1. Born in Germany, October 14, 1844 and died August 25, 1900

2. Father and paternal grandfather were Lutheran pastors, of whom at first Friedrich aimed to follow; his father died from a fatal fall when he was five years old and subsequently was raised by his mother, grandmother, two aunts, and Elisabeth, his older sister;

3. Educated at Bonn and Leipzig, at first in theology and then in philology and philosophy (he was in particular attracted to Arthur Schopenhauer who maintained among other things that the world is made of our will).

4. At 25 was appointed professor of Philology at the University of Basel, based primarily on the strength of his original, though controversial, work in progress, The Birth of Tragedy; he retired in 1876 because of ill health and his disdain for the conventions of the academy and social life; he became a recluse and traveled throughout Europe.

5. After a progressive mental deterioration, he collapsed in 1889 and was cared for by his mother till 1897 and then Elisabeth.

1. A radical shift from philosophical systems concerned with ontology and epistemology to an emphasis on instinctive and existential issues.

a. he built upon Kant's emphasis of the transcendental unity of apperception--

what behind the "I"?

b. built on Hegel's emphasis on the necessary conflicts and tension of life--the goal

is not a social transformation but a personal elevation

c. he emphasized the irrational aspects of human desires

d. the will to power dominates all thinking

2. He felt that European civilization had come to an end in its growing atheism and that his philosophy and essays represent the new way of thinking and living.

3. "Colossal power became Nietzsche' lifelong theme" (Rüdiger Safranski).

The Birth of Tragedy (1872), Human All Too Human (1878), Beyond Good and Evil (1886), The Genealogy of Morals (1887), Twilight of the Idols (1888), Thus Spake Zarathrustra, and The Will to Power (compiled by Elisabeth after his insanity).

IV. His Perspectival theory of truth--building upon Kant and Schopenhauer he maintains that cognition is an interpretative process, not the true representation of reality

1. "Originals" do not exist; there are only interpretations of interpretations; "There are no facts, only interpretations."

a. we perceive and think according to our desires, memories, and passions

"Disinterested contemplation . . . is a rank absurdity."

b. our interests determine our world

2. Language itself is perspectival--"Thinking is an activity." "There is no being behind the doing." We make what we think and we think what we desire.

a. thinking is not descriptive but argumentative; more like what a lawyer does.

3. Social life is a conflict and struggle of competing perspectives; there is no neutral view, not even the philosophical or scientific viewpoint.

1. The genealogy of morals is not in being, goodness, or God; it's in the will to power; the best morality is the most adventuresome, heroic, exciting, and dangerous life.

2. Christianity is the worst way to live because it promotes humility and service.

a. its concept of God is sick and weak

b. it actually promotes a "herd instinct" in which people are sheep

3. Even traditional philosophical accounts of morality are "herd instincts" because they make the person subservient to the Good or Duty or God.

a. if one denies being or God per se, then one must deny any objective morality

4. The Good life is to expand one's consciousness and to create oneself.

a. this is "master morality" which is gained only after thinking and living as

atheist--"God must die, because I could not be God if there were a God."

b. to remove the vestiges of theism, one must give up all hope in progress

c. the test is the "eternal recurrence of the same"

d. only in total despair can one become courageous enough for the transformation

of all values--"Follow yourself, do not follow me."

5. He extolled the classical Greek virtues of excellence and pride--promoted elitism.

6. The Übermensch is the goal.

a. rare--Alexander the Great, Caesar, Napoleon, Leonardo, Michelangelo, Goethe

7. Must affirm the Dionysian principle of life over the Apollonian.

a. Dionysus--free, dynamic, and unpredictable

b. Apollo--rational, orderly, predictable

8. Art becomes the best metaphor for the Dionysian life