3 ms·

yawn I’m tired of Nietzsche. Just as the world needed a new prophet, Zarathustra, we need a new misunderstood, brooding, wishes-he-were-a-poet grimbad philosoph

yawn I’m tired of Nietzsche. Just as the world needed a new prophet, Zarathustra, we need a new misunderstood, brooding, wishes-he-were-a-poet grimbad philosopher. Nietzsche is great, but the motions of the ages are even startig to catch up to him, too. Ecce Homo is still interesting and somewhat relevant, but all of his other works are full of ideas that hae been sufficiently adopted or misappropriated by society at large as to be faux pas or bland. His war against Christian society and morals, for instance, while stylistically interesting, is almost entirely irrelevant at this stage in history. He’s become idolized and his message has become diluted, just like everyone else. That said, he’s still a delight to read. Some of the aphorisms are also still glittering gems. I just find the major concepts in his thinking are somewhat musty at this point.

sysbin 7y ago
Nietzsche never truly had a war with Christianity. He was an optimist often mistaken as an nihilist. I’m skeptical why he never went into how free will is an illusion and otherwise his writing illustrates he thought people could make themselves have a good destiny or not. His eternal reoccurrence theory even is more understandable when thinking from a hard determinist mindset.
- voidhorse 7y ago
  There’s no doubt he was an optimist just as there’s no doubt he was at war with institutionalized Christianity. Combatting Christianity and being a nihilist are not the same thing. You’re right that Nietzsche’s work comes from a place of hope. Nietzsches cheif argument was for a “revaluation of all values”—he believed that, given the major technological and scientific breakthroughs in the 17c - 19c, man had to reorient his relation to life. The old social forms, such as traditional Christian morals, were holding humanity back by valuing or prioritizing the wrong things (e.g. humility instead of the pursuit of knowledge). That’s the major thrust of his whole output. He was largely right about this. The point of my op is to say that we’ve more or less achieved what he sought minus the ordination of some new shceme of shared values to guide us (ubermensch). People let Nietzsche’s admittedly amazing stylistics cloud their comprehension of his arguments which are actually rather straightforward—he saw that the world was changing and that societal change was lagging far behind technical change, as it in fact still does to this day.
- 97b683f8 7y ago
  > I’m skeptical why he never went into how free will is an illusion > Men were considered "free" only so that they might be considered guilty – could be judged and punished: consequently, every act had to be considered as willed, and the origin of every act had to be considered as lying within the consciousness (and thus the most fundamental psychological deception was made the principle of psychology itself). Source: Twilight of the Idols, Nietzsche
pmoriarty 7y ago
So who would you advise be read instead of Nietzsche?

sysbin 7y ago

Nietzsche never truly had a war with Christianity. He was an optimist often mistaken as an nihilist. I’m skeptical why he never went into how free will is an illusion and otherwise his writing illustrates he thought people could make themselves have a good destiny or not. His eternal reoccurrence theory even is more understandable when thinking from a hard determinist mindset.

voidhorse 7y ago
There’s no doubt he was an optimist just as there’s no doubt he was at war with institutionalized Christianity. Combatting Christianity and being a nihilist are not the same thing. You’re right that Nietzsche’s work comes from a place of hope. Nietzsches cheif argument was for a “revaluation of all values”—he believed that, given the major technological and scientific breakthroughs in the 17c - 19c, man had to reorient his relation to life. The old social forms, such as traditional Christian morals, were holding humanity back by valuing or prioritizing the wrong things (e.g. humility instead of the pursuit of knowledge). That’s the major thrust of his whole output. He was largely right about this. The point of my op is to say that we’ve more or less achieved what he sought minus the ordination of some new shceme of shared values to guide us (ubermensch). People let Nietzsche’s admittedly amazing stylistics cloud their comprehension of his arguments which are actually rather straightforward—he saw that the world was changing and that societal change was lagging far behind technical change, as it in fact still does to this day.
97b683f8 7y ago
> I’m skeptical why he never went into how free will is an illusion > Men were considered "free" only so that they might be considered guilty – could be judged and punished: consequently, every act had to be considered as willed, and the origin of every act had to be considered as lying within the consciousness (and thus the most fundamental psychological deception was made the principle of psychology itself). Source: Twilight of the Idols, Nietzsche

pmoriarty 7y ago

So who would you advise be read instead of Nietzsche?