Conatus: REVISED EDITION by Tom Wallace - HTML preview

C O N A T U S

rescue — the key to achieving universal compassion. Interbeing suggests that we are all in this together and that the differences between us are only superficial. So we should have compassion for everyone. Schopenhauer gets a little closer to Kant though, by saying that freedom from the Will can be a ‘gift of grace’. It’s not clear, however, where this grace might be coming from.

In considering Schopenhauer’s proposal in the last chapter, I suggested it could go either way. The reason is that ‘interbeing’ is fine as a concept applied to families, tribes and other small groups of people. We already have an innate tendency to treat them with compassion. But Schopenhauer is, in effect, urging us to extend that sense of compassion to wider and wider groups of people — extending the moral community — if you like. ‘Interbeing’ — already a difficult concept — is being treated as an ideology. It is suggesting that we bear some kind of obligation towards a wider community than our natural instincts usually allow. And you’ll remember that obligation is really the starting point between just doing what pleases us or instead leading an ethical life.

The above discussions on discourse ethics and the associated contractual and contractarian ideas are a way that we approach this cut off between the personal and the social. It is a kind of a workaround. We use hierarchical structures of one sort or another in order to reduce the number of people being asked to make decisions. Thus, we have the benefit of a small group — where our instincts are mostly towards being loyal, friendly and compassionate —

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