Does Nietzsche commit a 'Rapist's Fallacy'?

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Did this Schopenhauer person have oppositional-defiance syndrome, by chance? There are some people who are addicted to fighting, anger, hatred, and other negative emotions. Even Sherlock Holmes tended to get depressed when he wasn't going against a master criminal ... that led to his cocaine use.




Let's not ... it doesn't make much sense without understanding the original context. If you said you like ice cream, and I said "let's re-write that statement to replace ice cream with killing kittens" it would be unfair of me. So shame on you!! Why do you torture the poor, innocent kittens??

I think he was saying that his colleague Schopenhauer liked a good argument, or that the philosopher Schopenhauer had a flawed personality ... not much else can be taken from that. Your transformation of one statement certainly does not imply that Nietzsche approved of rape - but it is highly suggestive that you are you are trying to imply that.




Disclaimer: I have no respect for Nietzsche's work, nor that of Ayn Rand, who transposed Nietzsche's work to the economic sphere and cashed in ... I don't think selfishness and anti-social behavior should be encouraged or glorified.

I just want to clear something up, and that's that those of you who are telling me my analysis is 'utterly poor' might be reading more into my posts than you should.

I have not stated that the rewritten passage about child rape logically follows from Nietzsche's statement about Schopenhauer. I simply rewrote it, and said, "Look at the form of this statement. Doesn't it make you suspicious?"

To accuse me of making further claims when I do not is called the straw man fallacy. To deny my statements based merely on personal experience without explaining why is called the fallacy of argument from authority. Fallacies are mistaken rules of inference that don't always give true statements.

List of fallacies

nietzche is the sh-t, dude was almost. amazing, if he lived thousands of years ago he would have been considerd a prophet

yeah, a lot of what he predicted has come to pass.

i regard him as a kind of 'saint' despite his seeming rejection of christianity.

Iam worried that your missing the wood for the trees nietzsche was a free thinker don't think he professed a doctrine Kant had it right with that imperative thing sounds a bit like jc though hope springs eternal.

Haha...Nietzsche's aphorisms. Readable, yes, but comprehendible?

Twilight of the Idols is a good choice. For a basic supplementary starting point I also suggest Introducing Nietzsche: the Graphic Guide by Laurence Gane (not trying to be funny or condescending!...it's quite decent). I also like H.L. Mencken's book on Nietzsche -- he summarizes some of Nietzsche's main ideas in concise language.

Some of the post in this thread could do with more explanation, possibly from and anti-intellectualist stance.

People are not without justification in saying philosophy and metaphysics are pseudo-profound.

I hold Nietzsche in fairly neutral regard, he is certainly not a bad as some have made him out to be. I am interested in natural behaviour, and this concept of "morality". This idea that people derive and carry out 'ethics' from absolute OR entirely individual point of view is more a conscious delusion, an abstraction. However often a necessarily one at that, it is maddening to think otherwise for most.

We somehow forget that we are animals, and because we have created infrastructure and tools we have somehow escaped nature. Nature is inescapable, even when it is devoid of life. This is true for the Universe at least.

It is theoretically possible to reduce down any behaviour to its stimulus-> response constituents. Nothing we experience is selfless, however some people may get more out of what might be considered selfless at that point in time. This is still on the highly convoluted level.

fMRI of gambling addicts and people who like to donate to charity show similar activity than people who are amorous or aroused. In other words the pleasure centres of the brain.

I might have to read that then, I've een looking to read H.L. Mencken for other reasons, as I enjoy cynicism.

well in an anti intellectual way, if I had to summarise GOM, it would be that it's Nietzsche's creation myth for how we came to be the way we are. Like a 'fall' myth, how we fell from a 'perfect' state ('we' being the 'natural' leaders, chosen people, whatever) into a state of slavery and bondage.

He's a deeply religious thinker.

Then again, Schopenhauer was far from powerless, and actively chose to engage his enemies.


Then again, Nietzsche's insanity and occasional incoherency have been well known for at least a century by now.

If Nietzsche really did advocate cruelty, then I'm going to work to keep you Nietzsche fans from overtaking the planet and becoming sadists.

Yes, he did write 'cool' and his vocabulary was enormous, but the writing in this book doesn't have the flow of a valid rational argument.

In the meantime, I want you to think about what consciousness is and practice not being mean.

Cheers.

Cool lets talk consiousness modern day philosophers dont go there they have faith in neuroscience which they think will expain it all faith in science is the same as faith in god.Perhaps we have to go eastern to explain it perhaps being in the present moment with no prejudice and accepting there is no difference between any of us maybe there is only one thing and the play in front of us mere dellusion.

I don't think that Nietzsche's major focus was upon cruelty, although I would think he was against anti-cruelty. In any case, I don't think that abolishing pain would be accomplishable or desirable.


It isn't intended to have the flow of a valid rational argument, and Nietzsche himself was somewhat cynical towards reason.


Consciousness is nothing that can be thought about, because it is a fact known before thought and reason.

He wasn't advocating cruelty in itself, he was reacting against beliefs at the time that he strongly disagreed with to which to him he saw cruelty as being part of a (for lack of a better word) solution or answer, by a reverting back to a part of our more basic human instinctual nature which he thought that science, philosophy, religion, morality, government, education, etc. was undermining and suppressing. I realize this is only a partial, oversimplified, and thus easily misinterpretable attempt at an explanation but it's been a while since I've read or thought about this stuff and I don't have any of my books or notes on hand. What I'm really trying to say is that to understand this whole Nietzsche/cruelty thing you need to understand these issues that he's reacting against first, otherwise there's no point.

To say "Omg, Nietzsche advocates cruelty -- he's a evil, f'd-up sadist!" is just silly. Don't you think one of the most revered philosophers of the 19th century and an important figure in the discourse of Western philosophy in general has a tad more sophistication to his thoughts than that? Any sociopath can advocate cruelty, but Nietzsche wasn't a sociopath.

Ah, thanks, I forgot to address this but you beat me to it. It's true -- Nietzsche was a critic of the reason and the concept of "Truth" which had triumphed via Enlightenment-era philosophy and science. He couldn't use the same tool when he wanted to criticize that tool, so he had to do something... different.




I can't really tell if you're being serious or sarcastic here, but I thought I'd recommend Alva Noë's new book (Out of Our Heads: Why You Are Not Your Brain....) in which he criticizes the direction that neuroscience is going, the idea that consciousness can be explained alone with science. He believes consciousness is a much more dynamic process that current neuroscience isn't willing to take into account and he calls for philosophers to take back the study of consciousness and not let it be completely appropriated by science as a collaboration between the two would allow for a fuller picture.