Nietzsche’s Philosophy: Key Concepts and Western Decadence
Nietzsche’s Philosophy: Key Concepts
Becoming
Becoming is often used synonymously with evolving. Some conceptions of becoming include:
- The Eleatic solution: Seeking to account for evolution through denial.
- The Pythagorean and Platonic solution: Separating entities that move from motionless realities.
- The Heraclitean solution: Proclaiming that reality is, in essence, becoming.
Nietzsche understood the history of philosophy very well and considered that becoming was incomprehensible to reason. Therefore, dogmatic philosophy was devoted to finding and confirming the existence of a being that does not become. For Nietzsche, true metaphysical reality cannot be subject to becoming; it remains identical to itself, static, and immutable, i.e., it must be causa sui.
Lie
For Nietzsche, lying is a product of reason. One must use it to make sense of the faithful testimony of the senses, which tell us we are changing, evolving, and different even to ourselves.
Science
Science is the knowledge acquired through the use of the senses. If the testimony of the senses is valid and true, then the knowledge that comes from its use must have some guarantee. However, in Nietzsche’s text, the interest is different: it comes down to distinguishing those who speak of real sciences from those, like mathematics or logic, that are only theories of signs.
Causa Sui
To understand what Nietzsche means by causa sui, we must know two things: the context in which he uses it and the meaning of another term with the opposite meaning: becoming. The author uses this term in the context of what he calls dogmatic philosophy, which extends from Socrates to his day. Dogmatic philosophers have a serious prejudice against becoming; they feel that everything that becomes has been engendered and is minor to that which remains always the same. For them, an entity that does not become or has not been generated is causa sui. Causa sui, for dogmatic philosophers, as Nietzsche tells us, are the supreme values of the first rank, such as the unconditioned, the existing, the good, the true, and the perfect.
God
When Nietzsche refers to God, he refers to the god of religion but also to anything that can replace him because God is not really an entity but a place. God is a metaphor to express absolute reality, a reality presented as the Truth and the Good.
I (The Self)
For Nietzsche, the self is nothing; there is no thinking substance that remains the same now as before.
Substance
For Nietzsche, substance was indescribable, something mysterious and valuable, and we do not have an impression of such a substance.
Reason
For Nietzsche, reason does not possess innate ideas, as it does for rationalists. In contrast, reason is one of our prejudices, and it is an “old deceptive female.”
Apparent World vs. Real World
Nietzsche understands the apparent world as the world perceived through the senses, which is the only real world. However, traditional metaphysics has posited another world, the so-called real world. The reason philosophers have invented the real world is resentment towards the values of this life, a resentment that has led them to invent another, perfect world as a form of revenge.
Western Decadence
Decadent or descending life is a trait consistent throughout Western culture, characterized by the defense of values antithetical to life and the belief in an objective, true, immutable, and rational world as the basis of these values.
Following Nietzsche’s claims, we can distinguish various periods in Western decadence:
- The Greek world: Harmony between the Dionysian and the Apollonian.
- Euripides, Socrates, and Plato: The beginning of the decline, with the Apollonian triumphing over the Dionysian, marking the start of Platonism.
- Christianity: Platonism for the people, the triumph of slave morality, and resentment toward life.
- Modernity: The start of the metaphysical crisis and the death of God.
- The Present: The possibility of overcoming Platonism and the appearance of the Superman.