Date: Wed, 11 Feb 1998 13:45:55 -0800 (PST)
From: callihan-AT-callihan.seanet.com (Steven E. Callihan)
Subject: Re: Capitalism and Naivete


Randall Albright wrote:

>I am glad that Steve shows this correlation:
>>....while he clearly
>>opposes his will to power doctrine to the Utilitarian thesis, going so far
>>as to mirror the Utilitarian argument, but substituting power for pleasure
>>(happiness). Note, however, that the highest sign of power is, for him,
>>also, pleasure.
>
>Yes.

And I think this is really the crux of the matter, the substitution of power
for utility. Interestingly enough, both Mill and Nietzsche hearken back to
Epicurus, which is really how the notion of "happiness" figures in here. It
is worth digging back into the Gay Science, I think, to get a sense of the
basis on which Nietzsche asserts his own form of Epicureanism (especially in
contrast to what he terms as a "hedgehog" stoicism that he eschews).

>>The "feeling of power" is a pre-eminently pleasurable
>>feeling, in other words, even the highest pleasure, the very essence of
>>pleasure as such. So, just as Mill would unite utility with pleasure
>>(leaving power out of the question), Nietzsche would unite pleasure with
>>power (leaving utility out of the question).

>Mill, again, I say, is not ONLY utilitarian. He also talks about having
>time for "idle pleasures". Someone want to look that up, to see if I'm
>wrong?

And I agree that Nietzsche probably has, at best, a partial view of the full
extent of Mill's thinking--he clearly read "On Utilitarianism," and probably
read "On Liberty," but it is doubtful that he read anything else of Mill's.

Perhaps we can make some sense of how "pleasure" or "happiness" figure in
the utilitarian thesis. First, if we assume that a value is a utility, which
I think the utilitarians do, then the question, of course, is what is a
utility? Saying a value is a utility merely begs the question, as long as we
don't define what a utility is, or more specifically, I suppose, what a
social utility is. This simply means that a value is simply what something
is good for, that it serves some desirable end. In the absence of
"salvation," in other words, what might serve as a desired end, a utility,
if not that something might, or might not, conduce to pleasure or happiness,
that is, ultimately, to some desirabled end. A utility here simply means
that one thing is desirable as opposed to something that is not desirable (a
disutility).

One thing I think Nietzsche is criticizing is the notion that we can ever
know what is or is not a utility. We would have to know all possible
outcomes before we could know which outcomes were utilities, which
disutilities. Even then, supposing we might feel with some assurance, all
philosophical skepticism aside, what is and what is not a utility for
ourselves (what ends are desirable for us), on what basis might we assume
that it is a utility for others? Nietzsche's point here is that a utility is
not just something that is something desirable, but something that is
desirable for someone. Thus, what might be a utility (desirable) for one,
might very well be a disutility (undesirable) for another, etc.

>>To put this into some kind of political context, it seems to me that the
>>Utilitarian theory is in many respects an attempt to provide a justification
>>and rationalization for what, in the 19th Century, was a new power
>>configuration.
>
>Even as Mill and his wife looked forward to the coming socialism, the
>Achilles Heels that Mill saw in this, economically, are still valid, I
>believe, and are part of the reason why Clinton and Blair stand on the
>shoulders of Reagan and Thatcher, as much as they don't want to admit it.

I don't think Nietzsche believes that some other political order is
necessarily in order (or desirable). He is simply applying a Machiavellian
standard to that order. "Democracy" is a ruse, in other words.

>>It is the hegemony of The City (Wall Street in America) as
>>the real power behind the modern industrial state that is in need of
>>legitimation.
>
>Good point. Pleasure does not necessarily equal who has the most cash in
>the bank. Neither does how much someone paid for a Van Gogh, 100 years ago,
>equal what it MEANS, as an aesthetic entity, to people who now are able to
>enjoy such a picture in an art museum today. You can't quantify many
>things. But I think Mill understood that, as well as understood that... the
>marketplace is still the best solution, sadly, that we have. In "On
>Liberty", again, he says that we should let as many opinions flow... and it
>is up to people to deem whether they are "valid" or "misreadings", and...
>implication being that fluctuations of who is a "reprobate" and who is "the
>Son of God" may change over time.

I don't think Nietzsche is proposing a different economic order at all. He's
merely questioning whether the market can ultimately decide matters of value
(matters of utility/disutility), other than simply on the basis of what is
of value to the mass or herd (the "consumer"). For Nietzsche, the value of
any one individual never entirely correlates to the mass-value or
herd-value, and may be entirely opposed to it. Note that Nietzsche here
would indeed be an "individualist anarchist," as a listmember put it I
believe, except for the fact that he asserts a contrary basis for valuation,
which allows him to distinguish between "higher" and "lower" values, between
"noble" and "vulgar" values. What he takes to be higher and noble values he
sees as standing in stark opposition to mass-values of the herd, which he
sees as being lower and vulgar. His basis for making these distinctions are
rooted in his notion of will to power. The standpoint of mere utility, on
the other hand, provides no basis on which such a distinction might be drawn.

>Who said, after WWII, that democracy is the best of all the bad choices?
>Also, Mill, in fighting for causes such as the individual and "women",
>could be seen as putting these on a plateau such as the Bill of Rights, a
>"republic" idea, which then needs to be continually defended and expanded
>in the courts through organizations such as the ACLU in the States.
>
>[...]
>And Nietzsche's alternative is (?) :

Nietzsche is not proposing any economic or political alternative. The most
he proposes is that we cease to kid ourselves as to what our economic and
political system really is. It is certainly not just or moral, and hardly
"democratic." You have as much "liberty" as you can afford, in other words.
Nor should one assume that the exercise of one's power (one's "liberty") is
ever harmless--every exercise of power is harmful to the free exercise of
some other power. At best, he might be seen as proposing a cultural
alternative (the whole notion of "counter-culture" may very well be rooted
in Nietzsche, for instance).

>>For Nietzsche, power by itself has no, and can have no, justification or
>>rationale that might render it as being just, as opposed to being injust.
>>Rather, all power is injust, and only mindful of another power to the degree
>>that that power poses a threat.
>
>This, again, is Romantic of Nietzsche, in my opinion. The question is not
>"all power being unjust", but how to make the best of what is, perhaps, a
>bad situation, for me.
>
>>The deeper question for him, in that he
>>regards all power as injust (and immoral)
>
>Which would perhaps help our new member understand why he is an
>individualist-anarchist....
>
>And also why he does NOT understand, at times, that mere anarchy can
>degenerate into the Mob/Dionysian rule that he fears?

Actually, I think what is showing through here is the old World-Will of
Schoppenhauer. The point of Schoppenhauer's pessimism is that the World-Will
is incorrigibly evil, because the Will is the author of all suffering. The
world is a mass of pointless suffering. The only solution, from S.'s point
of view, is Buddhistic resignation. Nietzsche largely agrees with S. here,
in that he posits will to power (his substitute for the Schoppenhaurean
World-Will) as also being thoroughly immoral. For Nietzsche, as well, there
is no justice in the world, every action is necessarily injust (and
immoral), in that it is bound to harm or delimit the power of another to
either a greater or lesser degree. Relative to this, while resignation may,
in fact, be a fit choice for the herd individual, according to Nietzsche, it
cannot be a fit choice for the higher individual, for whom "tragic wisdom"
is proper attitude (the affirmation of the eternal return), which is
anything but a resignation. Nietzsche is saying that we should affirm the
world as it actually is, if we can.

>Napoleon was a complicated character, as Emerson knew, too.
>("Representative Men") The fact is, that despite certain good things he did
>like standardizing legal codes, making good roads, he also imposed
>Paris-rule imperialism on people, whereas Pax Americana today uses $$$. And
>are we WRONG to want to make sure Southeast Asia does not sink further? Or
>Mexico, two years ago?
>
>In other words, power in and of itself is like knowledge: I see nothing
>wrong with it. It's always going to be around. It's how it's used, be it to
>put people in gas chambers, or to try to help people from sinking so deep
>that they all want to cross into Texas and California, that is critical to
>keep in mind.

And Nietzsche is not saying there is anything wrong with power--that would
be like saying that life is worthless, in other words, an assertion for
which we cannot possibly have any basis. What he is saying, however, is that
power can never conform to our moral presuppositions. Power is never moral,
in other words, which is not the same thing as saying that there is anything
wrong with it. He even goes so far as to assert that will to power is
necessarily immoral in that it confounds any possible morality that might be
opposed to it (and a "morality" itself is just a will to power, and, as
such, entirely immoral). Nietzsche is, however, distinguishing between two
types of power, between active/creative and reactive/uncreative power.

Best,

Eubie the Mensch

----------------------------------------------------------------------
=A6 Steven E. Callihan            =A6        "The more mistrust,         =A6
=A6                               =A6        the more philosophy."       =A6
=A6 URL: http://www.callihan.com/ =A6                                    =A6
=A6 E-Mail: callihan-AT-callihan.com =A6-F. Nietzsche, The Gay Science, 346.=A6
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