{∅, {∅}, {∅, {∅}}} : Rage Against the Meat Grinder

In Edgar Saltus's Philosophy of Disenchantment, one of the chapters is called "The High Priest of Pessimism".

We are disciples of Arthur Schopenhauer.  No lie.

I've been rereading Saltus late into the night.

At times he is profound, at others vivacious; for instance, he is asked what man would be if Nature, in making the last step which leads to him, had started from the dog or the elephant; to which he answers, in that case man would be an intelligent dog or an intelligent elephant, instead of being an intelligent monkey. As may be imagined, there was about Schopenhauer very little of the Sunday-school theologian, and religion was in consequence seldom viewed by him from an orthodox standpoint; when, therefore, Schleiermacher was quoted before him to the effect that no man can be a philosopher who is not religious, he observed very quietly, "No man who is religious can become a philosopher,--metaphysics are useless to him, and no true philosopher is religious; he is sometimes in danger, but he is not fettered, he is free." Elsewhere he said, "Religion and philosophy are like the two scales of a balance; the more one rises, the more does the other descend."

"In my 17th year," he wrote in an autobiographical text,  "I was gripped by the misery of life, as Buddha had been in his youth when he saw sickness, old age, pain and death. The truth was that this world could not have been the work of an all loving Being, but rather that of a devil, who had brought creatures into existence in order to delight in their sufferings." 

And like the Buddha, it was his goal to dissect and then come up with a solution to this suffering.

It is chiefly the fault of universities that Schopenhauer is taught in such an academic way, if he is covered at all,  that it has stopped him from being widely known, read and followed.  And yet in truth, this is a man who – no less than the Buddha – deserves disciples, schools, art-works and monasteries to put his ideas into practice.


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an aside:  I want to focus on the problem of calculating the distance between a given point and an ellipse, but I am somewhat distracted by an email correspondence with a younger cousin (I am the oldest male cousin).  Both his [long divorced] parents died one after the other, his mother in 2015, his father just a few months ago.  He is married and is raising a daughter.  At the funeral we decided to begin exchanging some ideas via email, similar to the way Holden and I began communicating back in 2014 or so.

Well, I am at a loss at a certain point, since I so very much want to rise in the morning and focus on very petty and technical and UNDERSTANDABLE concepts (in math), and I have lost the desire to solve any cosmic riddles.  Besides that, I am repelled by the use of the word "God," especially when it is used in the Judeo-Christian sense as some kind of synonym for any grand idea.

Where I am stumped is when my cousin innocently states, "It is, for him, the First Cause, it is his God." - he is talking about the Will.

This is incorrect in so many ways.  My cousin is well over 40 years old, and may be set in his ways as far as his belief in some Christian-like God of the Old Testament and Book of Revelations in the New Testament.  His favorite thinker is a Sufi-like writer named Rene Guenon.

I find I am carefully constructing a response throughout the day, returning to the math, which is my main interest at the moment.  I actually view metaphysical and religious problems as a little annoying since so much is beyond our knowledge.  I prefer to spend my time thinking about things I can wrap my head around. 

All I can say, really, is that the Will is primordial, blind, and irrational.   This Will has nothing in common with "God as First Cause."

All I can say, really, is that the Will is primordial, blind, and irrational.   This Will has nothing in common with "God as First Cause."   It is more akin to Kant's Thing-in-Itself.  In fact, it may be thought of as our direct experience of the thing-in-itself as our own body extended in space (represented in our heads).  We experience the Will in all our want, all our disappointments, all our passions, joys, and sorrows.  You may be on to something when you say there is a transcendent aspect to it which is beyond our experience, the thing-in-itself of it.

Then I can end the email and get back to thinking about simpler things, like the kind of calculations and derivation of formulas one might find in an old book on the lost subject of Analytic Geometry.  Then translate this formula into a computer program for the sheer joy of creating an Ellipse class that is in some instances a Circle. 

I'm serious.  I resign as an "intellectual."  That is, if I ever imagined myself to be some kind of poor man's intellectual, I resign.  I think it would be more honest to see myself as a "struggling or failed mathematician" in the same way that  %% Adolf Hitler %%  was a "failed artist."

I will be content to be a simple-minded math-hobbyist.   In matters concerning doctrines and beliefs, I think Holden is right.  We may wish to remain silent so as to avoid deceiving ourselves and others.  It may be most honest just to remind myself each day that there are matters which are beyond a rational explanation, and this may be why I have such distrust of those who create or follow systems which assume to explain everything. 

This also explains my approach to studying math, that is, why I feel compelled to repeatedly go over things that I have already studied, just to make it clear to myself the fact that I retain very little and must always start from scratch with each exposure.

To put it as plainly as possible, I value honesty over cleverness.  I would rather acknowledge my ignorance than be deluded into fancying myself as "having grasped" that which eludes my understanding.  This goes for the general riddle of existence, but also for even elementary mathematical concepts.

%% In the comparison above, I feel compelled to point out that, to distinguish myself from everyone's favorite historical villain, I wish to be a good sport about my failures and/or limitations.  To me, being a good sport is equivalent to having a sense of humor.

I am neither "gifted" nor "talented."   

My delight is in understanding something which may have confounded me for years, if not decades. 

One need not be some kind of "intellectual" in order to devote ones energies to thinking.

As a teenager I would always remind myself of this "intellectual fallacy" by considering the work an auto mechanic engages in.   Our superficial society, in its film industry, may represent mechanics as "grease monkeys," when, in reality, they are engaged in a great deal of intellectual activity, that is, thinking, diagnosing, applying the scientific method, deductive reasoning, etc ... even trial and error.   In fact, there are few "jobs" which don't require the use of human intelligence; but mechanics of all kinds are definitely misrepresented.  It is said that they "work with their hands," but they really are using their brain power most of the time.