The Time Concept in the Philosophies of Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger and Milan Kundera (original) (raw)
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The Eternal Recurrence in Nietzsche’s Thought: “The Moment” as the Gateway to Affirmation
The oft ignored, oft misunderstood topic of eternal recurrence occupies a strange position in Nietzsche's thought. In secondary literature, the eternal recurrence figures as a cosmological, hypothesis about the nature of the universe, which Nietzsche struggles to prove through quasiscientific proofs. Yet Nietzsche describes the eternal recurrence as "the fundamental conception" (TSZ section of Ecce Homo, 1) of his Zarathustra, the "highest" and "deepest" book he ever wrote (Nietzsche's Preface to EH, 4). Does this mean, then, that a dismantling of the cosmological version -which is often acknowledged to be quite definitive -of the eternal recurrence is all one needs to say about Nietzsche's weightiest thought?
Kierkegaardiana, Vol. XI (1980), 93-119, 1980
Does thinking and willing life in terms of the eternal recurrence of the same bring about the complete affirmation of life that Nietzsche claims for it? In the following remarks, I shall first develop and substantiate this approach to the problem of the eternal recurrence of the same in Nietzsche's philosophy and then turn to an inquiry into the adequacy of Nietzsche's position by developing a Kierkegaardian critique of the doctrine of the eternal recurrence of the same. The purpose of such a critique is not that of presenting a "refutation" of Nietzsche's position through arguments drawn from Kierkegaard, but rather that of developing more fully the dimensions of a philosophical problem common to both Nietzsche and Kierkegaard: the problem of the limits of self-affirmation in light of the necessary temporality of human existence.
A Note on Nietzsche’s Eternal Recurrence
Social Sciences Research Network, 2020
In contemporary scholarship, it is readily assumed that Nietzsche’s Eternal Recurrence either does or does not overcome the ‘problem of nihilism’. This exclusive disjunction, however, is false. It has arisen out of the poor exegesis that Eternal Recurrence is meant to overcome nihilism and, if it does not, then this can be considered a shortcoming of Nietzsche’s philosophic enterprise. But Eternal Recurrence only overcomes what you want it to: if you do not want to overcome nihilism but embrace it, then Eternal Recurrence does not overcome nihilism, but this is in no way its failure.
The aim of this contribution is to highlight the possibility to investigate the relationship between Schopenhauer and Nietzsche in the light of the concept of the «Ascesis of Consciousness». Beyond the differences and the quarrels which animated the relationship between Nietzsche and Schopenhauer — a great passion which ended in very strong criticism — it is in fact possible to underline how the idea of an ascetical philosophy is very strong for both of them, even if determined by different declinations. In particular, in this contribution, the idea of an «ascesis of consciousness» will be related to the concept of the «untimely», which represents, in the horizon of Nietzschean philosophy, the first impulse to an elevation of mind in the direction of an overcoming of temporal finitude. As will be made clear, both Schopenhauer and Nietzsche were strongly orientated towards an elevation of thought in its experiential dimension, as it was able to grasp the essence of that eternity which lies beyond the finitude of the empirical and, thus, temporal experience. In this sense, the expression «ascesis of thought» — coined by the Italian philosopher Moretti-Costanzi — is what makes it possible to find the fil rouge which links Schopenhauer to Nietzsche in an over-historical way. In particular, the idea of an «ascesis», which borrows from the Greek term the significance of «exercise» and «experience», and from Latin the significance of an elevation (ascensus), is recalled by both thinkers here considered as the deep need they had to indicate a difference between ordinary experience, as determined by the finitude of temporality, and the eternity as that summit in which the consciousness regains itself in its original dimension. The experience of the ascesis of consciousness, therefore, will bring us to take into account the possibility to re-read the relationship between Schopenhauer and Nietzsche as animated by the same horizon of sense, by virtue of which the elevation of the experience of thought will lead to the definition of two different states of mind, or «levels». These levels of consciousness are defined by the movement of the ascesis itself in its bringing the consciousness from time into eternity.