Will to Live

Because the 'thing-in-itself' is unknowable in Kant's system, whether there is one or many such things is indeterminable. So, when Schopenhauer identifies it as 'the' universal Will to Live, his quantification is groundless. Furthermore, he reinforces that arbitrariness with the Platonist inference from plural specific cases of the Will to Live to the actual existence of the singular universal of which they are its instances. In contrast, Will, as conceived here, is an essentially exteriorizing process that eventuates in its publicly appearing. Hence, this Will is not a Platonist universal that remains 'in-itself'. This contrast also highlights a significant flaw in Schopenhauer's concept of 'Will', which he defines as 'Causality from an inner perspective'--perspective presupposes individuation, the illusoriness of which is a cardinal thesis of his system. Thus, on his own premises, the 'Will' to Live is actually no Will at all, i. e. it is the product of a personification in a system which denies the reality of Personhood.