The Demon of Descartes

South African author Joan De La Haye offers Demon Friday. Surprisingly, it's each Friday and it involves a demon from one grimoire or another. She also greets us as 'freaky darlings', similar to Vampira. Top class!

This is my own take on Demon Friday, except it's not always on Fridays and it doesn't feature real demons or pictures of real demons. Sorry.

These are all my posts on demons:

1. The demon of Laplace, regarding probability.


2. The demon of Maxwell, regarding thermodynamics.


3. The demon of Descartes, designed to invoke skepticism.


4. The demon of Morton, designed to make one aware of confirmation bias.

René Descartes invented the evil genius, or evil demon, to illustrate how far his skepticism stretched. The evil genius of Descartes presents a complete illusion of the outside world to the senses. In addition, Descartes's demon presents an illusion of a physical body to the senses. Similar to the Truman Show scenario, this demon keeps us captive in a simulated reality where we have no way of determining what is real or unreal based on sensory input. We also have no way of knowing that the demon is manipulating us.

This evil genius must have convinced Joel Schumacher to cast Val Kilmer as Batman. Or even to go anywhere near the Batman franchise.



Batman Forever, a film that underperformed due to its violent content. Really? No, I think it underperformed because it was crap. If Uma Thurman can't save a movie, nothing can.

Cartesianism

Descartes held that there are three realms:

1. The realm of the body, which is the physical world.


2. The realm of the mind, which is our internal mental world.


3. The realm of God, which is something that only Lemmy Kilmister of Motörhead knows anything about.

Similar to the religious conviction that people are souls that inhabit bodies, Descartes held that people are thoughts that somehow think themselves without the need for a body. The body is thus part of the physical realm. This physical realm is easily manipulated by the evil genius.



Lemmy of Motörhead. A real evil genius.

Different Versions of Descartes's Demon

Some interpretations of the evil genius grant the demon different powers. To some interpretors, there are things that do not rely on the senses for their validity. Among these are mathematics and logic. The evil demon would not be able to fabricate mathematics and logic, thus these are your weapons against Descartes's demon.

Other interpretations hold that the demon is omnipotent and can even manipulate our thoughts, or mathematics and logic itself, to convince us that our world is real. We are thus helpless against Descartes's demon.

BP stock holders might like Descartes's demon

If this world is simulated, it means that BP stock holders did not really lose a fortune after the tragic oil spill. Which would be a more comforting thought if the demon did not fabricate money in our realm in the first place.

Metacritique of "The Objectivist Ethics"

The following responds to a critique of "The Objectivist Ethics". Regular readers might have guessed that I am a bit of a Randroid. My numbering corresponds to the numbering of the author. To follow things smoothly, you have to read the critique and my metacritique next to each other.

1. Rand's argument

Objection to i
The fact that Ayn Rand does not offer an argument for 1 does not make it false. This piece does not offer a counter argument. That besides, Ayn Rand bases Objectivism on axioms. Per definition, axioms are not proven but assumed to be true.

Objection to ii
The alternatives need to be there for either schools of value to be satisfied. Absolute good is in contrast with less good options, relative good is in contrast with other worse options. A million US dollars, or South African Rand, has to be compared with something of lesser value (a million Zimbabwean Dollars, for instance) to be considered valuable.

Objection to iii
Non-living things cannot make value judgements as far as we know. This is the point of the fact that they cannot face alternatives: they cannot choose to be living things. We can.

Objection to iv
These two interpretations, oddly enough, seem to reinforce the idea that value has to be of value to someone. Value as a verb implies an agent that values. Value as an absolute implies comparison with less valuable or more valuable things, which begs the question valuable to whom? This again implies an agent that compares.

Objection to v
The implicit premise 7 is derived incorrectly.

Rand's premise: 6. Every living thing acts to maintain its life, for its own sake.
The author's implied premise: 7. There is no other thing that they act to gain or keep for its own sake.

In other words, agent does x because of y. This does not mean that an agent can't do z because of y (or an agent can't do other things merely for their own sake). Rather, Rand's implied premise seems to be that an agent cannot do x because of z (namely an agent cannot act to maintain itself for the sake of someone else), not that there are no other things that agents do for their own sake.

The author focuses on this incorrect premise 7, thus v is a classic strawman argument. It is important to read the entire 6 and to understand that agents act to maintain themselves for their own sake. v claims that this implies innate values, which it does not. As per 2 and 3, Rand claims that agents choose among alternatives according to what they value. Thus, values cannot be innate as instinct. They are a result of volition. Rocks cannot act to satisfy value systems, regardless of the value their kinetic energy might have to us.

Objection to vi
This breaks up 6 and gets lost in semantics. Again, 6 claims agents maintain themselves for themselves. Nothing more.

Objection to vii
This again focuses on the incorrectly derived premise 10. Rand stated that an agent's life is its ultimate value, at the heart of its values. This is why Rand stated that life is valuable for its own sake. It is thus rational to act in order to promote life. The derived premise states that Rand claimed it is rational to act in order to promote one's values. This does not follow from Rand's statements (unless one's values are necessarily in tune with promoting one's life), as Rand claimed that values are volition.

You may choose to have any values whatsoever, and acting to satisfy them is not necessarily tantamount to promoting your life. Rand claimed that it is rational to act to promote your life, therefore you should choose values accordingly. NOT that you should act to promote your values. If this were true and your values were not chosen to promote your life, your values - and not your life - would have the ultimate value.

vii begs the question why is it rational to act to satisfy values, if they do not promote your own life? This, I belief, is the point Rand was trying to make. We should, therefore, act to promote our own lives, and allow others to act to promote their own lives. This is the real meaning of altruism: to allow agents to live for their own sake and not to require other agents to live for your own sake, or to live for the sake of others.

Objection to viii
Another strawman argument. Rand did not claim that living without 100% reason results in instant death. She merely claimed that we as agents should be allowed to use our ultimate survival tool, namely reason. Reason here refers to acting in your own best interest in order to maintain your life, and allowing others the same course of action. This because the assumption is that life has value for agents, for its own sake.

3. General arguments against ethical egoism

This argument does not follow from Objectivist ethics. This argument begs the question who is forcing you to torture 500 people for the benefit of a dime? This scenario implies the absence of volition, which means Objectivist values do not apply.

4. Attacking straw men

Rand never claimed that moral values are arbitrary. Rand claimed that values should be based on that which keeps you alive. This is hardly arbitrary.

By the metaphysical nature of man and of existence, man has to maintain his life by his own effort; the values he needs—such as wealth or knowledge—are not given to him automatically, as a gift of nature, but have to be discovered and achieved by his own thinking and work. - Ayn Rand, Wikiquote.

This contradicts what the author claims about Rand's values. Another strawman argument, based on the incorrectly derived premise 7, which as discussed was not Rand's implied premise but of the author's own invention.

5. Man qua man and fudge words

Rand never claimed that life is a state of not being dead. On the contrary, to claim this is to miss the entire point of egoism. With Man Qua Man, Rand claimed this:

Man—every man—is an end in himself, not a means to the ends of others; he must live for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself; he must work for his rational self-interest, with the achievement of his own happiness as the highest moral purpose of his life. - Ayn Rand, Wikiquote.

The author again conducts a strawman argument by claiming Rand claims Life Qua Existence (which is the kind of Latin that Monty Python would probably not approve), and neglecting the basic purpose of Objectivist ethics, namely happiness.

Simply being alive is thus not the same as Rand's notions of acting in a rational manner to promote living in happiness.

6. Rand's intuitions

That is why there are no divergent views about mathematical theorems--when Euclid wrote his Elements, no one disagreed with it or presented arguments against it. That's because Euclid had actually proved his theorems.

Mathematics isn' t my field, but as far as I understand there is actually quite a bit of controversy concerning the axioms of mathematics. Particularly Euclid's axioms, which falls apart when gravity becomes too strong, becoming a mere approximation of physical space.

Besides, Euclid' s theorems are proved in exactly the same manner that Ayn Rand proved her Objectivist ethics, namely by defining axioms (self-evident truths) and arguing from them. Euclid never actually proved his axioms either, which is why they are called axioms.

If Euclidean geometry were so uncontroversial, why do we need Non-Euclidean geometry?

When we confront this sort of thing, it is imperative that we remember that Rand gave no argument for ethical egoism. She assumed egoism, discussed other propositions at some length, and then said that she proved it.

Again, not true. Rand proposed certain axioms and argued for egoism from these axioms. In this manner, Rand's theorems are proved just as much as Euclid' s theorems are proved, with the validity depending on the validity of the underlying axioms.

Now, I am not saying this means the concepts are illegitimate, nor does this, by itself, show that her argument is wrong (though the objections I raised in section 2 do).

The author does not claim that Rand was wrong, just that Rand was not right. What exactly does the author claim then? How do the objections raised in section 2 swing this either way?

The author in question focuses on absolute self-interest (more akin to selfishness), and neglects to consider the term 'rational self-interest' as a whole. The author does not actually critique Objectivist Ethics (which argues for rational self-interest) at all, but argues against irrational self-interest at the expense of another agent's rational self-interest. The irony is that altruism presumes it is noteworthy to act in the best interest of others, except if others want to act in their own best interest, as this would be selfish. Thus, under altruism, it is impossible to act in anybody's best interest, as nobody else can know your best interest, and acting in your own best interest is not selfless and thus not altruistic.

Review of Abel Ferrara's The Addiction (1995)

Conclusion

A slow moving, yet slick black and white take on vampirism. No Victorian garb, no corsets and no mortals painstakingly trying to convince vampires to turn them into immortals.

The Addiction is widely regarded as an allegorical tale of drug addiction, but there is inconclusive evidence to dispel my theory that the main character is brainwashed to believe that she is a vampire.

Plot

Kathleen Conklin (Lili Taylor) is a philosophy student who is shocked to learn about the My Lai massacre in one of her lectures. After escaping this environment of controlled information flow, she walks home in a state of emotional distress.

A vampire wench (Annabella Sciorra) attacks Kathleen by dragging her into an alley, making big eye scary faces and prompting Kathleen to order her to go away. Kathleen is caught off guard slightly, because those in humanities tend to be timid. Come to think of it, they also tend to be bucktoothed trend whores. The outdated (c)Rap music on the soundtrack testifies to that.


Is The Addiction about vampires? Photo courtesy of Can Stock Photo.

"Order me to go away"
Kathleen yelps a pathetic "please..." and the vampire wench bites her. Clearly, ambiguity is not a wise recourse when dragged into a darkened alley by someone taller than you. The vampire wench licks the blood off her own chin in a manner which suggests she regularly goes out with the sole purpose of ingesting the body fluids of impressionable girls. I can relate somewhat.

"It's not my actions but your incredulity that needs examination here"
Reborn as a vampire, Kathleen acclimatises herself to her new condition. She systematically upgrades from the morally grey area of using hapless homeless people as makeshift blood banks by drawing their blood inconspicuously to view the world in more black and white moral terms.

These terms position her as a predator of the ultimate mammalian predators. Only vampire rules apply to her, which is why she tells one of her shocked victims: "It's not my actions but your incredulity that needs examination here".

But all is not ponies and rainbows. Kathleen becomes self-destructive and realises she needs a little guidance in her newly-found vampire reality tunnel.


Or could The Addiction be about drug addiction?

There's no such thing as a free Naked Lunch
Peina (Christopher Walken) counsels Kathleen. He is allegedly a vampire who has overcome his thirst for blood. While comforting Kathleen in a slightly inappropriate sage-like manner, he considers it an apt time to start a book club. William S Burroughs' Naked Lunch makes the top of the list for that week.

"I'm not like you, you're nothing"
Seemingly converted to the fasting and meditation of Peina, Kathleen manages to finish her doctoral thesis. She has a graduation party but then all her colleagues in attendance get mauled in an orgiastic blood drinking rite.

Kathleen becomes ill and ends up in hospital. She asks the nurse to open the blinds, which would traditionally kill a vampire. The original vampire wench arrives to close the blinds again, claiming that suicide will not end the quest for rest. Kathleen has a change of heart, as opposed to just a change of blood, and confesses to a catholic priest.

"Self-revelation is annihilation of self"
The closing scene features a shot of Kathleen's grave. She lays a rose on her own grave, and then walks away.

Review

On the surface, it seems like an obvious allegorical tale of heroin addiction. The cravings, the mainlining, the mucking about in darkened alleys all seem to contribute to this allusion, but upon closer inspection it becomes apparent that the subtext is one that parallels Lifton's eight criteria for thought reform.


Or is The Addiction about mind control?

Lifton's Eight Criteria for Thought Reform

1. Milieu Control: Controlling the flow of information in a setting such as this is not a logistical nightmare. The entire film takes place in what appears to be one block in the Bronx. A vigilante group of vampires can likely overcome their fears of hepatitis and condition a victim such as Kathleen to also overcome similar fears by exercising control over a relatively small environment.


2. Mystical Manipulation: Someone with fangs jumping you on a street corner in the middle of the night would arguably count as a mystical manipulation. Similarly, Peina claims some mystical manipulation of his thirst for blood. This is despite offering no evidence that he is in fact a vampire.


3. Demand for Purity: Between Peina and the original vampire wench, Kathleen is expected to be either a vicious predator or an aloof ascetic vampire. To them, a golden means is not possible within their group. This is despite Kathleen's initial reaction of acquiring blood in less sinister ways and then mainlining it. Not exactly kosher, but less conspicuous than dealing with a large number of unpredictable converts.


4. Confession: Peina and the vampire wench stalk Kathleen and keep tabs on her actions. They appear at opportune and inopportune times to present themselves as benevolent creatures. It is doubtful that they have Kathleen's best interests at heart, especially since the vampire wench and Kathleen apply a little Affirmative Action of their own on Kathleen's faculty staff.
   
   Kathleen has no confidentiality. All her actions are made known to the others of the group, either by her own admission or by some apparently mystical manipulation.


5. Sacred Science: None of Kathleen's actions seem to be good enough for the group. If she chooses the option of becoming a vicious predator, Peina reprimands her. If she chooses the path of aloof ascetism, the vampire wench convinces her to leech on her faculty staff. Either way, the group's doctrine is not to be questioned by Kathleen.


6. Loading the Language: The group clearly has its own jargon. Phrases such as 'order me to go away' obtain new meaning within the context of this group, and Kathleen even begins to hurl similar jargon at her victims. In the view of this group, the victims are the ones who are to blame for being at the mercy of vampires because they are not strong enough to offer any resistance.


7. Doctrine over person: Personal experiences are considered irrelevant and subordinate to the experiences the group prescribes. In light of this doctrine, it becomes more clear why Peina and the vampire wench seemingly contradict each other. They are instilling a doctrine over the person of Kathleen by breaking down her mental resistance.


8. Dispensing of existence: Clearly, the group has the final say in who stays and who goes. Kathleen was chosen to be at the mercy of the group, and Kathleen has no way of getting out of this situation. Not even when she attempts suicide. Kathleen's individual existence is valuable to the group, for reasons unknown, and her existence will only be allowed to come to an end when the group decides that her existence is dispensable.

It is truly shocking that all of Lifton's eight criteria for thought reform are met by religious and political movements, but The Addiction is a pretty cool movie. Despite no inexplicable booby shots. It is an attempt at an art for art's sake film, so it doesn't really qualify as a horror movie. Its slow pace, its loaded language, its lack of flashy editing and its tiresome scenes of agony might not appeal to other gorewhores out there, but I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Ken Kelsch is a brilliant cinematographer and deserves a special mention. The shots are composed exquisitely and they manage to make the black and white format come alive. This is despite the film being shot in only 20 days!

The Addiction proves that sometimes buckets of blood and inexplicable boobshots are not required to produce a compelling film. Sometimes an existential crisis brought about by attempts at thought reform are sufficient.

Director

Abel Ferrara

Cast

Edie Falco,
Michael Imperioli,
Annabella Sciorra,
Lili Taylor,
Christopher Walken.

Rating

Why Nietzsche was not a nihilist and why you are forever trapped in the Wizard of Oz (part three)

This is a three part series. You can find all of the parts here:

1. Why Nietzsche was not a nihilist and why you are forever trapped in the Wizard of Oz (part one)


2. Why Nietzsche was not a nihilist and why you are forever trapped in the Wizard of Oz (part two)


3. Why Nietzsche was not a nihilist and why you are forever trapped in the Wizard of Oz (part three)

Dorothy and her motley crew. Armed with the will to power, these are dangerous intellectuals who undermine the authority of the state.

Why Nietzsche was not a nihilist

This is the third and final part, explaining why Nietzsche claims you may be perpetually trapped in the Land of Oz. At the very least, you are perpetually trapped on the yellow brick road.

• Considering Nietzsche's own testimony of his war method, we find that nihilism has all the characteristics of one of his worthy adversaries. Nihilism is a cause that is victorious. It is a cause against which he would not find allies easily, because his only allies would be deists, and these are hardly friendly with Nietzsche after such exhilarating titles such as Beyond Good and Evil and The Antichrist. It follows that Nietzsche would stand alone if he opposed nihilism, which he did in his writings. In fact, in The Antichrist, Nietzsche calls nihilism the will to nothingness, which is contrasted with the will to power. Nietzsche thus sees nihilism in opposition to the will to power. He identifies nihilism as a natural reaction of the Judeo-Christian perspectives to the notion that God is dead, and claims that nihilism is necessary in order to restore the healthy will to power in the populace.


• Considering the opposition of Apollonian and Dionysian impulses in art, it is easy to equate nihilism with a new world order. Nihilism represents the new Apollonian dynasty. With Nietzsche's methods in mind, it is obvious that Nietzsche would rather be the Dionysus of the new dynasty if the new Apollo already showed its face. Only an Apollo that could withstand the attacks of its Dionysus would be worthy of instilling the master morality of the new generation.


• Considering Nietzsche's radical perspectivism, one finds that Nietzsche acknowledges nihilism as a valid perspective, but he does not think that it is sound. Nihilism claims that there is no purpose to existence. Nietzsche believed in eternal recurrence. Eternal recurrence is a kind of determinism, meaning we don't really have free will. Eternal recurrence holds that time is infinite, but matter itself is finite. Since matter is finite, the exact combination of matter is likely to occur several times during the course of infinite time. With regards to the yellow brick road, nihilism says there is no point in moving either way along the yellow brick road. The thought of eternal recurrence holds that if we equate the yellow brick road with infinite time, the yellow brick road would extend forever beyond and before the Emerald City. In such an universe, it is likely to encounter the nihilists sitting on the side of the road, claiming the road leads nowhere. It is likely to encounter several Dorothies at various points along the road, and these various points would all be exact replicas of the Land of Oz. In other words, Nietzsche inverts the nihilistic notion that the yellow brick road leads nowhere and claims instead that the yellow brick road leads everywhere else.


• Considering Nietzsche's theory of master and slave moralities, one could deduce that Nietzsche's purpose is to test all master morality of the next generation. His perspective offers the hindsight of nihilism and Christianity, with its dogmatic requirements of the supernatural and of objective morality. Since these values are attributes of the fallen master moralities of old, Nietzsche rejects them outright. These values are too close for comfort to the values of the wizards who were already behind the curtain, and thus neither nihilism nor Christianity are worthy of pulling the levers in the sequel to the Wizard of Oz.

The Emerald City on the horizon. Eternal recurrence claims we may be forsaken to return to the Land of Oz. Forever.

In conclusion, it is clear that Nietzsche's notions of the will to power, the opposition between Apollonian and Dionysian impulses in art, the struggle between master and slave morality and eternal recurrence are incompatible with a nihilistic world view. His concepts of the übermensch and the last man represent two possible reactions to nihilism, with the übermensch being one that successfully transcends the pessimism of Schopenhauer by utilising the will to power and the last man being one who falls prey to nihilism, the will to nothingness. The last man is tired of living, he takes no risks, he sees no solutions, he seeks comfort and security. In contrast, the übermensch sees utility in place of the last man's futility.


Ruby slippers. Futility for the last man. Utility for the übermensch.

Sources consulted

• Tad Beckman's course notes on The Antichrist, one of Nietzsche's most controversial works.


• Wikipedia page on nihilism. Also claiming Nietzsche was critical of nihilism.


• Wikipedia page on determinism. Wikipedia is free, but not as free as you might think.


• Wikipedia page on eternal return, with an explanation of Nietzsche's eternal recurrence.


• Wikipedia page on the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, also contradicting the opinion that Nietzsche was a nihilist.


• Wikipedia page on Arthur Schopenhauer, with his will to live.


• Wikipedia page on The Wizard of Oz, the film not the book.

Why Nietzsche was not a nihilist and why you are forever trapped in the Wizard of Oz (part two)

This is a three part series. You can find all of the parts here:

1. Why Nietzsche was not a nihilist and why you are forever trapped in the Wizard of Oz (part one)


2. Why Nietzsche was not a nihilist and why you are forever trapped in the Wizard of Oz (part two)


3. Why Nietzsche was not a nihilist and why you are forever trapped in the Wizard of Oz (part three)

Nietzsche's perspective: Someone has to be the next Wizard of Oz and it might as well be one of us

Winston Churchill said that democracy is the worst form of government we could possibly have, except for all the others we have tried. This sums up what Nietzsche might say if he discovers that there are no more wizards behind the curtain in the Land of Oz. The next wizard would have to be less bad than the previous ones we had. In other words, any wizard different from previously flawed wizards would suffice. This explains Nietzsche's adversity to the Wizard of old, namely Christianity, and his adversity to the Wizards of his day, namely nihilism, nationalism and anti-semitism. But let's have the man speak for himself:

Nietzsche's methods: His practice of war

“My practice of war is formulated in four principles:

• ...I only attack causes that are victorious...


• ...I only attack causes against which I would find no allies, so that I stand alone...


• ...I never attack persons...


• ..I only attack things when all personal differences are excluded, when any background of bad experiences is lacking. On the contrary, to attack is to me a proof of goodwill, sometimes even of gratitude...”

This is taken from Ecce Homo, Nietzsche's sarcastic review of his own life and his own works.


The Wicked Witch of the West. Prime exponent of master morality. One example of perspectivism.

Nietzsche: The Toto of the yellow brick road.

Critics of Nietzsche claim that his philosophy has no purpose and that he is without conviction. This proves to be inaccurate when one considers common themes in his philosophy.

• The opposition of Apollonian and Dionysian impulses in art: The Greek gods Apollo and Dionysus represent a struggle between order and chaos in art. While they were not rivals in the classical mythology sense, their aspects are thought to be in conflict in works of art. Apollo represents order, stability and harmony. Dionysus represents primal nature, chaos, ecstasy and intoxication. In short, Apollo represents the perspiration and Dionysus represents the inspiration.


• The will to power: Darwin postulated that only the fittest survive, and evolution is the process of determining which physical characteristics are most desirable to enable the fittest to survive. It is thus the strong that rule the weak. With regards to Schopenhauer's will to live: those with a stronger will to live, survive those with a weaker will to live.
  
  Nietzsche claimed that the weak rule the strong (the meek shall inherit the earth, as it were), because the process of evolution serves to strengthen the weak and weed out the strong. Nietzsche claimed the will to power overrides even the will for survival. In other words, a will to power could even cause an organism to sacrifice its own life for a cause, thus contradicting that survival in the Darwinian sense is its ultimate cause.
  
  Recent discoveries in biology such as genetic drift affirm that survival of the fittest only becomes the overwhelming criterion when the survival of a species is threatened. In the absence of immediate threats to survival, genetic drift largely determines physical characteristics. Nietzsche's will to power is an attempt to explain why members of a society carry on growing and establish a hierarchy, despite the absence of a threat to their survival and by extension, despite an apparent purpose. In terms of the Wizard of Oz, each member of Dorothy's company had a different reason for going to see the Wizard, and none of these reasons were survival. Each of them exhibited a will to power.


• Slave morality and master morality: To Nietzsche, master morality weighs actions according to their consequences. The essence of master morality is nobility. Slave morality weighs actions according to their intentions. The essence of slave morality is utility. Morality in this sense suggests certain codes and norms of a society. Masters of a society establish these norms by considering consequences. Slaves of a society evaluate what the masters establish, in other words they affirm or reject the values established by stronger willed members. Slave morality and master morality are in conflict to create a moral middle ground. Dorothy represents master morality in the Wizard of Oz, and her companions are evaluating her intentions. When they find her motives to be in harmony with theirs, they accompany her on her journey down the yellow brick road.


• The claim that God is dead: Because of the advent of nihilism, God (capitalised, to indicate the Judeo-Christian conception of god) is dead because He is no longer considered a valid source of objective morality nor a cause of existence. In other words, Dorothy and her friends arrive in the Emerald City and they find that the wizard is an old man behind the curtain pulling levers. The wizard of Oz as they understood it is dead. For all intents and purposes, their god is dead.


• Radical perspectivism: Nietzsche claimed that all ideas originate from a particular perspective. There are many perspectives, and thus many different truths, but not all truths are equally valid or equally sound. Dorothy's perspective is that the wizard of Oz knows how to send her back to Kansas. The Wicked Witch of the West's perspective is that Dorothy represents a threat to the reign of terror, and Dorothy had to be eliminated. Dorothy's perspective was valid, considering her source of information, but not sound. The Wicked Witch of the West did have a valid and sound argument. From our perspective, she is a Wicked Witch because she interferes with Dorothy's plans to get back to Kansas. From her perspective, Dorothy threatens the moral fibre, because the Munchkins are not hapless slaves any longer.

Munchkins. Prime exponents of slave morality. Übermenschen, not so much.

It is clear that Nietzsche's philosophy did have meaning. To put it succinctly, since Nietzsche's philosophy had meaning, he could not have been a nihilist. For the more elaborate version, see the third part of his series.

Why Nietzsche was not a nihilist and why you are forever trapped in the Wizard of Oz (part one)

This is a three part series. You can find all of the parts here:

1. Why Nietzsche was not a nihilist and why you are forever trapped in the Wizard of Oz (part one)


2. Why Nietzsche was not a nihilist and why you are forever trapped in the Wizard of Oz (part two)


3. Why Nietzsche was not a nihilist and why you are forever trapped in the Wizard of Oz (part three)

A brief outline of nihilism

Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche is the one philosopher whose name is synonymous with nihilism. While there are similarities between nihilism and Nietzsche's philosophy, I do not believe it is accurate to claim that Nietzsche was a nihilist. In order to motivate my viewpoint, we will have to consider brief outlines of both nihilism and the philosophy of Nietzsche. Note that these are working definitions and my citations are mostly from Wikipedia. I am not a philosophy expert.


Nietzsche. Strapping young lad. Godless heathen. Nihilist, not so much.

The shocking claims of nihilism: there is no wizard behind the curtain, and even if we had a wizard it means nothing

Nihilism claims that existence itself is meaningless. It follows that there is no purpose to existence. The basic tenets of nihilism are:

• Objective morality does not exist. One course of action is not preferable over another.


• Since there is no objective morality, existence has no purpose.


• There is no credible evidence of supernatural beings. Even if there are supernatural beings, we are not obliged to worship them.

The fact that Nietzsche is credited with the axiom 'God is dead.. and we killed him' is not really helping to separate the wheat from the chaff either. Before we consider Nietzsche's philosophy, we need to consider the inherent problems in the philosophy of nihilism and an outline of Nietzsche's methods, or his raison d'etre if you will.

Inherent problems with the philosophy of nihilism: but there is a land of Oz with a yellow brick road

• Subjective morality does exist: The lack of objective morality is not reason enough to assume that there is no morality. It is not even reason enough to assume that morality is immoral, but perhaps enough reason to assume that morality is amoral. For instance, it is generally regarded that murder is wrong. This dogma does not point to objective morality, but it is consistent in virtually all cultures, and exceptions to this rule are just that – exceptions to the rule. When Dorothy kills the Wicked Witch of the East, it is reason for mirthful celebration and ponies and rainbows. No Munchkin demands Dorothy's head on a platter. There are exceptions to the rule that murder is wrong, and while it points to a lack of objective morality, it does not indicate complete lack of morality. It indicates subjective morality.


• Existence is a purpose: 'Existence has no purpose' is an empty statement. This is akin to Dorothy seeing the yellow brick road, but deducing that it disappears over each horizon, and therefore the yellow brick road goes all around the world and ultimately leads back to this exact same spot. What is her purpose then for following the yellow brick road?
  
  When examining this statement critically, it first needs to be falsified. Nihilists would have to define conditions for existence to have a purpose. Further complications aside, if you define objective morality as the condition and if you fail to prove that objective morality exists, then you could deduce that existence has no purpose. Perhaps this is why a statement like 'god is dead' is so shocking to religious people. To them, god is the ultimate objective gauge of morality. No god means no objective morality. No objective morality means no purpose. Everyone without god (including Nietzsche) must therefore be nihilists, since they do not believe in the ultimate reason for existence of those with a god.
  
  The axiom that existence has no purpose is fallible. What if the purpose of existence is to realise that existence has no purpose, and the purpose of existence is to overcome this existential crisis? This would mean that existence does have a purpose, which refutes the axiom. To summarise, what if the meaning of life is to give meaning to life? It is thus likely that the wizard of Oz built the Emerald City and established himself as ruler in order to give meaning to his life. While this exercise is ultimately futile, it suggests the notion that any action is better than no action. Nihilism proposes no action, since any action is ultimately futile. The Wizard of Oz proposes that any action has a purpose, if only for its immediate reactions.


• There is credible, but not conclusive evidence that there are no supernatural beings: In other words, there is not enough evidence to suggest that there is no tribe of flying monkeys. The statement 'there is no credible evidence of supernatural beings' would also have to be falsified. Nihilists would have to define conditions which would indicate evidence of supernatural beings. I for one agree with nihilists, but I can not prove conclusively that there are no supernatural beings. The lack of credible evidence supporting supernatural phenomena is also my main argument, and the natural scientific explanations of most supernatural phenomena to date are my conditions for falsifiability. If flying monkeys have a natural explanation, they aren't supernatural, but it does not mean that flying monkeys do not exist.

Nihilists and religious thinkers thus suffer from the same Achilles heel. Both ultimately rely on supernatural beings as a condition for objective morality. Both rely on objective morality is a requirement for the purpose of existence. Which side does Nietzsche take in this school yard brawl?