jancanc

about incentives, he pretty much only states the following "the 3 fundamental incentives are: compassion- the desire for another's well being; malice-...

Thanks so much for your replies. I was told that this was definitely a proof by case by a chap well versed in logic, yet I'm racking my brains to see ...

Yes, but then he has to refine his criterion of actions of moral worth, don't you think? It's not just a matter of the "absence of all egoistic motive...

Sure. Motives are representations; objects of external perception or thoughts. We see an external object or have a thought and this object or thought ...

but don't those images and symbols have words without which they cannot exist; without which they cannot be thought?

Yes, thanks, I do agree; and the meaning is very clear. I am just trying to reconstruct his argument in more rigorous terms. He actually is quite slop...

No need to apologize, it's a great answer. Got me thinking. I'm going to try and get the original German to get clearer on this. But as it stands, lik...

yep, see what you mean, something like, e.g.. my belief that the dodgers will win the final presupposes that I believe the dodgers exist. To be frank,...

Thanks. I agree, seems more like an entailment relationship...and, as such, Schopenhauer's use of "presupposes" entails a solecism!

As in "If another 'becomes the ultimate object of one's own will in the same way as oneself otherwise, then one "suffer directly with the other, and f...

Sure, I think can see what you mean, and, if I am interpreting it correctly, I do agree to a very large extent. Fundamentally, for me, everything is e...

Great answers from everyone, thanks. At a logical level feelings and activities can't be identical. Of course this very much depends on how we define ...

Yes, i know exactly what you mean. Even at one stage I think he says "empirical reality is perfectly real". It's just like the will is even more real....

So you think this understanding of "illusory" "saves" him from the inconsistency I outlined above?: 1.Compassion requires one to accept empirical dist...

Yes, which is the same to say that he recognizes there is fundamentally NO empirical distinction, that is: the compassionate being recognizes he that ...

Interesting, I'll muse on this!

so how can Salvation be an action, per se? "Will-less action" can only be a metaphoric expression

every action needs some effort of will. That's a predicate in the concept "action"

so some actions don't need an effort of will?

can salvation be a will-less action?

what do you mean exactly? I salvation is compassion in overdrive? Sounds interesting

I'm interpreting or reconstructing Schopenhauer. Trying to make sense of him. Now he says that compassion is the basis of ethics. Compassion requires ...

This is why some have said compassion and salvation are mutually antagonistic.

No, in salvation you deny the will to save yourself only. Like you deny your will to exist and thus are liberated from suffering. (according to Schope...

What this solution requires, I think, is a different understanding of "the will", as differentiated from the will-to-live: I know Schop. uses “the wil...

Perhaps this can be solved thus: (I think you are intimating at this) In renunciation and compassion willing does continue, but willing-to-live ceases...

Pretty much, yes. But more specifically because we "affirm the will-to-live", instead of trying to detach from this cosmic drive. The whole idea of de...

please explain haha

why not?.

you mean he is speaking metaphorically here?

we know the will subjectively, but the will itself - as thing-in-itself- exists independent of all thought.

Schop said all representations presuppose a subject/object distinction. Yet, through our body we know ourselves as both (representation) object and as...

I see what you mean, like infringing on another's will, as such.

The compassionate person “shares the suffering in him (the sufferer), in spite of the fact that his skin does not enclose nerves” Technically, I think...

Thanks, In your answer, I am assuming "harm" is a synonym for "suffering". Physical suffering and metaphysical suffering. So essentially you are sayin...

Some of these Kantian ideas....I have noticed that many people need to keep them in their mind constant lest they appear wholly unintelligible. A stud...

My friend, I have read Kant for years. I have read the Critiques, and the Groundwork. Yet trying to convey his thoughts to others (esp. with regards t...

It has truth value assuming a cognitivist view you mean?

More like commands, or imperative sentences.

The paradox supposedly there relates to the fact that we cannot "know" when altruism will be helpful or not since we cannot "know" if a person will re...

I see what you are saying. I guess in this argument, though, that intentionally inflicting suffering (in order to "help" another") is precluded due to...

Agreed 100% ! well stated.

That's an excellent point. I guess one could say "salvation is the *greatest* good", yet there is still other goods. But, I agree with your implicit s...

Exactly how I thought! Yet, trying to put this into some "standard type form" (like Meno's paradox etc etc) is kind of weird. I want to get it into a ...

Exactly how I formulated it! Yet, trying to put this into some "standard type form" (like Meno's paradox etc etc) is kind of weird. I want to get it i...

It's not my argument. And I don't think you need to suffer to achieve salvation. yet it depends on definitions...How does one define salvation? and "s...

My initial post is an argument I do NOT agree with. My question was, assuming the premises to be true, does the argument result in a paradox? I agree ...

I think it could be stated that there is a salvation, such as the denial of all desire etc; even death itself. Even independent from a Buddhist perspe...

Thanks, I see exactly now. From the Buddhist (or an implicit atheistic stance) things are more complex.

How does Christianity avoid the paradox?