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Nietzsche is Not a Determinist

JamesH
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Posted 08/06/05 - 06:04 PM: Subject: Nietzsche is Not a Determinist	#1
I have written a chapter of my dissertation discussing Nietzsche's position on the notion of 'free will' and would like to hear other people's opinions on this subject. (I am especially interested in arguments backed up by references, for obvious reasons, but don't consider that a requirement.) Philippa Foot in her article on 'Nietzsche's Immoralism' in 'Nietzsche, Genealogy, Morality' argues that Nietzsche's abandoning of 'free will' and his emphasis on psychophysiological factors in the behaviour of humans puts him into the determinist camp. She does not think that this entitles Nietzsche to criticize morality because even if determinism were true it would not stop men from being able to think about behaviour in moral terms. But, following Schacht ('Nietzsche') I noted that Nietzsche also criticizes the crude determinist notion of 'unfreedom of the will' and so should not be considered a determinist. Instead he should be considered as attempting to transform the issue by noting that there are only 'strong' and 'weak' wills. Herd morality he tells us is the will to power of the weak willed attempting to control the strong. What do you think about Nietzsche's position on 'freedom of the will'? Is he a determinist? And how does his position support or weaken his argument against morality? All comments welcome.

zjerome
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Posted 07/03/09 - 09:52 AM:	#2
This is the great thing about N. He argues two sides of the same argument a lot. And I think that is his basic goal. He wants people to think for themselves. I don't think he abandons free will in The Genealogy of Morals, I think he shows that people don't always realize they have it. They get stuck in the morality of the time, which if you look at history is sometimes ignorant. I think the herd morality thing is a little off too. I feel he talks about the herd as the weakest of creatures. The ones that don't realize they aren't thinking for themselves....the non "creators". I don't think he argues against morality, i think he argues against following blindly instead of figuring out for yourself what is right and wrong. I think thats why he has contempt for the church, because he sees corruption in it and he sees a lot of people blindly following.

kkiiji
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Posted 07/13/09 - 06:11 PM:	#3
Nietzsche didn't want to be bogged down by the traditional free will debate, so he went at it from a new angle. Freedom of will is a phenomenal experience, a passionate experience, one that is not mutually exclusive with deterministic behavioral factors. Of course he didn't say anything like this explicitly as far as I know, but he sure hints at it a lot. I would say Nietzsche knew that determinists were just being overly rational about things and forgetting what it feels like to be free, yet at the same time realizing that the notion of a truly metaphysically free will is a fantasy. I have no evidence, sorry, just my anecdotal two cents.
Heard joke once: Man goes to doctor. Says he's depressed. Says life seems harsh and cruel. Says he feels all alone in a threatening world where what lies ahead is vague and uncertain. Doctor says "Treatment is simple. Great clown Pagliacci is in town tonight. Go and see him. That should pick you up." Man bursts into tears. Says "But Doctor... I am Pagliacci." Good joke, everybody laugh. Roll on snare drum... Curtains.

makerowner
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Posted 07/13/09 - 06:38 PM:

In the "Four Great Errors" section of Twilight of the Idols he rejects the entire idea of causality, so I don't see how he could be a determinist any more than a libertarian.

3	The error of a false causality. Humans have always believed that they knew what a cause was; but how did we get this knowledge — or more precisely, our faith that we had this knowledge? From the realm of the famous "inner facts," of which not a single one has so far turned out to be true. We believe that we are the cause of our own will: we think that here at least we can see a cause at work. Nor did we doubt that all the antecedents of our will, its causes, were to be found in our own consciousness or in our personal "motives." Otherwise, we would not be responsible for what we choose to do. Who would deny that his thoughts have a cause, and that his own mind caused the thoughts?
	Of these "inward facts" that seem to demonstrate causality, the primary and most persuasive one is that of the will as cause. The idea of consciousness ("spirit") or, later, that of the ego (the "subject") as a cause are only afterbirths: first the causality of the will was firmly accepted as proved, as a fact, and these other concepts followed from it.
	But we have reservations about these concepts. Today we no longer believe any of this is true. The "inner world" is full of phantoms and illusions: the will being one of them. The will no longer moves anything, hence it does not explain anything — it merely accompanies events; it can also be completely absent. The so-called motives: another error. Merely a surface phenomenon of consciousness, something shadowing the deed that is more likely to hide the causes of our actions than to reveal them. And as for the ego ... that has become a fable, a fiction, a play on words! It has altogether ceased to think, feel, or will!
	What follows from this? There are no mental causes at all. The whole of the allegedly empirical evidence for mental causes has gone out the window. That is what follows! And what a nice delusion we had perpetrated with this "empirical evidence;" we interpreted the real world as a world of causes, a world of wills, a world of spirits. The most ancient and enduring psychology was at work here: it simply interpreted everything that happened in the world as an act, as the effect of a will; the world was inhabited with a multiplicity of wills; an agent (a "subject") was slipped under the surface of events. It was out of himself that man projected his three most unquestioned "inner facts" — the will, the spirit, the ego. He even took the concept of being from the concept of the ego; he interpreted "things" as "being" in accordance with his concept of the ego as a cause. Small wonder that later he always found in things what he had already put into them. The thing itself, the concept of thing is a mere extension of the faith in the ego as cause. And even your atom, my dear materialists and physicists — how much error, how much rudimentary psychology still resides in your atom! Not to mention the "thing-in-itself," the horrendum pudendum of metaphysicians! The "spirit as cause" mistaken for reality! And made the very measure of reality! And called God!

For philosophy, Socrates, if pursued in moderation and at the proper age, is an elegant accomplishment, but too much philosophy is the ruin of human life. Even if a man has good parts, still, if he carries philosophy into later life, he is necessarily ignorant of all those things which a gentleman and a person of honour ought to know.

kkiiji
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Posted 07/13/09 - 06:53 PM:	#5
Holy crap he just turned determinists into a subcategory of libertarians, as if the idea of determinism came originally from some conception of free will. I'm going to have to think about this. Didn't seem like he rejected causality though, he just kind of dissed both libertarians and determinists.
Heard joke once: Man goes to doctor. Says he's depressed. Says life seems harsh and cruel. Says he feels all alone in a threatening world where what lies ahead is vague and uncertain. Doctor says "Treatment is simple. Great clown Pagliacci is in town tonight. Go and see him. That should pick you up." Man bursts into tears. Says "But Doctor... I am Pagliacci." Good joke, everybody laugh. Roll on snare drum... Curtains.

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