Affective Foundation of Society in Nietzsche's Philosophy

IF 0.2 4区 哲学 0 PHILOSOPHY
Pluralist Pub Date : 2023-10-01 DOI:10.5406/19446489.18.3.01
Jihun Jeong
{"title":"Affective Foundation of Society in Nietzsche's Philosophy","authors":"Jihun Jeong","doi":"10.5406/19446489.18.3.01","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Nietzsche believes that the different human types should be allowed to thrive and not be reduced into uniformity, as he says “nothing should be banished more than . . . the approximation and reconciliation” of the different types (KSA 12:10[59]).1 He sees the approximation as a reflection of democratic values and monolithic morality that he opposes. Instead, he believes that humans should be naturalized and allowed to live in accordance with their own nature. To achieve this, Nietzsche proposed “the great politics,” which “makes physiology into the ruler over all other questions” to “breed humanity as a whole” so that “one affirms what one is, one denies what one is not” (KSA 13:25[1]). In this way, Nietzsche thinks the different types should live in accordance with their respective nature.In The Antichrist, Nietzsche argues that “every healthy society” consists of different physiological types.2 He repeatedly says that “Nature, not Manu,” separates these physiological types of the hierarchical order,3 which is “merely the sanction of a natural order, natural lawfulness of the first rank.” While each type has “its own hygiene, its own realm of work, its own feelings of perfection and mastery” (A 57), this rank order is “the sanctioning of a natural distance between several physiological types,” which are “determined and best developed for different activity,” like “division of labor” (KSA 13:14[221]). Therefore, Nietzsche describes the physiological types divided in a healthy society as “differently gravitating” and “mutually conditioning” types (A 57). In order for a society to be healthy as a whole, individuals should be neither uniform nor scattered, but should be in an organized structure together. This structure is “opposed to an atomistic anarchy.” A “human community is a unity [Einheit],” and “all unity is unity only as organization and co-operation.” In this way “a ruling structure,” which does not exist as one, “means one [Eins]” (KSA 12:2[87]).However, what is it that produces this unity? Nietzsche's envisioned “naturalization of human beings” (KSA 9:11[211]) involves a society where different types live actively in accordance with their nature or respective physiological constitution. However, the existence of different types does not ensure the formation of society as a whole. Individuals of different types with different power will not automatically gather to form a society if they remain merely as individuals. In other words, if there is no social character in nature itself, a society could be seen to be formed “by accident,” as Hobbes understands (42). What then is the basis that allows individuals to be incorporated into the social order? This article explores the social aspect of Nietzsche's understanding of nature, particularly with attention to his idea of affects, which will lead us to the idea of the affective foundation of society in his philosophy.4Nietzsche often describes nature as something chaotic that is elusive, uncertain, indifferent to human affairs, and without purpose and mercy. Thus, he writes, “how could you live according to this indifference? Living—is that not precisely wanting to be different than this nature? Is living not assessing, preferring, being unjust, being limited, wanting to be different?” (BGE 9) In this regard, the first point to note is that the “nature” of which Nietzsche speaks involves human nature strong enough to play with chaos and even to defy nature's indifference and brutality. As Conway points out, “the ‘return to nature’ that he envisions thus involves a return to human nature as the sole authority or justification for the nomothetic preferences required by the restricted economy of Life” (42–43). It is human nature to impose order on the natural world, transforming its amorphous state into a structured form of life, and to create a hierarchy of values in nature's indifference—this is perfectly natural and is the task of the philosophers. Therefore, rather than settling in “the infinite domain of Chaos” as Seung argues (292), Nietzsche reminds us of human nature: “We speak of nature and, in doing so, forget ourselves: we ourselves are nature” (WS 327). In this respect, the affirmation of nature means for Nietzsche above all the affirmation of human nature.Thus, this article is to clarify how human nature can be the basis for the formation of society in Nietzsche's philosophy. As Nietzsche introduced the concept of the “will to power” in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, he considers nature generally in terms of will to power. Thus, he writes, “homo natura. The ‘will to power’” (KSA 12:2[131]). This article particularly focuses on the social aspect of the concept, which has not been much explored. In the following sections, I will examine how Nietzsche's early and middle works recognized the social character of nature, and then how this social character is reflected in his later concept of the “will to power.”As Nietzsche seeks the affirmation of nature, from the early period onward, he seems to keep ruminating on the nature that should be sought for each person to be healthy. The problem is that there is no unaffected nature, and human nature is conditioned and affected by circumstances.5 Nietzsche was well-aware of this, and he pointed out that most value judgments, our behavior, and our feelings are affected by and adopted from others and then “become our nature” (D 104; D 34, 35, 38, 247). In other words, “nature arises from the long-lasting practice” (D 248). We can understand that his genealogical work is therefore designed to trace the practices that have formed our nature. The line between nature and culture is blurred, and cultural practices that will train people to incorporate certain values into the body become significant. If human nature is always affected by circumstances, what nature are we required to affirm?In his early and middle periods, Nietzsche distinguishes between the first nature and second nature. The first nature is the “inherited nature” given to us as “the products of earlier generations,” and the second nature is what is cultivated as “a new instinct” in us. On the face of it, his view of the second nature appears negative because the second nature is implanted “so that the first nature withers away.” This implantation is a dangerous attempt at “negating of the past” that has formed us (UM II:3). As we learn what is socially desirable and approved behavior, we develop a second nature whereby a certain socially acceptable drive predominates over the first (D 38). Human beings have their own nature, but its development can be hindered, in Nietzsche's view, by contemporary education and upbringings that are applied to all in a blanket fashion, not distinguishing between or adapting for different types. This contemporary method of upbringing compels a human being to accept values against their nature, which in Nietzsche's logic will lead them to “fall sick” and “ruin the vitality of their nerves [Nervenkraft]” (D 500). In this situation, “[w]ith most people, the embryo of the first nature dries up,” and only a few can be strong “enough to shed this skin” of the second nature “when under its cover their first nature has matured” (D 455).6When Nietzsche speaks of one living according to one's nature, it is arguably this first nature that he has in mind. However, it should be noted that the distinction between first and second nature does not mean that his intention is to entirely deny the second nature and bring out the first, since there is no such thing as absolutely ahistorical human nature; “even that first nature was once a second nature, and every victorious second nature will become a first nature” (UM II:3). As stated above, nature comes from long-standing practice (D 248; GS 290). Nietzsche at first seems to consider “nature” in terms of “talent [Begabung]” in contrast with “learning,” but then again, he writes that “the person who learns imparts [begaben] talent to himself” (D 540). Goethe and Raphael, without “envy,” “were both great learners and not just the exploiters of those lodes” of what was given from “their ancestors” (D 540). They were able to use their formative power, actively and without envy, to appropriate other nature. In this respect, the interplay between first and second nature is significant. Given that human beings live always in relationship to society and culture, we understand that there is a limit to what can be achieved by individuals’ personal cultivation if society as a whole is not healthy. It is therefore understandable for Nietzsche to envision a new society or a new whole where healthy individuals can be raised.In his letters dated December 1882, Nietzsche writes “I have a ‘second nature,’ but not to destroy the first [nature] but to bear it”; “I will now prove that only with this second nature I have entered into the actual [eigentlich] possession of my first nature” (KSB 6:344–45). These statements emphasize the second nature formed by the social context or interrelation that affects our first nature; unfortunately for the scholastic pursuit of continuity, he no longer explicitly uses the term “first nature” in his later period.7With the interplay described above in mind, it is difficult to create a reference point for measuring the health of nature and judging the kind of nature it is suggested that we should strive for. Nietzsche seems to emphasize the first nature and the “drives that constitute his being [Wesen]” (D 119), but drives are “transformed,” and what transforms the drives by being attached to them Nietzsche calls the “second nature” (D 38). It is hard then to reach the first nature, or to “return to myself,” the “nethermost self” (EH ‘HH’ 4), since our nature is already engaged in a web of social relationships. If we take Nietzsche's view of the interplay of our two natures into account, and we understand that drives are transformable, it is hard to create a single position from which the different drives that constitute human nature are judged and prioritized. Thus, Nietzsche no longer uses the term “the first nature” after 1882;8 instead, he uses the concept “will to power” as a tool for understanding nature.From this discussion, we learn that Nietzsche gives weight to the social and cultural aspects of nature—that is to say, the fact that human nature is coordinated and transformed in social relationships. This aspect is also included in the concept of will to power, as we shall see. By looking into the social character within the concept, we can see what the basis of the formation of society is.The will to power can, of course, be considered and examined in various ways. Nietzsche thinks “life itself is will to power” (BGE 13) and explores “a world whose essence is will to power” (BGE 186). He considers will to power using several terms: drive, affect, desire, and instinct (cf. GS 349; A 6; KSA 11:39[6]; KSA 12:1[61]; KSA 12:1[59]). These varied descriptions show the multi-layered aspects of the concept, and they come from the complex and multifaceted nature of life itself, with the “multiplicity of ‘will to power’: each with a multiplicity of expressions and forms” (KSA 12:1[58]).9 Life unfolds itself in various ways, through thoughts, desires, emotions, and so forth. In other words, life is a field wherein these express themselves. Nietzsche tries to understand these expressions in terms of will to power, which is “the innermost essence of being” (KSA 13:14[80]). He refers to this essence and its expressions with the same name; in essence, will to power is the affect and drive and desire that are expressed as affects and drives and desires.At the basic level of these life expressions, Nietzsche believes, are drive and affect, above all. This article focuses more on affect, because looking at will to power in relation to affect shows its social character in an evident way and reveals the implications associated with the formation of society more clearly. What then is the affective understanding of will to power? Nietzsche speaks of “will to power psychologically,” holding “that the will to power is the primitive form of affect, that all other affects are only its developments” (KSA 13:14[121]; cf. BGE 23). He thinks about the “derivation of all affects from the one will to power,” and considers them as of the same essence (KSA 12:10[57]). In this respect, will to power is the affect that is to consist in and be expressed as all affects.10It has often been discussed that drives are essential for understanding our nature. We need to see now in what sense affect is constitutive of nature. While Nietzsche emphasizes that “under every thought there is an affect” and the “series and succession of feelings, thoughts, etc. are symptoms of the actual occurrence” (KSA 12:1[61]), he does not provide a clear definition of affect. Nietzsche often uses “affect” to refer to what are usually called emotions or feelings, such as hatred, greed, envy, courage, love, and resentment (BGE 23, 192, 260; KSA 10:7[87]; 13:24[1].2), so that, broadly, scholars understand affects to be “feelings” (Janaway 206; Leiter, “Moralities” 576; Richardson 37), or “any mental episode which constitutively involves a pro- or con- attitude” (Poellner 229). In a rather different stance, Emden, highlighting the precedence given to biology, asserts that affects are not “discrete mental states” but the same as what Spinoza meant by affect [affectus] (Emden 33). Spinoza used “affect” [affectus] differently from emotions in an ordinary sense11 and argued that all affects arose from three primary affects: desire, joy, and sadness (III, P11, Schol.). Nietzsche similarly regards affects as a state of body and considers them as derived from will to power, and saw “pleasure” [Lust] and “displeasure” [Unlust] as “cardinal facts” in the action of will to power (KSA 13:14[80]). However, due to the lack of explanation in Nietzsche's text as well as in Emden's, it is not clear that what Nietzsche means by the term was necessarily influenced by Spinoza.Whether affects are understood as mental states or whether their physiological basis is emphasized, Nietzsche's comments on affect doing the work of interpreting and its relation to the will to power have often been somewhat downplayed. For example, Gemes argues that it is better to focus on drives rather than affects because “it is drives that Nietzsche most consistently and plausibly emphasizes as the basis of our nature,” and an affect or “a feeling, a ‘what it feels like’ does not seem to have the right temporal spread or active character to do interpreting” (104). This kind of view proceeds mainly from the understanding that affects are occurrent feelings. Are affects merely incidental then to the activity of drives?We find that Nietzsche often uses the terms “affect” and “drive” together, such as “soul as social structure of drives and affects” [Gesellschaftsbau der Triebe und Affekte] (BGE 12). Although he does not seem to differentiate between them clearly, scholars have tried to clarify the difference, although not particularly in relation to will to power. Janaway understands that “a drive is a relatively stable tendency to active behavior of some kind, while an affect, put very roughly, is what it feels like when a drive is active inside oneself” (214). Similarly, Constâncio and Branco draw a distinction in the editors’ introduction: “By ‘drives’ Nietzsche means the ‘forces,’ ‘under-wills,’ or ‘wills to power’ that direct our behavior towards the satisfaction of organic needs. An ‘affect’ is simply what it feels like to be driven by a drive” (xvi). Katsafanas clarifies the connection between drives and affects by defining drives as “non-conscious dispositions that generate affective orientations” (10). Surely affects accompany drives, and we can agree with the analysis in this respect. However, Nietzsche often puts them together without clarification or differentiation as if they are interchangeable. For example, Nietzsche writes that “the animals follow their drives and affects: we are animals . . . . and morality is only a sign language of our drives?” (KSA 10:7[76]). Later in another passage, he posits that “moralities are only a sign language of the affects” (BGE 187); it is understandable then that some scholars do not distinguish sharply between the two terms.12Still, if “drives and affects” is not merely a pleonastic expression, they at some point should play different roles in constituting our nature, and affects should not be considered merely incidental to drives. The first thing to point out in demonstrating this is that Nietzsche emphasizes the physiological basis of affects, which can operate at a deeper level than conscious thoughts and feelings. He argues that “what is really going on in the activity of our human affects” is the “physiological movements” (KSA 9:11[128]) and “all affects” are “a state of body” (KSA 10:9[44]). As affects are a state of the body as a physiological movement, affects are not understood as merely transient feelings but can have continuous influence or a temporal spread, which concerns Gemes, as seen above. Affects are related to the mechanism of our physiological response to what we encounter in the world, and this mechanism can be ingrained in the body. Nietzsche understands that “affects” are connected to “the formation of the memory-material—continuous living on and interacting” (KSA 11:25[514]), and memory leads to “a habituation to a particular causal interpretation” (TI ‘Errors’ 4).This view of interpretation in relation to affects not only applies to causality but can also be understood in a broader context. Nietzsche writes that “all affects” are “first a state of the body: which is interpreted. Later the interpretation freely produces the state” (KSA 10:9[44]). This shows that once the mechanism of how we respond to the world, how we interpret, is ingrained in the body, this mechanism or interpretation can produce our bodily state—so in the end, the interpretation does not come after events but comes first. With this in mind, we need to look at the concept of will to power in relation to drives and affects more closely.Behind our conscious thoughts and activities is the “play of affects” (KSA 13:11[113]) or the “play and struggle of affects” (KSA 12:1[75]), and the nature of this play is agonal (cf. BGE 117). It should be noted that Nietzsche does not think that the way the affects or drives work is entirely individual. He makes critical comments in a note on Spinoza's idea of self-preservation: “Pre-egoism, herd-drive are older than the ‘willing self-preserving.’ The human being is first developed as a function: from this the individual releases itself again later, while the individual as a function has come to know innumerable conditions of the whole, of the organism, and has gradually been incorporated” (KSA 9:11[193]; cf. 11[182]).In this respect, the human being and its drives are raised first in the context of society. As “the human being began as a part of a whole,” Nietzsche understands, “through indescribably long habituation, people first feel the affects of society . . . , and not as individuals!” (KSA 9:11[182]). Therefore, Nietzsche does not consider the play of affects and drives to be simply an occurrence isolated to the individual, since our existence is in the context of society and relationships with others. I argue that we can understand that in Nietzsche's paired expression “drives and affects,” the drives refer more to intra-relation and the affects to inter-relation. In other words, the drives are the basic element that constitutes an individual formed by the arrangement of drives,13 and the affects indicate how this individual is situated in the relational network of the whole.It is discussed that our judgments, especially moral judgments, result from affects about, or affective responses to, situations.14 Even in his middle period, Nietzsche clearly emphasizes the moral feelings that prescribe moral actions. But this feeling, this affective response, is not an individual's personal one; “evidently moral feelings are transmitted” in the way that children “imitate” the older generation's “inclinations for and aversions to certain actions” (D 34). These feelings become so natural for them that they grow to believe they are rationally justified. However, “behind feelings there are judgments and valuations, which we have inherited in the form of feelings (inclinations, aversions).” He continues: “To trust one's feeling—that means obeying one's grandfather and grandmother and their grandparents more than . . . our reason and our experience” (D 35). It is notable that Nietzsche thinks “the same drive develops into a painful feeling . . . or a pleasant feeling” under the different customs and social evaluations attached to it, which he calls the “second nature” as seen above, and in this way, drives are “transformed” (D 38). Drives can be transformed in the sense that some drives grow and others wither, in line with their interaction with external circumstances.It is important to note that Nietzsche places great emphasis on the social character of drives, or the second nature, as the factor coordinating drives. In his later period he still believes in the transformation of drives, arguing “drives are the after-effects of long-standing evaluations, which now act instinctively” (KSA 11:25[460]). Nietzsche's concept of drives transformed by socially attached feelings evolves into the paired expression “drives and affects” in his late period. The transformation is now understood in terms of “interpretation”: “the will to power interprets” (KSA 12:2[148]),15 and “the interpretation itself, as a form of the will to power, exists . . . as an affect” (KSA 12:2[151]). “Who interprets?—our affects” (KSA 12:2[190]). This affective interpretation shows “a symptom of certain physiological conditions” (KSA 12:2[190]) that reveals what one's life needs. In this respect, affects are not just what it feels like to be driven by drives, but rather they show how we interpret and how we instinctively see and utilize the world for our growth. All our activities are based on affectivity, the unconscious process of the affective interpretation of the world.Furthermore, what we understand as drives always work or are expressed in the form of affects. This is because, on the one hand, as Katsafanas argues, drives induce affective orientations, and on the other hand and more importantly for our discussion, the movements of the drives of individuals are always within the broader context of the whole since we live in the world as will to power, “essentially the world of relationships” (KSA 13:14[93]) where “only relations constitute being [Wesen]” (KSA 13:14[122]). That Nietzsche already speaks of the “social drive,” like “fearfulness” (D 174) directing the moral principle, hints that drives are in the social context and already in the form of affects.Affectivity indicates the relations or our being in the relations (Franck 158). As seen above, Nietzsche points out the imitation of feelings, which shows how our judgments, inclinations and aversions are already settled in us. Our life is situated in this kind of affective web of relationships, which generates a certain affective interpretation of the world. This interpretation becomes ingrained in us as we grow up. Human beings are always born and live in a certain affective network, and this network generates the interpretation to be built in them. This does not mean that there is only this network, and there are no drives or affects that belong to the individual, but what we regard as belonging to the individual does not exist by itself but operates within the network, and so cannot be thought of apart from the network.For example, appetite may be regarded as intrinsic to an individual, but the way the appetite is activated is largely prescribed in the network, so that something tasty to people in one country can be repulsive to people in another country merely by imagining it. This is the same with sex drive. We know the ancient Greeks treated sex differently from the way modern society does, and, in particular, differently from the largely repressive approach of Christian morality. That we acknowledge that general standards of beauty have changed over time means these changes have taken place in the affective network that generates certain interpretations with which we encounter the world. We may easily think that human drives are intrinsic and the same irrespective of circumstances, but we can imagine how differently the structure of the totality of our drives would be shaped and work if we grew up in a community where people believed men's libido was aggressive and women's passive, or wherein Eros was understood as longing for harmony and beauty as Plato understood it.16In this way, the structure of drives constituting the individual is formed by the individual's interaction with the affective network. The drives refer more to the intra-relation and the affects to the inter-relation, though they are not separated, and Nietzsche's paired expression “drives and affects” places emphasis on the social character of the expression of drives, meaning that drives are coordinated by affects and expressed in the form of affects. As discussed, the affects are deeply ingrained in us, and they play a crucial role in directing and regulating our drives, and they ultimately shape the way we act and behave. Ultimately, it can be said that our actions and behaviors are largely shaped by the way we interpret and respond to the world affectively.The world as will to power is the world of relationships. In this light, it makes sense that affect, which implies relationships, is used as the term to describe the concept of will to power. The will to power consists in wills to power, the multiplicity of the will to power, and this multiplicity signifies the relationships that are in the play of affects. In this respect, the will to power is the most basic “drive and affect” from which other “drives and affects” stem. Nietzsche remarks that “will” is “above all an affect: and specifically, the affect of command” (BGE 19). The command is toward power, and this “toward” indicates the drive, specifically “the basic drive of life” as “the expansion of power” (GS 349). Thus, will to power refers to affect that drives toward power. In this way, the will to power is related to the paired expression “drives and affects” and becomes the basic premise upon which one may view the world.From the discussion above, we understand that the economy of drives and affects points to the dimension beyond the individual. Nietzsche writes: The world seen, felt, interpreted as thus and thus so that organic life may preserve itself in this perspective of interpretation. Man is not only a single individual but the living total-organic [Gesammt-Organische] in a particular line. That he endures proves that a species of interpretation (albeit continuously being constructed) has also endured, that the system of interpretation has not changed. (KSA 12:7[2])The way people live represents a certain interpretation of the world produced by the economy of drives and affects. The character of this economy is basically agonal, or contesting, and there is a struggle between interpretations. This struggle is between the “incorporated piece of interpretation,” that is, “older evaluations which are so firmly incorporated that they belong to our basic constitution,” and the new interpretation based on “newer needs.” When there is an absence of struggle and the dynamic of interpretation ceases, it signifies the ruin of life and of the whole (KSA 12:7[2]).Here, the struggle of interpretation is not a horizontal movement; a “reinterpretation of the strengthened elements into the ‘good’” (KSA 12:9[185]) is needed. The “reinterpretability of the world” is related to the “managing of affects” (KSA 11:35[84]), and this re-interpretation is the enterprise of Nietzsche's great human beings with the long view who create values to direct humanity. They are the ones who can initiate the reshaping of the existing affective interpretation. This change in the affective interpretation as the way we instinctively see the world is also a change in our “taste” concerning the world. Thus, Nietzsche asks, “How does the general taste change?” The great individuals who initiate the change enforce “the judgment of their taste” to make it “a need of everyone” (GS 39). Since “our needs,” which represent our physiological condition, are the basis of the interpretation (KSA 12:7[60]), the change they initiate will eventually form a certain affective interpretation based on which people conduct their relationships and see the world. In a sense, they conquer the world: “to conquer—is the natural consequence of an overflowing power.” The “philosophers,” like “artists,” “want to make their taste ruling in the world” (KSA 10:7[107]). The change of the interpretation, then, involves this vertical movement.The struggle for the dominant interpretation might seem to be at odds with Nietzsche's emphasis on the durable social structure, which is expressed in his appreciation of imperium Romanum (TI ‘Expeditions’ 39; A 58, 59). Nietzsche sets a high value on durability: “[D]uration is a first-rank value on earth” (GS 356). However, it is not that he promotes a static society. He is well aware of “a gradual increase in inherited stupidity, which trails all stability like its shadow” (HH 224). The dynamics between old and new interpretations do not mean an unstable and rapidly changing society, which only indicates chaos of valuations. He believes the dynamics are possible only when based on a stable structure.We can find a clue to how Nietzsche explains the dynamics in social change or progress in section 224 of Human, All Too Human, where he employs the term “inoculation.” Here, he argues that “a partial weakening has to precede every large-scale advance.” There are individuals who attempt new things that deviate from the dominant drives and affects of society but unfortunately perish without gaining influence. However, “in general, especially when they have descendants,” they effect a partial weakening and come to inflict “a wound upon the stable element of a community” (HH 224). “Precisely in this wounded and weakened spot, the whole collective being is inoculated, as it were, with something new” (HH 224). However, Nietzsche adds, the whole “must be strong enough to absorb this new thing into its blood and to assimilate it”; otherwise, it only dismantles the whole. In this sense, durability is a necessary condition for constant social development.17 The “steady development and refining inoculation” is possible “only when the maximum durability has been securely grounded and guaranteed,” (HH 224) though established authority will resist this inoculation. Nietzsche sums up: “[T]wo things must come together: first, an increase in the stabilizing force brought about by uniting minds in belief and in communal feeling; and second, the possibility of attaining higher goals as . . . partial weakenings and woundings of the stabilizing force occur” (HH 224). In other words, there should be a durable society, but at the same time, the attempts at a new interpretation or re-interpretation are always needed.The “inoculation” of the new thing can be said to be the beginning of the formation of a new affective interpretation. As its influence expands, the affective interpretation may enter a race to become the new dominant interpretation in society. In the sense that the affective interpretation regulates the activity of drives, the dominant interpretation of a society shapes the lives of its members in a certain way, or “in a particular line” (KSA 12:7[2]). This “line” can also be thought of as a “perspective” as Nietzsche considered “perspectives” in terms of “affective interpretations” (GM III:12). As affective interpretations are shared within the network of affective relationships among people, the “perspective” refers not to the viewpoint of a single person, but to collectively generated perspectives or the shared understanding and interpretation of a group or community. The perspectives emerge from diverse and overlapping affective networks within society. While there can be multiple perspectives, a society as a whole forms the basic, shared affective interpretation as “the common seat or organ of sensation” [Sensorium commune] (KSA 11:25[461]) that serves as the foundation for affects within society. In this respect, our views and interpretations of the world are not entirely personal, not universal either, but collective. This collectively generated perspective as an affective interpretation works as the basic fabric of affects and forms the basis of a society.While Nietzsche seems to focus on the great individuals who can create the “line” or “perspective” shaping people's lives, his thought is not limited to the individual level. It is often believed that Nietzsche's philosophy is oriented toward the individual who seeks self-cultivation or self-mastery and escapes to solitude away from the miasma of society. However, Nietzsche stated that “all creative natures struggle for influence, even if they live alone— . . . self-overcoming only makes sense as preparation for being a ruler” (KSA 10:16[86]), indicating that these individuals are not completely isolated from society.Nietzsche recognized the extent to which individuals are influenced by society, as seen in his concept of “affect.” When the affective interpretation is fragmented and not shared, a society as a whole cannot be formed to have a certain unity, as Nietzsche denounces “modern society” in the decadent age of mixture as “not a ‘society,’ not a ‘body’” (KSA 13:16[53]). The affective interpretation is shaped by social relationships, and the affective interpretations, combined with drives, transform and shape our behavior. The drives of the public operate within this shared affective interpretation. In this way, the dominant interpretation of a society can shape people's lives in a particular way. Thus, society is a field of struggle over what kinds of human being are to be raised. In this sense, “society itself is a means of war” for shaping people's lives according to a certain line or perspective, and “life is a consequence of war” (KSA 13:14[40]) in that people's lives are shaped by the dominant interpretation. In this respect, affective interpretation serves as the foundation of society.","PeriodicalId":42609,"journal":{"name":"Pluralist","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.2000,"publicationDate":"2023-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Pluralist","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.5406/19446489.18.3.01","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"PHILOSOPHY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0

Abstract

Nietzsche believes that the different human types should be allowed to thrive and not be reduced into uniformity, as he says “nothing should be banished more than . . . the approximation and reconciliation” of the different types (KSA 12:10[59]).1 He sees the approximation as a reflection of democratic values and monolithic morality that he opposes. Instead, he believes that humans should be naturalized and allowed to live in accordance with their own nature. To achieve this, Nietzsche proposed “the great politics,” which “makes physiology into the ruler over all other questions” to “breed humanity as a whole” so that “one affirms what one is, one denies what one is not” (KSA 13:25[1]). In this way, Nietzsche thinks the different types should live in accordance with their respective nature.In The Antichrist, Nietzsche argues that “every healthy society” consists of different physiological types.2 He repeatedly says that “Nature, not Manu,” separates these physiological types of the hierarchical order,3 which is “merely the sanction of a natural order, natural lawfulness of the first rank.” While each type has “its own hygiene, its own realm of work, its own feelings of perfection and mastery” (A 57), this rank order is “the sanctioning of a natural distance between several physiological types,” which are “determined and best developed for different activity,” like “division of labor” (KSA 13:14[221]). Therefore, Nietzsche describes the physiological types divided in a healthy society as “differently gravitating” and “mutually conditioning” types (A 57). In order for a society to be healthy as a whole, individuals should be neither uniform nor scattered, but should be in an organized structure together. This structure is “opposed to an atomistic anarchy.” A “human community is a unity [Einheit],” and “all unity is unity only as organization and co-operation.” In this way “a ruling structure,” which does not exist as one, “means one [Eins]” (KSA 12:2[87]).However, what is it that produces this unity? Nietzsche's envisioned “naturalization of human beings” (KSA 9:11[211]) involves a society where different types live actively in accordance with their nature or respective physiological constitution. However, the existence of different types does not ensure the formation of society as a whole. Individuals of different types with different power will not automatically gather to form a society if they remain merely as individuals. In other words, if there is no social character in nature itself, a society could be seen to be formed “by accident,” as Hobbes understands (42). What then is the basis that allows individuals to be incorporated into the social order? This article explores the social aspect of Nietzsche's understanding of nature, particularly with attention to his idea of affects, which will lead us to the idea of the affective foundation of society in his philosophy.4Nietzsche often describes nature as something chaotic that is elusive, uncertain, indifferent to human affairs, and without purpose and mercy. Thus, he writes, “how could you live according to this indifference? Living—is that not precisely wanting to be different than this nature? Is living not assessing, preferring, being unjust, being limited, wanting to be different?” (BGE 9) In this regard, the first point to note is that the “nature” of which Nietzsche speaks involves human nature strong enough to play with chaos and even to defy nature's indifference and brutality. As Conway points out, “the ‘return to nature’ that he envisions thus involves a return to human nature as the sole authority or justification for the nomothetic preferences required by the restricted economy of Life” (42–43). It is human nature to impose order on the natural world, transforming its amorphous state into a structured form of life, and to create a hierarchy of values in nature's indifference—this is perfectly natural and is the task of the philosophers. Therefore, rather than settling in “the infinite domain of Chaos” as Seung argues (292), Nietzsche reminds us of human nature: “We speak of nature and, in doing so, forget ourselves: we ourselves are nature” (WS 327). In this respect, the affirmation of nature means for Nietzsche above all the affirmation of human nature.Thus, this article is to clarify how human nature can be the basis for the formation of society in Nietzsche's philosophy. As Nietzsche introduced the concept of the “will to power” in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, he considers nature generally in terms of will to power. Thus, he writes, “homo natura. The ‘will to power’” (KSA 12:2[131]). This article particularly focuses on the social aspect of the concept, which has not been much explored. In the following sections, I will examine how Nietzsche's early and middle works recognized the social character of nature, and then how this social character is reflected in his later concept of the “will to power.”As Nietzsche seeks the affirmation of nature, from the early period onward, he seems to keep ruminating on the nature that should be sought for each person to be healthy. The problem is that there is no unaffected nature, and human nature is conditioned and affected by circumstances.5 Nietzsche was well-aware of this, and he pointed out that most value judgments, our behavior, and our feelings are affected by and adopted from others and then “become our nature” (D 104; D 34, 35, 38, 247). In other words, “nature arises from the long-lasting practice” (D 248). We can understand that his genealogical work is therefore designed to trace the practices that have formed our nature. The line between nature and culture is blurred, and cultural practices that will train people to incorporate certain values into the body become significant. If human nature is always affected by circumstances, what nature are we required to affirm?In his early and middle periods, Nietzsche distinguishes between the first nature and second nature. The first nature is the “inherited nature” given to us as “the products of earlier generations,” and the second nature is what is cultivated as “a new instinct” in us. On the face of it, his view of the second nature appears negative because the second nature is implanted “so that the first nature withers away.” This implantation is a dangerous attempt at “negating of the past” that has formed us (UM II:3). As we learn what is socially desirable and approved behavior, we develop a second nature whereby a certain socially acceptable drive predominates over the first (D 38). Human beings have their own nature, but its development can be hindered, in Nietzsche's view, by contemporary education and upbringings that are applied to all in a blanket fashion, not distinguishing between or adapting for different types. This contemporary method of upbringing compels a human being to accept values against their nature, which in Nietzsche's logic will lead them to “fall sick” and “ruin the vitality of their nerves [Nervenkraft]” (D 500). In this situation, “[w]ith most people, the embryo of the first nature dries up,” and only a few can be strong “enough to shed this skin” of the second nature “when under its cover their first nature has matured” (D 455).6When Nietzsche speaks of one living according to one's nature, it is arguably this first nature that he has in mind. However, it should be noted that the distinction between first and second nature does not mean that his intention is to entirely deny the second nature and bring out the first, since there is no such thing as absolutely ahistorical human nature; “even that first nature was once a second nature, and every victorious second nature will become a first nature” (UM II:3). As stated above, nature comes from long-standing practice (D 248; GS 290). Nietzsche at first seems to consider “nature” in terms of “talent [Begabung]” in contrast with “learning,” but then again, he writes that “the person who learns imparts [begaben] talent to himself” (D 540). Goethe and Raphael, without “envy,” “were both great learners and not just the exploiters of those lodes” of what was given from “their ancestors” (D 540). They were able to use their formative power, actively and without envy, to appropriate other nature. In this respect, the interplay between first and second nature is significant. Given that human beings live always in relationship to society and culture, we understand that there is a limit to what can be achieved by individuals’ personal cultivation if society as a whole is not healthy. It is therefore understandable for Nietzsche to envision a new society or a new whole where healthy individuals can be raised.In his letters dated December 1882, Nietzsche writes “I have a ‘second nature,’ but not to destroy the first [nature] but to bear it”; “I will now prove that only with this second nature I have entered into the actual [eigentlich] possession of my first nature” (KSB 6:344–45). These statements emphasize the second nature formed by the social context or interrelation that affects our first nature; unfortunately for the scholastic pursuit of continuity, he no longer explicitly uses the term “first nature” in his later period.7With the interplay described above in mind, it is difficult to create a reference point for measuring the health of nature and judging the kind of nature it is suggested that we should strive for. Nietzsche seems to emphasize the first nature and the “drives that constitute his being [Wesen]” (D 119), but drives are “transformed,” and what transforms the drives by being attached to them Nietzsche calls the “second nature” (D 38). It is hard then to reach the first nature, or to “return to myself,” the “nethermost self” (EH ‘HH’ 4), since our nature is already engaged in a web of social relationships. If we take Nietzsche's view of the interplay of our two natures into account, and we understand that drives are transformable, it is hard to create a single position from which the different drives that constitute human nature are judged and prioritized. Thus, Nietzsche no longer uses the term “the first nature” after 1882;8 instead, he uses the concept “will to power” as a tool for understanding nature.From this discussion, we learn that Nietzsche gives weight to the social and cultural aspects of nature—that is to say, the fact that human nature is coordinated and transformed in social relationships. This aspect is also included in the concept of will to power, as we shall see. By looking into the social character within the concept, we can see what the basis of the formation of society is.The will to power can, of course, be considered and examined in various ways. Nietzsche thinks “life itself is will to power” (BGE 13) and explores “a world whose essence is will to power” (BGE 186). He considers will to power using several terms: drive, affect, desire, and instinct (cf. GS 349; A 6; KSA 11:39[6]; KSA 12:1[61]; KSA 12:1[59]). These varied descriptions show the multi-layered aspects of the concept, and they come from the complex and multifaceted nature of life itself, with the “multiplicity of ‘will to power’: each with a multiplicity of expressions and forms” (KSA 12:1[58]).9 Life unfolds itself in various ways, through thoughts, desires, emotions, and so forth. In other words, life is a field wherein these express themselves. Nietzsche tries to understand these expressions in terms of will to power, which is “the innermost essence of being” (KSA 13:14[80]). He refers to this essence and its expressions with the same name; in essence, will to power is the affect and drive and desire that are expressed as affects and drives and desires.At the basic level of these life expressions, Nietzsche believes, are drive and affect, above all. This article focuses more on affect, because looking at will to power in relation to affect shows its social character in an evident way and reveals the implications associated with the formation of society more clearly. What then is the affective understanding of will to power? Nietzsche speaks of “will to power psychologically,” holding “that the will to power is the primitive form of affect, that all other affects are only its developments” (KSA 13:14[121]; cf. BGE 23). He thinks about the “derivation of all affects from the one will to power,” and considers them as of the same essence (KSA 12:10[57]). In this respect, will to power is the affect that is to consist in and be expressed as all affects.10It has often been discussed that drives are essential for understanding our nature. We need to see now in what sense affect is constitutive of nature. While Nietzsche emphasizes that “under every thought there is an affect” and the “series and succession of feelings, thoughts, etc. are symptoms of the actual occurrence” (KSA 12:1[61]), he does not provide a clear definition of affect. Nietzsche often uses “affect” to refer to what are usually called emotions or feelings, such as hatred, greed, envy, courage, love, and resentment (BGE 23, 192, 260; KSA 10:7[87]; 13:24[1].2), so that, broadly, scholars understand affects to be “feelings” (Janaway 206; Leiter, “Moralities” 576; Richardson 37), or “any mental episode which constitutively involves a pro- or con- attitude” (Poellner 229). In a rather different stance, Emden, highlighting the precedence given to biology, asserts that affects are not “discrete mental states” but the same as what Spinoza meant by affect [affectus] (Emden 33). Spinoza used “affect” [affectus] differently from emotions in an ordinary sense11 and argued that all affects arose from three primary affects: desire, joy, and sadness (III, P11, Schol.). Nietzsche similarly regards affects as a state of body and considers them as derived from will to power, and saw “pleasure” [Lust] and “displeasure” [Unlust] as “cardinal facts” in the action of will to power (KSA 13:14[80]). However, due to the lack of explanation in Nietzsche's text as well as in Emden's, it is not clear that what Nietzsche means by the term was necessarily influenced by Spinoza.Whether affects are understood as mental states or whether their physiological basis is emphasized, Nietzsche's comments on affect doing the work of interpreting and its relation to the will to power have often been somewhat downplayed. For example, Gemes argues that it is better to focus on drives rather than affects because “it is drives that Nietzsche most consistently and plausibly emphasizes as the basis of our nature,” and an affect or “a feeling, a ‘what it feels like’ does not seem to have the right temporal spread or active character to do interpreting” (104). This kind of view proceeds mainly from the understanding that affects are occurrent feelings. Are affects merely incidental then to the activity of drives?We find that Nietzsche often uses the terms “affect” and “drive” together, such as “soul as social structure of drives and affects” [Gesellschaftsbau der Triebe und Affekte] (BGE 12). Although he does not seem to differentiate between them clearly, scholars have tried to clarify the difference, although not particularly in relation to will to power. Janaway understands that “a drive is a relatively stable tendency to active behavior of some kind, while an affect, put very roughly, is what it feels like when a drive is active inside oneself” (214). Similarly, Constâncio and Branco draw a distinction in the editors’ introduction: “By ‘drives’ Nietzsche means the ‘forces,’ ‘under-wills,’ or ‘wills to power’ that direct our behavior towards the satisfaction of organic needs. An ‘affect’ is simply what it feels like to be driven by a drive” (xvi). Katsafanas clarifies the connection between drives and affects by defining drives as “non-conscious dispositions that generate affective orientations” (10). Surely affects accompany drives, and we can agree with the analysis in this respect. However, Nietzsche often puts them together without clarification or differentiation as if they are interchangeable. For example, Nietzsche writes that “the animals follow their drives and affects: we are animals . . . . and morality is only a sign language of our drives?” (KSA 10:7[76]). Later in another passage, he posits that “moralities are only a sign language of the affects” (BGE 187); it is understandable then that some scholars do not distinguish sharply between the two terms.12Still, if “drives and affects” is not merely a pleonastic expression, they at some point should play different roles in constituting our nature, and affects should not be considered merely incidental to drives. The first thing to point out in demonstrating this is that Nietzsche emphasizes the physiological basis of affects, which can operate at a deeper level than conscious thoughts and feelings. He argues that “what is really going on in the activity of our human affects” is the “physiological movements” (KSA 9:11[128]) and “all affects” are “a state of body” (KSA 10:9[44]). As affects are a state of the body as a physiological movement, affects are not understood as merely transient feelings but can have continuous influence or a temporal spread, which concerns Gemes, as seen above. Affects are related to the mechanism of our physiological response to what we encounter in the world, and this mechanism can be ingrained in the body. Nietzsche understands that “affects” are connected to “the formation of the memory-material—continuous living on and interacting” (KSA 11:25[514]), and memory leads to “a habituation to a particular causal interpretation” (TI ‘Errors’ 4).This view of interpretation in relation to affects not only applies to causality but can also be understood in a broader context. Nietzsche writes that “all affects” are “first a state of the body: which is interpreted. Later the interpretation freely produces the state” (KSA 10:9[44]). This shows that once the mechanism of how we respond to the world, how we interpret, is ingrained in the body, this mechanism or interpretation can produce our bodily state—so in the end, the interpretation does not come after events but comes first. With this in mind, we need to look at the concept of will to power in relation to drives and affects more closely.Behind our conscious thoughts and activities is the “play of affects” (KSA 13:11[113]) or the “play and struggle of affects” (KSA 12:1[75]), and the nature of this play is agonal (cf. BGE 117). It should be noted that Nietzsche does not think that the way the affects or drives work is entirely individual. He makes critical comments in a note on Spinoza's idea of self-preservation: “Pre-egoism, herd-drive are older than the ‘willing self-preserving.’ The human being is first developed as a function: from this the individual releases itself again later, while the individual as a function has come to know innumerable conditions of the whole, of the organism, and has gradually been incorporated” (KSA 9:11[193]; cf. 11[182]).In this respect, the human being and its drives are raised first in the context of society. As “the human being began as a part of a whole,” Nietzsche understands, “through indescribably long habituation, people first feel the affects of society . . . , and not as individuals!” (KSA 9:11[182]). Therefore, Nietzsche does not consider the play of affects and drives to be simply an occurrence isolated to the individual, since our existence is in the context of society and relationships with others. I argue that we can understand that in Nietzsche's paired expression “drives and affects,” the drives refer more to intra-relation and the affects to inter-relation. In other words, the drives are the basic element that constitutes an individual formed by the arrangement of drives,13 and the affects indicate how this individual is situated in the relational network of the whole.It is discussed that our judgments, especially moral judgments, result from affects about, or affective responses to, situations.14 Even in his middle period, Nietzsche clearly emphasizes the moral feelings that prescribe moral actions. But this feeling, this affective response, is not an individual's personal one; “evidently moral feelings are transmitted” in the way that children “imitate” the older generation's “inclinations for and aversions to certain actions” (D 34). These feelings become so natural for them that they grow to believe they are rationally justified. However, “behind feelings there are judgments and valuations, which we have inherited in the form of feelings (inclinations, aversions).” He continues: “To trust one's feeling—that means obeying one's grandfather and grandmother and their grandparents more than . . . our reason and our experience” (D 35). It is notable that Nietzsche thinks “the same drive develops into a painful feeling . . . or a pleasant feeling” under the different customs and social evaluations attached to it, which he calls the “second nature” as seen above, and in this way, drives are “transformed” (D 38). Drives can be transformed in the sense that some drives grow and others wither, in line with their interaction with external circumstances.It is important to note that Nietzsche places great emphasis on the social character of drives, or the second nature, as the factor coordinating drives. In his later period he still believes in the transformation of drives, arguing “drives are the after-effects of long-standing evaluations, which now act instinctively” (KSA 11:25[460]). Nietzsche's concept of drives transformed by socially attached feelings evolves into the paired expression “drives and affects” in his late period. The transformation is now understood in terms of “interpretation”: “the will to power interprets” (KSA 12:2[148]),15 and “the interpretation itself, as a form of the will to power, exists . . . as an affect” (KSA 12:2[151]). “Who interprets?—our affects” (KSA 12:2[190]). This affective interpretation shows “a symptom of certain physiological conditions” (KSA 12:2[190]) that reveals what one's life needs. In this respect, affects are not just what it feels like to be driven by drives, but rather they show how we interpret and how we instinctively see and utilize the world for our growth. All our activities are based on affectivity, the unconscious process of the affective interpretation of the world.Furthermore, what we understand as drives always work or are expressed in the form of affects. This is because, on the one hand, as Katsafanas argues, drives induce affective orientations, and on the other hand and more importantly for our discussion, the movements of the drives of individuals are always within the broader context of the whole since we live in the world as will to power, “essentially the world of relationships” (KSA 13:14[93]) where “only relations constitute being [Wesen]” (KSA 13:14[122]). That Nietzsche already speaks of the “social drive,” like “fearfulness” (D 174) directing the moral principle, hints that drives are in the social context and already in the form of affects.Affectivity indicates the relations or our being in the relations (Franck 158). As seen above, Nietzsche points out the imitation of feelings, which shows how our judgments, inclinations and aversions are already settled in us. Our life is situated in this kind of affective web of relationships, which generates a certain affective interpretation of the world. This interpretation becomes ingrained in us as we grow up. Human beings are always born and live in a certain affective network, and this network generates the interpretation to be built in them. This does not mean that there is only this network, and there are no drives or affects that belong to the individual, but what we regard as belonging to the individual does not exist by itself but operates within the network, and so cannot be thought of apart from the network.For example, appetite may be regarded as intrinsic to an individual, but the way the appetite is activated is largely prescribed in the network, so that something tasty to people in one country can be repulsive to people in another country merely by imagining it. This is the same with sex drive. We know the ancient Greeks treated sex differently from the way modern society does, and, in particular, differently from the largely repressive approach of Christian morality. That we acknowledge that general standards of beauty have changed over time means these changes have taken place in the affective network that generates certain interpretations with which we encounter the world. We may easily think that human drives are intrinsic and the same irrespective of circumstances, but we can imagine how differently the structure of the totality of our drives would be shaped and work if we grew up in a community where people believed men's libido was aggressive and women's passive, or wherein Eros was understood as longing for harmony and beauty as Plato understood it.16In this way, the structure of drives constituting the individual is formed by the individual's interaction with the affective network. The drives refer more to the intra-relation and the affects to the inter-relation, though they are not separated, and Nietzsche's paired expression “drives and affects” places emphasis on the social character of the expression of drives, meaning that drives are coordinated by affects and expressed in the form of affects. As discussed, the affects are deeply ingrained in us, and they play a crucial role in directing and regulating our drives, and they ultimately shape the way we act and behave. Ultimately, it can be said that our actions and behaviors are largely shaped by the way we interpret and respond to the world affectively.The world as will to power is the world of relationships. In this light, it makes sense that affect, which implies relationships, is used as the term to describe the concept of will to power. The will to power consists in wills to power, the multiplicity of the will to power, and this multiplicity signifies the relationships that are in the play of affects. In this respect, the will to power is the most basic “drive and affect” from which other “drives and affects” stem. Nietzsche remarks that “will” is “above all an affect: and specifically, the affect of command” (BGE 19). The command is toward power, and this “toward” indicates the drive, specifically “the basic drive of life” as “the expansion of power” (GS 349). Thus, will to power refers to affect that drives toward power. In this way, the will to power is related to the paired expression “drives and affects” and becomes the basic premise upon which one may view the world.From the discussion above, we understand that the economy of drives and affects points to the dimension beyond the individual. Nietzsche writes: The world seen, felt, interpreted as thus and thus so that organic life may preserve itself in this perspective of interpretation. Man is not only a single individual but the living total-organic [Gesammt-Organische] in a particular line. That he endures proves that a species of interpretation (albeit continuously being constructed) has also endured, that the system of interpretation has not changed. (KSA 12:7[2])The way people live represents a certain interpretation of the world produced by the economy of drives and affects. The character of this economy is basically agonal, or contesting, and there is a struggle between interpretations. This struggle is between the “incorporated piece of interpretation,” that is, “older evaluations which are so firmly incorporated that they belong to our basic constitution,” and the new interpretation based on “newer needs.” When there is an absence of struggle and the dynamic of interpretation ceases, it signifies the ruin of life and of the whole (KSA 12:7[2]).Here, the struggle of interpretation is not a horizontal movement; a “reinterpretation of the strengthened elements into the ‘good’” (KSA 12:9[185]) is needed. The “reinterpretability of the world” is related to the “managing of affects” (KSA 11:35[84]), and this re-interpretation is the enterprise of Nietzsche's great human beings with the long view who create values to direct humanity. They are the ones who can initiate the reshaping of the existing affective interpretation. This change in the affective interpretation as the way we instinctively see the world is also a change in our “taste” concerning the world. Thus, Nietzsche asks, “How does the general taste change?” The great individuals who initiate the change enforce “the judgment of their taste” to make it “a need of everyone” (GS 39). Since “our needs,” which represent our physiological condition, are the basis of the interpretation (KSA 12:7[60]), the change they initiate will eventually form a certain affective interpretation based on which people conduct their relationships and see the world. In a sense, they conquer the world: “to conquer—is the natural consequence of an overflowing power.” The “philosophers,” like “artists,” “want to make their taste ruling in the world” (KSA 10:7[107]). The change of the interpretation, then, involves this vertical movement.The struggle for the dominant interpretation might seem to be at odds with Nietzsche's emphasis on the durable social structure, which is expressed in his appreciation of imperium Romanum (TI ‘Expeditions’ 39; A 58, 59). Nietzsche sets a high value on durability: “[D]uration is a first-rank value on earth” (GS 356). However, it is not that he promotes a static society. He is well aware of “a gradual increase in inherited stupidity, which trails all stability like its shadow” (HH 224). The dynamics between old and new interpretations do not mean an unstable and rapidly changing society, which only indicates chaos of valuations. He believes the dynamics are possible only when based on a stable structure.We can find a clue to how Nietzsche explains the dynamics in social change or progress in section 224 of Human, All Too Human, where he employs the term “inoculation.” Here, he argues that “a partial weakening has to precede every large-scale advance.” There are individuals who attempt new things that deviate from the dominant drives and affects of society but unfortunately perish without gaining influence. However, “in general, especially when they have descendants,” they effect a partial weakening and come to inflict “a wound upon the stable element of a community” (HH 224). “Precisely in this wounded and weakened spot, the whole collective being is inoculated, as it were, with something new” (HH 224). However, Nietzsche adds, the whole “must be strong enough to absorb this new thing into its blood and to assimilate it”; otherwise, it only dismantles the whole. In this sense, durability is a necessary condition for constant social development.17 The “steady development and refining inoculation” is possible “only when the maximum durability has been securely grounded and guaranteed,” (HH 224) though established authority will resist this inoculation. Nietzsche sums up: “[T]wo things must come together: first, an increase in the stabilizing force brought about by uniting minds in belief and in communal feeling; and second, the possibility of attaining higher goals as . . . partial weakenings and woundings of the stabilizing force occur” (HH 224). In other words, there should be a durable society, but at the same time, the attempts at a new interpretation or re-interpretation are always needed.The “inoculation” of the new thing can be said to be the beginning of the formation of a new affective interpretation. As its influence expands, the affective interpretation may enter a race to become the new dominant interpretation in society. In the sense that the affective interpretation regulates the activity of drives, the dominant interpretation of a society shapes the lives of its members in a certain way, or “in a particular line” (KSA 12:7[2]). This “line” can also be thought of as a “perspective” as Nietzsche considered “perspectives” in terms of “affective interpretations” (GM III:12). As affective interpretations are shared within the network of affective relationships among people, the “perspective” refers not to the viewpoint of a single person, but to collectively generated perspectives or the shared understanding and interpretation of a group or community. The perspectives emerge from diverse and overlapping affective networks within society. While there can be multiple perspectives, a society as a whole forms the basic, shared affective interpretation as “the common seat or organ of sensation” [Sensorium commune] (KSA 11:25[461]) that serves as the foundation for affects within society. In this respect, our views and interpretations of the world are not entirely personal, not universal either, but collective. This collectively generated perspective as an affective interpretation works as the basic fabric of affects and forms the basis of a society.While Nietzsche seems to focus on the great individuals who can create the “line” or “perspective” shaping people's lives, his thought is not limited to the individual level. It is often believed that Nietzsche's philosophy is oriented toward the individual who seeks self-cultivation or self-mastery and escapes to solitude away from the miasma of society. However, Nietzsche stated that “all creative natures struggle for influence, even if they live alone— . . . self-overcoming only makes sense as preparation for being a ruler” (KSA 10:16[86]), indicating that these individuals are not completely isolated from society.Nietzsche recognized the extent to which individuals are influenced by society, as seen in his concept of “affect.” When the affective interpretation is fragmented and not shared, a society as a whole cannot be formed to have a certain unity, as Nietzsche denounces “modern society” in the decadent age of mixture as “not a ‘society,’ not a ‘body’” (KSA 13:16[53]). The affective interpretation is shaped by social relationships, and the affective interpretations, combined with drives, transform and shape our behavior. The drives of the public operate within this shared affective interpretation. In this way, the dominant interpretation of a society can shape people's lives in a particular way. Thus, society is a field of struggle over what kinds of human being are to be raised. In this sense, “society itself is a means of war” for shaping people's lives according to a certain line or perspective, and “life is a consequence of war” (KSA 13:14[40]) in that people's lives are shaped by the dominant interpretation. In this respect, affective interpretation serves as the foundation of society.
尼采哲学中的社会情感基础
如果我们考虑到尼采关于我们两种本性相互作用的观点,并且我们理解驱动力是可改变的,很难创造一个单一的位置,从这个位置来判断和优先考虑构成人性的不同驱动力。因此,尼采在1882年之后不再使用“第一本性”这个术语,8相反,他使用“权力意志”这个概念作为理解自然的工具。从这个讨论中,我们了解到尼采重视自然的社会和文化方面,也就是说,人性在社会关系中得到协调和转化。正如我们将看到的,这方面也包括在权力意志的概念中。通过考察这一概念的社会性质,我们可以看到社会形成的基础是什么。当然,权力意志可以用不同的方式来考虑和检验。尼采认为“生命本身就是权力意志”(BGE 13),并探索了“一个本质是权力意志的世界”(BGE 186)。他使用几个术语来考虑权力意志:驱动力、情感、欲望和本能(参见GS 349;6;KSA 39 [6];KSA 12:1 [61];KSA 12:1[59])。这些不同的描述显示了这个概念的多层面,它们来自于生命本身的复杂和多面性,具有“‘权力意志’的多样性:每一个都有多种表达和形式”(KSA 12:1[58])生活以各种方式展现自己,通过思想、欲望、情感等等。换句话说,生活就是这些表达自己的领域。尼采试图从权力意志的角度来理解这些表达,权力意志是“存在的最内在本质”(KSA 13:14[80])。他把这个本质和它的表现都称为“本体”;本质上,权力意志是情感、动力和欲望,表现为情感、动力和欲望。尼采认为,在这些生命表达的基本层面上,驱动力和情感是最重要的。本文更多地关注情感,因为将权力意志与情感联系起来,可以明显地显示其社会特征,并更清楚地揭示与社会形成相关的含义。那么,对权力意志的有效理解是什么呢?尼采谈到“心理上的权力意志”,认为“权力意志是情感的原始形式,所有其他的情感只是它的发展”(《圣歌》13:14[121];参见BGE 23)。他认为“所有的情感都是从一个权力意志中衍生出来的”,并认为它们具有相同的本质(KSA 12:10[57])。在这方面,权力意志是一种情感,它包含在一切情感中,并被表现为一切情感。人们经常讨论驱力对于理解我们的本性是必不可少的。我们现在需要看看情感在什么意义上是自然的组成部分。虽然尼采强调“在每一种思想之下都有一种情感”,并且“情感、思想等的一系列和连续是实际发生的症状”(KSA 12:1[61]),但他并没有提供情感的明确定义。尼采经常用“affect”来指代通常被称为情绪或感觉的东西,比如仇恨、贪婪、嫉妒、勇气、爱和怨恨(BGE 23,192,260;KSA 10:7 [87];13:24[1].2),因此,从广义上讲,学者们将情感理解为“感觉”(Janaway 206;莱特,《道德》第576页;理查森37),或“任何本质上包含赞成或反对态度的心理事件”(波尔纳229)。埃姆登以一种截然不同的立场,强调给予生物学优先权,断言情感不是“离散的精神状态”,而是与斯宾诺莎所说的“情感”(affectus)相同(埃姆登33)。斯宾诺莎对“affect”[affectus]的用法不同于一般意义上的情感,他认为所有的情感都源于三种主要的情感:欲望、快乐和悲伤(III, P11, school)。尼采同样将情感视为身体的一种状态,认为它们源于权力意志,并将“快乐”(欲望)和“不快乐”(不欲望)视为权力意志行动中的“基本事实”(KSA 13:14[80])。然而,由于尼采的文本以及埃姆登的文本中缺乏解释,我们不清楚尼采使用这个术语的意思是否一定受到斯宾诺莎的影响。无论情感是被理解为精神状态还是被强调其生理基础,尼采对情感的评论是解释的工作以及它与权力意志的关系经常被淡化。例如,Gemes认为最好关注驱动力而不是影响,因为“尼采最一贯、最可信地强调的是驱动力是我们本性的基础”,而一种情感或“一种感觉,一种‘感觉是什么’似乎没有正确的时间传播或积极的特征来进行解释”(104)。这种观点主要来源于情感是发生的感觉的理解。 那么,对于驱力的活动来说,情感仅仅是偶然的吗?我们发现尼采经常将“影响”和“驱动”这两个词放在一起使用,例如“灵魂作为驱动和影响的社会结构”[Gesellschaftsbau der tribeund Affekte] (BGE 12)。虽然他似乎并没有明确区分这两者,但学者们已经试图澄清它们之间的区别,尽管并不是特别与权力意志有关。Janaway理解,“驱动力是某种积极行为的相对稳定的倾向,而情感,非常粗略地说,是当一个驱动力在自己内心活跃时的感觉”(214)。同样地,康斯坦斯坦·尼西奥和布兰科在编辑的引言中做出了区分:“尼采所说的‘驱力’是指‘力量’、‘意志之下’或‘权力意志’,它们引导我们的行为朝着满足有机需求的方向发展。‘affect’就是被驱动力驱动的感觉”(16)。Katsafanas将驱动力定义为“产生情感取向的无意识倾向”,从而澄清了驱动力和影响之间的联系(10)。肯定会影响伴随的驱动,我们可以同意这方面的分析。然而,尼采经常把它们放在一起,没有澄清或区分,好像它们是可以互换的。例如,尼采写道:“动物遵循它们的本能和情感:我们是动物. . . .道德只是我们冲动的一种符号语言吗?(王上10:7[76])。后来在另一段中,他假定“道德只是情感的一种手语”(BGE 187);因此,一些学者没有明确区分这两个术语是可以理解的。然而,如果“欲望和情感”不仅仅是一种修辞,它们在某种程度上应该在构成我们的本性中扮演不同的角色,而情感不应该仅仅被认为是欲望的附带因素。首先要指出的是,尼采强调情感的生理基础,它可以在比意识思想和感觉更深的层次上运作。他认为“我们人类情感活动中真正发生的”是“生理运动”(KSA 9:11[128]),而“所有情感”都是“身体的一种状态”(KSA 10:9[44])。由于情感是身体的一种生理运动状态,所以情感不能仅仅被理解为短暂的感觉,而可以具有持续的影响或暂时的传播,如上所述,这与Gemes有关。影响与我们对世界上遇到的事物的生理反应机制有关,这种机制可以在体内根深蒂固。尼采认为,“影响”与“记忆-物质-持续存在和相互作用的形成”(KSA 11:25[514])有关,记忆导致“对特定因果解释的习惯化”(TI ' Errors ' 4)。这种与影响有关的解释观点不仅适用于因果关系,也可以在更广泛的背景下理解。尼采写道,“所有的情感”“首先是身体的一种状态:这是被解释的。”后来的解释自由地产生了状态”(KSA 10:9[44])。这表明,一旦我们对世界做出反应的机制,我们如何解释的机制,在身体中根深蒂固,这种机制或解释就会产生我们的身体状态——所以最终,解释不是发生在事件之后,而是发生在事件发生之前。考虑到这一点,我们需要更密切地研究与驱动力和影响有关的权力意志的概念。在我们有意识的思想和活动的背后是“情感的游戏”(KSA 13:11[113])或“情感的游戏和斗争”(KSA 12:1[75]),这种游戏的性质是agonal (cf. BGE 117)。需要注意的是,尼采并不认为影响或驱动的方式是完全个体的。他在一篇关于斯宾诺莎自我保护思想的笔记中提出了批评:“前利己主义、群体驱力比‘自愿自我保护’更古老。“人首先是作为一种功能而发展起来的,后来个人又从中解脱出来,而作为一种功能的个人已经了解了整体和有机体的无数条件,并逐渐被纳入其中”(KSA 9:11[193];cf。11[182])。在这方面,人类及其驱力首先是在社会背景下提出的。正如“人类作为整体的一部分开始,”尼采理解,“通过难以形容的长期习惯,人们首先感受到社会的影响……,而不是作为个人!(王上9:11[182])。因此,尼采不认为情感和驱力的作用是孤立于个人的事件,因为我们的存在是在社会和与他人关系的背景下。我认为,我们可以理解,在尼采的配对表达"驱力和情感"中,驱力指的是内在关系,而情感指的是内在关系。
本文章由计算机程序翻译,如有差异,请以英文原文为准。
求助全文
约1分钟内获得全文 求助全文
来源期刊
Pluralist
Pluralist PHILOSOPHY-
CiteScore
0.50
自引率
0.00%
发文量
39
×
引用
GB/T 7714-2015
复制
MLA
复制
APA
复制
导出至
BibTeX EndNote RefMan NoteFirst NoteExpress
×
提示
您的信息不完整,为了账户安全,请先补充。
现在去补充
×
提示
您因"违规操作"
具体请查看互助需知
我知道了
×
提示
确定
请完成安全验证×
copy
已复制链接
快去分享给好友吧!
我知道了
右上角分享
点击右上角分享
0
联系我们:info@booksci.cn Book学术提供免费学术资源搜索服务,方便国内外学者检索中英文文献。致力于提供最便捷和优质的服务体验。 Copyright © 2023 布克学术 All rights reserved.
京ICP备2023020795号-1
ghs 京公网安备 11010802042870号
Book学术文献互助
Book学术文献互助群
群 号:481959085
Book学术官方微信