Nietzsche’s full name: Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (October 15, 1844 - August 25, 1900). Nietzsche was a German philosopher whose works provided extensive criticism and discussion in the fields of religion, morality, modern culture, philosophy, and science. His writing style is unique, often using the techniques of aphorisms and paradoxes. Nietzsche had a great influence on the development of subsequent generations of philosophy, especially existentialism and postmodernism, which responded to Nietzsche's philosophical thoughts in their own forms. Nietzsche's main ideas: Nietzsche's philosophy was once regarded as an "action philosophy" at the time, a philosophy that claimed to maximize personal requirements and desires. His philosophy is disdainful and critical of everything. This is an important reason why his philosophy is appreciated by postmodernists. Postmodernism either rejects or dispels traditional philosophy and modern philosophy. Yet there was a soft spot for Nietzsche's philosophy, from which postmodernists absorbed everything they needed. Including the basic ideological viewpoints of Nietzsche's philosophy, and even Nietzsche's philosophical style. The dissolution tendency in Nietzsche's philosophy became the spiritual pillar of postmodernism. Nietzsche never imagined that he would become the theoretical pioneer of postmodernism. For him, philosophical thinking is life, and life is philosophical thinking. He created a unique philosophy with different forms from the past to demonstrate his philosophical thoughts. His philosophy requires no reasoning and argument, no systematic framework, and is not a theoretical system at all. It is his direct perception of the pain and joy of life. Nietzsche, in his first academic work - "The Birth of Tragedy", had already begun his criticism of modern civilization. He pointed out that in capitalist society, despite increasing material wealth, people have not achieved true freedom and happiness. The rigid mechanical model suppresses human personality, causing people to lose their passion for free thought and the impulse to create culture. Modern culture appears so decadent. This is a disease of modern civilization, and its root cause is the atrophy of life instinct. Nietzsche pointed out that in order to cure modern diseases, we must restore human life instinct and give it a new soul to provide a new interpretation of the meaning of life. He received inspiration from Schopenhauer and believed that the essence of the world is the will of life. Nietzsche violently exposed and criticized traditional Christian morality and modern rationality. In epistemology, Nietzsche was an extreme anti-rationalist, and he made the most thorough criticism of any rational philosophy. He believes that the spiritual life of Europeans for two thousand years is centered on belief in God, and humans are God’s creations and appendages. The value of life and everything in human beings rest on God. Although the basis for God's existence has begun to disintegrate since the Enlightenment, in the absence of new beliefs, people still believe in God and worship God. Nietzsche's famous saying, "One shout - God is dead" - is a ruthless and fearless criticism of God. He said through the mouth of a madman that he was the murderer of God, pointing out that God deserved to be killed. Christian ethics constrains the human mind and suppresses human instinct. To gain freedom, God must be killed. Nietzsche believes that the decline of Christianity has its historical necessity. It transformed from the religion of the oppressed into the religion of the rulers and oppressors. Its decline is a historical necessity. After killing God as God, we ushered in the God of capital, God incarnated by capital. Nietzsche ignored a basic fact: being enslaved by capital is not much freer than being enslaved by God. But the enlightening value of his cry "God is dead" cannot be underestimated. Nietzsche believes that in a world without God, people have gained unprecedented opportunities and must establish new values, values ??centered on human will. For this reason, traditional moral values ??must be liquidated. Traditional moral concepts are the last cover of God. They penetrate deeply into people's daily lives and corrode people's hearts. Nietzsche claimed to be an amoralist and anti-Christian. He violently criticized Christian morality and the virtues advocated by Christianity. Nietzsche also held a critical attitude towards modern rationality. He first attacked the rational philosophers. He pointed out that the first characteristic of philosophers is their lack of sense of history. For thousands of years, everything that philosophers have dealt with has become a conceptual mummy. The role of reason is nothing more than to freeze the flowing history and use some eternal concepts to frame living reality. The result is to stifle the process of birth and death of things and stifle life. He believes that this world is a world full of contingency, turmoil, and thus unpredictable. He said that there is no reality, everything is fluid, ungraspable, and evasive. The second characteristic of philosophers is to "reject the evidence of the senses" and reverse the real world and the imaginary world. Perceptual evidence is real and believable, it's just the processing of it that stuffs lies into it. The third characteristic of philosophers is to confuse the beginning and the end. They deny the process of growth and evolution. The fourth characteristic of philosophers is to use the "reason" in language to force people to make mistakes. "Is" is confused with "existence", making falsehoods appear true and truths seeming false, deceiving ignorant people. He believes that it is absurd for people from Socrates to modern people to fanatically appeal to reason. The reason why human beings advocate reason is that they expect it to bring freedom and happiness to people; however, the result is exactly the opposite. Reason is always the enemy of human instinct, causing greater suffering to people. It is correct to criticize the fallacies brought about by reason, but we cannot deny the existence of reason, its historical status and role. Rationality is the symbol of human progress and the fruit of the process of human civilization. Some outstanding philosophers in history used rational weapons to observe and understand the world.
There is nothing wrong with rationality itself, and rationality cannot be denied. Without reason, humans cannot correctly understand the world and the truth. Without reason, human beings will fall into a confusing and terrible situation. Nietzsche wants to establish a new philosophy, a philosophy that puts the will of life above reason, an irrational philosophy. As a challenge to reason, he proposed the theory of will to power. The place of God, the place of traditional metaphysics, is replaced by will to power. The core of the will-to-power theory is life-affirming and life-affirming. The will to power is not a secular power, it is an instinctive, spontaneous and irrational force. It determines the essence of life and the meaning of life. Nietzsche compared the different characteristics of will to power and reason. The characteristics of reason are: calmness, precision, logic, stiffness, and abstinence; the characteristics of will to power are: passion, desire, wildness, activity, and fighting. Nietzsche believes that the will to power originates from and returns to life, and it is the real life. Although life is short, as long as you have a strong will, a will to create, and become a spiritual strongman, you can realize your own value. The will to power, as the highest value measure, on the one hand affirms the value of life, and on the other hand it also defends the inequality in the world. In Nietzsche's view, human beings, like natural life, are divided into strong and weak ones. The strong are always in the minority, and the weak are in the majority. History and culture are created by a few strong people, and they rule the weak as a matter of course. Nietzsche overthrew the divine hierarchy and affirmed the human hierarchy. Nietzsche also proposed his philosophy of Superman, a philosophy about constructing an ideal life. Superman is a symbol of the ideal of life, the ideal goal and realm of life pursued by Nietzsche. Nietzsche was very disappointed with modern people and modern life. He dreamed of improving people and creating new people, that is, supermen. Superman is not a specific person, but an illusory image. Superman has the momentum and style of the earth, ocean, and lightning. Nietzsche believes that Superman does not yet exist in reality, but is the ideal image of future people; Superman puts forward value goals for real life; Superman is human self-transcendence. Nietzsche advocates that the purpose of life is to realize the will to power, expand oneself, and become a superman who controls everything. Superman is the highest value of human beings. He should despise all traditional moral values, do whatever he wants, and realize himself by enslaving the weak and the masses. At the same time, he was particularly opposed to gender equality, freedom of marriage, and women's liberation. In his opinion, the way people treat women is "don't forget your whip." The value of Nietzsche's voluntarism philosophy is dual. On the one hand, Nietzsche inherited the essence of the Enlightenment and reflected the awakening of modern consciousness. The positive affirmation of the value of life triggered people to think about the meaning of life and the value of life, and repositioned life; the negative criticism of instrumental rationality and industrial civilization started the modern irrational trend of thought. On the other hand, the criticism of rationality and the denial of tradition are also one-sided, which is exactly what postmodernism appreciates. His ethical thoughts reflected the interests of the emerging monopoly bourgeoisie.
Nietzsche's main works: "The Birth of Tragedy" "Philosophy in the Age of Greek Tragedy" "An Untimely Survey" "Confessor and Writer David Strauss" "Untimely Survey" Part Two: "The Uses and Abuses of History" The third part of "An Untimely Investigation": "Schopenhauer as an Educator" "Nietzsche on Schopenhauer" "Description of Ancient Rhetoric" The fourth part of "An Untimely Investigation": "Wagner in Bayreuth" "Human Nature, "All Too Human" Volume 1 "Revelation of the Souls of Artists and Writers" "Morning Glow" "Joyful Knowledge" "Optimistic Wisdom" "Antichrist" Interpretation of "Thus Spoke Zarathustra" "Good and Evil" "Transcendence" a translation of "Beyond Good and Evil" "The Genealogy of Morality" "The Wagner Affair" "Twilight of the Idols" "The Death of God" "God is Dead" "The Autobiography of Nietzsche" "Behold! This Man" "Look at this Man" "Nietzsche's Autobiography" "Nietzsche's Life" "Look at that Man! 》 "The Will to Power - An Attempt to Reevaluate All Values" "Copy of Nietzsche's Poems" "Selected Poems of Nietzsche" "The Wisdom of Joy" "My Sister and Me"