“What a man is contributes much more to his happiness than what a man has.” ~ Arthur Schopenhauer
“Health outweighs all other blessings so much that one may really say that a healthy beggar is happier than an ailing king.”~ Arthur Schopenhauer Continue reading Schopenhauer On Wisdom
Arthur Schopenhauer, the quintessential philosophical pessimist
A thoughtful reader offered a rejoinder to the conclusion of my recent series on life and meaning. In it he advances an unequivocal pessimism in response to my (qualified) notions of optimism and hope. I reprint it here, edited slightly for brevity. Continue reading Philosophical Pessimism
I would be remiss if I didn’t consider the critique of hope found in the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer. (I considered his pessimism in my last post.) He speaks of hope most directly in his essay, “Psychological Observations.” Immediately preceding his brief discussion of hope, he makes these pertinent observations Continue reading Summary of Schopenhauer on Hope: From “Psychological Observations”
Arthur Schopenhauer (1788 – 1860) was a German philosopher known for his atheism and pessimism—in fact, he is the most prominent pessimist in the entire western philosophical tradition. Continue reading Summary of Schopenhauer’s Pessimism
(Yesterday’s post summarized Schopenhauer’s “On The Vanity of Existence”)
In focusing upon the movement of time Schopenhauer has zeroed in on a fundamental fact of life which may render it meaningless Continue reading Commentary on Schopenhauer’s “On the Vanity of Existence”
