Talk:Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche/Archive 1

POV
The presentation of Nietzsche's philosophy on Wikipedia is heavily slanted and constitutes more propanganda than accurate scholarship. See the POV disputes on the other articles relating to Nietzsche. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.146.1.8 (talk • contribs)


 * Instead of taking jabs and making generalizations, please provide examples apart from original research. Each editor here has their own perspective on Nietzsche, and speaking at least for myself, have had to reserved their own interpretations for the sake of the article. I, too, had to take advice on what |what is and is not POV. It is debatable, but much of what is on the article also comes from deeply researched secondary sources (though there is still a huge lack in many places). For the sake of the article, and civility, please provide contextual examples instead of speculations, and constructive criticism instead of slights to everyone else working on this project. Everyone has to learn this. I had to learn it. -Bordello 03:46, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for the honesty and good will. [removed collective attack on Wikipedia contributors]. Your request will be answered briefly. [deleted counterfeit signature] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.161.5.77 (talk • contribs) 03:57, 8 August 2006

http://www.filosofia.it/pagine/argomenti/Losurdo/Losurdo_Santi.htm

The Journal of Nietzsche Studies, n. 27, (Spring 2004) Nietzsche, the aristocratic rebel.

Rudiger Safranski, Nietzsche: A Philosophical Biography:

"In his quest to defend aesthetic significance in history, Nietzsche assailed democracy as far back as the early 1870s, even before his shrill attacks on the 'complete appeasement of the democratic herd animal' some years later. Nietzsche considered the ancient Greek slaveholder society the paragon of culture for the very reason that it disallowed concessions to the 'democratic herd animal.' He extolled antiquity for being honest enough not to have covered up the terrible foundation from which its blossom grew ... Just as people need brains and brawn, Nietzsche argued, society needs the hardworking hands of laborers for a privileged class, allowing that class 'to engender and fulfill a new world of needs' (The Greek State) ... More recent eras have glorified the world of work, but glorification is self-deception, because even the 'terminological fallacy' of the 'dignity of work' does not alter anything in the fundamental injustice of life, which metes out mechanical work to some and creative activity to the more highly gifted. Slave societies were brutally frank about their inequities, whereas our modern times feign contrition but are unwilling forgo exploitation in the service of culture. Thus, if art justifies our existence aesthetically, it does so on the foundation of 'cruelty' (The Greek State). ...

"In both Twilight of the Idols and The Antichrist, Nietzsche evaluated a book he had discovered in Turin, namely the Laws of Manu. This book was alleged to be a moral code of the caste system based on the Vedas. Nietzsche was captivated by the chilling consistency with which this corpus of laws divided society into mutually exclusive social milieus according to an ominous requirement of purity. He regarded the fact that members of the various castes could not interact with one another as a clever biopolitics of breeding that would prevent degeneration...

"In his last writings, notably in Twilight of the Idols, Nietzsche employed even more adamant moral and philosophical arguments to advocate anti-Judaism, and introduced on occasional hint of racial biology: 'Christianity, with its roots in Judaism and comprehensible only as a growth from this soil, represents the countermovement to any morality of breeding, of race, or privilege: it is the anti-Aryan religion par excellence' (TI 'Improvers of Mankind' 4)."

Ernst Nolte, Three Faces of Fascism:

"The discovery of the Dionysian background of tragedy, the defense of genius against the masses, the insistence on the necessity of slavery, serve no other purpose than to explicate the elements of genuine culture: its background, relevance, and basis. They are developed along with the indictment of the enemies of culture: science and its logical (Socratic) optimism, mass emancipation and its shallow utilitarian outlook, revolution and it pernicious effects ... For if history amounts to nothing more than the petty and sterile calculation of the last 'squinting' men, who neither obey nor rule and desire to be neither poor nor rich, then the most mighty effort is required to force them back into the state of slavery which is their rightful place ... In fact, Nietzsche's whole thought represents the very antithesis of the Marxist conception, and the idea of destruction is the negative aspect of its core ... Nietzsche is not in any obvious sense the spiritual father of fascism; but he was the first to give voice to that spiritual focal point toward which all fascism must gravitate: the assault on practical and theoretical transcendence, for the sake of a 'more beautiful' from of 'life.' Nietzsche was not concerned with magnificent animality for its own sake, nor was destruction per se Hitler's goal. Their ultimate aim was a 'supreme culture' of the future ... Many decades in advance, Nietzsche provided the political radical anti-Marxism of fascism with its original spiritual image, an image of which even Hitler never quite showed himself the equal ... Nietzsche's thought is not an ideology of the bourgeoisie: on the one hand it is a deeply disturbed protest of the artistic temperament against the general world trend, on the other it is the violent reaction of the feudal element in bourgeois society at being threatened." (p. 441-45) "[Note 57] ...[Nietzsche] claimed that miscegenation was responsible for the triumph of democratic ideals (Werke, VIII, 245)." (p. 545)

Hubert Cancik, MONGOLS, SEMITES AND THE PURE-BRED GREEKS: Nietzsche's handling of the racial doctrines of his time:

Greece as Model

...Nietzsche thoroughly accepted the biological discourse of his contemporaries: history was supposed to be explained through the "mixing of blood", the "coupling" of heterogeneous elements, "extraction" (in a biological sense) and, finally, "collisions" and "waves" of "immigrants". The genesis of the Greeks in Greece, where they "became Greeks", is the point of his notes on the "original inhabitants". This point owes a debt to a particular biological (see "Nietzsche's Greeks, Jews and Europe" below) and political (see "A higher caste", below) theory of Nietzsche's. "A higher caste"

Nietzsche's notes jump from the prehistoric "original inhabitants" to the historical period of Greece: from the conquerors came the rulers; from the original inhabitants came the slaves; from the battle of races came the battle of the "castes". Politics built itself upon the previous "racial history". Together, all of these components formed the Greek model that was supposed to mediate between antiquity and the European future. Immediately following upon his racial history of Greece, Nietzsche continued with these words:

If one considers the enormous number of slaves on the mainland, then Greeks were only to be found sporadically. A higher caste of the Idle, the statesman, etc. Their hostilities held them in physical and intellectual tension. They had to ground their superiority upon quality - that was their spell over the masses (UB 118, p. 206 = 5[199]).

Now then, there are "Greeks". The conquerors "had taken into their blood", consumed and digested the Semitic, Mongolian and Thracian components. Something new had come into existence. Yet the "wild energy" through which the conquerors had taken possession of the land and its inhabitants remained preserved up into the earlier perlod of antiquity - or so Nietzsche thought. It was, indeed essential in order to keep the "enormous number of slaves" suppressed. This same energy drove the Greeks both to rivalry with each other and to the highest cultural achievements: "The intellectual culture of Greece [was] an aberration of the tremendous political drive toward distinction" (UB 118, p. 118=5[179]). The highest achievements of culture were necessary; they were not some lovely but superficial decoration. They engendered the cohesion of the higher caste of the "idle" - the political class and the creators of culture: in the musical and the athletlc contests, aggression was channelled and sublimated (cf. e.g. the piece from December 1872 on: "Homer's Wettkampf": KSA vol. 1, pp. 783-92). Moreover, the supreme achievements of culture cast a spell over the "masses", who obviously had to care for each one of those belonging to the "Idle", whose rule, in this manner, was justified aesthetically. Consequently, Nietzsche believed that he had proven through historical methods that the wild power and energy belonging to a conquering people has to be "bred great" (groB gezuchtet), a cultivation process by which such achievements as those the Greeks once produced would also be brought forth in Europe in the future (UB 118, p. 116 and 114 = 5[185] and [188]). Neither peace, luxury, socialism, the ideal political state, welfare, nor short-term educational reform are preconditions for the engendering of genius - whether of a people or of an individual; rather, genius should arise from conditions "as malicious and ruthless" as those in nature itself: "Mistreat people - drive them to their limits" (UB 118, p. 112 = 5j 191] and [194]).

Nietzsche's considerations about race and caste as well as rule and culture for the Greeks were aimed at his present. "The Greeks", he thought, "believed in differences among the races". Nietzsche approvingly recalled Schopenhauer's opinion that slaves were a different species, and in addition, he cited the image of a winged animal in contrast to that of an unmoving shellfish (UB 118, p. 112 = 5[72] and [73]). In such a generalization as this one, the statement is incorrect, and in a more narrowly defined sense, it is racist... Accordingly, the following statements by Nietzsche are to be characterized as racist:

1. "The new problem: whether or not educating[!] a part of humanity to a higher race must come at the cost of the rest. Breeding . . ." (1881 KSA vol. 9, p. 577 12[10])

2. "We would as little choose 'early Christians' as Polish Jews to associate with us: not that one would need to have even a single [i.e., rational] objection to them.... Both of them simply do not smell good." (AC 46)

Nietzsche tested his racial teachings within the framework of classical studies. The aphoristic formulation that he gave to his "Notes" on the original population of Greece in September 1876 forms a connection to the racial teachings of his critical writings ("Die Pflugschar" 143 KSA vol. 8, p. 327; it is proved by the version of "Pflugschar" that the passages numbered 5[198] and [199] in KGW are not separated "tragments" but rather a unity). In his "Plowshare", Nietzsche excluded the Doric migration and avoided the word "caste" as well as such peculiarities as the tree and snake cult, or the Mongolian elements in the Odyssey or the Italians who had become Greeks. Purified of offensive, concrete, verifiable details, a more refined, polished, dashing aphorism emerged, one that suggested, in more pleasing language, the necessary connection of racial differences to the rule of "higher beings" -- thus "the idle, the political class, etc." are now called - and to cultural superiority. NIETZSCHE'S GREEKS, JEWS AND EUROPE

Inheritance of acquired characteristics

...the "purity" of the race is also a positive, basic concept of biology for Nietzsche. Nietzsche constructed a little racial history of ancient Europe upon concepts he had borrowed from biology (GM 15 1887; note that Nietzsche had read Tocqueville - see his letter to Overbeck, 23 February 1887). "Blood mixing", skull shape and skin and hair color are the main terms of his anthropology. Nietzsche coupled the biological to social characteristics and to moral values: the blond-haired is better than the black-haired, and the short-skulled is worse than the long-skulled. Some fearless etymologies suggested by the erstwhile philologist make this chapter from the Genealogy of Morals into a prize exhibit of philo-Aryan prose (some examples: esthlos/"noble" to einai/"to be", malus/"bad" to melas/"black") because for Nietzsche, the long-skulled blond - the good, noble, pure conqueror - was the Aryan, of course: they were the master race in Europe. Nietzsche's little racial history of ancient Europe aimed at the present. In the social and political movements of the Democrats, the Anarchists and the Socialists of his time, he saw, namely, the instincts of the "pre-Aryan population" breaking through again. Nietzsche related these political programs explicitly to biology. He feared that "the conquering and master race - that of the Aryans - is also being defeated physiologically" (GM I 5). According to Nietzsche, the Jews had begun this slave revolt: they led the slaves - the mob, the herd - to this victory over the aristocracy. This victory meant "blood poisoning", "intoxication" - this pastor's son and classical philologist loved to adorn himself with medical jargon. Nietzsche identified the reason for the poisoning: "It [i.e., the victory] had mingled the races promiscuously" (GM I 9; for the mixture of races considered as an evil, cf. JGB 208, 200). The pre-Aryan population was thus in league with the Jews and against the Italians, the Greeks, the Celts, the Germans - and generally speaking, all Aryans everywhere ... In 1881, Nietzsche published a general draft of his racial ideas under the title "The becoming-pure of a race". What he had previously scattered about in notes concerning classical studies and in various other hints is here summarized in twenty-five lines of print covering five points: 1. The races are not originally pure but, at best, become pure in the course of history. 2. The crossing of races simultaneously means the crossing of cultures: crossing leads to "disharmony" in bodily form, in custom and in morality. 3. The process of purification occurs through "adapting, imbibing, [and] excreting" foreign elements. 4. The result of purification is a stronger and more beautiful organism. 5. The Greeks are "the model of a race and culture that had become pure"... The significance of this text for Nietzsche has been shown by W. Muller Lauter. The "model" for the breeding of a European ruling caste was the Greeks: "it is to be hoped that a pure European race and culture will also one day succeed [in coming into being]" (JGB 25, last sentence & Daybreak IV 272, last sentence). In such a race and culture - as the model prepared by Nietzsche has instructed us - the foreign elements (those bred in) will be imbibed for digestion or excretion...

...Spencer had transferred theorems from biological evolution to the historical process. He complained that a policy of social reform hindered "natural selection". For this reason, Nietzsche advised, one must "eliminate the continuance and effectiveness" of bad, sick and uneducated people (KSA vol. 9, p. 10 (1880); cf. ibid., pp. 27t., 454t). From Sir Francis Galton, one of the original founders of eugenics, he took over the formula of "hereditary genius", which Galton had used in his study of the families of criminals (letter to Strindberg, 8 December 1888.; cf. Ietter to Overbeck, 4 July 1888. Ct. Marie Louise Haase, "Friedrich Nietzsche hest i rancis Galton", Nietzsche-Studien, 18 1889: 633ff)...

Nietzsche's utterances about acquired character, the purity of races, the inheritance of characteristics, the degeneracy of halfbreeds (JCB 208 KSA vol. 5, pp. 138. Cf. JGB 200: "The man belonging to an epoch of dissolution which mixes up the races") and the cultivation of drives over long periods of time could - for this branch - suggest an unorthodox (Neo-)Lamarckianism...

In historical scholarship as well - and even in classical philology - racist teachings had penetrated. Within Nietzsche's racial teachings, Jews and Aryans had a special position. In his first monograph (1872), Nietzsche had already arrayed the "Aryan character" against the Semitic one, Prometheus against Eve, the creative man against the lying woman, the tragic wantonness in battle for higher culture against lascivious sin (The Birth of Tragedy 9; in German, the word Frevel/"wantonness" is masculine in gender; the word Sunde/"sin" is feminine). This argumentative structure is still present in The Antichrist (1888): against the philhellenic Hyperboreans and what Nietzsche called "Aryan humanity" stood denatured Judaism and Judaism "raised to the second power", Christianity (cf. GD The 'correctors' of mankind" KSA vol. 12, p. 501). The Jews - as Nietzsche had indicated with the Eve myth - are not creative in contrast to the Aryan peoples, they are mere "intermediaries", merchants: "they invent nothing." Even their law is from the Codex of Manu - copied from an "absolutely Aryan creation" (Letter to Koselitz, 31 May 1888, cf. n. 31)...

Breeding a pure European race

"Imbibed and absorbed by Europe"

Nietzsche found surprising the fact that Christianity could have forced a Semitic religion upon the Indo-Germans (KSA vol. 9, pp. 21f). For this reason, he fought both Judaism and Christianity, and he created for himself a pagan, Indo-Germanic alternative with his new, Hellenic Dionysos and the Iranian Zarathustra...

The Christian was "only a Jew of a 'freer' confession of faith" - Christians and Jews were "related, racially related" (AC 44), and Christianity was a form of Judaism raised "yet one time" higher through negation (AC 27: "the small rebellious movement, which is baptised in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, is the Jewish instinct once more"). Nietzsche wrote:

Christianity is to be understood entirely in terms of the soil from which is grew - it is not a countermovement to the Jewish instinct; it is the successor itself, a further step in its [i.e., the Jewish instinct's] frightening logic. (AC 24)

Nietzsche's fight against the "denaturalization of natural values" (AC 25), his "transvaluation of all values" was directed against Jews and Christians. Because Nietzsche argued against both, Christian antiSemitism was especially offensive for him. The Jews, Nietzsche maintained, were nevertheless guilty: They had "made humanity into something so false that, still today, a Christian can feel antiSemitic without understanding himself as the last stage of Judaism". (AC 24) The Antichrist was Nietzsche's last word on Judaism which he himself intended to be published. It is precisely with respect to supposed or truly "positive" utterances on Jews and Judaism that this fact should never be forgotten.

A short essay (section 251) in Nietzsche's "Philosophy of the Future" - Beyond Good and Evil (1885/6) - belongs to the "positive" parts. Here, "the breeding of a new caste to rule over Europe", definitely a current "European problem", according to Nietzsche, is discussed. The breeding of this caste follows the "Greek model": the foreign elements are "imbibed" and either assimilated or "excreted" - thus does a "pure European race and culture come into being". With the Jews, however, Germany was going to have difficulty, for Germany had "amply enough Jews" (so wrote Nietzsche in 1885/6): "that the German stomach, the German blood, is having difficulty (and for a long time yet will continue to have difficulty) finishing even this quantity of 'Jews'." Other European countries had finished with the Jews "because of a more strenuous digestion"; in Germany, however, there were simply too many. Nietzsche demanded what all anti-Semites demanded at that time: "Allow no more Jews in! And, especially, close the gates to the east (including the one between Germany and Austria!"... For anti-Semitism itself, Nietzsche had complete understanding; he was simply - like "all careful and judicious people" - against the "dangerous extravagance" of this feeling, "especially against the tasteless and scandalous expression of this extravagant feeling". (By asking moderation in the expression of anti-Semitism, which he considers as principally justified, Nietzsche takes the same posltlon as the later Wagner and Wolzogen.) Nietzsche had a measured and tasteful manner of expressing this "feeling". And his solution to the problem was also mild: the Jews are to be bred in. They even desire it themselves, "to be in Europe, to be imbibed and absorbed". As for the "antiSemitic complainers", those who might hinder this gentle final solution with their radical words, Nietzsche wanted to have them expelled from the country. And then, he thought, one could - "with great care" and "with selectivity" - cross an intelligent Jewish woman with an "aristocratic officer from the Mark" (i.e., a Prussian aristocratic officer)... In this elevated, fine, tasteful, gentle anti-Semitism, a thematic communality between Wagner and Nietzsche reveals itself, one going deeper than any disagreement in other areas, whether personal, musical or religious.

Nietzsche's Views on Women
I am delighted to see that my segment on Nietzsche's views on women (which has been moved - I think - 3 times since I wrote it more than 6 months ago) has survived more or less intact, improved and made more accurate by other contributions by my fellow Wikipedians. However, the various addings and leavings has given the segment a rather telegraphic tone, which I have set out to rectify and make more easily readable. As always, the results are subject to your comment and manipulation --Marinus 05:14, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
 * A bit later I'll add a few more references and quotes to satisfy a higher standard of Wiki-correctness. --Marinus 05:54, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Here are two paragraphs I removed while editing. They kinda changed while I was working on the article, because they're complete junk, and even now I don't think they should ever go back in, obviously. The rest, however, can be dealt with.Non-vandal 07:07, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

"Nietzsche's view of women is based upon their role as potential mothers, and he places the creation of greater things as the central task of a rich and valuable life; it is an exultation of womanhood as maternity. This stands in contrast to the then-prevailing view of Woman as the receptacle of male fertility. Nietzsche argues that fruitfulness has value – because man has no natural avenue for a meaningful existence he sets himself into fruitful pursuits. Woman, however, is herself a source of fertility. That is to say, both are capable of doing their share of humanity's work, with their respective physiological conditions. Moreover, some of his statements on women seem to prefigure the criticisms of post-feminism against prior versions of feminisms, particularly those that claim orthodox feminism does violence to women by positing and privileging the ideation of woman. However, Nietzsche may be seen as lacking clarity in expressing whether his image of woman is a product of nature or of nurture. While he sometimes suggests the former, he only explicitly discusses the attitudes, tendencies and values that are the latter. It may be misleading to generalise from Nietzsche's writings – he was not a systemic philosopher. The implication exists that woman can take a different path than the one he has laid out, even if it contradicts her 'nature'. Nietzsche certainly never reprimanded any woman for taking a non-maternal role, and the women he associated with typically reported that he was more amiable and respectful than most educated men of the time."


 * I think you were a bit heavy-handed. The piece does need references, yes, but not as many as you had indicated (like This stands in contrast to the then-prevailing view of Woman as the receptacle of male fertility"  which was referenced, if not by a footnote). Not all of these problems are a lack of reference, either - more flags than are needed. Those paragraphs aren't trash ( except for The implication exists that woman can take a different path than the one he has laid out, even if it contradicts her "nature", which is waffling). My edit certainly didn't decrease the degree of correctness of the article, like your reply suggests. --Marinus 05:45, 11 August 2006 (UTC)


 * The fact of the matter is these statements do not stand on their own: please read WP:NOR to see what I mean. Anyway, if they can be substantiated, which I seriously doubt, then they can go back in the article. But they also reek of POV-mongering. As for what my reply suggests: please to not attribute some statement that you think I made to my post. I just did what I think the section needs. My reply was to you out of convenience. No reason to take it personally (and why should you? we're all here doing the same thing, I assume).Non-vandal 05:59, 11 August 2006 (UTC)


 * You'll note that I voiced my concerns, but didn't charge into the article to repair my contribution, as well as the note I put here promising that references will soon be added (at worst the level of Wiki-correctness was the same as before my edit). I am acquinted with the policies you are so diligently referring to. I think you are being over-zealous - what am I supposed to cite for saying that Nietzsche is commonly called a misogynist? More precisely, which attack? Also, I've reffered to the Michel Foucault article (which had been raised as an example of an excellent article) as to how to approach the writing of such an article. My reading is that it should be an uncontentious summation of the tendencies of secondary research (which is hard to cite but doesn't need support - none of the secondary literature I've read gives referrences for common tendencies) and summaries of specific works (which isn't relevant here). As a matter of form - if I refer to particular statements in Nietzsche's work (to back up my claims of what, in particular examples, he said) do you think footnotes are the best option? Inline quotes are out of the question, in my opinion, and the use of such quotes need to be minimised, so footnotes for the single examples it would be necessary seem fitting. The secondary literature commonly uses inline quotes, but they aren't aiming at the brevity we are. --Marinus 06:24, 11 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Call me over-zealous or not, I disagree, especially per WP:CN. Although I like what you recently did to the section, the points in question need proper sourcing (ie., the claims of Nietzsche's misogynism, etc.). Examples for specific claims shouldn't be so difficult to find (we are talking about Nietzsche, y'know?). I would also suggest you use the tags instead of parentheticals. Using these we can be more specific where the information is and won't need to provide inline quotations, which I agree are really pointless and add too much to the article anyway.Non-vandal 07:24, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I am exhausted, but there are some things amuck on the Views on Women section. Things which I myself may have caused. I would correct them, find cites, revert, etc., but it is far past my bed-time. A shiney brown asterik to the first person who makes this secion credible and/or edible. -Bordello 10:13, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Is that better? What more needs to be done? --Marinus 06:45, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

IPs and Protection
Could we get an admin to protect the page from IPs? Sock-puppets are strictly prohibited. -Bordello 04:22, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Übermensch
Since this section retains its own article, I think Philosophy of... should have something different from what the Übermensch article has for an introduction. It could be much more comprehensive, helpful, and, as these things imply, better written. This is going to be a long process.Non-vandal 06:49, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Gutless Liberal-Modernist Whitewashing
The views presented here are quasi-Marxist and un-Nietzschean. For Nietzsche, there is no dualistic separation of the biological from the spiritual and Nietzsche certainly never pretended degeneracy is 'desirable'. Rudiger Safranski is honest enough to really present Nietzsche's anti-modernist, radical-conservative, eugenic-racialist doctrine:

Safranski, Rudiger (trans. Shelley Frisch). Nietzsche: A Philosophical Biography. Norton, 2002:

The Uebermensch's mastery of self-configuration is not the only issue here. There are also biologistic overtones in Zarathustra's speeches, especially when he explains that man in his current form evolved from the ape, but that there is still too much of the ape in him and too much laziness, which wants to revert to the animal kingdom. Man is a creature in transition. He is still in flux between the ape from which he originated and the Uebermensch into which he may evolve ...

Nietzsche was thoroughly familiar with his contemporaries' ideas on biological breeding and evolution. While in Sils-Maria in the summer of 1881, he had sent for literature on this subject. He would have had to be completely ignorant of the widespread trend of biological evolutionary thought spurred by Darwinism to have escaped its influence. Despite all of his criticism of the specifics of Darwinism, Nietzsche was unable to extricate himself entirely from the powerful implications of this theory...

The statements that introduce the Uebermensch in Zarathustra are inconceivable without Darwin: 'You have made your way from worm to man, and much in you is still worm' (4, 14; Z First Part, Prologue 3).

The metaphoric style of presentation in Zarathustra only hints at its biologistic contents. In his notebooks from the period of Zarathustra, Nietzsche was more forthright. He wrote that the 'goal' was the 'evolution of the entire body and not just of the brain' (10, 506). Overt references to the specifics of the physical evolution of man would have been ill-suited to the pathos of Zarathustra's speeches. Ought Zarathustra to have said something about, for instance, the quantity of hair, musculature, arm length, or head size of the Uebermensch? This would have been unintentionally comical. In matters concerning the physical appearance of the Uebermensch, Zarathustra confines himself to this advice for those contemplating marriage: 'Do not REproduce yourself, bur rather produce UPWARD! May the garden of marriage help you to do this' (4, 90; Z First Part, 'On Child and Marriage') ...

What this 'upward' means for biology remains vague, but Zarathustra leaves no doubt that the "far too many" should not be allowed to reproduce indiscriminately. 'Far too many live, and far too long they hang on their branches. If only a storm would come to shake all of this rot and worm-eaten decay from the tree!' (4, 94; Z First Part, 'On Free Death'). Rampant reproduction must be stopped. Chance and the power of the great masses must not continue to have the upper hand ... This declaration could be seen as an incitement to kill the weak and infirm before they could reproduce. Nietzsche did harbor thoughts of this kind in fits of fury and rage about what he considered a stifling air of banality. In his final writings, Nietzsche would shed his inhibitions, break out of the parable form, and draw conclusions on an open stage: 'Mankind sacrificed en masse so that one single STRONGER species of man might thrive--that WOULD be progress' (GM Second Essay 12), he wrote in On the Genealogy of Morals, and in Ecce Homo we find some notorious pronouncements on the tasks of the future 'party of life.' 'The new party of life, which takes charge of the greatest of all tasks, raising up humanity, including the relentless destruction of all that is degenerate and parasitical, will gain make possible the excess of life on earth from which the Dionysian state must reawaken' (EH 'Birth of Tragedy' 4)...

The internal logic of his thoughts built on a notion Nietzsche had already developed in The Birth of Tragedy, which held that culture is justified by great works and great individuals. If mankind does not exist 'for its own sake, if, rather, the goal lies in its peaks, in the great "individuals," the saints and the artists, it is also permissible to use mankind as material for the production of genius, masterpieces, or even the Uebermensch. And if the masses are more of a hindrance, space has to be created--by getting rid of the 'degenerates,' if necessary. Even in his fantasies of annihilation, however, Nietzsche was still a highly sensitive soul and hence more amenable to the option that the 'misfits' could offer to 'sacrifice' themselves willingly...

Nietzsche, the critic of ressentiment, was himself full of vengeance toward the common man of ressentiment, wishing to make room for his Uebermensch in Zarathustra by attacking the 'far too many.' He felt surrounded by those 'last people' who have their 'little pleasures' for the day and the night who 'blinkingly' contrive the joy of work. To such people, the lofty and sublime are just plain boring: 'What is love? What is creation? What is longing? What is a star? Thus asks the last man and blinks' (Z First Part Prologue 5). This is a burden that prevents man from soaring upward. Nietzsche responded with fantasies of annihilation. He, the Uebermensch, with whom they will all come face to face. Woe unto them...

-- 63.3.10.2 (talk) 07:29, 27 May 2007 (signed by RJC Talk)


 * Safranski may be correct about the philosophy, but the claim that "The statements that introduce the Uebermensch in Zarathustra are inconceivable without Darwin: 'You have made your way from worm to man, and much in you is still worm' (4, 14; Z First Part, Prologue 3)." appears to be wildly inaccurate. It's true that Nietzsche was working at a time when Ernst Haeckel was promoting his idea of Darwinismus, but if Ruse is cited correctly, Haeckel did not support natural selection, rather believing in Lamarckian inheritance of acquired characteristics. Jean-Baptiste Lamarck published his ideas of evolution between 1800 and 1822, and these had considerable influence long before Charles Darwin made evolution respectable. According to Richard Leakey, Lamarckism differed from Darwin's theory not so much in the inheritance of acquired characteristics (which Darwin accepted as a supplement to natural selection) as in Lamarck postulating a desire for change, or besoin, which caused the change in the organism which was then passed on to its offspring. This seems to me to match Nietzsche's ideas at least as well as Darwin's idea of heritable variation from unknown laws (now thought of as random mutation) being preserved or removed by natural selection, and even without Darwin the idea of evolution was still in circulation. By the way, is the rather inflammatory heading a reference to liberal Christianity? .. dave souza, talk 14:37, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

"Deliberate Misinterpretation"
The article claims, more than once, that the Nazis "deliberately misinterpreted" Nietzsche's views. I think this claim needs sourcing. We do know that Hitler idolized Nietzsche, raised him to prominence and built statues of him. What has not been demonstrated is that Hitler's or the Nazi's adoration of Nietzsche was in any way disingenuous from their own point of view. Whether Nietzsche would have agreed with their methods or not, they certainly seem to have genuinely believed they were in line with his philosophy. This is an important distinction. If there is evidence to the contrary it should be included, or the claim should be removed. -- -- 67.142.130.38 (talk) 05:55, 26 June 2007 (signed by RJC Talk 23:24, 26 June 2007 (UTC))

POV, etc
Thanks to all for the nice article. However, i must agree with the references/OR/neutrality tags. I don't have the Nietzsche background (or research time) to make the changes myself, tho i've done what copyediting i could, but here are a couple POV problems that especially stand out for me:


 * The corrently titled section on "criticisms of anti-semitism" completely ignores N's notorious anti-jewish statements, which are relevant to this article in themselves, and are necessary to make balanced sense of his anti- anti-semitism.


 * While i applaud the work done on the challenging "views on women" section, incl the obvious effort to be neutral, the section is still strikingly POV.
 * 1.The section quotes none of his many severely "unflattering statements towards women", and only offers quotes apparantly used to soften or deny his sexism.
 * 2.The only "further reading" source critiques the view that N was sexist.
 * 3.It seems (and the fact that this is unclear and that i could be mistaken is a criticism in itself) to partially excuse or even argue against N's sexism (note that i make no case for his "misogyny") by emphasizing his statements to the effect that women are different but not inferior. This needs to be better argued (more below). But it in any case misunderstands that, in our society, in which WP is being written, extreme different-but-not-inferior (with N we can't say "equal" ;^) ) views of the sexes (such as "men are rational and thus suited to politics, whereas women are irrational and thus should have no role in politics, but are not inferior in that they are more able than men in other areas, such as bearing and raising children") are uncontroversially and by definition sexist, because they lie outside the findings of science and our social norms. So this is a non sequitur as an argument against N's sexism. Against his misogyny, it might well be, but not against his sexism. Yes, i know that much more moderate different-but-equal views are current today and are not uncontroversially considered sexist. But N is way outside that range. And there are other similar non sequiturs, such as N calling Ibsen an "old woman" -- as if it isn't std sexism for a man to put another man down by calling him a woman. If something else is to be proved by this, it must be spelled out, not just cited rhetorically.
 * 4.The section is a study in words to avoid and related POV, notably: his "alleged views" (a striking tone not present in the rest of the article); the repeated "[critical view] *however* [less critical view]" rhetorical structure; falsehood on top of bias (the uncited "That Nietzsche also mocked men and manliness in the same way has not prevented charges of sexism" -- what N scholar would so equate N's views of men and women?). And numerous other points -- i could almost unpack the bias of this section sentence by sentence, but i'm already going on too long to make the simple argument for a thoro NPOV rewrite.
 * 5.Nonetheless, i can't resist one more point, because i think it's not only a POV problem but an interesting issue in scholarship and WP sourcing. There's a clear mismatch in this section (and there are other places where the article would benefit from reexamination on this point) between the authorities cited on different sides of the sexism issue: On the "sexist" side, Kaufmann is cited, tho probably ever major modern biographer and N specialist could be as well (so there is also a bias in the number of people cited on each side). On the other side is Derrida, and to a lesser extent, Irigaray -- the only ones WP-linked among a total of four. This is strikingly asymmetrical: the latter clearly deserve treatment in Influence and reception of Nietzsche, but they are not N specialists and are not highly regarded for their "objective" historical views of N -- and oc the postmodernist view of the impossibility or irrelevance of such historiography (pardon my shorthand) is an issue in itself. So i submit that the debate is miscast, and that in a way there is no debate (at least in the way it's laid out here): Among those who use traditional social-science/historical techniques to recover N's actual views, his sexism is uncontroversial. This is a different conversation and project from the postmodernists and reappropriators, who in their largely original works of philosophy and cultural theory may offer non-sexist readings of N.

Finally, i'll note that some more copyediting is needed, but i felt that the bigger rewriting should be addressed first. One area i was tempted to fix but have left for those who can consult the primary sources is the quotes which are rendered in italics (and with redundant quotation marks around block quotes). This is not WP usage, but i believe that N sometimes used extended italics. Could someone check on this?

I've written quickly, making a flawed but i trust adequate case. Thanks again, incl for reading this and making whatever NPOV improvements seem called for. Hope this helps, "alyosha" (talk) 02:25, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Opening Paragraphs and Why they Stink
Here, with commentary, are the opening paragraphs of this terrible article.

philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche developed during the 19th Century amid growing criticism of Hegel's philosophic[al?] system and had its greatest intellectual and political [NECESSARY?] influence in the 20th Century. Friedrich Nietzsche applied himself [no, he applied his mind, no his nose, no his stomach] to such topics [?]as morality, religion, epistemology, psychology, ontology, and social criticism.

Nietzsche himself [nor did Nietzsche, his dog] left no systematic exposition of his philosophy, and so it remains the subject of intense scholarly dispute and interpretation. Because of Nietzsche's evocative style and often outrageous claims, his philosophy generates strong reactions of passionate love and disgust, and amateurs of all stripes are also heavily involved in the project of interpretation[this sentence is abysmal at the grammatical and logical levels]. Nietzsche noted in his autobiographical Ecce Homo that his philosophy developed over time, so interpreters have found it difficult to relate concepts central to one work to those central to another (e.g., the thought of the eternal recurrence features heavily in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, but is almost entirely absent from his next book, Beyond Good and Evil)[first off, interpreters have not found it difficult, second, all philosophies develop over time, third, the eternal return does NOT feature HEAVILY in Zarathustra]. Added to this challenge is the fact that Nietzsche did not seem concerned to develop his thought into a system, even going so far as to disparage the attempt in Beyond Good and Evil. [Oh, the bugaboo of "its not a system" comes out for another flogging]

Common themes in his thought can, however, be identified and discussed. His earliest work emphasized the opposition of Apollonian and Dionysian impulses in art, and the figure of Dionysus continued to play a role in his subsequent thought. [This sentence first appeals to undefined concepts, then asserts the falsehood that Dionysian plays a role in later thinking. It does not. the term barely appears, and NEVER appears in any significant part of his middle or later period.] Other major currents include the will to power, [undefined] the claim that God is dead, the distinction between master and slave moralities, and radical perspectivism [undefined and again, false]. Other concepts appear rarely, or are confined to one or two major works, yet are considered centerpieces of Nietzschean philosophy, e.g., the Übermensch and the thought of eternal recurrence. His later works involved a sustained attack on Christianity and Christian morality, and he seemed to be working toward what he called the transvaluation of all values (Umwertung aller Werte). [arbitrary selection of themes] While Nietzsche is often associated in the public mind with fatalism and nihilism, Nietzsche himself [no, his dog] viewed his project as the attempt to overcome the pessimism of Arthur Schopenhauer [oh, did he himself think that of himself, eh?]

This is indeed amateur, my friends, thoroughly amateur! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Not2plato (talk • contribs).


 * I have a few short comments about this latest, abusive tirade. These opening paragraphs introduce the article, and so have to be vague.  If the selection of themes dealt with in them seems arbitrary, it is because editors have bothered to write about those themes in the main body of the article itself.  I am not sure when "applied himself" became unidiomatic, but I don't think that any has any difficulty with the phrase.  Radical perspectivalism is so often associated with Nietzsche that banning it from articles about his philosophy has to be considered original research, especially when Not2Plato does not cite any literature on the subject.  The same goes for the rest of the substantive criticisms. RJC Talk 05:11, 21 August 2007 (UTC)


 * A short response to your criticisms of the opening paragraphs: "Friedrich Nietzsche applied himself [no, he applied his mind, no his nose, no his stomach]  to such topics [?]as morality, religion, epistemology, psychology, ontology, and social criticism."


 * despite what you say in the brackets being rendered practically nonsensical by your thick Scottish accent (its no making any sense ta me marn) your correction seems poorly informed. Why assert 'his mind' over the present author's 'himself'. To quote Nietzsche:

"To the despisers of the body will I say my word. Not that I would have them learn and teach differently,but simply say farewell to their own bodies - and thus become mute."

--Nietzsche is dead - god (talk) 11:50, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Left-wing Corruption of Nietzsche
The corruption of Nietzsche's philosophy in this article by radical-left activists is insane. What better way to neutralize one's enemy than to appropriate, weaken, soften and distort him? The German Rudiger Safranski, at least, has the balls to speak the truth in a world gone mad with doctrinaire socialistic political correctness:

"According to Nietzsche, nature produces the weak and the strong, the advantaged and disadvantaged. There is no benevolent providence and no equitable distribution of chances to get ahead in life. Before this backdrop, morality can be defined as an attempt to even out the 'injustice' of nature and create counterbalances. The power of natural destinies needs to be broken. In Nietzsche's view, Christianity represented an absolutely brilliant attempt to accomplish this aim ... Nietzsche greatly admired the power of Christianity to set values, but he was not grateful to it, because its consideration for the weak and the morality of evening things out impeded the progress and development of a higher stage of mankind.

Nietzsche could envision this higher stage of mankind only as a culmination of culture in its 'peaks of rapture,' which is to say in successful individuals and achievements. The will to power unleashes the dynamics of culmination, but it is also the will to power that forms a moral alliance on the side of the weak. This alliance works at cross-purposes with the goal of culmination and ultimately, in Nietzsche's view, leads to widespread equalization and degeneration. As a modern version of the 'Christian theory of morality,' this alliance forms the backbone of democracy and socialism. Nietzsche adamantly opposed all such movements. For him, the meaning of world history was not happiness and prosperity of the greatest possible number but individual manifestations of success in life. The culture of political and social democracy was a concern of the 'last people,' whom he disparaged. He threw overboard the state-sponsored ethics of the common welfare because he regarded such ethics as an impediment to the self-configuration of great individuals. If, however, the great personalities were to vanish, the only remaining significance of history would be lost in the process. By defending the residual significance of history, Nietzsche assailed democracy and declared what mattered was 'delaying the complete appeasement of the democratic herd-animal'(11,587; WP 125) ... Nietzsche opted against democratic life organized according to the principle of welfare. For him, a world of that sort would signal the triumph of the human herd animal...

If we are content to regard this highly personal philosophy and these maneuvers of self-configuration with fascination and perhaps even admiration, but are not willing to abandon the idea of democracy and justice, it is likely that Nietzsche would have accused us of feeble compromise, indecisiveness, and epitomizing the ominous 'blinking' of the 'last men.'" Safranski, Rudiger (trans. Shelley Frisch), Nietzsche: A Philosophical Biography, Norton, 2002, pp. 296-298. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.3.10.2 (talk) 13:49, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Mencken and Leftist Distortion
As regards super-trendy left-wing corruption and whitewashing of Nietzsche,see H.L. Mencken's The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche (1908) for a fearless, harshly honest portrayal before the egalitarian demagogues and the "post-modern industry" appropriated Nietzsche for their own "civil rights" and anarchistic purposes:

"Nietzsche opposed squarely both the demand for peace and the demand for equality...he believed that war was not only necessary, but also beneficial, and that the natural system of castes was not only beneficent, but also inevitable. In the demand for universal peace he saw only the yearning of the weak and useless for protections against the righteous exploitation of the useful and strong. In the demand for equality he saw only the same thing. ... [Nietzsche's] ideal was an aristocracy which regarded the proletariat merely as a conglomeration of draft animals made to be driven, enslaved and exploited" (Mencken, 162-63).

It seems a gross abuse of scholarly equity that interpreters like Safranski, Mencken, etc. are not given fair recognition in the articles and fringe-left activists arbitrarily decide their own weird, neutralizing interpretation as the only acceptable one. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.3.10.2 (talk) 08:50, 16 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Thank you for your suggestion. When you feel an article needs improvement, please feel free to make those changes. Wikipedia is a wiki, so anyone can edit almost any article by simply following the Edit this page link at the top. The Wikipedia community encourages you to be bold in updating pages. Don't worry too much about making honest mistakes — they're likely to be found and corrected quickly. If you're not sure how editing works, check out how to edit a page, or use the sandbox to try out your editing skills.  New contributors are always welcome. You don't even need to log in (although there are many reasons why you might want to).   And getting yourself a user name will give your proposals more weight. .. dave souza, talk 09:39, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Hello: You don't seem to understand. In the past, on different IPs, I tried many times, in a civil and polite manner, to rebalance the Nietzsche articles to counter the monopoly of interpretation of leftwing postmodern dogmatism. My efforts were quickly, cleverly and repeatedly suppressed, and my citations by prominent scholars (Nolte, etc.) were absurdly referred to as "original research". I was not allowed by the "established editors" to alter the article at all, period, and was often unjustly suspended or banned because I proposed an unfashionable, "non-politically-correct" way of engaging Nietzsche. In sum, I have tried the "normal" route of influence and it does not work for me, and my citations of non-fashionable Nietzsche scholars are barely even permitted by the "established editors" on the talk pages. If you or others can incorporate the information by various authors I have presented on the Nietzsche talk pages into the actual articles, please do and it is appreciated; I (or my IP) am "blacklisted" and the editorial influence-wielders simply will not give me the chance to refine the public articles. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.130.0.195 (talk) 10:03, 16 September 2007 (UTC)


 * When you run up against these creatures your best bet is to keep engaging them, keep providing references to the material (remember, stop injecting your own interpretation. Only those of the people you reference are allowed). The objections to original research were probably because you wanted to deliver an opinionated sermon of your own as opposed to just stating the facts of what your referenced material said. As long as you play by Wikipedia standards, if they are unjustly removing your material then you can complain about them. JettaMann (talk) 15:05, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Falsity of Leftwing Democratic Nietzsche
http://theoccidentalquarterly.com/archives/vol6no2/NietzschereviewTOQV6N2.pdf

[...]

Nonetheless, some in today’s left-dominated “post-modernist” academia have a more open-ended view. Homosexual Marxist philosopher and famed sadomasochist Michel Foucault, for example, insisted there was no single Nietzschean philosophy. He suggested the right question to ask was, “What serious use can we make of Nietzsche?”3 Taking Foucault’s apparently political invitation to heart, some Nietzsche scholars have decided to paint their left wing politics with a Nietzschean brush, claiming his pedigree for a variety of left-wing causes on behalf of the “oppressed,” even Communism.

In the 1970s, Tracy Strong, now professor of political science at the University of California in San Diego, suggested that Communist China and Cuba represent the “the very Nietzschean proposition of creating ‘new men.’”4 Referring to any Communist society as Nietzschean flies in the face of Nietzsche’s frequent denunciations of egalitarianism and socialism as manifestations of what he regarded as slave morality. Unfortunately, that sort of misinterpretation and mischaracterization appears throughout Nietzsche scholarship today, and seems to go unchallenged. While not every philosophy scholar is willing to go so far as to describe Communists as Nietzschean social experimenters, some deliberately attempt to minimize or camouflage those parts of Nietzsche’s writings that contradict or undermine the egalitarian and left-wing ideologies that pervade America’s university system.

Strong himself nearly admitted as much elsewhere: [T]hose on the democratic left who have been attracted to Nietzsche and have wanted to enlist his thought in their projects have done so by arguing that, while Nietzsche’s thought is not (really) political, his thought provides material for developing a new progressive politics. Such interpretations thus conclude that it is necessary to set aside Nietzsche’s particular political judgments.5 But even Strong’s candid assessment of his colleagues is accompanied by a bit of camouflage of his own. '''“It is hard, on the face of it,” he writes, “to find in Nietzsche support for liberal egalitarian democracy in any of its modern incarnations.”6 As an understatement, the remark is breathtaking. It is akin to suggesting that it is hard to find in Martin Luther King’s works any support for Southern slavery.''' The phrase “it is hard to find” implies that it might be found if one only looks hard enough. In truth, however, it is hard to find because it isn’t there.

Undermining Nietzsche’s antiegalitarian views by trying to diminish or minimize their significance appears to be common. Robert C. Solomon and Kathleen M. Higgins, authors of numerous books and essays on Nietzsche, have tried, for example, to dismiss a central tenet of Nietzsche’s antiegalitarianism by asserting “Nietzsche clearly intended the Übermensch as a fiction…”7 Walter Kaufmann, evidently embarrassed by Nietzsche’s seeming Aryan racialism in his explicit glorification of “the magnificent blond beast” described as mastering Europe, tried to explain away the reference by claiming that the blondness refers symbolically to the tawny lion, a metaphor used in Thus Spake Zarathustra to signify creative destruction.8 Kaufmann also dismissed Nietzsche’s decidedly politically incorrect views of women as “philosophically irrelevant.”9

Close examination of Nietzsche’s texts reveals the weaknesses in these claims. Solomon and Higgins argue that since Nietzsche was not a Darwinian, the Übermensch must not be a biological notion, and that Thus Spake Zarathustra (a fictionalized presentation of Nietzsche’s ideas) is the only text in which the idea is seriously addressed.

While it is true that he did not accept all of Darwin’s theory of evolution, Nietzsche’s concern with a higher type of man, and the idea of breeding the higher type in both a eugenic and psychological/cultural sense, emerged early in his writing career and remained an important part of his philosophy.

The Übermensch is indeed a “fiction” in the sense that such a being does not yet exist, but Nietzsche repeatedly urged its pursuit as a goal. As early as “Schopenhauer As Educator,” which appears in Untimely Meditations, his second book, Nietzsche calls for the creation of conditions under which “the individual higher exemplar, the more uncommon, more powerful, more complex, more fruitful” man can emerge.10 This was not yet the Übermensch of Zarathustra, but its beginnings are there, and Nietzsche remained committed to the concept throughout his life. In a notebook of 1885, the year he completed part 4 of Zarathustra, he wrote of the need to create a new morality “whose intention is to breed a ruling caste – the future masters of the earth” who are described as “a new species and caste of masters” who are the logical result of efforts by “a newer kind of ‘free spirits’” driven by their “dissatisfaction with present-day man.”11 In 1887, long after publication of Zarathustra, he wrote, “The progressive diminishment of man is what drives one to think about the breeding of a stronger race.... Not merely a master race, whose task would be limited to governing; but a race with its own sphere of life, with a surplus of force for beauty, valor, culture, manners, right up to the highest intellectual realm...”12 He did not use the word Ubermensch, but the concept is identical. In part two of Zarathustra itself, Nietzsche makes it rather clear that he regards the Ubermensch as a very real possible creation of will, in contrast to God, which was a fictional creation.

Once you said God when you looked out onto distant seas; now, however, I have taught you to say: Ubermensch. God is a conjecture, but I do not want your conjectures to reach beyond your creative will. Could you create a God? Then do not talk to me about any gods! But you could certainly create the Ubermensch. 1

As for Kaufmann’s attempt to deny that the “blond beast” refers to any racial or ethnic group, the context disproves him. The phrase appears in a passage recounting an historical epoch. In one of those contexts where the phrase appears, Nietzsche explicitly refers to “the blond Germanic beast.”14 Nietzsche was no racialist, but the weakness in Kaufmann’s argument betrays a certain anxiety, urgency, and even desperation to prove it. '''Kaufmann makes it hard to avoid suspecting him of a political motive. That is especially true with regard to his dismissal of Nietzsche’s comments about women being irrelevant to his philosophy. The assertion is simply untenable''', because Nietzsche’s views of women are intimately bound up with his understanding of history and society, and his belief that social progress in which women play a role is the decadence of modernity. In section 239 of Beyond Good and Evil he wrote:

Wherever the industrial spirit has triumphed over the military and aristocratic spirit, woman strives for the economic and legal independence of a clerk: “woman as clerkess” is inscribed on the portal of the modern society which is in course of formation. While she thus appropriates new rights, aspires to be “master,” and inscribes “progress” of woman on her flags and banners, the very opposite realizes itself with terrible obviousness: woman retrogrades. Since the French Revolution the influence of woman in Europe has declined in proportion as she has increased her rights and claims; and the “emancipation of woman”…thus proves to be a remarkable symptom of the increased weakening and deadening of the most womanly instincts.15 [Emphasis in the original]

The decline of culture through this sort of progress/decadence, of which feminism is an integral part, sets the stage for the nihilism from which Nietzsche sought to provide the West an escape with his philosophy.

One egregious example of minimizing Nietzsche’s antidemocratic views deserves special mention. In a book purporting to explain what Nietzsche “really” meant, Solomon and Higgins admit that Nietzsche had “harsh words” for democracy, but reassure their readers that his criticism was merely “routine.”

His comments are not very different in tone or temper from the routine complaints we hear today (from democrats) about uneducated and ignorant voters who are easily led astray by demagogues, about the irrationality of making delicate and important strategic decisions by majority vote, about the need for leadership and wisdom at the top rather than simply a popular mandate through polls.16

That characterization of his views is easily refuted by any of a number of passages in Nietzsche’s writings that refer to democracy, of which the following is typical:

I believe that the great, advancing and unstoppable democratic movement of Europe, that which calls itself ‘progress’ – and equally its preparation and moral augury, Christianity – fundamentally signifies only the tremendous, instinctive conspiracy of the whole herd against everything that is shepherd, beast of prey, hermit and Caesar, to preserve and elevate all the weak, the oppressed, the mediocre, the hard-done-by, the halffailed; as a long-drawn-out slave revolt...17

Those comments reveal a profound and radical critique, and do not sound at all like “routine complaints” about democracy. The contrast between Nietzsche’s actual comments and the characterization of them by Solomon and Higgins is quite noticeable, and forces any educated reader to question the interpretative skills of these two scholars. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.3.10.2 (talk) 12:14, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

It would be tiresome to continue to produce examples from democratic egalitarian works on Nietzsche simply to refute them with quotations from Nietzsche’s texts. Suffice it to say that the Nietzsche most nonspecialists are familiar with today is largely a mass-market product of the left-wing university system, and should be regarded with healthy skepticism... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.3.10.129 (talk) 19:21, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Nietzsche's AntiBlack White Racism
On the Genealogy of Morals. Trans. Douglas Smith. Oxford University Press, 1998. , p. 49:

"By way of consolation to the more delicate, perhaps in those does pain did not hurt as much as it does today. At least, that might be the conclusion of a physician who has treated Negroes* (these taken as representatives of prehistoric man--) for serious cases of internal inflammation; such inflammation would bring even the best-organized European to the brink of despair--but this is not the case with Negroes. (The curve of human capacity for pain seems in fact to fall off extraordinarily abruptly, once past the upper ten thousand or ten million of the higher culture; and I personally have no doubt that in comparison with a single painful night undergone by one hysterical little bluestocking, the total suffering of all the animals put to the knife in the interests of scientific research simply does not enter into consideration.)"

Note 49 by Douglas Smith, p. 147: "Nietzsche's terminology and views here are clearly racist, assuming an evolutionary difference between white European and black African."

James Winchester, "Nietzsche's Racial Profiling" in Race and Racism in Modern Philosophy. Ed. Walls, Andrew. Cornell University Press, 2005. 255:

"At one point Nietzsche suggests that black skin may be a sign of lesser intelligence as well as a sign that one is closer to the apes (Dawn/Daybreak 241). Nietzsche clearly shares some of the basic tenets of nineteenth-century race theory ... In On the Genealogy of Morals, Nietzsche writes that Negroes are representatives of prehistoric men (vorgeschlictlichen Menschen) who are capable of enduring pain that would drive the best-organized European to despair (Genealogy 2.7). Today most would see this claim about Africans as a prejudice. Who today would defend the claim that blacks feel pain less acutely than whites, particularly given that such a characterization could be used to justify the enslavement and maltreatment of blacks? ... William Preston uses this passage to make the claim that Nietzsche is a cruel racist, and there are in fact many places that support this claim (William A. Preston, "Nietzsche on Blacks" in Existence in Black: An Anthology of Black Existential Philosophy. Gordon, Lewis. Routledge, 1997, 169). Preston also argues that Nietzsche is equating Negroes to lab animals and that Nietzsche feels that blacks are worth so little that men of distinction will not derive much pleasure in oppressing them. As we have already seen, Nietzsche states unambiguously that cruelty is essential to every 'higher' culture..."

"In On the Genealogy of Morals, we find a discussion of the Aryan race, which is, Nietzsche proclaims, white. Against Rudolf Virchow, whom Nietzsche credits with having created a careful ethnographic map of Germany, Nietzsche argues that dark-haired peoples of Germany cannot be Celtic. Germany's dark-haired people are essentially pre-Aryan. Nietzsche further argues that suppressed races are coming to the fore again in Europe, and one can see this on the basis of the emergence of darker coloring and shorter skulls. He says it is even possible that modern democracy, or even more likely modern anarchism and the inclination for the commune, 'the most primitive form of society which is now shared by all socialists in Europe', is a sign of the counter-attack of the pre-Aryan races. The Aryan race may very well be in a state of physiological decline..."

Gooding-Williams, Robert, "SUPPOSING NIETZSCHE TO BE BLACK--WHAT THEN?" in (same author) Look, a Negro!: Philosophical Essays on Race, Culture and Politics. Routledge, 2005.

"While new and still newer Nietzsches continue to thrive...older Nietzsches remain-one of which is Nietzsche, the philosopher of aristocratic radicalism, but likewise the brutally scathing critic of socialism, feminism, and liberalism-indeed, of all forms of modern egalitarianism. This, for example, is the figure Georg Lukacs describes in writing that Nietzsche's 'whole life's work was a continuous polemic against Marxism and socialism' (The Destruction of Reason). Similarly, it is the figure William Preston evokes when...he insists that 'Nietzsche's whole philosophy-and not just his view of blacks-is racist.' In an essay meant for an anthology devoted to black existentialism ('Nietzsche on Blacks' in Existence in Black: An Anthology of Black Existential Philosophy. Gordon, Lewis. Routledge, 1997, 169), Preston asks, 'Can Nietzsche help black existentialists find answers to their own questions?' 'No' is Preston's clear response to this question, but a careful reading of his argument urges a still stronger conclusion-namely, that progressive philosophers given to a serious engagement with issues like white supremacy, colonialism, black politics, and black identity-whether or not they are existentialists, and whether or not they are black-have no use for Nietzsche. Preston tends toward this conclusion when he claims that Nietzsche saw suffering black people as laboratory animals that he wanted 'to make ... suffer more.' In effect, Preston argues that black and other progressives have no use for Nietzsche, because Nietzsche was a 'cruel racist' and a forwardlooking, trans-European 'man of the Right.'

...In his excellent essay on Nietzsche and colonialism, Robert Holub remarks that events heralding Germany's emergence as a colonial power (Germany began to acquire colonies in Africa and the Pacific in 1884) 'reached their height during the years that Nietzsche was composing his major works' ('Nietzsche's Colonialist Imagination: Nueva Germania, Good Europeanism, and Great Politics' in The Imperialist Imagination: German Colonialism and its Legacy, ed. Sara Friedrichsmeyer, Sara Lennox). Holub also reminds his readers that Nietzsche became personally involved with colonialism through the adventures of his sister and brother-in-law, Elisabeth and Bernhard Forster, founders of the Paraguayan colony of Nueva Germania. Finally, and most important for my purposes, Holub recognizes that this personal involvement has 'a philosophical counterpart in [Nietzsche's] writings.' More exactly, he acknowledges that Nietzsche's philosophical imagination becomes a colonialist imagination when it conjures the images of the 'good European' and a 'great politics' to envision a caste of 'new philosophers' that would rule Europe and subjugate the entire earth. A critic of the sort of nationalism the Forsters embraced,

Nietzsche endorsed a supranationalist imperialism, and his 'untimeliness ... involves his unusual way of approaching the problems posed by foreign affairs and world politics. Eschewing the nationalist, mercantile, and utopian/idealist approach to colonization, he developed ... a conceptual framework that entailed a geopolitical perspective. In the 'good European' he found a term for a future elite that could overcome the nation-state, create a superior cultural life, and achieve domination of the world. With 'great politics' he offered an alternative to parliamentary life and actual colonial fantasies, as well as a vague blueprint for global conquest on a grand scale.'

Holub's description of Nietzsche's geopolitics helps put Preston's remarks into perspective. Thus, when Preston describes Nietzsche as a forward-looking, trans-European 'man of the Right,' he alludes to Nietzsche's colonialist fantasy of a future, European elite that would dominate the world beyond Europe. When he describes Nietzsche as a racist, he reminds us that this fantasy is, in part, the fantasy of a black Africa subjected to European rule, and that Nietzsche's antiblack racism (evident, for example, in his suggestion that the black race is less intelligent than the white races; see Daybreak, aphorism 241; On the Genealogy of Morals, second essay, aphorism 7, where Nietzsche takes blacks as representatives of prehistoric man) in tandem with his enthusiasm for breeding higher human beings, suggests that he imagined an 'imperialism of the future' as involving the domination of racially inferior black Africans by racially superior white Europeans. In short, Preston exposes the white supremacist connotations of Nietzsche's colonialist imagination."

Cf. Abir Taha, Nietzsche, Prophet of Nazism: The Cult of the Superman: Unveiling the Nazi Secret Doctrine —Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.131.55.73 (talk) 03:52, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Nietzsche's Antisocialist Defense of Slavery
"In his 1872 essay 'The Greek State,' Nietzsche contended that Greek artistic genius depended on the continued suffering of slaves and the lower classes...Elsewhere, he noted that such suffering was also present in modern society, as could be seen from the agitations of the socialist internationals. In both cases, he argued, it was dangerous and useless to attempt to overturn the social order: in the end, the Greek idea of 'humanity' had nothing to do with democracy or 'human rights' (Grundrechte). With this brusque rejection of political equality, Nietzsche departed sharply from the repulican ideals of eighteenth-century Philhellenism." (George S. Williamson, The Longing for Myth in Germany, University of Chicago Press, 2004, p. 242). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.3.10.2 (talk) 14:34, 10 October 2007 (UTC)

As you say, in 1872... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.209.205.136 (talk) 10:35, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Edit war
Please disscuss the dispute here, this is getting silly. Zazaban 18:38, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

Everyone is an amiture and not a one is right —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.32.153.28 (talk) 02:12, 2 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Why doesn't this article have references? Nietzsche is a very popular philosopher; this shouldn't be difficult.  I would add them in myself, but I didn't write this article.This.machinery (talk) 01:41, 7 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Oh, that's no reason not to add the references! Be bold:  no one owns any of these articles.  RJC Talk Contribs 01:55, 7 March 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't quite understand. How would you categorize these 42 items? ~ Alcmaeonid (talk) 14:49, 7 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Well, a few sections do lack sufficient citations, and a number of the references that the article does have are to Nietzsche's works; it would be more in keeping with WP:NOR and WP:V if we could get more secondary sources. RJC Talk Contribs 17:33, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I'm new to writing on wikipedia so I don't know if this would be the best place to start this discussion. Anyway, here goes: I don't agree with the statement in this article that Nietzsche "disdained" the master morality. In fact, at least in my head the master morality is essentially similar to the will to power, and Nietzsche's 'philosophers of the future' would embrace both (although I admit I'm not exactly an expert). I'd suggest that, as mentioned above, the article needs more references/citations, or alternatively more mention be made of the extreme difficulty faced in interpreting Nietzsche's works. (I'm loathe to edit anything as of yet, as I don't have particularly good evidence to back up my position either.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.72.176.244 (talk) 14:55, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Nietzsche and biology
The articles says:

His project of a "great politics" radically opposed him to contemporary eugenist programs which purported to struggle against the "degeneration" of the "race" by improving the "elites," for whom Nietzsche only conceived despise, and eliminating the "weak" and lower classes — whereas Nietzsche only required "distance" from the "gregarious type," which included people from all social classes and "races."

This is not true. See, for example the Nietzsche book by Safranski. So I rewrote the section and included the following pro-eugenics remarks by Nietzsche.

Twilight of the Idols (1888): ''Morality for physicians. -- The sick man is a parasite of society. In a certain state it is indecent to live longer. To go on vegetating in cowardly dependence on physicians and machinations, after the meaning of life, the right to life, has been lost, that ought to prompt a profound contempt in society. The physicians, in turn, would have to be the mediators of this contempt--not prescriptions, but every day a new dose of nausea with their patients. To create a new responsibility, that of the physician, for all cases in which the highest interest of life, of ascending life, demands the most inconsiderate pushing down and aside of degenerating life--for example, for the right of procreation, for the right to be born, for the right to live. To die proudly when it is no longer possible to live proudly.'' The Antichrist (1888): ''What is good? -- All that heightens the feeling of power, the will to power, power itself in man. What is bad? -- All that proceeds from weakness. What is happiness? -- The feeling that power increases -- that a resistance is overcome. Not contentment, but more power, not peace at all, but war; not virtue, but proficiency (virtue in the Renaissance style, virth, virtue free of moralic acid.) The weak and ill-constituted shall perish: first principle of our philanthropy. And one shall help them to do so. What is more harmful than any vice? -- Active sympathy for the ill-constituted and weak -- Christianity ....'' Ecce homo (1888): The new party of life, which takes charge of the greatest of all tasks, raising up humanity, including the relentless destruction of all that is degenerate and parasitical, will gain make possible the excess of life on earth from which the Dionysian state must reawaken.

I also replaced the phrase:

''It was also long thought that one central political theme running through much of Nietzsche's work was Social Darwinism — the idea that the strong have a natural right to dominate the weak, and that feelings such as compassion and mercy are burdens to be overcome. This, too, is based on a misrepresentation of his critiques of morality and politics: the "genealogical method" is, in this sense, an appeal to the possibility of different moral values rather than a defence per se of what he describes as "master" and "slave" moralities.''

by the more neutral form

''Some think that one central political theme running through much of Nietzsche's work was some sort of Social Darwinism — the idea that the strong have a natural right to dominate the weak, and that feelings such as compassion and mercy are burdens to be overcome. Others think that this is a misrepresentation of his critiques of morality and politics: the "genealogical method" is, in this sense, an appeal to the possibility of different moral values rather than a defence per se of what he describes as "master" and "slave" moralities. For the different interpretations, see Safranski. Regards, --D.H (talk) 15:11, 24 June 2008 (UTC)