Nietzsche in 4 Minutes
An Introduction to the Father of Existentialism/Psychoanalysis/Postmodernism
This is a brief taster of Nietzsche. If you're only vaguely aware of a thinker then reading a long-form article can be a bit of a leap of faith. These brief tasters then are a way of making that leap a little less daunting. By boiling down a thinker to what is most compelling about them someone can read a short piece and decide whether or not they want to know more. You can read the long-form essay on Nietzsche here.
There is something rotten in the state of Western culture. This was the diagnosis of German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. His entire philosophy can be understood as an attempt to diagnose and counter this cancer spreading through the body of our culture without anybody suspecting it.
When Nietzsche's madman proclaimed the death of God in 1882's The Gay Science, it was not an atheistic celebration but a dire warning about the coming shadow of Nihilism. This death of God represented a calamity without equal:
This long plenitude and sequence of breakdown, destruction, ruin, and cataclysm that is now impending ... an eclipse of the sun whose like has probably never yet occurred on earth
This calamity was the collapse of our value system which, as individuals and collectives, we orient ourselves by. In his later years Nietzsche took up the language of medicine and biology. His task was to diagnose and if possible propose a cure for this crisis.
Diagnosis Decadence
His diagnosis was Decadence and Decadence for Nietzsche is essentially the opposite of health. It is decay. More specifically it is decay of the instincts:
To have to fight the instincts—that is the formula of decadence: as long as life is ascending, happiness equals instinct
Nietzsche is commonly thought of as the Father of Existentialism but he might also (and perhaps more accurately) be called the Father of Psychoanalysis. The theme of non-conscious, non-individual forces in the psyche runs through Nietzsche's work from his first book The Birth of Tragedy (1872) to his final work Ecce Homo (1889). He was a constant explorer of the dark realms of psyche that lie beyond consciousness. The overarching themes of Nietzsche's work may be philosophical but the methodology is psychoanalytical through and through.
In Twilight of the Idols we find the definition of Decadence as "anarchy of [the] instincts". Nietzsche speaks of the two strategies that have been used to deal with this suppression: reason and morality. These two forms of Decadence are the basis of his critiques of Socrates (The Birth of Tragedy and The Twilight of the Idols (1889)) on the one hand and Christianity on the other (On the Genealogy of Morals (1887) and The Antichrist (1889)).
The problem as Nietzsche sees it is that by suppressing these instincts we are suppressing life itself. The instincts are the cacophonous chorus of life coursing through us. To cut ourselves off from this is to cut ourselves off from life. And so Nietzsche's idea of Health is an affirmation of life. It's an integration of the instinctual.
Say Yes to Health
In contrast to the life-denying tradition of philosophy ("Greek philosophy: the decadence of the Greek instinct") Nietzsche describes himself as the first "tragic philosopher". He is the Dionysian to stand against the Crucified. He is the one preaching a new ideal of humanity as "the meaning of the earth". The Yes-Saying doctrines of Zarathustra: the Übermensch the Eternal Recurrence and the Will to Power are a new metaphysics of affirmation of life, the earth and the instincts.
Health doesn't mean an abandonment of reason to the instincts. Instead he writes:
"In times like these, abandonment to one’s instincts is one calamity more. Our instincts contradict, disturb, destroy each other; I have already defined what is modern as physiological self-contradiction"
There is no way back to a harmony with the instincts; there is only a way through:
a reversion, a return in any sense or degree is simply not possible. We physiologists know that. ... Nothing avails: one must go forward—step by step further into decadence
This was Nietzsche's quest: to find a way beyond Decadence. His ideal — contained in the epithet of "tragic philosopher" — was the same in his last work as it was in his first: the synthesis of the Apollonian and the Dionysian. Not the overgrown reason or oppressive morality of the excessive Apollonian. And not "that horrible mixture of sensuality and cruelty" that characterised much of the Dionysian festivals of the ancient world. Nietzsche's ideal is the fusion of these two forces. The Apollonian as the contained — as the sails; the Dionysian as the great dynamic natural force infusing this container and filling these sails. The goal is a fusion of the conscious and unconscious that leaves us with a deep love of life in all its suffering and its joys.
Nietzsche's metaphysics of the earthly that we find in Zarathustra may be questionable. But this goal of health — of life-affirmation and integration of our instinctual drives — is an eternally relevant one. And as the Nihilistic crisis that Nietzsche predicted continues to deepen, it is a quest that is essential to our continued existence.
That's everything for this brief taster of Nietzsche. The next instalment will give a more comprehensive perspective of Nietzsche's work and we'll talk more about his key ideas from the Apollonian Ideal and the Ascetic Ideal to each of Zarathustra's three great doctrines: the Eternal Recurrence, the Will to Power and the Übermensch.
This was a solid interpretive summary and well written essay.
Philosophy is my drug of choice and like a good drug dealer, you always leave me eagerly anticipating my next fix!
Looking forward to the next one! I’ll try not to suppress my instincts in the meantime.