Nietzsche on Nihilism & the Death of God (Ken Gemes)

In this first talk, Ken Gemes introduces Nietzsche as the philosopher of the death of God. Nietzsche claims that we have not yet fully understood the ramifications of the modern rejection of belief in God. Giving up the belief in God undermines all our values, though many cling to those values in the absence of God or of any other justificatory basis for those values. When we truly appreciate the meaning of the death of God, we will, says Nietzsche, lapse into nihilism; the inability to find any foundation for values and meaning in the world. This Nietzsche presciently predicts as the future of Europe for the next two hundred years. Nietzsche does not endorse nihilism but seeks to move beyond it to a new affirmation of this world, the one and only world. But what does Nietzsche mean exactly by nihilism? This is discussed in the talk.
The next lecture by Ken Gemes on Nietzsche: • Nietzsche on the Value...
This is a re-upload from the other channel. Note, the audio has been slightly improved.
More Nietzsche: • Nietzsche
00:00 Talk
31:42 Q&A
#philosophy #nietzsche #nihilism

[@SeekerAppleSwordSerpent]

This is great. Thanks for sharing!

[@LuigiSimoncini]

Great lecture, thanks for the upload

[@alpagator1372]

29:50 How on earth can anyone who's read any amount of Nietzsche conclude that he is an endorser of nihilism? Perhaps as a stepping stone and a temporary state on the path to new values, but it's extremely clear that nihilism is not the end goal.

[@117Industries]

Continued references to the need for ‘free spirits’ who’d become the gardeners of the world’s soils, making it rich for the growth of some as of yet unseen ‘Great Man’, who would himself become the architect of the future and a new kind of human, was perhaps the central point in ‘Beyond Good and Evil’ and ‘The Will to Power’. So aye, nihilism is a necessary collective death preceding the rising phoenix- the inevitable noble climb of humanity towards its collective future on further soils, with sufficient grandeur, and grandiosity, to toil those soils for the seeds of yet unseen future philosophies and arts. It’s all part of the great plan of humanity: to overcome and transcend itself, and to become human; all *too* human, more than human, and beyond.

[@tastytoast4576]

37:00 answers ur point, it is a necessary stepping stone

[@jordanoconnor4954]

How on earth can anyone who's had this question not have the patience to finish the the lecture and recieve the answer

[@wallacecollect]

Gemes says that Nietzsche wants us - after we have passed through nihilism - to "create strong values and back those values up with our drives", so that we can create great works of art and philosophy. Of course, Nietzsche wants to go far beyond that towards a world-historical moment comparable to the arrival of Dionysos in ancient Greece, the founding of Rome of the founding of the Church, or the Renaissance. The point is that it is only in such world historical moments that great art and philosophy is possible.

[@Richie.G.String]

WRONG! Nietzsche understood the flaws underlying the documented thoughts of those old europeans.

[@Richie.G.String]

There's no thing such as a world historical moment because nobody can define what that even means. Perhaps you can? I doubt it. Great art, which is in the mind of the observer, can occur at any random time. The same with regards to philosophy.

[@wallacecollect]

@@Richie.G.String Who said they were "flawless"? Strawman argument. Nietzsche also saw the Laws of Manu [Indian, not European] in the same light. So not all "old europeans"

[@wallacecollect]

@@Richie.G.String Nietizsche could define it & he did. How many times have we heard this Nihilistic "no such thing" from you? Nietzsche clearly defined those world historical moments, whether they be Manu in India, Heraclitus in Greece, Caesar in Rome, Raphael in the Renaissance or Napoleon in the 19th century. Indeed, the moment of his own Zarathustra!

[@xbuzzkingx]

I feel that Nietzsche was misunderstood and overlooked regarding the hopeless and existential meaningless of life in General that Society would feel as a whole. I think the Jungian Concept of the Collective Unconscious is viewed as a mythical fantasy by a majority of the modern world, but Nietzsche was trying to explain the Collective Unconscious Nihilism we would feel. As humanity, we must get thru Nihilism as a Collective Unconscious.

[@stevenjbeto]

We evolved in a small social system, a less differentiated society. An overarching authority seems required to maintain a large population with diverse values. That external, overarching authority creates a bond of ‘agree to disagree’. What is the divide and conquer driving mechanism and for what purpose? Can individual exist without family and some form of society? Can a planet exist outside of the solar system; the solar system outside of galaxy; galaxy without the overarching effect of the singularity? When you split the atom there is only death.

[@gabrielpadilla7839]

would sublimation be some form of meta programming? the man that can make himself would be like a computer that rewrites its own code it seems to me...

[@kevinbeck8836]

I see sublimation as the redirection of drives towards another outcome. An example may be an artist has sexual desire for another. Instead of satisfying those drives through sex, the artist draws or paints their desired. The drive has been sublimated into art. That is how I conceive of it, anyway

[@mandys1505]

did he think that zen buddhism was in error with its moral precepts? zen has much nihilism but perhaps is spoiled by morality...

[@theodoricsmith577]

To point I think. Spoiled by morality?

[@AlbertAlbertB.]

Buddhism nihilistic? Nihilism is abyss, while buddhism tries to find the light, does it not?

[@mandys1505]

@@AlbertAlbertB. its at peace with meaninglessness, if you would equate the two... i guess there's mant types of nihilism in philosophy; i'd like to learn more

[@mandys1505]

@@theodoricsmith577 yes~ because morality fails to see the value in the so-called bad or evil ...and i think this is a dire mistake ( when people label something as evil and then ignore it or shun it; to me, this is losing out on all of the subtleties of life... its perceiving the world in blocks and not layers and intertwining of things... much like in samuel beckett's writing; it seems that zen in books points to that, and does appreciate it, even moreso than most; but- the taking of the precepts is very black and white, in delineating moral behaviors amd etc. ) its why i didnt take the precepts...

[@mandys1505]

[ nihilsim to me, would be, to accept all things, both light and dark, because zen /chan buddhism goes beyind duality ]

[@hanskung3278]

Stop! I never feel "regret" when I drink coffee nir do I feel dissatisfied when I drink it, quite the opposite.

[@hanskung3278]

So frustration and despair are the same? Leave it to philosophers to complicate something that is not complicated.

[@maghrebforever2012]

dumbest question of the decade @ 39:25. Yikes

[@MegaSudjai]

Y'know that as soon as "capitalism" is mentioned that that person is a reductive post-modernist and not only misinterprets Nietzsche but actually inverts what Nietzsche stresses to avoid to suit their own pathology of weakness as a "good".

[@bhaskarbhattacharya9510]

What I have understood by the rich scriptures like The Gita, Veda, Purana and Upanishads actually the other religions haven't been contemplated into the drive of asking God in the conversational manner like done between Prahalad ( the devotee of Vishnu and Yama or the God of death 🙏🙏

[@alwaysgreatusa223]

Are you sure those values have no basis other than God ? Like species, values survive in the struggle for existence, so the mere fact that a value has survived for millenniums attests to its importance for life. Jesus did not invent compassion, he sacrificed himself as a testament to it !

[@godotkrull579]

ähä

[@bronsomccor2642]

I'm kinda of nihilistic even as a kid never had meaning or cared about life so I can relate to Nihilism the most then any other philosophy

[@AlbertAlbertB.]

Poor man

[@fenlexer]

This guy sounds like a gay science

[@tti2Lee]

The Worst reading of Nietzsche I’ve heard; quite remarkable how a “professor” got it so absurdly wrong

[@bryanutility9609]

This is a great reading on Nietzsche, especially the part about the herd remaining Christian.

[@JSwift-jq3wn]

Unless you have read Schopenhauer and Freud you cannot understand the meanderings of an infantile man in history of the Western Civilization.

[@AlbertAlbertB.]

Did you just call Nietzsche an infantile man?