Nietzsche's idea of amor fati
Is Nietzsche correct in his critique of Christianity and much of the tradition of western philosophy as being life denying, a turning away from life? . He includes not on Christianity in this but he attacks all forms of Idealism and rational thought and indeed all systems of philosophy in general as being life denying and he wants instead to affirm life, to say yes to life in his famous concept of amor fati. However is he really right about that? Is it rather the case that many of these philosophical systems of ethics and morality whether it's Aristotle's or Plato's ethics or Kant's moral theory that they are a goal or set of ideas for humanity to aspire to. An attempt to construct a framework of values by which a society or even an individual can live by without any such framework it would be almost anarchical. Isn't Aristotle correct that human beings are fundamentally social beings and therefore in the matter of ethics and values that it's important to see them in a SOCIAL context, to provide a some kind of guide to how human beings can flourish not only as individuals but also crucially to live together with a common set of moral values. But Nietzsche attacks all forms of moralizing altogether. Is he correct here or is it being unrealistic?
Comments (61)
Nietzsche isn’t denying that people need value systems in order to function. He is saying that to claim any one value system as privileged over all the others is to deny modem, because it is to deny change by desiring the freezing into place of one value. The purpose of values is to provide a sense of order and control. Being always ensconced withi. one state or other, we will always have a measure of structure and order, but order becomes disorder when it is ossified into ‘truth’.
Go with the flow is what that means to me. Very Daoist!
Yes I see what you mean but what about Aristotle's ethics or virtue ethics, neither are not a rigid system of rules or codes to live by. They emphasis the importance of developing a good character , that's their end goal and they do not include a prescription of what one most do or believe in. Essentially these philosophies are flexible, there is not set of rules , just guidance on how to achieve well being unlike Christianity or Kant's ethics which includes set of rules and duties to live by. Why does Nietzsche reject Aristotle's and stoicism also . I don't perceive any element of control or the "freezing into place of one set of values" . Rather the stoics emphasis how we can navigate the hardships of life successfully through cultivating resilience. They don't preach a religious creed or doctrines.
Nietzsche determines the good as the effect of an ‘instinct’ of assimilation and control. Thus the good , and ‘good character’ is closely linked to conformity to particular value systems. Our sense of morality, righteousness , ‘character’ and goodness cannot escape this association with incorporation and control.
“ The commanding element (whatever it is) that is generally called “spirit” wants to dominate itself and its surroundings, and to feel its domination: it wills simplicity out of multiplicity, it is a binding, subduing, domineering, and truly masterful will. Its needs and abilities are the same ones that physiologists have established for everything that lives, grows, and propagates. The power of spirit to appropriate foreign elements manifests itself in a strong tendency to assimilate the new to the old, to simplify the manifold, to disregard or push aside utter inconsistencies: just as it will arbitrarily select certain aspects or outlines of the foreign, of any piece of the “external world,” for stronger emphasis, stress, or falsification in its own interest. Its intention here is to incorporate new “experiences,” to classify new things into old classes, – which is to say: it aims at growth, or, more particularly, the feeling of growth, the feeling of increasing strength.”(Beyond Good and Evil)
Thus we must move past the good vs evil
binary , which always privileges the good and depicts evil as a lack, an absence , a negation, and recognize that what opposes the good is not only necessary but fecund.
Thanks for your reply but unfortunately I don't understand alot of what you're saying. There's loads of technical terms that I can't understand. If you could put it into simple straightforward language that would be appreciated. Thanks
Who is Frantic Freddie, I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about here. Are you saying that Nietzsche is borrowing some ideas from other thinkers. I think Nietzsche's concept of amor fati is different from the ancient stoics. It's more above loving and embracing life rather than mere stoic acceptance, which for Nietzsche seems not very life affirming.
Unfortunately I’m utterly incapable of putting anything into simple straightforward language.
Sorry, sometimes I give philosophers nicknames. I've always thought Nietzsche to be a very excitable, emotional sort, too fond of exclamations and hyperbole for my taste.
The Stoics didn't merely accept life; that's a common misconception, like the claim that the Stoics disliked emotions. The Stoics always thought of Nature as being governed by a divine, benign, spirit which is immanent in it, and so could not think of our lives as something we must merely accept and resign ourselves to as best we can. You can see something of their reverence for life and the world in the Hymn of Cleanthes, but the Roman Stoics in particular were expressive of this, i.e. Seneca, Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius.
I think he has a point if he's addressing the time after the rise of Christianity. Even though ancient pagan philosophers like Plato thought the world to be in a sense "a cave" the rejection of life and its pleasures, physical and mental, wasn't present in ancient pagan philosophy, nor do I think this was a view shared by most in pre-Christian times in the West.
But doesn't only attack Christianity for this he also attacks most of Western philosophy since Socrates as being in the category in what he describes as "life denying". I would take issue with Nietzsche here. I think he is overlooking the great diversity in western thought, some of which was influenced by Christianity but a lot of it may have been influenced by the pagan ancient philosophers and even Eastern philosophy from the 19th century onwards.
The element of what Nietzsche refers to as 'Socratic' (that Nietzsche objects to) is the separation of the realm of becoming from the realm of the eternal in a way where it is said that the former is built upon the structure of the latter.
Nietzsche depicts the delight in the 'given' objectivity of our experiences as secretly relying upon the reliance upon a 'given' eternal condition underlying the chaos we try to make sense of. An article of faith is being treated as a living god. So, it is a really good mask because it has a mask for its mask-i-ness. The world stands before me like a bowl of breakfast cereal.
Regarding the inheritances of cultural legacies, Nietzsche describes 'Christians' stealing the idea of the eternal from the 'Socratic' vision for their own uses. Whatever was going on with Jesus was accepted by N as the last expression of a message barely heard. N described Jesus as the last Christian. But that interesting element is only a side note to how little worth 'cultural legacies' were regarded by N. The way people used/use those legends to develop 'identity' for themselves receive the greatest scorn.
The above is presented for the purpose of noting that N wrote the Genealogy of Morals, not the Science of Morality. Exploration versus Explanation.
BT 14
BT 15
At the same time,
BGE 10
Reginster, "The Affirmation of Life", chapter 6 part 2
That's what happens when you philosophize with a hammer. I'm still ambivalent about a lot of his writing as soon as it gets into science, rationality, etc. As someone who tries to play a bit of music, the angle of "life is actually art, and your precious rationality will implode without it" was at first appealing, but I'm not so sure anymore. It's a similar sentiment to what I think Lovecraft expresses in e.g. The Silver Key. However, it seems to me that the trajectory of modern (neuro)science could well lead to real knowledge of art, maybe even to the death of the soul?
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Quoting Ross
Again, good questions. I can't quickly find a passage of his criticism of Aristotle, do you have an example? I'm not doubting that he does this. His criticism of Stoicism:
BGE 9
Seems problematic. I'm not about to go full solipsist, but current ideas about how our brain functions suggest that we are constantly minimising misfit between predictions based on our model of the world and our experiences. So yes, we are constantly "imposing" stuff on "nature". Not clear how else morality or ideals or any of that are supposed to happen. I agree that it seems like he is trying to spin this as dogmatism, which he can then dismiss in terms of his overarching anti-dogmatic project.
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Quoting Ross
They are, however I think he means that many of them are compromised by subtle ties to dogmatic or religious ideals and tend to use some kind of cop-out to deal with the issue he wants to examine, which is the problem of suffering and its role as a source of nihilism in the modern world. I'm convinced now that he was significantly influenced by reading Schopenhauer, but completely disagreed with Schopenhauer's conclusions. He can't stand the idea of "denial of the will", and from this point of view he distrusts, any aloof, rigid systems that impose boundaries from outside. Of course, some boundaries are necessary in practice, as you said. I think his contribution is to point out that in the highly dynamic modern world, if we want to keep any ideals, they need to be resililent to being constantly challenged.
But Aristotle's ethics which have been hugely influential in western thought is not at all a rigid system. There are no rules or duties in it. It's aim to cultivate a good character through developing the virtues. Now what argument could Nietzsche make against that. Aristotle's ethics are not life denying, they are secular, don't assume any creed or doctrines. Yet Nietzsche attacks the whole tradition of the thought and I presume he's including Aristotle in this critique.
Whatever else the phrase augurs, to adopt the stance of amor fati is to rebel – Das Ja-sagen "Nein!"@ :strong: :sweat:
And because Christianity is, according to Freddy, "contra amor fati" (i.e. life-denying resentment), contra — self-overcoming – every kind of "contra amor fati" is also what amor fati (i.e. life-affirming approbation) entails.
@ [quote=The Rebel: An Essay on Man in Revolt][i]What is a rebel? A man who says no, but whose refusal does not imply a renunciation. He is also a man who says yes, from the moment he makes his first gesture of rebellion.
Not every value entails rebellion, but every act of rebellion tacitly invokes a value…
Rebellion, though apparently negative, since it creates nothing, is profoundly positive in that it reveals the part of man which must always be defended.
Because his mind was free, Nietzsche knew that freedom of the mind is not a comfort, but an achievement to which one aspires and at long last obtains after an exhausting struggle.[/i][/quote]
(Emphasis added.)
I was misled by fate which I read as passively, stoically, resignedly accepting whatever it is that comes your way without resisting (rebelling).
To] ultimately prefer even a handful of ‘certainty’ to a whole carload of beautiful possibilities [ . . . ] this is nihilism and the sign of a mortally weary soul.
I think Nietzsche is mistaken in his critique of Socrates and western philosophy here. It is a misunderstanding of human psychology. It's human nature to seek certainty, it's probably related to our survival instinct. I don't agree that Socrates thought is nihilism. Socrates and many others after him and indeed the field of science sought a rational explanation for the universe and for human life. There's nothing nihilistic about that. I think some of the religious or political ideologies may be a form of nihilism eg the belief in salvation and in heaven or a Utopia etc. But I think Nietzsche goes to far in attacking the whole edifice of western thought including even science of being nihilistic.
Are you familiar with the doctrtine of eternal recurrence that N proposed as the antithesis to depicting life 'here' as some kind of test for another life? The idea is not presented as a desiderata. It is presented as an unavoidable medicine if one is to reject the other pharmaceuticals on offer.
So Nietzsche scorns religion's offer of a better afterlife. Basically one-bird-in-the-hand-is-worth-two-in-the-bush logic. I like that. To Nietzsche religion is an empty promise, a scam as it were that's defrauded people by the billions of a life they have by dangling before their eyes an afterlife that's so good to be impossible to resist and, before I forget, there's an element of threat (hell) for those more cautious with their $10 million (the worth of a human life).
"Eternal life" is now-here – "giving all to the present" as Camus says ("blessedness" ~Spinoza, "beatitude" ~C. Rosset, "unselfing" ~I. Murdoch)
Quoting 180 Proof
A 'moral-psychological' test for loving fate (i.e. affirming life-nature-entropy): Freddy's gedankenexperiment of eternal recurrence of the same.
Nietzsche' eternal recurrence vis-à-vis Camus' Sisyphusean nightmare scenario. How do the two relate?
The latter is an analogic translation of the former, it seems to me, with the same speculative (chthonic) throughline going all the way back to, at least, Empedocles & Kohelet. :fire:
[quote=Marcus Aurelius]The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.[/quote]
[quote=The Gay Science, no. 341]The greatest weight.-- What, if some day or night a demon were to steal after you into your loneliest loneliness and say to you:
"This life as you now live it and have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more; and there will be nothing new in it, but every pain and every joy and every thought and sigh and everything unutterably small or great in your life will have to return to you, all in the same succession and sequence - even this spider and this moonlight between the trees, and even this moment and I myself. The eternal hourglass of existence is turned upside down again and again, and you with it, speck of dust!"
Would you not throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse the demon who spoke thus?... Or how well disposed would you have to become to yourself and to life to crave nothing more fervently than this ultimate eternal confirmation and seal?[/quote]
"I leave Sisyphus at the foot of the mountain. One always finds one's burden again. But Sisyphus teaches the higher fidelity that negates the gods and raises rocks. He too concludes that all is well. This universe henceforth without a master seems to him neither sterile nor futile."
~The Myth of Sisyphus
Quoting 180 Proof
:death: :flower:
Quoting 180 Proof
The eternal return of the same "infinite task", no? Zarathustra and his self-overcoming mountain, Sisyphus and his philosopher's stone – twin 'eternal champions of the multiverse.' :smirk:
What Nietzsche rejects in the expectation of an afterlife is that it avoids our responsibility to decide for ourselves what to value or discard in this one. Note how having an intellectual conscience is demanded without qualification:
Quoting The Gay Science, translated by Walter Kaufmann, Book One, paragraph 2
This touched a chord. It resonates with me and as chance would have it I have something to say about it.
In the book Jurassic Park, the mathematician Ian Malcom talks about fractals and he gives an example - cotton prices. The graph for cotton price variations for a decade looks exactly like that of a year, a month, a week. A lifetime = A day.
What did I do today?
Awoke, washed up, went to work, returned home, slept.
What would I have done for my entire life?
Ditto!
Sisyphus & Eternal recurrence!
By the way, thanks for explaining Nietzsche & Camus to me
Yep. Throw away a perfectly good real opportunity for an infinitely better but imaginary one. Reminds me of Pascal's wager.
:up:
Consider this from Beyond Good And Evil, (Gutenberg edition, translated by Helen Zimmern) Chapter 1, section 9 sourced from here
You desire to LIVE “according to Nature”? Oh, you noble Stoics, what fraud of words! Imagine to yourselves a being like Nature, boundlessly extravagant, boundlessly indifferent, without purpose or consideration, without pity or justice, at once fruitful and barren and uncertain: imagine to yourselves INDIFFERENCE as a power—how COULD you live in accordance with such indifference? To live—is not that just endeavouring to be otherwise than this Nature? Is not living valuing, preferring, being unjust, being limited, endeavouring to be different? And granted that your imperative, “living according to Nature,” means actually the same as “living according to life”—how could you do DIFFERENTLY? Why should you make a principle out of what you yourselves are, and must be? In reality, however, it is quite otherwise with you: while you pretend to read with rapture the canon of your law in Nature, you want something quite the contrary, you extraordinary stage-players and self-deluders! In your pride you wish to dictate your morals and ideals to Nature, to Nature herself, and to incorporate them therein; you insist that it shall be Nature “according to the Stoa,” and would like everything to be made after your own image, as a vast, eternal glorification and generalism of Stoicism! With all your love for truth, you have forced yourselves so long, so persistently, and with such hypnotic rigidity to see Nature FALSELY, that is to say, Stoically, that you are no longer able to see it otherwise—and to crown all, some unfathomable superciliousness gives you the Bedlamite hope that BECAUSE you are able to tyrannize over yourselves—Stoicism is self-tyranny—Nature will also allow herself to be tyrannized over: is not the Stoic a PART of Nature?… But this is an old and everlasting story: what happened in old times with the Stoics still happens today, as soon as ever a philosophy begins to believe in itself. It always creates the world in its own image; it cannot do otherwise; philosophy is this tyrannical impulse itself, the most spiritual Will to Power, the will to “creation of the world,” the will to the causa prima.
Any such construction is an attempt to reduce life to abstract categories, abstract definitions of right and wrong, and abstract explanations why these morals exists and why one should cling to them, and abstract ways to make oneself or others a better person.
Now it would be no problem if people want to conduct their life according to these rules, and transform life to conform to the abstract image they have. If only they would apply the system to themselves only. The problem though is that because of the claim of universality it is thought to be applicable to all, like is thought for almost any western systems of thought which are mostly abstract views. Abstraction and universality are concepts that lead away from real life and locality. The same holds for the abstract world of science which claimes to be universally valid. Same problem here.
Where does this desire for abstraction and universality come from? I agree with Nietzsche that the roots lay in ancient Greek. Mathematics (the ultimate form of abstraction), physics, metaphysics, and abstract moral, have origins in the minds of the mathematicians, physicists, metaphysicists, and moralists alive back then. The philosophers, that is. Which made its way to the modern-day world, causing the existential misery it finds itself in.
I would not describe it as a 'perfectly good real opportunity.' Perhaps you are aware of this, but Nietzsche specifically called out Pascal as the poster child of how a great talent can be misled by morbid ideas (more in N's notebooks than actual books).
On Nietzsche's side, one is risking a lot. The desire for certainty is not any kind of promise it will be met. Honesty is the wager.
On Pascal's side, the wager is not even a gamble. There is nothing to lose if you shove your chips across the board. The casino is an illusion. You are not here.
Pascal's wager.
Risk-seeking.
[quote=Wikipedia]In accounting, finance, and economics, a risk-seeker or risk-lover is a person who has a preference for risk.
While most investors are considered risk averse, one could view casino-goers as risk-seeking. A common example to explain risk-seeking behaviour is; If offered two choices; either $50 as a sure thing, or a 50% chance each of either $100 or nothing, a risk-seeking person would prefer the gamble. Even though the gamble and the "sure thing" have the same expected value, the preference for risk makes the gamble's expected utility for the individual much higher.[/quote]
Risk-aversion.
[quote=Wikipedia]In economics and finance, risk aversion is the tendency of people to prefer outcomes with low uncertainty to those outcomes with high uncertainty, even if the average outcome of the latter is equal to or higher in monetary value than the more certain outcome.[1] Risk aversion explains the inclination to agree to a situation with a more predictable, but possibly lower payoff, rather than another situation with a highly unpredictable, but possibly higher payoff. For example, a risk-averse investor might choose to put their money into a bank account with a low but guaranteed interest rate, rather than into a stock that may have high expected returns, but also involves a chance of losing value.[/quote]
It looks like people are gambling with their lives; in monetary terms, as per the US federal government, that's $10 mil per head.
[quote=Wikipedia]William Lee Bergstrom (1951 – February 4, 1985) commonly known as The Suitcase Man or Phantom Gambler, was a gambler and high roller known for placing the largest bet in casino gambling history at the time amounting to $777,000 ($2.44 million present day amount) at the Horseshoe Casino, which he won.[/quote]
William Lee Bergstrom's bet is just one-fifth of $10 mil.
Yep, it's real but we can conceive of a better deal (heaven); Christianity/other religions step(s) in and annoounces that heaven is real, it's just that you have to die to get there and not only that you have to earn it, pay for it with good deeds.
As you can see, the moment you think of the this and now as not ideal, you open the doors to Pascal's wager. You can't have one without the other. Hence, my statement, "perfectly good real opportunity".
I'm familiar with the passage. Very typical of Nietzsche, full of assumptions, pronouncements, exclamation points and rhetorical questions.
Nietzsche, if I am not mistaken, admired the Stoic spirit of acceptance of what cannot be changed, like Spinoza, but what do you say of his critique of the Stoic's belief in logos and providence?
I can't comment on the merit of his ideas but the prose is so bombastic I can't ever get though more than a few sentences before needing to leave in a hurry. It's like being stuck next to a hectoring uncle who teaches lit crit somewhere.
My point is he makes no criticism. There is no critique. He just says they're wrong. He also says he's right.
Thus he claims Nature is unjust, pitiless, indifferent. He claims we can't live according to Nature.
To live is to be unjust, to be different. He says the Stoics practice self-tyranny. He declares. That's all he does.
It's odd that he appears to know very little about Stoicism, or perhaps he simply means to mischaracterize it. The Stoics felt that Reason is the basis of the divine, immanent spirit guiding the universe. Because humans have the ability to reason, they share, in a small way, the Divine Reason. Living according to nature is to live in accordance with what reason dictates; reason is the special characteristic of humans as parts of the world, so to live according to nature is to live in accordance with our own nature. Living according to Nature isn't merely to imitate Nature in all respects, which obviously is impossible.
Living isn't being unjust or different. We can certainly be unjust, and different, but according to the Stoics being unjust, being immoral, arises from the failure to recognize that all humans have within them a portion of the divinity, and the desire for things beyond our control. We should be just to each other as we are the same as partakers in the divine. The desire for things beyond our control is unreasonable. Stoicism isn't self-tyranny, unless tyranny consists of seeking to avoid being angry, hateful, bitter, maniacal, etc., and to seek tranquility.
There are arguments that can be made against Stoicism, but Nietzsche doesn't make them. He just rambles on, beating a rather awkwardly contrived straw man.
I'm afraid that's true. All too often it seems he's too excited and self-righteous to do more than proclaim. I picture him breaking pen after pen as he condemns various and sundry people and beliefs. He always seem to be in a great hurry; he rants, in fact. This is why I call him, unkindly, "Frantic Freddy."
[quote=Beyond Good and Evil, Chap. 1, sec.9]You want to live "according to nature"? Oh you noble Stoics, what deceptive words these are! Imagine a being like nature, wasteful beyond measure, indifferent beyond measure, without purpose and consideration, without mercy and fairness, fertile and desolate and uncertain at the same time; imagine indifference itself as a power — how could you live according to this indifference? Living — is that not precisely wanting to be other than this nature? Is not living estimating, preferring, being unjust, being limited, wanting to be different? And supposing your imperative "live according to nature" meant at bottom as much as "live according to life" — how could you not do that? Why make a principle of what you yourselves are and must be? — In truth, the matter is altogether different: while you pretend rapturously to read the canon of your law in nature, you want something opposite, you strange actors and self-deceivers! Your pride wants to impose and incorporate your morality, your ideal onto nature, even into nature, you demand that it be nature "according to the Stoa," and you would like all existence to exist only after your own image — as an immense eternal glorification and universalization of Stoicism! For all your love of truth, you have forced yourselves so long, so persistently, so rigidly and hypnotically to see nature falsely, namely stoically, that you are no longer able to see it differently — and some abysmal arrogance finally still inspires you with the insane hope that because you know how to tyrannize yourselves — Stoicism is self-tyranny — nature, too, lets itself be tyrannized: is not the Stoic — a piece of nature? ..... But this is an old, eternal story: what formerly happened with the Stoics still happens today, as soon as any philosophy begins to believe in itself. It always creates the world in its own image, it cannot do otherwise; philosophy is this tyrannical drive itself, the most spiritual will to power, to the "creation of the world," to the causa prima.[/quote]
When you put it that way, the 'now' sounds like a description of a Bed and Breakfast one reports visiting without enthusiasm. It was okay for the night but not anything to celebrate.
Nietzsche is asking for one to put oneself in a vulnerable position by choice. The bird he held in his hand is free to fly away. He seeks a verification that may not happen. That is why he keeps talking about being courageous.
On Pascal's side, the risk being taken on by his interlocutors has already been accepted. These people have deferred the sufferings for their sins upon some kind of existence they have already abandoned. They are numb and suspicious. Pascal proposes a period of accommodation rather than call for people to fall on their knees in fright. Those cards have already been played.
I've wondered more than once whether my aversion to certain writers is related to the translation of the works into English. I can't know, of course, but it seems that it may not be, as this aversion relates primarily to 19th century authors, but Germans in particular. Would all translations have the same defects?
Maybe the Romanticism of the time induced them to write in such a florid, bombastic style, and aphoristically. You see the Romantic bombast in the music of the time as well--consider Wagner and Franz Liszt. I prefer their contemporary Brahms. As to Nietzsche in particular, maybe he was too much devoted to the mad god Dionysus, forsaking Apollo altogether. The Stoics were never followers of Dionysus as far as I know.
I think some of the style comes from growing up in a dour religious household.
Maybe so. I wonder, also, whether the fact Christianity became less and less credible had an unsettling effect on thinkers and writers of the time, leaving them all a bit frantic.
Quoting Paine
Would you have preferred he write in a different style?
Don’t you think that if a writer is astute enough to distill the spirit of their time and put it under critique, that they would be as deliberate and insightful in choosing their style of attack?
But I think there is a geometric element in his rhetoric that endeavored to show what the reverse of conventions produced. I don't read N as someone so simple to think he could just reverse what was commonly held and be accepted as someone trying to do serious work.
A lot of the language demonstrates elements beyond specifc propositions. Something like, 'you say reverence has to be couched in such and such a language. Well, this is what it sounds like if I use the exact opposite means of expression.' Nietzsche was a pretty astute student of the use of 'egotism' in European literature. It seems strange to me to read his use of the form without a grain or two of salt.
So, sincere? Yes, to a fault. Unaware of that quality as a matter of rhetoric? Very unlikely.
No question, but the merits of that second aesthetic choice may still be up for debate.
That is an interesting question. He was clear that if someone wanted to do better, then do better. That is as honest a response I can imagine.
Understood. (I also prefer Brahms. Btw, N did outgrow and then repudiate both Wagner and his music ... as not Dionysian enough!)
Why? I think your impression of what I said reflects the peculiarities of your own worldview.
Quoting Paine
So the choices are grin and bear it or gamble your life away. Tough call.
There is no doubt I am viewing the matter through my own peculiar view of the world.
I meant no offense. The comment was put forward as an alternative reading of Nietzsche and Pascal to your interpretation.
Nietzsche spoke specifically against the 'punishment of self' Pascal applied to himself. I am not aware of any remarks by N regarding Pascal's wager. Leaving aside my reading of Pascal in the context of Christian expression, what text of Nietzsche exemplifies the grin and bear it quality you hear?
Quoting Paine
Vulnerable means, in my book, to be deprived of all means of escape/relief - there's nothing you can do (amor fati) and so :grin: and bear it!
That expression is at odds with Nietzsche saying life keeps happening despite the entropy. The cups keep getting filled over. We have no idea why.
And what do you make of all the language surrounding freedom from bad science and sick thoughts? He does not replace all that with sunshine. That absence is part of his proposition, if you could make it a sentence, the sentence would have been written.
For me, Nietzsche's amor fati is a call to reconfigure our attitude towards life/reality as there really is nothing we can do to alter our circumstances and religion makes an already bad situation even worse by portraying this life/reality as a base of sorts where you prepare for your real (after)life of eternal bliss (heaven), such an outlook having the overall effect of allaying/assuaging our suffering/misery which then delays amor fati and the benefits that come with it.
"My formula for greatness in a human being is amor fati: that one wants nothing to be different, not forward, not backward, not in all eternity. Not merely bear what is necessary, still less conceal it—all idealism is mendacity in the face of what is necessary—but love it." From Ecce Homo.
Quotes from the Stoics:
"Love the hand that fate deals you and play it as your own, for what could be more fitting?" (Marcus Aurelius).
“Accept the things to which fate binds you, and love the people with whom fate brings you together, but do so with all your heart.” (Marcus Aurelius)
"Do not seek for things to happen the way you want them to; rather, wish that what happens happen the way it happens: then you will be happy." (Epictetus)
Amor Fati wouldn't seem to be the most novel or revolutionary of Freddie's insights.
Yes, it could seem that way if you haven’t read much ‘Freddie’.
One difference between N and those Stoics is that N dd not appeal to a cosmic Good as a point of departure.
I read a great deal of that excitable fellow in my naive and romantic youth. I must have enjoyed overwrought writing back then in some way. I read a great deal of Ayn Rand as well at that time, I'm ashamed to admit.
I wonder if Nietzsche managed to love his fate.