Simmel Collected Works - Schopenhauer and Nietzsche - A Series of Lectures

Author: Georg Simmel
Publisher:
Publication Date: 2006-12-01
Features: This book is a collection of lectures by Simmel on Schopenhauer and Nietzsche. The lectures are not merely a report; they go beyond the content of the doctrines, critically linking cultural facts, spiritual relationships, criteria of knowledge, and ethical values. From his entire argument, the author selects a concise, unified, and important thread that reflects his thought, discussing the intrinsic core of Schopenhauer and Nietzsche's doctrines that objectively possess value and are truly permanent, aiming to contribute to the general history of the spirit and culture, as well as to the eternal significance of understanding the thoughts of these two philosophers. Lectures on the Position of Schopenhauer and Nietzsche in the History of Ideas. The Ultimate Value and Christianity. Schopenhauer's Will Philosophy as a Feature of the Contemporary Spiritual State. The Loss of the Absolute Life Purpose and the Continuing Existence of Its Demand. Nietzsche Elevating the Life Process Itself as a Relative Life Purpose to Replace the Absolute Life Purpose: "übermensch" as a Model of Human Development That Transcends All Existing Stages. The Relationship Between These Two Doctrines With the Same Starting Point Is Their Fundamental Difference.
Lecture 2: Schopenhauer
The world that human reason can know, as opposed to the unknowable "thing-in-itself" in our consciousness. The human soul as a meeting point of two worlds. Our will as the absolute reality of ourselves, the only content of our existence outside the realm of representation. The distinction between the fundamental will and its psychological phenomena manifested in concrete volitions. Humans are interpreted as rational beings; the transformation of the concept of the human in modern philosophy and Schopenhauer's critique.
Lecture 3: Schopenhauer
The diversity of will metaphysics as the phenomenal form of Dasein (being-there), with the essential nature of Dasein as absolute unity. The essence of the human, as rationally recognized, is transferred to the metaphysical attributes of all Dasein: the world as the phenomenon of the metaphysical will. Refuting the accusation that Schopenhauer personifies the world-view with mysticism. The contradictions within the will and the principled impossibility of its satisfaction. The incomprehensibility of existence and its degradation through interpretation as will. The unity of the will as the motivation for pessimism.
Lecture 4: Schopenhauer
Pessimistic happiness as the simple cessation of the pain of lack. Psychologically unnatural tearing of life: no pain and no happiness. Anticipated happiness as approaching possession. The main motivation for Schopenhauer's error: unifying will metaphysics and pessimism in a forced and systematic manner. The accounting of pleasure and pain, and the absolute meaning of pain. Cruelty. Metaphysical justice, and the empirical distribution of pleasure and pain.
Lecture 5: Schopenhauer
Art. Metaphysically, the pure phenomenal content of things frees itself from reality. "Idea" as the content of art. The subject and object of the aesthetic state, transcending the world of will, causality, and individuality. The meaning of space. Realism. The artist's problem. Music as the direct artistic expression of the metaphysical will. The happiness of art and pessimism. Art as the opposing unity of life.
Lecture 6: Schopenhauer
Morality and the self-liberation of the will. Morality as the negation of the individual form of the will. Schopenhauer's abandonment of all objective norms and the motivation behind his pessimism. The metaphysical unity of essence as the foundation of morality. In contrast: the ethical significance of duality. Love as sympathy. The negative universality of life value. Existence and the ought-to-be. Freedom. Asceticism as the negation of the will. Suicide. The ultimate liberation.
Lecture 7: Nietzsche
Human value and decadence. The historical enhancement of life intensity as the ultimate value. Christianity and democracy's inversion of this value. Its factual consistency with the Christian ideal. The distinction between the concepts of the human and society, and their relationship to individuality. Natural distance as a condition for human development. Psychological difference sensitivity and the ethics of Maeterlinck. Value measurement of an era, both average and peak. The meaning of antimoralism.
Lecture 8: Nietzsche
Noble morality. The objective characteristics of Nietzsche's morality. The noble ideal. Existence and action. The cost of upward cultivation. Neither egoism nor hedonism, but individualism. Responsibility. The eternal recurrence of the same in the metaphysical and ethical sense. The absolute immanence of Nietzsche's ideal. The very act of valuing the life process itself as the profound difference between Schopenhauer and Nietzsche.