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Nietzsche on Morality Copyrighted Material-Taylor & Francis Copyrighted Material-Taylor & Francis Nietzsche on Morality Both an introduction to Nietzsche’s moral philosophy, and a sustained commentary on his most famous work, On the Genealogy of Morality, this book has become the most widely used and debated secondary source on these topics over the past dozen years. Many of Nietzsche’s most famous ideas – the “slave revolt” in morals, the attack on free will, perspectivism, “will to power,” and the “ascetic ideal”–are clearly analyzed and explained. The first edition established the centrality of nat- uralism to Nietzsche’s philosophy, generating a substantial scholarly literature to which Leiter responds in an important new Postscript. In addition, Leiter has revised and refreshed the book throughout, taking into account new scholarly literature, and revising or clarifying his treatment of such topics as the objectivity of value, epiphenomenalism and consciousness, and the possibility of “autonomous” agency. Brian Leiter is the Karl N. Llewellyn Professor of Jurisprudence and Director of the Center for Law, Philosophy and Human Values at the University of Chicago, USA, where he teaches and writes about moral, political, and legal philosophy in both the Anglophone and Continental European traditions. Copyrighted Material-Taylor & Francis This page intentionally left blank Copyrighted Material-Taylor & Francis Nietzsche on Morality Second Edition Brian Leiter ROUTLEDGE Routledge~~o~;!~n~~~up LONDON AND NEW YORK Copyrighted Material-Taylor & Francis First published as Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Nietzsche on Morality 2002 by Routledge This edition published as Nietzsche on Morality 2015 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2002, 2015 Brian Leiter The right of Brian Leiter to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Leiter, Brian. [Routledge philosophy guidebook to Nietzsche on morality] Nietzsche on morality / by Brian Leiter. -- 2nd ed. pages cm Rev. ed. of: Routledge philosophy guidebook to Nietzsche on morality. 2002. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm, 1844-1900. 2. Ethics, Modern--19th century. I. Title. B3318.E9L45 2014 170.92--dc23 2014016618 ISBN: 978-0-415-85679-9 (hbk) ISBN: 978-0-415-85680-5 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-315-75833-6 (ebk) Typeset in Garamond by Taylor & Francis Books Copyrighted Material-Taylor & Francis For Sheila and our beautiful children, Sam, William, and Celia Copyrighted Material-Taylor & Francis This page intentionally left blank Copyrighted Material-Taylor & Francis Contents Preface and acknowledgements to the second edition x Preface and acknowledgements to the first edition xiii Abbreviations xxi 1 Introduction: Nietzsche, naturalist or postmodernist? 1 What is naturalism? 2 What kind of naturalist is Nietzsche? 5 How could Nietzsche be a naturalist? 9 Nietzsche’s project: the revaluation of values 21 2 Intellectual history and background 24 Classical philology 27 The Presocratics and the Sophists 30 Schopenhauer 42 German Materialism 50 Summary 56 3 Nietzsche’s critique of morality I: the scope of the critique and the critique of moral agency 58 The scope problem 58 “Morality” as the object of Nietzsche’s critique: a formal account 61 The Descriptive Component of MPS 63 The critique of the Descriptive Component: fatalism and agency 64 The critique of free will 69 Transparency of the self 81 Universality and similarity 83 Copyrighted Material-Taylor & Francis viii Contents 4 Nietzsche’s critique of morality II: the critique of moral norms 91 “Higher men” 92 Higher men and the critique of MPS: objections 100 The normative content of MPS and the causal mechanism of harm 103 Metaethics: realism about value? 110 Metaethics: anti-realism about value 118 Two final puzzles 126 Conclusion 131 5 What is “genealogy” and what is the Genealogy? 133 The principles and method of “genealogy” 133 “Genealogy” and critique 139 What is the Genealogy? 144 The unity of the Genealogy 146 6 A commentary on the First Essay 155 Explaining historical blindness 156 Ressentiment 162 Beyond good and evil 165 The triumph of slave morality 174 7 A commentary on the Second Essay 178 The morality of custom and the origin of conscience (1–3) 180 Bad conscience: debt and guilt (4–8) 183 Bad conscience: internalized cruelty (16–18) 185 The moralization of conscience through religion (19–22) 188 Bad conscience and the ascetic ideal (23–25) 193 8 A commentary on the Third Essay 196 Artists, philosophers, and the will to power 198 Priests, humanity, ressentiment, and the ascetic ideal 203 Truth, science, and perspectivism 211 Two final puzzles about the Third Essay 223 Unifying the three essays 227 Copyrighted Material-Taylor & Francis Contents ix 9 Nietzsche since 1900: critical questions 232 Postscript: Nietzsche’s naturalism revisited 244 The role of culture in naturalistic explanations 252 Problems of causation 254 The metaphysics of the will to power 258 Concluding thoughts 261 Bibliography 264 Index 273 Copyrighted Material-Taylor & Francis Preface and acknowledgements to the second edition In the more than ten years since the first edition of this book appeared, the secondary literature on Nietzsche has matured considerably, to the point that it now compares favorably, I believe, with the secondary literatures on figures like Kant and Marx, something that was not true when I finished the first edition in late 2001. Readers of Nietzsche now defend precise interpretive claims, offer systematic evidence, engage with the views of other scholars, and explore with care the implications of arguments. Important scholarly monographs by Berry (2011), Clark and Dudrick (2012), Janaway (2007), and Reginster (2006) have appeared, as well as many philosophically sophisticated and penetrating articles on Nietzsche’s ethics, metaethics, philosophy of mind, and philosophy of action (e.g., Gardner 2009; Hussain 2007; Kail 2009; Katsafanas 2005, 2013; Railton 2012; Riccardi 2014; Rutherford 2011; Shaw 2014). I have been fortunate that all these scholars – as well as many others – have engaged my work, and a primary aim of this revised, second edition is to incorporate what I have learned from the excellent scholarly literature, and from much unpublished feedback, over the last decade. I have changed my view on two major issues. First, I now think it is a mistake to defend the claim that Nietzsche believes that there are objec- tive facts about non-moral, more specifically, prudential goodness. Some incisive questions from Nadeem Hussain a number of years ago set me on the path to rethinking that claim. Second, I now think the connection between the “revaluation of values” and Nietzsche’s attempt to respond to Schopenhauer’s challenge – why is life worth living if it involves senseless suffering? – is different than I had originally conceived it. I was helped to see this by Shaw (2014), and have tried to develop the view further in Leiter (forthcoming). At many other places, I have refined, but not substantially revised, my treatment of particular issues, to reflect what I have learned from other scholars, from colleagues, and from students. There are three primary topics where the refinements may be notable. The first pertains to my interpretation of Nietzsche’s naturalism, which has generated a Copyrighted Material-Taylor & Francis Preface and acknowledgements, second edition xi substantial secondary literature over the last decade, and has also largely triumphed as the standard reading of Nietzsche’s philosophical orientation, at least in the Anglophone world (it has made some inroads in some non-Anglophone literatures as well [especially French and Portugese], though the distorting influence of Heidegger’s creative appropriations of Nietzsche continue to loom large in much of the German literature). I still think my interpretation is correct, but the criticisms have enabled me to see deficiencies in the original presentation. I have made some modest revisions to the discussion of naturalism in Chapter 1, but I have also added a Postscript to discuss the issue of naturalism, and Nietzsche’s naturalism in particular, in more detail. The Postscript draws on material that originally appeared in my essay “Nietzsche’s Naturalism Recon- sidered,” from The Oxford Handbook of Nietzsche, edited by Ken Gemes and John Richardson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013). I consider there critiques by Gemes and Janaway (2005) and especially Janaway (2007), the latter of which ends up defending a naturalistic reading essentially the same as mine, his protestations to the contrary notwith- standing. The Postscript tries to sort out the various interpretive and philosophical issues. The second topic on which I have refined my treatment concerns Nietzsche’s views on free will and autonomy. My claim that Nietzsche is a “fatalist”–defended in Chapter 3 and, originally, in Leiter (1998a) – has attracted considerable critical comment. Some scholars have tried to argue that, in fact, Nietzsche defends a recognizable notion of freedom, and that his repudiation of free will and responsibility is not as radical as it seems. This view has often struck me as unclear, but I try now to resolve the unclarities and defend the essentials of my original “fatalist” reading, but with these criticisms in mind.
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