>but it remains intriguing to look at a beautiful rose and wonder what forces, or perhaps intelligence, led its stem to be studded with protective thorns that say to the observer, “keep your distance.”

But we already know what force "led its stem to be studded with protective thorns" That force is evolution by natural selection. At some point a mutation led to roses with very minor thorns but those thorns gave the mutated rose a slightly better change to reproduce so eventually the mutation spread through all roses. Then another mutation happened to make them longer and/or sharper until we got modern roses.

>chemical or physiological considerations coupled with mere chance

This is a common misconception about evolution by natural selection. Dawkins talks about this in his book Climbing Mount Improbable. It's not "mere chance". It's "mere chance" (aka randomness) coupled with natural selection that selects adaptations that increase Reproductive Success (RS). But that last part is essential and it is an error to just say "mere chance" results in anything.

>It is nonetheless difficult to set aside the possibility that the fish transformed its fins into legs because it somehow wanted to get out of the water,

The only reason it is difficult to set aside the idea that the fish "wanted" to get out of the water is ignorance of Biology and the fact that people have a tendency to see agency even when there isn't any. That actually is also a result of evolution. If a hunter gatherer hears rustling in the forest the cost of thinking it might be a predator when it is just the wind is far less than the cost (again in terms of RS) of thinking it is the wind when it is actually a predator.

>Schopenhauer offered a number of images to represent the cannibalistic reality of life,

Schopenhauer didn't have the benefit of Neo-Darwinism. In the early days of Darwinism when he lived the thought was that "nature red in tooth and claw" was all that drove natural selection. We know better now. Cooperation and synergy are just as important, especially for social animals such as primates. And synergy doesn't happen just within conspecifics but across species as well. Robert Trivers in his seminal paper on Reciprocal Altruism had several examples such as little cleaner fish that swim into the mouths of much bigger fish (that could easily eat the small fish) but the larger fish let the cleaner fish act as their dentists, cleaning out the little bits of food in their mouths. When the big fish suddenly has to move (e.g., because an even bigger fish like a shark is around) it could quickly shut its jaw and get a little meal but instead it signals to the little fish (via a change in coloring) that cleaning time is over and it's time to get out ASAP which they do.

>Upon realizing that we are all made of Will, a sense of deep guilt about our very constitution follows.

What does it even mean to say we "are all made of Will"? And whatever it means assuming for the sake of argument that it is true why should that make us feel guilty if that's the way nature made us? One of the amazing things about humans is we can override our genetic predispositions (if that weren't the case there would be no market for contraceptives) so assuming we "are all made of will" (again whatever that means) we can change that if we want to.

Also, I don't agree at all that individualism is completely bad. I think it's clearly wrong to take it to extremes the way people like Ayn Rand do but that doesn't mean that individualism is completely wrong. People make scientific discoveries, beautiful art and music even do altruistic acts at least partly because they are driven by a desire to express their individuality. There's nothing inherently wrong with that. At least I find no compelling argument in this article that supports such a conclusion. Just statements that it is true with no real justification.

I do think that there are good ideas in Buddhism. I try to meditate every day and I've found meditation helps me with impulse control, anger management, substance abuse and in general to do a better job of understanding what I really want rather than being driven by short term gratification. But ultimately the reason I do that are at least partly selfish, because I want to lead a better life and part of that better life includes doing research, publishing papers, and getting recognition for my work which to me is an example of how individualism can be a good thing.