| Description |
This thesis reconsiders the meaning of Nietzsche's eternal recurrence and argues, against most of his recent interpreters, that it is first and foremost a matter of accepting the nature of life itself rather than coming to terms with our individual lives. For the eternal recurrence implies that there is no ultimate goal or purpose to existence - since our lives will simply be repeated over and over again - and accepting it therefore requires that we embrace the nature of life for its own sake, rather than looking for some external goal or purpose. Since the nature of life is struggle and suffering through and through, embracing the recurrence means finding value in struggle for its own sake. I argue that coming to terms with the nature of existence requires us to become moral genealogists, for in doing so we come to see that contemporary morality - which condemns struggle that lacks ultimate purpose - is deeply problematic. I argue that only those who have properly unified their drives can embrace the recurrence, and that proper unification can be described in terms of interpretation: those who embrace the recurrence have interpreted their drives well. Finally, I argue that the eternal recurrence can only be understood rightly when it is taken to be the solution to the fundamental problem that concerned Nietzsche: namely, the problem of democratic morality, which, he believed, was setting humanity on a course for disaster. The eternal recurrence acts as a selective principle for what can only be called a breeding program, one that Nietzsche designed (or for which he at least proposed a very preliminary plan) with an eye toward promoting the interests of strong human beings who have overcome democratic morality and interpreted their drives well. |
