Nietzsche Overcoming Nihilism Analysis

Admittedly, the philosophy of the late nineteenth century German Friederich Nietzsche had a profound impact on my world view. I concur with his belief that humans should occupy themselves with living in the reality that is, and not to be preoccupied with fantastic illusions of working towards a great afterlife. Granted, I am still very young, but from what I can see, humans have no universal nature nor do any set of underlying human morals dictate what is right and wrong. And as much as people would like to believe, unfortunately, we do not have free will. Every action carries the weight of a punishment or reward, so in essence, people do things either in fear or in

Nietzsche is widely known as a critic of religion. In fact, he talks in depth about morality in regards to religion in his essays about the genealogy of morals. But the problem is not within religion itself or within morals. The problem is involved in the combination of the two to create society’s understanding of morality through a very religious lens. In fact, Nietzsche has criticism for almost any set of morals constructed by a group of individuals and meant to be applied to society as a whole. True morality, according to Nietzsche, requires a separation from these group dynamic views of morality- or at least a sincere look into where they originated and why they persist- and a movement towards a more introverted, and intrinsically personalized understanding of what morals mean in spite of the fact that “the normative force to which every member of society is exposed, in the form of obligations, codes of behavior, and other moral rules and guidelines, is disproportionally high” (Korfmacher 6).

Christianity had become the enemy of life and nature and the church has stifled its followers by turning them into closed minded and weak humans. Nietzsche ultimately believed that religion creates a concept of anti-natural morality which damages our development as humans quite

A historical example that I believe applies to Nietzsche’s quotes is the Civil Rights Movement, particularly Rosa Parks. Parks was an African-American women, who, at the time, did not have the same rights as white people due to the color of her skin. In 1955, due to the whites-only section being filled on a bus, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat in the colored section to a white person. Parks was arrested for these actions, as were a few others who took the same actions. Due to this historical event, Parks was motivated to bring change to people of color and she eventually joined forces with Martin Luther King Jr. in

Progress is complacency. Mankind lazes around in the incandescent knowledge of ostensible progress, illiterate in the true nature of man. Progress is movement towards a destination, not a destination in and of itself. Presently, our world has progressed only marginally since the 19th century, when the world of enlightened thinkers shifted away from Nihilism towards Modernism. Friedrich Nietzsche, one of the seminal thinkers of the era, rejected nihilism and the essence of life. For Nietzsche, “we are simply random gatherings of molecules that cohere and experience consciousness for a short time before dissolving again into nothingness” (Backman, 860). An assorted collection of Nietzsche’s texts, including The Gay Science and ‘Good and Evil,’ ‘Good and Bad,’ suggest that Nietzsche would be inordinately condemnatory of the present state of the West, incredulous to the false notion– myth¬– of progress. Undergirded by democracy, “a political system that gives fools an equal share of influence” (Backman, 861) Nietzsche would argue that Western society has eschewed

A comparable theme from both Nietzsche and Murdoch is that humans derive their beliefs about human nature from morality. Nietzsche believes morality is living out passions, rather than suppressing them as religion does. Nietzsche denies religious moral values and believes that each individual’s conscience has natural passion to determine what is immoral or moral. Nietzsche believes that as human beings get morality from nature. Nietzsche believes that there are people with a strong morality, who can carry out their passions in life, and there are those who do not have strong inner morals who cannot control their passions in life. Those who cannot control their passions suffer because their passion overpowers them. The greatest of moralities are “those that accommodate nature, the weakest are those that deny it” (Nietzche 535).

Nietzsche makes an attempt on “Restoring the innocence of becoming” by getting rid of “Punishment” and “Guilt”. He makes this claim in his “Error of Free Will”, by saying that, “Nowadays, since we are engaged in a movement in the opposite direction, since we immoralists especially are seeking with all our strength to eliminate the concept of guilt and punishment again and to cleanse psychology, history, nature, social institutions and sanctions of them, there is in our view no more radical opposition than that which comes from the theologians who, with their concept of ‘moral world order’, persist in plaguing the innocence of becoming with ‘punishment’ and ‘guilt” (pg. 472). Nietzsche

Terri Murray, 2009, delivers his aspect from ‘Philosophy Now’, stating that “One may accept Nietzsche’s view, as do I, that orthodox Christianity reeks of hypocrisy”. However, although Christianity does have corrupt elements established within it, it is more complicated than simply stating the religion is corrupt. It seems logical to assume that Eli has been used as a symbol to represent all divine religions. Therefore it can be regarded as being slightly prejudice to claim Christianity as being corrupt, but rather it is used in a corrupt manner, and is tweaked and changed to suit the desires of immoral beings. Another religion seen in a similar light is Islam. This religion has been labelled as contradictory, violent and sexist as a pitiful

Nietzsche argues that there is a perception of significant nothingness when it comes to the existence of human beings and that because of it, we’ve become tired of humanity altogether. This argument constitutes the idea that there is no longer hope for humanity; paradoxically, he points out that people, aristocrats, the superiors, and the wealthy have the audacity to say that we are “progressing”.

Although the problem of the relationship between Nietzsche and metaphysics might seem to be a settled issue, this is in fact a quite complicated and fascinating problematic. The difficulty with this subject lies in the often unacknowledged ambiguity that the term ‘metaphysics’ exhibits in Nietzsche's writing, as this word assumes different nuances and connotations in different contexts. Therefore, if we can get past the usual rhetoric on the topic, we come to realize that Nietzsche addresses the topic of metaphysics in at least two distinct ways.

Nietzsche can be misunderstood from the surface. It would seem he was against morality, but he was not, he simple just believed morality could not be achieved under the code of Christianity. Nietzsche thought if we threw away morality as we know it we would have a happier freer life. In his theory of the master/slave relationship he uses his thoughts about morality. He compares the masters to Gods having the freedom to do as they will without any regulation and this made them free and happy. The slaves on the other hand thought this was wrong and immoral and decided to change the rules. When the rule changes the masters were slaves to the new moral codes and the slaves were free. This is a flawed concept in my opinion Nietzsche needed a

In order to properly evaluate BGE, I believe one must do so without appealing to traditional standards of valuation. As previously discussed, one of the fundamental aims of the text is to reject such notions. Instead, I will base my evaluation on two assumptions that are not undermined by the goals of the text. First, I will assume that Nietzsche is aiming to convey ideas to the reader. Second, if there is an ambiguity in the text that makes the nature of those ideas unclear, then there is a fundamental problem with the text. Accordingly, my criticism hinges on an ambiguity that is central to Nietzsche’s position. This ambiguity is the lack of clarity over whether Nietzsche makes the distinction between “truth” and “fact”. This is evident in

In addition, the assertion that man can only find meaning within life by “…discharging its strength…” (15), which though vague, serves as the crux of Nietzsche’s philosophical outlook on the world. For example, Nietzsche criticizes the acceptance of ambiguity by his contemporaries in that “There was a type of enjoyment in overpowering and interpreting the world in the manner of Plato…” (Beyond Good and Evil 15-16); Plato’s philosophy, though proven incorrect, theorizes an encompassing philosophy that explained the totality of life and the world. The process of understanding the world, though futile, acts as a means of gaining power over the world within Nietzsche’s philosophy. By accepting ambiguity, Nietzsche claims that his contemporaries were forgoing an opportunity to express their

Nietzsche knows the body exists but what he is conflicted between is what we are, what is the body. Nietzsche believes that the body exists and because it exists in a certain state it has to have soul. Soul is both the conscious and the unconscious mind. This would require us to hold Nietzsche to this philosophy, that the body requires soul. The body is what we have, what we are, but what is the body? Nietzsche aims to explain to us the concept will to power, the soul, and the goals of the body.

Nietzsche transitions to talk about the European outlook on the matter. Nietzsche states “the ordinary consciousness of Europeans more unwilling to be corrected than on this matter, people now rave everywhere, even under the guise of science, about coming conditions of society in which the exploiting character is to be absent.” Here, he’s basically saying that Europeans seem to be so stubborn on this matter because they don’t want to be corrected. They don’t understand that time is changing and don’t want to accept it either. To Nietzsche, this sounds like the Europeans have created a type of life where they reject all natural functions in the world. The term “exploitation” does not belong to an imperfect society with many problems within it. It belongs to the living being as a primary natural function. As a consequence, it is a part of the Will to Power, which leads to the Will to Life. Nietzsche believes that this is a fundamental fact and people should be honest towards themselves about this matter.