Schopenhauer on Women
Arthur Schopenhauer, acclaimed philosophical curmudgeon, was rumoured to be quite the ladies’ man. One wonders how, given the views espoused in the infamous essay On Women:
One needs only to see the way she is built to realize that woman is not intended for great mental or for great physical labour. She expiates the guilt of life not through activity but through suffering, through the pains of childbirth, caring for the child and subjection to the man, to whom she should be a patient and cheering companion. Great suffering, joy, exertion, is not for her: her life should flow by more quietly, trivially, gently than the man’s without being essentially happier or happier.
[...] Thus nature has equipped women, as it has all its creatures, with the tools and weapons she needs for securing her existence, and at just the time she needs them; in doing which nature has acted with its usual economy. For just as the female ant loses it’s wings after mating, since they are then superfluous, indeed harmful to the business of raising the family, so the woman usually loses her beauty after one or two childbeds, and probably for the same reason.1
The last sentence would probably be Western philosophy’s most demeaning use of analogy, if Hegel hadn’t used a plant analogy to describe women in his Philosophy of Right. Schopenhauer then moves on to his account of women’s cognitive abilities and problems with telling the truth:
As a consequence of her weaker reasoning powers, woman has a smaller share of the advantages and disadvantages these bring with them. She is, rather, a mental myopic …
One must say that the fundamental defect of the female character is a lack of a sense of justice. This originates first and foremost in their want of rationality and capacity for reflexion but it is strengthened by the fact that, as the weaker sex, they are driven to rely not on force but on cunning: hence their instinctive subtlety and their ineradicable tendency to tell lies … Dissimulation is thus inborn in her and consequently to be found in the stupid woman almost as often as in the clever one … A completely truthful woman who does not practice dissimulation is perhaps an impossibility, which is why women see through the dissimulation of others so easily it is inadvisable to attempt it with them.2
Having established—in his eyes at least—the stupidity and inherent dishonesty of women, Schopenhauer notes in passing that “fundamentally women exist solely for the propagation of the race and find in this their entire vocation …”3, and commences the aesthetic assessment of his subject:
Only a male intellect clouded by the sexual drive could call the stunted, narrow-shouldered, broad-hipped and short-legged sex the fair sex … More fittingly than the fair sex, women could be called the unaesthetic sex. Neither for music, nor poetry, nor the plastic arts do they possess any real feeling of receptivity: if they affect to do so, it is merely mimicry in service of their effort to please. 4
This is becoming a very lengthy entry, but, as you can see, Schopenhauer has a LOT to say on the matter (and the essay is being quoted selectively). As the end eventually nears, the great philosopher sums up his views on the society women of his milieu:
The European lady is a creature which ought not to exist at all. What there ought to be is housewives and and girls who hope to become housewives and who are therefore educated, not in arrogant haughtiness, but in domesticity and submissiveness.5
Schopenhauer closes with a mention of woman’s “rightful and natural position, the subordinated one”6 but honestly, the sustained barrage of generalisations and prejudiced conjecture has long since become tedious.
CITATIONS:
1. Arthur Schopenhauer, ‘On Women’ in Essays and Aphorisms, trans. R.J. Hollingdale. London: Penguin Books, 1970. (pp.80-88) pp.80-1.
2. ibid. pp.82-3.
3. ibid. p.84.
4. ibid. p.85.
5. ibid. p.87.
6. ibid. p.88.
Comments
33 Comments so far
He was ahead of his time, almost everything he says is in accordance with modern science and moral theory. He may be blunt, but that doesn’t make him wrong.
I totally concur. Philosophy is based on Observation of nature and proceeds on deductive and inductive reasoning. Philosophy is not ideology! Philosophic “misadventures”? If it isn’t “politically correct”–it’s a “misadventure”? What is a misadventure is Politically correctness which is an ideology masquerading as philosophy. Don’t misconstrue ideology and philosophy. Philosophy is the love of the sophia in the natural order and is based on the Natural law. I found his analogy of the ant and a woman quite apropo.
Knege:
Could you provide some details in support of your position? I fail to see how Schopenhauer could be “ahead of his time” with comments that are nothing more than standard chauvinism. While it is lovely to hear you share Schopenhauer’s prejudices, you provide no reason to accept them beyond the extraordinarily contentious declaration “everything he says is in accordance with modern science and moral theory”. The onus is on you to substantiate that claim. As it stands, your comment is nothing more than a bald assertion of opinion unsupported by argument.
WLindsayWheeler:
In the context of a philosophical discussion, using the pejorative “You’re politically correct” as an argument amounts to little more than name-calling. It’s superficial and ad-hominem. How should I respond? In kind, by similarly ignoring all substantive issues and simply hurling epithets?
Would you be so kind as to detail your specific objections to “political correctness”? You object to the idea of not using derogatory and demeaning language? You dislike the principle that all humans are deserving of a basic level of respect? You disagree with the notion that people of different religious belief, sexual orientation, gender, ethnicity or minority grouping etc. should be protected from persecution and discrimination? Has it occurred to you that a great many people see the wisdom in these principles, even if you don’t?
And Schopenhauer’s comments are a “misadventure” because they represent little more than a tsunami of pseudo-scientific nineteenth-century misogynistic bile posing as philosophy.
I, too, totally concur – but with the anti-misogynist side. Does that make me PC too? – golly, how terrible!
It’s interesting to see the people who agree with this type of material, and the arguments they offer (or don’t offer!). Mr Wheeler, you are a repeat offender – if you look at recent posts on this site, you continually jump in with weakly justified positions, but when challenged (which you have been on a number of occasions) you completely fail to respond. It seems you are not interested engaging in a discussion, but rather with shouting out your point of view as loudly as possible.
Maybe it’s time to reconcider just who is offering ‘ideologically-driven’ ‘non-philosophical’ positions?
I usually don’t read this place but once a month and leave a comment. It is kind of hard to have a dialogue when things happen a day later or eight days later.
But if you want to me to repond, why? Your set in your ideas and I in mine. Discussion is not going to change a thing. You’re modernists and I am a traditionalist. You hate anything that is of the Old Order. What’s there to discuss?
Furthermore Carl, Chris Matthews attacks my observation of political correctness but then goes on the typical Leftist rant of “And Schopenhauer’s comments are a “misadventure†because they represent little more than a tsunami of pseudo-scientific nineteenth-century misogynistic bile posing as philosophy.” which is the Pot calling the kettle black.
I have read Yves Christian’s “Sex Differences, Modern Biology and the Unisex Fallacy”, a brilliant book that debunks all this Women are equal crap. Now, being leftists you don’t read conservative books and I on the Right don’t read Leftist books. Neither the twain shall met.
Political correctness means that one can’t be a Male Chavanist. Why can’t Schopenhauer, or Erasmus that said “Women are silly stupid Creatures”, or myself make comments about women like that. They are. They are NOT men.
One man’s bile is another man’s treasure. Marxism teaches female equality, NOT the Ancien Regime. So go take your self-righteous hypocrisy and shove it. Modern sophistry is nothing more than Marxist ideology. Political Correctness is Marxist ideology. Marxism has NO place in Western Civ. Sorry.
So, to summarize, your final position is a mixture of the following: a) I’m a proud bigot and chauvinist, b) I don’t have to justify what I say, c) I’ve read a book which proves I’m right (but don’t have to explain it myself), d) I’m not interested in anyone else’s opinion, e) some bizarre form of genetic fallacy regarding Marxism (???).
The claim there’s no point in people with opposing perspectives debating is nonsense and, more to the point, pure intellectual cowardice (just as hiding behind whatever ‘label’ you adopt is). Even if there is no final resolution or clear ‘winner’ to a discussion, or if none of the participants ultimately change their views, there is still significant benefit to be found in the general exchange of ideas; in reflecting on the principles one supports and attempting to justify them, and in defending one’s position from the criticisms of others. These activities are, after all, a large part of what philosophy is about.
Frankly, I’m stunned at where this exchange has ended: to admit that you aren’t interested in debating with people who don’t share your point of view is too admit that you aren’t interested in doing philosophy.
And yet you post on a philosophical website. Strange…
What don’t you understand about “philosophy”? The Greeks were realists not idealists. What don’t you understand about the difference between ideology and philosophy? Philosophy is from two words, “philo” and “sophia” and the coining of the term is from Pythagoras who intimates that the Greeks were not wise but lovers of the sophia that is embeded in the Natural Order. The Sophia is what built the Natural Order. The Sophia of genders is that the female is the weaker sex (Aristotle). The law of righteousness of the natural order teaches that only one thing can do one job. It is for men to lead and women to be submissive. That is the Natural Law and Greek philosophy and Western Philosophy guided by Christianity for 1700 years is the Natural Law.
The Love of Sophia is not from man but from God for God has the Sophia, and only righteous men recognize that and are lovers of God’s Sophia. That is why he says “Thus ***nature*** has equipped women..” Nature begins philosophy. The Left rejects the Natural Law, has no loyalty or fidelity to the Natural Order.
Yet again you ignore counterarguments and fall back on your self-serving and limited definition of what philosophy is.
Give me a few days (I’m currently on holiday and travelling a lot) and I’ll respond. [see next post.]
I’m with WLindsayWheeler
Gee, that’s swell Greg. But do you have any arguments or reasoning to offer along with your opinion?
i think schopenhauer has suffered from his mother’s character (probably was fell victim to ‘acts’ of other women too, especially when he was teaching -before his partial reclusion), and faced with that kind of ‘injustice’ he explains his quite objective observations (well people lie, they also get uglier in time (which is more than true for childbirth)) by accusing women of being stupid and lesser in many ways. you see, i think what he says is: i have suffered because of you, and the reason you were able to even touch my titanic mind is because your stupidity gives you certain tools which i cannot hope to counter. i am righteous, i am truly aesthetic, i am intelligent… hence my suffering.
now as to his observances, i believe that different physical attributes and differences in social positions leads to different abilities, so there is nothing absolute that natural law dictates as to how women/man are and how they should act according to this law. Then again, on this world, it might not be very healthy to strive after total equality, as it always has eluded us: there will always be aspects that are female contra male, like yin and yang, that chase each other.
all in all, i think schopenhauer’s article might be classified as bile in some ways, but that’s not why i am commenting here, i cannot stand people who does not know themselves. say, wheeler, in what way aren’t your comments full of warped ideology? in what way are you a philosopher? there might be many among the leftists that don’t know a thing about argumentation, but their problem is just that: argumentation. I think, wheeler, that you act exactly like those you call leftist in that matter, you cannot argue you point, not even to yourself. i apologize for pointing this out, but i recommend that you overcome your desire to be right all the time, and then you can begin to ‘love sophia’.
Schopenhauer was indeed a genius and his text is the perfect response to modern feminist movement.
Just to take one example:
“For just as the female ant loses it’s wings after mating, since they are then superfluous, indeed harmful to the business of raising the family, so the woman usually loses her beauty after one or two childbeds, and probably for the same reason.”
This is very much the case, I mean it is no news that men prefer YOUNG women, men have always done so and will always do so. This is in complete accordance with modern evolutionary biology and basically all he says can be supported by modern science.
The arts is the same thing, it is no secret that males have dominated all artforms in all cultures at all times in history. The exceptions are so few that they only help proving the rule.
You could go on and on, but at the end of the day we have to conclude that Schopenhauer was very much in the right. However, women are the real losers in the modern society, so it’s not derogatory in anyway, rather his view is in the favor of women and their chances to lead a good life.
“The European lady is a creature which ought not to exist at all.”
What!?!?!? I cannot believe so many people actually thnk like this.
Sorry, this isn’t really philosophy now but something is baffling me and I hope someone can help me with this – what kind of a person actually wants a submissive woman? I just dont get it. Presuming you’re a straight man why on Earth would you not want a strong, intresting, creative partner who stimulates and challenges you? Surely only a weak and insecure person actually desires a submissive partner? Doesn’t a subordinate partner just provide an absolutely dull, deluded relationship?
To anyone who actually has female friends or works with women it becomes abundantly clear (if we’re working on strict empirical observation here) that they can hold their own on any intellectual ground in a debate or conversation (presuming that their intelligent which will of course vary from person to person AS IT DOES IN MEN)and are just as capable as men at a wide range of different jobs or tasks. Of course there are differences between men and women but there’s even bigger differences between individuals.
I might be wrong and you might be happily married to nice, polite submissive wives who are dying inside themselves day by day, but these ramblngs about female submissiveness sound like the claims of people who just dont know many women or have many female friends. Go on, meet some, talk to some, they’re not as scary as you think, you might discover they’re not that different from men after all….
@Bee-log
Being submissive and strong/interesting/creative/challenging is NOT mutually exclusive. A woman can be all of those things and still be submissive.
Being submissive is a ROLE. Just like being a leader is a role. The opposite side of the coin.
If someone is the leader, someone is being submissive and following the leader.
Your negative view of women who are submissive is irrational. If a man leads in the relationship, a woman must be submissive. If not, conflict or confusion will ensue with regard to leadership and the relationship will end.
Based on your comments, it’s quite clear you lack experience with women on a romantic level. A word of advice … women despise weak men who refuse to lead. They will be friends with them. They will work with them … but they will never be intimate with them.
“A word of advice … women despise weak men who refuse to lead. They will be friends with them. They will work with them … but they will never be intimate with them.”
headrush, what utter nonsense. Have you ever heard of a meeting of equals, or are all of your relationships simple power struggles?
“I might be wrong and you might be happily married to nice, polite submissive wives who are dying inside themselves day by day”
Perhaps they are married to women who have been “educated, not in arrogant haughtiness, but in domesticity and submissiveness”?
Mating patterns of women seem to debunk the leftist orthrodoxy. Most of the geeks and nerds, who are most likely to be good husbands and lovers, are dumped by women, in favour of bad boys and pick up artists.
@headrush
Your statement looks the most logical of the entire thread. women prefer serial killers in place of lilly levered weak men.
First- I’ll admit this- I recognize what he is saying. I have often thought how my lot as a women is a bad one. I have thought how we as women have been, because of our ‘naturally’ assumed position in society (and it must be commanded thus), subconsciously pigeon holed into this position, so that if we attempt to break out of it it seems ‘unnatural’. The reason for this is that we are naturally weaker than men, and so when humanity was evolving, men ended up on top, and when humanity found itself in this state, the heirachy remained, the primary focus of a man-ruled society being power, which is ‘naturally’ a more masculine trait. So civilization grew with the accepted generalization than men are leaders, women servers.
However, this does not mean that it is right. Yes, women and men are different, certainly biologically. But we must all questioned whether the psychological and hierarchical differences are indeed ‘natural’ or rather,and I think this is more the case, ‘man-made’. In the natural world, there are not many examples of animals having systems of perceived importance, despite the male of the species being almost always the stronger, and indeed, in the few instances in which levels of importance occur, the group is matriarchal (if that is word at all, sorry). So it would be entirely logical to assume that yes, in human society boundaries of gender exist, but they are not at all ‘natural’ and are entirely artificial, and have been accepted over thousands of years not because, as so many people say, ‘men hate women’, although I am sure many do, but because the woman has been in the position of submission so long that it is seen as ‘natural’.
In the past couple of thousand years, brains has been considered as much worth brawn. However, before that, as civilization was shifting onto two levels, ‘man’ and ‘woman’, strength and so-called male virtues were valued above everything in a person. However, as focus was drawn to intellectuality, women were conceived to be less mentally able than men, because they were already seen as the less significant in every way. It is interesting to note that in ancient societies, it was widely thought that before puberty, boys and girls were equal in metal ability- (note how in Islam, not meaning to be offensive, women must wear a veil when they begin puberty). After that, men and women went separate ways- the boys were educated, and the girls taught how to be mothers. This method of dealing with girls and boys as they grow has only comparatively recently been challenged- girls are now given equal education to that of a boy, and have proved themselves there unquestionable equals. This is further evidence that women’s supposed inferiority is completely mentally and physically manufactured. What is difficult is breaking this frame of mind, although it is essential that it must be done. In the western world we have largely made women socially equal to men, however what is really needed is a psychological change, which is yet to be accomplished, and may never be. This is why, when I am in my classes at school, I hear boys my age saying the woman’s place is by the sink. This why there are so many men who claim to hate women. This is why men such as Schopenhauer see women only as being there to make them comfortable. This is why when you see a women politicain, poet, conductor, artist, soldier, priest you all, whether you think it right or not, dismiss her as ‘untalented’, ‘pretentious’, ‘a fraud’. It is so VERY wrong. A world without the distinction of gender would be a better one, but as that it physically impossible, we must all struggle to make the psychological change, all men and all women, to see a person as a person, not the male or the female.
@ Daisy:
Although I agree with you on many things, I don’t think you consider the fact that new generations of men, and women, are born into societies which have to deal with issues of safety and survival. Brawn was (and still is) highly thought of because if you can’t defend yourself, you can’t guarantee your survival. With big empires such as the Romans and Napolean’s empire, defence and the necessary corollory of aggression were very necessarily and seen as more valuable than their opposites, which seemed to be exemplified in women. You’re right though: nowadays, when technology (e.g., nukes) can defend us better than warriors with swords can, we have less need of aggressive masculinity. Issues of safety and survival can be solved economically and intellectually.
Arguements for women’s inferiority and submissiveness are often circular or based on evidence that doesn’t stand critical investigation. E.g., “Women *ought* to be in the household” is a statement based on observed evidence of what women do most and do best, as well as the knowledge we’ve received from history, yet in a society where women actually *are* made to be subordinate, which can be achieved with gender ideologies and religious doctrines, all the empirical evidence will point to this being natural; all observations you make will confirm this because it is the case that all women are subordinated under the current social order. We can also say that the same was true in the past, leading to heaps of “historical evidence.” E.g., women weren’t educated and raised the same way as men in Schopenhauer’s time, yet Schopenhauer disregards the effect this might and applies the same criteria to women who were *placed* at a distinct disadvantage as he does to men whose strength, reason, and boldness were promoted from a young age (while womens’ gentleness and submissiveness were equally encouraged from very young). But think about it: if women were naturally inferior, why would you *need* to enforce such gender norms as Schopenhauer argues? E.g., In the workplace, the evidence should show that women are inferior workers when given the same tasks, but there has never been an equality of opportunity (because of prevailing gender ideologies), and there has been much cultural derision of women who try to “do things”; thus there is no objective basis for claims about women: all the “natural” evidence is mediated by cultural norms. When women do get in the workplace, they perform just as well as men, with individual exceptions of course. Cultural reasons affect everything else, and it is possible for culture to live on for a long time, thus perpetuating the “reality” over and over again. Every generation uses history as evidence for the way things ought to be in the present. E.g., men would tell women “it has always been this way” and so women, not being as educated, would be likely to believe this based on the historical evidence (shown to them by men), and fall into the prevailing gender ideology, *thus providing more historical evidence* for men to use in the future to keep women in a submissive role. See how this is anything but natural?
Since we live in a patriarchal world (Western society is and has been largely patriarchal), we would expect prevailing gender identities to reflect this, and they do. There simply are not very many socially sanctioned roles for biological women other than subordinated ones. New and alternative gender roles are frequently attacked; ask yourself: would you want to choose a gender role in which you knew you would be persecuted? Chances are you wouldn’t. Most people look out for their well-being; therefore, if alternative (un-subordinated) kinds of gender identities are scorned, it would be logical to choose the subordinate ones in order to maximize happiness. And the cycle continues. Men enforce women’s submissiveness over long historical periods, and then future men say “look at this Natural Order!” Of course it doesn’t hurt when infallible religious texts also endorse such arrangements.
I can’t believe there are still people who take Schopenhauer seriously in this essay on women. “lament” hit the nail on the head when he/she brought up Schopenhauer’s relationship with his mother. I have to think this one essay was written more out of anger and disgust, with a couple specific relationships he’s had with specific women, than any amount of objective thought.
It’s obviously true that most women are physically weaker than most men, but to generalize the mental prowess of all women in such a demeaning way only shows a sad ignorance of what women are capable of and what they think. This is most likely because you never gave any of them the opportunity to prove themselves as anything more than pretty flowers who exist only to have your babies and make you feel good about yourself.
Go ahead and point to the fact that there are so many more famous male painters and classical musicians than female ones, but at the same time you need to remember that a woman’s “place” in society has long prevented her from even having the chance to earn the general public’s respect for creating a great piece of art or music. I have no doubt that there have been countless great works by women in the last three hundred years that have been buried in obscurity simply because they were women.
I have to mostly disagree with the two silly skirts who thought appropriate to share their opinion on this issue.
Women have been given equal opportunities as men for several decades now, and guess what? We’re not impressed. Everything is still male-dominated. It has yet to be proven that a woman is capable of doing much more than following orders. Men are still responsible of everything that matters. 100% of the scientific and technological advancement comes from men. Everything you see has been designed and built by men. Women’s work in our society is still mostly superficial and limited to picking up the phone, etc.
Daisy has brought up the point that equal education somehow makes women equal to men, or that women being able to graduate somehow proves that they’re equals. Nobody has ever questionned that women are able to memorize things and follow orders. Even before seeing any evidence, I would have never doubted that women could do well at university. All that involves is showing up in class and doing what the teachers says. The required level of intelligence is generally below average.
Innovation and real complexity are where women fail. Explain to a woman exactly what she needs to know to pass the test, and she’ll do it. Ask a woman to build you a complex electronic device, and she’ll laugh it off because in her mind, the task is impossible. Electronics grow on store shelves.
@ stephen:
“I have to mostly disagree with the two silly skirts who thought appropriate to share their opinion on this issue.”
If you want anyone to take you seriously, debate with people you don’t agree with, but nonetheless acknowledge them. Why, exactly, are the two women ’silly skirts’?
Too much anti-feminist talk is poisoned with old canards and cliches, these sound angry and hateful and discredit the skeptics positions.
For some good anti-feminist skeptic writing, see Mencken’s “In Defense of Women” and Chineau’s (sic) “Power of Women.”
I’ve been a hardcore feminist man for all my 50 years and used to vigorously argue in favor of all the usual feminist principles. But life, marriages and divorces have taught me that the only part of feminism worth supporting is the principle of equal rights in the political realm. The rest is false equivalence based on surface appearances, and only the relatively rich and idle can afford to support such illusion.
In my 20’s I believed that the only difference between men and women lay between their legs. I still think it’s true, but the significance of our genitalia is much deeper then it seemed then. Many people have too much faith in our ability to transcend our base nature with intellect. This is ridiculous arrogance, our base nature directs our intellect, not the other way around. And our genitals direct our base nature.
Of course sexual differences are statistical, the Bell curves of any measurable characteristic largely overlap.
But on average, women are the way they are because they bear children. And men are the way they are because they don’t. Women, on average, decide how men are by choosing mates. And men have more variation ( in both plus and minus directions, ) because that’s what the role rewards.
As much as possible, I ignore inflammatory language when reading about these matters and try to find the underlying wisdom, which is usually not normative. Getting angry about ugly generalizations is a distraction, and Schopenhauer did have valuable points to make despite the cheap insults.
Interesting start, but not much of a discussion as some old ‘arguements’ seem to keep resurfacing.
“Innovation and real complexity are where women fail. Explain to a woman exactly what she needs to know to pass the test, and she’ll do it. Ask a woman to build you a complex electronic device, and she’ll laugh it off because in her mind, the task is impossible. Electronics grow on store shelves.”
Madame Curie I guess didn’t exist in some worlds out there.
http://www.astr.ua.edu/4000WS/summary.shtml
I know that women haven’t achieved equality in the ’short’ time they have been given somewhat equal access to education and career opportunities, but nor has world peace suddenly appeared on our doorsteps. Then again, look at the state of the world with the majority of government leaders still being men? Could women do a worse job?
“Getting angry about ugly generalizations is a distraction, and Schopenhauer did have valuable points to make despite the cheap insults.”
The idea of women losing their beauty after having a child or two doesn’t always apply. But the often quoted double standard whereby ugly men with social status and/or money can still attract beatuiful women does. Now as to whether wealthy ‘handsome’ women can attract suitors is a theory that needs to be better tested. Money does often attract something, just not always what you expect.
As to a lesser intellect, it’s often difficult to tell the difference depending on the culture betwen well crafted logical arguements versus well staged emotional appeals when often it’s neither one nor the other, but rather a varied blend of both. I see these made at work all the time, whenever people in charge have to explain why some change is made. Often arguements could be made for both sides, and simply someone in power decided it would be better this way based on the information they had at that stage in time and quite possibly how they thought it would affect the strength of their ‘office’ power. These people tend to be both women and men, so I don’t see much difference in their intellectual approaches.
I’m glad to know that even some 300 or so years later, Schopenhauer’s essay still appeals to the forever frustrated dorks of the world. I love that the “WOMEN LOVE BAD BOYS BUT HATE NICE GUYS (WHO ARE NERDS OF COURSE)” resentment defense is on full display here by the sort of people who comprise the self-described skeevy “nice guy” label.
Also, I’d like to note that Schopenhauer’s analogy on ants doesn’t even hold up. Almost all ants are female: from warriors, workers, to the queen. Workers and warriors are sterile, of course. Male ants have wings, like young queens, and essentially exist to mate. They die not long after. I am not sure if this fact was not known during his time or if he was just fundamentally ignorant but it sure makes his analogy poor in retrospect.
Sacrificing truth at the cost of positivity, the reason philosophy is clouded. If women are useless losers, with weak intellect, full of themselves at all times, and if they lack any creative talent and if it happen’s to be the truth, and quite noticable in our daily life, then why deny it? Because we rather like a world suited for us*.
*Explains why women would never accept such a thing, not matter how true, because it speaks negatively of their entire existence or classifies them into a group which they ‘feel’ they don’t belong to.
In philosophy we search for truth, not new way’s to make the world more positive and colorful. So accept the despair, face the fact (if true) that women are useless, except through child birth.
Schopenhauer is bad enough – on the issue of women, but the bigotry of many of the posts is unbelievable.
The most worthwhile point of Schopenhauer’s essay is the noting of the lack of female achievement in the arts.
A common feminist canard is that which states that prior to the twentieth century, there is a lack of profound female achievement in the arts and sciences because the mythical patriarchy would not allow the delicate flowers to bloom. However, medieveal women were allowed and indeed, often encouraged to paint, as it was seen as work which would not defile their ladylike nature. So where then, are the female Michelangelos, Raphaels, and Da Vincis?
One poster brought up Madam Curie, which immediately supported the point of the poster who stated something about exceptions and rules(don’t feel like rereading the posts again just to quote). Great, one woman scientist of note(and well worth bringing up, because the Curies were both great minds), just fantastic proof of your point. Why not bring up the “patriarchal victim” of my branch of study, Rosalind Franklin, as well? Oh yeah, probably has something to do with the fact that she sat on top of some of the most important data in the history of molecular biology for months without being able to interpret it correctly, and it is up in the air whether she ever would have been able to(she was quite stuck on the idea that strands ran in the same direction). Watson credited her disagreeable nature as her foil going so far as to say that “she would have been famous for having found DNA if she’d just talked to Francis for an hour.”
In summary, the above poster is wrong, men have not been responsible for 100% of mankind’s most important scientific discoveries and artistic endeavors, just 99% of them.
Someday when the reign of political correctness ceases and the feminist gestapo can no longer intimidate researchers from studying the instrinsic differences between the sexes, many of Schopenhauer’s views shall be vindicated. Science will prove what everyone else already intuits from common sense and observation.
Even Charles Darwin could plainly see that women are inferior in intellect: “The chief distinction in the intellectual powers of the two sexes is shewn by man’s attaining to a higher eminence, in whatever he takes up, than can woman- whether requiring deep thought, reason, or imagination, or merely the use of the senses and hands. If two lists were made of the most eminent men and women in poetry, painting, sculpture, music (inclusive both of composition and performance), history, science, and philosophy, with half-a-dozen names under each subject, the two lists would not bear comparison. We may also infer, from the law of the deviation from averages, so well illustrated by Mr.Galton, in his work on Hereditary Genius, that if men are capable of a decided pre-eminence over women in many subjects, the average of mental power in man must be above that of woman.”
“Without the higher powers of the imagination and reason, no eminent success can be gained in many subjects. These latter faculties, as well as the former, will have been developed in man, partly through sexual selection, that is, through the contest of rival males, and partly through natural selection, from success in the general struggle for life; and as in both cases the struggle will have been transmitted more fully to the male than to the female offspring. It accords in a striking manner with this view of the modification and re-enforcement of many of our mental faculties by sexual selection, that, firstly, they notoriously undergo a considerable change at puberty, and, secondly, that eunuchs remain throughout life inferior in these same qualities. Thus man has ultimately become superior to woman. It is, indeed, fortunate that the law of the equal transmission of characters to both sexes prevails with mammals; otherwise it is probable that man would have become as superior in mental endowment to woman, as the peacock is in ornamental plumage to the peahen.”
Nietzsche had a worse view of the fair gender which he constantly maligns through his entire body of work.
Those who say women are not capable :
I refer you to the WWI an WWII war production experience.
test pilots, pilots,welders to cops etc. Women did the full range of men’s jobs.
What amazes me is it took until the 1970s for the women’s movement to full come of age.
Of course if women are to be equal – the children must have no parents to mind them. Enter the daycare which exists to assist the female achieve socioeconomic equality.
___ abet, anus obit
He said this after his wife dided.
Can anyone fill in the blank?
RE: Ion McLaren on July 9, 2010 9:36 pm
___ abet, anus obit
Can anyone fill in the blank?
A: “obit anus, abit [not obit] onus”,
This is Schopenauer’s diary entry on the death of a woman he paid a monthly allowance to after a personal injury suit was successfully litigated against him.
3 women had been chattering in his hallway and he enjoyed silence. AS asked them to leave; the lady in question refused upon which he came back with a stick. He claims he waved it ; she claimed she was beaten and suffered permanent injury.
He wrote, “obit anus, abit [not obit] onus”, which translates to “the old woman has died, the burden has departed” because in civil law the claim dies with the claimant.
http://books.google.ca/books?id=TOCjnQs6ZnUC&pg=PA13&lpg=PA13&dq=schopenhauer+pays+allowance&source=bl&ots=vHs5_UeuEW&sig=Dys4xo69rfQNce_bIGW2vFpPhbI&hl=en&ei=Vac4TImPFNGLnQfe9MzoAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CBgQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q&f=false