/lit/ - Literature

>>8532476
just plunge us further into its depths

He found the answer but not the solution. He's still far ahead of his time

This is like asking "does David Lynch provide us with resolutions to the mysteries of his films or simply plunge us deeper into their depths?"

The answer is that the author is just a kookey guy walking you through a narrative that is ultimately yours to craft

no but Aristotle did
read the Nicomachean Ethics

>>8532545
This. Nietzsche knew how subjective everything is and taylored his writing thereafter. He knew exactly how misunderstood he was going to become, and rejoiced in this fact. He wanted people to interpret his work differently.

>>8532582
Was he, dare I say it, the least spooked man in history?

buddha did

>>8532526
>He found the answer but not the solution.

Does this sentence even mean anything at all?

>>8532476
Define nihilism.

>Nietzsche
>a Nihilist

Oh look this thread again...

>>8532920
Pure ideology.

>>8532634
Maybe. I don't think he completely subscribed to his own ideology but like the other guy said, he was just putting it out there. Possibly for money but more likely because he enjoyed doing it.
Yeah, he was very unspooked. However the people who do subscribe to his ideology are spooked. Being the unspooked lad that he was, Nietzsche wouldn't even care.

>>8533418
Logical positivism and existentialism are subsets of nihilism.

>>8532476
Literally not a single correct answer in this thread. Nietzsche understood nihilism as an inevitable current which would unravel out Christianity (or slave morality), which itself unraveled out of Socratic dialectic. Nihilism is an inevitable seed which was to sprout out into the world with or without him.
His whole stuggle and shtick was against nihilism and in overcoming nihilism.

>>8533590
Furthermore he knew nihilism would get picked up in its insipid "hurr do wtvr i waaant" form immediately after Zarathustras revelation. Btw both Foucault and Deleuze, his postmodern inheritors, understood this fact quite clearly.

>>8533590
>>8533610
Thanks for the summary of Nietzsche's wikipedia article. This thread desperately needed that banality.

>>8533617
My bad I thought the question asked whether his answer was nihilism.

>>8532794
He found the answer to the question
>Did he actually find a solution to nihilism or just plunge us further into its depths?

>>8533617
this actually made me laugh out loud

>>8533590
>His whole stuggle and shtick was against nihilism and in overcoming nihilism.

I know, my question was whether he actually accomplished that with his philosophy (or if he just toar down he values of christianity without offering a viable replacement).

>>8533418
Nietzsche was trying to overcome nihilism not support it. He even claims himself that he had managed to surpass it in the will to power but really he just invented another God. I.e. the will to power.

>>8532582
>>8533496
Does being spooked mean denying any truth exists at all? Dose it mean being unable to stand by a decision resolutely, without revision or backpedaling of any kind? Does it mean supporting an ephemeral view of reality, where since everything repeats an endless cycle of coming into being and passing away, no knowledge of things can ever be properly stated or claimed, since it would be nearly relative in its authority? And why is this a good thing?

>>8532476
There is no solution

bump

Neither. He just stated it presence.

>>8533697
>it's another "I haven't even tried to read Stirner but still like to post arguments against him" type post

I'm not going try to explain a 350 page book in a single post.

A spook is an abstraction. Think if someone wants to steal money from a store but there's a cop standing next to it; you don't do it because the cop who arrest you. Now imagine the cash register is unattended and there is no one to see, no cameras etc.
You want the money but you don't take it because that's the wrong thing to do. That idea that it's wrong to steal is controlling your behavior in the same way the cop would. In reality there is nothing stopping you. The idea (the spook) is controlling you like the cop would, the difference is the cop is real and the spook is all in your head. So free your mind from all control. The ideas only promote themselves and only stop you from doing what you want.

The argument for being despooked writes itself if you understand the concept. Being despooked doesn't mean you're obligated to steal. People like Ayn Rand are extremely spooked as are people who like Marx.

Now before you try to refute the concept, go read the actual book. It gets frustrating trying to argue with people on /lit/ about Stirner because it is not an argument at all but instead one person trying to explain Stirner to the other whist the person who should be learning acts hostile to the other.

>>8533782
>The ideas only promote themselves and only stop you from doing what you want.

False. Keep your ill-informed nonsense for your diary, will ya?

>>8533847
Just read the book, man. I wish it was just my ill-informed nonsense because I'd be able to write a great book with that nonsense.

>>8533782
I'm not going to try and refute him, because I haven't read the book, you're right. And I don't mean to come off as hostile...

But do you have zero awareness of the genealogy of ideas from ancient philosophy to Stirner? Does someone proposing we revert back to our most base animal drives not set off red flags in your mind, no matter how sexy the argument is on paper? Do you see no correlation between ideas and the material universe? Do you think the only constant in the human discovery and creation of ideas has been to restrain behavior for some spurious motive?

This is where these people who dare to question you might be coming from. I will read the book, don't worry. But it's understandable to think you should encounter opposing views and have to defend what you know to people who may not be familiar, or who may have a general idea but not all the details.

>>8533912
It didn't take a whole lot of reading before I discovered that S. was just a plain 'ol nominalist, albeit an uber-egoistical one. The fact that the lads around here still ask questions about spooks and misunderstand S. in the most comical ways is very silly indeed, we agree on that. Have a mighty fine evening.

>>8533610

I recently heard 'I'm Free' by The Soup Dragons, and a particular lyric made me realize (more than anything else) that we are in the age of the last man:

>"I'm free to do what I want any old time"

bump

>>8532567
Weak answer anon. If you truly believe the Nicomachean Ethics solve nihilism, please elobarate, but for the most part it just sounds like you don't know a whole lot about philosophy.

>>8533992
Glad to hear you will be reading it. But to answer your question, Stirner isn't some kind of anarchist and doesn't think we should just act like animals or anything.
Do you think at your very core all you really want to do is eat, have sex or whatever? It's in human nature to relate to others and work together.

If you find chemistry fascinating and want to study it eventually make a living off it, there's no reason not to pursue it. If someone else wanted to study it because they think it is what they should do because their parent's want them to or because they want to give back to society then Stirner would ask why do you feel that.

There's the kind of feeling someone would get if they didn't do something they think they're suppose to do. Like if someone walks past a homeless person begging and they feel kind of bad for not giving anything. Some people would give to a homeless person just so they don't feel bad and that is the essence of the spook; why are you trying to cure yourself of a feeling that comes from you own head by giving to the beggar? You don't really want to give money, you just want to not feel bad.
Stirner suggest you look for the source of the bad feeling which is a moral value that has possessed you and is now causing you to act in a way you normally wouldn't.
If you feel bad at not buying the over priced domestic produce in favor of the import, it's the same deal. The examples are endless.

Now contrast that with a desire for water: The feeling you get from needing water is something that can't be fixed by changing the way you think.
If reading a book is something you enjoy then you should do that. You see, the difference is that you're not reading the book because you feel like you should and therefore feel bad for not doing it, it's because reading it makes you feel something that you like.
The spook could also work to subtract enjoyment. If you grew up thinking reading was evil, then even if you read a book and enjoy it, there would be a nagging feeling like what you're doing is wrong. Stirner would again ask why you let this idea control you. That idea that reading is bad could end up making you stop reading all together, that's the spook altering your behavior in a way that is not what you normally would do.

Stirner's philosophy is away of thinking ad not a way of acting. There are no obligations because feeling obligated is always the result of a spook.
I hope you can see that there is nothing particularly anti-society or anti-progress. An individual may use this thinking to justify being lazy and a hedonist, but it could also be used to justify becoming really successful. Everyone knows there is a kind of satisfaction that you get from doing something hard.
I am studying chemistry in college currently because I love it. Finding answers to difficult questions makes me feel good. That satisfaction is something I can't just make myself feel.

Sorry for being a bit rambly.

>>8532476
Both.

He found a solution, but it was basically Romanticism on steroids.

>>8532476
Yes, he did. It is embedded within Thus Spoke Zarathustra. It's quite simple.

The solution to nihilism is creation.

>>8532476
Read Jung to get the answer. (or Jordan B Peterson)

>>8535883
>The solution to nihilism is creation.

Of what?

>>8536288
of deez nuts!
ha

>>8532476
Yes. His death.

>>8535887
what is his solution to nihilism?

>>8536297
Got em!

>>8532476
nietzsche didn't find nihilism a problem which needed a "solution," nietzsche understood nihilism as the space in which one has freedom

>>8532476
AMOR FATI

>>8536288
>Of what?
A new world.

>>8536288

New values, namely.

There's also the bit about the tarantula and the mountain(?), it's been a while since I read it. If you want to know what else Nietzsche had in mind when it comes to creation, however, think Napoleon/Caesar - two of his favourite historical figures who think for themselves. Two people who defiantly triumphed over the Zeitgeists they happened to be born into, and made something great for themselves. Empires, namely.

>>8535745
>hur dur don't let ideas control you if they don't accord with some amorphous notion of "self"
pleb shit. There is nothing that indicates the "self" (a completely made-up notion) is the best source of morality. This is pathetically simple.

Don't get me wrong; this way of thinking that you describe may do wonders for some people with a strong intuition of "who they really are" (i.e. a strong sense of self). But most people don't have a strong sense of self and mistakenly believe that the "self" is there. So what ends up happening is a swirling cauldron of unconscious desires, unresolved conflicts, and just bad ideas in general flood reality under the guise of achieving one's innermost desires, when a person subject to such a process would benefit so much more from simply adopting that morality imposed on them by some higher man/woman (here we enter Nietzsche).

Morality is so much more stupidly complex than Stirner's conception of it that it's not even funny. I don't see how anyone could believe this for more than a day without realizing its flaws.

>>8532476
His solutions cumulated into fascism, and are now considered uncool to talk about.

>>8536924
I mean Nietzsche's still cool in a watered down sort of way; but if you point out that all that the man on the tightrope looks an awful lot like Mussolini in an unbiased light people get uncomfortable.

>>8536924

>His solutions cumulated into fascism

>>8532526
>ahead of his time
He was basically Zeitgeist: the philosopher.

He was a literary genius tho

>>8534438
>>>"I'm free to do what I want any old time"
this is the dream of women, but more importantly, these people want to avoid being blamed once they fuck up

Yeah, Nietzsche is just a dialectical response to nihilism. He's sublated by it, as Father Seraphim Rose illustrates.

>>8536954

>Father Seraphim Rose

>>8536962
Father Seraphim was intensely anti-modernist and Enlightenment, that's pretty far from Kantian.

>>8536952
>Having sex is fucking up and women should be legally forced to bring young thugs and nigger wannabees into existence instead of killing them while their brains are still the size of a walnut.


Ok virgatron9000.

>>8536946
Marxism ended with the same thing though. Stalin, Mao, Mussolini, Peron, all great men and women who used the same or at least similar ideas of hero-worship and the state as a new god to lead their countries into greatness.

>>8536978

>Interpreting women fucking up for a point on abortion

Wow, guilty conscience much? Maybe you realize that abortion is the abandonment of responsibility par excellence

>>8536971
It's a Hitler quote about Jews that's been misattributed.

>>8532476
It's called 'death of the author' weakling.

>>8536985

You have no fucking idea what you're talking about.

Hero-worship is more Carlyle than Nietzsche. The latter certainly didn't like the former.

>>8536990
>It's a Hitler quote about Jews that's been misattributed.
I know

women are pride
-to kill their menstruation
-to bend over
-to have abortion

>>8536997
which means btw that they are the closest uberman that you can find today.

Compared to women, Men completely fail to create values

>>8536991
I'm pretty sure taking over a country and building up a cult of personality around yourself in order to better exercise your will to power while also inspiring a new race of men is pretty Nietzscheian.

So are poets and journalists creating radical autonomous city states, or overthrowing weak European monarchies to replace them with a new race of aristocratic superman who read ten books a day (I'm pretty sure that's close to what Stalin's 'number' was) while maintaining a perfect physique (look at Mussolini, the guy was jacked), not to mention either hijacking religious institutions for your own political and ideological gain (via Italy), or simply destroying them altogether to replace them with a 'cult-du-moi' (like Germany and Russia).

>>8537013

Just stop.

>>8536999
I'm going to need some elaboration on this.

>>8537022
What was Nietzsche about exactly then?

Nihilism is just metaphysical conjecture based on inflated definitions of meaning, category error and a weird stockholm syndrome like reliance on overarching telos.

Basically you allowed yourself to be spooked by words because of your uncritical and unexamined usage and there is nothing to overcome for any serious intellectual.

bump

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7-dAmdy-JE&t=1h44m

>he's really a philosopher of knowledge and of language

what did he mean by this?

>>8537013
garden sheds etc

What solution? Nihilism is a retarded claim.

>>8538219
it's an autopsy, not a claim.

>>8532476
Walt Whitman was a better poet-philosopher

>>8538219
Suck a dick, fatty

>>8538463
Can you qualify this statement?

>>8538571
claim is normative, autopsy is descriptive.

>>8538576
Claim: an assertion of something as a fact.

>>8532476
There are no depths to nihilism.

The premise on which it starts is where it ends.

>>8538576
Then why do some people claim to be "nihilists?" My friend claims to be a nihilist and I have no idea how to respond/argue with that

>Stirner laughs in his blind alley, Nietzsche beats his head against the wall.

>>8536901
The self is not a made-up notion, Stirnet's 'self' is very well defined. Stirner doesn't say you can't adopt the values of someone higher than you if you think it's best for you - but your 'reward system' understanding of morality is the simplistic one. If the moral system doesn't draw its power from a certain ideology/metaphysical truth/general big other, its efficiency is irrelevant.

I bet there isn't one guy on this board who can actually explain Nietzsche's solution to nihilism.

>>8538897
Nihilism solves itself.

>>8538897
(I'm OP) yeah that's what I was really looking for with this thread but no one seems to have a solid grasp on him even. Do you know his solution?

>>8538897
See >>8535883

>>8538932
you don't even know what you mean

>>8538938
Not as good as a book but I can give it a shot. If this thread is alive in an hour or two i'll type an explanation sure.

>>8539016
He isn't wrong but he only touches the tip of the iceberg.

>>8532476
>a solution to nihilism
just walk it off

>>8539070
/thread

>>8539070
Not gonna lie, this is the closest I've gotten.

>>8539053
I know exactly what I mean.

See my above post. >>8538810

>>8539190
that's solipsism

>>8538897
I'll give it a shot. Build a new aesthetic that isn't nihilistic. Now, he had a lot of ideas on how one might do this, but this is the soul of the argument.

>>8532920
>>8533418
>>8533590
Dumbest people in the thread. You are either shitposting on a meta-ironic level that I have yet to attain or you are just responding with your blind knee jerk response to anything regarding Nietzsche and nihilism. I suspect the latter.

>>8539190
Nihilism in itself may be 'end where it begins', but the shift of a world from value to lack of value is where depth is created.

>>8538938
Okay, i'll try to summarize it. I'm probably repeating a lot you already know but whatever. It's too much to talk about Nietzsche's definition of will and its place in his ontology, but assume the basic features: it is the force driving men, it is a cause for itself (satisfaction, action, etc only exist through will), its mere satisfaction is devoid of meaning (Schopenhauer's pessimism is the premise here).

For Nietzsche our greatest will (and in many readings, the main force running the world) is the will to power - the will to overcome oppressive forces for the sake of genuine creation. Changing a situation, creating a reality, transforming matter into creation, unleashing unique thoughts, and so on; our default mode is static (or even - decay), we must overcome obstacles to execute our most immaterial desires. It is not the achievement itself we value the most, but the act of overcoming, overpowering. It is the power we crave, and through it we find meaning: the will to power isn't one you repeatedly satisfy through an insipid process - willing in itself, then pursuing, both unpleasant - it is inseparable from the process of its satisfaction, it is the will for the process, for the defeat of the obstacle (not the situation in which the obstacle is defeated). In this sense, it is an everlasting will not for a goal, but for a process, for more of itself - Nietzsche's way to flip Schopenhauer's philosophy on its head: life as a whole is meaningful, because it is not the satisfaction we crave, but the constant move towards it.

So, it is by staying true to our will to power that we make life a meaningful experience in its entirety (as in, during life, not yet in the face of death), and hence the well known call to abandon past morals and values, give the most glorious fulfillment to our uniqueness, and most importantly, unleash our desire to fulfill it.

Nietzsche was well aware this isn't a complete victory over nihilism, but it places us as a 'bridge to the ubermensch' - by pushing away from the last man, we can create a world in which a truly strong, pure man can grow: one who's life affirmation is more complete, who could make death essential to his creation (as a contrast to be defeated, which interestingly is also a source for power), affirming everything about his existence. Through bringing him closer, we can perhaps find even deeper affirmation of ourselves.

>>8539070
>>a solution to nihilism
>just walk it off
Stoicism is pretty good, yeah

>>8539421
Maybe I didn't write enough about the actual 'creation' - basically, you're right. It is not exactly an aesthetic that isn't nihilistic, but an aesthetic which is neither a surrender (nihilism) or enslavement (past aesthetic values, enforced by the current power structure). Creation of both actual material, and values which dictate its existence, unique to you, despite natural and social opposing forces.

>>8539509
for you

>>8538884
>"it's very well-defined"
>doesn't give definition

>This whole post is just abysmal. How old are you?

>>8539814

not the guy you're arguing with (dunno about philosophy to get roped in) but

>hurr durr you're dumb because you didn't spoonfeed me

>>8532476
Not sure there really is a solution to nihilism, if it even is a problem to begin with. I think what nihilism does is highlight our species inability to really deal with truth as much as we think we're able to, or as much as we'd like to be able to. If we get too close to truth and try to live with it, we end up destroying ourselves, we stop reproducing, we are slowly rejected by natural selection.

In other words, it seems too much self-awareness and understanding of the world may not be as much of an evolutionary advantage as we thought it was, and evolution might end up rejecting it.

>>8532476
What was Nietzsches view on morals?

>>8539479
>but the shift of a world from value to lack of value is where depth is created.
Can you provide evidence for your claim that the world lacks value please?

Nihilism is banal and anti-intellectual. Sorry if this upsets you.

>>8540512
Why?

>>8540512

Nihilism is the starting point for most of the major works in philosophy of the 20th century. Name a philosopher after Nietzsche that wasn't heavily influenced by Nietzsche. Anybody you can name is a faggot. Nietzsche was the word. The rational ordering of the universe is despair. Nietzsche charted a path through nihilism.

And nihilism may be banal, but it isn't anti-intellectual. It's entry level. It's foundational. If you haven't experienced nihilism you are spiritually a child. If anything, the truly anti-intellectual position is the absolute refusal to attempt the deconstruction of one's own morality.

Breathing is banal and anti-intellectual. Sorry if this upsets you.

Eating is banal and anti-intellectual. Sorry if this upsets you.

Defecation is banal and anti-intellectual. Sorry if this upsets you.

Shitposting is banal and anti-intellectual. Sorry if this upsets you.

>>8540472
Morals? fuck em, lets move past them and have all the individual values fight to the death forever because it will be interesting. I want nature to produce the greatest men who control the natural production of great men who can look back at any point and say "universe conquered".

>>8540568
That does sound nice though I wonder how far was Nietzsche willing to go for it, would he betray his family and friends?

>>8540579

>would he betray his family and friends?

>>8539814
Have you fucking read his books? Am I supposed to explain an entire philosophy to you by refuting your comments? Stirner's entire ontology is basically the title of his book: 'the ego', and 'its own' - the relationship between two parts of a dichotomy. The ego (whether 'you', or an illusion, or whatever) is a unique being which experiences the world. The world exists (for him), only as his experience, therefore its his. The ego and the world are only defined through each other - the world exists only as the ego's experience, the ego only exists as an entity having an experience.

>>8540176
Can people stop only understanding the world through the pointless lens of evolution

>>8540472
They are a projection of the individual's perspective on the world, rather than an absolute rule drawing power from a divine source (religious, ideological, etc.). Slave morality (the one subjects apply to instead of create) is crooked because of many reasons, read Antichrist and Genealogy of morals if you're curious. Great individuals must ignore current moral standards, and carve new ones which are more life affirming.

>>8540484
This isn't an ontological debate as much as it is an anthropological one: for most of history, societies revolved around 'big others' (to use modern terminology), setting life with values and with a goal. When Nietzsche talks about the death of god, he talks about the fade of these external figures, which is a fact: atheism was really becoming 'normal' during the 19th century, as well as a secular lifestyle. (maybe even during the 18th century idk). When you stop believing in what was the source of value to life, an immense abyss is created. Even if ethics are preserved, they themselves become devoid of meaning. How does men justify living, how is he supposed to live, given the abyss?

>>8540588
What happened between him and wagner?

>>8540596
Wagner told people that Nietzsche masturbated too much, so he got butthurt. He also wanted Wagner's waifu, but Nietzschuchan underestimated his prowess as a bull and found that Wagner is hard to cuck.

>>8540596
When he moved to Germany and converted to Christianity Nietzsche basically told him he sucks. Also, don't know if you know, he was enough of a madman to write an entire essay against the dude.

>>8540602
Sounds interesting, love wagner's music still

>>8540568
legitimately anti-intellectual

>>8540588

Actually laughed out loud.

>>8540596

Wagner became a pretty hardcore/sincere Christian, which was strike one in Nietzsche's book. Most of Wagner's work revolves around the theme of redemption (Nietzsche wrote about this) and was thus inherently distasteful to Nietzsche - as it implied man was 'fallen' and thus needed redemption, specifically divine redemption.

Secondly, Wagner was an equally sincere anti-Semite, most likely due to the long-standing rumour that his illegitimate father was a Jew. The fuel for the fires of WW1/WW2 Germany was actually stockpiled (for the most part) between 1850-1900. Nietzsche, to his credit, saw well in advance that the German Spirit's longing for a 'Reich' was growing, and that their anti-Semitism was gaining ground in consequence.

Nietzsche's view of the Jews is surprisingly nuanced - he doesn't dispute their stereotypical cunning/underhandedness/etc, but admires them for it. Why? Because, in his own words, they said 'Yes' to life - at any cost. Nietzsche's idea of the Jew is someone for whom there is no such thing as 'stooping too low', if it means you'll live.

>>8540606

I used to like Wagner's music, but lately I've come to see why Nietzsche declared Wagner to be 'poison' when it comes to music. Specifically, his music is more theatrical than musical - and theatre, as everyone knows, is for the plebs.

>>8540617
The Jews also stayed true for many years to a very tough moral system, one which demands you to overcome. He had this fascinating idea about how German and Jewish 'blood' should mix (as in, culture, obviously) to create people as free as Germans and as stubborn as Jews.

Bump

>>8540617
>and theatre, as everyone knows, is for the plebs.
Why so?

>>8540600
>Wagner is hard to cuck
stupid roasties, always going for Chads who have status in the here and now, if only they knew of my posthumous recognition... I wish god was dead.

bump

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>>8542612
bump