Schopenhauer's View on Death and the Will

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To understand Schopenhauer's view on death, it's essential to have some understanding of his ontology. For Schopenhauer, we are fundamentally the same representations of what he terms the Will, a concept akin to Kant's 'thing-in-itself.' The essence of existence is not individual but shared; what we perceive as 'ourselves' is merely a subjective aspect of consciousness that ceases at death. Death, understood as the end of an individual's consciousness, is viewed as the ultimate cessation of the world.

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Understanding Death from Schopenhauer's Perspective

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From his work 'The World as Will and Representation Vol I', we find:

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[Death is] the temporal end to the particular temporal appearance.

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For Schopenhauer, the fear of death is rooted in the fear of the individual's end, which is openly acknowledged by the cessation of consciousness. He asserts that since an object cannot exist without a subject perceiving it, the end of an individual's consciousness is tantamount to the end of the world.

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Deep Sleep as an Analogy for Death

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In 'The World as Will and Representation Vol I', Schopenhauer compares deep sleep to death, suggesting that the two are essentially the same:

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Deep sleep cannot be distinguished from death into which it often steadily passes – e.g. in the case of freezing to death with respect to the present they are distinguishable only with respect to the future namely when it comes to waking up.

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For Schopenhauer, deep sleep and death are both states of oblivion where the individual is forgotten, and everything else appears anew, or has never slept at all.

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The Will and Individuality

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Schopenhauer's view that consciousness involves knowledge while the will is knowledgeless provides his critique of philosophical and religious teachings about the survival of the individual after death. He terms the 'soul' a transcendent hypostasis and an error, pointing out that:

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All philosophers before me from the first to the last place the true and real inner nature or kernel of man in knowing consciousness. Accordingly they have conceived and explained the I or in the case of many of them its transcendent hypostasis called soul as primarily and essentially knowing in fact thinking and only in consequence of this secondarily and derivatively as willing.

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In 'WWR Vol II', he reinforces this critique:

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In regard to suicide, Schopenhauer argues it is a mistake. The death of the body leads to the annihilation of consciousness, but the will, the true essence, endures. Thus, someone oppressed by life's burdens cannot find liberation through death or suicide. The will to life is an unyielding force, and life itself is a constant present, unaffected by individual experiences.

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As Schopenhauer concludes in 'The World as Will and Representation Vol I', the will to life is a certainty, and life's form, the endless present, remains unaffected by the fleeting nature of individual appearances.

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The eternal recurrence of the present reflects the will's unyielding presence, and the cycle of life, death, and rebirth is a palingenesis or rebirth, an aspect of the indomitable will that persists beyond individual consciousness.

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Conclusion

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In Schopenhauer's philosophy, death is the ultimate extinction of an individual's conscious experience, but the underlying will endures. The concept of palingenesis, or rebirth, symbolizes the continuity of the will through life, death, and the cycles of existence.