| |
 |
|
|
Science Forum Index » Philosophy Forum » Pessimism...
Page 1 of 1
|
| Author |
Message |
| turtoni... |
 Posted: Fri May 09, 2008 11:45 pm |
|
|
|
Guest
|
Pessimism, from the Latin pessimus (worst), is the decision to evaluate
something as a negative when it is uncommon to do so. Value judgments may
vary dramatically between individuals, even when judgments of fact are
undisputed. The most common example of this phenomenon is the "Is the glass
half empty or half full?" situation. The degree in which situations like
these are evaluated as something good or something bad can be described in
terms of one's optimism or pessimism respectively. Throughout history, the
pessimistic disposition has had effects on all major areas of thinking.[1]
Philosophical pessimism is the similar but not identical idea that life has
a negative value, or that this world is as bad as it could possibly be.
Historical account of pessimism
The first idea of an apocalypse has been traced back to 1400 BC.[2] Because
the first world war was followed by another, our collective ability to learn
moral lessons from history begins to seem suspect. Operating on the premise
that morality is empty rhetoric, game theory and its political complement
political realism appear as a model for understanding and prescribing
behavior. The post war fifties saw the rise of dystopian literature. Books
such as T. S. Eliot's wasteland (novel), Kafka's the trial (novel), Huxley's
Brave New World, George Orwell's 1984, and plays such as Samuel Beckett's
waiting for Godot expressed a deep pessimism during this time. The utopian
promises of communism revealed themselves as false or unlikely during the
collapse of communism. Reason itself, which once held on unquestioned status
of perfect objectivity, as humanity is access to the truth, and it's
understanding of progress, so widespread and unprecedented criticism in
postmodernism and post structuralism. Likewise, nature, whose power and
purity could at one time not be denied, is now the victim of problematic
population growth and environmental decline.
Upon broad analysis of history, some have determined that things in general
are bad, and seemed to be in decline.
"I can only see emergency following up on another as wave follows up on a
wave"
-- HAL Fisher
[edit] Pessimism by individual
[edit] Arthur Schopenhauer
Arthur Schopenhauer's pessimism comes from his elevating of Will above
reason as the mainspring of human thought and behavior. Schopenhauer pointed
to motivators such as hunger, sexuality, the need to care for children, and
the need for shelter and personal security as the real sources of human
motivation. Reason, compared to these factors, is mere window-dressing for
human thoughts; it is the clothes our naked hungers put on when they go out
in public. Schopenhauer sees reason as weak and insignificant compared to
Will; in one metaphor, Schopenhauer compares the human intellect to a gay
man who can see, but who rides the ass of the blind giant of Will.
Likening human life to the life of other animals, he saw the reproductive
cycle as indeed a cyclical process that continues pointlessly and
indefinitely, unless the chain is broken by too limited resources to make
continued life possible, in which case it is terminated by extinction. The
prognosis of either pointlessly continuing the cycle of life or facing
extinction is one major leg of Schopenhauer's pessimism.
Schopenhauer moreover considers the desires of the will to entail suffering:
because these selfish desires create constant conflict in the world. The
business of biological life is a war of all against all. Reason makes us
suffer all the more, in that reason makes us realize that biology's agenda
is something we would not have chosen if we had a choice, but is helpless to
prevent us from serving it, or allow us to escape the sting of its goad
(compare this to the role of desire in Buddhism).
[edit] Schopenhauer's Proof
Instead of asserting a personal opinion or viewpoint about the appearance of
this world being the worst possible, such as a glass being half full or half
empty, Schopenhauer attempted to logically prove it by analyzing the concept
of pessimism.
But against the palpably sophistical proofs of Leibniz that this is the
best of all possible worlds, we may even oppose seriously and honestly the
proof that it is the worst of all possible worlds. For possible means not
what we may picture in our imagination, but what can actually exist and
last. Now this world is arranged as it had to be if it were to be capable of
continuing with great difficulty to exist; if it were a little worse, it
would be no longer capable of continuing to exist. Consequently, since a
worse world could not continue to exist, it is absolutely impossible; and so
this world itself is the worst of all possible worlds.
- Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation, Vol. II, Ch. 46.
He claimed that a slight worsening of conditions, such as a small alteration
of the planet's orbit, a small increase in global warming, loss of the use
of a limb for an animal, and so on, would result in destruction. The world
is essentially bad and "ought not to be".[1] These are disputable
assertions, considering that the planet's orbit is not wholly consistent to
begin with, global temperature fluctuates over time, and animals can still
live after losing a limb. However, taking into respect the fact that major
fluctuations in global temperature have typically resulted in mass
extinctions in the past and an animal that loses a limb will only rarely
survive long in the wild, they may appear reasonable.
Thus throughout, for the continuance of the whole as well as for that of
every individual being, the conditions are sparingly and scantily given, and
nothing beyond these. Therefore the individual life is a ceaseless struggle
for existence itself, while at every step it is threatened with destruction.
Just because this threat is so often carried out, provision had to be made,
by the incredibly great surplus of seed, that the destruction of individuals
should not bring about that of the races, since about these alone is nature
seriously concerned. Consequently, the world is as bad as it can possibly
be, if it is to exist at all. Q.E.D.
- Ibid.
Freud
Sigmund Freud could also be described as a pessimist and he shared many of
Schopenhauer's ideas. He saw human existence as being under constant attack
from both within the self, from the forces of nature and from relations with
others. The following quote, from Civilization and its Discontents, is
perhaps the best example of his pessimism:
We can cite many such benefits that we owe to the much despised era of
scientific and technical advances. At this point, however, the voice of
pessimistic criticism makes itself heard, reminding us that most of these
pleasures follow the pattern of the "cheap pleasure" recommended in a
certain joke, a pleasure that one can enjoy by sticking a bare leg out from
under the covers on a cold winter's night, then pulling it back in..... What
good is a long life to us if it is hard, joyless and so full of suffering
that we can only welcome death as a deliverer?
Oswald Spengler
The source for this is Spengler's The Decline of the West (1918 - 1923),
often cited in the years following its publication. Oswald Spengler once
declared, "Optimism is cowardice."[3] His description of the western
civilization is where the populace constantly strives for the
unattainable-making the western man a proud but tragic figure, for while he
strives and creates he secretly knows the actual goal will never be reached.
Arnold J. Toynbee: Toynbee wrote a similar comparative study of the rise and
decline of civilizations, A Study of History, somewhat concurrently with
Spengler, which was released much later, around the conclusion of World War
II.
Others
The term has also been used to describe the position of the Norwegian
philosopher Peter Wessel Zapffe, although he clearly states in his
philosophical treatise Om det tragiske that pessimism is a term which cannot
describe his biosophy.
Some works of popular literature may also exhibit pessimism, such as Stephen
King's Pet Semetary. King later expressed his reservations about the work:
"It seems to be saying nothing works and nothing is worth it, and I don't
really believe that" (Bare Bones 144-5).
a.. Cassandra
b.. José Saramago
c.. Woody Allen
d.. Luis Buñuel
e.. Roman Polanski
f.. Emil Cioran
g.. Giacomo Leopardi
h.. Richard Wagner
i.. Thomas Malthus
j.. Edward Grey
k.. Karl Barth
l.. Dietrich Bonhoeffer
m.. Martin Heidegger
n.. Marcus Junius Brutus
o.. Marcus Castillo
p.. Arnold J. Toynbee
q.. Tsar Nicholas II
r.. Oswald Spengler
s.. R. Abraham Edwards
t.. Marcus Buckle
u.. H. P. Lovecraft
Pessimism by subject
Moral pessimism
Narratives of decline can be identified in morality. Friedrich Nietzsche's
amorality, Freud's description of co-operation as sublimation, Stanley
Milgram shock experiments. The continued presence of war and genocide
despite global interconnectedness. The continual rise of political apathy.
Intellectual pessimism
Main article: skeptical hypothesis
postmodernism, Max Weber, Nietzsche and Schopenhauer.
Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi (1743 - 1819), characterized rationalism, and in
particular Immanuel Kant's "critical" philosophy in order to carry out a
reductio ad absurdum according to which all rationalism (philosophy as
criticism) reduces to nihilism, and thus it should be avoided and replaced
with a return to some type of faith and revelation.
Political pessimism
Main article: Political realism
Political realists assert that states always have and always will be amoral
wealth-seekers. With the proliferation of nuclear weapons, and the shifting
balance of power, we may be entering the most dangerous political times ever
encountered.
Environmental pessimism
peak oil, water shortage, the depletion of the ozone layer, bioaccumulation
of toxins, the population problem, the loss of biodiversity. These problems,
though and not simply and knowledge but pessimists, contribute to the the
belief that things are in decline, perhaps irreparably.
Cultural pessimism
Main article: Cultural pessimism
Cultural pessimists feel the Golden age is in the past, and the current
generation is fit only for dumbing down and cultural careerism. Some
significant formulations have gone beyond this, proposing a
universally-applicable cyclic model of history - notably in the writings of
Giambattista Vico.
Eschatological pessimism
Main article: Eschatology
Apocalypse predictions and the low likelihood of alien contact lead to
pessimistic ideas in eschatology.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pessimism |
|
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
|
Page 1 of 1
All times are GMT - 5 Hours
The time now is Wed Aug 20, 2008 6:21 am
|
|