Yesterday, I did my absolute best to take another step on the rope held between beast and übermensch. I descended upon the unwary prey, my interviewer, and let loose a torrential outpouring of understanding and desire for a job with Zia Records. I grasped at his need of musical depth, we spoke of many topics ranging from banjos to the UPT style of Borders pre-close. I aspired to inspire my inquisitor, to bring him to a final realization that I, in fact, was the best employee he would ever encounter. Unfortunately, there's a second mandatory interview, and I'm left to wonder whether or not I got that, if at all.
In my mind, the Übermensch, or Overman as we've talked about in class, is in essence an analogue to the Christian God. That is, he's a source of ideas and morals and goals, of games and rituals, he is that which humanity strives to become; however, unlike God, he's just another one of us. He's a man, or woman, that has fully understood their life, and through their enthusiasm for living, defined life by their terms. This is diametrically opposed to the more base life of the beast, a life of living moment to moment, defined by the herd instinct of the many, choosing to follow what the others say simply because it's the "right" (in the sense that he goes on to explain in "Between Good and Evil", which we'll get to in my next two posts) thing to do. The beast has no lucidity to them, they define consciousness as being aware of how to live, rather than WHY to live, and the Übermensch, well, the Übermensch decides WHY to live. This lucidity, this grasp of the game of life and the nature of consciousness as a herd mentality just clicks with me- to transcend into the Übermensch is to act less as the Shepard (which the Christian God would be considered), as it is to act as the explorer, so that other inquisitive and wondering minds can follow in their own time. The Übermensch is the one that takes classic morality, strips it of the fluff that Christianity imbues it with, and makes it essentially their own- all with the instructions laid for the following people simply through the lens of the life of Übermensch (to me, I think of my many heroes to be goals. Jimmy Page, Joni Mitchell, Benjamin Franklin, Henry David Thoreau, etc...), and I think that Nietzsche might agree with me that there's no way of knowing if it will be one person.
This leads me to epistemological nihilism- the argument that we cannot know anything for certain, as we are incapable of truly verifying the information we receive. As I follow it, I can understand the delineation of objective truth and subjective truth to be the presence of absolutes- this post, for example, is absolutely online. You're not holding it as a paper, say, and any other person can follow your steps to read it; subjectively, you may have enjoyed it, but they may not have. Follow?
To me, epistemological nihilism is the rejection of objective truth. It's the assumption that while we may see "something", and others may agree with us that "something" is there, we can never be absolutely certain. This gets into a lot of really dense ideas about what IS truth, and what can be assumed real and how can we possibly continue learning if we never really know, etc... but I think that I can glean an idea from it that falls in parallel without be as nihilistic and depressed; I think that there's an analogue between considering epistemological nihilism as possible and setting the Übermensch as a goal. For, if knowledge is impossible to truly grasp, but one does not give up in search of knowledge, then isn't one trying to find the limits of knowledge? Is not the individual aiming to become, in essence, the Übermensch? I believe this is the case. I believe that the Übermensch, in realization that God is dead, decides unequivocally to continue living, to continue growing, and to never give up in that growth.
So when the Madman tells the crowd of atheists that God is dead, I believe he is inciting them to grow in spite of this fact. He is telling them that there is no definition beyond our own personal lens with which we see the world, because WE as unique individuals, define our own lives. Is that really so mad?
I've always heard that Nietzsche read as depressed and despondent, finding no love of life and giving up. However, having read more of him now at this stage in my life, I think I must disagree. I think Nietzsche is arguing that anything is possible, since nothing is known, and we should all aim to become this Overman, this Übermensch, simply because we CAN. There's no definition of life, and there's no reason to define life, so why not do it anyways?
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