Editing Arthur Schopenhauer (section)

==== Heredity and eugenics ====
[[File:Frankfurt Am Main-Portraits-Arthur Schopenhauer-1845.jpg|thumb|upright|Schopenhauer at age 58 on 16 May 1846]]

Schopenhauer viewed personality and [[intellect]] as inherited. He quotes [[Horace]]'s saying, "From the brave and good are the brave descended" (''Odes'', iv, 4, 29) and Shakespeare's line from ''[[Cymbeline]]'', "Cowards father cowards, and base things sire base" (IV, 2) to reinforce his hereditarian argument.<ref>Payne, ''The World as Will and Representation'', Vol. II, p. 519</ref>
Mechanistically, Schopenhauer believed that a person inherits his intellect through his mother, and personal character through the father.<ref>''On the Suffering of the World'' (1970), p. 35. Penguin Books – Great Ideas.</ref> This belief in heritability of traits informed Schopenhauer's view of love—placing it at the highest level of importance. For Schopenhauer the "final aim of all love intrigues, be they comic or tragic, is really of more importance than all other ends in human life. What it all turns upon is nothing less than the composition of the next generation. ... It is not the weal or woe of any one individual, but that of the human race to come, which is here at stake." This view of the importance for the species of whom we choose to love was reflected in his views on [[eugenics]] or good breeding. Here Schopenhauer wrote:

<blockquote>With our knowledge of the complete unalterability both of character and of mental faculties, we are led to the view that a real and thorough improvement of the human race might be reached not so much from outside as from within, not so much by theory and instruction as rather by the path of generation. Plato had something of the kind in mind when, in the fifth book of his ''Republic'', he explained his plan for increasing and improving his warrior caste. If we could [[castrate]] all scoundrels and stick all stupid geese in a convent, and give men of noble character a whole [[harem]], and procure men, and indeed thorough men, for all girls of intellect and understanding, then a generation would soon arise which would produce a better age than that of [[Pericles]].<ref>{{cite book | last = Schopenhauer | first = Arthur | title = The World as Will and Representation |editor=E. F. J. Payne |volume=II | publisher = Dover Publications | location = New York | year = 1969 |isbn=978-0-486-21762-8 |page=527 }}</ref></blockquote>

In another context, Schopenhauer reiterated his eugenic thesis: "If you want Utopian plans, I would say: the only solution to the problem is the [[despotism]] of the wise and noble members of a genuine aristocracy, a genuine nobility, achieved by [[mating]] the most magnanimous men with the cleverest and most gifted women. This proposal constitutes my Utopia and my Platonic Republic."<ref>''Essays and Aphorisms'', trans. R.J. Hollingdale, Middlesex: London, 1970, p. 154</ref> Analysts (e.g., [[Keith Ansell-Pearson]]) have suggested that Schopenhauer's anti-[[egalitarianism|egalitarianist]] sentiment and his support for eugenics influenced the neo-aristocratic philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, who initially considered Schopenhauer his mentor.<ref>''Nietzsche and Modern German Thought'' by K. Ansell-Pearson – 1991 – Psychology Press.</ref>