Nietzsche, Myths or Truth?

[miemio]

Edit: This is not a thread about thruts and myths ABOUT Nietzsche, but about the philosophical issue of truth vs myth. (For you analphabets in here..)

So I've been learning about Nietzsche, and of course he exites and inspires me.(Got to love that clear cynicism!) I'm gonna write a paper on him next month, but I thought that a little input from others would be nice to get the thoughts up and running.. So I figured I'd try my fellow Oddthoughters, I know there are a lot of bright minds out there, come on and ponder with me! I even decided to make a poll... Read through this post first and then answer it!

I'll start off by giving you my understanding of one perspective of his philosophy first, then it's easier to discuss on the same terms..

The will to power is basic, thats the driving force in any living thing. (It sounds pretty nazi-ish and all, but think of it like this: even a little daffodil has the will to power as its driving force, it's standing there, prowd and alive, and it wants to be.

The will to power is a creative force, it's the origin of all art (Art is more important than truth to Nietzsche), and it is also the origin of myths. They have guided people in how to live their lives in all times, taught them how to relate to the world and other people. From myths we have derived religions, myths in a system so to say.

Here we have to pull in Plato and his world of ideas (he postulates a dimension-of-sorts where the perfect ideas of all things reside), because he thinks that there is som place where things are in order, and where there is order, there is truth. For Plato truth is more valuable than art. When Christianity mixes with Plato's philosophy you get a God with a will who knows the truth and hides it from you. Then you have a new will emerge; The will to truth. Creation and the will to power takes the back seat. Now the new ideal will not be to posess the will to power, but to posess the truth. And if you obey God's will, he will let you know the truth. So what happens? The will to slavery emerges. People want to submit to God and his will. (one issue here, who knows what that will is?)

When you have all these people running around like madmen searching for truth and ignoring their artistic and creative side this resource starts to fade. The myths and the religions lose their grip on people, a person who is not connected to that side of her/himself cannot relate to what the myths are telling them. God is dead to them, he can't reach them.

So as I see it, in these days, when our collective God is dead and we don't believe in anything everybody has to create his/her own myths so they are able to manouvre themselves in life. They have to make out all the archetypes necessary for psychological growth and to keep the will to power alive. When we fail in creating our myths properly the world becomes incomprihensible and people tilt..? If everybody is walking around living in their own little world and it doesn't fit in with the myths of the people around them, it's bound to create some issues isn't it?

The world is so small now, all the collective myths that have been separated by land and sea for so long are all in the same place now and in clinch with eachother.. (f.i. religions, values) Even though most mythical moral have the same essence (correct me if Im wrong here, I'm not so read up on them, but from what I have encountered I sense the same underlying messages in them), we still fail to see it and we fight over who knows the truth.
This might be because we have succumb to the will to be slaves to the truth, instead of the will to be and create our own truth. We want something solid and refuse to realise that the world is chaotic. The myths cannot make it solid, but they can provide some temporary order, a glimpse of how it works.

If we had the will to power we would not acknowledge the myth as true, we would know that it was an imperfect (and at the same time, as perfect as possible) way to convey hints about the meaning of life. (NB. There cant be any 'meaning of life' besides the experience of it, a bigger meaning beyond that is a distracting and selfrestraining idea. Leads to submission to truths, back to base one again)

Hmm.. This might have become too long and airy to understand, but I hope some of you will have something to say about it. Maybe some of you have another perspective on this or something useful to say about the issue.

Should myths and art have a bigger place in our world or are we able keep our sanity by upholding the search for truth? Does myths only confuse us, or are the wisdom in them more valuable than f.i. advanced mathematics and other sciences?

[So Warped]

Here is a quick biog for anyone who has never read his works.

Friedrich Nietzsche was born in 1805 in Vienna, Austria. Friedrich lived a troubled childhood, stemming from the intense difficulty he had in spelling his own name. Finding himself morally challenged, and having already stumbled through a lifetime of uncertainty and confusion, Friedrich thought it was a good idea to study philosophy. During his college years, Friedrich supported himself by moonlighting as an investigative reporter.

Nietzsche was a man most noted for his impressive sexual prowess; it is reported that no one could beat his record of sexual harrassment lawsuits in Austria. Nietzsche is the only Austrian Americans have ever heard of). Nietzsche is also known for his hatred of Richard Wagner, mainly because Wagner once supposedly twice thrusted Nietzsche's copy of Oedipus Rex at a waiter masturbating in the back of Strudel City.

Nietzsche decided to claim that "God is deaf, and one-three-three-seven", talked about the "Will to power up", and the "Slave animality" and other passionate nonsense! One side-effect is that Nietzsche invented Superman for DC Comics using his strange statements that are still often misinterpreted by the common moron.

He has also written several books, including The Gay Pseudoscience. This has been known for provoking many people to come out of the closet after reading it, because it is very dark in there and you can't see the words properly.

Ecce Homo: the book where Nietzsche confesses his total homosexuality for the first time. A masterpiece of gay literature, that enshrouded him with wreaths of literary glory in the empyrean of alternative literary movements - and at every gay pride rally. A lapel pin with the first line of this book ("Here I am, there you are, yet we still have something in common also if you are there and I am here, and nothing would change if it would have been me to be there and you to be here, or the other way round. Got it?") has now become the GOP Usa party official pin.

Human, Way Far Too Much Exceedingly Human: in this momentous book of 7,303 pages (abridged versions of only 5 pages are available), Nietzsche speaks of the many advantages of being not human. He argues that God can find much better jobs than human can, needs no plumbers on weekends, and that his job is so good that he sticks to it a lil too much, being thus a clear cause of unemployment. Hailed by Karl Marx as the quintessential work against the many evils of Capitalism, was later on seized by the nazi, who read of it only Karl Marx's introduction, as a manifesto of subversion (they changed their minds when they realized that the first 7,203 pages were not by Nietzsche, but they were by Karl Marx's introduction - but alas, then it was too late already, and the war derived from this unfortunate misunderstanding was coming to an unexpected closing). It is because of this book that Nietzsche has been accused so many times of having been the starting cause of World War II.


"Dirty water must know how to wash himself with he who lives amongst YOU!"

— Zarathustra Spoke Thus To YOU!-Nietzsche

"Well now you know, and knowledge is half way to being Übermensch"

— Nietzsche

“Philosophers cannot die.”

— Nietzsche

“Those who would fight the beast must beware not to become the beast.”

— Nietzsche

“Those who would fight the beast must also carry a +2 mace and the BLUE keycard. Trust me, you'll need this when the ninjas attack you in the second corridor.”

— Nietzsche

“What does not kill us maims us.”

— Nietzsche

“God is deaf.”

— Nietzsche

“What??”

— God

“God is dead.”

— Nietzsche

“Nietzsche is dead.”

— God

“Nietzsche is God.”

— Dead

“God is Nietzsche.”

— Undead

“Listen, Nietzsche is DEAD”

— God

“Yeah very mature”

— Nietzsche

“If I'm dead how can I be immature?”

— God

“Some are born posthumously”

— Nietzsche

“Nietzsche is immortal.”

— Sigmund Freud

“What a hack! He's stealing my material!”

— Søren Kierkegaard

"French people piss me off."

— Eric Cartman

[miemio]

lmao
I liked you better when you were a mime

[So Warped]

lmao
I liked you better when you were a mime

http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/9697/105yh6.jpg

.....

[Kat]

Even though most mythical moral have the same essence (correct me if Im wrong here, I'm not so read up on them, but from what I have encountered I sense the same underlying messages in them)

I haven't read anything about Nietzsche - I may try to and join in the discussion if I get time, but I thought I'd respond to this. I don't know much about mytholoies either, but I do know a bit about the Norse one. In this the Gods enter a great final battle with the undead and the giants and other nasties, which is all pretty standard I think. But Norse is the only mythology where the Gods loose, which I find really interesting (it's definitely worth reading about, lots of fun with boats made out of dead people's toe nails and all sorts).

In this part of the world (Northern Europe, Scandanavia, Iceland), we don't get any literature, or even writing (apart from a few runes) before the conversions to Christianity. Other material culture is also very sparse. So to talk about a pre-Christian era is very problematic (even the mythology I mentioned above might well be a largely post-Christian invention). So that's the problem I have with argument, or hypothesise, that rest (as I think you're saying it does) on the dualism between a religious community, and a non-religious (or less organised religious) community. Because information on the latter state is often simply guessed at, or even made up.

I don't know anything about pre-Christian evidence from other parts of the world though.

[miemio]

I haven't read anything about Nietzsche - I may try to and join in the discussion if I get time, but I thought I'd respond to this. I don't know much about mytholoies either, but I do know a bit about the Norse one. In this the Gods enter a great final battle with the undead and the giants and other nasties, which is all pretty standard I think. But Norse is the only mythology where the Gods loose, which I find really interesting (it's definitely worth reading about, lots of fun with boats made out of dead people's toe nails and all sorts).

In this part of the world (Northern Europe, Scandanavia, Iceland), we don't get any literature, or even writing (apart from a few runes) before the conversions to Christianity. Other material culture is also very sparse. So to talk about a pre-Christian era is very problematic (even the mythology I mentioned above might well be a largely post-Christian invention). So that's the problem I have with argument, or hypothesise, that rest (as I think you're saying it does) on the dualism between a religious community, and a non-religious (or less organised religious) community. Because information on the latter state is often simply guessed at, or even made up.

I don't know anything about pre-Christian evidence from other parts of the world though.
I forgot to answer thos one. First of all, welcome back Kat! And second.. I wish I'd read more of our mythology, dead peoples toenails-boats and dying gods sounds interesting. (honestly!) Is this in Edda?
The problem with unreliable sources is definately an issue, but the entire argument has to be viewed as a mindpuzzle, and not be taken too serious.
I think it has gone a bit over people heads as well, so I think Im forced to do my assignment with only my own input:hidey:

[Tekke]

Here is a quick biog for anyone who has never read his works.
.....

.....

"French people piss me off."

— Eric Cartman

(y) (Y) (y) (Y)

[bongobaba]

So as I see it, in these days, when our collective God is dead and we don't believe in anything everybody has to create his/her own myths so they are able to manouvre themselves in life. They have to make out all the archetypes necessary for psychological growth and to keep the will to power alive. When we fail in creating our myths properly the world becomes incomprihensible and people tilt..? If everybody is walking around living in their own little world and it doesn't fit in with the myths of the people around them, it's bound to create some issues isn't it?

I don't think the problem comes from the absence of a collective god. There is still some collective gods you can choose and being hindou, christian, muslim ... and there are some ideologies that still exist and act as a religion like communism or nazism, fascism. But I agree people has choices to make to construct their own identity.

The world is so small now, all the collective myths that have been separated by land and sea for so long are all in the same place now and in clinch with eachother.. (f.i. religions, values) Even though most mythical moral have the same essence (correct me if Im wrong here, I'm not so read up on them, but from what I have encountered I sense the same underlying messages in them), we still fail to see it and we fight over who knows the truth.
This might be because we have succumb to the will to be slaves to the truth, instead of the will to be and create our own truth. We want something solid and refuse to realise that the world is chaotic. The myths cannot make it solid, but they can provide some temporary order, a glimpse of how it works.

I also agree with that, the problems come from people who knows and want to impose it to others and not from people who believes. I don't think it is recent though, we have a common history full of persecutions against people who were "heretics".

Should myths and art have a bigger place in our world or are we able keep our sanity by upholding the search for truth? Does myths only confuse us, or are the wisdom in them more valuable than f.i. advanced mathematics and other sciences?
I'm quite confused now. Because for me it is two different questions. For the first one I would answer than we must not be obsessed by finding the truth, and our society and education is going in the wrong way. The litterature and arts is less present than before in our education. Having some knowledge in philosophy and art is as important as knowing basic mathematics, because without arts and philosophy you can't dream and construct your identity. But arts and myths are not opposed to sciences. Sciences is a tool for understanding how the world works. As all tools it can be imperfect some times. And myths and philosophy are tools to find why the world works like that. You must know though that you will never be able to find all answers to those questions, how and why.

PS : Tekke, french swiss are almost like french :p

[Mikey:)]

Should myths and art have a bigger place in our world or are we able keep our sanity by upholding the search for truth? Does myths only confuse us, or are the wisdom in them more valuable than f.i. advanced mathematics and other sciences?

I dont know much about myths or advanced mathmatics so ill just pick up on the question of art. Post modernism brought about the notion of the death of the author/birth of the critic which is to say that art is no longer about hugely celebrated pieces and artists... we will never have another Monet or Renior for instance. Art has become all about the subjective tastes of the individual which has led to the explosion of design. With this art has become more central to our lives... we can express our individualism through out choice of fashion, decor, architecture, music etc. Art in the traditional sense is dying out but if you see art in its simplest form as an act of creation then you will find it is bigger than ever with the advance of technology making it easier and more accessable for people to be creative and expressive in their own way.

[Kat]

I forgot to answer thos one. First of all, welcome back Kat! And second.. I wish I'd read more of our mythology, dead peoples toenails-boats and dying gods sounds interesting. (honestly!) Is this in Edda?
The problem with unreliable sources is definately an issue, but the entire argument has to be viewed as a mindpuzzle, and not be taken too serious.
I think it has gone a bit over people heads as well, so I think Im forced to do my assignment with only my own input:hidey:
Sorry, only just saw this. Yeah, it's in Snorri's Edda - I think some of it's in the poetic Edda too, because he quotes it, but I think a lot of it is unique (and quite possibly made up). Thanks for the welcome; it's nice to come back when I have a minute and spam things up a little :)


Post modernism brought about the notion of the death of the author/birth of the critic which is to say that art is no longer about hugely celebrated pieces and artists... we will never have another Monet or Renior for instance.

As I understood it, the 'Death of the Author' philiosophy isn't about whether we celebrate particularly influentual art or works by a particular artist as such. It's about abandoning the idea of an unfounded concept of authorial intention, the idea that a piece of art has a particular meaning that we need to try and reconstruct. The birth is of the viewer, or the reader, or the listener, rather than specifically of the trained critic; the text is freed from unhelpful contraints (although not all contraints, a sense of cultural and social context is still important for art) and meaning becomes plural.

It's a few years since I did this stuff, and I read Barthes in relation to texts rather than works of art, so the above might not be right. I think it's a really interesting subject though.