Dinesh

Dinesh club

Posted: 20 May 2017


Taken: 20 May 2017

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Arthur Schopenhauer
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The Consciousness Instinct
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Michael Gazzaniga
World as will
And representation
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Arthur Schopenhauer

Arthur Schopenhauer
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 Dinesh
Dinesh club
Early in the nineteenth century, for the purposes of our quest, that sharp east wind was blowing out of Germany, and more specifically out of the mouth of Arthur Schopenhauer. He took the wind out of the sails of Descartes, who thought that the mind is fully accessible and that nothing is hidden from conscious reflection. Schopenhauer was a philosopher who was focused on the motivations of the individual. He concluded that they aren’t too pretty: humans are motivated by their will and not by their intellect, though they may firmly deny it. In his 1818 publications, ‘The World as Will and Representation,’ he came to the conclusion that “man can indeed do what he wants, but he cannot will what he wants.” In essence, not only is the will (i.e., our subconscious motivations) in charge, but the conscious intellect does not ralize it. Schopenhauer made this clear when describing the will as blind and strong and the intellect is sighted by lame. “The most striking figure for the relation of the two is that of the strong blind man carrying the sighted lame man of his shoulder

Schopenhauer’s framing kicked the problem of consciousness onto a much larger playing field. The mind, with all of its rational processes, is all very well but the “will” the thing that gives us our “oomph”, is the key: “The will. . . again fills the consciousness through wishes, emotions, passions, and cares.” Today, the subconscious rumblings of the “will” are still unplumbed; only a few inroads have been made. . . . Page 45

THE CONSCIOUSNESS INSTINCT
2 years ago. Edited 2 years ago.
 Dinesh
Dinesh club
The will according to Schopenhauer, is the will to live, a drive that wheedles humans and all animals to reproduce. for him, the most important purpose of human life int he ultimate end product of a love affair, offspring, because ti determines who makes up the next generation. Schopenahuer puts the intellect in the backseat. it isn’t the driver of behavior and also isn’t privy to the will’s decisions; it’s just an after-hours spokesperson, making up the stories as it goes along to explain ex post facto what the will has wrought.

Schopenhauer, in deposing conscious intellect, also opened up the Pandora’s box of the unconscious. he described our distinctly conscious ideas as merely like the surface of a pool of water, while the depths are made up of indistinct feelings, perceptions, intuitions, and experiences mingled with our personal will: “Consciousness is the mere surface of our mind, and of this, as of the globe, we do not know tthe interior, but only the crust.” he said that our real thinking seldom takes place on the surface, and thus can rarely be described as a sequence of “clearly conceived judgments.” ~ Page 48
2 years ago.

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