SOCCIO ARCHETYPES OF WISDOM
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Last printed 3/14/2023 11:35:00 AM
CHAPTER 16
THE ANTI-PHILOSOPHER: FRIEDRICH
NIETZSCHE
Chapter 16 Key Concepts
Nietzsche saw himself as the first to recognize a profound
sickness at the core of modernity. Modernity refers to the
Influenced by Schopenhauer s pessimism, Nietzsche
concluded that life itself is an irrational, purposeless striving
for a pointless existence. Nietzsche disagreed with
Schopenhauer in a fundamental way, however, insisting that
Nietzschean perspectivism, the contention that every
view is only one among many possible interpretations, rejects
the possibility of a neutral stance or perspectiveless
According to Nietzsche, all life is governed by the will to
power. This will to power is often disguised as influencing,
SOCCIO ARCHETYPES OF WISDOM
Nietzsche accuses modern Western culture of being
moralistic, a form of hypocrisy that resembles what Freudian
psychologists refer to as a reaction formation, the name of the
Nietzsche claimed that he discovered the death of God:
the idea of God had lost its full creative force, its full power,
According to Nietzsche, the death of God leads to
nihilism, the belief that the universe lacks meaning and
purpose and that moral, social, and political values are
creative interpretations; they reflect their subjective origins
because without God, there is no objective base for values.
Slave morality is a distortion of the will to power in
which the characteristics of the inferior type are praised as
Master morality is an aesthetic-heroic code of honor. The
overman looks only to him- or herself for value defined in
SOCCIO ARCHETYPES OF WISDOM
According to Nietzsche, the death of God provides a
glorious opportunity for the fearless perfect type, the more-
than-human overman. The overman is a higher type that
Through amor fati (the love of fate) the overman
embraces his particular life with delight that everything is
exactly as and what it is.
Chapter 16 Teaching Tips
1. Address Nietzsche s controversial reputation directly and
early. Discuss the importance of free inquiry to the search for
2. Discuss Schopenhauer s pessimistic conclusion that every
satisfied desire merely produces ten new unsatisfied desires
to our perpetual ultimate disappointment. A good example of
3. Refer to the passage from the Stefan Zweig box (page 453)
to illustrate Nietzsche s personal struggle, his own will to
4. The Philosophical Queries on pages 454 and 456 make
excellent starting points for a class discussion of
460). Pick your favorite and help students understand the
difference between presenting moral arguments and being
6. When discussing the idea that God is dead, point out that
a central aspect of Nietzsche s insight might be valid even for
7. For a very powerful effect, read aloud from the This Is
My Morning! box on page 452. Alert students to the ominous
opening hum/rumble and ascending theme of Strauss s
Thus Spoke Zarathustra musical tone poem (symphony). Then
8. Discuss the box An Iconoclast Looks at Education on
page 468 from the standpoint of contemporary attitudes
toward education. Raise the issue of what it means to say that
the decline of a culture can be attributed to the fact that
higher education is no longer a privilege but a right. Is it
inevitable that as education is widespread, it becomes
mediocre?
9. Ernest Hemingway s story The Short, Happy Life of
Francis Macomber has a decidedly existential theme. Assign
10. Discuss current democratic and collaborative trends
in education as a way to generate a discussion of
11. Refer students to the photo on page 449. Have them assess
Nietzsche s barb that Another century of readers and the
12. Use the For Deeper Consideration on page 466 to initiate a
serious discussion of the death of God, culturally and
13. Refer to the photo on page 462 as a prompt for a
discussion about Nietzsche s prediction that Western culture
14. Nietzsche s appropriation by Hitler s Nazis and today s
disparate Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists leads some
observers to assume that Nietzsche himself had fascist