The Magician: Thus Spake Zarathustra

[adschenck]

<<1. From Russell:

Nietzsche’s criticism of religions and philosophies is dominated entirely by ethical motives. …the majority, in his opinion, should be only means to the excellence of thefew, and should not be regarded as having any independent claim to happiness or well-being... Almost all of the higher hopes of this century, he says, are
due to Napoleon.

Is he misstating N’s position? If yes, evidence that it is a misstatement?>>

First off, I don’t believe that Nietzsche’s criticism is “dominated by ethical motives.” I think this is a major aspect to what he was criticizing in the first place: that our valuations are ontological, that is, metaphysical, realities in and of themselves, apart from our language and knowledge, apart from our world, apart and over, life itself. It is the total affirmation of life, of reality, that begins any honest speculation at all. Besides, he never criticized “ethics,” but “morality” between which there is an etymological difference that’s become ever more confused since Cicero translated “ethos” for “morality.”

I don’t think it’s that difficult to present evidence to the contrary at all. Again, in light of what I stated about Nietzsche’s affirmation of life, it will only be a few that can and will attain this in a world where the majority finds “hope,” “redemption” and escape in otherworldy fictions. This complete affirmation is simply beyond most people to comprehend muchless undertake. Most simply don’t have the wherewithall to attain it. His “aristocracy” is not that of the “blonde beast” which he explicity critiques in GM 1:11.

You do realize that you are taking Russell’s interpretation as a matter of fact.Nowhere can I find Nietzsche stating anything like ” the majority should be only means to the excellence of the few, and should not be regarded as having any independent claim to happiness or well-being.” Nowhere…and I’ve read a lot of Nietzsche. That is Russell’s erroneous hermeneutic…and hermeneutic it is, but not fact.

You (and Russell) seem to negate the fact that later in the work which Russell quotes entitled The Will to Power, Nietzsche also criticizes Napoleon (section 1026). You also seem to forget Napoleon’s own context within the very leveling ideological and totalitarian sentiment left in the wake of the Revelution and its Terror. Simply because Nietzsche may have admired Napoleon’s individual initiative within the latter’s context does not entail N embraces Napoleon in toto (see GM 1:16). Aspects to many men can be admirable even while the man as a whole may not be so.

Yes, I think Russell wholly missed the point and as such his thesis is skewed.

It may be of note, too, that WP is not held to be the most reputable source in Nietzsche scholarship, even while it may be quite interesting. Some of it is indeed so, but given the stature of N’s sister in his own eyes it should behoove you to be wary of a book she compiled of his notes after his death.

<<2. How about this quote from N:

"I abhor the man’s vulgarity when he says ‘What is right for one man is right for another’; 'Do
not to others that which you would not that they should do unto you.’ * Such principles would
fain establish the whole of human traffic upon mutual services, so that every action would
appear to be a cash payment for something done to us. The hypothesis here is ignoble to the last
*degree: it is taken for granted that there is some sort of equivalence in value between my actions and thine."*You agree with the above?>>

Well, it seems as if Russell, Heidegger and yourself are in good company in your shared reliance upon the “Will to Power” as the authoritative document Nietzsche never published and which remains under some scholarly scrutiny for authenticity. But anyhow…

How can I agree with such a cherry-picked quote (from WP 926)? It wholly ignores the context of Nietzsche’s thoughts (which include WP 925) on actions and consequences, and that the idea “do nothing that ought not be done to you” may result in no action at all since it presumes one must hold the certainty that one’s own action will not harm another in any way, prior to that action. I don’t know about you, but, I’m neither disembodied or somehow ahead of myself in some occult manner

<<3. More Russell, summarizing N’s view of life. Take note, women and blacks… Is he misstating N’s position? If yes, evidence that it is a misstatement? >>

Yep. Russellis misstating again.

Rather than spending time looking at Nietzsche as a man, Russell seems to see Nietzsche as “ideas” on paper. What do I mean? Nietzsche was a classical philologist by profession, which is important to consider when reading him. Am I digressing? Not in the least.

Again, you bring up “aristocracy,” and since I’ve already cited where Nietzsche explicity critiques “the blonde beast” (ye olde tyme authoritarianism) let’s look at the term as a classical philologist might: that is, etymologically. “Aristos” means excellence, and in light of Nietzsche’s published work and its main and constant theme of joyful affirmation of the real (and my comments above regarding its difficulty in terms of living amongst “serious” philosophies and beliefs) living a life of Nietzschean “excellence” has no real connection to authoritarianism at all, Russell’s silly hermeneutics notwithstanding.

Good grief, I’m inclined to put some of Russell’s remarks on par with Heidegger’s belief that we could understand more about Nietzsche in Nietzsche’s absense, than Nietzsche understood of himself!

OK, now for the “woman” issue. If you have read any Nietzsche at all, particularly Beyond Good and Evil you would see that Nietzsche’s use of the term “woman” most often corresponds to the “truths” of philosophers (BGE Preface). You might also know that the term for “truth” in German (Die Wahrheit) is feminine in that language, as well as the “idea” of “Truth” in classical philosophy (“Sophia”). Not a big stretch there…I know it’s more fun for him to be considered a misogynist regardless of what women who actually knew the man said to the contrary.

And, yes, Nietzsche disliked the continued upholding of what he termed “slave morality,” but never really says anything negative regarding blacks (he actually praises “African” exuberance in comparison to Northern European moral solemnity…I know though, joy just can’t be taken “seriously” as philosophy). This does not mean that he thought slavery was therefore a good idea or practice. He thought that slave morality was faulty on at least two counts:

1. It created an escapist metaphisics, a dual ontology, between this world of “appearance,” ephemerality, and tragedy, and that of a fictitious world that was held to be “better,” more “true” and more “real.”

2. It upheld weakness, sorrow, world-hatred, renunciation, etc., as “virtues” for which to strive, as a “way” to get to the “better” world. It created a static sense of being that was wholly false and opposed to the possibility of becoming…which is precisely what I thought free-market capitalism was to engender, you know, to allow people to raise themselves up out of poverty.

Nietzsche was proposing a way of raising oneself out of nihilistic “spiritual” poverty. His philosophy denied nihilistic fictions pertaining to “truer,” “better,” worlds as well as the neurotic perpetual sorrow, which Christianity and socialism share in their pity/compassion. He thought people might be better off embracing reality as it is as a first step in alleviating sorrow, rather than inflating an egotistical vision to universal levels through universal “oughts” meant to denigrate the world and continue sorrow’s reign.

To reiterate: I see no good reason to give a perpetual status to former “victims,” do you? Isn’t this part of the idea and logic behind the Welfare State at present, in that the “victim” is nearly everywhere held to be an eternal ontological reality for which we should care forever and always? Why not encourage them in every way possible to become different than a perpetual wretch as well as make the climb out of poverty? I think these may go hand in hand quite well, don’t you?

<<4. Russell, summarizing N on compassion:..>>

Again. Yes, Russell is wrong.

Nietzsche believed that “compassion” is exactly that: “the same passion with.” In other words, one who takes the “passion” of sorrow along with the one who sorrows, has thereby only increased sorrow in the world, not lessened it. While we will never eradicate the sorrowful and tragic character of the real (such a desire constitutes the “progressive” neurosis in my opinion), we can lessen it, quantitatively and qualitatively. In Thus Spoke Zarathustra (Of the Compassionate) Nietzsche admonishes us to be a resting place for another’s suffering, “but a resting place like a hard bed, a camp-bed” so as to not encourage them to think of their suffering in terms of being, but of change and becoming.

Again, what in this is so abominable? I tend to think it is a great philosophy to encourage people to continuously encourage themselves creatively and “spiritually” as well as economically . Hence, my draw toward capitalism.

<<5. Here’s where I see a path to free market capitalism,… By which I mean cooperation…“The misfortunes of all these small folk do not together**constitute a sum-total, except in the feelings of mighty men.”>>

Is he misstating N’s position? If yes, evidence that it is a misstatement?>>

Once again, using the questionable “source” of WP ( here WP 965) and the questionable tactic of relying solely Russell’s hermeneutic cherry-picking…itself unreliable.

Nietzsche is speaking of an “ideal,” or more, a thought experiment, not a thing in this chapter (Der Grosse Mensch). “Mensch” equates roughly to “human being” rather than a singular man (Mann). Again, keep in mind my comments regarding Nietzschean “aristocracy,” courage, and the overall affirmation of life. People tend to distract themselves with every kind of political intrigue, with propoganda, with doling out their “compassion” to near meaninglessness (“universal” compassion), rather than concentrating their energies on the immediate, relevant and tactile. Again, I can see nothing amiss here, in postulating a notion that inspires one to life rather than retreating from it according to fictions of a “beyond” or “true reality” always with a concomitant moral conviction that this world is somehow inferior to that fiction.

As to the implication that Nietzsche was somehow “uncooperative,” see GM 3:12 where he states explicitly his rejection of the view that “objectivity” consists of fictions such as “pure reason,” disinterested comtemplation,” “knowledge as such” and other such absurdities. This is patently false. “Objective” knowledge only comes by way of the plurality of “eyes” constituting varying perspectives and completely interwoven in language. As such, any knowledge upheld as “objective” is inherently cooperative. The philosophy of science, particularly in view of theories of complexity and emergence, is dealing with precisely this currently in order for biologists and physists to speak to one another in a meaningful and coherent way. (See William Wimsatt’s work, for example.)

<<6. Another blow for liberty by N. He is not a nationalist:

Nietzsche is not a nationalist, and shows no excessive admiration for Germany. He wants an
international ruling race, who are to be the lords of the earth: "a new vast aristocracy based upon
the most severe self-discipline, in which the will of philosophical men of power and artist-tyrants
will be stamped upon thousands of years.">>

The contention that N wants a ruling race in the authoritarian sense is baseless and rather puerile. In fact, I’ll go so far as to say it is patently ridiculous, in light of what I’ve already stated. Yes, he desires a new view of reality which is joyful, affirmative, and which negates, in its very appearance, nihilism in all its forms, including Christianity and socialism. If that is Nietzsche’s “race” of “aristocrats,” the more the better in my eyes.

<<7. Here’s one for the girls reading this:>>

Are we going for an appeal to emotions, now? I’ve already given you the reason why N used “feminine” terminology. But what of N’s “warrior” terminology? Maybe it could have something to do with the etymological roots and the concomitant cultural ties alive within the word “virtue” itself…just maybe…those “virtuous” philosophers were indeed inept at charming Lady Truth, after all. (BGE P)

<<8. Of course, if you did something wrong, don’t feel bad or try to correct it:

Nietzsche is nauseated by repentance and redemption, which he
calls a folie circulaire.>>

Again, another bit of hermeneutical autoeroticism. But, I hardly think I have to point out the impossibilities of going back in time to “pay” for an act done, tit-for-tat, or that monetary compensation isn’t a completly reliable manner of restitution, particularly within the context of theories of subjective valuations. For most, I’m sure, given the “human, all too human” propensities of “ressentiment” at play today, any elapse in time will accumulate a great deal of unaccountable interest…

Yet, the folie circulare (Antichristian 51) that Nietzsche uses isn’t simply based upon the “blessed ideas” of repentance and redemption, so much as that these latter are held as matters of certainty, to be absolutely necessary and true. In addition, these are fictions built upon the ground of that “ressentiment” toward ephemerality and uncertainty so prevalent in Nietzsche’s day (and which continue in our own) in the form of “slave moralities”: Christianity and socialism. Nietzsche believes this is a sickly teaching of death…and yet those darn priests and philosophers who teach such nihilistic world-denigration just can’t seem to bring themselves to quit the world they hate and denigrate… and go on spewing their hatred.

<<9. In praise of cruelty:… "almost everything that we call ‘higher culture’ is based upon the spiritualizing and intensifying of cruelty." The “noble” man is essentially the incarnate will to power.>>

Russell’s paragraph, here, is as ludicris it is disenginuous. For one thing, the quote, “__almost everything that we call ‘higher culture’ is based upon thespiritualizing and intensifying of cruelty”__is taken from a section of BGE (229) where Nietzsche is explicitly speaking about cruelty’s omnipresent dimension in all things culture calls “great,” whether they be the Roman arena, the Crucifixion, bullfighting, arts such as many operas, mythology, and finally, even in the search for truth.

Russell is being dishonest (unless he was simply a poor reader) when stating Nietzsche simply relegated this to “aristocratic excellence” (particularly in the form of “the blonde beast”) and even more dishonest in trying to make it sound that Nietzsche releshed it. Nietzsche only approbated cruelty only in so far as that the real itself is irredeemably tragic, but this does not equate to any love of violence on Nietzsche’s part. Such a conflation is a non-sequitur at best.

<<9. A word or two about N in general, and his contribution to our understanding of the world. Russell pseaking about waht is important in N’s works:..Do you agree?>>

No.

<<: “I omit Russell’s solid refutations of N’s absurdities.”>>

…based as they are on Russell’s absurd but “solid” certainties, of course…

<<: “In sum, I stand by my assertion about N.>>

Fantastic! I wouldn’t try to stop you even if I could.

[Smiling_Dave]

Summarizing your position:

0. Russell totally missed the point of N’s work, which is to open us to living a “real” life.

1. Women in N’s works are not women at all, but “Truth”.

2. The Will to Power, especially the parts Russell quotes, was not written by N, but by his sister.

3. For all his analytic abilities, Russell did not know what he was reading, how to summarize it correctly, nor how to make correct deductions from it.

4. Not only that, he cherry picks. Meaning for every quote he takes out of context, there are many many others scattered in N’s works which show the reverse.

5. N was full of compassion, of the kind called tough love.

Well, I can only really express an intelligent opinion by actually reading N’s work. If I ever feel the need to face life like a primitive African, I’ll look into it.

[Smiling_Dave]

Poor misunderstood Nietzsche!

Not only did Bertrand Russell totally misrepresent him, but Will Durant made the exact same mistakes. Both of these ordinarily intelligent men just went off the path, and oddly enough, in the same direction.

A bit of Will Durant, from his Story of Philosophy:

1*. Men who could think clearly soon perceived what*
the profoundest minds of every age had known: that in this
battle we call life, what we need is not goodness but strength,
not humility but pride, not altruism but resolute intelligence;
that equality and democracy are against the grain of selection
and survival; that not masses but geniuses are the goal of ev-
olution; that not “justice” but power is the arbiter of all dif-
ferences and all destinies.^So it seemed to Friedrich Nietzsche.
Now if all this were true, nothing could be more magnificent
or significant than Bismarck. Here was a man who knew the
realities of life, who said bluntly that "there is no altruism
among nations," and that modern issues are to be decided not
by votes and rhetoric, but by blood and iron. What a cleans-
ing whirlwind he was for a Europe rotten with delusions and
democracy and “ideals” ! In a few brief months he had
brought decadent Austria to accept his leadership; in a few
brief months he had humbled a France drunk with the legend
of Napoleon ; and in those brief months had he not also forced
all those little German “states,” all those petty potentates,
principalities and powers to fuse themselves into a mighty
empire, the very symbol of the new morality of strength?
The growing military and industrial vigor of this new Ger-
many needed a voice; the arbitrament of war needed a philos^
ophy to justify it. Christianity would not justify it, but
Darwinism could. Given a little audacity, and the thing
could be done.
Nietzsche had the audacity, and became the voice.

2. “Here,” he wrote, "you
have the state, of shameful origin; for the greater part of
men a well of suffering that is never dried, a flame that con-
sumes them in its frequent crises. And yet when it calls, our
souls become forgetful of themselves ; at its bloody appeal the
multitude is urged to courage and uplifted to heroism." 1 At
Frankfort, on his way to the front, he saw a troop of cavalry
passing with magnificent clatter and display through the
town ; there and then, he says, came the perception, the vision,
out of which was to grow his entire philosophy. "I felt for
the first time that the strongest and highest Will to Life does
not find expression in a miserable struggle for existence, but
in a Will to War, a Will to Power, a Will to Overpower !"

3. What a tragedy for ancient Greece that it produced Socrates and Plato ans Aristotle. Here’s why:

Socrates — “the type of the theoretical man” 4 — was ,a sign
of the loosened fibre of the Greek character; "the old Mar-
athonian stalwart capacity of body and soul was more and
more sacrificed to a dubious enlightenment, involving progres-
sive degeneration of the physical and mental powers." x Crit-
ical philosophy replaced the philosophical poetry of the pre^
Socratics ; science replaced art ; intellect replaced instinct ; di-
alectic replaced the games. Under the influence of Socrates,
Plato the athlete became an esthete, Plato the dramatist be*
came a logician, an enemy of passion, a deporter of poets, a
“pre-Christian Christian,” an epistemologist. On the temple
of Apollo at Delphi those words of passionless wisdom were in-
scribed — gnothe seauton and meden agan 2 — which became, in
Socrates and Plato, the delusion that intelligence is the only
virtue, and in Aristotle the enervating doctrine of the golden
mean. In its youth a people produce mythology and poetry ;
in its decadence, philosophy and logic.

4. The Ubermensch:

Already in these essays two of
his distinctive ideas found expression : that morality, as well as
theology, must be reconstructed in terms of the evolution
theory ; and that the function of life is to bring about "not the
betterment of the majority, who, taken as individuals, are the
most worthless types," but “the creation of genius,” the de-
velopment and elevation of superior personalities.

5. Peaceloving N:

“Live dangerously,” he preaches.
"Erect your cities beside Vesuvius. Send out your ships to
unexplored seas. Live in a state of war."

6. Let your conscience be your guide. NOT:

Honor is pagan* Roman*-
feudal, aristocratic; conscience is Jewish, Christian, bour-
geois, democratic. 1 It was the eloquence of the prophets,
from Amos to Jesus, that made the view of a subject class an
almost universal ethic; the “world” and the “flesh” became
synonyms of evil, and poverty a proof of virtue. 2
This valuation was brought to a peak by Jesus : with him
every man was of equal worth, and had equal rights;

7. On love. [Hint: there’s no such thing]:

Behind all this “morality” is a secret will to power. Love
itself is only a desire for possession; courtship is combat and
mating is mastery : Don Jose kills Carmen to prevent her from
becoming the property of another. "People imagine that
they are unselfish in love because they seek the advantage of
another being, often in opposition to their own. But for so
doing they want to possess the other being. . . . Uamour
est de tous les sentiments le plus Sgoiste, et, par consequent,
lorsqu’il est blesse, le moms genereux" 2 Even in the love
of truth is the desire to possess it, perhaps to be its first pos<
sessor, to find it virginal. Humility is the protective colora-
tion of the will to power.

8. I could go on and on. Will Durant just cherry picks quote after quote, and totally misses the bus, just like Bertrand Russell.

[Eric080]

Russell was coming out of the WWII era and interpreted Nietzsche, as most often did, as a Nazi sympathizer. Needless to say, Nietzsche did not support anti-Semitism nor did he support nationalism. Reading Nietzsche as a political philosopher is to entirely miss the point; his main area of interest was in the realm of values and how to live your life. Nietzsche uses loaded language, but that is in the goal of illustrating a point. Just because he embraces suffering and hardship and looks at it like it is a part of life and something to be overcome, I don’t see how that is “tough love” in a pejorative sense. Sure there’s no need to cause needless suffering, but to embrace suffering when it does come and view it as a challenge can be something that’s affirming.

Nietzsche’s complaints about women were harsh, but if you ever read Nietzsche, there is always a bit of tongue-in-cheek going on. He realizes that he is being biased and he realizes his view is probably not an accurate representation of reality. Besides, even if Nietzsche was a total dick in his philosophy, it doesn’t mean you can’t read what he wrote and take bits and pieces to enlighten yourself.

[Eric080]

Wow, I skim-read your post and stumbled across #5. “Live in a state of war.” “Oh, I guess that means he is telling me to use violence and fight people! ROFL!” Yes, to the untrained eye it may certainly appear that way, Dave. There’s a thing called, “symbolism” though. All he is saying there is to take chances and live on the edge rather than be in a perfunctory state of living.

Yeah maybe Durant and Russell are wrong, because just about every modern (i.e., not between the late 40s and early 60s like the time frame of Druant’s publication) Nietzsche scholar this side of the sun doesn’t interpret his writings in such a manner. So somebody is wrong here, because there are two accounts of interpretation (yours I believe is in the minority) and they contradict each other.

#6, I don’t see anything strange about that. Any non-egalitarian would be proud. Not everybody is equal. #7 is just expressing a type of psychologial egoism. Is he incorrect? If so, why? You’re only appealing to…Well, I don’t know what you’re appealing to in that instance.

[Eric080]

A simple Sparknotes search can clear up a lot of confusion:

The Nihilism of Contemporary Europe

While most of his contemporaries looked on the late nineteenth century with unbridled optimism, confident in the progress of science and the rise of the German state, Nietzsche saw his age facing a fundamental crisis in values. With the rise of science, the Christian worldview no longer held a prominent explanatory role in people’s lives, a view Nietzsche captures in the phrase “God is dead.” However, science does not introduce a new set of values to replace the Christian values it displaces. Nietzsche rightly foresaw that people need to identify some source of meaning and value in their lives, and if they could not find it in science, they would turn to aggressive nationalism and other such salves. The last thing Nietzsche would have wanted was a return to traditional Christianity, however. Instead, he sought to find a way out of nihilism through the creative and willful affirmation of life.
The Doctrine of the Will to Power

On one level, the will to power is a psychological insight: our fundamental drive is for power as realized in independence and dominance. This will is stronger than the will to survive, as martyrs willingly die for a cause if they feel that associating themselves with that cause gives them greater power, and it is stronger than the will to sex, as monks willingly renounce sex for the sake of a greater cause. While the will to power can manifest itself through violence and physical dominance, Nietzsche is more interested in the sublimated will to power, where people turn their will to power inward and pursue self-mastery rather than mastery over others. An Indian mystic, for instance, who submits himself to all sorts of physical deprivation gains profound self-control and spiritual depth, representing a more refined form of power than the power gained by the conquering barbarian.

On a deeper level, the will to power explains the fundamental, changing aspect of reality. According to Nietzsche, everything is in flux, and there is no such thing as fixed being. Matter is always moving and changing, as are ideas, knowledge, truth, and everything else. The will to power is the fundamental engine of this change. For Nietzsche, the universe is primarily made up not of facts or things but rather of wills. The idea of the human soul or ego is just a grammatical fiction, according to Nietzsche. What we call “I” is really a chaotic jumble of competing wills, constantly struggling to overcome one another. Because change is a fundamental aspect of life, Nietzsche considers any point of view that takes reality to be fixed and objective, be it religious, scientific, or philosophical, as life denying. A truly life-affirming philosophy embraces change and recognizes in the will to power that change is the only constant in the world.

[Smiling_Dave]

TY Eric for your interesting posts.

1. About ROFL to the claim that N loved war, he writes about how wonderful it is on every page, seems to me. Look at #2. He saw a bunch of soldiers and was so impressed by them that he realized what life is about. War. Overpowering. So if we put your claim together with Allen’s, a woman is not a woman, but “truth”, and War is not war, but a symbol. Uh huh.

2. About the Marxist kind of logic, that Russell could not think straight because he conflated N with Nazis, here’s what he says about that:

He is also not definitely anti-Semitic, though he thinks Germany contains as many Jews as it can
assimilate, and ought not to permit any further influx of Jews. He dislikes the New Testament, but
not the Old, of which he speaks in terms of the highest admiration. In justice to Nietzsche it must
be emphasized that many modern developments which have a certain connection with his general
ethical outlook are contrary to his clearly expressed opinions.

3. So everything he wrote is all tongue in cheek and he didn’t mean a word of it. Poor Russell and Durant just didn’t get the joke, hey? I’m not buying it.

4. As for them being in the minority, and therefor wrong, I’m sure you know better than that. If not, read this lovely article at cracked.com:

http://www.cracked.com/article_18822_5-famous-scientists-dismissed-as-morons-in-their-time.html

You could also read your Neitzsche, about how the masses are all fools anyway.

Now what could have happened is that after WW2 people sorta woke up and realized that N is full of it. But he writes well. So they just ignored 90% of what he had to say, the Nazi stuff, and found joy feeling superior to the masses without actually killing them. This might account for his renaissance. After all, it is very comforting to some people to think they are the Ubermenshen, that they are beyond good and evil, that everyone else has to be decent human beings but not aristocratic them.

5. Bottom line, whatever floats your boat. Ayn Rand doesn’t get kindness, Nietzsche thinks it’s for slaves, I liked MAD magazine as a child. Now I like Cracked.com.

[Smiling_Dave]

Yes, #6 is not strange at all. It is very familiar, the Nazi philosophy. If you are inspired by it, think it’s true, knock yourself out.

#7 I’m appealing ot my own experience, and that of the poets. Ever watch Titanic? The hero freezes to death, literally, to save his girl. You don’t know of parents who did that, or would do that, for their kids? All unexplainable if you are a Nazi, I mean a Neitzschean, who thinks #7 is right.

If, like Neitzsche, you don’t know what I’m talking about, I feel sorry for you. Maybe you are young, have not had children. If so, life has pleasant surprises in store.

For your amusement, here are partial lyrics to Mad Mission by Patty Griffin. I guess she met Neitzsche in that bar:

“Mad Mission”

We were drinking like the Irish
But we were drinking scotch
Bartender turned on a movie
Everybody turned to watch
And every single eye was gleaming
As he reached the final scene
Well, at least mine did
Here’s lookin’ at you, kid

It’s a mad mission
Under difficult conditions
not everybody makes it
To the loving cup
It’s a mad mission
But I got the ambition
Mad, mad mission
sign me up

I think I’ve seen the look before,yes,
it’s kind of non-commital
It says come hither, baby, but then he’s hard wood to whittle
He says it don’t mean a thing, but still, somehow it does
He’d like you to join the club that likes to say
there’s no such thing as love and

It’s a mad mission
Under difficult conditions
not everybody makes it
To the loving cup
It’s a mad mission
But I got the ambition
Mad, mad mission
sign me up

[Smiling_Dave]

Yes, the Sparknotes are a nice bowdlerized version of what he had to say.

I didn’t know monks give up on sex. From what I heard it’s just the opposite.

Bottom line, if what you get from N is the message “Don’t be such a wimp”, fine. But that’s just you, stopping short of what he really says, which is “Kill everyone else, and love it. That is the way of the Superman like you.”

[adschenck]

0. I never said such a thing regarding “real” life. But yes, Russell’s assumptions were necessarily the basis of his analysis. That’s usually the case whenever we think…Nietzsche’s point was to revaluate the most common, though nihilistic, assumptions grounding much of philosophic thought and analysis.

1. I didn’t make that equation straight across the board. Comprehensively read much, Dave? Obviously not, given your admitted ignorance of N, all the while making pompous claims about him based upon Russell’s rather emotional “analysis” in this case.

2. WP is widely held by scholars to be somewhat dubious, yes. It is widely known that Ns notes that comprise WP were tampered with by his sister.

3. Based upon Russell’s presumptions, his reading of N was therefore skewed, yes. Analytic ability doesn’t equate to the “truth” of our knowledge. You might wish to listen to a course on the history of modern science, as a prime example of this very thing. Dr. Steven Goldman’s Science Wars: What Scientists Know and How They Know It available at the Teaching Company is wonderful demonstration of what I mean, here.

4. Yes, cherry-picking galore. And as to your charge of N’s “many, many” other “scattered” quotes showing the reverse, sources, Dave? So far, you’ve shown exactly none, all the while demanding them from me, a demand of which I obliged in good faith. Oh, and by the way, “quotes” are not necessarily the sole constituent of good philosophy. As a teacher once told me when I was young: “Context, context, context!” There’s a quote that you may find useful most of the time.

5. This is rather flippant and puerile, at best. I was under the impression that folks like Hazlitt and Mises were precisely concerned with long-term consequences of actions. Encouraging the static and perpetual view of someone’s “victimhood,” that is, their subjective valuation of themselves and society, thereby making this status on par with an ontological category, seems to me support for the perpetual demand for entitlements supplied through coercion at the expense of everyone else. Over the long haul, this seems to go counter the long-term capitalist desire for benefiting people through peace and prosperty, don’t ya think, Dave? It seem a more joyful and logical solution to encourage the notion that one can change their circumstances and their perspective simultaneously, in my estimation. But, you seem to enjoy perpetual “victims” as you can thereby excercise your “compassion” and look “good” in the eyes of others (or “God” perhaps?) while supporting authoritarian measures to attain what is demanded in order to gird a sense of fictitious, but “ontological,” integrity.

<<Well, I can only really express an intelligent opinion by actually reading N’s work. If I ever feel the need to face life like a primitive African, I’ll look into it.>>

Yes. Reading primary sources is certainly one of the hallmarks of critical thinking and philosophy, Dave. I thought this would be obvious in this time of “advanced” modernity. But, whenever I feel the need for my thought to regress to simplistic, ham-fisted, binary lethargy, glib but unsupported attempts to brush off other perspectives, cheap shots toward “primitive” blacks, and a need to cling to my own smug ego, I’ll know that I can look you up for guidance. Thank you…

[Smiling_Dave]

Mises on the Superman nonsense. First he presents the case:

It has been asserted that man is a beast of prey whose inborn natural
instincts impel him to fight, to kill, and to destroy. Civilization, in creating
unnatural humanitarian laxity which alienates man from his animal origin,
has tried to quell these impulses and appetites. It has made civilized man a
decadent weakling who is ashamed of his animality and proudly calls his
depravity true humaneness. In order to prevent further degeneration of the
species man, it is imperative to free him from the pernicious effects of
civilization. For civilization is merely a cunning invention of inferior men.
These underlings are too weak to be a match for the vigorous heroes, they
are too cowardly to endure the well-deserved punishment of complete
annihilation, and they are too lazy and too insolent to serve the masters as
slaves. Thus they have resorted to a tricky makeshift. They have reversed
the eternal standards of value, absolutely fixed by the immutable laws of the

universe; they have propagated a morality which calls their own inferiority
virtue and the eminence of the noble heroes vice. This moral rebellion of the
slaves must be undone by a transvaluation of all values. The ethics of the
slaves, this shameful product of the resentment of weaklings, must be
entirely discarded; the ethics of the strong or, properly speaking, the nulli-
fication of any ethical restriction must be substituted for it. Man must
become a worthy scion of his ancestors, the noble beasts of days gone by.

Sound like a fair statement of the Neitzscheian position, no?

Now comes a little about let’s not confuse this with Darwinism:

It is usual to call such doctrines social or sociological Darwinism. We need
not decide here whether this terminology is appropriate or not. At any rate it is
a mistake to assign the epithets evolutionary and biological to teachings which
blithely disparage the whole of mankind’s history from the ages in which man
began to lift himself above the purely animal existence of his nonhuman
ancestors as a continuous progression toward degeneration and decay.

OK, so what is a strictly biological view of what’s been going on as we wait for Superman?

Biology
does not provide any standard for the appraisal of changes occurring within
living beings other than whether or not these changes succeeded in adjusting
the individuals to the conditions of their environment and thereby in improving
their chances in the struggle for survival. It is a fact that civilization, when
judged from this point of view, is to be considered a benefit and not an evil.
It has enabled man to hold his own in the struggle against all other living
beings, both the big beasts of prey and the even more pernicious microbes;

it has multiplied man’s means of sustenance; it has made the average man
taller, more agile, and more versatile and it has stretched his average length
of life; it has given man the uncontested mastery of the earth; it has
multiplied population figures and raised the standard of living to a level
never dreamed of by the crude cave dwellers of prehistoric ages.

But what about the disappearance of the He-Man With the Club?

It is true
that this evolution stunted the development of certain knacks and gifts which
were once useful in the struggle for survival and have lost their usefulness
under changed conditions. On the other hand it developed other talents and skills
which are indispensable for life within the frame of society. However, a
biological and evolutionary view must not cavil at such changes. For primitive
man hard fists and pugnacity were as useful as the ability to be clever at
arithmetic and to spell correctly are for modern man. It is quite arbitrary and
certainly contrary to any biological standard to call only those characteristics
which were useful to primitive man natural and adequate to human nature and
to condemn the talents and skills badly needed by civilized man as marks of
degeneration and biological deterioration. To advise man to return to the
physical and intellectual features of his prehistoric ancestors is no more reason-
able than to ask him to renounce his upright gait and to grow a tail again.

Next, is Neitzsche basically a nutcase, or just biting the hand that feeds him:

It is noteworthy that the men who were foremost in extolling the eminence
of the savage impulses of our barbarian forefathers were so frail that their
bodies would not have come up to the requirements of “living dangerously.”
Nietzsche even before his mental breakdown was so sickly that the only
climate he could stand was that of the Engadin valley and of some Italian
districts. He would not have been in a position to accomplish his work if
civilized society had not protected his delicate nerves against the roughness
of life. The apostles of violence wrote their books under the sheltering roof
of “bourgeois security” which they derided and disparaged. They were free
to publish their incendiary sermons because the liberalism which they
scorned safeguarded freedom of the press. They would have been desperate
if they had had to forego the blessings of the civilization scorned by their
philosophy.

Yes, the post is getting long. So we pause here.

[Smiling_Dave]

Oh yeah. Add Mises to the list, along with Bertarnd Russell and Will Durant, of those who had the same opinion of what Nietzsche is about.

It is noteworthy that the men who were foremost in extolling the eminence
of the savage impulses of our barbarian forefathers were so frail that their
bodies would not have come up to the requirements of “living dangerously.”
Nietzsche even before his mental breakdown was so sickly that the only
climate he could stand was that of the Engadin valley and of some Italian
districts. He would not have been in a position to accomplish his work if
civilized society had not protected his delicate nerves against the roughness
of life.

Yep, that’s what N is about, according to Mises. Extolling the savage impulses of our barbarian forefathers.

While he personally was such a wimp he could only live in what he would consider faggy Italy. Any connection between his self image and his philosophy? Naaah.

[adschenck]

Brilliance in economics doesn’t equate either to brilliance in reading comprehension or philosophy.

Mises seems to have missed the fact that nearly all of those who Nietzsche held in high regard were authors: Heraclitus, Aristotle, Goethe, Spinoza, Heine, Montaigne, and so on. In addition, Nietzsche was highly intrigued and influenced by his then-contemporary natural sciences. Both of these arenas are civilized endeavors. To say that Nietzsche spurned civilization as such is due to ignorance of these fact (amongst others),which, in turns, says to me he only used second-hand knowledge of Nietzsche without reading Nietzsche himself, or is completely lying. Given that I think Mises attempted to be basically an honest man, I’ll approach him in good faith and discount the last option until, and if, I find out differently.

Mises’ critique becomes even more suspicious to me (though in light of the possibility of never reading it himself and relying on the dubious interpretations of others) in that Nietzsche rejects outright the notion that what became known as “social Darwinism” was the only perspective in which to view the rise and continued existence of civilization (see HH 224 and GM 3:13). Nietzsche saw that both “weakness” and “strength” in civilizations were crucial in that:

“Wherever progress is to ensue, deviating natures are of greatest importance. Every progress of the whole must be preceded by a partial weakening. The strongest natures retain the type, the weaker ones help to advance it. Something similar also happens in the individual. There is rarely a degeneration, a truncation, or even a vice or any physical or moral loss without an advantage somewhere else. In a warlike and restless clan, for example, the sicklier man may have occasion to be alone, and may therefore become quieter and wiser; the one-eyed man will have one eye the stronger; the blind man will see deeper inwardly, and certainly hear better. To this extent, the famous theory of the survival of the fittest does not seem to me to be the only viewpoint from which to explain the progress of strengthening of a man or of a race…” (HH 224)

So, keep it going Dave…and I’m glad to see that you not only disparage “primitive” blacks while making inane charges of the like against Nietzsche, but now Italy is to be disparaged for supposedly being a home for homosexuals? OK…

It might be a good idea to put down Mises’ when making remarks about Nietzsche and read Nietzsche himself for once. But, then again, that would be like asking a commited communist to read Mises as Mises rather than through the “eyes” of Marx, Mao, and Gramsci.

[MnoruS]

Smiling Dave, better if you read Nietzsche yourself, while keeping in mind what Allen’s telling you and what you’ve read from Durant, Mises and Russell. From there you can draw your conclusions.

I believe Mises, Durant’s and Russell’s failings were not intellectual per se, but an inability to grasp Nietzsche’s style. We’re much more fortunate to have the likes of Kaufmann to place Nietzsche’s statements in context.

For example, Durant criticized Nietzsche’s statement that man must “become more evil,” which Durant took to mean be more of an asshole murderer, when in fact Nietzsche expounds on the concepts of ‘bad’ and ‘evil’ for an entire third of his ‘Genealogy of morals.’

Russell may have also been affected by the Nazi and proto-Nazis seeking to claim Nietzsche as their spokesperson, hence his especially sharp (but wrong) criticisms. To say that Nietzsche advocated killing millions is just flat out nonsense.

What Russell and Mises missed was that Nietzsche was not praising barbarism or cruelty in his discussions on these. Nietzsche had a psychological perspective for these concepts; he wanted to inculcate the vitality of past conquerors, but this does not mean oppressing others. He also saw hypocrisy and pettiness in supposedly ‘righteous’ acts such as giving alms. Nietzsche himself saw magnanimity in kindness and compassion, given a healthy state of mind.

Mises almost got it, in noting that Nietzsche, himself a sickly man, highly benefited from free trade. If Nietzsche literally meant an order of rank that justifies murdering the weak, Nietzsche himself would not have lived long.

It was also Nietzsche’s ‘power’ framework that scared off a lot of people. Power seems so crude an interpretation of human relations, unless you take the time to read Nietzsche’s explanations.

Having said all this, Nietzsche was himself not an anarcho-capitalist and was inconsistent in his understanding of economic ideas, as is understandable for a non-economist in the 19th century. So while some of his insights on logic, morality and epistemology can be applied to a philosophy of liberty, Nietzsche could not be a representative of liberty himself.

[adschenck]

Hello Paul-

You wrote: “What Russell and Mises missed was that Nietzsche was not praising barbarism or cruelty in his discussions on these.”

Another interesting thing, and one that drew me closer to Mises, and free-market economics all together, was that this perspective seems to promote a sound, empirical arena of Nietzsche’s thought regarding 1) the revaluation of values, 2) a case against the “ressentiment” that is found explicitly in socialism (“the religion of sorrow” as N. put it) and “amor fati” in terms of not demanding of the world more than it can offer (such as peace while expropriating the property/labor of others). Mises’ own book The Anti-Capitalist Mentality is full of just this life- and world-affirming attitude, and a critique of the very same “religion of sorrow.” Though perhaps only an idle speculation, I think Nietzsche would have found much of interest therein.

At any rate, I find critiques of N from a liberal perspective, such as Dave’s, almost analogous to socialistic attempts to cast contemporary banking as somehow a free-market enterprise.