Nietzche: On the genealogy of morals
... Walter Kauffman argues forcefully against the claim that Nietzsche disparages slave morality in favor of the master morality of the "blonde beast," the barbarian, that maims and slaughters. While it seems clear that Nietzsche would prefer these barbarians to contemporary Europeans, his other writings suggest that his ideal is far from this master morality as well. That Nietzsche does not align himself with master morality is consistent with the claim that he does not align himself with any system of morals. In the later essays, we shall see how Nietzsche values the drive to refine oneself, to control oneself, and to affirm oneself. While master morality is better off for lacking ressentiment, it lacks the discipline and self-control necessary to fit Nietzsche's ideal. For instance, Nietzsche suggests that the man of ressentiment is cleverer than the noble man: either Nietzsche does not think the noble man is perfect, or he thinks that being clever is a weakness. We might want to offer a brief criticism of Nietzsche's analysis. Perhaps he gives in a bit too much to his weakness for polemic, but the dichotomy between master morality and slave morality seems a bit simplistic. If slave morality is based on a ressentiment felt toward the masters, and now the whole world has succumbed to slave morality, who are the masters that we all resent? While masters and slaves make up a convenient opposing pair, it seems highly unlikely that the world is divided quite so cleanly, as if there were nothing between masters and slaves. We find Nietzsche being more careful in Beyond Good and Evil, section 200, where he characterizes both the dominant slave morality and the praiseworthy exceptions of the modern world as arising from a complex mixture of drives and values. Second essay, "'Guilt,' 'Bad Conscience,' and the like" Section 12 contains the first mention in the Genealogy of Morals of the famous Nietzschean term "will to power." Since it is not immediately obvious what is meant by either "will" or "power," this term can be a bit obscure. All we can be sure of is that Nietzsche considers it very important: at the end of section 12, he calls it the "essence of life." Another clue is provided in section 18, where he uses the term synonymously with "instinct for freedom." A superficial understanding of the will to power can easily be gained when we recognize that we all see it in our everyday dealings: everyone wants power over everyone else. For instance, the bully at school bullies weaker students for the feeling of power he gets over them. The nerd studies hard so as to get better grades and be smarter than his classmates, giving him a different kind of power. Anyone who has survived (or is surviving) adolescence is well aware of the power struggles that take place even between friends. The popular kids form a clique that excludes other kids and they feel more powerful by virtue of their exclusivity. Men and women both engage in sexual exploits largely for the feeling of power it gives them over the person they seduce. Nietzsche even suggests that acts of generosity are ultimately motivated by a will to power. If I do you a favor, I am essentially showing you that I have the power to help you, to put you in my debt. Nietzsche suggests that the will to power is the fundamental drive that motivates all things. This suggestion might contrast with the suggestion that our fundamental drive is the will to life; that is, the suggestion that above all we pursue self-preservation. There are a number of reasons for seeing power as more important to us than life. For instance, the martyr who is willing to die for a cause is essentially saying "you can kill me, you can do anything to my body, but you cannot touch my principles because I am powerful enough to resist all your threats." This martyr clearly values that power of independence more than life itself. This example might help us understand why Nietzsche identifies the will to power with the instinct for freedom. A powerful will is essentially one that cannot be dominated or controlled by any other. If I do whatever my friends tell me, I am not powerful because my will is subject to their whims. If not even the threat of torture and death can't change my behavior, I must have a very strong will that resists domination at all costs. Nietzsche also identifies willing quite closely with meaning and interpretation. That something is meaningful to us means that some will or force is dominating it. For example, my harming you might be an act of bullying or an act of self- defense. In the first case, there is a very crude will to power acting, where I harm you for the feeling of power it gives me. In the second case, I am acting out of an instinct of self-preservation. In both cases, the deed itself might be the same, but the will that drives me to act interprets the deed in very different ways. Wherever we find a meaning or an interpretation, there is a will acting to give a deed or a thing that meaning or interpretation. Nietzsche spells this point out in the case of punishment. The act of punishing has always been the same, but the meaning of that act has changed radically. The barbarians of ancient time had very different wills than the modern slave morality endorses. As a result, though the act of punishing and the word "punishment" have remained unchanged, they have been interpreted very differently. Nietzsche is showing that what is significant to us about punishment is not the act itself, but the meaning that we attach to it. Because this meaning is independent of and inessential to the act itself, we could potentially come to understand punishment as meaning pretty much anything. Because conventional wisdom sees the world in terms of things and deeds rather than forces and wills, we are unable to separate the meanings of punishment from the deed itself, and assume that the deed has always had the same meaning. Nietzsche raises the same point with pretty much all our moral concepts, showing that, while the words "good," "conscience," "guilt," or "justice" have been around for a long time, they have, unnoticed by us, taken on very different meanings depending on the wills that were interpreting them. Third essay, "What is the meaning of ascetic ideals?" In trying to understand Nietzsche's analysis of the "herd" (the masses who suffer and feel ressentiment), there are two fundamental facts to keep in mind. First, they are powerless. Second, like all things, their fundamental drive is the will to power. Because they are powerless, this will to power is re-routed and delayed at all turns, and yet they would rather (to borrow Nietzsche's phrase) will nothingness than not will. In saying that the ascetic priest serves as a sick doctor to these sick masses, Nietzsche is suggesting that the ascetic priest directs and channels their degenerate wills to power. The three channels offered here are an extinction of the will, hard work, and the consciousness of sin and guilt. The extinction of the will is mostly associated with Indian philosophy, and has come to the West largely thanks to Schopenhauer. The Hindu ideal of reuniting with Brahman and the Buddhist ideal of Nirvana both laud the extinction of the ego and the total disappearance of the distinct self into a greater whole. The water drop, so to speak, ceases to see itself as a water drop and comes to see itself as a part of the ocean. This is the paradigmatic example of choosing to "will nothingness rather than not will." The will here turns against itself, finding in itself something that it can overpower. The more it overpowers itself, the weaker it becomes. In hard work, the will ceases to direct itself against itself, but rather at everything else. The result, however, is the same. The individual becomes lost in work and in the community of workers, becoming a part of a congregation rather than an individual. The individual will weakens by seeing itself in service of a larger community. The self-flagellation brought about by a consciousness of sin and guilt ultimately serves only to increase the feelings of sin and guilt. Again, the individual's will is turned against itself, mortifying each thought and deed as sinful, and seeing the consequent suffering as just punishment. In each of these cases the will is exercised, but the result is never a strengthening of the will. In each case, the will becomes "tamer," less capable of asserting itself and dominating others. Thus, the ascetic priest does nothing to "cure" the "sickness" of the "herd." But it would be a mistake to see the ascetic priest faced with the alternative of teaching the members of the herd to assert and affirm themselves as individuals and not choosing it. The priest does not have a "cure" at hand that he refuses to administer. Rather, he is faced with the alternatives of leaving the herd to allow their wills to collapse altogether or to lead them to some sort of exercise of their wills. Any assertion of the will, Nietzsche argues, is life affirming. The exercise of the will that the ascetic priest encourages in the herd is thus a life affirming opposition to the displeasure they feel at their suffering. Life is a struggle for which they are not strong enough, and the ascetic priest encourages them not to give up entirely but to find an alternative outlet for their weak wills. The result is that the herd develops bad taste and bad health, but this is still better than nothing. It may seem confusing that Nietzsche might see the ascetic ideals of the herd as in some sense good for them. No doubt, Nietzsche despises the herd, their morality, their weakness, and their ressentiment. He even claims explicitly that ascetic ideals are harmful. However, if we recall section 13 of the first essay, Nietzsche would not blame the herd for being the way they are. It's not as if they could have been strong and have failed, making them somehow responsible for their weakness. Rather, they simply are what they are, with no sens...