Review_on_Nietsche_-_on_the_Geneology_of_Morality

Review on Nietzsche: On the Genealogy of Morality - style: playful, careful, curious, his punctuation (the use of dashes and ellipses); this book is supposed to be very accessible – to chew on his words “ruminate” - “polemic” a warlike writing; battle against himself and invites us to battle against ourselves as well - purpose: where do morals come from' + and what are their values' (advantageous to us as a species or as an individual' Are they holding us back') - book begins with anxiety and alienation: we don’t know ourselves, and systematically ignore our experiences, we have a prejudice when we meet ourselves cause we have a certainty, so don’t experience. Thus there’s a need to see their values (the descent of values) - side note: Darwin’s theory of natural selection – survival of the fittest – not because they’re more moral, but simply because they can survive and reproduce; so it’s a life without purpose' - Essay 1: “good and evil; good and bad” • Aristocratic method: good = self-definition of people (define themselves as self-affirmatively good: aristocrat, noble, just, truthful, the real people (sec2)) • German – can see the ways the words’ meanings changed through time (sec 4) → not a moral judgment • Ascetism = dying away from the world -priests: trying to make you regard them as pure; they do not have power but rule you by values of ascetism, by your regard of them as purity -p.18: concepts of the interesting and dangerous (Nietzsche makes them undetermined) • Not anti-semitism • Christianity not different from Judaism → interested in how Christianity extends this line → morality of the victim • Slave’s revolt in reality -what’s interesting is that it’s created (no mention of its values or morals) → a reactionary movement -ressentiment = in French: to feel again -moral judgment begin with slaves, who wins and Judaic Christianity takes over. -Sec 12: -long-term effect of slave revolt put us in nihilism, where values do not have any values anymore, completely empty; why criminals celebrate their escape: no shame, complain about the punishment being too harsh; punishment only makes one more clever, more imaginative and inventive of trying to escape it. -p. 27: we have become exhausted -Sec 13: -the victims, the oppressed, want to blame the oppressor and hold them morally culpable; people going to articulate moral culpability in terms of free choice; example of eagle or lamb: cause had choice to do otherwise (i.e. not eat it); part of our human nature to be both. -absurd: to distinguish between the deed and the doer: good as good actions; but initially good and bad refer to people; it is only after the slave’s revolt that there’s the doer and the deed (to evaluate action) -allowed people to understand their lives as accomplishments (to have purpose); so the victims the oppressed can see their lives as a moral dignity, as an accomplishment. -p. 30: moralised: want justice instead of physical force: but doesn’t mean that we need to go back to barbarians (Nietzsche is aiming for something beyond; to go beyond good and evil…) -Sec 13: -doer and the deed → characteristic of agency -slave’s revolt → deposit some sort of agency (understanding life: distinguish between ourselves and what we are doing; understanding that we could have done otherwise) -everything we are doing is the will to power (no doer/deed but could be interpreted as such → could not have chosen to do so → this is only an interpretation; re-interpreted in moral terms as humility -will to power = expression of life’s force, hides a value judgment inside human beings → we want power, essential freedom, but limited by society; will to power is self-affirmative (doesn’t necessarily mean oppressive/dominating other people) -we have to embrace the slave’s revolt as part of being human; it is no longer possible to think of ourselves in Plato’s way (as a citizen of the city) → for we now express ourselves as radical individuals; we’re trapped in ourselves as moral agencies. - Essay 2: • Forgetfulness is a great strength, cause without it, we’ll be completely oppressed by our memories, overwhelmed by it. (Qu: how is it that we keep promises by remembering') • The sovereign individual (Kierkegaard: the solitary individual): in affirmative tones who takes delight in able to keep promise (moralized → people feel guilty when breaks a promise; comes after the slave’s revolt); the right to say “yes” to oneself self-affirmatively, not moralized yet • Desires rearranged ( a change in humans) → do not want to do this • When did they come to moralize this' – not simply not wanting to but also the bad feeling when not doing it → precisely did not come from punishing people because punishment do not make people feel guilty; it makes them more intelligent in trying to figure out ways to avoid punishment. • German word – “debts” – people pay back debt → interiorised; feel of guilt when not paying back the debt (Oedipus – feeling of shame at end but never the feeling of guilt → no role of guilty in Plato!) • Pleasure of being master, to be cruel → paid back in cruelty by someone who doesn’t pay off; people have become more sensitive to pain • Sec 10: mercy arises not from moralization but an extension of power; prerogative of the master, not a result of the slave’s revolt. • Sec 11: justice is se up by masters; there is no just or unjust by nature, only when a legal system is set up; people act cruel so have to accept it → they try to set up justice to tame us. Love of justice an artefact of slaves • ***********sec 12************* • lays out genealogical method • origin of things doesn’t necessarily tell us the purpose of it (justice); we have an innate desire to want to know where it comes from, because we think we can find purpose there • things are put into different purposes over time; will to power expressed differently • maybe all you have is a chain of stuff – no way of seeing back to the origin (but we somehow relate origin to purpose) → we create this fiction • ex: punishment → imagine it created initially not to make people feel guilty but to behave cruelly for debt no paid; not a moral system – simply an exchange for not paying the debt • sec 13: we do not know what punishment means anymore; purposes are so multiple → lead to nihilism when you can’t tell the purpose anymore; no way of finding any common ground • sec 14: one thing is certain: punishment doesn't make people feel guilty; not the acts, it must be soothing of interpretations. It makes the man clever, but not better • sec 16: this must be the way that bad conscience starts → no choice so need to limit free exercise of desires (also in individual growth → come to a point where suddenly you need to limit, internalize your aggression and have feelings of guilt = “internalization of man” (p61) • • - Essay 3: what happens when there’s no purpose in life or no value in morality' But man can’t stand this, so people try to fill up this space → “man would rather will nothing than not will” Overall Analysis and Themes Nietzsche is difficult to read because he demands that we overturn or suspend many of the assumptions that our very reasoning relies upon. He is one of the Western tradition's deepest thinkers precisely because he calls so much into question. If we can come to understand Nietzsche's genealogical method, his doctrine of the will to power, and his perspectivism as all linked, his arguments will become much easier to follow. In Nietzsche's distinction between a thing and its meaning, we find the initial doubt with which Nietzsche unravels so many of our assumptions. We are generally tempted to see things as having inherent meanings. For instance, punishment is at once the act of punishing and the reason behind the punishment. However, Nietzsche argues, these things have had different meanings at different times. For instance, the act of punishment has been at times a celebration of one's power, at times an act of cruelty, at times a simple tit-for-tat. We cannot understand a thing, and we certainly cannot understand its origin, if we assume that it has always held the same meaning. Central to Nietzsche's critique, then, is an attempt at genealogy that will show the winding and undirected route our different moral concepts have taken to arrive in their present shape. Morality is generally treated as sacred because we assume that there is some transcendental ground for our morals, be it God, reason, tradition, or something else. Yet contrary to our assumption that "good," "bad," or "evil" have always had the same meanings, Nietzsche's genealogical method shows how these terms have evolved, shattering any illusion as to the continuity or absolute truth of our present moral concepts. Because they can have different, even contradictory, meanings over the course of their long life spans, Nietzsche does not believe that concepts or things are the fundamental stuff that makes up reality. Instead, he looks beneath these things to see what drives the different meanings that they adopt over time. Hiding beneath he finds force and will. All of existence, Nietzsche asserts, is a struggle between different wills for the feeling of power. This "will to power" is most evident on a human level, where we see people constantly competing with one another, often for no other purpose than to feel superior to those that they overcome. That a thing has a meaning at all means that there is some will dominating it, bending it toward a certain interpretation. That a thing may have different meanings over time suggests that different wills have come to dominate it. For instance, the concept of "good" was once dominated by the will of healthy, strong barbarians, and had the opposite meaning that it does now that it is dominated by the will of weak, "sick" ascetics. According to Nietzsche, then, a belief in an absolute truth or an absolute anything is to give in to one particular meaning, one particular interpretation of a thing. It is essentially to allow oneself to be dominated by a particular will. A will that wishes to remain free will shun absolutes of all kinds and try to look at a matter from as many different perspectives as possible in order to gain its own. This doctrine that has deeply influenced postmodern thought is called "perspectivism." Nietzsche's inquiries are thus conducted in a very irreverent spirit. Nothing is sacred, nothing is absolute, nothing, we might even say, is true. Our morality is not a set of duties passed down from God but an arbitrary code that has evolved as randomly as the human species itself. The only constant is that we, and everything else, are constantly striving for more power, and the only constant virtue is a will that is powerful, and free from bad conscience, hatred, and ressentiment. Nietzsche's main project in the Genealogy is to question the value of our morality. Ultimately, he argues that our present morality is born out of a resentment and hatred that was felt toward anything that was powerful, strong, or healthy. As such, he sees our present morality as harmful to the future health and prosperity of our species. While the "blonde beasts" and barbarians of primitive master morality are animalistic brutes, at least they are strong and healthy. On the other hand, our present ascetic morality has "deepened" us by turning our aggressive instincts inward and seeing ourselves as a new wilderness to struggle against. Nietzsche's ideal is to maintain this depth and yet not be ashamed of our animal instincts or of the life that glows within us. [pic][pic]