Forum Post: WWND?: What Would Nietzsche Do?
Posted 12 years ago on Nov. 12, 2011, 1:09 p.m. EST by Dionysuslives
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Das Übermensch will rise. And lay waste to the machinery of control. Thus Spake Zarathustra.
A simple answer is ...who cares...really...human beings generally suck...here in the USA we suck even more...we are the masters of nothing...we serve nothing...in truth we give very little and take all we can...we think ourselves as great beings with superior intellect...though we think small and believe our thoughts tremendous and grandiose ...we repeat the same mistakes over and over and over again without realizing our only advancements are technological which feeds our instant gratification and most of time separates us with little if no regard for anyone else...Nietzsche was a fraud and like most frauds his wisdom was to find people who would believe his trash because of their own feeble beliefs...his ideas were not new and people who are attracted to ideas like his have always been around...those of you who find his arrogant and little minded writings appealing are spiritually vacant...and will defiantly disagree with me...so like I said in the beginning of my post...who cares...not I...I laugh at you with a wisdom you will never have...vacant is vacant...nothing exists there...and "there" for the Nietzsche followers is the space between your ears....
The superman is now rising,. the machinery of control will be smashed, or re-purposed into eco-villages for the new race of enlightened beings to live in.
i read his book. and to have people like nietzsche in the world is not all bad, but the government and others should be there to regulate people like him. Out of his brain innovation arises, but when everyone thinks like him, society razes
your answer is to regulate "people" like him....just what is that......who will "regulate the ones you might choose to follow...and who will regulate you and the ones that make that choice..."out of his brain innovation arises"...and who will regulate which ones will be for the good and suppress the ones that would be bad...how about learning from history once and for all..."let us not open pandoras box for some ideologic experiment"....pretty simple.
that's democracy baby. the great experiment.
and yeah...tell me...down through history how has that worked out...and of coarse you believe we got it right...based on your view of democracy....baby.
that is just it. it'll never be "right." It'll just be. this conundrum we are in is nothing new. in fact there is nothing new under the sun. you want a new idea; read an old book. a open minded philosophy, my philosophy, is what separates conservatives from progressive. we look to the past to avoid pit falls in the future.conseviteves look to the pass with nestalgic eyes, always wanting to go back to the good ol' days. well, history tell me they were not so good.
you call yourself a progressive...read your posting...there's nothing progressive about it...your a closet conservative just waiting for your "brand" of "progressive" so there can be your brand of society...Albert Einstein was of far more intelligence than Nietzsche could ever imagine...why don't you read some of his writings...that might serve you better...your brand of progressive frightens me more than the conservatives...their plain to see...your kind of progressives are wolves in sheep's clothing...
my interpretation a Nietzsche, when put in context of the era that he lived, is that he wanted humans to be creative and not look to old school thoughts for inspiration. I believe that he used religious symbolism to ruffle the feathers of those of his era. Now, some of his writings were a little too extreme but i take it all with a grain a salt. it is when people want Nietzsche to be their bible that i would take heed. the best part i liked is when zarathustra came down from the mountain and talked with the religious man. after finding out that the man was happy with his religious teachings, he let him be because he did not want to disrupt the man's bliss. there is a lot to be said in his writings. any idea can be taken to an extreme. I don't quote him very often but i understand his love for knowledge. and love for knowledge is not necessarily bad.
I'm sure your not aware of this...but you state "it is when people want Nietzsche to be their bible that i would take heed" and then quote like some would quote from the bible... "the best part i liked is when zarathustra came down from the mountain and talked with the religious man. after finding out that the man was happy with his religious teachings, he let him be because he did not want to disrupt the man's bliss."...wow...best part you liked...Zarathustra let him be because he did not want to disrupt the man's bliss...how condescending a statement Nietzsche was able to speak through Zarathustra...wow...and again you liked it....love for knowledge is good...but knowledge in it's self is a tool the human condition perverts time and time again...what is the lesson there...I bring up Albert and yet you stay away from his philosophical ideas...not esoteric enough for you...
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there you go...would not answer a single statement nor question I asked...just kept up quoting and generalizing...there's a free thinker...I like that...cheers and be well.
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my fellow human being...no misunderstanding here...I have all my life over intellectualized issues like most are doing here believing that I could think my way through the human condition...be you from any core belief or mixture there of...we have been in thought for thousands of years...I bring up good old Albert Einstein...why because most of his answers were simple ones regarding...human beings ...politics...governments...societies...I found him last...and had the hardest time with his simple thoughts on these subjects...until I could not explain why such a man with a thought process we may never see again believed in such simple truths about human beings and what we really should be worrying about...
Whatever it is, a moral person would do the opposite.
Good reading on Nietzsche: http://college-ethics.blogspot.com/2010/12/friedrich-wilhelm-nietzsche-1844-1900.html
To which he himself would readily admit. It is, after all, Morality as such that he was drawing into question.
To be replaced with nothing. He had nothing. Nihilism. Worse than nothing, he offered the will to power. He gets off scot-free for the repercussions of his hateful screed. To hell with him.
Pity is contemptible, as are the pitiful. Compassion drags you down. Power is everything. What a guy.
"The strong men, the masters, regain the pure conscience of a beast of prey; monsters filled with joy, they can return from a fearful succession of murder, arson, rape, and torture with the same joy in their hearts, the same contentment in their souls as if they had indulged in some student's rag.... When a man is capable of commanding, when he is by nature a "Master," when he is violent in act and gesture, of what importance are treaties to him?... To judge morality properly, it must be replaced by two concepts borrowed from zoology: the taming of a beast and the breeding of a specific species."
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I think so. I try not to fall into the trap of hating him. I think he was extremely intelligent and did identify some real problems with western civilization, and I'm sure his intentions weren't as bad as the work he produced, and worse, how it's been used to justify atrocity and evil in general. I understand existential anxiety but I think his response to it was way off the reservation. Others like Kierkegaard, and Sartre have much healthier ideas on existentialism, so if you're interested...
He wasn't promoting master morality, per se. He was simply observing a tendency within it towards self-willed activity as opposed to reactive guilt. Contained within his perspective are the seeds of total affirmation.
"per se"....really so you knew him...had conversations with him..."per se"..."seeds of total affirmation"...ahhhh the higher self....and then...control all the "little" people...we can see in history how well that has always worked can't we..."self-willed activity as opposed to reactive guilt"...such a cute way of justifying the anti "I am my brothers keeper"...I got ya.
Use fewer elipses. It makes you more coherent.
I guess that is all you had to say. I wasn't coherent enough for you to understand what I was saying. Sorry
In fact, I believe he was; rejecting the christian notion of the slave morality and idealizing the master one (which is, to its credit in his eyes, a lack of morality). Don't look down.
Kaufman and others have done a great job cleansing Nietzsche's ideas, but the raw stuff speaks for itself.
You "believe" he was? That sounds like an a priori to me. In any case, Nietzsche obviously isn't beyond critique or reformulation, but his ideas are useful insofar as they examine the historicality of moral values and point towards the possibility of fully autonomous individual action -- an understanding of individuality, by the way, which flies in the face of the capitalistic, liberal-democratic notion of "the Individual" as an abstract unit caught up in the pursuit of rational self-interest.
It is simply a judgment based on my experience of the man's works and, just as importantly, his impact on those who hold them up.
His examination of morality is not the extent of his impact on society. His destruction (deconstruction unto annhiliation) of morality is more important.
I assume you're using liberal in the european sense? You might consider a different term here. There's enough confusion in that regard... Anyway '...which flies in the face of the capitalistic, liberal-democratic notion of "the Individual"...' Tell that to those who hold him up, along with Ayn Rand, in justifying their self-serving, self-indulgent, self-deifying behavior.
Yes, clearly, his ideas have been misinterpreted and bastardized in all sorts of contemptible directions, including by the Third Reich. But such is the nature of hotly contested ideas. I'd rather engage with people like Nietzsche on my own terms and reformulate them for my own purposes.
In any case, yes, I am using the term 'liberal' in the Classical European sense of individual liberty within the confines of state-implemented 'checks and balances.' The contemporary 'liberal vs. conservative' debate in the US is grounded in a colloquial understanding of both concepts that opposes 'permissive' liberalism on the one hand and 'rigid' conservatism on the other. This is a false opposition grounded in a watered-down analysis.
I've always alluded to the point, entertained the perspective, but ultimately dismissed Nietzsche as rather biased and shallow.
My fourth great-grandfather served as teacher and mentor to George II, and for many years, as the Curator of the University of Jena. It seems, he was equally unimpressed, and as one who entertained some of the greatest minds of the time period, I think there might be cause to pause... and consider.
The library of George II consisted of some 3000 books; all were read. That's more than most Americans would read given the opportunity of two or three lifetimes. And George was focused on philosophy... but it seems, he too, chose to entirely neglect Nietzsche.
Why the fascination?
"State is the coldest of all monsters. Coldly it tells lies too; and this lie crawls out of its mouth: 'I, the state, am the people!' That is a lie!" - My homeboy, Frederich Wilhelm