Talk:On the Freedom of the Will

Assessment

Are the assessments of this article the result of mere subjective, individual opinion? If so, they have little value. Can one person judge the objective importance of this article? Lestrade (talk) 19:06, 24 March 2010 (UTC)Lestrade

That would seem to be the case. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.180.26.249 (talk) 12:50, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

I have twice read this essay by Schopenhauer and I fail to understand what's wrong with this article. It very accurately exposes what Schopenhauer writes in his book. The assessments definitively have nothing subjective or individual in them, they exactly describe Schopenhauer's views. You're lucky to have this article in English (I'm French). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.22.116.222 (talk) 21:30, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Please clarify

Quoting the Lead section:

Essentially, Schopenhauer claimed that as phenomenal objects appearing to a viewer, humans have absolutely no free will. They are completely determined by the way that their bodies react to stimuli and causes, and their characters react to motives. As things that exist apart from being appearances to observers, however, humans have free will.

Care to try that in English? Humans are phenomenal objects appearing to some mysterious, unnamed, (therefore irrelevant?)) viewer? ...and would that viewer also be a phenomenal object appearing to an unnamed viewer? Or is the viewer some (mythological?) real, actual being of objective (or "truthy") substance? ? And wouldn't the "things that exist apart from being appearances to observers," be nonhumans unobserved by humans? Could "as phenomenal objects" be a mis-translation of "regarding phenomenal objects...?" It gives me the feeling of a gambit tangled in a spider web. Yet I get the feeling that the original concept was fairly simple.

If it's as-yet undefined jargon, it does not belong in the lead, please see: Wikipedia:Manual of Style (lead section)...extracts:
The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview of the article. ... While consideration should be given to creating interest in reading more of the article, the lead should nevertheless not "tease" the reader by hinting at—but not explaining—important facts that will appear later in the article.
Perhaps it's the victim of attempting to be too technically precise and all-encompasing--in the overview? ...such as; "their characters?" (A list of truisms is almost never an effective explanation/definition/communication.)
Also, the word "motive" is a morally neutral term but it seems to be used later on as if it were bad, such as an "ulterior motive." Directed action is impossible without motive (motivation).
--68.127.87.79 (talk) 06:34, 8 August 2013 (UTC)Doug Bashford

Hi,

this means you haven't obeyed Schopenhauer's requirement of reading Kant's KdRV before reading himself :)

The explanation above is heavily dependent on a Kantian metaphysics of perceivable phenomena and "pre-perception" Noumena ("Ding an sich"). According to at least S's interpretation of Kant, individuation and causality are manifestations of the "intelligible World" (the world of Dinge für mich), and when seen on this level, humans are tied into inescapable networks of causation; the will, however, is not "intelligible" in the same sense, it "exists aprt from being an appearance to an observer", and therefore it is not subject to causation. At least as far as I understand Schopenhauer.

One thing I would change is " It is one of the constituent essays of his work Die beiden Grundprobleme der Ethik", to "(/Optional: Together with "Grundlegung der Moral/Foundation of Morality, it ..."/) It is one of the two essays he published in book form as Die beiden Grundprobleme der Ethik". Just to be more precise.

T 88.89.219.147 (talk) 19:51, 6 March 2016 (UTC)