Schopenhauer and Nietzche

Schopenhauer's work comes within the general School of General Idealism of the 19th Century. He was a contemporary with Hegel who was someone Schopenhauer particularly hates. His position is that of immateralism which is to say that the apparent world does not exist independently of perception. In any ways Schopenhauer is similar to Kant, such ways are that they both believe that you can deduce by reason that there is a necessary pre-existent formless 'something' which is a necessary condition of the existence of anything at all. Yes, pretty confusing right. I'll have to get back to you on the meaning of that long and winding sentence and the meaning behind it. 

Kant - each object can be a 'thing in itself' separate from another 'thing in itself'. He argued that all experience could only come through us by our facilities and senses. In simpler terms, what we could experience ultimately depended on the nature of the facilities which we possess. 

For Schopenhauer there is only one undifferentiated 'thing in itself' and this is existence as a thing in itself. For this he uses the term 'WILL'. Consequently this can be confused with the term 'free will' and therefore is a bad choice. The concept of will in Schopenhauer is the same according to Nietzsche as 'eternal fire' in Heraclitus (a pre-Socratic). Nietzsche hated Socrates such as Plato and believed that the Socrates were only trying to think their way out of things and it would never work.

All experience is subject dependent. Therefore we could see reality in 2 ways (which is named the double aspect theory). Things in themselves independent of experience. Similar to Kant’s theory of noumnea, but for Schopenhauer all noumnea are the same thing – a ‘everything as a thing in itself’. This is an example of his term the will. His work was securely in the mainstream of Western Philosophy and he knew about Buddism and Hinduism. Due to this, he was the only major Western Philosopher to draw parallels between Western and Eastern thought.

Nietzsche believed in the term ‘good is dead’ and thought that the future would be full of violence. Not only this but also thought that humanity was a passing phase, ultimately branding him anti-human/Christian. Nietzsche’s main book was named The Birth of Tragedy and focused on the art form that transcended the pessimism of a meanless world.