Arthur Schopenhauer

On Vision and Colors by Arthur Schopenhauer

Jacket Description/Back: This is the first English translation of this work, which first appeared in 1816, in Germany. Not only will this book offer insight into the younger Schopenhauer, it is also a significant document in the history of optics and color theory. Biographical Note: David E . Cartwright is a Professor of Philosophy, at theUniversity of Wisconsin-Whitewater. Marc Notes: Revision of E. F. J. Payne's early translation of: On visions and colors (1942)--P. vii.; Includes bibliographical references. Publisher Marketing: This is a translation of work which first appeared in 1816 in Germany. Although Schopenhauer himself acknowledged that the treatise did not present any new and significant doctrines to his philosophy, he nonetheless considered it important enough to publish it again in revised form toward the end of his life, in 1854. As Professor Cartwright argues in his introduction, the book's philosophical value is to be found in the means it provides for increasing our understanding of Schopenhauer's philosophy, both in terms of its method and meaning. Not only does this book aim to offer insight into the younger Schopenhauer, it is also a significant document in the history of optics and colour theory.

Contributor Bio:  Schopenhauer, Arthur Arthur Schopenhauer's pessimism comes from his elevating of Will above reason as the mainspring of human thought and behavior. The Will is the ultimate metaphysical animating noumenon and it is futile, illogical and directionless striving. Schopenhauer sees reason as weak and insignificant compared to Will; in one metaphor, Schopenhauer compares the human intellect to a lame man who can see, but who rides on the shoulder of the blind giant of Will. Schopenhauer saw human desires as impossible to satisfy. He pointed to motivators such as hunger, thirst and sexuality as the fundamental features of the Will in action, which are always by nature unsatisfactory. Contributor Bio:  Cartwright, David E David E. Cartwright is a Professor of Philosophy and Religious Studies and the chair of the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies at the University of Wisconsin, Whitewater. He has numerous publications in nineteenth-century German philosophy and has edited and translated a number of Schopenhauer's books, most recently, with Edward E. Erdmann, The Two Fundamental Problems of Ethics (2010); and he is the author of Schopenhauer: A Biography (2010).