Nietzsche then goes on to claim that modern society is inherently atheist, with the past ideas of God being dead (and philosophers have killed him). However such spirits must not let themselves be attached to anything and be constantly testing themselves, he calls the new generation of philosophers 'attempters' (versucher) who reject dogmatism etc.įirstly Nietzsche thoroughly dissects Christianity, claiming all the demands and self-denial it creates is what push people to dreams of Saintism. Lastly Nietzsche makes the ironic statement of how 'free spirits' often need masks to hide their true nature and beliefs (as to not be misunderstood). Nietzsche also believes that all things in the world are based on, and come from our fundamental will to power. Nietzsche makes the important assumption that nothing is real other than our drives, passions and desires, all other things are simply those working in conjunction. He argues against the way our society judges actions based on their motives, he claims we must look into the much more complex drives which set these actions about unconsciously. He claims 'free spirits' thrive in isolation, as their knowledge will only be misinterpreted by others, still he states also that such people must interact with the general populous to gather more knowledge. He first claims that our truths are simplified creating our knowledge, that the truths put forward by philosophers are simply their own prejudices when they should be questioning themselves. Finally, he criticizes Descartes' famous 'I think therefore I am', claiming that it is not the 'I' that is thinking, rather the thought itself.

He then elaborates with examples such as the Stoics (forcing their truth onto nature) and Kantian thinking (a priori, which he argues does not exist, yet is necessary), claiming he uses nothing more than circular reasoning. He also claims that we put an unfair bias towards truth over falsehood, when falsehood can be just as useful as truth.

In this part, Nietzsche puts forward that our truths are often based not on objectivity, but on prejudice.

Part 1: On the Prejudices of Philosophers We are thankful for their contributions and encourage you to make your own. These notes were contributed by members of the GradeSaver community.

Frederick niche beyond good and evil