Some Thoughts on Greatness

Some Thoughts on Greatness

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Nietzsche and Wittgenstein are not ends. They are variously fodder, grist, ports in the storm, and storms to be sailed into. The same for epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, logic—for philosophy. Living well is an end, a goal, though it is not a final point. It is more like a buoy in the open ocean—it can perhaps be reached, but vast openness, danger, and uncertainty lie beyond. Greatness means overflowing with a multitude. One must, for example, have a multitude of projects,…

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Nietzschean Thoughts on Black Friday

Nietzschean Thoughts on Black Friday

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Today is “black Friday” and the masses are waiting in absurd lines, dealing with absurd crowds, rubbing elbows in fear and anticipation, waiting to fork out money on “deals,” hoping to buy things for their greedy friends, relatives, and children. Why? Because those desires, those wants, when satisfied by the material goods and gadgets will make them happy, finally, or bring them that much closer to ultimate and final satisfaction. Being the compassionate souls that we are, we want to…

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The Monkey Swinging in the Way of Greatness

The Monkey Swinging in the Way of Greatness

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After teaching about Buddhism this past week and Nietzsche’s ideas on creativity and greatness, and after watching Limitless last night, the following thoughts came to me. In the Will to Power, Nietzsche writes: How does one become stronger?— By coming to decisions slowly; and by clinging tenaciously to what one has decided. Everything else follows. The sudden and the changeable: the two species of weakness. (Section 918) In Limitless, a creatively blocked writer takes a drug that allows him to utilize…

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Nietzschean Buddhism: An Experiment

Nietzschean Buddhism: An Experiment

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I have long been drawn to Buddhism and to Nietzsche’s ideas. After much thought, I propose a reconciliation; I propose the creation of a Nietzschean Buddhism. How could this be a possibility? After all, the third noble truth of Buddhism is that there is a way out of suffering, and the fourth noble truth gives us the way out. Suffering is optional, as is staying in samsara, the eternal recurrence of rebirth and a life of suffering. How is that…

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From Faith to a Pernicious Idolatry

From Faith to a Pernicious Idolatry

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1. You shall have no other gods before me. 2. You shall not make for yourself any carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generations…

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The Value of Suffering and the Importance of Suffering Thresholds

The Value of Suffering and the Importance of Suffering Thresholds

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In an earlier essay I raised some questions about the value of suffering, especially the default assumption that suffering is to be avoided and brought to a quick end when it does occur. In Nietzsche’s writing we find claims that suffering has instrumental value and intrinsic value, or at least it will to the higher types of human beings who have the appropriate will. Here I want to consider the claim that suffering has instrumental value and what that means…

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Why Not Suffering? Buddhism, Nietzsche, and the Value of Suffering

Why Not Suffering? Buddhism, Nietzsche, and the Value of Suffering

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The cessation of suffering is Buddhism’s end goal. The Buddha has discovered how to do it, according to Buddhism and Buddhists who have achieved the goal. A supposedly central requirement for achieving the goal is to realize the truth of no-self: there is no substantial self that endures over time. Leaving aside what exactly this means, an important question regards why one should accept the doctrine of no-self. The Buddha gave arguments for the view and later Buddhists gave still…

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The Need for Outspoken Outrage and Disgust

The Need for Outspoken Outrage and Disgust

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A few people I’ve been close to have been very critical by nature, easily outraged and disgusted by the actions and character of those around them. It was this that caused one of them to leave Facebook recently. He couldn’t see the point in engaging in something that was bringing forth so much bile. However, none of the people I’ve known have been as vociferously outspoken as Wittgenstein was personally or Nietzsche in writing. All of this raises two interesting…

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Some Thoughts on Living with Pain

Some Thoughts on Living with Pain

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Pleasure and pain are as intriguing as they are dangerous. They are with us from the beginning and experienced daily, yet I don’t think many of us understand them very well. Most basically they are tools, very primitive ones. If you feel pain, then that is often a good sign that you should try to stop what you’re doing. We can’t necessarily say the same thing reversed about pleasure. Pleasure is a less discriminating tool than pain. And that is…

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Religious Practice and the Limits of Philosophy

Religious Practice and the Limits of Philosophy

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In reading Siderits’s excellent Buddhism as Philosophy I have come to realize the following problem. If a religion has its base in philosophy, if its central tenets are supposed to follow from the use of reason and argument, then none of its conclusions can ever be firm enough to ground religious practice. There will always be difficult objections and questions that cannot be answered in a way sufficient to allow one to say, “I know this is true and I…

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