The Legend of Zelda and Philosophy_ I Link Therefore I Am - Luke Cuddy [88]
Hyrule revolves around Link and his player and recreates itself at every game. Link is the means for the gamer to manifest his or her will into Hyrule. Michel Foucault wrote that man is an “empirical-transcendental doublet,” because of his twin existence of thing among things and of knower of those things.65 Link too is a doublet between a virtual body and a player. Or, to put it differently, there’s a connection between Link in Hyrule and the Player on Earth. But to understand all this we will have to clarify what we mean by transcendental.
None of the other characters in the gameworld know that Link is guided by another being, that outside Hyrule there are real people. The most they can know are the actions of Link as a game entity, and so how to react if Link behaves in a certain way. With all this in mind, with respect to Hyrule’s dimension, Link’s will (the player’s) is necessarily too much ‘inside’ him or too much ‘outside’ Hyrule to be understood.
In certain respects our condition as human beings is not that different from Link’s. Of course, Link and Ganon never wonder if something outside Hyrule really exists, if they are free to act as they want or if something or someone is ruling their lives. It would be fun to hear Link arguing with Ganon that he sometimes feels something inside, and then listening to Ganon’s reply that it is just an illusion …
Will’s Awakening
History of will begins with someone trying to put something into his (or her) mouth because damn he wants it full stop. He does not really know why—he doesn’t even care—but he knows that he wants it. With time, he will be able to get the thing he wants, to take control of his body and of his actions and to satisfy his will. Having many ways to get the thing he wants, he can choose the one that looks best. He would then feel freedom of action.
Some people believe that freedom of action is also freedom in general, freedom in the fullest sense. But often in saying that we are free we mean that we can choose what to want. A person is free not only if he knows what he wants, but also if he can consciously determine his desires—in other words if he has freedom of will. Someone who saw this distinction between freedom of action and of will very clearly (and who did not quite believe that we humans have both of them) was the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer.
According to Schopenhauer, at first glance, I am a consciousness obeying a will (and all of you reading are too, sorry). What makes a man out of me is knowledge: I know, therefore I am a man. And the more I know the better I can understand what happens around me. I see things differently than a mosquito, so I’m not a mosquito. But I’m not completely different from it; if it could understand things as I do (or if I could share my knowledge with it) it would behave exactly like me. This happens because in both me and in the mosquito there is a will of the very same nature.
What do I know about myself? Do I know that I am choosing what to want? For Schopenhauer the answer is a clear no. I know what I want, and I try to obtain it in the best way I can, but I never actually feel within my consciousness the moment when a decision is made. It’s simply an illusion to find a decision in my consciousness. I only hear my will choosing. I feel the outcomes of my will, and I confuse them with the process of decision.
My internal life is somehow like a strange painter’s studio, where the painter draws a few lines, then a helper from a distance observes his results and describes them accurately back to him, and then the painter draws a few more lines. Who’s in charge is the painter: he is the