Nietzsche

"Nihilism stands at the door."

• A "prophet" foretelling the coming nihilism
• Nihilism defined

Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883)

• The state of man stuck between ape and a higher state of being
• Requiem aeternum deo - God is Dead
  • Nietzsche's view of the current state of religion
  • The world without absolute truths
• Ubermensch
  • The Ubermensch in the making
  • Nihilism is the illness… the Ubermensch is the cure

Beyond Good and Evil (1886)

• A new morality to replace the old
• An anti Judeo-Christian morality
  • "New wine in old skins"
  • Not a transformation of the old, but a destruction making way for the new
• Anti democratic
  • Chaos of "nose counters"
  • Worship of mediocrity
  • "Babel governments"
• A new aristocracy
  • Superior individuals rising above the mediocre masses
  • A blood caste
  • Plato's guardians - tyrant philosophers?

Implications in the Arts

• Gesamtkunstwerk
  • "Total work of art"
  • A Romantic synthesis of music, literature, philosophy, and art into a complete aesthetic
• Richard Strauss - Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Is Morality...

• Absolute - i.e. god (nature) given? (AKA The Enlightenment)
• Imposed by the strong to control the masses (AKA The Inquisitor)
• Used by the weak to limit the strong (AKA Nietzsche)

Humanities Resource of Mark Hunter