In his infamous 1992 work "The End of History and the Last Man" Francis Fukuyama identifies two distinct threats to the intellectual hegemony of western, liberal, capitalist democracy. The following quotation I think is interesting in as much as it is rare to see the political relevance of Nietzsche's ethical doctrines taken seriously.
The possibility that liberal society does not represent the simultaneous satisfaction of desire and thymos but instead opens up a grave disjuncture between them is raised by critics on both the Left and the Right. The attack from the Left would maintain that the promise of universal, reciprocal recognition remains essentially unfulfilled in liberal societies, for the reasons just indicated: economic inequality brought about by capitalism ipso facto implies unequal recognition. The attack from the Right would argue that the problem with liberal society is not the inadequate universality of recognition, but the goal of equal recognition itself. The latter is problematic because human beings are inherently unequal; to treat them as equal is not to affirm but to deny their humanity. [1]
This is not to say that I agree with Fukuyama's characterization of Friedrich Nietzsche as a progenitor of neo-right philosophy; in truth I consider the Manichean dualism of the left/right dichotomy as a rhetorical device which is generally employed pejoratively to hinder rather than aid comprehension.
What I think is significant, other than Fukuyama's decision to treat Nietzsche's political implications seriously is that Fukuyama is attempting to analyze and evaluate ideological structures according to a philosophical criterion of 'what it means to be human'. Here and throughout "The End of History" Fukuyama is following Kojeve's interpretation of Hegel, insofar as he sees a political systems ability to 'satisfy the desire for recognition' as that which constitutes the greatest measure of its success. [2]
Most great philosophical systems contain some kind of definition/conceptual delineation of the human condition. Plato's understanding of what it is to be human is central not only to his politics but also his ethics and his epistemology. Despite the apparent peculiarity of much of what Plato has to say, it is the masterful integration of the disparate elements which make up his system which leaves us in a position where we have little choice but to accept or reject the system in its entirety.
Moreover, it is high time a little philosophical rigor was injected into the contemporary political debate as part of an attempt to break the hegemonic dominance of a plutocratic culture that sees material splendor as a universal panacea - what "we do not need [however, are] forcible new distributions of property". [3]
Plato argues that the properly constituted state is just a macrocosm of the correctly, psychologically integrated individual. That is, in his Republic, the philosophers rule, the military aid them in this role and the workers serve. This order is justified by a subtle interplay of psychological and epistemological doctrine.
Only the philosopher is competent to rule for it is only the philosopher who has achieved a just internal order. In terms of Plato's tripartite conception of the soul, a just order, (remember for Plato justice is a question of things occupying their proper place) is one where the rational facet of the soul, (logistikon) with the aid of the spirited component, (thymoeides) suppresses the appetitive, (epithymetikon).
The right to rule belongs to the philosopher alone, as only he who is commanded by reason is able to grasp the logos, (in Platonic terms, the illumination of the object of knowledge by the 'light' of the good). Thus for Plato there is a direct correspondence between individual well being and the overall health of the state. The fully actualized human being is the one in whom reason is dominant, the philosopher. The ideal state is the one where the philosophers rule, the Republic. [4]
It is my contention that Plato's importance in the Western philosophical pantheon is due to his ability to 'sublate' and thereby reconcile the ideas of two key, pre-Socratic thinkers, Parmenides of Elea, (c. 450 BCE) and Heraclitus of Ephesus, (c. 500 BCE) [5] while simultaneously advancing the teaching of his friend and master Socrates, (469-399 BCE).
This was an impressive philosophical feat, however it has had an enduring effect on our philosophy and consequently our civilization.
The old cliché that 'all philosophy consists of footnotes to Plato' has emanated from the uncanny ability of Plato to incorporate the most important aspects of pre-Socratic thought into his own work. There are few who would deny the pervasive influence Platonic thought has exercised over the western world, however, even in light of the power exerted by academic philosophy there are just as few who are aware of the origin of these ideas or indeed the seemingly insoluble dilemma with which western society has been saddled as a result.
Nietzsche, like Hegel sees understanding the history of philosophy as critical to the comprehension of philosophy itself. Preempting Foucault, (who described himself as an archaeologist of knowledge), Nietzsche adopts a genealogical method. Thus he begins his search for the source of our modern dilemma with the pre-Socratics whom he sees as representing philosophical archetypes, (from the Greek arche meaning starting point); the earliest, pure streams of thought and the bulk of the raw material out of which all later western philosophy was created. [6]
Parmenides faced the question of observable change in the world in an ethical form, i.e. "How can anything pass away which has a right to be"? [7] A powerful unifying drive was at work within Parmenides and he countered Anaximander's dual-world, (the boundless primal chaos of the indefinite, apeiron, and the realm of coming to be/passing away) by deciding that the world contained both something that exists and something that does not exist, asserting the primacy of that which exists through his concept of being.
In other words Parmenides dealt with the question of observable change by denying it. All change therefore, (including motion) is in fact illusion. [8] The world is a perfect, unchanging, un-generated sphere outside of which there is nothing, neither space nor time.
Thus he accomplished the immensely significant first critique of man's apparatus of knowledge, a critique as yet inadequate but doomed to bear dire consequences. By wrenching apart the senses and the capacity for abstraction, in other words by splitting up mind as though it were composed of two quite separate capacities, he demolished intellect itself, encouraging man to indulge in that wholly erroneous distinction between 'spirit' and 'body' which, especially since Plato, lies upon philosophy like a curse. [9]
Parmenides felt the corruption and decay omnipresent in the world to constitute an indictment on existence too savage to be borne. Thus, like so many who were to follow him he took refuge within an abstract metaphysical realm where nothing could touch him.
When one makes as total a judgment as Parmenides about the whole of the world, one ceases to be a scientist, an investigator into any of the world's parts. One's sympathy toward phenomena atrophies; one even develops a hatred for phenomena including oneself, a hatred for being unable to get rid of the everlasting deceitfulness of sensation. Henceforward truth shall live only in the palest, most abstracted generalities, in the empty husks of the most indefinite terms, as though in a house of cobwebs. And beside such truth now sits our philosopher, likewise as bloodless as his abstractions, in the spun out fabric of his formulas. A spider at least wants blood from its victims. The Parmenidean philosopher hates most of all the blood of his victims, the blood of the empirical reality which was sacrificed and shed by him. [10]
Though the influence of Parmenides on Plato is seldom sufficiently acknowledged, the resigned pessimism that invariably resulted from a view of reality where every experience was considered mendacious was an insufficient impetus for Plato's bold, new program of 'improving mankind'.
The figure of Socrates stands as perhaps the most optimistic character in the Western philosophical tradition. [11] Socrates also considered reason alone to be capable of peering through the veil of illusion that shrouds reality, however, unlike Parmenides Socrates believed reason to be capable of changing this reality.
In the face of this practical pessimism, Socrates is the archetype of the theoretical optimist who, in his faith in the explicability of the nature of things, attributes the power of a panacea to knowledge and science, and sees error as the embodiment of evil. To penetrate those arguments and separate true knowledge from illusion and error seemed to Socratic man the noblest, or even the only, truly human calling: just as the mechanism of concepts, judgments and conclusions, from Socrates onwards, was deemed the supreme activity, the most admirable gift of nature above all other talents. [12]
Socrates adhered to the dictum "that no one sins willingly"; evil therefore resulted form ignorance, as, for Socrates, to know the good is to do the good. Thus the Platonic Socrates spends most of his time attempting to find satisfactory definitions for ethical concepts in the belief that true knowledge of the subject entailed possession of the quality itself.
Socrates himself committed none of his thoughts to writing. Instead he devoted himself entirely to teaching. I imagine most teachers at some point during their career wonder whether they have any influence on their students. If the distilled version of Socrates' doctrine that we have received via the medium of the Platonic dialogues is any indication, Socrates suffered very little from this type of doubt.
…There is a profound illusion which first entered the world in the person of Socrates - the unshakeable belief that rational thought, guided by causality, can penetrate to the depths of being, and that it is capable not only of knowing but even of correcting being. This sublime metaphysical illusion is an instinctual accompaniment to science, and repeatedly takes it to its limits…[13]
Those who have studied Platonic philosophy will undoubtedly be aware of the horrors contained in Book X of the Laws. [14] Other scholars have commented on the irony of Plato advocating the ultimate sanction against those found guilty of 'thought crimes' given that his beloved master was put to death by the Athenian state for precisely this reason. However I don't believe these scholars fully appreciate the depth of this irony given that it was Socratic inspiration which lay behind Plato's formulation of the blueprint for the re-education camp.
Socrates was charged with 'corrupting the youth of Athens'. One of the key problems Plato attempts to address in his dialogues is the question of why the 'good' cannot reliably produce children who are themselves good. The Socratic answer to this question is that the 'good' do not really understand themselves. [15] The implication of this idea, (and consequently the gravamen of the accusations leveled at Socrates) is that the 'good' only effect the appearance of virtue and do not actually embody these qualities because they do not understand the true nature of these qualities.
Plato carries this idea further by arguing that certain, (indeed it seems most) individuals are in fact incapable of embodying virtue due to the injustice of their internal order which prevents them from grasping the logos and therefore prevents them from possessing knowledge. Thus Plato provided an effective theoretical justification for all the grotesque machinery of the police state.
The rise of Christianity sounded the death knell of classical/post-classical culture. Though the Christian ethos came to supplant the classical, the patriarchs of the early Church certainly did not view themselves as implacable foes of a cultural milieu within which they, themselves were schooled. In fact, just the reverse was true. As educated Christians, many within the early Church endeavoured to incorporate all they could of classical culture into there own system. This, they did for two important reasons. Firstly, to provide something of an intellectual underpinning for what was essentially a peasant movement; [16] and secondly, to mitigate the perceived orientalism of their cult which cast a suspicious light over their movement in the eyes of Imperial Roman authority.
Those who had rejected the noble ethic of evaluating as 'good' that which was healthy and strong and supplanted it with a 'slave ethic' where, that which was deemed 'good' was that which, (like the Christian), was weak, broken and in dire need of something to dull the pain of existence required an effective intellectual instrument to achieve this unprecedented cultural metamorphosis on a grand scale.
In the early Church fathers, the mysticism of Parmenides and the pedagogic enthusiasm of Socrates, (mediated by an unashamedly transcendental Neoplatonism), met Christian missionary zeal and the vulgar taste for the unconditional. The Church wished to erect a theoretical edifice to support its claims of universally applicable, divine authority. Further, it was the mechanism of the concept that would facilitate the process of correcting existence/reality by the predominately dispossessed and downtrodden membership of the primitive Church. Henceforth the synthetic concepts of guilt, sin and judgment [17] would be employed to yoke humanity to an ever-increasing state of domesticity and enfeeblement.
Though the ascension of the Christian Church was to eclipse the humanism of classical culture, Christianity constituted, at least an active form of nihilism.
While Hegel and Nietzsche may be philosophically antithetical, interestingly, there is some degree of commonality between their respective delineations of the human condition. Hegel's 'master-slave dialectic' portrays the emergence of the first human as emanating from a condition where the proto-human's sense of self-worth overrides the creatures innate drive to self-preservation and the first 'bloody battle for pure prestige' ensues.
Nietzsche too sees the essence of what it is to be human as a question of the capacity to value. Unlike Hegel, however, the object of value is not necessarily the self. For Nietzsche the quintessential human activity is the creation of meaning through the bestowal of value. Most animals will chance physical harm in the pursuit of territory or food, if they perceive the benefit to outweigh the risk. Only humans, however are capable of sacrificing their own lives, (not to mention the lives of others) in the name of abstract metaphysical principles which provide them with no direct material benefit.
Thus, ironically we now find ourselves in a position where we know what it means to be human yet we are unable to achieve this very a state of being. Much was achieved under the aegis of Christian cultural hegemony despite its inherent nihilism. At least it was something to believe in. Human beings need something, those of sufficient strength will create their own systems of value, others need to obtain them from somewhere else for, "man would rather will nothingness than not will".[18]
We can no longer found our humanity on this traditional basis, as we have gone beyond that state of being. Modern humans have simply seen too much. [19] We are no longer able to espouse the virtue of any one metaphysical fiction over and above all the others as we are too aware of the nature of these systems in toto. Unlike their medieval counterparts, most modern Christians are, to a greater or lesser extent, quite well appraised of the nature of their soteriological competitors and consequently extreme dogmatism is now almost the exclusive preserve of only the crudest congregations.
Now we have moved into the post-Christian era, it is important to remember that the ramifications of Nietzsche's exultant claim, "god is dead" [20] extend well beyond the religious sphere. As sad an indictment on the state of contemporary ethical thought as it may be, we are still apparently incapable of escaping our Judeo-Christian heritage. Though we no longer deem it appropriate to 'kill in the name of god', (in fact, those who do claim to act according to divine imperatives often head the list of our enemies), it is still ethical concepts of Christian origin that legitimate the kind of action taken in the Gulf, (1991) and more recently in Kosovo, (1999), not to mention liberal, capitalist, democracy itself.
What Nietzsche is heralding with his statement that "god is dead" is the end of all universal systems of value. [21] As painful as it may be for some to acknowledge, concepts like, innate rights, the equality of man, natural justice and even the common good, are just as fictitious as the myriad of deities that have been dreamt up since time immemorial. And while I am aware that ideas such as these provide an enormous amount of comfort for millions of people throughout the western world, they are, nonetheless lies concocted in the name of social control.
The challenge facing contemporary, liberated, thinkers is to provide nothing less than a new foundation for our humanity without recourse to metaphysical, conceptual fictions. Those who attempt to force reality to meet a conceptual imperative not only condemn themselves and their disciples to perpetual disappointment but also fail to seize the opportunity presented by the "death of god".
Ours should be a time of great celebration. Rather than viewing the "death of god" as the collapse of a fortress which has shielded us from existential chaos, we should, instead see this momentous event as breaching of the walls of a prison which has fettered us within an artificial horizon for millennia. The demise of all external systems of value and authority represents the most liberating experience humanity has ever undergone. The sole remaining boundary to human potential is that of human creativity itself.
1 F. Fukuyama, The End of History and the Last Man, New York, 1992, p.289.
3 F. Nietzsche, Human, All Too Human, 1878, trans. Marion Faber & Stephen Lehmann, Penguin 1994, p.216.
4 Plato, The Republic, HC, passim.
5 I do not intend discussing Heraclitus in the present piece as he has wielded neither as profound nor as pernicious an influence on later philosophy as Parmenides.
6 F. Nietzsche, Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks, (not published during Nietzsche's lifetime), trans. Marianne Cowan, Gateway, 1962, p.31.
8 Zeno's Paradoxes, provide ample evidence of the perverse 'truths' obtainable by supposedly logical-rational methods.
9 F. Nietzsche, Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks, p.79.
10 Ibid., p.80, cf. G. W. F. Hegel, Preface to the Phenomenology, [1.2], "Truth can attain its true form only by becoming scientific, or, in other words, I claim that truth finds the element of its existence only in the Concept." W. Kaufmann, Hegel: texts and commentary, Notre Dame, 1977, p.14.
11 F. Nietzsche, Human, All Too Human, p.17, "All philosophers are tyrannized by logic: and logic, by its nature, is optimism."
12 F. Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy: Through the Spirit of Music, 1872, trans. Shaun Whiteside Penguin, 1993, p.74.
14 See especially Plato, Laws, book X, 909 a-b, where he advocates the death sentence for those found guilty of atheism.
15 Keep in mind the Delphic exhortation to 'know thyself'.
16 A. Momigliano, Religion in Athens, Rome and Jerusalem in the First Century B.C., states, "The mere fact that one had to study in order to be pious is a strange notion that made Judaism increasingly intellectual". Reproduced in G.W. Bowersock, Fiction As History: Nero to Julian, Sather Classical Lectures, vol. 58, 1997, p.121-2.
17 F. Nietzsche, The Anti-Christ, 1895, trans. R. J. Hollingdale, Penguin 1968, p.167, cf. p.193.
18 F. Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morals, 1887, trans. W. Kaufmann & R. J. Hollingdale, New York, 1967, p.163.
19 F. Nietzsche, Human, All Too Human, p.152. "Besides, we cannot go back to the old system; we have burnt our bridges behind us. All that remains is to be brave, whatever may result".
20 F. Nietzsche, The Gay Science, 1882, p108.
21 Regarding 'god', R. J. Hollingdale, Nietzsche: The Man And His Philosophy, Revised Edition, Cambridge, 1999, p.70, states: "…it is intended to imply all that ever has been or ever could be subsumed in the name 'God', including all God-substitutes, other worlds, ultimate realities, things-in-themselves, noumenal planes and wills to live - the entire 'metaphysical need' of man and all its products".