ohwilleke

One could argue that it is the myth of the Constitution and democratic ideals that has replaced Christianity. No human can live up to all ideals. No one can really be an Uber Mench. But, something like the Bill of Rights, can create a myth that inspires mere morals to try, while protecting the ideals from their own failings.

boneyard bill

ohwilleke writes:

A very good point. Not only the constitution but the whole ideology of democracy, human rights, and individual freedom. But freedom for what? Isn't that what Nietzsche was getting at? We need an Ubermench because their no objective way to determine what life is all about so the Ubermench will make the existential choice for the rest of us.

phaedrus

Day

And I didn't mean 'king' in the literal sense, I meant it as an honorary title to whoever or whatever guides and controls things in CHristianity's stead.

Ok, could you point out as to where did the fritz actually say this?

Exactly - he had the Uber-Mensch and the Uber-Mensch's morality become the 'king' that determines/guides/holds together the society he is in. I think history shows that this view is incorrect, that instead its a combination of the government and the economy that dictate and guide these things.

Umm, he did that? Again request you to point out to the exact phrases and context. My reading would be that Ubermensch the destroyer paves the way for Ubermenschen.( Ender??? ) I would rather think the superhuman he envisaged was not in the context of ruling the society rather than "using the hammer" against the herd mentality and is a sort of utopian sort of human being which we will never become. Btw govt. and economy were not exactly enemies as far as the individual was concerned during the times of Nietzsche, it was religion and the effect it had on the state and in turn on the people. But you can apply the same arguements against herd mentality even in today's world.

Daydreamer

BB and Phae,

I think I need to read more/more critiques of Nietzsche before I can properly answer your challenges, my theory was merely an attempt to reconcile the events of the last century with his theory of some guiding ubermensch, centering on what I thought was a misplaced hope in a personal guide.

How do you see Nietzsche's ideals in terms of the last century?

boneyard bill

Daydreamer asks:

Nietzsche's ideals have become adopted by the herd that he despised. First the Nazis and now the post-modern left. Nietzsche's attacks on Christianity are as popular with the American left today as his attacks on the Jews were popular with the Nazis. And his perspectivism meshes well with the neo-romanticist inclinations of the "diversity" movement even though I don't think Nietzsche favored diversity per se.

Daydreamer

So you wouldn't consider Hitler, Stalin, etc. as wanna-be ubermensches? Merely as conduits through which select bits of Nietzsche's philosophy were feed to the masses?

boneyard bill

Daydreamer writes:

Hitler might very well have thought of himself as the Ubermensch. I don't know how much philosophy Hitler knew. Some of his followers probably thought of him that way.

But Stalin surely didn't think of himself that way. He was a Marxist and for a Marxist it is history that imposes values throught the class struggle. Stalin may have imposed values on the people, but in that capacity he would merely have been the instrument of the proletarian class.

phaedrus

Atleast the association of Adolf you can give to Nietzsche's sister.

And as far as our man's ideals were concerned, as ender's lecturer would say...maybe he was the last real philosopher Anyhows i think he was one of the first western philosophers who came close to eastern way of thinking, whether through contact or on his own i dont know.

Daydreamer

How so?

philechat

Isn't Schopenhauer the one who came very close to eastern thoughts? Schopenhauer actually studied eastern thought, and held an ideal life as being something not very different from Buddhist "nirvana".
Nietzsche was strongly influenced by Schopenhauer, especially in his earlier works.
I wonder that was the "eastern" side of him?