My posts are removed sometimes for mysterious reasons. For example, the one I posted just above yours was removed from r/philosophy & stated it would be okay in this open discussion thread.

Schopenhauer & Synchronicity

I am reading Schopenhauer's Parerga & Paralipomena (translated by E.F.J. Payne). I am going to put forward that the essay, simply titled (😉) Transcendent Speculation on the Apparent Deliberateness in the Fate of the Individual. is a precursor to Carl Jung's notion of Synchronicity. This isn't to say many other authors didn't do this, or this topic regarding Schopenhauer hasn't been exhaustively discussed previously, but I was taken aback by Schopenhauer's tentative, almost apologetic tone. Because I just ploughed through some 200 pages of Schopenhauer's vitriol towards his contemporaries, the switch in delivery was very noticeable.

I'll try not to cloud this issue with misrepresentations of Schopenhauer's main philosophy, but forgive me if I do & try to look past this to my point regarding Synchronicity.

I'll use S for Schopenhauer from this point on. S was a determinist very much immersed in the Newtonian view of cause & effect, indeed very impressed with the scientific advances made in his lifetime. As a self-professed Kantian he agreed in main with Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. He regarded perception as the basis for knowledge & further that our perceptual apparatus provided a "template" to organize & filter these perceptions. Space, time, & causality were a priori, in other words, built in conditions for our perceptions. These 3 conditions could not be overcome & science was a systematic discovery of the consistencies of our perceptual world - not an unraveling of the mysteries of the universe.

S posited a loophole: we have a unique experience of something within ourselves. He called this the Will. He comes close to ascribing this to our experience of emotions. Although unaware of Darwin's theory of evolution, S also argues that other life indicates a advancing development of perceptual ability & complexity in general.

Despite arguing the the Will is unknowable, S tells us quite a bit about this Will. It is the foundation of the universe, the basis for life, an incomprehensible presence outside of space, time, & causality. Here is where one can point out this is similar to Carl Jung's collective unconscious (or other accounts of psyche, élan, spirit, noosphere, etc.)

S fought the hook he caught himself on - a hook made of the deterministic universe of Newtonian physics & an unknowable basis for this universe that was not deterministic. Here is S fighting the hook in his essay: "Although the ideas to be given here do not lead to any firm result, indeed they might perhaps be termed a mere metaphysical fantasy, I could not bring myself to consign them to oblivion …"

In the essay S examines historical accounts of coincidences within individual lives that challenge the concept of causality. S, of course, predated Quantum Theory, so he didn't have this avenue to explore & possibly make a convoluted argument to account for these mysterious coincidences. He instead is forced to give arguments of cause & effect chains beyond our perception or understanding, but the fact remains he presents circumstances which could be viewed as synchronicity including daimons, psychoids & archetypes. S mentions fate, destiny, second sight, soothsayers, & so on. S really goes out on a limb here especially considering the thrashing he gave. earlier in the work. to Fiche, Schelling, & Hegel.

I'll forgo a quote where S gives an account of one of these coincidences. I'll go out on a limb myself & state the reader has experienced such occurrences themselves, so such a quote would be redundant. Instead here is some of what S thought about this:

"... a subjective connection that exists only in reference to the individual who experiences them."

"Now those two kinds of connection exist simultaneously and yet the same event, as a link in two quite different chains, …"

"It is the great dream that is dreamed by that one entity, but in such a way that all its persons dream it together."

I felt a mental shove to post this. I have been reacquainting myself with Jung as well as Schopenhauer. So here is a possible synchronicity for me: in his essay, S references a work by Jung-Stilling (1740 - 1817) called in translation, Theory of Pneumatology. Given that I was reading about Jung & S, this reference stood out. Surely this wasn't an ancestor of Carl Jung? It bothered me so I did some searching online & concluded there isn't any relationship. But it was a meaningful connection to me. Blame this event for this post. 😊

Time is a wheel/time is an arrow/time is created by the faculty of intuitive perception (Schopenhauer)

I read the blog post, as well as investigated some of the ideas & terms in the comments. I offer another view of time which is well known & discussed since philosophy was first conceived.

Following Kant, Schopenhauer argued (something like this) that time, space, & causality are organizing attributes living entities use to perceive - that is, create the externality about us. Schopenhauer predated evolution, but it can be argued convincingly that perception is an evolved characteristic and living things have a wide variation in perceptual ability.

Call it Will (Schopenhauer), or god, or collective unconscious (Jung), or élan (Bergson) or psyche (Kastrup) or just common sense (Glasersfeld): there is no way to go around, dismiss, or explain away that our experience, including thoughts, emotions, bodily functions, is based on our perceptual apparatus.

Schopenhauer (Book 1 of The World as Will & Representation) page 1 "everything that exists for knowledge, & hence the whole of this world, is only object in relation to the subject, perception of the perceiver, in a word, representation."

Philosophy Now, Issue 134, page 8 "for the external world to become known to me, it must first be filtered through structures in my mind which arrange the raw data of my sense, so that the chaotic torrent of sensation that impacts my senses ends up as ordered chunks of experience & knowledge."

In short, our perceptual apparatus (as with all living things) can only deliver to us "what the apparatus at our disposal can do or mediate." Bryan Magee, The Tristan Chord, p 153.

Schopenhauer considers "Time" as one of the perceptual/reasoning attributes used to organize & conceptualize our interactions with our perceptions. Physicalism or materialism or scientism may dispute this by pointing out the advancements of science & technology. One could counter this point by considering that perceptual consistencies for all creatures is evolved & humanity is simply discovering the consistencies of our perceptual "world."

Wonderful reply. Thank you. And you're right about the false dichotomy. And clever rebuttal.

Thank you for your thoughtful reply.

I suppose my point is man's abilities are evolved abilities - or they're not. If you dismiss injection of self-reflection by a higher power, what else can they be? We can only jump so high. Live so long, Think so far.

As a young man, just out of high school, I read Desmond Morris's The Naked Ape & The Human Zoo. Both books were enjoyable & they strongly reinforced my fledgling wariness of reason.
I accept we are creatures who evolved over billions of years & sometime in the recent past we began to develop language & civilizations. We are animals with evolved abilities like all creatures on this planet. Reason is an evolved ability that did not somehow leap past biological barriers & provide us with a god-like tool to unlock the mysteries of the universe. Sure we have honed this skill, language & mathematics have stretched its reach & scientific methods of repetition & peer checking have lessened many of the personal idiosyncrasies that have tainted research in the past.
However the faculty, that a lion uses to figure out when prey are most likely to be at the watering hole, is still the faculty that we are using. The lion could be said to be using the faculty in a simplistic manner while we are using it in a far more complex way. Okay, I can accept that. Still … despite the scientific findings & the technological marvels we have created, how does this faculty, when used properly, become limitless in its reach?
Reason can give us plausibility in our perceptual world. The lion has increased the probability of killing a prey animal by being near the watering hole at a certain time, but it is an increased probability not a truth: there is simply a higher plausibility of prey. Evolution has a high plausibility - I use my belief in this plausibility in my argument. There are myriad observations & experimental models to support this highly plausible theory. I step back from saying evolution is true; I stick with evolution is highly plausible. And I would add: Evolution is highly plausible "within our perceptual world." Same with the atomic theory or quantum mechanics - they are plausible within our perceptual world. Atomic bombs are very convincing.
When a person reaches the sophistication to philosophize, they have been nurtured, indoctrinated, trained, taught, practiced, & accepted by the societal measures used to gauge success academically. What constitutes correct reasoning & proper of language has been inured in us long before personal logic or philosophy of language concerns arise. We are primed to accept reason & put on a pedestal. It is very difficult to use the approved societal, scientific, or philosophical reasoning & language to knock reason off that pedestal.
As animals we sense; as animals we digest nourishment & expel waste; as animals we think to assist survival of the species. Somehow we've detached the latter ability from its roots. We are animals. With limited evolved abilities. We are in the present world situation partly because we deny our evolved limitations. We are a lion starving to death at the water hole because plausibility is not certainty.

Hello. I read your blog article on Camus & Kierkegaard. I enjoyed your examination of the absurd in each of the authors. I agree they are both very important philosophically.

I suggest that many existentialists would celebrate the absurdity of a human fighting for significance in a vast, uncaring world. The achievement is the fight, not winning. The creation of value as thoughts, emotions, & actions may be futile & absurd, but isn't it wonderful that it is done anyway?

A different take on absurdity could be pushed further back then to individual philosophers, or back further than even the whole of philosophy. For many, evolution is a very plausible biological theory (let's not argue about facts & theories now). By what biological mechanism can we have become the savants who can discover & understand the meaning, or lack thereof, of the universe? By what leap?

I consider humanity's flight from nature, civilization, is the place where such questions of life's meaning or absurdity come into play. The universe doesn't care or does care, but we as evolved creatures cannot know this. When our distant forebears in poorly tanned furs chased giant elk, while the other tribe members sat hopeful & starving at camp, humanity was closer to the meaning or absurdity of life than now.

Now we have built ourselves fortresses from which we sally forth to destroy whole species & ecosystems. Most of us don't even notice these actions & even deny they happen. We have isolated ourselves in our ever growing enclave from which we measure, gene splice, make smart phones, celebrate our magnificence, & weigh the value or nonvalue of the universe. Our circumscribed redoubt of reason, science, economies, morality, & meaning are the place considerations of absurdity & meaning belong. Our considerations are localized by our limitations which we have exaggerated with our drive to separate ourselves from the grunting, smelly ancestors we know about, but at the same time, by some sleight of mind, refuse to truly acknowledge as being us.

To return to existentialism, I consider existentialism to be a human endeavor reserved for the educated, well-spoken civilian immersed in human culture. It has value within that orbit. As for the universe, or even the natural world we have walled ourselves from both physically & intellectually, such considerations of absurdity or meaning, don't even exist. We invented such considerations … & that is existentialism at its core.

On an individual basis, or I suppose in a small process therapy group, the underlying values & beliefs could be brought, at least in part, to the surface & discussed.

We take so much of our foundational beliefs, without even noticing it, from our upbringing, social interactions & education. These foundational aspects are important to the stability of society but they are seldom examined in an objective way for their actual plausibility. These beliefs often persist when their function & usefulness has long passed.

On a larger scale, such beliefs gradually evolve often with great suffering & turmoil. Consider the transition of western cultures from Christianity & feudalism, to Capitalism, scientific inquiry, & triumphant technology, and now to recognition of life extinction on a mass scale & what to do about an 8,000,000,000 population. (Shades of Hegel's dialectic in all of this.)

Or for that matter, the Islamic belief system fighting for relevancy in the modern world of science, capitalism, democracy, religious freedom, value fluidity, & gender issues.

Great discussion points - thank you for your reply.

I agree, whenever a moral stance or ideological stance is at the top of the approval rating by mass media, social media, & the general populace you will have a entitled, snobbish, dismissive, even hostile attitude towards different stances.

The term that seems to best encompass this self-justifying attitude is egregore. This term signifies a thought form accepted by large numbers which persists over generations - a lot of definitions include an occult bit which I think is a symptom of the dismissive attitude of those immersed in the egregore).

Possible examples: 1) an economy must continue to grow, capitalism 2) electricity via solar power & wind power will reverse climate change 3) humanism 4) MAGA & Trumpism 5) systemic racism 6) systemic genderism 7) the monarchy 8) theism, 9) human rights, & 10) your last point from your reply, scientism.

I read your blog, Informed Consent & the Joe Rogan Experience.

Essentially I agree.

When a person takes an extreme position, or even one just not generally accepted, there is a tendency to insulate oneself from criticism by claiming little known but important information that only a brave person, like themselves, will continue to hold despite others' disbelief or even outrage.

Consider a staunch religious believer - scorn, ridicule, dismissal actually strengthens the person's conviction. The believer will usually feign esoteric understanding, a higher purpose, & even display sorrow for the unbeliever.

There is an element of the straw man fallacy. Informed consent is not the issue - but it is put forward as a central issue which the proponent is bravely putting forward against opposition.

The whole situation resembles a Christian contending that unless one has read the whole bible, nay further, has memorized chapter & verse of the bible, then one cannot make a valid argument against Christianity.