Is Nietzsche's Superman not a guardian, a guardian of a tradition? Is ego the only thing? Must he not pass it on? Must he not let go?
Is Nietzsche's Superman not a guardian, a guardian of a tradition? Is ego the only thing? Must he not pass it on? Must he not let go?
I thought that Nietzsche believed that we were all potentially the Übermensch, unfortunately, he forgot to tell us how to achieve it.
docendo discimus
It's all good and well that he didn't.Originally Posted by Red-Headed
What d'you mean "future Superman" - I am the Superman!!
N wrote: "Man is the bridge between ape and Superman" (something like that).
Imagine a world full of Supermen. A world full of wannabe Supermen. It's a nightmare vision really. Who would decide who is a Superman. How would these so-called Supermen treat those who don't fit the bill. What about women. Is there a Superwoman.
I haven't bothered including question marks in the above because these questions are not worth answering. Nietzsche was a fascinating character, and the history of his thought processes shine a light on many crucial comprehensions. But in the end he was just another quasi-religious philosopher who fell into the trap of trying to envision the perfect human being. In other words: his own originality became more important to him than truth. You can't dismantle one system of idealism (Christiandom) and then go halfway to replacing it with another idealistic vision, can you?
Having said that, I do think his "the will to power" is a good formula that helps us understand (psychologically) the ins-and-outs of human motivation.
Last edited by Panglossian; 08-06-2011 at 07:27 AM.
That's because he thought we were still evolving physiologically & psychologically. He thought we could eventually rise above the duality of good & evil, but in a non-transcendent way. Unfortunately, this has been misinterpreted.
If the world was full of supermen, wouldn't everyone be equally super?
Irrelevant in a world where everybody is super.
I believe Übermensch is not gender specific in German. Just as the noun 'man' wasn't in English at one time.
Ah, so that's the reason.
No, you've made the classic (& often it seems) mistake of confusing Nietzsche with Hitler. It's easy to do I suppose, from a distance (of around a thousand kilometres I should imagine) they do sound almost identical.
Have you actually read any Nietzsche?
*Hint; Nietzsche didn't write Mein Kampfe*
He didn't like Christianity, but who does? He was a bit of a dionysiac on the side.
As I see it, Wille zur Macht was not about motivation but Nietzsche's belief that we could one day overcome moral duality. It needed an act of will, but a non-transcendent one. As I said earlier, unfortunately Nietzsche didn't know or explain how we could realistically achieve this.
Last edited by Red-Headed; 08-06-2011 at 12:09 PM.
docendo discimus
How pessimism could be mistaken for idealism beats me. Nietzsche was not deluded.
Who are you, the local wind-up merchant. These comments are ludicrous. I never mentioned Hitler, nor was referring to Hitler in any way.
So why did you post?:
"Imagine a world full of Supermen. A world full of wannabe Supermen. It's a nightmare vision really. Who would decide who is a Superman. How would these so-called Supermen treat those who don't fit the bill. What about women. Is there a Superwoman."
This has nothing to do with Nietzsche.
docendo discimus
Nietzsche re-inverted the traditional value scheme. Perhaps there are subtleties to his thought that I don't fully grasp, but to me his morality is in essence a Homeric morality. Its an anti-christian morality - against meekness, humility, pity, ect. That does not make it beyond good and evil. It makes it evil, if evil is taken in its traditional Christian context.
He called Caesar the most "beautiful type," and as a classicist he knew who Caesar was. That to me says a lot about where Nietzsche stood. He also loved Machiavelli.
I don't see the superman concept as in any way mysterious or esoteric. Odysseus was a superman. The superman is Homeric, he's pre/post-christian.
Granted there's more to it than that, but at bottom Nietzsche was all about getting beyond Christian morality. You read Genealogy of Morals and its obvious which type Nietzsche sides with - the master.
There's also an aesthetic dimension. The Superman could be called a Homeric artist.
To me its all balderdash now. Lose the essence of "slave morality" and you lose your humanity. Nietzsche's pride was monstrous. And when you dispense almost entirely with tradition, that's all you're really left with - pride.
Last edited by Darcy88; 08-07-2011 at 01:11 AM.
Nietzsche tended to contradict himself a lot & over time certain concepts eventually emerged that were more constant. It is not so much that he was 'against' meekness & humility but the understanding of who or what invented the slave morality & what its purpose was. He understood that Christianity is the epitome of the slave morality. The real evil, according to Nietszche is the essence of what the aristocratic mentality originally termed 'good' which is used to subdue the will of the ordinary people (the Herd) by their own misunderstanding of what the concepts of good & evil actually entail. He was almost certainly right about this as all organised religions subdue the masses with their own peculiar subjective views of dualistic morality.
Neither did Nietzsche.
No he wasn't, he was just a crafty mortal, if he ever existed.
I am not so sure the superman can be both Homeric & post-Christian.
Of course it is. Christianity is the slave morality in action. Liberation is near.
No, lose the the slave morality & rise above the duality. That is the essence of the superman.
According to him, so was god's. God is dead, long live the superman!
... and the slave morality.
docendo discimus
Nietzsche didn't believe reading his philosophy could bring about the coming of the superman. He believed that the superman would come from atavism. The most recent person Nietsche cited as having been a sort of superman was Napoleon Bonaparte, but Nietzsche stipulated that Napoleon was a synthesis of both super-human and inhuman and so he was not a complete superman. The atavism in Napoleon's case was that of the noble classical Roman ideal made flesh. Nietzsche in a truly 19th century eugenical mode of thinking believed the superman will be the result of fortunate breeding.
[QUOTE=Red-Headed;1061229]Nietzsche tended to contradict himself a lot & over time certain concepts eventually emerged that were more constant. It is not so much that he was 'against' meekness & humility but the understanding of who or what invented the slave morality & what its purpose was. He understood that Christianity is the epitome of the slave morality. The real evil, according to Nietszche is the essence of what the aristocratic mentality originally termed 'good' which is used to subdue the will of the ordinary people (the Herd) by their own misunderstanding of what the concepts of good & evil actually entail. He was almost certainly right about this as all organised religions subdue the masses with their own peculiar subjective views of dualistic morality.
You think that the wills of Buddha and Christ and other such figures were subdued? Will is such a silly term in this context. Certain of their appetites were perhaps subdued. And they also drew limits. They had principles. Love, compassion, humility, ect.
And Nietzsche was against meekness and pity and humility. He mocked them, disdained them. The texts clearly show this.
And contrary to what you say here - Nietzsche didn't give a damn about the herd. The evil to him was not that slave morality would subdue the wills of the herd. Rather, he worried that slave morality would tame exceptional people. In some points I think he actually lauds the effects of slave morality, crediting it with making the herd more tolerable.
His worry is especially hilarious when you consider that a large proportion of history's most exceptional persons were those who came closest to embodying slave morality.
Neither did Nietzsche.
No he wasn't, he was just a crafty mortal, if he ever existed.
In the same way that thinkers refer to fictional characters quite often in order to illustrate a point, that's how I was referring to Odysseus.
I am not so sure the superman can be both Homeric & post-Christian.
I was clearly using the phrase "Homeric" in a loosely descriptive sense, not confined to any specific time. An Achilles-like individual could be born tomorrow. Such a man would be both post-christian and Homeric. To me Homeric and Master are inter-changeable, they mean the same thing to me. Perhaps this is a simplification, I don't know.
Of course it is. Christianity is the slave morality in action. Liberation is near.
What does liberation from slave morality look like exactly? I'm curious. Enlighten me. If it goes beyond slave morality, if it goes beyond humility and meekness and pity, then what you have is a grotesque and inhuman specimen, to my mind at least.
No, lose the the slave morality & rise above the duality. That is the essence of the superman.
Ok there Raskolnikov.
According to him, so was god's. God is dead, long live the superman!
God is dead and so the moral burden falls on us alone. It is not lightened, not removed.
Freedom.
There is no such thing. We are not Gods. Sometimes we can be free. Sometimes. If you are free all the time you slip into a state of madness or criminality or sheer idiocy.
We are human beings. Nietzsche forgot this.
Try living free. Shed every skin, dispense with "slave morality," live for aesthetics and power and truth - yes I include truth - and see what you become.
Its like looking at the sun. You cannot stare. I'm sure someone out there must know what I'm talking about.
Rimbaud figured this out.
Rimbaud figured nothing out as far as I can tell.
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