Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Part I Early Darwinism to the “Anti-Darwin”
- Part II Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morals
- Chapter 4 Nietzsche's “nature”: or, whose playing field is it anyway?
- Chapter 5 The birth of morality out of the spirit of the “bad conscience”
- Chapter 6 Darwin's “science”: or, how to beat the shell game
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
Chapter 5 - The birth of morality out of the spirit of the “bad conscience”
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 November 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Part I Early Darwinism to the “Anti-Darwin”
- Part II Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morals
- Chapter 4 Nietzsche's “nature”: or, whose playing field is it anyway?
- Chapter 5 The birth of morality out of the spirit of the “bad conscience”
- Chapter 6 Darwin's “science”: or, how to beat the shell game
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
In my previous analysis, I focused on Nietzsche's and Darwin's contrasting views of nature. While he discussed alternative moral valuation systems in GM I, Nietzsche's larger concern was to characterize the will to power of distinct physiological types. The implications of Nietzsche's theory of the will to power challenged Darwin's mechanistic conception of nature. In GM II, Nietzsche's interests extend beyond an examination of guilt and (bad) conscience, as its title (“‘Guilt,’ ‘bad conscience,’ and related matters”) suggests. It also explores more than the origins of morality and its relationship to the bad conscience. GM II concentrates on man's early socialization process and the emergence of the “state.” It thus continues with his line of argumentation, which undercuts Enlightenment assumptions about man, nature, and the state.
But whereas GM I shifts between two dominant typologies, the aristocratic and priestly valuation systems, GM II concentrates primarily on the origins of a third will – the derivative “moral” will, or the man of “bad conscience.” Nietzsche argues that the rudiments of the “moral” will were located in earliest civilization, but that the future spread of morality first required a warrior unit of superior organization suppressing nomadic tribes, thus laying the psychic groundwork for the “bad conscience.” Although morality did arise from the instincts of individual wills (and here Nietzsche and Darwin agree), it flourished only among a specific sub-group – namely, wills enslaved by warrior castes. It was born from their instinctual anarchy.
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- Information
- Nietzsche's Anti-Darwinism , pp. 140 - 171Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010