Beyond Good and Evil 11-19

(Originally written August 7, 2007 in Book 16)

Beyond Good & Evil
Friedrich Nietzsche

11

Kant asked, "How are synthetic judgments a priori possible" and he replied by "virtue of a faculty".

His answer is circular and equivalent to "How does opium induce sleep? By a faculty of sleepiness"/

The question we ought to ask is "why is belief in such judgments necessary?" (Nietzsche, 209).

These judgments can be false but belief in them as true is necessary as a perspective for life.

12

We must rid ourselves of atomism especially soul atomism and the belief in the indestructible, indivisible and eternal soul.

But we need not throw out the soul entirely. We can use a "moral soul" hypothesis.

13

All living things seek first and foremost to discharge its strength.

"Life itself is will to power" (Nietzsche, 211).

Self-preservation is only a frequent result of the will to power.

14

Physics is merely an interpretation and exegesis of the world to suit us, not a world-explanation.

15

Our sense organs cannot be phenomena in physiology otherwise we would be left with the absurd thought that:
1) the world is a product of our organs
2) our body is part of the world
3) our organs are a product of our body
4) our organs are products of our organs
5) Our organs are self-caused

(which is absurd)

16

We should free ourselves of the seduction of words and phrases like, "I think" (Descartes), "I will" (Schopenhauer), "immediate certainty", "absolute knowledge", and "the thing itself" because they involve a contradiction in adjecto (contradiction between the noun and the adjective).

17

We cannot say "I think" because a thought comes when it wishes not when I wish it.

We cannot say "it thinks" because this involves interpretation of the process, not the process itself.

18

Refutations of theories add charm to the theory and therefore, make it more appealing.

19

We speak of the will as if it is the most easily known thing to us, but willing is, above all else, something complicated.

The will is a complex of thinking and sensation. It is also an affect. It is the affect of command.