I found a series of fictional advertisements in the style of political negative campaigning against various “candidates”. Most amusing.
Kierkegaard in ‘08
Descartes Attack Ad
Down with Hume
AC1
Update: Found two more Kant related spoofs: Kant: The Motion Picture and Kant Book Review.
Compared to the other Nietzsche books I have read - Will to Power (fragmentary and repetitious) and Birth of Tragedy (obscure but rather conventional), the Gay Science is a refreshing blast of fresh mountain air. As part of the middle period of the authors works, it is written in Nietzsche’s iconoclastic and aphoristic style. What is unusual about the book is the lightheartedness and humour with is contained in the prose and poetry.
This book contains ideas and many turns of phrase that recur in his next book Thus Spake Zarathustra. In some ways the key ideas of Zarathustra are already expressed in The Gay Science but I don’t feel it is repetitive because, although Nietzsche distrusts systemization of philosophy, the narrative story is a weak system. Some ideas are again restated in Twilight of the Idols but that book seems to be intended as an overview and written in a highly condensed style to the point of the ideas being crush under their own weight. Things are expressed more expansively in The Gay Science and is as good a starting point as I know into Nietzsche.
As usual, it is impossible to summarize the content of the book since it contains many disparate lines of thought. But that perhaps is the message? He claims it is untruthful to rob existence of its ambiguous nature. To provide a final immovable answer, as most ancient philosophy and theology attempts to do, is a flat denial of the ambiguous world. Nietzsche quickly points out that the ambiguous and apparent world is the only world. His explains why he is often misunderstood by others (including Bertrand Russell). I have heard it asked that if he can be misinterpreted, does he share the responsibility of how is works are misused? Interestingly, this argument is also leveled at the Bible, Koran and other holy books as a way of disparaging religion. This argument can be rebutted by considering any and all language can be misinterpreted to support any action, so to assign guilt to an author would be to potentially condemn all writing and speaking (reductio ad absurdum).
“All philosophical idealism has hitherto been something like a disease…” 372
‘One not only wants to be understood when one writes, but also - quite certainly - not to be understood. It is by no means an objection to a book when someone finds it unintelligible: perhaps this might just have been the intention of its author, - perhaps he did not want to be understood by “anyone”.’ 379
The mind boggles. 
This book is the most pro-science I have read of Nietzsche. He is, as always, an acute observer and discusses the bounds that science may address. He is again skeptical about Darwin’s theory of evolution. Nietzsche’s idea of power and the abundance of power does not seem compatible with his perception of evolution and its “struggle for life”. I think this is Nietzsche’s misinterpretation and he perhaps would have accepted the gene centric view of evolution which was popularized in the book “The Selfish Gene” by Dawkins.
The most famous section is the “God is dead” speech. I won’t reproduce it again since it is already easy to find on the internet. The speech is put into the mouth of a madman - probably Nietzsche’s concept of his own public image or perhaps a foreshadow of himself considering his mental collapse in 1889. Obviously, “God is dead” is not meant literally. One interpretation might be “the concept of God has come to an end”. The madman speaks to the onlookers who were already atheist. Why is it necessary to proclaim the death of God to atheists? The speech is a statement of existential removal of the foundations of civilization and a call for their reestablishment on new footings. When he finishes the speech, the crowd look at him in amazement. The madman realizes the news of God’s death has not yet reached them but is still on its ways to the ears of men. This is probably in reference to the assumptions and ideals that were taken from Christianity were carried into the secular societies of the modern world without being closely examined. The news of the death of God would call them into question as not being timeless and objective.
I love the end of book 4 of The Gay Science (aphorisms 340-342). It is rare that just two pages can contain so many ideas and written in such a vibrant manner.
340 Discusses the death of Socrates and its implication for his philosophy. This has huge significance for the modern world as much of this as been intellectually passed down through St. Augustine and the Catholic Church. Socrates, at his trial for corrupting the youth of Athens, goaded the court into sentencing him to death. Socrates’s last words (according to Plato) were “Crito, we owe a cock to Asclepius. Please, don’t forget to pay the debt.”
“For him who has ears, this ludicrous and terrible “last word” implies: “O Crito, life is a long sickness!” “Socrates, Socrates had suffered from life! And he also took his revenge for it…” “We must surpass even the Greeks!” 340
Nietzsche attempts to connect Socrates’s denial and hatred of life to idealism and to equate the two. This connects with the idea of the ambiguous world being the only world. To claim a thing exists “in itself” is to value a non-existent thing above an existent thing. Hence, Nietzsche’s fondness for accusing idealism of nihilism.
Aphorism 341 is the first statement in his writings of the thought of the Eternal Return. This circular view of time again emphasizes the apparent existence on earth as the only existence. It perhaps is simply an inversion of the thought of an afterlife. This ideal is the core idea of Zarathustra and also a theme in the Unbearable Lightness of Being. The “lightness” is perhaps the terror and uncertainty at the lack of external significance of life - considering eventually the universe will suffer heat death and also from the death of God. The novel also discusses the “weight” provided by the Eternal Return (”It must be so! It must be so!”). If each of our actions are to be repeated for eternity, we are almost forced to place a massive but subjective significance on every action we perform. Nietzsche seems to regard the thought of the Eternal Return as a thought experiment and a requirement for the Superman. In the Will to Power his seems to have the intention of arguing for the physical reality of the concept. Eternal Return is a form of Eternalism and Hard Determinism. I hardly need add that Nietzsche argued against “free will”.
Aphorism 342 is simply the first section of Zarathustra’s prologue. I suppose I find self quotation and interconnections of ideas amusing. The Gay Science’s close connection is again confirmed when Zarathustra “quotes” Nietzsche:
When Zarathustra was alone, however, he said to his heart: “Could it be possible! This old saint in the forest hath not yet heard of it, that GOD IS DEAD!” Prologue, Z
Since I was too busy enjoying The Gay Science, I forgot to record interesting quotations. I also lack an electronic copy of the book. I normally would have included more quotations but I hope you can overlook their absence.
Anti Citizen One
I have returned from holiday and I have been busy reading.
Yes Man by Danny Wallace
After enjoying his previous book “Join Me”, I was looking forward to a new series of adventures of Danny. He vows to say YES to every opportunity or suggestion that presents itself. This temporarily leads to his new appreciation of life and to enjoy embracing opportunities. After a time this reverses to a weariness of this irresponsible life style.
‘…I don’t want to be like I was, but I’m so sick of saying Yes. All it does is tire me. It was supposed to help. It was supposed to be exciting.’
Ian put his pool cue down, and nodded, sadly.
‘What Yes giveth,’ he said, ‘Yes also taketh away.’
Danny begins to question the value of Yes and the existential value of his project.
What was I doing with my life? I mean, really? What was the point in all this? To waste six hours of my day on a train? To wake up confused and bewildered in a Dutch hotel room? To severely annoy my ex-girlfriend? What was I gaining from this, really? Apart from a car and some mild abuse?
He does find new energy to persist saying Yes to life. It begins to become instinctual and effortless.
…I wasn’t saying Yes because I was playing the Yes game. I’d all but forgotten about that. I wasn’t saying Yes to prove anything to myself any more, or to Ian, or to anyone else. I was saying Yes because I wanted to. I was saying Yes because all of a sudden it was coming naturally.
The book ends with a transition away from “Yes” to a more settled and mature way of life. To gratuitously quote Nietzsche, he would have approved of Danny’s embrace of life:
“Aye, for the game of creating, my brethren, there is needed a holy Yea unto life” Zarathustra
but probably would not have agreed with saying Yes to all opportunities. Sometimes No is necessary.
“All-satisfiedness, which knoweth how to taste everything, that is not the best taste! I honour the refractory, fastidious tongues and stomachs, which have learned to say “I” and “Yea” and “Nay.” To chew and digest everything, however- that is the genuine swine-nature! Ever to say YEA that hath only the ass learned, and those like it!” Zarathustra
The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster by Bobby Henderson
The Gospel is a parody and reductio ad absurdum against the Intelligent Design movement. The core argument is if religion can be taught in schools and given legal protection, then this spoof religion, featuring the Flying Spaghetti Monster (FSM) as God, is equally deserving of the same benefits.
I think we can all look forward to a time when these three theories are given equal time in our science classrooms across the country, and eventually the world; one-third for Intelligent Design, one-third time for Flying Spaghetti Monsterism, and one-third time for logical conjecture based on overwhelming observable evidence.
The book takes several of the classical arguments (First Cause, Ontological, Design, Logical arguments) and adapts them to suit the FSM. The fact that their logic is flawed is presumably intended as a criticism of the original arguments. There is also an amusing spoof of Genesis featuring the FMS as a very incompetent, slightly insane, ego-maniacal creator God. One or two sections are intended as an improvement of Christian values. The Eight “I’d Really Rather You Didn’ts” basically reduce to “be tolerant of others”, “have a good time” and “don’t be religiously pretentious”.
All in all a good read for people interested in the Intelligent Design movement.
I will write a review of Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig when I have a chance.
Anti Citizen One
The Birth of Tragedy discusses the world view and theatre of the ancient Greeks and how it applies to the culture of his day. Nietzsche borrows several ideas from contemporaries, notably Hegelian dialectic and applies it to Dionysus (thesis), Apollo (antithesis) and Greek Tragedy(synthesis). The Dionysian and Apollonian tendencies were both said to be an answer to the “wisdom of Silenus”.
…King Midas hunted in the forest a long time for the wise Silenus, the companion of Dionysus, without capturing him. When Silenus at last fell into his hands, the king asked what was the best and most desirable of all things for man. Fixed and immovable, the demigod said not a word; till at last, urged by the king, he gave a shrill laugh and broke out into these words: ‘Oh, wretched ephemeral race, children of change and misery, why do ye compel me to tell you what it were most expedient for you not to hear? What is best of all is beyond your reach forever: not to be born, not to be, to be nothing. But second best for you - is quickly to die.’
This idea was echoed more recently by Camus in The Myth of Sisyphus - is a pointless task (or pointless life) better abandoned?
Nietzsche says there are three traditions that answer this question:
1) Dionysus, god of Wine and bringer of ritual ecstasy. His followers rejoice in life as it actually is including all tragedy and discord. Nietzsche closely identifies Dionysus with music, without words, as a mirror of the world in a similar way as Schopenhauer’s concept of music as pure will. In theater, Dionysus is linked with all tragic heroes caught in epic downfalls and myths. Reality is a subjective and is intuitively and instinctively understood.
The truly Dionysian music presents itself as such a general mirror of the universal will: the conspicuous event refracted in this mirror expands at once for our consciousness to the copy of an external truth. Section 17
Here the most profound instinct of life, that directed toward the future of life, the eternity of life, is experienced religiously — and the way to life, procreation, as the holy way. Twilight of the Idols
2) Apollo, god of the Sun and bringer of knowledge, reason, wisdom and plastic (visual) beauty. This movement flatly rejects Silenus and instead holds that man’s goal is to pursue knowledge which in turn leads to beauty, virtue and happiness. The lyricist takes precedence over the musician and the music only supports the words of the writer. The theater, characters become more like the audience and given realistic emotions. The protagonists are now intelligent slaves and cunning men and women while the classic heroes are parodied. This use of realistic characters often makes the story impossible to fit with the expected Apollonian outcome (intelligence/beauty is rewarded) so deus ex machina is used to resolve the story. This shift in style is attributed to Euripides and ultimately to Socrates. Mythology and subjectivity are destroyed and replaced by the theoretic, the objective and history.
“…hence the picture of the dying Socrates, as the man raised above the fear of death by knowledge and reason, is the sign about the entrance-gate of science reminding every one of its mission, namely, to make existence seem intelligible, and therefore justified.” Section 15
If we could conceive of an incarnation of dissonance -and what else is man? - then, that it might live, this dissonance would need a glorious illusion to cover its features with a veil of beauty. This is the true artistic function of Apollo… Section 25″
3) Buddhist tradition which, according to Nietzsche, agrees with Silenus’s nihilism.
Since it is impossible to reach either ideal completely, life and theater is said to be best understood as a synthesis of both the Apollonian and Dionysian tendencies.
For the more clearly I perceive in Nature those omnipotent art impulses [...] the more I feel myself impelled to the metaphysical assumption that the Truly-Existent [Dionysus?] and Primal Unity [Apollo?], eternal suffering and divided against itself [...] are compelled to apprehend as [...] empiric reality. Section 4.
After Socrates, Greek taste shifts towards the Apollonian and Socraties (and his cronies Plato and Aristotle) and culture is still operating under the same system today. People are still considered as rational individuals who can detach themselves from the world they are observing. The problem with the Apollonian ideal is that it is fatally flawed - as any post modernist will tell you!
And as thou hast forsaken Dionysus, Apollo hath also forsaken thee; rouse up all the passions from their haunts and conjure them into thy circle, sharpen and whet thy sophistical dialectic for the speeches of thy heroes - thy very heroes have but counterfeit, masked passions, and utter but counterfeit, masked words. Section 10
As we reach the limits of philosophic reason and consider the boundaries of science, we realize that much of the world is not yet intelligible - and most likely will never be. This fundamentally undermines the claim of Apollonian view.
“If ancient tragedy was diverted from its course by the dialectical desire for knowledge and the optimism of science, this fact might lead us to believe that there is an eternal conflict between the theoretic and the tragic world-view; and only after the spirit of science has been pursued to its limits, and its claim to universal validity destroyed by the evidence of these limits may we hope for a rebirth of tragedy…” Section 17
By emphasizing the objective viewpoint of individual members of the public (rather than subjective view of heroes), Euripides thought the “public” on stage could be a better judge of the play.
But “public,” after all, is only a word. In no sense is it a homogeneous and constant quantity. Why should the artist be bound to accommodate himself to a power whose strength lies merely in numbers? Section 11.
This instantly reintroduces the subjective back into what is intended to be objective. We are instantly drawn back to the Dionysian.
There is a great amount I did not understand in the book as Greek culture is fairly obscure. The style of Nietzsche is more restrained as he mentions other philosophers without pouring scorn on them - particularly notably are Kant and Schopenhauer - who he later rejected utterly. He does identify Socrates as a target at this early stage in his writing.
Anti Citizen One
Searle published an attempt to answer Hume’s Is-Ought Problem. It states:
Consider the following series of statements:
(i) Jones uttered the words “I hereby promise to pay you,
Smith, five dollars.”
(2) Jones promised to pay Smith five dollars.
(3) Jones placed himself under (undertook) an obligation
to pay Smith five dollars.
(4) Jones is under an obligation to pay Smith five dollars.
(5) Jones ought to pay Smith five dollars.
Searle J R, How to Derive “Ought” From “Is”, The Philosophical Review, Vol. 73, No. 1 (Jan., 1964), pp. 43-58
Searle states that the following are tautological truths:
“All promises are (create, are undertakings of, are acceptances of) obligations,”
“One ought to keep (fulfill) one’s obligations.”
With these definitions, we can see the logic to go from statement (2) to (5) because it is a tautological, according to Searle, to equate “promise” with “ought to”. It is then possible to simplify the above argument with:
(A) Jones uttered the words “I hereby ought to to pay you,
Smith, five dollars.”
(B) Jones ought to pay Smith five dollars.
I cannot see any way B automatically follows from A. And since this is logically equivalent to Searle’s response, we can see the original argument is invalid in going beyond step (1). Another way to state my objection is to consider if “One ought to keep (fulfill) one’s obligations” is really tautologically true? If we can say “promise = obligation”, then is “One ought to keep (fulfill) one’s promises” a tautological truth? No, it isn’t.
And, even if Smith believes he ought to pay back Smith, why ought he believe that? The whole argument is couched in social convention and definition of words - to a critical eye this reeks of faulty reasoning.
Ayn Rand’s attempt also relies on the loose interpretation of words. “The fact that a living entity is, determines what it ought to do. So much for the relation between ‘is’ and ‘ought’” Which is suddenly appears similar to Searle’s answer.
Update: I also noticed Searles definition “All promises are (create, are undertakings of, are acceptances of) obligations,” does not really reduce to “promises are obligations”; the words in the brackets are important. Promises are only representations of obligations. Obligations may be represented without actually existing!
Anti Citizen One
I have finished reading The Will to Power (by Nietzsche, obviously - tr. Kaufmann and Hollingdale) a few minutes ago. I think a few background observations might be in order:
1) The Will to Power as a canonical book, although was considered as a philosophical project by the author, was abandoned or not completed.
2) The book as it exists today is the previously unpublished notes and drafts of Nietzsche. It is not a coherent book. The publication was certainly not authorized by the author.
3) The notes were edited, selected and sorted by subject by several editors - each editor may have had an agenda not necessarily in agreement with the author. Even sorting many notes into subjects will cause great changes in their interpretation - especially in the style of the authors writing where the resonance between the words and sentences often have a secondary meaning. It this is was said that his writing is pitched somewhere between metaphor and truth; this is a fine balance.
4) The book was used by the Nazi government to justify their ideology. Fallaciously, I might add. (If in doubt, see the chapters “The New Idol” in Zarathustra and “Things the Germans Lack” in Twilight.)
5) The book is often read in a translated version. None of the translations were seen or approved by the author. Again the subtleties of meaning could be lost - or should I say WILL be lost?
So any quotation of the Will to Power should be viewed with some skepticism… even if I quote it! But the topics in the WtP are scattered wide and I could not hope to summarize the book in any sensible way. After all it is not a “book”, it is a collection of notes. I have attempted as few thoughts on the concept of the Will to Power but that is only a small part of the book’s content. The title is there fore misleading.
I agree with the translators view that to understand Nietzsche’s real view, one should turn to Twilight of the Idols, Zarathustra and the other completed books. The Will to Power should only be read in this light as additional thoughts but were never published for one reason or another.
The book is highly repetitious in itself and compared to his other works. There are several drafts that were modified, to a greater or lesser extent, and published in the other works. Usually the previously published versions are superior. There are a few gems, which make the book worth while reading.
Conclusion: this books is for completists and definitely not for a first time reader of the author. Although I have failed in addressing what the book is actually about, I will provide one quotation:
Section 976
Why the philosopher rarely turns out well. His requirements include qualities that usually destroy a man:
1. a tremendous multiplicity of qualities; he must be a brief abstract of man, of all man’s higher and lower desires: danger from antitheses, also from disgust at himself;
2. he must be inquisitive in the most various directions: danger of going to pieces;
3. he must be just and fair in the highest sense, but profound in love, hate (and injustice), too;
4. he must be not only a spectator, but also a legislator: judge and judged (to the extent that he is a brief abstract of the world);
5. extremely multifarious, yet firm and hard. Supple.
Anti Citizen One
Nietzsche’s concept of the Will to Power is fundamental to his philosophy and yet often misunderstood. It is also constantly discussed by commentators but they seem to state the history of its interpretation rather than interpreting the idea itself. Indeed, Nietzsche warned against this view of ideas - of collecting and cataloging them:
Everything that philosophers handled over the past thousands of years turned into concept mummies; nothing real escaped their grasp alive. Whenever these venerable concept idolators revere something, they kill it and stuff it [...] (Twilight)
Another mistake of commentators is to say what the will to power isn’t - most typically in relation to the will to existence. I will try not to use this method and positively define the Will to Power. Most of the ideas are Nietzsche’s own but I am contemporized them in places.
1) The Will to Power is the force that determines good and evil. (Read in a footnote but I forget where.)
If I may assume for a moment that morality has an earthly origin, what else can we say of its source? The source by definition must be outside morality. Or more directly, the source of morality is immorality. For example if we say “it is always good to tell the truth”, we are in fact lying since we are just inventing a false objective truth.
My chief proposition: there are no moral phenomena, there is only a moral interpretation of these phenomena. This interpretation itself is of extra-moral origin. WtP 258
Personally, I am greatly influenced by the “it-ought” problem. I have not yet seen a satisfactory solution and I provisionally conclude there is no external source of ought statements. I do accept that “ought” statements are necessary. “Ought” statements provided by society may be tolerated but are not truth. I conclude that morality is completely discretionary. If course I would still suffer the consequences if I was caught breaking the law but there is no truth at work here.
Another theme in Nietzsche is the how much primitive superstition is loaded into language. Morality is not justified by language, rather language is shaped by moral judgments. A linguistic argument for morality is, by definition and by virtue of needing outside definition, not objective and therefore not truth. This foreshadows Wittgenstein’s concept of language games. The Will to Power’s voice is the language game.
Values did man only assign to things in order to maintain himself — he created only the significance of things, a human significance! Therefore, calleth he himself “man,” that is, the valuator. (Zarathustra, The Thousand and One Goals)
2) The Will to Power is the force that determines knowledge.
Truth is the kind of error without which a species could not survive. (WtP?)
All philosophers love to argue “logically”. Why logic? Why not rather illogical argument? That accusation we can put to all a-priori discussions. The reason for accepting logic is that it seems to be reflecting in the testimony of our senses (a posterior experience). For example, we generally don’t see things as simultaneously X and not X. Therefore any tendency to argue logically is, in fact, an acceptance of the natural world. To disprove naturalism by logic is self contradictory.
Inductive reasoning has the problem of potential over generalization. We may always discover a counter example to a given rule. As Shaw once said “The golden rule is that there are no golden rules”. But we still hold that concepts such as time, space, causality, substance, properties really exist. The ability to do this has no objective basis but we must impose a schema on sensory experience to understand it. To accept that these concepts are real, we must effectively ignore the problem with inductive reasoning - this is an exercise of the Will to Power. We assign value to sensory phenomena and call them arbitrary things: words, language, computer, screen, blog, etc. Note that none of these concepts have any reality except in our minds. But act as if they do - that is valuation.
Science cannot escape the flaw in inductive reasoning but it attempts to mitigate its effect. So called scientific “dogma” is all conditional knowledge and not objectively true - this is an acceptance of the limitation of induction. Also to use valuations of things but to be economical as possible with valuations is an interesting guideline (also known as Occam’s Razor). But since some valuation is necessary to do any science, objective truth via science is unachievable. But ignore the impossibility of the task and do it anyway - that is Will to Power. This economy of valuation causes science to find a description of reality rather than an explanation of reality. The “explanation” could only exist in our minds.
3) The Will to Power is the abstraction of all other drives e.g. Will to Existence, Will to Knowledge, Will to Virtue, Will to Wealth, Will to Political Influence, etc.
4) Will to Power is a discharge of gathered potential for action. The Will to Power is an abstraction of the source of happiness.
What is happiness? The feeling that power increases, that a resistance is overcome. (The Anti-Christ)
This means we should not seek to abolish resistance to our will since it is necessary for exercise of the will. It is therefore a freedom from ressentiment and slave morality (which states what harmful agents are “bad” and should be eliminated). (Note: happiness is not a proof of truth.)
I assess the power of a will by how much resistance, pain, torture it endures and knows how to turn to its advantage; I do not account the evil and painful character of existence a reproach to it, but hope rather that it will one day be more evil and painful than hitherto— WtP 382 Emphasis mine.
5) Existentially, the Will to Power is a rejection of nihilism.
Ironically, Nihilism claims “life is meaningless” or more accurately “life should be meaningless”. That is itself a valuation of life and therefore a use of the Will to Power. The flaw in nihilism is it is a valuation of life that says there is no “true” valuation. There fore it is a self contradiction.
6) All life has the Will to Power. Throughout history, only a few individuals have ever exercised it on a grand scale.
People always get worried when there is mention of imposition of views from one charismatic leader. The comparison is always of a totalitarian leader and guilt by association. This is not logical. Let me state: “you may not impose ideas on others” is this not ITSELF an idea? And it is value imposed on modern society? This is a self contradiction!
All art and all creating is a value judgment “The world lacks X and should have X. I will create it.”
If I may talk for a moment beyond Good and Evil, we have to be more questioning of our ideals. And yes I am questioning of my tendency to be questioning!
Most influential sources of western culture: Equality (Christianity), The soul (Plato), Right to divorce (Henry VIII), Pursuit of branded goods (Marketing departments), Environmentalism (???)…
7) In some ways, the act of defining the Will to Power IS the Will to Power - since it is act of valuation.
As Brian was accused in the Life of Brian, I am also guilty: “He’s making it up as he goes along!” That is almost the point of The Will to Power. Also a bit like the Wizard of Oz himself: the will to lie to maintain so called “truth” as true. It also reminds me of the justification used by parents though the ages: “Why? Because I said so.”
The one who exercises the Will to Power is closely related to the concept of the superman.
Innocence is the child, and forgetfulness, a new beginning, a game, a self–rolling wheel, a first movement, a holy Yea. (Zarathustra)
Anti Citizen One
PS I am half way though Nietzsche’s book called, confusingly, “The Will to Power”. I will explain why sometime later.
Friedrich Nietzsche begged us to look beyond the traditional dichotomy and prejudice of good and evil. Our traditional means of viewing the world involve arbitrary splits; creating them and us.
What we do in dreams we also do when we are awake: we invent and fabricate the person with whom we associate - and immediately forget we have done so. aphorism 138
Out of a desire for moral coherence and convenience we retrospectively and proactively justify our subjective truths my making them into universals.
Our vanity would have just that which we do best count as that which is hardest for us. The origin of many a morality. aphorism 143
In short, systems of morals are only a sign-language of the emotions. aphorism 187
And so he is led to say:
What is done out of love always takes place beyond good and evil. aphorism 153
The medieval German mystic Meister Eckhart similarly taught that the just man does just deeds, but the doing of just deeds does not make a just man.
Whoever loves justice remains so fully established in it that what he loves becomes his own essence. Justi vivent in aeturnum
The just man does not seek support elsewhere, he does not let his acts be determined by external precepts. When you conform with exterior laws, your acts are merely legal. The just man who acts out of intimate assimilation with Justice “is”.
The path, Meister Eckhart preaches, is detachment, or releasement from distinctions, names, oppositions.
Whatever bears a name can be juxtaposed or be compared with something that has another name.
Indeed, before there were creatures, God was not yet God, but he was what he was. But when creatures came to be and recieved their created being, then God was no longer God in himself, rather he was God in the creatures…
Thus we say that man must be so poor that he is not and has no place wherein God could act. Where man still preserves some place in himself, he preserves distinction. This iswhy I pray God to rid me of God, for my essential being is above God insofar as we comprehend God as the principle of creatures. Blessed are the Poor
Thus Eckhart asks us to live life without a why, to go beyond good and evil, beyond the distinctions of creator and created.
If you seek God for the sake of a foundation, Eckhart says, if you look for God even for the sake of God himself then ‘you behave as though you transformed God into a candle in order to find something with it; and when one has found what one looks for one throws away the candle’ Reiner Schurmann quoting Eckhart’s Omne datum Optimum.
So Nietzsche and Eckhart in terms of a moral discourse both point towards detachment or releasement, the living without a why, the going beyond good and evil, the loss of the prejudices of Binary Opposition.
Those who seek something with their works, those who act for a why, are serfs and mercenaries. Eckhart, Justus in perpetuam vivet.
It is interesting to note that this wisdom of letting-be is to be found across the continents and the ages, in the context of Nietzsche’s post-christian paradigm, Eckharts via negativa, and also in the Tao Te Ching, Lao Tzu’s book of the way. The second ideogram of the Tao is remerkable in its resemblance both to the teachings of the above masters and the analysis of Jacques Derrida and the Post-Structuralists.
When people see some things as beautiful, other things become ugly. When people see some things as good, other things become bad.
Being and non-being create each other. Difficult and easy support each other. Long and short define each other. High and low depend on each other. Before and after follow each other.
Therefore the Master acts without doing anything and teaches without saying anything. Things arise and he lets them come; things disappear and he lets them go. He has but doesn’t posess, acts but doesn’t expect. When his work is done, he forgets it. That is why it lasts forever. Tao Te Ching ~ 2
Orpheus Emerged, written by Jack Kerouac in 1944/45 was only published posthumously in 2002 following the death of his wife. Friend, Poet and contemporary Robert Creeley wrote in his introduction that this was an momentous occasion, the rediscovery and publication of a lost classic by the ‘voice of a generation’ Beat author Jack Kerouac. Yet despite the positive reviews printed on the dust covers the book was near universally panned by the critics. Dull. Achingly Stiff. Pretentious. Immature. Pedantic. Critics clearly did not like it.
This was the second time I had read this novella, and for the second time I managed to finish it in a couple of hours. And for the second time I was left wondering what was it I had just read. I had my ideas, but I felt somehow cheated that I had read a book, somebody elses creation which was yet so ambigous that its value and meaning depended upon my interpretation of it, as though it were in fact my book. My greatest dissappointment though (first time round) was, like the critics, reserved for the fact that it just wasnt anywhere near as good as Kerouac’s seminal work ‘On The Road‘. Looking for some guidance, and some hint of what it all meant I ploughed the internet for literary criticisms. All I found, as you can see from the perjorative descriptions listed above, were equally confused and disappointed readers.
Orpheus Emerged is the story of a group of young bohemian intellectuals studying at university. It is a chronicle of their passions, conflicts and dreams, and ultimately is a record of their search for truth through art and philosophy.
Michael is the artist, desperately seeking happiness, and wallowing in his own artistic model of the aesthete. He is a bohemian whose poetry infers an experimentation with drugs, a dabbling with mystical religion, and sexual experimentation. Paul (whose relation to Michael is unknown, see later on for my theory) is an out of town bum, with little money, an intellectual who annoys everyone he touches, and yet with whom that cannot do without. He is not registered as a student, but he attends lectures anyway, and the professors politely ignore him until he speaks up and makes his contributions in a class on Nietszche. Arthur, Leo, Anthony and Julius are ensemble characters who weave through the story. Arthur is a budding poet who aspires to Michael’s aesthetic heights. Leo likewise is in awe of Michaels work, but is critically aware of deeper trains of thought. Julius is an observer, and a shrewd one at that, described by the others as a ’super-voyeur’ he alone guesses at the complex relationship between Michael and Paul. Arthur is an emotional wreck, an alcoholic and a wife beater, married to Marie, who being a more dominant character cares not about the violence, loves Anthony dearly, but seeks to explore her own sexuality in an affair with Michael. Finally Maureen is Michael’s mistress in her late twenties, seeking commintment and security from the young bohemian, she is mature, wise and singularly uninterested in the pretentious artsy world of Michael and his friends.
When you read the book, set over a couple of weeks, nothing much happens, and there is no coherent plot or exploration of character. Chance meetings are always just around the corner and everything seems so utterly contrived. They meet, they eat, they drink copiously, they hold a party, they attend lectures, they talk pretentious waffle about art and philosophy, often subconsciously aware that they dont know what they are talking about. They conduct affairs, they gossip, they suffer emotional crises, they seek oblivian in drink and plumb the depths of despair and talk of suicide.
It is easy considering all this, the shallowness of the characters, the pretentious rubbish that they spout, the numerous references to Nietszche, Rimbaud and other counter-cultural figures in literature, the meandering pace of the plot, to simply say ‘who cares?’
Then I had a revelation. Within the book was hidden a kernel of truth, within the very motif of the search for truth. Michael the poet is frustrated with the aesthetic life, Paul mocks him relentlessly as a failure. Michael is aware of the pretentiousness of much of his work, yet recognises the need to continue as a prophet for the sake of Arthur and Leo (at least). Michael is troubled by his amoral nature in conducting his affair (destroying his relationship with Maureen and near killing Anthony who drinks himself to oblivion), yet as Paul hints at, by being troubled he is clearly not amoral.
Throughout the novel there is one continous battle, between Michael the aesthete and Paul the iconoclast. Michael feels the need to touch God, and to impart in his long winded poetry an essence of the divine. Paul ridicules his work, calls him a failure, enrages him, goads him, steals his work and threatens to burn it. The two of them are constantly at daggers drawn. Michael attacks him with a lampstand, then later when blind drunk and contemplating suicide decides to murder Paul at the same time.
In the novel, which is set in no particular time or place (it could easily be here and now) Kerouac is himself searching for truth. He is looking to find his voice, the voice of a generation. This book is the beginning of the genesis of the beat movement. He wrote it at the end of the second world war, at columbia university shortly after he met Allan Ginsberg, Lucien Carr and the other artists who would become the leaders of the beat movement. It is an early postmodern work of art, it is an existential masterpiece of self-analysis. The movement that was to spawn rock and roll, the hippy movement, pacifism, the anti-war generation and free love, was born out of this novel, this chronicle of existential angst. Dissillusionment with the war and the world, the rejection of authority and conventional morality.
No wonder Orpheus Emerged reads so badly, it is unfinished, its merely a particle of the developing Kerouac. Too caught up in the real world who has been there to teach Kerouac how to write? Nobody has, he has had to develop all by himself, find his own voice, his own identity. As he says of Wagner in the novel, he has had to spend years sorting out his intellectual grounding before he can produce his art.
Who is Paul? My reading is that he is the alter-ego of Michael, his shadowself. He has a ghostly ethereal character to him. When Michael disappears for a week (conducting his affair) Paul leaves town and ’sleeps on the grass and eats fruit for breakfast’. When Michael reappears so does Paul. When one goads the other, the other always responds ready for a fight. When Michael falls ill with a fever (at the climax of the novel) so too does Paul. Michael never attends lectures, but Paul does. And the greatest hint, when Michael resolves to commit suicide he decides he can only do so after killing Paul. In the end, Michael storms to Pauls apartment, wherein is the mythical ‘Helen’ a character about whom we know nothing about, other than she is the love of both of them. Helen and Paul are seen catching the streetcar and leaving town. This scene witnessed by Arthur, Leo and Julius concludes the novel, and they like the reader are left uncertain who the man is, Michael or Paul? The shrew observer Julius, earlier concludes that Paul must be Michaels brother, so we can assume some physical resemblance between the two.
In conclusion I see that the book is much deeper than many critics give it credit for. Yes it is poor in comparison to his other works, but it is meant to be, it is an existential biography in which Kerouac embarks on a sincere quest to find his own voice.
Michael, the artist-man, wants to achieve literary perfection, Paul his shadowself mocks and scorns his efforts, such perfection cannot be achieved by affecting the habits and manners of great artists, it can only be found in self-discovery. The search for truth can only be resolved by being true to oneself. Michael and Paul are meant to be the same character, shadows of each other, Michael and Paul are Jack Kerouac. Their struggles are his struggles. This work is the chronicle of his existential journey. It is through this existential journey, through writing this book, that Kerouac can begin to find his true voice. Jack Kerouac is Orpheus Emerged, and once he has found himself the mature writer, the writer for whom the critics are full of praise, can finally emerge.
Taking no more than two hours, its an easy read. But (and it took me a long period of contemplation) you may feel as though you have witnessed nothing of any import. I cannot recommend this book on its own merit. But can recommend it as a source for contemplative guidance in the existential sense. Michael and Paul remind me very much of me at the same age.
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