叔本华的人生观显然是暗淡和悲观的。Consider the following description of the life of man (and animals):

意志和奋斗是它的全部本质，完全可以比喻为一种不可抑制的渴望。然而，一切意愿的基础是需要、匮乏，因此是痛苦，因此，就其本质和起源而言，它注定是痛苦的。另一方面，如果因为太容易得到满足而又失去了追求的对象，那么，一种可怕的空虚和厌倦就会袭来;换句话说，它的存在和它的存在对它来说是一个无法忍受的负担。因此，它的生命就像钟摆一样在痛苦和无聊之间来回摆动，而这两者实际上是它的最终组成部分。This has been very quaintly expressed by saying that after man had placed all pains and torments in hell, there was nothing left for heaven but boredom

Interestingly, the pendulum swinging to and fro betwixt the pain of desire and the boredom of attainment pretty much describes the approach taken to sex by Phillip, the Schopenhauer stand in in Irv Yalom's novelThe Schopenhauer Cure.Phillip pursues women with a passion and urgency evidently borne of some kind of emptiness. But as soon as he makes a sexual conquest, he experiences not pleasure and fulfillment, but utter boredom. Almost immediately, he returns to the chase with the same urgency and the whole cycle repeats itself. Irv, by the way, will be our guest tomorrow. I don't doubt we'll spend lots of time talking aboutThe Schopenhauer Cureand what seems to me it's non-Schopenhauerian ultimate message.

Schopenhauer's pessimism is deeply held and forcefully argued. He clearly sees it as integral to his metaphysical, ethical, and aesthetic system. Notice how he heaps ridicule and scorn on the optimist:

．..I cannot here withhold the statement thatoptimism, where it is not merely the thoughtless talk of those who harbor nothing but words under their shallow foreheads, seems to me to be not merely an absurd, but also a really awickedway of thinking, a bitter mockery of the unspeakable sufferings of mankind. Let no one imagine that the Christian teaching is favorable to optimism: on the contrary, in the Gospels world and evil are used almost as synonymous expressions.

在接下来的文章中，我想简要地阐述一个观点，即叔本华的悲观主义可能是没有根据的，有点言过其实了。我并不是说叔本华是个悲观主义者是错误的。我不会像莱布尼茨想让我们相信的那样，认为这是最好的世界。我更关心的是，你可以有一个像叔本华那样的形而上学，特别是，可以接受他关于意志本质的很多观点，但仍然不会被他的悲观主义所驱使，至少在我看来是这样的。我认为，叔本华所忽略的，是像我们这样的生物，从某种意义上说，从自然界的空虚中创造出虚无价值的力量。他似乎认为，如果价值和意义不存在于，就像，前因宇宙本身，那么它们就不可能存在于任何地方。但我认为这是他的错误。价值的存在是因为我们创造了它们。他讲述的关于遗嘱的故事似乎完全符合这种方法。

Without plunging deep into Schopenhauer's metaphysics, the argument I want to make is a little hard to state. But let me try. Suppose that we grant Schopenhauer that human life, indeed all existence, is the "objectification," as he calls it, of the ceaseless striving of an aimless, meaningless will, a will that is the inner essence of all that exists. Suppose too that this will 'cares' nothing for the well being of individuals. As Schopenhauer puts it:

Nature too, the inner being of which is the will-to-live itself, with all her force, impels both man and the animal to propagate. After this she has attained her end with the individual, and is quite indifferent to its destruction; for, as the will-to-live, she is concerned only with the preservation of the species; the individual is nothing to her.

So far, so bleak. But even if we grant that we as such simply don't matter to the great scheme of things, that nature is indifferent to us, what exactly follows from that? After all, we matterto ourselves．事实上，我们对自己产生影响的能力正是建立在叔本华长篇大论的基础上。比如，想想他是怎么说我们的欲望和我们的知识的。我们的欲望是我们不断奋斗的直接源泉。他认为它们只是痛苦和折磨的来源。但为什么要这么想呢?诚然，欲望没有得到满足，就会有不安和追求实现的努力。But if my desirecanbe fulfilled, especially if I canconceivethat my desire can be fulfilled, then the desiresets me a project．以这种方式设定一个项目的能力不让我成为一个全新的人吗?我是一个有并追求项目的人。我不只是大自然的工具。大自然对我可能有自己的用处。但我也有自己的用处。让大自然对我为所欲为，让它在我满足了物种的繁殖需要后抛弃我。不过，这就是我想要的。我为之奋斗的。我给自己安排了什么项目。 Those projects matter to me, whether or not it matters to nature whether I ever get what I want.

Think of the earth. The earth is an objectification of the all encompassing will, Schopenhauer would no doubt say. Though the earth has endured for billions of years, its existence too is a matter of indifference to nature at large. If the earth were consumed by the sun tomorrow, nature would go on without a hitch, with no remorse or regret. But does that mean that earth does not matter to us. Our caring is enough to make the earth matter, not to the universe at large, but to us. Does our caring stand in some need of vindication from nature? I don't see why it should.

Schopenhauer would probably say that it's an illusion that your projects are "self-given." When you learn to see yourself under the aspect of the will, you will see that you are nothing but nature's only temporarily useful tool. But that's the step that I don't think is inevitable. We have indeed been constituted by blind, uncaring nature. And nature is through with us in the blink of an eye. But we have been constituted by her as creatures who are capable both of knowing and desiring, by Schopenhauer's own lights. Merely this, however, already gives us at least the beginnings of the capacity forcreating价值，可以说，来自于自然的虚无。The values we create are onlyourvalues and not nature's own. Nature doesn't have any values. It's blind and aimless, just as Schopenhauer alleges. But that doesn't mean that we have to be. Does it?