Nietzsche Presentation January 2008

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Introduction to Some of

Nietzsches Concepts

Prepared by

Paolo A. Bolaos


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The greatness of philosophy ismeasured by the nature of the events towhich its concepts summon us or that itenables us to release in concepts. So

the unique, exclusive bond betweenconcepts and philosophy as a creativediscipline must be tested in its finestdetails. The concept belongs to

philosophy and only to philosophy. - G.Deleuze and F. Guattari, What isPhilosophy?


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The Concepts

1. The Horrific Life

2. Metaphorical World3. The Heaviest Weight

4. Nihilism

5. Force and Power


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The Horrific LifeDionysiac art . . . wants to convince us of theeternal lust and delight of existence; but weare to seek this delight, not in appearancesbut behind them. We are to recognize thateverything which comes into being must beprepared for painful destruction; we areforced to gaze into the terrors of individualexistence - and yet we are not to freeze in

horror: its metaphysical solace tears usmomentarily out of the turmoil of changingfigures. - F. Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy,sect. 17


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In BT, Nietzsche proposes that it is onlyas an aesthetic phenomenon thatexistence and the world can be justified.

For Nietzsche philosophy begins withhorror - existence is horrible and

absurd.The above speaks of Nietzsches

influence on existential philosophy. Wefind this leitmotiv in Heidegger (Angst),Sartre (Nausea), and Camus (Absurd).The BT is the most existential ofNietzsches main works.


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The BT contains Nietzsches early musings

on nihilism. Nihilism is articulated as anexistential affair arising from a cosmic

problem, in contrast to nihilism as a

cultural/historical pathology.

The BT contributes to aesthetics viaNietzsches discussion of the dialectical

interaction between the Apollonian and

Dionysian spirits.

The BT also stages a critical encounter with

Socratic optimism, which Nietzsche sees as

decadent and life negating.


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Between Apollo and Dionysus

The A and D are competing sensibilitiesin Greek culture. A - the god of light,

dream and prophecy, the shining one.D - the god of intoxication and rapture.

A - visible form, comprehensibleknowledge, and moderation.

D - formless flux, mystical imagination,and excess.


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A - names a world of distinct individuals

(principle of identity/individuation).D - names a world where distinct

individuals are dissolved and find

themselves reconciled with theelemental forces and energies of

nature.

Through Dsian rapture we become part

of a single, living being with whose joy

in eternal creation we are fused.


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A is the god of the plastic or

representational arts, like painting andsculpture. While Dionysus is the god of

the non-representational art of music,

w/out physical form.For Nietzsche, the A is a complex and

tedious engagement with the D.

Nietzsche seeks for an adequate unionbetween the two sensibilities which he

finds in Greek tragedy.


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We suffer as individuals for variousreasons. Once we recognize our

cosmic insignificance we know thatthere is no ultimate purpose to humanexistence.

The inevitable fact of death brings thishome to each individual clearly andforcefully, thats why Heidegger calls itones ownmost possibility.

Life is characterized by desire andenergy, but this activity is not centeredon us humans - life is a biological

network and we dont control it.


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This existential nihilism gives us aprofound and pessimistic view of life.

As humans with the propensity torationalize the world, we are alienatedfrom nature and our awareness of this

separation afflicts us - this is the causeof our suffering - philosophy begins inhorror.

For Nietzsche, the world is a tragic playof opposites - per se, it knows noredemption and requires no salvation.


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It is through philosophy that one overcomes

harsh (not necessarily evil) reality.

Philosophy is a matter of tragic wisdom.Tragic wisdom can only be cultivated through

understanding the relation between A and D

sensibilities. We need to understand that

theres a primordial strife between D

(darkness) and A (light), or chaos and logos.

It is through art that this tragic insight comes

in full force - for art itself is this activeengagement with existential nihilism. It is

through art that one can affirm life and find

joy in becoming, even in destruction.


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The Rhetorical Worldview

What then is truth? A movable host ofmetaphors, metonymies, andanthropomorphisms: in short, a sum of humanrelations which have been poetically and

rhetorically intensified, transferred, andembellished, and which, after long usage,seem to a people to be fixed, canonical, andbinding. Truths are illusions which we have

forgotten are illusions; they are metaphors thathave become worn out and have been drainedof sensuous force, coins which have lost theirembossing and are now considered as metal

and no longer coins (TLNM1).


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Nietzsche takes the role of languageseriously. From a rhetorical point of view, the

world is mediated through language. It isonly by means of language that we makesense of the world, only by means oflanguage as mediation that we negotiate our

ways in the world.Thinking is, therefore, linguisticOne infers

here according to the grammatical habit:Thinking is an activity; every activity

requires an agent . . .(BGE 17).Nietzsche is critical of an ontology and

epistemology based on the metaphysicalworldview create a world of transcendent

forms which results in a nihilistic worldview,


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The basic tendency of metaphysics,

beginning with Plato, is the overvalorization of a hierarchy whichprioritizes essences over appearances and,in effect, results in an epistemology

which purports an essentialist notion oftruth rather than interpretation.

An ontology and epistemology based

on the metaphysical worldview create aworld of transcendent forms whichresults in a nihilistic worldview, asdiscussed above.


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An ontology of transcendence downplays theimmanentworld of appearances; to Nietzsche, this is

the fiction that metaphysicians superimpose onreality, a fiction which results in the denigration of theearth, the body, the sensualin other words, thedenigration of whatever is physical and thevalorization of the supra-mundane, the spirit, the

hallowedin other words, the reified. In The Will to Power, Nietzsche points out that the

Root of the idea ofsubstance is in language, not inbeings outside us! (WP 562). This simply means

that what metaphysicians call substance, regardedas essence, is something which we negotiatethrough the system of language and, thus, is merelyan epiphenomenon of thought.


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Common forms of talking about the world(theological, scientific, philosophical, political, orsociological, inter alia) are, to Nietzsche, linguistictransactions with reality.

For Nietzsche the strict opposition betweenconceptual and metaphorical language has alreadybeen effaced in the rhetorical view.

This is not to say, however, that Nietzsche rejectsan outside world. As a matter of fact, based on hisphilosophy of the will to power where forces areconsidered expressions of power, the so calledoutside world is also the world of forces; forNietzsche, the affirmative expression of force isonly possible in relation to other forcesan activeforce is always a force that acts on other forces,by conquering them orovercomingthem.


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Our relationship with the world, therefore,is one of subjugation and not

comprehension.If we take the world as a force or

assemblages of forces, then it issomething that gives itself to us (akin toHeideggers notion ofes gibt); we do not,however, accept what the world gives us,rather, we subjugate the world via our

only possible means, language.Language, therefore, is a way of

anthropomorphizing nature.


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The Heaviest WeightWhat if some day or night a demon were to stealinto your loneliness and say to you: This life asyou live it and have lived it you will have to liveonce again and innumerable times again . . .. Ifthis thought gained power over you, as you are itwould transform and possibly crush you; thequestion in each and every thing, Do you want thisagain and innumerable times again? would lie on

your actions as the heaviest weight! Or how welldisposed would you have to become to yourselfand to life to long nothing more fervently than forthis ultimate eternal confirmation and seal? (GS341).


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Eternal return parodies the idea of anultimate selection, one that would come

to an end of ones life as a finaljudgment and determine whether onegoes to heaven or hell.

Following Zoroastrian religion, thedetermination of salvation orcondemnation is based on onesattainment of ethical achievement.

The ER, therefore, is Nietzschesversion of an ethical imperative. It is apsychological test of ethical health.


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As opposed to traditional moral philosophy,Nietzsches ethics of affirmation is not based

on metaphysical or transcendent categories.As a psychological test, the ER does not

force us to follow pre-given standards but,rather, requires the active selection of what is

important and significant in our lives.The ER does not condemn us to an infinitely

repeated life in which we are powerless totransform ourselves, but asks us to

incorporate in our lives as a musical refrainthe question: Do I want this again andagain? This way, we are always reminded ofthe weight of things that confront us.


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Nihilism In the mature Nietzsche, we find a shift in the

meaning of nihilism. Nihilism now becomes acultural or historical pathology.

He declares: Nihilism stands at the door,whatmight have caused it?he adds, the Christian-moral one, that nihilism is rooted (WP, I, 1) Thedecadent characteristic of the Judeo-Christiantradition is understood by Nietzsche as a mode of

being typical of the spirit ofressentiment.The practice of this kind of morality, this purported

panacea for the ills of humanity, is nihilistic in thesense that it rips out life by the root, and thusbecomes an enemy of life (TI, V, 1).


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He argues that nihilism is rooted in Christianmorality, because he views Christianity to be the

very epitome of a negative stance towards lifeithas proven itself to be the best vehicle ofressentimentand bad conscience. Nietzsche

envisions the end of Christianityat the hands of

its own morality (WP, I, 1).However, this critique of morality is not limited to

the Christian religion alone, but, significantly, also acritique of the more general contexts of religion,psychology, history, and metaphysics; this is the

reason why Nietzsche views nihilism as a culturalexperienceit is, in a sense, an all-inclusive realitythat has the tendency to creep into every nook andcranny of life.


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Nihilism and the spirit of revenge are synonymous,

orressentimentis an instance of nihilism.

Nihilism can also be understood as a mode of

being that has informed our ways of living, the

spirit of revenge is the genealogical element ofour

thought, the transcendental principle of our way of

thinking (Deleuze, NP)

Hence, any analysis of nihilism must take into

account this ontological fact, because nihilism is an

enemy of life. Nihilismoperates whenever ones

sensitivity to life is disparaging, and that life itself isrendered dispensable. In this sense, it is not

surprising that Nietzsche considers Socrates to be

the ancient precursor of this base mode of being.

Nietzsche Presentation January 2008

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