{∅, {∅}, {∅, {∅}}} : Mutual Respect Between Nervous Reeks and Wrecks

OK, so we have come to the realization that life is not worth living.  We know how Schopenhauer escaped the miserable life of wealthy businessman.   We know less about how Cioran managed to escape the fate of those without an inheritance to live on.  I know Cioran lived frugally and often stayed with friends.  He shunned jobs.

Myself, well, you know my story, Holden.

Now, how will you escape that corporate wage-slavery and find a way to hole up in a room to live the life of a Schopenhauerian scholar?

I understand that you must be searching for a way out of your harness. 

In the meantime, may I suggest you get yourself a very small notebook and jot down your thoughts during the workday.  You probably already do this.

It's a shame there is no such thing as a secular monastery.

In A Strong Dose of Madness, I had written:

Enter philosophical movements disguised as jokes or jokes disguised as philosophical movements. These are grim days indeed. Jokes are in high demand, but a few hearty laughs may shake us from our angst so that we might become more focused on the task at hand, whether it is sleeping, feeding, warming, or even contemplating our own death. I wish we could organize a movement to keep writers, scholars, and artists physically alive – to permit them to continue their work in this most difficult century. Studios could be organized where we form our own schools.

Dressed in old coats, chilled and hungry, we could become totally absorbed in discussions of literature, philosophy, comedy, wilderness survival, and “the end of history.” My “true” inner self is different from the self that appears in conversations with others. I need writing to supplement the misleading signs of my speech. In other words, in my speech and action I may seem to be going along with the status-quo, so I need my writing to pick up on the elements within me resisting. I need writing because my speech gets misinterpreted.

Where we would build our shanty town, I don't know.  We would have to start a non-religious international order of scholars.  I am not necessarily serious ... just ruminating.

I don't plan on accomplishing any great task while alive.  I'm just wondering what kind of living arrangements might be best for those who may be in between the land of the living and the dead ... you know, like antinatalists who are just waiting for our species to bow out gracefully.

What makes Schopenhauer great is this-he says that the very idea that the world is governed by laws is questionable.In some versions of Christianity natural laws are seen as God's commands,which can be revoked to permit miracles.In Aristotle laws of nature make a universe that strives for perfection ,while for Plato the physical world is a shadowy image of eternal forms.In these classical and Christian philosophies a human conception of order is built into the universe.Once we put these systems aside,however,there is no reason to suppose the world is ruled by laws.There are simply regularities,possibly evanescent,which have nothing to do with human ideas of law.

... and triangles only exist in the mind ...

Towards the end of the chapter, [5] The Better Consciousness, Causes, Grounds, Confrontations, at the end of a section called, Conclusions, Cartwright touches upon something that zooms in on the nature of Schopenhauer's respectful disagreement with Kant. 

"From showing that the four forms of the principle of sufficient reason stem from our cognitive capacity and can be summarized as a single principle, it does not follow that this principle refers to some simple, single, absolute ground.  To think that this follows would be like thinking there is something like a triangle in general, something over and above equilateral, isosceles, or scalene triangles.  Although one can formulate the concept of a ground in general, just as one conceptualizes a triangle in general, there are no possible objects denoted by these concepts, which are simply empty abstractions produced by discursive thought.  To think otherwise is to be a realist, falsely believing that the concepts denote objects.  In this matter, Schopenhauer declared allegiance with the nominalist:  these concepts have no objective reference and exist only as names."

Kant ignored his own profound insight that the contingency of things is itself only phenomenal and can lead to no other than the empirical regressus that determines phenomena by referring to the thing in itself variously, as the "ground," "reason," and "intelligible cause" of phenomena. 

I would like to return to this thread when I have "time" ...

note: see There's No Such Thing As Triangles

One of the most valuable things about our correspondence, Holden, is that you totally understand the informal nature of my interest in mathematics and programming.  I do not glorify it as "leading anywhere".  Verily, I am on the road to nowhere.

I do not pretend to have a substantial grip on anything whatsoever, and you do not judge me for my brutal frankness.   

Señor Hentrich,
I do not read your blog following an order.You write that life is not worth living,yes, but we continue living on this planet. That´s the problem. I am afraid of death just like any other human being. Take care. Raúl