Nietzsche’s Philosophy: Tragedy, Knowledge, and Morality
Nietzsche and the Tragic Sense of Life
According to Nietzsche, the ancient Greeks especially embodied his tragic sense of life. Building upon Schopenhauer’s concept of life and the world as tragic and terrible realities, Nietzsche provides a vision that transcends pessimism. The Greeks were able to transmute the more frightening aspects of life through art, making existence more bearable as an aesthetic experience.
According to Nietzsche, Greek civilization discovered two ways to cope with life events. These two opposing attitudes are the Apolline and the Dionysian. Apollo is the symbol of light, measure, and proportion. Dionysus represents the unstoppable force of life that knows no boundaries or barriers.
Suspicion of Knowledge
The classical concept of truth argues that words express and structure the world with objective truth. A proposition’s truth is its suitability or correspondence with reality. Thus, truth is independent of and prior to being known. There is a fixed order that human knowledge is limited to reproducing. Nietzsche rejects this conception. For him, there is no single truth, but rather multiple interpretations, some more or less advantageous or disadvantageous to life. Therefore, there is not one interpretation of reality, but several approaches to it; objective truth does not exist.
Falsehood is not an objection against a judgment. The possibilities of thought are the possibilities of language, and language is not merely an instrument for organizing relations among men and things. The knowledge we call true is knowledge that has become useful. Nietzschean perspectivism is the doctrine according to which all knowledge is received from a particular perspective and from vital foundations that condition it. For Nietzsche, common sense believes there is an objective reality ready to be absorbed by human cognitive mechanisms. This perspective is the one from which knowledge operates. Failing to recognize this determination is based on certain conditions.
Critique of Moral Values
Nietzsche deeply criticizes traditional metaphysical concepts, the cognitive methods that have produced this metaphysics, and the moral values in which it is inspired. He calls for a transvaluation of all values that have hitherto dominated European culture.
- The Morality of Lords: This is the affirmative acceptance of life with all its demands. Strong, creative individuals forge their own destiny, merrily discharging their vital energy. It is a morality of individualistic values that are taught only to themselves.
- The Morality of Slaves: This is born of fear and feelings of inferiority. The hatred felt by slaves towards those they fear engenders resentment. Incapable of direct action, they impose values to protect the herd, where they find the warmth of the miserable like themselves. Some values are called good, and others are called bad. The slaves eventually impose their values on the lords. With the help of religion, the weak can impose their own weakness and even use words like love, compassion, resignation, and charity, while harboring a profound hatred in the heart of the slave, who becomes a lord.