The Life & Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche

The Life & Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche

Philosophy Class Essay Born: 1844. Rocken, Germany Died: 1900. Weimar,

Germany Major Works: The Gay Science (1882), Thus Spoke Zarathustra

(1883-1885), Beyond Good & Evil (1886), On the Genealogy of Morals (1887),

MAJOR IDEAS

Self deception is a particularly destructive characteristic of

West Culture. Life is The Will To Power; our natural desire is to

dominate and reshape the world to fit our own preferences and assert our

personal strength to the fullest degree possible. Struggle, through which

individuals achieve a degree of power commensurate with their abilities,

is the basic fact of human existence. Ideals of human equality perpetuate

mediocrity -- a truth that has been distorted and concealed by modern

value systems. Christian morality, which identifies goodness with meekness

and servility is the prime culprit in creating a cultural climate that

thwarts the drive for excellence and self realization God is dead; a new

era of human creativity and achievement is at hand.

-- Great Thinkers In The Western World. By: Ian P. McGreal, 1992

PREFACE

Much information is available on Mr. Friedrich Nietzsche, including many

books that he wrote himself, during his philosophical career. I took this

as a good sign I would find a fountain of enlightened material produced by

the man. I've had to go through a bit of my own philosophical meditations

to put my own value judgements aside, and truly look for the contributions

Nietzsche gave to philosophy. Much of my understanding came only after I

had a grasp of Neitzsche's history; therefore, I encourage you to read-up

on his history before diving into his philosophy (see Appendix I). The

modern Westerner might disagree with every aspect of his philosophy, but

there are many things one must unfortunately admit are true (only if you

put your morality aside). So, from here, I will present his

contributions to philosophy, and do my best to delete my own opinions,

other than to say that he was not the chosen topic of this paper out of

any admiration.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE

Sometimes philosophy is called "timeless," implying that it's lessons are

of value to any generation. This may be hard to see in Nietzsche's work;

but, we are assured that it was appropriate thought for his time. However,

even Nietzsche's critics admit that his words hold an undeniable truth, as

hard as it is to accept. Perhaps this is why his work is timeless, and

has survived 150 years in print.