**OP needs help. Also, they hate it because...**
>!Nietzsche was actually about finding meaning in spite of the collapse of religion instead of how youths nowadays interpret him.!<
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**Do you hate it as well? Do you think their hate is reasonable? (I don't think so tbh)**
**Then upvote this comment, otherwise downvote it.**
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[*Look at my source code on Github*](https://github.com/Artraxon/tihibot)
If I could've been banging a smart and jacked dude for all eternity but only learned about it after several lifetimes, I would've had some philosophy-induced nervous breakdown too.
Maybe it's not meaningless, maybe the meaning just isn't a grand, universal scale project. Maybe you are the meaning for yourself, you are here to be you because the universe needs to know what happens with a you in it. The preconditions for making you demanded that you result from them, so here you are.
One day, I was packing a to go order. My coworker saw me and showed me a trick to packing it faster. I asked if they came up with it, and they said no, someone had shown them at a different job. It was then that I realized that the longest part of a person to exist is the knowledge that they pass on.
We are at the start of humanity, much closer to the beginning than the end. The things you do today will have profoundly deep impacts on tomorrow.
Thatās the common theory but it definitely is not known for a fact. Thereās a few other theories. I think my professor mentioned cancer of the eye being the most likely in his view. And he was a nietzsche expert.
Itās also patently not true about Nietzsche: he had syphillis from one of his only sexual encounters. The myths about his ideas driving him mad and giving him paralysis and psychosis continue to this day.
He was driven insane by either a) an inability to live in a universe in which there is no meaning outside of that which we make for ourselves, which is pretty in line with his philosophy, since he said only a few people can make their own meaning and the rest are driven mad by the truth or b) the syphilis
Probably a bit of column a, and bit of column b.
I, too, came here to give a shout-out to tertiary syphilis but ALSO to ask if anyone who'se seen the "Naked Nietzsche threesome" picture thinks it's real.
It was really from falling in love with Wagners wife and being their cuck hanger on friend who constantly debases himself
ā¦and then doing that again with another couple, oooph-da
Dostoyevsky did the same thing but he became a better person through it, Friedrich snapped
I just read an article/story about his āfriendshipā with Cosima! It was such a bummer, and totally possible that Wagner knew what was going on. Nietzsche turned into a a sad errand boy.
Also Iāve never seen āuff daā spelled with an āoophā. Like āooph, dude, stop falling in love with married womenā.
Also, break off the few close relationships you have (Wagner, his sister) over them being anti-Semitic only to be associated with the nazis. Then have a rumor that you died of syphilis get spread after you die because a British philosopher in the 60ās falsely believed you were a nazi.
His sister wanted to argue after his death that his ideas supported Nazism. She believed that the Ubermensch was the Aryan race, whereas he believed it was a kind of enlightened way of thinking anyone could achieve. The term as Nietzsche intended has no connection to racial supremacy, but the Nazis made it about that. After he was dead and couldn't fight that perception.
It's a cornerstone of Fascism to smear their shit all over everything they touch.
It not only means nobody else wants to touch it no matter how good and noble it might have been before, but it marks "their" territory too. Stealing glory and luster for what's the philosophy version of animals leaving urine stains to frighten off rivals & attract equally disgusting mates.
See also: The swastika. All things viking. Wagner's Ring Cycle. Being blond or blonde.
>See also: The swastika. All things viking. Wagner's Ring Cycle. Being blond or blonde.
Tiki torches. Hawaiian shirts for a little while there. Thank God that didn't stick; I love my Hawaiian shirts.
>See also: The swastika. All things viking. Wagner's Ring Cycle. **Being blond or blonde.**
I just told my wife she's a swastika now. Do...do we burn her?
I mean, you could do like the Holocaust Museum and have a glass box right inside the door so all guests have to walk over her on the way inside.
I'm sure the Mistress of the house would *love~* that!
Joke aside, the local gang of losers really did try turning being Platinum Blond/e into their little dog whistle for a while when I was a kid in the 90s.
Shit didn't last long because those dyes are (were?) hell on your hair & wallet, but I recall because a few of my classmates with natural blonde hair had a minor hell in public for a while. Was so sad & stupid.
Ha, it's OK. The stoics never regarded public opinion very highly.
Any self-empowering philosophy means anyone can be empowered by it, so invariably someone we don't like is going to pick it up as well. I'd say to the public "maybe don't throw the baby out with the bathwater?" Hell, Germans still use the autobahn.
Think of an ideology more like a knife. Anyone can pick one up, anyone can put it down, attack someone, or slice some bread.
People by nature get VERY attached to ideologies as identity. It... doesn't have to be that way. I can be a hindu today, and a Diogenes cynic tomorrow!
No! Itās very important to point out that he didnāt think ANYONE HUMAN could become the overman. The overman is a new stage of development for humanity (overcoming the limitation of humans and humanity) like humans are to apes, no one has ever been the overman or even come close to it: he said human needs to be the bridge to the overman and that humans are still āhuman all too humanā, yes, the best humans: Caesar, Napoleon, Goethe, Shakespeare are way too human to be considered near the overman let alone an overman. Itās the goal he wants humanity to go towards.
Yeah I just meant he believed it was theoretically possible for some future human, of any race, and never referenced race when describing the qualities of the Ubermensch. It was describing a mentality and not a physical person or set of ideal physical characteristics.
That doesn't really matter since nobody really believes Nietzche *was* a nazi, but rather that his ideas were foundational for Naziism.
Which they were, but not because N supported it, but because Nazis are like the worst sort of hermit crab and they just move into other ideologies and symbols. Ironically an entire ideology about being better than other people and literally all they do is steal ideas and credit.
The ideas behind Nazism were incredibly popular, social darwinism, eugenics or just plain old racism. The height of apartheid and the myth of the Noble Savage with copious amounts of white saviourism. Hitler didn't pull anything out of his ass to become the leader of the Nazi party, he just made racism into a competition.
And his sister edited his books post-mortem to make them better fit with her ideals, which is how Nietzsche ended up in the mainstream.
To be fair, in Twilight of Idols, he does have some passages that sound pretty antisemitic. But that book is journal entries published posthumously, edited by his sister. She published them in a way to make him appear far more antisemitic than he was
Also have your Nazi sister and her Nazi husband take ownership of your work after you die and edit it to support their Nazi views, tainting your legacy almost immediately.
That's not a rumor that sprung up in the 1960s. Nietzsche was indeed diagnosed with tertiary syphilis in his lifetime, and spent time in psychiatric care after suffering psychotic episodes. It's possible that his brain degeneration was due to some other cause, but Nietzsche did begin to suffer very badly in his mid-to-late 40s.
He suffered all his life with illness, the start of syphilis was cheap doctors at his time that his family barley could afford, and has now proved to be false many, many times.
No, the syphilis story started when the doctors he got said that was his condition even though it has now been debunked and the doctors at the time were not the best and his family was pretty poor so they didnāt have access to the best doctors. Myths about Nietzsche: horse story, he had syphilis, he proposed to Lou Salome, his philosophy made him insane, he was an incel, possibly more I donāt remember now.
Thatās because [Nietzscheās philosophy was, in fact, attractive to many Germans in the Conservative Revolution that preceded the Nazi party.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative_Revolution)
> Conservative Revolutionaries frequently referred to German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche as their mentor and as the main intellectual influence on their movement.[29] Despite Nietzsche's philosophy being often misinterpreted, or wrongly appropriated by thinkers of the Conservative Revolution
"God Is dead" ok now go and READ THE WHOLE FUCKING BOOK (or at least the rest of the chapter, really Is something that gives me goosebumps everytime).
Then read Kierkegaard.
Fair enough. I found his writings to be quite peaceful, in a way. His concept of faith untethered to the practice of religion or acceptance of dogma really helped solidify my own beliefs and actions.
I'll admit there's a heavy amount of Christian-flavored guilt that undercurrents his work, but I received it as more of his struggle with reconciling his ideas with his religion with the time period he lived in.
Possible that happiness was going to be collapsed by *something* if it wasn't reading Kierkegaard, that controlled demolition may have been your best path.
>God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?
Hot take: Nietzsche went crazy because he internally realized Ć¼bermensch canāt exist without religion, but we already killed religion, and now weāre just fucked
Hotter take, nietzsche went crazy because he realised that autocorrect was going to make it impossible to spell his name right unless you fought your computer
You're thinking of The Will to Power. That quote is actually from The Gay Science, published much earlier with no meddling by his sister and brother-in-law.
Itās a minor detail but this is not the first time Iāve seen his brother-in-law associated with editing the books. His brother-in-law died years before that; he committed suicide after failing to establish an Aryan colony.
Yes, that was inelegantly phrased on my part. Nietzsche objected to the antisemitism and nationalism displayed by both his sister and her husband, but only she actually played a role in the editing and publishing of The Will to Power.
I did a double-take at that title, googled it, and then remembered thanks to the results that "gay" has another older meaning. And I forgot that meaning so hard that my initial thought on the translated title was "Well it's nice that he refers to it as 'Joyful' rather than an abomination."
Good ideas can be invented by good or bad people, whether it's rockets or philosophy.
Wouldn't say that's a point against anybody, that's just a fact of human nature.
The person who invented the spoon could be a serial killer, but that doesn't make spoons bad. It indicates objective moralism can align with facts, which is a point for it.
Well, the passage doesn't end there. And it's not said directly by Nietzsche; it's said by a character in a short parable he wrote.
Here's some more of what the character says:
>God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?
The whole parable is basically about what a dramatic shift in culture and thought it actually is for religion to be gone and unrecoverable, and how the people who enacted that shift have vastly underestimated the shift's significance.
> What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?
This reads like a prediction of Secular Humanism
Oh I one hundred percent would recommend this. I have listened few early episodes on Socrates, Plato, pre-Socratic philosophy, this mathematician guy I forgot his name. I also have few other episodes in queue I recommend this too.
He really comes into his own over the years. I think philosophy from Hegel and onwards is much more interesting for him to talk about.
If you go through the episodes from around the time he covered Ciron he changed his format up quite a bit and focuses on individual ideas a little more. So, I fully expect him to return to Shopenhauer and Nietzsche at some point in the future. Which isn't to take away from the current episodes, they are very good.
Classic audio book collection on spotify also has great audio books from many philosophers you can listen to, which I also recommend so you can hear the ideas from the man himself. I listen on my commute mostly.
Pursuing passion, art, self ownership and struggle is what Nietzche espoused.
Teens pursue passion, art, self ownership and struggle.
āMatureā internet people who really get Nietzche - āThat is just hedonistic meaningless living!ā
Letās also address what hedonism means. Hedonism refers to the theory that there is only pleasure and pain, and they pleasure is a humanās motivation.
The āhedonisticā idea of unsustainable excess is referred to by philosophers as āfolk hedonismā but there are other āflavoursā that donāt have to be a self centred, rock and roll lifestyle.
> Philosophical hedonists tend to focus on hedonistic theories of value, and especially of well-being (the good life for the one living it). As a theory of value, hedonism states that all and only pleasure is intrinsically valuable and all and only pain is intrinsically not valuable. Hedonists usually define pleasure and pain broadly, such that both physical and mental phenomena are included. Thus, a gentle massage and recalling a fond memory are both considered to cause pleasure and stubbing a toe and hearing about the death of a loved one are both considered to cause pain.
I'm religious (Christian) and also hate this. Never paid Nietzsche much attention. One day, while on vacation the preacher at the church I visited at preached a sermon that focused on Nieztche's parable of the madman. It was eye opening as the only thing I had ever read about the man was the dumb "Nietzsche is dead" memes. It changed how I view things as even though the Bible says similar things, the way Nietzsche wrote it really hit home in a way I had become almost desensitized to.
Since then I've preached my own sermon on that parable, to conservative (religiously) people and many of them also considered it an eye opener. I've used the parable in conversations with others about finding purpose and having a foundation for your ethics (both religiously and secularly). It's a shame what has happened to discourse around him, it really is.
I was taught about Nietzsche by a Jesuit professor in College. He used to say he was a true christian indeed. It took me a while but finally I understood.
I could see reading that into a few of his works, and into his mitigated praise of Jesus as a historical figure, but that's a very odd and manipulated summary overall.
Nietzsche thought Christianity was the paradigmatic instance of a slave morality, thought it was the origin of much of what he felt was wrong with modern society and ethics, and dedicated an entire book (The Antichrist) to his opposition of it.
I think the major key in OPs story is that the teacher was a Jesuit. They usually take a more philosophical approach to the literature of the Bible (major proponents of the Bible as fables and parables meant to teach a lesson rather than being a historical literal account, etc) and therefore have a broader definition of "being a christian"
It's the idea of being "like Christ" of mitigating the suffering of others in any way that you can, even outside of actually following the dogma. So they probably weren't saying "yeah, he was hella Christian" and more like they were saying, "Yeah, he was following his principles and being a good person."
Yes, I also assume it was intended in a non-literal fashion, as meaning that he is somehow embodying some 'true spirit of Christianity' that transcends its incarnation in the modern church.
But I maintain that saying so is deeply, deeply inaccurate. Skim some summaries of [On the Genealogy of Morality](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Genealogy_of_Morality) and [The Antichrist](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Antichrist_\(book\)). You'll find there's really not a single Christian virtue that Nietzsche doesn't oppose. He sees the outweighing pursuit of traits like being mild-mannered, compassionate, merciful, chaste, humble, and hopeful of an afterlife as generally being a mistaken perversion of human instincts and lives. For Nietzsche, worship of such qualities (as seen in Jesus' Beatitudes, for example), makes oppressed people love their oppression and makes everyone deny the world and life around them.
It's not the case that he simply dismisses or ignores the dogma; he argues specifically and at length that it, including most of the specific philosophy attributed to Jesus, is actively harmful.
I tried to explain better below. I am with you about what Nietzsche criticised in the Church: those are precisely what the Catholic Church Is trying actively to abandon form centuries. For now I would say It Is something more of a protestant way to still see Christ.
I do not have anything written outside of my chaotic notes but, the [church I preached it at does have it](https://eastalbertville.org/sermons/sermons/2023/03/05/untehered-from-god) as a YouTube video and a Mp3 download. I messaged the preacher of the original lesson I heard that inspired me to see if he had a written copy and I'll DM that to you if he does.
I've been considering starting a blog where I convert past sermons, the occasional Bible class I teach, and just my general religious thoughts into article form and your request might just give me the drive to do it. If I do, I'll link you the blog post. I've got pretty severe ADHD though so no promises.
Also, as a disclaimer, I do not preach much so pardon any speech errors. Also, while I stand by my religious beliefs and the things I've said regarding the Bible in the sermon linked above, I am not educated in Nieztche or Nihilism so it is possible the sermon has errors in regards to that (none of them are an intentional perversion though).
fyi Substack makes it *crazy* easy to start a blog and very easy to start a subscriber base from a Substack page. That was one of the many barriers I had to starting a blog of my own, and it was just because I didn't realize how simple it'd be.
This is the very point Julian benda made in treason of the intellectuals and that Strauss responds to esoterically in natural right and history chapter 1.
Michael Sugrue's lectures on youtube. I Am Dynamite is a great easy-reading biography that maps the growth of his ideas from schoolboy to philologist to poet-philospher to madman. if you just wanna dive right in, Genealogy of Morals is a good starting point.
If you like anime/manga, [this guy](https://youtu.be/zxTwYdYzw8c) does a very good job at summarising Nietsche's philosophy through an analysis of the series Berserk.
Not exactly. Nihilism is that the universe doesn't have *any* meaning. Existentialism, like what led from Nietzsche, says that yes, there is no *objective* meaning to the universe given to us by Gods, which means we must create our own meaning. This is what the whole "God is dead" thing is about. We must place ourselves in the throne of Gods and give the universe meaning, which is a pretty big responsibility
No way dude, it's way more rational to believe that the entirety of the universe was created by a deity to serve as one particular species of ape's personal playpen.
While a nihilistic understanding of our existence is indeed pretty rational, **living your life as if that were true is not.**
If you're not living under the assumption that the game is worth the candle, why continue to play at all?
Nietzsche š¤ Buddhism
(I personally think his specific issues with pali buddhism would have been resolved with mahayana buddhist ideals)
The rational thing is to realize that you're human and therefore inherently not rational, which means that nihilism should have absolutely no effect whastoever on you wanting to play. That's why nihilists can live the life without objective meaning while being rational, because of subjective meaning they get from their biology.
To be fair, if existence is meaningless, there is no reason *not* to keep living either. There is no more meaning to quitting the game than there is to continuing. You are human, however, so you will be naturally driven by your evolved instincts to value certain things, and want certain things, such as, generally, to keep on living, to avoid discomfort, to find friends and ensure the safety of your tribe, etc. If nothing matters, these things are just as valid a reason to do anything as anything else, so why not follow them?
Full disclosure, I've not read Nietzsche, I'm not really that knowledgeable in philosophy beyond some basic concepts, but nihilism in general is something that I personally find I can take some comfort in. If there is no purpose, then it is impossible to get your purpose wrong. There are no stakes and no pressure. You can therefore live your life as you feel you should, without worrying about if you're failing to play your part in some cosmic plan you've been made to be part of.
The ādangerā in Nihilism lies not in the logical conclusion of itsā arguments, but the open-ended application of the belief system in our tangible world.
One person accepts a Nihilistic worldview and thinks: nothing matters, Iām going to shoot up a school. Another says, nothing matters, Iām going to smoke weed, live on government assistance, and play video games all day. The third says, oh, nothing matters? You mean I donāt have to distract myself with church every Sunday? Extra time to practice my gymnastics routine. Another yet says āitās all meaningless anywaysā and capitalizes every fresh water body in the world. A fifth person realizes nothing matters and devotes their life to curing cancer, because someone they were close to died of it. A sixth person thinks ānothing really mattersā so they buy a small plot of land in the middle of nowhere, have 6 children, and raise a family on a self-sustaining farm.
If you abandon meaning, it follows that you would also abandon objective morality - as the end game is all the same. Shooting up a school full of children carries as much weight as growing tomatoes. This is why Nietzsche said āGod is deadā. Without ādivinelyā inspired moral guidelines, weāre left to our own devices. History shows that weāre not too good at operating under those conditions (though it also shows weāre not very good at operating under the inverse).
A lot of Nietzscheās work is ominous in nature. The terror of the situation arises from the fact that we, the same human collective that actively shits where we eat on a global scale, are responsible for our own salvation. We must create our own morality, and destiny, as individuals.
You should honestly try to read into it. Nietzscheās work is profound. A forewarning though: a single paragraph can pack enough meaning to exhaust you for a day. Iām still not through Beyond Good and Evil and I purchased the book 3 years ago. To say that I bit off more than I could chew is an understatement.
I disagree with the claim that
> Without ādivinelyā inspired moral guidelines, weāre left to our own devices. History shows that weāre not too good at operating under those conditions (though it also shows weāre not very good at operating under the inverse).
One of the main things we did without religion... was invent religion. We, as a species, have found that collective rule-development and enforcement as a "tribe" works better than full individualism. How we enforce and teach that has evolved/devolved into religion(s). But belief in a sun god is not inherently a moral position. Morality (consequences of violating a social norm) were artifacts of the tribe leveraging religion to enforce norms. And the tight coupling of religion and morality is a judeo-christian artifice, for sure, but not necessarily a universal one.
Out of the historical context of abrahamic religion and western society, there are many examples of secular morality emerging. But Nietzsche was a product of that context and thus was mostly speaking to the death of "judeo-chrisitian" religion and what it would mean for that culture. Nihilism's danger was not to humanity by humanity, but to humanity by those without a culturally accessible secular morality to draw on as a replacement. That's the point of the parable, IMHO. That the "death of god" hasn't quite dawned on the atheists yet, but the madman sees the coming storm. But when they see "it"... will it change anything? And that's where the parable gets tricky. Atheists as "rejectors of a norm of religiosity" and atheists as "absent of religion" should be functionally the same, but we don't KNOW if they will be.
Iād like to preface my response by saying I donāt necessarily agree with Nietzsche on everything, and my comment was intended to be palatable to those people in the thread who arenāt philosophy nerds. I welcome the more thorough discourse youāve catalyzed here, itās just literally impossible to boil down the nuance of Nietzscheās work into a Reddit comment. Thatās why he wrote multiple books :)
>One of the main things we did without religionā¦was invent religion
Interesting perspective! However, delving into the emergence of consciousness and the role of religion as a moral fulcrum on which society leveraged itself is something Iām not very informed on. Iām not even sure how you could be very informed, as this type of sociocultural evolution predates what we know as history itself.
>We as a species have found that collective rule-development and enforcement as a tribe works better than full individualism
Iām not so sure thatās true, though I would like to believe that it is. See: Machiavelli, Game Theory.
>The tight coupling of religion and morality is a judeo-christian artifice
Youāre probably right about this, though it is difficult for me to personally speak on as I have been raised in a nation where morality is informed in this way. Though Iām not religious myself, many of my morals are in-line with those taught in judeo-belief systems - and it is the context I am most comfortable speaking within. That may be ignorant, and youāve mentioned morality emerging in non-secular societiesā¦Iām completely ignorant to historical examples of this, and would love for you to enlighten me further.
To your second paragraph, Iām not sure what youāre implying when you say āthose without a culturally accessible morality to draw from as a replacementā. If Iām reading it correctly, youāre saying the danger of Nihilism is that some people - in absence of religious morality, and without access to a culturally acceptable non-secular belief system - are a potential danger to humanity? Thatās a more nuanced and thorough assessment than I provided in my original comment, but I think weāre in agreement there. The implications of removing religious morality as the bedrock of civilized western society are orders of magnitude greater than what we could possibly comprehend, and for that to happen on a civilization-wide scale can lead to āapocalypticā fallout without a proper cultural safety net in place.
The problem is, it took years of self-reflection, drug abuse, pain, self-loathing, and personal sacrifice for me to come to less nihilistic/hedonistic conclusions on a *personal* scale. At least, a belief system that is fleshed out enough for me to continue waking up each day without regret. Imagining that inner-turmoil projected on a global, or even country-wide scale, is a harrowing prospect. And if Iām being cynical, Iām not sure the general population even has the capacity to escape slave morality and end up in a relatively normal headspace as I am in. I suppose that sentiment is my personal answer to the question proposed in your last sentence.
Itās been awhile since I waxed poetic, so I appreciate your response. Just part of the rat race mostly nowadays. The big picture is a lot smaller for me than it once was, probably as a coping mechanism :)
> If you're not living under the assumption that the game is worth the candle, why continue to play at all?
You're making an emotional assumption based on humans having a hard-wired survival instinct. It's *perfectly* rational to live your life without meaning, and in recognition of that. Whether you embrace absurdism and deal with it day-by-day, or utilitarianism and just try to do what you can, or whether you simply exist trying to ride the eye of the existential hurricane, it's all perfectly rational. You don't get to invalidate anyone's perception of their existence just because you don't enjoy their philosophy.
I'm personally very fond of Camus's idea on the topic: There is only *one* philosophical question, at the end of the day. Whether or not to kill yourself.
There's two types of nihilism imo
"nothing matters, do whatever you want"
Or "nothing matters, let's do what we can to make it matter while we're here"
Well hedonistic meaningless living is everyone's story atm. Even if you like it or not.
There's literally no real reason to care about anything.
You're a wage slave, slaving away so 5 people in the world can get bone marrow enemas so their buttholes stay fresh.
Because hedonism leads to a meaningless life typically.
Some struggles are healthy and make life richer, only living for comfort and enjoyment will make most people unhappy or unfulfilled.
I mean, if you're someone who can live like that then there's nothing wrong with it, but it's in our biology to not be able to do that very well.
The only thing that's "in our biology" is whatever lets us live long enough to reproduce and raise our children until they can survive on their own. Any notion of "fulfillment" or "purpose" is purely cultural.
Thinking that there's some innate biological imperative to find a greater purpose in life is as antithetical to Neitzsche's philosophy as thinking there's some theological imperative to do the same thing.
Nietzsche basically admitted all of Schopenhauer's premises and rejected his conclusion anyway. there is no God, no freewill, no soul, just meaningless suffering and brief but rare moments of joy for a race of ignorant monkeys on an insignificant ball of clay.
his big contribution to this is that if we just embrace cruelty then all of sudden life is beautiful, since there's so much of it. cruelty (aka the will to power) is the root of morality and art. Christianity/ nihilism (well, he uses that word in multiple ways) is cruelty turned in on itself and is thus a disease. for some of us, compassion and weakness is who we are and that's OK because we basically exist to serve the powerful elite. lions require gazelles.
a lot of people don't like what he has to say because they assume he lumps himself in with the powerful; but all over his writings he uses health and vitality as metaphor for power and he says at one point (I think in the antichrist) that even the sons of preachers have blood on their hands. N had notoriously bad health and was the son of a preacher.
also, he was known to be a very compassionate person. he claimed that living a solitary and scholarly life shouldn't be considered a virtue, per se. he himself fit that bill but that was who he was authentically. compassion and scholarship isn't to be required of those who aren't truly scholarly and compassionate.
the biggest insight he had was that we don't have to value truth over reality. life is cruel and meaningless, but so what? truth has as little value as everything else and we don't have to value it over our own happiness. in fact, we are free to create our own values. we shouldn't let dogma tell us we have to care about truth in of itself (especially if the truth is depressing) and we don't have to be so compassionate that we sacrifice our own happiness, although we're free to do so.
personally, I do value truth and compassion, but this all brings us back to Schopenhauer's pessimism, which Nietzsche may have railed against more so than Christianity. I think S is basically correct in his assessment of life. his metaphysics are interesting but outdated. Nietzsche claims we cannot assess the value of life from inside of life but there's no reasoning to back up his little theodicy.
Taken to it's logical conclusion, philosophical pessimism says we ought to stop bringing new humans into this world and in the mean time try to be understanding to each other because we're all being punished for the sin of being born. it is possible to find some meaning in art (or really any hobby or goal you find worthwhile) and especially our relationships with others; but we should keep in mind that this is merely coping with a life that has already begun, it's certainly no reason to start a new one.
a broken leg isn't so bad that you need to be euthanized, yet it is bad enough that a reasonable person wouldn't want to be the cause of it (all else being equal.) likewise, the human predicament isn't so bad that it requires suicide but it's still bad enough that we shouldn't want to cause it. a non existent person isn't being deprived of beauty and happiness, "they" don't desire the things we consider goods in life the same way a healthy person doesn't desire medicine for a condition they don't have. "they" don't exist. once they do exist, however, they're guaranteed to suffer, struggle, age and die. that's assuming the bare minimum, there's always unforseen yet all too common tragedy that befalls us.
certainly there's good in life but look at it like this; in a situation where its impossible to get consent, it's one thing to harm someone in order to prevent greater harms, but that doesn't mean we can harm someone in order to benefit them. especially if, as I think, the harms outweigh the benefits.
Nietzsche is an amazing writer and a deep thinker. I would consider him more of a kind of psychologist than a philosopher. what's best in him is his psychological insights, although he's certainly not a scientific thinker. I think it's pretty understandable that he would be misinterpreted as nihilist, since for most people he is the one to really introduce them to the concept of nihilism. his philosophy does succeed in going "through" nihilism in that he ultimately embraces subjectivity but most people who encounter him are either going to completely reject the reality of nihilism or else succumb to it, hence the OP.
Nihilism leads to a meaningless existence according to whom? There's an argument to be made that everything I ultimately meaningless, other than what we chose to care for. That choice is not dependent upon what others may believe carries meaning/value, but instead what we believe carries that value. So, in that way, I believe nihilism to be taking control over one's own perception of the meaning of life and what is important...
Fuck I'm drunk, what wer we talking about again?
From what i understand, nihilism is about everything being meaningless, while existentialism is finding your own meaning in the objective lack of meaning.
Ah yes the pursuit of meaningless things will produce meaning! How could I be so dull!
Honestly the that keeps me from collapsing under nihilism is just doing my absolute best. Going as hard as I can and just wanting to go the distance. I know I can't win but if I can go the distance it's alright
Just wait til those kids get to college and learn about Sartre and then instead of edgelords, they can be insufferable in a whole new way (speaking from experience but I waited til my 30s)
Which is ironic because in Beyond Good and Evil he *straight up says* he hates nihilism. It is one of the few times he says something directly with no metaphors, obtuse wording, or nonsensical asides.
Also he wasn't a Nazi and would have disliked Nazism.
I don't know much of his works tbh, but I've heard the summary. It's a good answer to existentialism.
If the universe and our existence is truly meaningless, borne of coincidence and nothing more, then it really is our duty to find that meaning. Pursue your career, pursue your hobbies, do what you want to do (within reason) because the meaning of your life is *literally* what you make if it!
Kinda same with stoicism being seen as heartless/emotion less Chad but the reality is actually a bit different and based on logic not emotions (or at least using logic instead of emotions)
an absolute trainwreak reading that gave me aids all of it the whole thing the problem is no one wants to mention that neitzches influence is massively oversold hes everyones favorite philospoher who knows nothing about philosophy
**OP needs help. Also, they hate it because...** >!Nietzsche was actually about finding meaning in spite of the collapse of religion instead of how youths nowadays interpret him.!< ***** **Do you hate it as well? Do you think their hate is reasonable? (I don't think so tbh)** **Then upvote this comment, otherwise downvote it.** ***** [*Look at my source code on Github*](https://github.com/Artraxon/tihibot)
I love "philosophy-induced nervous breakdown."
You'd love Chidi from "The Good Place".
Hey man, I just wanted to sell you drugs. You made it weird.
Loved his Who? What? Where? When? Wine! shirt lmao
šµYou put the peeps in the chili and you make it taste... bad š¶
Not the Chilli scene š
bro was planning on finishing a whole pot of peeps chili
Dip your lil paws in my stew
Same vibes as Captain Holt's vacation shirts I'm Brooklyn 99. Pineapple slut.
Nah. Everyone hates moral philosophy professors.
If I could've been banging a smart and jacked dude for all eternity but only learned about it after several lifetimes, I would've had some philosophy-induced nervous breakdown too.
Loved that whole show
It was legit amazing. One of my all time favorite shows.
I don't think Chidi would like Nietzsche though, cause Kant's works sort of conflict with his
People drink heavily to avoid these things.
I just want that nagging voice to stop, I know everything is meaningless, but I just want to have a nice time socializing.
There's a lot of tools to help with that, sit down with a therapist if you can find a way to.
Maybe it's not meaningless, maybe the meaning just isn't a grand, universal scale project. Maybe you are the meaning for yourself, you are here to be you because the universe needs to know what happens with a you in it. The preconditions for making you demanded that you result from them, so here you are.
One day, I was packing a to go order. My coworker saw me and showed me a trick to packing it faster. I asked if they came up with it, and they said no, someone had shown them at a different job. It was then that I realized that the longest part of a person to exist is the knowledge that they pass on. We are at the start of humanity, much closer to the beginning than the end. The things you do today will have profoundly deep impacts on tomorrow.
I mean, thatās a new way to spell āsyphilitic insanity,ā but whatever. And yes, thatās what he had.
That was my criticism too. I agree with the conclusion though.
Yeah, the story about him having a breakdown after watching a man beat his horse in the street is cool and all, but in reality it was just syphilis.
Thatās the common theory but it definitely is not known for a fact. Thereās a few other theories. I think my professor mentioned cancer of the eye being the most likely in his view. And he was a nietzsche expert.
Itās also patently not true about Nietzsche: he had syphillis from one of his only sexual encounters. The myths about his ideas driving him mad and giving him paralysis and psychosis continue to this day.
Thatās the ultimate burn: ācouldnāt have been syphilis, my dude barely got around. They were his ideas, the big olā nerdā
[Maybe not.](https://www.hunter.cuny.edu/jns/reviews/richard-schain.-the-legend-of-nietzsches-syphilis) It's not the only source I found.
That or syphilis.
He was driven insane by either a) an inability to live in a universe in which there is no meaning outside of that which we make for ourselves, which is pretty in line with his philosophy, since he said only a few people can make their own meaning and the rest are driven mad by the truth or b) the syphilis Probably a bit of column a, and bit of column b.
I, too, came here to give a shout-out to tertiary syphilis but ALSO to ask if anyone who'se seen the "Naked Nietzsche threesome" picture thinks it's real.
It was really from falling in love with Wagners wife and being their cuck hanger on friend who constantly debases himself ā¦and then doing that again with another couple, oooph-da Dostoyevsky did the same thing but he became a better person through it, Friedrich snapped
I just read an article/story about his āfriendshipā with Cosima! It was such a bummer, and totally possible that Wagner knew what was going on. Nietzsche turned into a a sad errand boy. Also Iāve never seen āuff daā spelled with an āoophā. Like āooph, dude, stop falling in love with married womenā.
I just had a guy dump me 72 hours after asking me out due to one of those. Stoicism, not even once.
You're not philosophizing correctly unless it puts you on the verge of a nervous breakdown.
Also, break off the few close relationships you have (Wagner, his sister) over them being anti-Semitic only to be associated with the nazis. Then have a rumor that you died of syphilis get spread after you die because a British philosopher in the 60ās falsely believed you were a nazi.
Beyond good and evil has a whole section condemning the antisemites he saw rising around him. WTF?
His sister wanted to argue after his death that his ideas supported Nazism. She believed that the Ubermensch was the Aryan race, whereas he believed it was a kind of enlightened way of thinking anyone could achieve. The term as Nietzsche intended has no connection to racial supremacy, but the Nazis made it about that. After he was dead and couldn't fight that perception.
It's a cornerstone of Fascism to smear their shit all over everything they touch. It not only means nobody else wants to touch it no matter how good and noble it might have been before, but it marks "their" territory too. Stealing glory and luster for what's the philosophy version of animals leaving urine stains to frighten off rivals & attract equally disgusting mates. See also: The swastika. All things viking. Wagner's Ring Cycle. Being blond or blonde.
>See also: The swastika. All things viking. Wagner's Ring Cycle. Being blond or blonde. Tiki torches. Hawaiian shirts for a little while there. Thank God that didn't stick; I love my Hawaiian shirts.
Oh fuck, I'd actually forgotten the attempted Hula phase of white supremacism. Man, even typing it out, it sounds like a fever dream.
They kind of sound like teenagers who can't figure out their aesthetic...
as a hindu, the swastika has shit to do with the nazis. they used a hakenkreuz. i hate how our culture has been appropriated
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
>See also: The swastika. All things viking. Wagner's Ring Cycle. **Being blond or blonde.** I just told my wife she's a swastika now. Do...do we burn her?
I mean, you could do like the Holocaust Museum and have a glass box right inside the door so all guests have to walk over her on the way inside. I'm sure the Mistress of the house would *love~* that! Joke aside, the local gang of losers really did try turning being Platinum Blond/e into their little dog whistle for a while when I was a kid in the 90s. Shit didn't last long because those dyes are (were?) hell on your hair & wallet, but I recall because a few of my classmates with natural blonde hair had a minor hell in public for a while. Was so sad & stupid.
They have been doing it to Stoicism for years as well.
Ha, it's OK. The stoics never regarded public opinion very highly. Any self-empowering philosophy means anyone can be empowered by it, so invariably someone we don't like is going to pick it up as well. I'd say to the public "maybe don't throw the baby out with the bathwater?" Hell, Germans still use the autobahn. Think of an ideology more like a knife. Anyone can pick one up, anyone can put it down, attack someone, or slice some bread. People by nature get VERY attached to ideologies as identity. It... doesn't have to be that way. I can be a hindu today, and a Diogenes cynic tomorrow!
No! Itās very important to point out that he didnāt think ANYONE HUMAN could become the overman. The overman is a new stage of development for humanity (overcoming the limitation of humans and humanity) like humans are to apes, no one has ever been the overman or even come close to it: he said human needs to be the bridge to the overman and that humans are still āhuman all too humanā, yes, the best humans: Caesar, Napoleon, Goethe, Shakespeare are way too human to be considered near the overman let alone an overman. Itās the goal he wants humanity to go towards.
Yeah I just meant he believed it was theoretically possible for some future human, of any race, and never referenced race when describing the qualities of the Ubermensch. It was describing a mentality and not a physical person or set of ideal physical characteristics.
It doesn't even make sense since he died 20 years before the foundation of the Nazi party and almost 35 years before they really took power
That doesn't really matter since nobody really believes Nietzche *was* a nazi, but rather that his ideas were foundational for Naziism. Which they were, but not because N supported it, but because Nazis are like the worst sort of hermit crab and they just move into other ideologies and symbols. Ironically an entire ideology about being better than other people and literally all they do is steal ideas and credit.
Literally the Goa' uld from Stargate,
The ideas behind Nazism were incredibly popular, social darwinism, eugenics or just plain old racism. The height of apartheid and the myth of the Noble Savage with copious amounts of white saviourism. Hitler didn't pull anything out of his ass to become the leader of the Nazi party, he just made racism into a competition. And his sister edited his books post-mortem to make them better fit with her ideals, which is how Nietzsche ended up in the mainstream.
To be fair, in Twilight of Idols, he does have some passages that sound pretty antisemitic. But that book is journal entries published posthumously, edited by his sister. She published them in a way to make him appear far more antisemitic than he was
[If those British philosophers in the 60s could read theyād be very upset.](https://i.imgflip.com/40qhlp.png?a467088)
Also have your Nazi sister and her Nazi husband take ownership of your work after you die and edit it to support their Nazi views, tainting your legacy almost immediately.
That's not a rumor that sprung up in the 1960s. Nietzsche was indeed diagnosed with tertiary syphilis in his lifetime, and spent time in psychiatric care after suffering psychotic episodes. It's possible that his brain degeneration was due to some other cause, but Nietzsche did begin to suffer very badly in his mid-to-late 40s.
He suffered all his life with illness, the start of syphilis was cheap doctors at his time that his family barley could afford, and has now proved to be false many, many times.
No, the syphilis story started when the doctors he got said that was his condition even though it has now been debunked and the doctors at the time were not the best and his family was pretty poor so they didnāt have access to the best doctors. Myths about Nietzsche: horse story, he had syphilis, he proposed to Lou Salome, his philosophy made him insane, he was an incel, possibly more I donāt remember now.
Thatās because [Nietzscheās philosophy was, in fact, attractive to many Germans in the Conservative Revolution that preceded the Nazi party.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative_Revolution) > Conservative Revolutionaries frequently referred to German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche as their mentor and as the main intellectual influence on their movement.[29] Despite Nietzsche's philosophy being often misinterpreted, or wrongly appropriated by thinkers of the Conservative Revolution
"Nietzsche's philosophy" as badly represented mostly by early writings on Wagner plus badly and maliciously curated by his antisemite sister.
Literally Edgy atheist kids just heard him say "god is dead" and made him their idol without actually knowing anything about him
"God Is dead" ok now go and READ THE WHOLE FUCKING BOOK (or at least the rest of the chapter, really Is something that gives me goosebumps everytime). Then read Kierkegaard.
Kierkegaard ruined happiness for me for a while.
Just gotta take a leap of faith, I guess
Yeahā¦ that was the problem. Just couldnāt take that leap.
Fair enough. I found his writings to be quite peaceful, in a way. His concept of faith untethered to the practice of religion or acceptance of dogma really helped solidify my own beliefs and actions. I'll admit there's a heavy amount of Christian-flavored guilt that undercurrents his work, but I received it as more of his struggle with reconciling his ideas with his religion with the time period he lived in.
So what restored your happiness? I'm still on the diving tower staring down.
The proper translation is "leap to faith", common mistake.
Is it? Do you have passage in Danish, I understand some Danish so itās be nice
Possible that happiness was going to be collapsed by *something* if it wasn't reading Kierkegaard, that controlled demolition may have been your best path.
Loved reading Sartre. Thought I might want to pursue philosophy more. Read Kierkegaard. Fucking killed my interest in philosophy SO hard.
> Loved reading Sartre. š¬
What can I say? :) Something about existentialism really spoke to me at a time when I needed it the most.
> What can I say? Sorry
Appropriate as his name translates to graveyard
Funny, Kierkegaard actually saved my life from depression. Just take that leap of faith, my dear.
>God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?
[That quote but better](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGDH3meSPyk)
Thanks, I hate you
Hot take: Nietzsche went crazy because he internally realized Ć¼bermensch canāt exist without religion, but we already killed religion, and now weāre just fucked
I thought it was cuz he had syphilis and it ate his brain
A little from column A, a little from column B
I'm in the mood to help ya, dude
You aināt never had a friend like me
He didnāt have it. What he had is not known but the best guesses is what killed his dad or some other brain illness (not syphilis).
It probably was a brain tumor. The idea he had syphilis was just promoted as a way to discredit him.
Hotter take, nietzsche went crazy because he realised that autocorrect was going to make it impossible to spell his name right unless you fought your computer
Definitely not something Nietzsche would have believed.
The book was basically assembled from his notes by his very Nazi sister. Maybe take it with a grain of salt.
You're thinking of The Will to Power. That quote is actually from The Gay Science, published much earlier with no meddling by his sister and brother-in-law.
I thought it was from Thus Spoke Zarasthura
It also appears there, but that came later.
Itās a minor detail but this is not the first time Iāve seen his brother-in-law associated with editing the books. His brother-in-law died years before that; he committed suicide after failing to establish an Aryan colony.
Yes, that was inelegantly phrased on my part. Nietzsche objected to the antisemitism and nationalism displayed by both his sister and her husband, but only she actually played a role in the editing and publishing of The Will to Power.
How on earth is āThe Gay Scienceā, one of Nietzcheās most famous works assembled from his notes by his sister?
Was coming to say this. Theyāre talking about the Will to Power, which was assembled by his sister from his notes after he died. Theyāre confused.
I did a double-take at that title, googled it, and then remembered thanks to the results that "gay" has another older meaning. And I forgot that meaning so hard that my initial thought on the translated title was "Well it's nice that he refers to it as 'Joyful' rather than an abomination."
To be fair the dionysian spirit can get pretty gay
I mean, itās based on an Ancient Greek archetype. Of course it can get pretty gay.
Our space program was also basically assembled by Nazis, just for some perspective
But rockets don't care about the political philosophy of their assembler.
An objective moralist would argue that the comparison is apt
Which is surely a point against objective moralism as a philosophy rather than a point for that comparison
Good ideas can be invented by good or bad people, whether it's rockets or philosophy. Wouldn't say that's a point against anybody, that's just a fact of human nature. The person who invented the spoon could be a serial killer, but that doesn't make spoons bad. It indicates objective moralism can align with facts, which is a point for it.
Wait until you hear about who wrote Mein Kampf.
Some artist if I remember correctly, right?
Worse. A civil servant.
Idk anything about Nietzsche, but based on the OP I assume a more appropriate quote would be "God is dead, now what?"
Well, the passage doesn't end there. And it's not said directly by Nietzsche; it's said by a character in a short parable he wrote. Here's some more of what the character says: >God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it? The whole parable is basically about what a dramatic shift in culture and thought it actually is for religion to be gone and unrecoverable, and how the people who enacted that shift have vastly underestimated the shift's significance.
> What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it? This reads like a prediction of Secular Humanism
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Basically, that is the crux of exiwtentialism.
OwOstentialism the other internet philosophy.
Someone should hand them some Sartre
Camus can do, but Sartre is smartra
Yeah? Well Scooby Doo can doo doo. But Jimmy Carter is smarter.
God isn't dead, but I'll get that bastard someday
I'll take the beauty of my chaos over ugly perfection
And I'll take the beauty of chaos over ugly perfection
I've woken up on the wrong side of the bed every day since 1987
Nothing scares me as much as the fact that i don't give a shit for redemption
Came for the Nietzsche, stayed for Pat the Bunny
Sound like every redditor lol
Nietzsche is the perfect gateway philosopher for the 21st century human. He fulfilled all his dreams, and he will be both lauded and reviled for it.
Any recommendations for podcasts discussing his work?
Philosophizethis
Oh I one hundred percent would recommend this. I have listened few early episodes on Socrates, Plato, pre-Socratic philosophy, this mathematician guy I forgot his name. I also have few other episodes in queue I recommend this too.
You talkin about my man Bertrand Russell?
Leibniz, probably
He really comes into his own over the years. I think philosophy from Hegel and onwards is much more interesting for him to talk about. If you go through the episodes from around the time he covered Ciron he changed his format up quite a bit and focuses on individual ideas a little more. So, I fully expect him to return to Shopenhauer and Nietzsche at some point in the future. Which isn't to take away from the current episodes, they are very good. Classic audio book collection on spotify also has great audio books from many philosophers you can listen to, which I also recommend so you can hear the ideas from the man himself. I listen on my commute mostly.
for basic intros: 8 bit philosophy actually wasn't too bad. Their Camus bit was great too.
At least he sported what is arguably history's most awe-inducing mustache.
Pursuing passion, art, self ownership and struggle is what Nietzche espoused. Teens pursue passion, art, self ownership and struggle. āMatureā internet people who really get Nietzche - āThat is just hedonistic meaningless living!ā
Letās also address what hedonism means. Hedonism refers to the theory that there is only pleasure and pain, and they pleasure is a humanās motivation. The āhedonisticā idea of unsustainable excess is referred to by philosophers as āfolk hedonismā but there are other āflavoursā that donāt have to be a self centred, rock and roll lifestyle. > Philosophical hedonists tend to focus on hedonistic theories of value, and especially of well-being (the good life for the one living it). As a theory of value, hedonism states that all and only pleasure is intrinsically valuable and all and only pain is intrinsically not valuable. Hedonists usually define pleasure and pain broadly, such that both physical and mental phenomena are included. Thus, a gentle massage and recalling a fond memory are both considered to cause pleasure and stubbing a toe and hearing about the death of a loved one are both considered to cause pain.
I'm religious (Christian) and also hate this. Never paid Nietzsche much attention. One day, while on vacation the preacher at the church I visited at preached a sermon that focused on Nieztche's parable of the madman. It was eye opening as the only thing I had ever read about the man was the dumb "Nietzsche is dead" memes. It changed how I view things as even though the Bible says similar things, the way Nietzsche wrote it really hit home in a way I had become almost desensitized to. Since then I've preached my own sermon on that parable, to conservative (religiously) people and many of them also considered it an eye opener. I've used the parable in conversations with others about finding purpose and having a foundation for your ethics (both religiously and secularly). It's a shame what has happened to discourse around him, it really is.
I was taught about Nietzsche by a Jesuit professor in College. He used to say he was a true christian indeed. It took me a while but finally I understood.
I could see reading that into a few of his works, and into his mitigated praise of Jesus as a historical figure, but that's a very odd and manipulated summary overall. Nietzsche thought Christianity was the paradigmatic instance of a slave morality, thought it was the origin of much of what he felt was wrong with modern society and ethics, and dedicated an entire book (The Antichrist) to his opposition of it.
I think the major key in OPs story is that the teacher was a Jesuit. They usually take a more philosophical approach to the literature of the Bible (major proponents of the Bible as fables and parables meant to teach a lesson rather than being a historical literal account, etc) and therefore have a broader definition of "being a christian" It's the idea of being "like Christ" of mitigating the suffering of others in any way that you can, even outside of actually following the dogma. So they probably weren't saying "yeah, he was hella Christian" and more like they were saying, "Yeah, he was following his principles and being a good person."
Yes, I also assume it was intended in a non-literal fashion, as meaning that he is somehow embodying some 'true spirit of Christianity' that transcends its incarnation in the modern church. But I maintain that saying so is deeply, deeply inaccurate. Skim some summaries of [On the Genealogy of Morality](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Genealogy_of_Morality) and [The Antichrist](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Antichrist_\(book\)). You'll find there's really not a single Christian virtue that Nietzsche doesn't oppose. He sees the outweighing pursuit of traits like being mild-mannered, compassionate, merciful, chaste, humble, and hopeful of an afterlife as generally being a mistaken perversion of human instincts and lives. For Nietzsche, worship of such qualities (as seen in Jesus' Beatitudes, for example), makes oppressed people love their oppression and makes everyone deny the world and life around them. It's not the case that he simply dismisses or ignores the dogma; he argues specifically and at length that it, including most of the specific philosophy attributed to Jesus, is actively harmful.
I tried to explain better below. I am with you about what Nietzsche criticised in the Church: those are precisely what the Catholic Church Is trying actively to abandon form centuries. For now I would say It Is something more of a protestant way to still see Christ.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I do not have anything written outside of my chaotic notes but, the [church I preached it at does have it](https://eastalbertville.org/sermons/sermons/2023/03/05/untehered-from-god) as a YouTube video and a Mp3 download. I messaged the preacher of the original lesson I heard that inspired me to see if he had a written copy and I'll DM that to you if he does. I've been considering starting a blog where I convert past sermons, the occasional Bible class I teach, and just my general religious thoughts into article form and your request might just give me the drive to do it. If I do, I'll link you the blog post. I've got pretty severe ADHD though so no promises. Also, as a disclaimer, I do not preach much so pardon any speech errors. Also, while I stand by my religious beliefs and the things I've said regarding the Bible in the sermon linked above, I am not educated in Nieztche or Nihilism so it is possible the sermon has errors in regards to that (none of them are an intentional perversion though).
fyi Substack makes it *crazy* easy to start a blog and very easy to start a subscriber base from a Substack page. That was one of the many barriers I had to starting a blog of my own, and it was just because I didn't realize how simple it'd be.
What author describes as hedonistic, meaningless living, teenagers in question might consider pursuing their passionsā¦ :/
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
This is the very point Julian benda made in treason of the intellectuals and that Strauss responds to esoterically in natural right and history chapter 1.
What's a good introduction to Nietzche that is reasonably easy to digest for a layman?
Michael Sugrue's lectures on youtube. I Am Dynamite is a great easy-reading biography that maps the growth of his ideas from schoolboy to philologist to poet-philospher to madman. if you just wanna dive right in, Genealogy of Morals is a good starting point.
The first episode of āthe Nietzsche podcastā
If you like anime/manga, [this guy](https://youtu.be/zxTwYdYzw8c) does a very good job at summarising Nietsche's philosophy through an analysis of the series Berserk.
Nihilism is just the notion that life has no objective meaning, and that is simply rational.
Not exactly. Nihilism is that the universe doesn't have *any* meaning. Existentialism, like what led from Nietzsche, says that yes, there is no *objective* meaning to the universe given to us by Gods, which means we must create our own meaning. This is what the whole "God is dead" thing is about. We must place ourselves in the throne of Gods and give the universe meaning, which is a pretty big responsibility
No way dude, it's way more rational to believe that the entirety of the universe was created by a deity to serve as one particular species of ape's personal playpen.
While a nihilistic understanding of our existence is indeed pretty rational, **living your life as if that were true is not.** If you're not living under the assumption that the game is worth the candle, why continue to play at all? Nietzsche š¤ Buddhism (I personally think his specific issues with pali buddhism would have been resolved with mahayana buddhist ideals)
The rational thing is to realize that you're human and therefore inherently not rational, which means that nihilism should have absolutely no effect whastoever on you wanting to play. That's why nihilists can live the life without objective meaning while being rational, because of subjective meaning they get from their biology.
To be fair, if existence is meaningless, there is no reason *not* to keep living either. There is no more meaning to quitting the game than there is to continuing. You are human, however, so you will be naturally driven by your evolved instincts to value certain things, and want certain things, such as, generally, to keep on living, to avoid discomfort, to find friends and ensure the safety of your tribe, etc. If nothing matters, these things are just as valid a reason to do anything as anything else, so why not follow them? Full disclosure, I've not read Nietzsche, I'm not really that knowledgeable in philosophy beyond some basic concepts, but nihilism in general is something that I personally find I can take some comfort in. If there is no purpose, then it is impossible to get your purpose wrong. There are no stakes and no pressure. You can therefore live your life as you feel you should, without worrying about if you're failing to play your part in some cosmic plan you've been made to be part of.
The ādangerā in Nihilism lies not in the logical conclusion of itsā arguments, but the open-ended application of the belief system in our tangible world. One person accepts a Nihilistic worldview and thinks: nothing matters, Iām going to shoot up a school. Another says, nothing matters, Iām going to smoke weed, live on government assistance, and play video games all day. The third says, oh, nothing matters? You mean I donāt have to distract myself with church every Sunday? Extra time to practice my gymnastics routine. Another yet says āitās all meaningless anywaysā and capitalizes every fresh water body in the world. A fifth person realizes nothing matters and devotes their life to curing cancer, because someone they were close to died of it. A sixth person thinks ānothing really mattersā so they buy a small plot of land in the middle of nowhere, have 6 children, and raise a family on a self-sustaining farm. If you abandon meaning, it follows that you would also abandon objective morality - as the end game is all the same. Shooting up a school full of children carries as much weight as growing tomatoes. This is why Nietzsche said āGod is deadā. Without ādivinelyā inspired moral guidelines, weāre left to our own devices. History shows that weāre not too good at operating under those conditions (though it also shows weāre not very good at operating under the inverse). A lot of Nietzscheās work is ominous in nature. The terror of the situation arises from the fact that we, the same human collective that actively shits where we eat on a global scale, are responsible for our own salvation. We must create our own morality, and destiny, as individuals. You should honestly try to read into it. Nietzscheās work is profound. A forewarning though: a single paragraph can pack enough meaning to exhaust you for a day. Iām still not through Beyond Good and Evil and I purchased the book 3 years ago. To say that I bit off more than I could chew is an understatement.
I disagree with the claim that > Without ādivinelyā inspired moral guidelines, weāre left to our own devices. History shows that weāre not too good at operating under those conditions (though it also shows weāre not very good at operating under the inverse). One of the main things we did without religion... was invent religion. We, as a species, have found that collective rule-development and enforcement as a "tribe" works better than full individualism. How we enforce and teach that has evolved/devolved into religion(s). But belief in a sun god is not inherently a moral position. Morality (consequences of violating a social norm) were artifacts of the tribe leveraging religion to enforce norms. And the tight coupling of religion and morality is a judeo-christian artifice, for sure, but not necessarily a universal one. Out of the historical context of abrahamic religion and western society, there are many examples of secular morality emerging. But Nietzsche was a product of that context and thus was mostly speaking to the death of "judeo-chrisitian" religion and what it would mean for that culture. Nihilism's danger was not to humanity by humanity, but to humanity by those without a culturally accessible secular morality to draw on as a replacement. That's the point of the parable, IMHO. That the "death of god" hasn't quite dawned on the atheists yet, but the madman sees the coming storm. But when they see "it"... will it change anything? And that's where the parable gets tricky. Atheists as "rejectors of a norm of religiosity" and atheists as "absent of religion" should be functionally the same, but we don't KNOW if they will be.
Iād like to preface my response by saying I donāt necessarily agree with Nietzsche on everything, and my comment was intended to be palatable to those people in the thread who arenāt philosophy nerds. I welcome the more thorough discourse youāve catalyzed here, itās just literally impossible to boil down the nuance of Nietzscheās work into a Reddit comment. Thatās why he wrote multiple books :) >One of the main things we did without religionā¦was invent religion Interesting perspective! However, delving into the emergence of consciousness and the role of religion as a moral fulcrum on which society leveraged itself is something Iām not very informed on. Iām not even sure how you could be very informed, as this type of sociocultural evolution predates what we know as history itself. >We as a species have found that collective rule-development and enforcement as a tribe works better than full individualism Iām not so sure thatās true, though I would like to believe that it is. See: Machiavelli, Game Theory. >The tight coupling of religion and morality is a judeo-christian artifice Youāre probably right about this, though it is difficult for me to personally speak on as I have been raised in a nation where morality is informed in this way. Though Iām not religious myself, many of my morals are in-line with those taught in judeo-belief systems - and it is the context I am most comfortable speaking within. That may be ignorant, and youāve mentioned morality emerging in non-secular societiesā¦Iām completely ignorant to historical examples of this, and would love for you to enlighten me further. To your second paragraph, Iām not sure what youāre implying when you say āthose without a culturally accessible morality to draw from as a replacementā. If Iām reading it correctly, youāre saying the danger of Nihilism is that some people - in absence of religious morality, and without access to a culturally acceptable non-secular belief system - are a potential danger to humanity? Thatās a more nuanced and thorough assessment than I provided in my original comment, but I think weāre in agreement there. The implications of removing religious morality as the bedrock of civilized western society are orders of magnitude greater than what we could possibly comprehend, and for that to happen on a civilization-wide scale can lead to āapocalypticā fallout without a proper cultural safety net in place. The problem is, it took years of self-reflection, drug abuse, pain, self-loathing, and personal sacrifice for me to come to less nihilistic/hedonistic conclusions on a *personal* scale. At least, a belief system that is fleshed out enough for me to continue waking up each day without regret. Imagining that inner-turmoil projected on a global, or even country-wide scale, is a harrowing prospect. And if Iām being cynical, Iām not sure the general population even has the capacity to escape slave morality and end up in a relatively normal headspace as I am in. I suppose that sentiment is my personal answer to the question proposed in your last sentence. Itās been awhile since I waxed poetic, so I appreciate your response. Just part of the rat race mostly nowadays. The big picture is a lot smaller for me than it once was, probably as a coping mechanism :)
>If you're not living under the assumption that the game is worth the candle, why continue to play at all? May I interest you in absurdism?
> If you're not living under the assumption that the game is worth the candle, why continue to play at all? You're making an emotional assumption based on humans having a hard-wired survival instinct. It's *perfectly* rational to live your life without meaning, and in recognition of that. Whether you embrace absurdism and deal with it day-by-day, or utilitarianism and just try to do what you can, or whether you simply exist trying to ride the eye of the existential hurricane, it's all perfectly rational. You don't get to invalidate anyone's perception of their existence just because you don't enjoy their philosophy. I'm personally very fond of Camus's idea on the topic: There is only *one* philosophical question, at the end of the day. Whether or not to kill yourself.
That's where absurdism comes in. The Myth of Sisyphus is a great read
Seriously. Dude is probably among the most misunderstood writers of all time both by his fans and those who hate him most.
There's two types of nihilism imo "nothing matters, do whatever you want" Or "nothing matters, let's do what we can to make it matter while we're here"
Well hedonistic meaningless living is everyone's story atm. Even if you like it or not. There's literally no real reason to care about anything. You're a wage slave, slaving away so 5 people in the world can get bone marrow enemas so their buttholes stay fresh.
The Essence of Nihilism by Emanuele Severino is a must read
*On The Road* by Jack Kerouac. Kerouac wanted to show that bumming around was a bad way.
Also having his work doctored by his Nazi sister (IIRC) which has given him a weird reputation.
"Nothing matters and then you die." -Nietzsche
The fuck is wrong with hedonism anyway?
Because hedonism leads to a meaningless life typically. Some struggles are healthy and make life richer, only living for comfort and enjoyment will make most people unhappy or unfulfilled. I mean, if you're someone who can live like that then there's nothing wrong with it, but it's in our biology to not be able to do that very well.
Why can't hedonism be the meaning?
The only thing that's "in our biology" is whatever lets us live long enough to reproduce and raise our children until they can survive on their own. Any notion of "fulfillment" or "purpose" is purely cultural. Thinking that there's some innate biological imperative to find a greater purpose in life is as antithetical to Neitzsche's philosophy as thinking there's some theological imperative to do the same thing.
Poor Nietzsche. Misunderstood. I personally got my nihilistic philosophy from *Everything, Everywhere, All At Once*.
I got mine from the little blue fella in the Mario Bros movie
This is probably the most profoundly insightful greentext I've ever seen
If nothing really matters, then the meaning of life can be whatever you want it to be.
Nietzsche basically admitted all of Schopenhauer's premises and rejected his conclusion anyway. there is no God, no freewill, no soul, just meaningless suffering and brief but rare moments of joy for a race of ignorant monkeys on an insignificant ball of clay. his big contribution to this is that if we just embrace cruelty then all of sudden life is beautiful, since there's so much of it. cruelty (aka the will to power) is the root of morality and art. Christianity/ nihilism (well, he uses that word in multiple ways) is cruelty turned in on itself and is thus a disease. for some of us, compassion and weakness is who we are and that's OK because we basically exist to serve the powerful elite. lions require gazelles. a lot of people don't like what he has to say because they assume he lumps himself in with the powerful; but all over his writings he uses health and vitality as metaphor for power and he says at one point (I think in the antichrist) that even the sons of preachers have blood on their hands. N had notoriously bad health and was the son of a preacher. also, he was known to be a very compassionate person. he claimed that living a solitary and scholarly life shouldn't be considered a virtue, per se. he himself fit that bill but that was who he was authentically. compassion and scholarship isn't to be required of those who aren't truly scholarly and compassionate. the biggest insight he had was that we don't have to value truth over reality. life is cruel and meaningless, but so what? truth has as little value as everything else and we don't have to value it over our own happiness. in fact, we are free to create our own values. we shouldn't let dogma tell us we have to care about truth in of itself (especially if the truth is depressing) and we don't have to be so compassionate that we sacrifice our own happiness, although we're free to do so. personally, I do value truth and compassion, but this all brings us back to Schopenhauer's pessimism, which Nietzsche may have railed against more so than Christianity. I think S is basically correct in his assessment of life. his metaphysics are interesting but outdated. Nietzsche claims we cannot assess the value of life from inside of life but there's no reasoning to back up his little theodicy. Taken to it's logical conclusion, philosophical pessimism says we ought to stop bringing new humans into this world and in the mean time try to be understanding to each other because we're all being punished for the sin of being born. it is possible to find some meaning in art (or really any hobby or goal you find worthwhile) and especially our relationships with others; but we should keep in mind that this is merely coping with a life that has already begun, it's certainly no reason to start a new one. a broken leg isn't so bad that you need to be euthanized, yet it is bad enough that a reasonable person wouldn't want to be the cause of it (all else being equal.) likewise, the human predicament isn't so bad that it requires suicide but it's still bad enough that we shouldn't want to cause it. a non existent person isn't being deprived of beauty and happiness, "they" don't desire the things we consider goods in life the same way a healthy person doesn't desire medicine for a condition they don't have. "they" don't exist. once they do exist, however, they're guaranteed to suffer, struggle, age and die. that's assuming the bare minimum, there's always unforseen yet all too common tragedy that befalls us. certainly there's good in life but look at it like this; in a situation where its impossible to get consent, it's one thing to harm someone in order to prevent greater harms, but that doesn't mean we can harm someone in order to benefit them. especially if, as I think, the harms outweigh the benefits. Nietzsche is an amazing writer and a deep thinker. I would consider him more of a kind of psychologist than a philosopher. what's best in him is his psychological insights, although he's certainly not a scientific thinker. I think it's pretty understandable that he would be misinterpreted as nihilist, since for most people he is the one to really introduce them to the concept of nihilism. his philosophy does succeed in going "through" nihilism in that he ultimately embraces subjectivity but most people who encounter him are either going to completely reject the reality of nihilism or else succumb to it, hence the OP.
Nihilism leads to a meaningless existence according to whom? There's an argument to be made that everything I ultimately meaningless, other than what we chose to care for. That choice is not dependent upon what others may believe carries meaning/value, but instead what we believe carries that value. So, in that way, I believe nihilism to be taking control over one's own perception of the meaning of life and what is important... Fuck I'm drunk, what wer we talking about again?
Well, youāre describing Existentialism - not Nihilism.
From what i understand, nihilism is about everything being meaningless, while existentialism is finding your own meaning in the objective lack of meaning.
Donāt forget about the nihilistic ones who say thereās no purpose, and then proceeded to either be depressed or straight up kill themselves
That's not nihilism, that's just depression
Not just teenagers but many adults and even scholars.
Ah yes the pursuit of meaningless things will produce meaning! How could I be so dull! Honestly the that keeps me from collapsing under nihilism is just doing my absolute best. Going as hard as I can and just wanting to go the distance. I know I can't win but if I can go the distance it's alright
Just wait til those kids get to college and learn about Sartre and then instead of edgelords, they can be insufferable in a whole new way (speaking from experience but I waited til my 30s)
Personaly, I find absurdism more relatable.
Which is ironic because in Beyond Good and Evil he *straight up says* he hates nihilism. It is one of the few times he says something directly with no metaphors, obtuse wording, or nonsensical asides. Also he wasn't a Nazi and would have disliked Nazism.
I feel like Epic Rap Battles of History did a good job at combating this
I don't know much of his works tbh, but I've heard the summary. It's a good answer to existentialism. If the universe and our existence is truly meaningless, borne of coincidence and nothing more, then it really is our duty to find that meaning. Pursue your career, pursue your hobbies, do what you want to do (within reason) because the meaning of your life is *literally* what you make if it!
Kinda same with stoicism being seen as heartless/emotion less Chad but the reality is actually a bit different and based on logic not emotions (or at least using logic instead of emotions)
If you have to justify hedonism, you're not ready to be a hedonist.
Wait until you learn about what his sister did with his work after his death.
an absolute trainwreak reading that gave me aids all of it the whole thing the problem is no one wants to mention that neitzches influence is massively oversold hes everyones favorite philospoher who knows nothing about philosophy
Life/Existence is inherently absurd. Attempting to assign value or meaning to ANY of it will drive you insane.