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While I don't agree with everything Pinker says, I must say, Pinker's point on "Drop the Nietsche" in his book, Enlightenment Now, did influence me: Keep some

While I don't agree with everything Pinker says, I must say, Pinker's point on "Drop the Nietsche" in his book, Enlightenment Now, did influence me: Keep some perspective. Not every problem is a Crisis, Plague, Epidemic, or Existential Threat, and not every change is the End of This, the Death of That, or the Dawn of a Post-Something Era. Don't confuse pessimism with profundity: problems are inevitable, but problems are solvable, and diagnosing every setback as a symptom of a sick society is a cheap grab for gravitas. Finally, drop the Nietzsche. His ideas may seem edgy, authentic, baad, while humanism seems sappy, unhip, uncool. But what's so funny about peace, love, and understanding? Edit: "I agree" --> "influenced me". Maybe reading more of Nietsche might open up my mind more on his work. :-)

keiferski 7y ago
Pinker is perhaps the single most uninformed public “intellectual” in society today. His ideas are slightly above Gladwell yet somehow he commands respect. I really don’t understand it.
- freddie_mercury 7y ago
  Ad hominem attacks don't really improve the level of discussions on HN.
  - keiferski 7y ago
    I don’t consider it an ad-hominem attack. The man has consistently shown that he is vastly undereducated on things he has public opinions on. The quote linked to above is a perfect example - it reads as if from someone who skimmed the Wikipedia article on Nietzsche and spent zero time attempting to understand his thought. For anyone who has even a passing knowledge of Nietzsche’s ideas, Pinker’s quote is just hilariously, woefully ignorant. Nietzsche was not a pessimist - if anything he was an optimist. It’s only in the (uninformed) public imagination that he is some kind of nihilist pessimist. Judging from Pinker’s quote, his knowledge of Nietzsche doesn’t go deeper than public hearsay. Considering that nearly all of Pinker’s works suffer from this same flaw, I have no problem dismissing him.
  - ulisesrmzroche 7y ago
    Neither does nagging like this
- kashyapc 7y ago
  By any stretch I'm not "blown over" by Pinker's work, but calling him "most uninformed" is uncharitable. Sure he has his blind spots, and sometimes gets carried away and says things that are not at all in his wheelhouse. But overall, I think his work is a "net good".
Errancer 7y ago
Nietzsche's work is all about fighting with pessimism? Instead of dropping Nietzsche, go and actually try to read him / or about him from genuine source, `Nietzsche and Anarchy: Psychology for Free Spirits, Ontology for Social War` is a great, positive and down to text reading for start
goto11 7y ago
Don't try to be Nietzsche unless you actually are Nietzsche.
division_by_0 7y ago
I think there is an interesting idea of Nietzsche related to pessimism that often gets lost. I've read Nietzsche's entire published work and Nachlass multiple times in my teen years and the most central concept in Nietzsche for me personally was his concept "pessimism of strength": Quote 1: We can thus guess where the great note of interrogation concerning the value of existence had been set. Is pessimism necessarily the sign of decline, of decay, of failure, of exhausted and weakened instincts?—as was the case with the Indians, as is, to all appearance, the case with us "modern" men and Europeans? Is there a pessimism of strength? An intellectual predilection for what is hard, awful, evil, problematical in existence, owing to well-being, to exuberant health, to fullness of existence? Is there perhaps suffering in overfullness itself? A seductive fortitude with the keenest of glances, which yearns for the terrible, as for the enemy, the worthy enemy, with whom it may try its strength? from whom it is willing to learn what "fear" is?[0] Gibt es einen Pessimismus der Stärke? Eine intellektuelle Vorneigung für das Harte, Schauerliche, Böse, Problematische des Daseins aus Wohlsein, aus überströmender Gesundheit, aus Fülle des Daseins? Gibt es vielleicht ein Leiden an der Überfülle selbst? Eine versucherische Tapferkeit des schärfsten Blicks, die nach dem Furchtbaren verlangt, als nach dem Feinde, dem würdigen Feinde, an dem sie ihre Kraft erproben kann? an dem sie lernen will, was »das Fürchten« ist?[1] Quote 2: A fundamental question is the relation of the Greek to pain, his degree of sensibility,—did this relation remain constant? or did it veer about?—the question, whether his ever-increasing longing for beauty, for festivals, gaieties, new cults, did really grow out of want, privation, melancholy, pain? For suppose even this to be true—and Pericles (or Thucydides) intimates as much in the great Funeral Speech:—whence then the opposite longing, which appeared first in the order of time, the longing for the ugly, the good, resolute desire of the Old Hellene for pessimism, for tragic myth, for the picture of all that is terrible, evil, enigmatical, destructive, fatal at the basis of existence,—whence then must tragedy have sprung? Perhaps from joy, from strength, from exuberant health, from over-fullness.[0] Eine Grundfrage ist das Verhältnis des Griechen zum Schmerz, sein Grad von Sensibilität, – blieb dies Verhältnis sich gleich? oder drehte es sich um? – jene Frage, ob wirklich sein immer stärkeres Verlangen nach Schönheit, nach Festen, Lustbarkeiten, neuen Kulten aus Mangel, aus Entbehrung, aus Melancholie, aus Schmerz erwachsen ist? Gesetzt nämlich, gerade dies wäre wahr – und Perikles (oder Thukydides) gibt es uns in der großen Leichenrede zu verstehen –: woher müßte dann das entgegengesetzte Verlangen, das der Zeit nach früher hervortrat, stammen, das Verlangen nach dem Häßlichen, der gute strenge Wille des älteren Hellenen zum Pessimismus, zum tragischen Mythus, zum Bilde alles Furchtbaren, Bösen, Rätselhaften, Vernichtenden, Verhängnisvollen auf dem Grunde des Daseins, – woher müßte dann die Tragödie stammen? Vielleicht aus der Lust, aus der Kraft, aus überströmender Gesundheit, aus übergroßer Fülle?[1] [0] https://www.gutenberg.org/files/51356/51356-h/51356-h.htm https://www.gutenberg.org/files/51356/51356-h/51356-h.htm [1] http://www.zeno.org/Philosophie/M/Nietzsche,+Friedrich/Die+Geburt+der+Trag%C3%B6die/Versuch+einer+Selbstkritik http://www.zeno.org/Philosophie/M/Nietzsche,+Friedrich/Die+G...

keiferski 7y ago

Pinker is perhaps the single most uninformed public “intellectual” in society today. His ideas are slightly above Gladwell yet somehow he commands respect. I really don’t understand it.

freddie_mercury 7y ago
Ad hominem attacks don't really improve the level of discussions on HN.
- keiferski 7y ago
  I don’t consider it an ad-hominem attack. The man has consistently shown that he is vastly undereducated on things he has public opinions on. The quote linked to above is a perfect example - it reads as if from someone who skimmed the Wikipedia article on Nietzsche and spent zero time attempting to understand his thought. For anyone who has even a passing knowledge of Nietzsche’s ideas, Pinker’s quote is just hilariously, woefully ignorant. Nietzsche was not a pessimist - if anything he was an optimist. It’s only in the (uninformed) public imagination that he is some kind of nihilist pessimist. Judging from Pinker’s quote, his knowledge of Nietzsche doesn’t go deeper than public hearsay. Considering that nearly all of Pinker’s works suffer from this same flaw, I have no problem dismissing him.
- ulisesrmzroche 7y ago
  Neither does nagging like this
kashyapc 7y ago
By any stretch I'm not "blown over" by Pinker's work, but calling him "most uninformed" is uncharitable. Sure he has his blind spots, and sometimes gets carried away and says things that are not at all in his wheelhouse. But overall, I think his work is a "net good".

Errancer 7y ago

Nietzsche's work is all about fighting with pessimism? Instead of dropping Nietzsche, go and actually try to read him / or about him from genuine source, `Nietzsche and Anarchy: Psychology for Free Spirits, Ontology for Social War` is a great, positive and down to text reading for start

goto11 7y ago

Don't try to be Nietzsche unless you actually are Nietzsche.

division_by_0 7y ago

I think there is an interesting idea of Nietzsche related to pessimism that often gets lost. I've read Nietzsche's entire published work and Nachlass multiple times in my teen years and the most central concept in Nietzsche for me personally was his concept "pessimism of strength": Quote 1: We can thus guess where the great note of interrogation concerning the value of existence had been set. Is pessimism necessarily the sign of decline, of decay, of failure, of exhausted and weakened instincts?—as was the case with the Indians, as is, to all appearance, the case with us "modern" men and Europeans? Is there a pessimism of strength? An intellectual predilection for what is hard, awful, evil, problematical in existence, owing to well-being, to exuberant health, to fullness of existence? Is there perhaps suffering in overfullness itself? A seductive fortitude with the keenest of glances, which yearns for the terrible, as for the enemy, the worthy enemy, with whom it may try its strength? from whom it is willing to learn what "fear" is?[0] Gibt es einen Pessimismus der Stärke? Eine intellektuelle Vorneigung für das Harte, Schauerliche, Böse, Problematische des Daseins aus Wohlsein, aus überströmender Gesundheit, aus Fülle des Daseins? Gibt es vielleicht ein Leiden an der Überfülle selbst? Eine versucherische Tapferkeit des schärfsten Blicks, die nach dem Furchtbaren verlangt, als nach dem Feinde, dem würdigen Feinde, an dem sie ihre Kraft erproben kann? an dem sie lernen will, was »das Fürchten« ist?[1] Quote 2: A fundamental question is the relation of the Greek to pain, his degree of sensibility,—did this relation remain constant? or did it veer about?—the question, whether his ever-increasing longing for beauty, for festivals, gaieties, new cults, did really grow out of want, privation, melancholy, pain? For suppose even this to be true—and Pericles (or Thucydides) intimates as much in the great Funeral Speech:—whence then the opposite longing, which appeared first in the order of time, the longing for the ugly, the good, resolute desire of the Old Hellene for pessimism, for tragic myth, for the picture of all that is terrible, evil, enigmatical, destructive, fatal at the basis of existence,—whence then must tragedy have sprung? Perhaps from joy, from strength, from exuberant health, from over-fullness.[0] Eine Grundfrage ist das Verhältnis des Griechen zum Schmerz, sein Grad von Sensibilität, – blieb dies Verhältnis sich gleich? oder drehte es sich um? – jene Frage, ob wirklich sein immer stärkeres Verlangen nach Schönheit, nach Festen, Lustbarkeiten, neuen Kulten aus Mangel, aus Entbehrung, aus Melancholie, aus Schmerz erwachsen ist? Gesetzt nämlich, gerade dies wäre wahr – und Perikles (oder Thukydides) gibt es uns in der großen Leichenrede zu verstehen –: woher müßte dann das entgegengesetzte Verlangen, das der Zeit nach früher hervortrat, stammen, das Verlangen nach dem Häßlichen, der gute strenge Wille des älteren Hellenen zum Pessimismus, zum tragischen Mythus, zum Bilde alles Furchtbaren, Bösen, Rätselhaften, Vernichtenden, Verhängnisvollen auf dem Grunde des Daseins, – woher müßte dann die Tragödie stammen? Vielleicht aus der Lust, aus der Kraft, aus überströmender Gesundheit, aus übergroßer Fülle?[1] [0] https://www.gutenberg.org/files/51356/51356-h/51356-h.htm https://www.gutenberg.org/files/51356/51356-h/51356-h.htm [1] http://www.zeno.org/Philosophie/M/Nietzsche,+Friedrich/Die+Geburt+der+Trag%C3%B6die/Versuch+einer+Selbstkritik http://www.zeno.org/Philosophie/M/Nietzsche,+Friedrich/Die+G...