Combining Texts

Ideas for '', 'The World as Will and Idea' and 'Resurrecting Biological Essentialism'

unexpand these ideas     |    start again     |     choose another area for these texts

display all the ideas for this combination of texts


2 ideas

15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 1. Consciousness / a. Consciousness
A consciousness without an object is no consciousness [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: A consciousness without an object is no consciousness.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (The World as Will and Idea [1819], I Supp)
     A reaction: This hints at Hume's observations about the self. Certainly totally vacant consciousness seems inconceivable, but is that a necessary or a contingent truth?
15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 2. Unconscious Mind
We have hidden and unadmitted desires and fears, suppressed because of vanity [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: We often do not know what we desire or fear. For years we can have a desire without admitting it to ourselves ....because the intellect is not to know anything about it, since the good opinion we have of ourselves would inevitably suffer thereby.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (The World as Will and Idea [1819], II 210), quoted by Christopher Janaway - Schopenhauer 5 'Will'
     A reaction: The idea of unconscious thought crept up well before Freud. It is in La Rochefoucauld, and important in Nietzsche. Neuroscience seems to give it a strong priority over the conscious mind, which is a revolutionary idea.