File spoon-archives/nietzsche.archive/nietzsche_2000/nietzsche.0008, message 23


Date: Wed, 30 Aug 2000 22:49:08 -0700
From: George Sherwood <search-research-AT-worldnet.att.net>
Subject: Re: Nietzsche ist tot


At 04:38 PM 8/28/00 +0200, Syphon Soul wrote:
>
>   'Revolution' of course is too strong a term. Evolution would be more
fitting.
>But times pre- and post- Nietzsche are in deed quite revoltive in their
>differences. 

How so? And are these times really any different fundamentally than when
Hesiod though he lived in the Age of Iron and somehow missed out on Golden
Age? When Nietzsche criticized modernity, did he not do so because the
masses would now be able to voice their resentment though democracy? The
Greeks practiced a true democracy, but they lacked resentment, so it might
be it is not democracy per se that N criticized, but the bitter, buzzing
masses who would fail to affirm the Ubermench, and they have from both the
left and the right, mostly because they are all so busy resenting the past.

>We now posess a great deal of individual freedom, which we
>squander. Also the value-system has been equally individualized. 

Don't these thoughts contradict N's preaching against the Last Man? Isn't
the idea to create values and decide what is valuable and what isn't, to
practice One Thing is Needful? Sure, many squander their freedom, but so
what. The Ubermench will not.

>Actually, we
>are living in a world of quite rabit perspectivism, to use a pun of sorts.
Yet,
>despite all these superficial signs of 'the revolution' it has not occured.

Forgive me, but what revolution are you speaking of, the great war that N
proclaimed? Are we not fighting it now over values and tablets that no
longer apply even though some warriors hold on to them with dear life? Let
us not forget that pessimism is the doom and gloom over the failing of an
ideal life, that it will never get better. Let us not forget that we can
and never will live life in some ideal world, and to think we will is the
source of resentment as well as its consequence. All we can concentrate on
is the present and the reality of the present.

>Humanity is still bound by it's profound fear of knowing itself, of using
>psychology on itself. We can easily pick apart others, but how is it that we
>cannot pick apart ourselves? Put ourselves in perspective... move BEYOND
>oneself.

Good point, but most use that narcotic "work" to avoid themselves in the
day and that other drug "TV" to do the same at night. Those who hold the
power now want it that way, so that going to work the next day will break
the monotony of staying home. It's a perfect mechanism to keep the herd
under control, and hasn't it always be close to this way? Of course, but it
never stopped the potential Ubermench from flourishing.

>
>   At what tree I am barking, I am not quite sure. Only thing I know is
that the
>more 'learned' I become, the less I am able to justify a claim for my 'own'
>philosophy.

Ah, yes, same here, but N did say we pass though many philosophies on our
crooked path. In Dionysian terms, we die and are born again.

>
>  But is there really anything wrong with being a hub, an annex for different
>views? My only problem is that I am not one who enjoys being a reaction.

This last line is my real reason for a reply. There has been much
discussion here and there about being a reaction. What is that? What is
wrong with it? What in life is not a reaction? In all sports, from ping
pong to football, reactions are not only necessary, but quick reactions are
esteemed. War in the military sense is reaction and anticipating reactions,
and those who can plan the best strategy around this usually wins. Art and
philosophy are both reactions. We can say the development of philosophy is
a series of reactions (it is not that, it is this!), and art is a reaction
even though we call it inspiration. Of course, "being a reaction" and
reacting could be too different things, but no one, it would seem, can be
only a reaction. Perhaps the difference is in if one creates via a reaction
or not? But then, we could argue that even non-creation can be a crooked
path to creation (convalescence?). This to me is what beyond good and evil
is all about. If Nietzsche saw a hell, it was spelled L-A-S-T M-A-N, and he
himself may have offered enough perspectives to prevent a conventional
agreement on what he meant. Actually, he would rather be a buffoon than
have a standard one-interpretation-fits-all. That's my guess anyway, and I
don't expect anyone to say, "yes! that's right!" It is only right for me,
and only at this moment. This understanding could die and another be reborn
at any moment.

George



>
>  Haakon G. Engen
>
>
>
>
>	--- from list nietzsche-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
>
>
>
"Having resentment is like taking poison and waiting 
for the other person to die" -- Malachy McCourt.
http://home.att.net/~search-research/


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