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Friedrich Nietzsche

Nietzsche Quote “That which does not kill us makes us stronger.”

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Nietzsche Reading Notes

Perhaps the most cited philosopher in the transhumanist discussion is the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. In

Thus Spoke Zarathustra Nietzsche presents his image of the Übermensch, which philosophers translate as “overman” or

“superman” or “superhuman.”

This book has a narrative form, and it is difficult to follow. At the center of the work is a protagonist named Zarathustra.

Zarathustra is a philosopher who lives in a cave on a mountain close to the sun. He also seems to be a great individual,

and has some of the features of Aristotle’s superhuman and Emerson’s godlike man. He lives beyond the realm of the

state, and he seems to be not only physically above humanity (on his mountain), but he is also intellectually above

humanity. Zarathustra also identifies himself as being his own law, and here clearly Nietzsche is using either Aristotle or

Emerson or both. Zarathustra says: “I am a law only for my kind” (Nietzsche, Zarathustra, 285). Zarathustra also says:

“Can you give yourself your own evil and your own good and hang your own will over yourself as a law? Can you be your own judge and avenger of your law? Terrible is it to be alone with the judge and avenger of one’s own law” (Nietzsche, Zarathustra, 63).

Zarathustra seems to be more like Emerson’s godlike man than Aristotle’s superhuman because he is the teacher of the

superhuman, rather than the superhuman himself, but perhaps either interpretation can be developed. Nietzsche also

draws upon Plato in developing the character of Zarathustra. Zarathustra lives beyond the state, like Aristotle’s

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superhuman, but he lives in a cave and gazes at the sun, and as many of you will already note, the imagery of the cave

and the sun is very important in the history of philosophy. Plato in the Republic famously tells the allegory of the cave,

with prisoners in the underground cave, and a philosopher who escapes and journeys to the sun. Dante retells that

allegory with his imagery of the cave of Hell and the journey toward the sun in his Comedy. Now Nietzsche retells that

story beginning with a philosopher close to the sun, but living in the cave, and making a journey to the people to teach

humanity the meaning of its very nature in the achievement of the superhuman. In the following passages, Zarathustra

identifies himself as the teacher of humanity and humanity, as on the way to the superhumanity:

“I teach you the overman. Man is something that shall be overcome. What have you done to overcome him.

“All beings so far have created something beyond themselves; and do you want to be the ebb of this great flood and even go back to the beasts rather than overcome man?” (12)

“I will teach men the meaning of their existence—the overman, the lightning out of the dark cloud of man.” (21)

“Behold, I teach you the overman: he is this lightning, he is this frenzy.” (14)

“Behold, I am a herald of the lightning and a heavy drop from the cloud; but this lightning is called overman.” (16)

The overman is the meaning of the earth.” (13)

This educational theme is essential to understanding the Prologue of Zarathustra, and Zarathustra as a whole.

Zarathustra descends his mountain and comes to humanity to teach humanity that its true nature lies in a higher form.

Zarathustra teaches humanity that it is an incomplete species. Humanity is only partly developed, even though

humanity takes itself to be at its end, and its goal. Zarathustra explains to humanity that humanity is suspended

between two ends, a beginning and a goal. Zarathustra uses some analogies to explain this middle stage. Humanity is a

bridge, says Zarathustra, to another and higher form of being. Humanity is a rope, says Zarathustra, suspended

between two ends, the beasts and the superhuman. Humanity is a means to an end, not an end in itself.

Humanity is developing toward this superhuman condition, but it requires an act of will to overcome a basic limitation.

That basic limitation that faces humanity is the condition of the last man. The last man, as Zarathustra defines him, is

the condition of humanity in the modern world, after so much history, and before so much development toward the

superhuman condition. Zarathustra portrays the last man condition as a softening of the spirit. The last men of the

world desire to increase their pleasure by increasing the quantity and quality of their creature comforts. They no longer

desire to overcome their limitations, and they do not have in view their goal of the superhuman. They only want to relax

and enjoy the pleasures of satiation. They are effectively lazy and exhausted and satisfied in their laziness and

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exhaustion. They do not want a condition beyond what they have achieved in history. Zarathustra sees this condition as

one of two paths into the future. Humanity can stay on this path of the last man, and continue to develop the quantity

and quality of its creature comforts and forms of entertainment, or humanity can change its course of direction:

humanity can enter onto the higher path toward the superhuman. This is a more difficult path. It requires more

discipline and strength of mind.

It is important to note that Zarathustra does not say what this higher path looks like. We do not really get a picture of

the superhuman from Nietzsche in Zarathustra, which makes discussing the idea of the superhuman somewhat

difficult. The picture of the last man seems to be clear enough: he is a kind of couch potato and he does not identify

himself with anything greater than physical enjoyment. But the greater path seems to be as vague as the lesser path is

clear. Perhaps, however, there is a way in which to understand this greater path, as Nietzsche imagines it, but that way

will require some historical interpretation. By drawing on Aristotle, Dante, and Emerson, a view of the superhuman, as

Nietzsche might imagine it, steadily comes into view. There seems to be little question that Nietzsche draws his

imagery of the superhuman at least partly from Aristotle, given that Aristotle develops a major philosophical analysis of

the superhuman already in the ancient world. Perhaps for Nietzsche, as for Aristotle, the superhuman would be an

individual who is virtually unrecognizably human, a law unto himself, a natural king, a natural hermit, and exceedingly

intelligent and powerful in mind. Perhaps too the superhuman would be like the transhumanized individual in Dante,

and Nietzsche in Zarathustra even seems to draw on Dante’s imagery in the Commedia. Zarathustra says:

“And that is the great noon when man stands in the middle of his way between beast and overman and celebrates his way to the evening as his highest hope: for it is the way to a new morning” (Nietzsche, Zarathustra, 78).

Dante portrays the Pilgrim as in the middle of his own way (his own life), and in the middle of his way toward

transhumanization, and he implies that humanity is in the middle of its way from its ancient past to its transhumanized

future. Dante also portrays the process of transhumanization as taking place at noon, and as a metamorphosis.

Nietzsche also portrays humanity in the middle of its way, and becoming superhuman at noon, and he portrays

humanity as metamorphosing as well in the section following the Prologue, namely, “The Three Metamorphoses.”

Perhaps Nietzsche is really drawing his imagery for Zarathustra from Dante’s Commedia, and portraying humanity as

transhumanizing in the distant future. If that is the case, then the imagery of transhumanization as a metamorphosis of

the Pilgrim into a superhuman with new sensory and intellectual powers, and even the powers of flight, might be used

to fill out what Nietzsche has in mind. Emerson’s philosophy may also be used to explain what Nietzsche has in mind

with the superhuman, considering that Nietzsche identifies Emerson as a great influence on his thought. One of the

many ways in which that influence appears in Nietzsche regards the idea of self-overcoming. Emerson portrays

humanity as continuously overcoming itself toward the superhuman and then beyond the superhuman. Nietzsche in his

section in Zarathustra entitled “On Self-Overcoming” draws on Emerson for this view, with the implication that even if

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humanity achieves the superhuman (perhaps as Dante portrays it), still humanity in its superhuman condition will

continue to seek to overcome its limitations, whatever they may be for the superhuman condition.

“And life itself confided this secret to me: “Behold,” it said, “I am that which must always overcome itself. Indeed, you call it a will to procreate or a drive to an end, to something higher, farther, more manifold: but all this is one, and one secret.” (115)

Images:

Friedrich Neitzsche - http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-

JcXyinFRqYw/VZnpxQsITFI/AAAAAAAAYcc/cK27C2DvsUE/s1600/1%252BNietzsche%252C%252BFriedrich%252B-

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Zarathustra Painting by Caspar David Friedrich - http://www.tuttartpitturasculturapoesiamusica.com/2012/09/il-canto-

della-notte-cosi-parlo.html

Fredrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra -

http://static1.squarespace.com/static/535746bae4b049723f707ddf/t/53632dd8e4b0b6889d1b5c8a/1399008742739/Thus+S

poke+Zarathustra

Übermensch - http://static.highexistence.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Nietzsche.png