Representation, Time, Will

To 'represent' means to 're-present'.  Thus, a represented object is fundamentally 'temporal' not because the subject locates it in some order of successiveness, as Schopenhauer conceives it, but because the process of representing an object is necessarily subsequent to its object.  Accordingly, in self-representation, the subject of representation and the object of representation are identical only on the basis of some extrinsic intellectual principle.  This is why it is not merely the case that Time is 'the form of Inner Sense', as Kant proposes, but that it is necessarily such.  Schopenhauer thus errs when he asserts the identity of the 'I' of 'I think', and the 'I' of 'I will' that appears to it in Inner Sense.  Likewise, insofar as he derives the possibility of the self-denial of the Will from the self-knowledge of the Will, his efforts to promote the former are self-defeating.

Phenomenon, Illusion, Will

What, in the World as Will and Representation, begin as Kantian 'phenomena', e. g. physical bodies, end as 'illusions'.  In contrast, at B69 of the 1st Critique, Kant clearly denies that "these objects are mere illusions."  He then proceeds, at B70, to diagnose the fundamental target of his entire Critical enterprise: "it is only when we ascribe objective reality to [subjective representations], that it becomes impossible for us to prevent everything from being transformed into mere illusion."  But, ascribing objective reality to a subjective representation is precisely and plainly what Schopenhauer does when what he first discovers as "I will", in #42 of the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason, becomes impersonal 'Will' in WWR.  Hence, what, from a Kantian perspective, is illusory in Schopenhauer's system, is its purported noumenon, not its phenomena.

Music, Composition, Dancing

In #52 of World as Will and Representation, Schopenhauer characterizes Music as "independent of the phenomenal world", as possibly existing "even if there were no world at all", as the innermost soul of the phenomenon without the body", and as perceived "with absolute exclusion of space".  Thus, his likening of a composer to a "somnambulist" undermines that concept of Music, because being a 'somnambulist' entails having a body, that exists in the phenomenal world, and that moves through space.  Accordingly, a composer is, rather, a special case of a dancer, who expresses Music as essentially phenomenal, spatial, and embodied.  Likewise, the function of Contemplation in the process of composition is not to catch a glimpse of some noumenal language, but to project an imaging of possible motion.  In other words, to compose is to actively structure, not to passively describe.

Suffering, Asceticsim, Oblivion

In #68 of World as Will and Representation, in the context of an exposition of Asceticism, Schopenhauer asserts that "With the complete abolition of knowledge the rest of the world would of itself also vanish into nothing, for there can be no object without a subject."  The key words in this statement are "also" and "world".  For, the former implies that the subject, as well, would vanish into nothing, while the latter is not qualified either as 'Will' or as 'Representation'.  So, with this assertion, Schopenhauer, perhaps unwittingly in the context, is promoting Oblivion, not Asceticism as the solution to suffering.  The conflation here is not incidental--in its diagnosis of suffering, his system vacillates between attributing it to the individuation that is the product of the severing of subject from object in Representation, and to the incessant striving of Will.  The ambiguity of 'world' in the assertion epitomizes that fundamental incoherence in his system.

Life and Suffering

The perhaps cardinal tenet of Schopenhauer's doctrine is that "all life is suffering" (from #56 of World as Will and Representation).  He derives it from: 1. Life is Will-to-Live; 2. Will-to-Live is constant striving; 3. Striving can be, at best, only temporarily satisfied; and 4. Dissatisfaction is Suffering.  Now, as has been previously discussed, #1 is problematic, because he bases it on a contingent volitional interpretation of his own inner experience.  Furthermore, #3 entails that at least some striving is satisfied, and, hence, that not "all" Will-to-Live is suffering.  So, he shows no more than that his own experience is predominantly unsatisfactory, which might resonate on occasion with others, but which is inadequate as the cardinal tenet of a universal doctrine.

Will and Life

Nietzsche suggests that given that Will is already alive, Schopenhauer's equation of 'Will' and 'Will-to-Live' is superfluous, a suggestion that Schophenhauer implicitly endorses when he dismisses 'death' as merely phenomenal.  However, the superfluity of the equation that poses a more serious threat to Schopenhauer's doctrine is the converse--that Life is Will.  For, as Heidegger proposes, any concept of 'will' is derived from Subjectivistic Psychology, as are the presumably noumenal characteristics that Schopenhauer attributes to it, i. e. "urge" and "striving".  Specifically vulnerable to Heidegger's challenge is the fundamental premise of Schopenhauer's theory of Will--that the volitional processes that he perceives in his own inner experience are noumenal, and are not merely already the objects of an interpretation.  Accordingly, Schopenhauer's own fundamental principle can be conceived as individualistic as he claims Kant's, i. e. Pure Reason, to be.

Music, Contemplation, Will

The perhaps epochal significance of Schopenhauer's theory of Music is that it posits Will as the essence of it, with respect to which, in the millennia-old Pythagorean mathematical concept, Music is "considered merely externally" (#52 of World as Will and Representation).  However, he does not concomitantly propose an analogously exclusive access to Music, unlike e. g. Bergson's 'Intuition', so, in his system, the preeminent experience of Music remains the same Contemplation that is that of Numbers and other traditional Platonic Ideas.  Thus, the ultimate value, for him, of Music, lies in the contemplation of it, insofar as the latter affords detachment from it, and, thus, from Will.  In that respect, the Contemplation of Music is less effective than the Contemplation of Will itself, and, is, therefore, of value only as preparation for the latter.