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df5a80d
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Man stands alone in the universe, responsible for his condition, likely to remain in a lowly state, but free to reach above the stars.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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7b1cfd8
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No other German writer of comparable stature has been a more extreme critic of German nationalism than Nietzsche.
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nazism
nietzsche
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Walter Kaufmann |
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7714007
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What overlooked was the hair-raising possibility that God might out-Luther Luther. A special area in hell might be reserved for those who go to mass. Or God might punish those whose faith is prompted by prudence. Perhaps God prefers the abstinent to those who whore around with some denomination he despises. Perhaps he reserves special rewards for those who deny themselves the comfort of belief. Perhaps the intellectual ascetic will win al..
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philosophy
immanuel-kant
mathematician
pascal
pascal-s-wager
speculation
kant
friedrich-nietzsche
nietzsche
homer
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Walter Kaufmann |
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324c345
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Man's world is manifold, and his attitudes are manifold. What is manifold is often frightening because it is not neat and simple. Men prefer to forget how many possibilities are open to them. They like to be told that there are two worlds and two ways. This is comforting because it is so tidy. Almost always one way turns out to be common and the other is celebrated as superior. Those who tell of two ways and praise one are recognised as pr..
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Walter Kaufmann |
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c622d81
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Men love jargon. It is so palpable, tangible, visible, audible; it makes so obvious what one has learned; it satisfies the craving for results. It is impressive for the uninitiated. It makes one feel that one belongs. Jargon divides men into Us and Them....
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Walter Kaufmann |
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714a1f5
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To an even moderately sophisticated and well-read person it should come as no surprise that any religion at all has its hidden as well as its obvious beauties and is capable of profound and impressive interpretations. What is deeply objectionable about most of these interpretations is that they allow the believer to say
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religion
theology
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Walter Kaufmann |
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def8da6
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Not all deceptions are palatable. Untruths are too easy to come by, too quickly exploded, too cheap and ephemeral to give lasting comfort. Mundus vult decipi, but there is a hierarchy of deceptions. Near the bottom of the ladder is journalism: a steady stream of irresponsible distortions that most people find refreshing although on the morning after, or at least within a week, it will be stale and flat.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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933ec87
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The Golden Rule is intolerable; if millions did to others whatever they wished others to do to them, few would be safe from molestation. The Golden Rule shows anything but moral genius, and the claim by which it is followed in the Sermon on the Mount -- 'this is the Law and the Prophets' -- makes little sense.
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jesus
morality
golden-rule
morals
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Walter Kaufmann |
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8e714a5
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A system must necessarily be based on premises that by its very nature it cannot question.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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51ff431
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The good must be clearly good but not wholly clear. If it is wholly clear it is too easy to reject.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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cc66c95
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Since the Renaissance, Shakespeare, Rembrandt, Mozart, and a host of others have shown that this religious dimension can be experienced and communicated apart from any religious context. But that is no reason for closing my heart to Job's cry, or to Jeremiah's, or to the Second Isaiah. I do not read them as mere literature; rather, I read Sophocles and Shakespeare with all my being, too.
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religious
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Walter Kaufmann |
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0107336
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The self is essentially intangible and must be understood in terms of possibilities, dread, and decisions. When I behold my possibilities, I experience that dread which is "the dizziness of freedom," and my choice is made in fear and trembling." --
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kierkegaard
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Walter Kaufmann |
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89df8a8
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No one system reveals the entire truth; at best, each organizes one point of view or perspective. We must consider many perspectives, and a philosopher should not imprison his thought in one system.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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0def4f7
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Gozonunde tutulacak ilk nokta, varolusculugun herhangi bir ozel politik programi gerektirmedigi, uc onemli varolscunun Hitler yillarinda birbirinden apayri yollar tutmalarinin hic de sasirtici olmadgidir. Ama bu, ucunun de yazdiklarina ayni olcude bagli kaldiklari anlamina gelmez. Sein und Zeit'de durmadan olumu yigitce karsilamaktan soz eden Heidegger, Hitler'in yetkiyi ele gecirisinden sonra Nazilerle birleserek, universitenin rektoru ola..
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Walter Kaufmann |
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777e3c5
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The problem of evil is unanswerable if one believes that there is only one god and that he is omnipotent as well as infinitely good, merciful, and just. But as soon as one denies one or more of these premises, the problem disappears. The belief in two great gods, one good and one evil, is merely one way of doing that. Polytheism is another. Belief in only one god who is omnipotent but not infinitely good, just, and merciful is a third way. ..
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Walter Kaufmann |
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d4a5bd7
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we others who thirst for reason want to look our experiences as straight in the eye as if they represented a scientific experiment
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Walter Kaufmann |
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23ce8bf
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Few words in world literature equal the impact of this saying. All man's alibis are unacceptable: no gods are responsible for his condition; no original sin; no heredity and no environment; no race, no caste, no father, and no mother; no wrong-headed education, no governess, no teacher; not even an impulse or a disposition, a complex or a childhood trauma. Man is free; but his freedom does not look like the glorious liberty of the Enlighten..
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Walter Kaufmann |
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e97722d
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All that we are is the result of what we have thought.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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0d71d7a
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One can oppose the shallow optimism of so many Western thinkers and yet refuse to negate life.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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3baa6b8
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The powerful, as Nietzsche points out expressly, have no need to prove their might either to themselves or to others by oppressing or hurting others; if they do hurt others, they do so incidentally in the process of using their power creatively; they hurt others 'without thinking of it'. A good illustration of the manner in which the person who has power may hurt another person incidentally without without the express wish of doing so woul..
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Walter Kaufmann |
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6f02489
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The Germans think that strength must reveal itself in hardness and cruelty; then they submit with fervor and admiration: they are suddenly rid of their pitiful weakness and their sensitivity for every naught, and they devoutly enjoy terror. That there is strength in mildness and stillness, they do not believe easily. They miss strength in Goethe ...!--XI, 112.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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24a307c
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When it is founded on decision, love is no longer an unreliably moving passion, but the fulfillment to which alone real Being reveals itself.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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a2a9c64
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when Nietzsche's fame had begun to spread rapidly, she climbed on the bandwagon. She acquired the sole rights to all his writings, including even the letters that he had sent to others. She sued those who published material to which she could claim a right.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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38a5500
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Nietzsche says: "Nicht nur fort sollst du dich pflanzen sondern hinauf"--you should propagate yourself not only onward but upward: procreation need not be a senseless continuation of an essentially meaningless story and an addition of more and more zeros--it can really be a creation."
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Walter Kaufmann |
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6c30314
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The point is not at all that you are found interesting or fascinating instead of being seen as a fellow I. The shock is rather that you are not found interesting or fascinating at all: you are not recognized as an object any more than a subject. You are accepted, if at all, as one to be spoken at and spoken of; but when you are spoken of, the lord of every story will be I.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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be8aeb7
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The world needs less faith and more love and nobility.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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a9db74e
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he would be permitted to say to the moment "Abide, you are so fair!" And to share Goethe's faith - for it was no mere confidence in fame but a cosmic faith: "The traces of my earthly days/No aeons can impair."
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Walter Kaufmann |
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b22a825
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The projection of one's feeling toward oneself upon a cosmic scale may seem to hinge on a metaphysical premise, but it can be defended empirically. That I am here, now, doing this - that depends on an awe-inspiring series of antecedent events, on millions of seemingly accidental moves and decisions, both by myself and many others whose moves and decisions in turn depended on yet other people. And our very existence, our being as we are, req..
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Walter Kaufmann |
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e44109b
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But a solitary suffers terribly from any suspicion concerning the few people he loves--especially
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Walter Kaufmann |
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0e6ce4f
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The difference between great philosophers who disagree is perhaps less considerable than that which separates them from their followers. Members of philosophic schools or coteries live on what others have seen, and the disciple usually applies his master's insights with a confidence which, most of the time, the master lacked.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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941f52f
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The powerful, as Nietzsche points out expressly, have no need to prove their might either to themselves or to others by oppressing or hurting others; if they do hurt others, they do so incidentally in the process of using their power creatively; they hurt others 'without thinking of it'. Only the weak man 'wishes to hurt and to see signs of suffering'. A good illustration of the manner in which the person who has power may hurt another pers..
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Walter Kaufmann |
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e8ef055
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In truth, there was only one Christian, and he died on the cross.--A 39.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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88ef875
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The powerful, as Nietzsche points out expressly, have no need to prove their might either to themselves or to others by oppressing or hurting others; if they do hurt others, they do so incidentally in the process of using their power creatively; they hurt others 'without thinking of it'. Only the weak man 'wishes to hurt and to see signs of suffering'. A good illustration of the manner in which the person who has power may hurt another per..
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Walter Kaufmann |
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cf3ec26
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Time is the "moving image of eternity."12"
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Walter Kaufmann |
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e575d58
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What distinguishes knowledge is not certainty but evidence.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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293eae8
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Use all the stars we have in stock; Of water, fire,walls of rock, And beasts and birds there is no lack. In our narrow house of boards, bestride The whole creation, far and wide; Move thoughtfully, but fast as well, From heaven through the world to hell
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philosophy-of-religion
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Walter Kaufmann |
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a923256
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My lot is that I must be the first decent human being,
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Walter Kaufmann |
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3d47cab
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Spirit is not opposed to life altogether, but directed only against one level of it. Its mission is not to destroy but to fulfill, to sublimate or--to use the expressions of the Meditations--to transfigure and perfect man's nature.
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Walter Kaufmann |
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00c486d
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The Ubermensch at any rate cannot be dissociated from the conception of Uberwindung, of overcoming. "Man is something that should be overcome"--and the man who has overcome himself has become an overman."
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Walter Kaufmann |
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7f07993
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Power through the lie--in the knowledge that one does not possess it physically, militarily--the lie as a supplement to power, a new concept of "truth."
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Walter Kaufmann |
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37fb605
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For Nietzsche, the overman does not have instrumental value for the maintenance of society: he is valuable in himself because he embodies the state of being that has the only ultimate value there is; and society is censured insofar as it insists on conformity and impedes his development (cf. G. IX 44).
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Walter Kaufmann |