures three times a week. As a result, Hegel's class was packed, while Schopenhauer's class was deserted, with only three or five listeners. He failed. He laughed at himself and said, "How high is Socrates' reputation among his contemporaries? "

Two years later, he had to resign as a lecturer with resentment and frustration. But he wouldn't. 1826, he returned to teach at the University of Berlin and failed again. 183 1 year, a cholera epidemic occurred in Berlin, and Schopenhauer quickly fled Berlin. Since then, his experience of teaching in the university has ended forever. Schopenhauer has lived in Frankfurt on the Rhine since 1832. He lived here for 28 years until his death.

For Schopenhauer, 1848 The days before the German Revolution were a fluke. No one listened to his lectures, and no one bought his books when they were published. It is said that of the 500 dissertations published by 18 13, 10 only sold 150. Only 100 of the 800 main works were sold in a year and a half, and the publishing house kept a small part, and the rest were all waste paper. Schopenhauer hoped for success and longed for honor, but fate deliberately played tricks on him. He resented, he was upset, he was sad, but it didn't help. 1832, he wrote in "Meditation" in Frankfurt: "The extreme contempt for my works shows that either I can't live in contemporary life, or the opposite. In either case, it means that there is only silence left. " Yes, Schopenhauer failed not because he had no talent, but because he didn't live in his time. At that time, the German bourgeoisie was still a class yearning for revolution, full of hope and vigor. How can Schopenhauer's pessimistic philosophy full of dark emotions be accepted by them? However, after the revolution, the situation is very different. The revolution ended in failure. The bourgeoisie was defeated by feudal forces. What little revolutionary courage it had was lost. For a time, pessimism, lack of progress, and stealing security have become the general mentality of the broad bourgeoisie. 1852, Uncle Ben Umbrella published Appendix and Addendum to guide people to find his main works to read. At this time, people suddenly realized that Schopenhauer had revealed people's mood at this time as early as 30 years ago and spoke their minds. For Schopenhauer, it is generous for people to meet and hate each other late. 1844 published the book "The World as Will and Representation", which has been slow-moving, immediately became a hot commodity and sold out quickly. Schopenhauer became famous and became a great philosopher. For a time, a "Schopenhauer trend" appeared in the society. Some celebrities who used to despise Schopenhauer are now uncharacteristically respectful to him. 1855, the bourgeoisie held an oil painting exhibition for Schopenhauer in Frankfurt. 1858 On Schopenhauer's 70th birthday, many celebrities and dignitaries came to congratulate him, and a large number of congratulatory letters poured in from European countries.

Schopenhauer finally succeeded. In the preface to the third edition of his main work written in 1859, he wrote with joy: "I finally found comfort in Peterak's famous sentence, that is,' whoever walks all day and arrives in the evening should be satisfied.' I finally arrived. In the last few years of my life, I saw my influence begin to start, and at the same time I was satisfied with hoping that my influence would conform to the ancient law of' spreading for a long time and getting rich late'. "

Schopenhauer in his later years was intoxicated with the honor of his death. His original withdrawn, melancholy and pessimistic personality has changed greatly, and people have become amiable. He read all the published articles about him carefully, and he paid people to collect newspapers and magazines to comment on his articles.

Frankfurt is a beautiful town. Schopenhauer rented two houses and lived a comfortable life. He has no wife and children, so he is exempted from housework; There are not many relatives and friends who come to visit and disturb. He was accompanied by a white poodle named Atom (meaning the spirit of the universe). Schopenhauer deliberately imitated the lifestyle of the great philosopher Kant. For more than 20 years, life has been very regular: drink a cup of espresso for breakfast in the morning and study or write for 3 hours in the morning; Then go to the restaurant for lunch and play the flute enthusiastically after dinner; Concentrate on reading in the afternoon; Take the puppy for a walk at night. Often go to the theater or opera house in the evening; Read for a while before going to bed. There are a lot of books in his room. There is a bust of Kant on the bookcase and portraits of Goethe and Shakespeare on the wall. There is a bearskin mattress on the ground. That's where his beloved dog lies. Schopenhauer's later years may be due to his carefree spirit. He always felt that he was in good health, confident that he could live a long life, and refused to seek medical advice. One day, he sat at his desk, ready to proofread the manuscript, and he was waiting for the landlady to bring coffee. The landlady put coffee in front of him and called him, but he didn't agree-he had left this world as a will and representative. The time is 1860.

Schopenhauer's anecdotes are numerous, so I won't list them here. People recognize him as a genius and a great philosopher. But he is often very picky about his personality. Russell, a famous modern British philosopher, said that in his life, it was difficult to find any traces of virtue except kindness to animals. He is completely selfish. Many people point out that he is a hypocrite and have different views.

Schopenhauer's erudition is universally acknowledged. He read a large number of ancient and modern philosophy and religious classics in the East and West, and was familiar with a large number of ancient and modern European literary works and various natural science achievements at that time. He is familiar with many foreign languages, such as English and French. His writing style has won wide acclaim.

Schopenhauer had a tenacious and persistent struggle with rationalist philosophers represented by Hegel when he established his position in irrational philosophy. When he was a college student and a teacher, he hated and opposed Hegel and Fichte. In the preface of the second edition written by 1844 for his main works, he severely denounced and criticized rationalist philosophers such as Hegel, described Hegel, Fichte and Schelling as "famous sophists" and called Hegel "the spiritual Kareben (ugly ghost)", saying that their philosophy was hypocritical, bad, absurd and meaningless. Exposing their philosophy is a tool of state rulers, not truth at all. It is said that they engage in philosophy not to pursue truth, but to earn money to support their families. Schopenhauer's criticism of rationalism philosophy is inappropriate, but it really hits the nail on the head.

In political position, Schopenhauer stood on the side of the most reactionary class of the German bourgeoisie, trying to maintain the feudal ruling order and opposing revolution and democracy. He openly opposed the 1848 revolution, cursed the revolutionary masses as "out-and-out thugs", called the executioner who suppressed the revolutionary people "his dear friends", and even lent them his binoculars to let them photograph the "thugs" more accurately. He also made a will, stipulating that part of his property should be donated to the survivors of soldiers who were injured and killed in the suppression revolution.

Schopenhauer's pessimism

Schopenhauer accepted the banner of Kant's criticism to a certain extent, and thought that science and philosophy understood with the help of rational concepts and categories can only reach phenomena but not things themselves. But he stressed that things themselves are indispensable to people's morality. Schopenhauer expressed his world outlook with two propositions: "The world is my representation" and "The world is my will". He thinks that everything in the phenomenal world is just my appearance, and the "pillar of actual existence" of the world is my will. People's understanding of the existence and relationship of representation inevitably comes down to some form of "according to the law", or existence (perception of time and space), or change (intellectuality and causality), or behavior (self-awareness and motivation about human behavior), or cognition (rationality and logic). As the essence of the world, existence and movement are beyond the reach of any cognitive ability and can only be perceived by intuition. This is the existence and movement of the will of life and the basis of all appearances. The will of life creates everything, and man is the highest form of objectification of the will of life. Therefore, the source of people's will to survive, the reason and motivation of all actions can only be found in my will. Obviously, Schopenhauer replaced the traditional ontological position of "reason" and "idea" with will, trying to find the meaning of life from will (not from reason), which is quite different from traditional metaphysics. This is also the source of his attraction to young Nietzsche.

Schopenhauer criticized Kant's moral philosophy with his volition theory-the last refuge of God and the last fortress of traditional metaphysics. He laughed at "Kant (conveniently) regarded practical reason as the direct source of all virtues and described it as an absolute throne". Schopenhauer emphasized that moral obligation cannot be based on rationality, because the essence of human beings lies not in rationality, but in the will to life. Since any behavior based on will can only be self-interested, then moral obligation can only be based on justice and love, which must be at the expense of the suppression of the will of life. He said: "Our obligations to ourselves, like our obligations to others, must be based on justice and love." It is impossible for them to establish their obligations on an appropriate basis, because the basic principle is self-evident: what they will do is harmless. Because what I do is always what I want, and what I do to myself is only what I want, nothing else; So, it won't be unfair. "In other words, in Schopenhauer's view, people's actions are based on their own will, and justice is not important. The morality of behavior is endowed, and obligation is not based on human will, so it cannot be the basic virtue of human behavior.

Schopenhauer believes that will is absolute, and the freedom of will does not depend on reason. Any behavior of human beings is an activity of will. But it is also necessary to distinguish between the will activity as an objectified behavior and the will of life itself ("thing itself"). Only the will of life itself is unfounded, absolute and free, while the will activity is grounded, causal and relative. Thus, in Schopenhauer's view, although the will itself is absolute "self-determination", all human actions are not free. Because "individual people and personality people themselves are not the will of things, but the phenomenon of will." As phenomena, they have been decided to enter the form of phenomena and enter the law. " Therefore, although man has a lot of pre-planning and repeated thinking, his actions have not changed. He must always play a role he doesn't want to play from the beginning to the end of his life, and he must also perform his part of the plot to the end of the play. Schopenhauer said: human existence "must keep jumping and scurrying on a circle surrounded by hot coal", which is endless, but it can't go on like this.

It is precisely because Schopenhauer thinks that the fate of life is the inevitability of will activity that he opposes the traditional view that human happiness and happiness satisfaction are the basis of morality, and thinks that happiness or happiness is not necessarily related to morality. On the contrary, Schopenhauer believes that moral behavior itself means the denial of personal happiness, which means that the actor must endure greater pain, or that morality is the denial and sacrifice of the will to life. Because moral behavior, as a kind of contribution to him, runs counter to the essence of the will to life. Schopenhauer adopted Hobbes' logic and thought that morality was produced because of the overall survival and development needs of mankind. In order to avoid the conflict between individual behaviors and relationships of human beings and better safeguard the will of human beings as a whole, people have formed moral concepts among themselves.

Schopenhauer absolutes and mystifies the will to life itself, separates it from the individual life (appearance) of the phenomenon, and regards morality as the negative form of the will to life of the individual self, so he is bound to draw pessimistic conclusions.

In Schopenhauer's view, the essence of human beings lies in the constant pursuit of their own will to life. As an objectified will to life, as an individual, man is "the condensation of thousands of needs". Demand, desire and pursuit are human life. There are two basic human desires, namely, the individual's desire for self-survival (such as food and color, etc.). ) and human desire for self-development (that is, "the need for racial continuity"). Man's desire stems from demand, which is the pain of scarcity and insatiable greed. Because of constant desires and needs, life is also painful. Schopenhauer said: "Desire is endless, demand is endless, satisfaction is short-lived and the weight is tight." What's more, this final satisfaction itself is even false. In fact, this desire to be satisfied immediately gave way to a new desire. The former is a recognized mistake, and the latter is still an unrecognized mistake. "In this way, life will never be happy. In daily life, people are often intoxicated by a temporary indulgence, but after waking up, they are still hungry, happy, empty, troubled and miserable. Trouble comes from the distance between endless desire for life and limited satisfaction; Pain is a natural reaction that cannot achieve its goal; Emptiness comes from boredom after short-term satisfaction of desire.

In Schopenhauer's view, life is nothing but pain. In other words, pain is the essence of life. Moreover, the more perfect the will phenomenon, the more painful it is. Plants have no feelings, so there is no pain; The sensory ability of animals is limited, and the pain is relative; Only man, as the highest stage of objectification of life will, is also the most painful. Genius is the most painful among people. When people are willing to suffer, all that remains is great boredom. Therefore, Schopenhauer said that life is like a "pendulum", always swinging between pain and boredom.

Since pain is the inevitable product of the will of life itself, the only way to get rid of pain is to deny the will of life. Schopenhauer thinks there are two ways to get rid of pain. One is to temporarily give up his will to life through artistic "observation"; One is to seek permanent liberation by abstinence and completely denying the will of life.

Schopenhauer thinks that art is a good way for people to get rid of pain. People enter the aesthetic "pure observation" through artistic activities, immerse themselves in artistic intuition, and enter the transcendental realm of selflessness, so that their subjectivity is "lost" in the observation of artistic objects. In this way, individuals can temporarily get rid of the entanglement of their own life will and escape from the painful sea. For this reason, Schopenhauer called art the "detergent" of life will, and thought that architectural beauty and natural beauty were the most basic observation, tragedy was the highest observation, and music was the most profound observation. Schopenhauer emphasized, however, that artistic views have only a temporary effect. Once people wake up from the artistic vision, the existence and relationship as the will of life are imposed on others, and the painful torture begins again. Therefore, people can't expect to get rid of the pain of eternal life by art.

In order to eliminate the pain of eternal life, we must completely deny the will of life. Schopenhauer believes that this requires abstinence and even death to destroy the will of life. Schopenhauer said that abstinence is "intentional destruction of the will". Because as long as life exists, "all the will of life must exist in terms of its possibility, and it is still struggling to re-enter reality and burn again with all its enthusiasm." Therefore, only abstinence and death can completely get rid of the shackles of the will of life and get rid of the painful life.

Schopenhauer believes that abstinence is based on the insight and consciousness of the nature of life will, and it has some basic ways, namely, voluntarily giving up sexual desire, being willing to endure pain and hunger strike. Schopenhauer said: "Because sexual desire is the core of the will to survive and the focus of all desires, I call the reproductive organs' the focus of the will'. Not only that, but even human beings can be said to be the embodiment of sexual desire, because the origin of human beings is due to coitus, and the combination of the two sexes is also the desire of human beings in desire. Only in this way can we combine with other phenomena and make human beings last forever. "Therefore, voluntarily giving up sexual desire is the first denial of the will to life and the first step to bid farewell to the painful life. At the same time, Schopenhauer emphasized that pain is not only the bitter fruit brought by the will of life, but also the "purification furnace" of life suffering. Only as Buddhism teaches, people are willing to endure the hardships of real life and remain indifferent, can they truly understand the details of desperate life, and then consciously get rid of the pain and enter the "bliss in silence." "However, the only absolutely effective way to fundamentally deny the will to life is to die of a voluntary hunger strike. This kind of "suicide" is a kind of suicide different from ordinary suicide. It is not produced from the will of life, but an act of "completely interrupting desire before interrupting life". When people get to this point, they will dissolve the pain and declare the end of boring life, leaving nothing. " With the voluntary denial and abandonment of the will, all those phenomena that have no goals and ends at all levels have been cancelled, and the incessant hectic and desperate efforts that the world exists and exists because of it; Layer after layer of formal diversity has been cancelled, and with the cancellation of random records, the whole phenomenon of will has also been cancelled; Finally, the universal form, time and space of these phenomena, as well as the final basic form, subject and object are cancelled. No will, no appearance, no world. ..... So what remains in front of us is the passing away, and nothing is the last thing hanging behind all virtues and sacredness. ……" 。 In this way, Schopenhauer consciously turned from pessimism to nihilism, thus fulfilling Nietzsche's assertion that pessimism is an early form of nihilism.

Nietzsche resolutely opposed Schopenhauer's pessimism. Schopenhauer explained the world and life with will and emphasized the significance of art to life, but it gave Nietzsche great inspiration. But fundamentally speaking, Nietzsche regards Schopenhauer's pessimism as a negative nihilism, which is "inferior to the old metaphysics and no longer has the ability to explain and create fiction".

In Nietzsche's view, negative nihilism is the result of the need and inability to invent a "real world" and the lack of courage to accept it. It is often the product of "idealism". Nietzsche said: "If a philosopher may be a nihilist, then he is, because he has found nothingness behind all human ideals. It's not even nothingness-it's just worthless, absurd, morbid, cowardly and boring things, all kinds of dregs poured out of the drained cup of life ... ". Schopenhauer's pessimism finally found a huge "nothing".

Nietzsche pointed out that pessimism, as a negative nihilism, stems from its denial of life. "The reason for pessimism" is that "life so powerful so far and the desire to have a bright future have been condemned, so life curses itself". Although there are various types of pessimism, such as "sensitive pessimism (too much pain, too much excitement);" Pessimism with illiberal will (in other words, lack of resistance to stimulation); Suspicive pessimism (fear of solidification, fear of grasping, fear of touching) ". However, "aren't these all exactly the same decadent and pathological phenomena?" ..... too much emphasis on moral values, or fictional' the other side', or social emergency, very painful, and so on. Any exaggeration of narrow views is a sign of illness. Paying attention to negation is definitely the same as not paying attention to it! Schopenhauer's pessimism, as a kind of "sensitive pessimism", is a typical form of this negative nihilism, which attaches importance to negation and ignores affirmation.

Of course, there is another kind of pessimism, which Nietzsche calls "strong pessimism", "rational pessimism" and "our pessimism". Nietzsche said: "Our pessimism is not as valuable as what we say in the world-our belief itself has greatly increased our desire for knowledge, so that we have to say so." In this way, the world is becoming less and less valuable; Because the world is thought to be like this. -only in this sense, we are pessimists; We should admit the new valuation without reservation, and never stick to the rules and deceive ourselves ... "This pessimism is" strong pessimism ". Under the strong pessimism, "man no longer defends evil, but he flatly refuses to defend evil." People should enjoy evil completely and thoroughly, and think that meaningless evil is the most interesting. Nietzsche said that this pessimism is an extreme form of pessimism, and with it, "real nihilism will come out", and Nietzsche confidently said "I have seen this". Nietzsche "saw" because this is what he pursued and implemented. Nietzsche took the banner of Schopenhauer, but he innovated it. This innovation turned Schopenhauer's "sensitive pessimism" into strong pessimism, and at the same time made nihilism thorough, from "negative nihilism" into "positive nihilism". It can be said that in Nietzsche's view, "strong pessimism", "complete nihilism" and positive nihilism are synonyms. Nietzsche himself gave full affirmation and clear explanation to his innovation movement:

"My innovation. -Pessimism continues to develop and rationality is pessimistic. Because, moral criticism, dissipated the last comfort. The knowledge of decadent signs blinds any powerful behavior; Culture is isolated, which is wrong, but it has become strong.

1, I am committed to opposing the decline and weakening of personality. I'm looking for a new center.

I realize that this kind of effort is impossible.

3. So, I continued on the road of destruction-where I found the source of personal strength. I must be the destroyer! -I realize that the state of destruction, individuals can not perfect their own state, but the reaction of general life and individual circumstances. I adhere to the theory of eternal reincarnation and oppose the sense of paralysis caused by the destruction of the universe and imperfection. "