SemperFiDawg
Political Forum Arbiter of Truth (And Lies Too)
I found this book review thought provoking. Sounds like a good, informative book.
From Darwin to Nietzsche to Hitler
This is the first of a 2-part series on Darwin’s impact on philosophy and politics.
In today's piece, I investigate how Darwin influenced the existentialist philosopher Frederic Nietzsche, and how Darwin and Nietzsche together influenced the German dictator Adolph Hitler, whose crimes against humanity include World War II and the Holocaust.
Some experts prefer to link Darwin and Hitler directly - and that connection can certainly be made. However, I also want to discuss the role of Nietzsche – because it was Nietzsche (not Darwin) who built evolutionary theory into a moral philosophy – a philosophy that not only shaped Hitler, but also crystallized the thinking of many Europeans in the early 20th century.
“Darwin’s evolutionary theory had an uncomparable impact on European culture. After Darwin, the fact of evolution could no longer be denied, and the popular imagination, long prepared for such a theory, extended it to ever new fields.” – The Politics of Cultural Despair: A Study in the Rise of the German Ideology
One of those fields was philosophy. Frederic Nietzsche, arguably the most famous and controversial philosopher of the past 150 years, used Darwinism as the foundation of his moral system.
“'The total nature of the world,’ Nietzsche wrote in Die frohliche Wissenschaft, ‘is. . . to all eternity chaos,’ and this thought, basic to his philosophy, arose directly from his interpretation of Darwin.” - From Nietzsche: The Man and His Philosophy
“The scientist Charles Darwin had awakened the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche from his dogmatic slumber by the realization that, throughout organic history, no species is immutable (including humans). Pervasive change replaced eternal fixity.
"Going beyond Darwin, the great German thinker offered an interpretation of dynamic nature that considered both the philosophical implications and theological consequences of taking the factual theory of biological evolution seriously.
"Nietzsche was not previously oblivious to either geological time or the paleontological record. He accepted the most controversial ramification of Darwin’s theory: humankind had evolved from remote apelike ancestors, in a completely naturalistic way, through a process of chance and necessity (fortuitous random variations appearing in, and inevitable natural selection acting on, individuals within a changing environment).
"Even the mental faculties of human beings, including love and reason, were acquired during the course of evolutionary ascent from earlier primate forms.
"For Nietzsche, evolution is the correct explanation for organic history but it results in a disastrous picture of reality, since evolution (as he saw it) has far-reaching truths for both scientific cosmology and philosophical anthropology: God is no longer necessary to account for either the existence of this universe or the emergence of our human species from prehistoric animals. In fact, this philosopher held that Darwinian evolution led to a collapse of all traditional values, because both objective meaning and spiritual purpose had vanished from interpretations of reality (and consequently, there can be no fixed or certain morality).” -Darwin, Nietzche, and Evolution
Nietzsche believed that the “collapse of all values” caused by Darwinism was ominous for mankind…
In his book, On the Use and Abuse of History for Life, Nietzsche anguished over the consequences he foresaw:
"If the doctrines of sovereign Becoming, of the liquidity of all...species, of the lack of any cardinal distinction between man and animal -- doctrines which I consider true but deadly -- are foisted on people for another generation with the frenzied instruction which is now customary, then it should take no one by surprise if people destroy themselves in egotistical trifles and misery, ossifying themselves in their self-absorption, initially falling apart and ceasing to be a people.
Then, in place of this condition, perhaps systems of individual egotism, alliances for the systematic larcenous exploitation of those non-members of the alliance and similar creations of utilitarian nastiness will step forward onto the future scene."
Nietzsche tried to stave off this condition by creating a new philosophic system.
"Nietzsche knew that the previous philosophical systems from Plato and Aristotle to Kant and Hegel were inadequate to deal with the crisis of evolution. As a result, a totally new philosophy of the world was now required." -Darwin, Nietzche, and Evolution
“In the early 1880s, when he wrote Thus Spake Zarathustra, Nietzsche arrived at a conception of human life and possibility – and with it, of value and meaning – that he believed could overcome the Schopenhauerian pessimism and nihilism that he saw as outcomes of the collapse of traditional modes of religious and philosophical interpretation. He prophesied a period of nihilism in the aftermath of their decline and fall; but this prospect deeply distressed him. He was convinced of the untenability of the 'God hypothesis,' and indeed of all the religious and metaphysical interpretations of the world and ourselves; and yet he was well aware that the very possibility of the affirmation of life was at stake, and required more than the mere abandonment of all such “lies” and “fictions”. He took the basic challenge of philosophy now to be to reinterpret life and the world along more tenable lines that would also overcome nihilism.” - Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy
Nietzche’s “basic challenge” is quite similar to Brian’s challenge in The Mustard Seed.
In Chapter 2 of The Mustard Seed, Brian describes his fear of having to choose between truth and happiness…he wishes to have both, but – given what he's been told about the world - it seems like a contradiction… thus, Brian would be sympathetic to Nietzsche’s dilemma…so would Heather Manning, for that matter…indeed, Heather – like Nietzche – wants to “reinterpret life” to “overcome nihilism.” Thus, she created of “Spiritual Rationalism.”
But Nietzche – unlike Heather Manning – was a prisoner of his Darwinian outlook.
"God is dead means that the idea of God can no longer provide values. With the sole source of values no longer capable of providing those values, there is a real danger of nihilism….
Nietzsche posited the Übermensch as a goal for humanity to set for itself in his 1883 book Thus Spoke Zarathustra…
Zarathustra presents the Übermensch as the creator of new values. In this way, it appears as a solution to the problem of the death of God and nihilism. Because the Übermensch acts to create new values within the moral vacuum of nihilism, there is nothing that this creative act would not justify. Alternatively, in the absence of this creation, there are no grounds upon which to criticize or justify any action, including the particular values created and the means by which they are promulgated.
Whereas Nietzsche diagnosed the Christian value system as a reaction against life and hence destructive in a sense, the new values which the Übermensch will be responsible for will be life-affirming and creative…
Zarathustra first announces the Übermensch as a goal humanity can set for itself. All human life would be given meaning by how it advanced a new generation of human beings. The aspiration of a woman would be to give birth to an Übermensch, for example; her relationships with men would be judged by this standard.
Some commentators associate the Übermensch with a program of eugenics. This is most pronounced when considered in the aspect of a goal that humanity sets for itself. -Wikipedia
In many ways, the Ubermensch sounds innocuous enough – even admirable – but a closer reading of Nietzsche's text – reveals a more disturbing aspect to his creation.
“The essential characteristic of a good and healthy aristocracy” argues Nietzsche, is that it “accepts with a good conscience the sacrifice of untold human beings who, for its sake, must be reduced and lowered to incomplete human beings, to slaves, to instruments.” The “fundamental faith” of the aristocracy, then, is that “society” exists for them, for their sake, so that all the lesser types who serve them in society exist “only as the foundation and scaffolding on which a choice type of being is able to raise itself to its higher task and to a higher state of being…”
A higher state of being, the übermensch, who cares nothing for those upon whom he steps to go up the evolutionary slope -- that is Nietzsche’s goal…
Nietzsche thought we were slipping back down the evolutionary slope to the “last man…and the only thing that could drive upwards, was a great conflict. Writing before World War I…he believed the “‘European problem’” could be solved by “the cultivation of a new caste that will rule Europe.”
To revive Europe, a great danger must present itself, thought Nietzsche, one that calls forth once again the desire to fight and conquer:
“I mean such an increase in the menace of Russia [for example] that Europe would have to resolve to become menacing, too, namely, to acquire one will by means of a new caste that would rule Europe, a long, terrible will of its own that would be able to cast its goals millennia hence -- so that the long-drawn-out comedy of its many splinter states as well as its dynastic and democratic splinter wills would come to an end. The time for petty politics is over: the very next century will bring the fight for the dominion of the earth -- the compulsion to large-scale politics.”
One cannot help but hear the marching boots of the Third Reich - Darwin, Nietzsche, and Hitler: Evolution of the Ubermensch
From Darwin to Nietzsche to Hitler
This is the first of a 2-part series on Darwin’s impact on philosophy and politics.
In today's piece, I investigate how Darwin influenced the existentialist philosopher Frederic Nietzsche, and how Darwin and Nietzsche together influenced the German dictator Adolph Hitler, whose crimes against humanity include World War II and the Holocaust.
Some experts prefer to link Darwin and Hitler directly - and that connection can certainly be made. However, I also want to discuss the role of Nietzsche – because it was Nietzsche (not Darwin) who built evolutionary theory into a moral philosophy – a philosophy that not only shaped Hitler, but also crystallized the thinking of many Europeans in the early 20th century.
“Darwin’s evolutionary theory had an uncomparable impact on European culture. After Darwin, the fact of evolution could no longer be denied, and the popular imagination, long prepared for such a theory, extended it to ever new fields.” – The Politics of Cultural Despair: A Study in the Rise of the German Ideology
One of those fields was philosophy. Frederic Nietzsche, arguably the most famous and controversial philosopher of the past 150 years, used Darwinism as the foundation of his moral system.
“'The total nature of the world,’ Nietzsche wrote in Die frohliche Wissenschaft, ‘is. . . to all eternity chaos,’ and this thought, basic to his philosophy, arose directly from his interpretation of Darwin.” - From Nietzsche: The Man and His Philosophy
“The scientist Charles Darwin had awakened the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche from his dogmatic slumber by the realization that, throughout organic history, no species is immutable (including humans). Pervasive change replaced eternal fixity.
"Going beyond Darwin, the great German thinker offered an interpretation of dynamic nature that considered both the philosophical implications and theological consequences of taking the factual theory of biological evolution seriously.
"Nietzsche was not previously oblivious to either geological time or the paleontological record. He accepted the most controversial ramification of Darwin’s theory: humankind had evolved from remote apelike ancestors, in a completely naturalistic way, through a process of chance and necessity (fortuitous random variations appearing in, and inevitable natural selection acting on, individuals within a changing environment).
"Even the mental faculties of human beings, including love and reason, were acquired during the course of evolutionary ascent from earlier primate forms.
"For Nietzsche, evolution is the correct explanation for organic history but it results in a disastrous picture of reality, since evolution (as he saw it) has far-reaching truths for both scientific cosmology and philosophical anthropology: God is no longer necessary to account for either the existence of this universe or the emergence of our human species from prehistoric animals. In fact, this philosopher held that Darwinian evolution led to a collapse of all traditional values, because both objective meaning and spiritual purpose had vanished from interpretations of reality (and consequently, there can be no fixed or certain morality).” -Darwin, Nietzche, and Evolution
Nietzsche believed that the “collapse of all values” caused by Darwinism was ominous for mankind…
In his book, On the Use and Abuse of History for Life, Nietzsche anguished over the consequences he foresaw:
"If the doctrines of sovereign Becoming, of the liquidity of all...species, of the lack of any cardinal distinction between man and animal -- doctrines which I consider true but deadly -- are foisted on people for another generation with the frenzied instruction which is now customary, then it should take no one by surprise if people destroy themselves in egotistical trifles and misery, ossifying themselves in their self-absorption, initially falling apart and ceasing to be a people.
Then, in place of this condition, perhaps systems of individual egotism, alliances for the systematic larcenous exploitation of those non-members of the alliance and similar creations of utilitarian nastiness will step forward onto the future scene."
Nietzsche tried to stave off this condition by creating a new philosophic system.
"Nietzsche knew that the previous philosophical systems from Plato and Aristotle to Kant and Hegel were inadequate to deal with the crisis of evolution. As a result, a totally new philosophy of the world was now required." -Darwin, Nietzche, and Evolution
“In the early 1880s, when he wrote Thus Spake Zarathustra, Nietzsche arrived at a conception of human life and possibility – and with it, of value and meaning – that he believed could overcome the Schopenhauerian pessimism and nihilism that he saw as outcomes of the collapse of traditional modes of religious and philosophical interpretation. He prophesied a period of nihilism in the aftermath of their decline and fall; but this prospect deeply distressed him. He was convinced of the untenability of the 'God hypothesis,' and indeed of all the religious and metaphysical interpretations of the world and ourselves; and yet he was well aware that the very possibility of the affirmation of life was at stake, and required more than the mere abandonment of all such “lies” and “fictions”. He took the basic challenge of philosophy now to be to reinterpret life and the world along more tenable lines that would also overcome nihilism.” - Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy
Nietzche’s “basic challenge” is quite similar to Brian’s challenge in The Mustard Seed.
In Chapter 2 of The Mustard Seed, Brian describes his fear of having to choose between truth and happiness…he wishes to have both, but – given what he's been told about the world - it seems like a contradiction… thus, Brian would be sympathetic to Nietzsche’s dilemma…so would Heather Manning, for that matter…indeed, Heather – like Nietzche – wants to “reinterpret life” to “overcome nihilism.” Thus, she created of “Spiritual Rationalism.”
But Nietzche – unlike Heather Manning – was a prisoner of his Darwinian outlook.
"God is dead means that the idea of God can no longer provide values. With the sole source of values no longer capable of providing those values, there is a real danger of nihilism….
Nietzsche posited the Übermensch as a goal for humanity to set for itself in his 1883 book Thus Spoke Zarathustra…
Zarathustra presents the Übermensch as the creator of new values. In this way, it appears as a solution to the problem of the death of God and nihilism. Because the Übermensch acts to create new values within the moral vacuum of nihilism, there is nothing that this creative act would not justify. Alternatively, in the absence of this creation, there are no grounds upon which to criticize or justify any action, including the particular values created and the means by which they are promulgated.
Whereas Nietzsche diagnosed the Christian value system as a reaction against life and hence destructive in a sense, the new values which the Übermensch will be responsible for will be life-affirming and creative…
Zarathustra first announces the Übermensch as a goal humanity can set for itself. All human life would be given meaning by how it advanced a new generation of human beings. The aspiration of a woman would be to give birth to an Übermensch, for example; her relationships with men would be judged by this standard.
Some commentators associate the Übermensch with a program of eugenics. This is most pronounced when considered in the aspect of a goal that humanity sets for itself. -Wikipedia
In many ways, the Ubermensch sounds innocuous enough – even admirable – but a closer reading of Nietzsche's text – reveals a more disturbing aspect to his creation.
“The essential characteristic of a good and healthy aristocracy” argues Nietzsche, is that it “accepts with a good conscience the sacrifice of untold human beings who, for its sake, must be reduced and lowered to incomplete human beings, to slaves, to instruments.” The “fundamental faith” of the aristocracy, then, is that “society” exists for them, for their sake, so that all the lesser types who serve them in society exist “only as the foundation and scaffolding on which a choice type of being is able to raise itself to its higher task and to a higher state of being…”
A higher state of being, the übermensch, who cares nothing for those upon whom he steps to go up the evolutionary slope -- that is Nietzsche’s goal…
Nietzsche thought we were slipping back down the evolutionary slope to the “last man…and the only thing that could drive upwards, was a great conflict. Writing before World War I…he believed the “‘European problem’” could be solved by “the cultivation of a new caste that will rule Europe.”
To revive Europe, a great danger must present itself, thought Nietzsche, one that calls forth once again the desire to fight and conquer:
“I mean such an increase in the menace of Russia [for example] that Europe would have to resolve to become menacing, too, namely, to acquire one will by means of a new caste that would rule Europe, a long, terrible will of its own that would be able to cast its goals millennia hence -- so that the long-drawn-out comedy of its many splinter states as well as its dynastic and democratic splinter wills would come to an end. The time for petty politics is over: the very next century will bring the fight for the dominion of the earth -- the compulsion to large-scale politics.”
One cannot help but hear the marching boots of the Third Reich - Darwin, Nietzsche, and Hitler: Evolution of the Ubermensch
