Altur Schopenhauer was born in Danzig, Germany, on February 22nd, 1788, which is 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 He is withdrawn, irritable, severe and melancholy.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, 2 years younger than his father. She is beautiful, intelligent, cheerful, lively and sociable. Schopenhauer said that he inherited his character from his father. Really, he has been withdrawn and depressed since childhood, and likes to meditate.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 led by his parents many times. These experiences made him not have a strong nationalist thought like many Germans, and Schopenhauer claimed that his thought was "cosmopolitan".
in p>185, at the age of 17, Schopenhauer obeyed his father's wishes and entered a business firm in Hamburg as an intern shop assistant. Father hopes that he can inherit his career. However, Schopenhauer showed no interest in accounting, bookkeeping and banking. He often takes time off 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 The death of his father made Schopenhauer more withdrawn, melancholy and pessimistic.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 in p>189. He was first in the Department of Medicine and then transferred to the Department of Philosophy. Here, he is very interested in physics, chemistry, botany, anatomy, physiology, astronomy, meteorology and other natural sciences. In 1811, he transferred to Berlin University to study philosophy. But he was disappointed when he listened to the lectures of famous professors Fichte and Schleiermacher. He resented Fichte's mysterious eloquence and arrogant attitude. Schopenhauer also quibbled for mistakes in Fichte's lectures and argued with him.
Soon after the war of liberation broke out, Schopenhauer was indifferent. He left Berlin, hid further away from the battlefield and began to write his dissertation. In 1813, he completed his dissertation "Four Roots of Full Law", submitted it to the University of Jena, and obtained a doctorate certificate. Then he returned to Weimar's mother's place, where he met Goethe, a great poet and writer, and made friends with him. Goethe commissioned him to study color, and his research result was the paper Vision and Color published in 1816. Because he was incompatible with his mother's personality, his mother's debauchery made him even more dissatisfied, so he moved to Dresden in 1814.
In Dresden, he worked diligently and persistently, and finally spent four years writing the main work of establishing the system, The World as Will and Representation. On March 28th, 1818, 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 interpretation of an existing philosophical system, but a new philosophical system that combines a series of ideas that have not been thought of so far to the highest degree. This work is definitely different from the rhetoric, vagueness and meaningless of the new philosophical school. At the beginning of 1819, Schopenhauer's book was published and was warmly praised by Goethe.
In p>182, Schopenhauer was accepted as an extra lecturer at the University of Berlin. At that time, it was the time when rationalism philosophy represented by Hegel was popular. Schopenhauer, however, 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 offered to put his lectures three times a week at the same hour on the same day as Hegel's lectures. As a result, Hegel's class was packed, but Schopenhauer's class was deserted, with only three or five listeners. He failed, and he laughed at himself and said, "How high is Socrates' reputation among his contemporaries?"
after two years, he had to resign as a lecturer with resentment and frustration. But he was unwilling. In 1826, he returned to teach at the University of Berlin and failed again. In 1831, there was a cholera epidemic in Berlin, and Schopenhauer quickly fled Berlin. Since then, his experience of teaching at 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, the days before the German Revolution in p>1848 were a fluke. No one listens to his lectures, and no one buys books when they are published. It is said that of the 5 dissertations published in 1813, only 15 were sold in 1 years. Only 1 of the 8 major works were sold in a year and a half, and the publisher kept a small part, and the rest were treated as waste paper. Schopenhauer hoped for success and longed for honor, but fate deliberately played a trick on him. He resented, he was upset and he was sad, but all to no avail. In 1832, in his "Meditation" in Frankfurt, he wrote: "The extreme contempt for my works shows that either I have failed to live in contemporary life, or vice versa. In either case, it means that all that remains is silence. " Yes, Schopenhauer's failure was not due to his lack of talent, but to his failure to live in his time. At that time, the German bourgeoisie was still a class yearning for revolution, full of hope and full of vigor. How could Schopenhauer's pessimistic philosophy saturated with dark emotions be accepted by them? However, after the revolution, the situation was very different. The revolution ended in failure. The bourgeoisie was beaten up by the feudal forces. What little revolutionary courage it had was lost. For a time, pessimism, failure to make progress, and stealing peace have become the general mentality of the broad bourgeoisie. In 1852, Uncle Benumbrella published the book Appendices and Addenda, which led people to look for his main works to read. At this time, people suddenly realized that Schopenhauer had exposed people's state of mind at this time as early as 3 years ago, and spoke their minds. For Schopenhauer, people are very generous to meet and hate each other late. The book The World as Will and Representation, published in 1844, which has been unsalable, immediately became a hot commodity and sold out quickly. Schopenhauer became famous and became a great philosopher. For a time, there was a "Schopenhauer trend" in society. Some celebrities who used to despise Schopenhauer are now uncharacteristically respectful to him. In 1855, the bourgeoisie held an oil painting exhibition for Schopenhauer in Frankfurt. On Schopenhauer's 7th birthday in 1858, many celebrities and dignitaries came to congratulate him, and a large number of congratulatory letters came to him 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, which is:' Whoever walks all day and arrives in the evening should be satisfied.' I finally got there. In the last years of my life, I have seen my influence start to launch, and at the same time, I am satisfied with the hope that my influence will conform to the ancient law of' spreading for a long time and getting rich late'.
Schopenhauer in his later years was intoxicated by the late honor. His original withdrawn, melancholy and pessimistic personality has greatly changed, and people have become amiable. He carefully read all the published articles about him, and he paid people to collect articles commenting on him in newspapers and magazines.
Frankfurt is a beautiful town. Schopenhauer rented two houses and lived a comfortable life. He has no wife and children, thus exempting him 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 Cosmic Spirit). Schopenhauer deliberately imitated the lifestyle of the great philosopher Kant. For more than 2 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 a restaurant for lunch and play the flute enthusiastically after dinner; Concentrate on reading in the afternoon; Take a long walk in the evening accompanied by a puppy. Often go to the theater or opera house in the evening; Read for a while before going to bed. There are a large number of books in his room. There is a bust of Kant on the bookcase, and portraits of Goethe and Shakespeare are hung on the wall. There is a bearskin mattress on the ground. That's where his beloved dog lies. Schopenhauer in his later years may be because of his carefree spirit. He always felt in good health, confident that he could live a long life, and refused to seek medical treatment and medication. One day, he was sitting at the table, preparing 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 a representation. The year is 186.
Schopenhauer's anecdotes are numerous, so we won't list them here. People admit that he is a genius and a great philosopher. But he is often very critical of his character. Russell, a famous modern British philosopher, said that it was difficult to find any traces of virtue in his life except kindness to animals. He is completely selfish. Many people point out that he is a hypocrite with different opinions.
Schopenhauer's erudition is universally acknowledged. He read a large number of ancient and modern philosophical and religious classics in the East and West, and was familiar with a large number of ancient and modern European literary works and a variety of natural science achievements at that time. He is familiar with many foreign languages such as English and French. His style of writing 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 teaching, he hated and opposed Hegel and Fichte. In the preface of the second edition written for his main works in 1844, he severely denounced and criticized Hegel and other rationalist philosophers, described Hegel, Fichte and Schelling as "famous sophists", called Hegel "the spiritual Caleb Ben (ugly ghost)", and said that their philosophy was hypocritical, bad, absurd and meaningless, and was "bragging". 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 rationalist philosophy is inappropriate, but it does hit the nail on the head.
politically, Schopenhauer stood on the side of the most reactionary class of the German bourgeoisie, and tried his best to maintain the feudal ruling order and oppose revolution and democracy. He openly opposed the revolution of 1848, cursed the revolutionary masses as "complete thugs", referred to the executioners who suppressed the revolutionary people as "their beloved friends", and even lent them his binoculars so that they could shoot the "thugs" more accurately. He also made a will, specifying that part of his property should be donated to the survivors of soldiers wounded and dead in the suppression of the revolution.
Schopenhauer's pessimism
To a certain extent, Schopenhauer took over the banner of Kant's criticism, thinking that science and philosophy, which are understood by means of rational concepts and categories, can only reach phenomena, but not things in themselves. But he stressed that things in themselves are indispensable to people's morality. Schopenhauer expressed his world outlook with two propositions: "The world is my appearance" and "The world is my will". He believes 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 law", or existing (perception of time and space), or changing (intellectuality and causality), or behavioral (self-awareness and motivation about human behavior), or cognitive (rationality and logic). As the essential existence and movement of the world, it is beyond the reach of any cognitive ability and can only be perceived by intuition. This is the existence and movement of the will to life, which is 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 live and the reasons 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, and tried to find the meaning of life from will (not from reason), which is quite different from traditional metaphysics. This is also the root of his attraction to young Nietzsche.
Schopenhauer criticized Kant's moral philosophy, the last refuge of God and the last fortress of traditional metaphysics, with his volition theory. He laughed at "Kant (admittedly conveniently) regarded practical reason as the direct source of all virtues and described it as an absolute (that is, descending from heaven) throne". Schopenhauer emphasized that moral obligation can't be based on rationality, because the essence of human beings lies not in rationality but in their will to life. Since any behavior based on will can only be egoistic, moral obligation can only be based on justice and love, which must be at the expense of the suppression of life will. 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 own obligations on a proper basis, because the self-evident basic principle is: what they will do is harmless. Because what I do is always what I want, what I do to myself is only what I want, not anything else; Therefore, it will not be unfair. " In other words, in Schopenhauer's view, people's actions are based on their own will, and it doesn't matter whether they are just or not. The moral nature of behavior is endowed, and the obligation is not something based on people's will, so it can't be the basic virtue of human behavior.
Schopenhauer believes that will is absolute, and freedom of will does not depend on reason. Any behavior of human beings is an activity of will. However, we should also distinguish 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, caused and relative. In this way, in Schopenhauer's view, although the will itself is absolutely "self-determination", all human actions are not free. Because "individual people and personality people are not the will of things in themselves, but already the phenomenon of will. As a phenomenon, they have been decided to enter the form of phenomenon and enter the law." Therefore, although people have a lot of pre-planning and repeated thinking, his actions have not changed. He must always play a role that he does not want to play from the beginning of his life to the end of his life, and he must also perform the part of the plot that he is responsible for to the end of the play. Schopenhauer said: human existence "must keep jumping and scurrying on the circle line surrounded by hot coal", which is endless but 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 people's 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 giving for him, runs counter to the nature of life will. Schopenhauer adopted Hobbes' logic and thought that morality was produced by human beings.