Will to Power

[Ataraxia]

First let me preface this post by saying that although holding a long time interest in political theory I'm relatively new to philosophy.If I've misinterpreted the thrust of this concept I welcome posters more au fait with Neitzsche to point out such.

Also being new to this forum I was unsure if this the correct section to post my thoughts.If 'worldy matters' is the more suitable sub forum then I encourages the mods to move it accordingly.

My idea is that every specific body strives to become master over all space and to extend its force (--its will to power:) and to thrust back all that resists its extension. But it continually encounters similar efforts on the part of other bodies and ends by coming to an arrangement ("union") with those of them that are sufficiently related to it: thus they then conspire together for power. And the process goes on--

from The Will to Power, s.636, Walter Kaufmann transl.

and

Anything which] is a living and not a dying body... will have to be an incarnate will to power, it will strive to grow, spread, seize, become predominant - not from any morality or immorality but because it is living and because life simply is will to power... 'Exploitation'... belongs to the essence of what lives, as a basic organic function; it is a consequence of the will to power, which is after all the will to life.
from Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil, s.259, Walter Kaufmann transl.

From the above quotes and from further reading of Neitzsche i've come to the conclusion he welcomes and more importantly predicts the rise of the 'man' willing to exert power both externally(upon others) and internally(upon the self)

Now maybe I'm looking through my own flawed prism, but it seems to me he celebrating/predicting the rise of the 'individual'.

Why then,125 years post his writings, do i not see this at least begin to manifest itself in society?

Why, in an at least a western semi-democracy like Australia,US or Britain do the people continually empower authoritarian style governments be they Liberal/republican/Tory or Labor/Democrat -embracing the 'slave morality'-Why is Libertaianism or Anarchy not more popular?

Why do the Australian people and the media devote reems of dissection of the rescent budget to explain/find out 'what is the government(master) going to do for them'

Why,in 50 years have not the North Korean people numbering 23million not revolted-reclaiming their individuality(reclaiming their master morality)

How did communism or national socialism in China,Russia,Germany,Cuba etc. get such a foothold(post Neitzche) amongst billions of people?

Why are organised religions(more expression of slave morality in Neitzche's view)such as Christianity,Islam ever expanding in it's popularity?

Where is mans move towards the self determining,self empowering Ubermensch?

Was Neitzsche wrong,or just wildly optomistic?

[Elizabeth Isabelle]

Why, in an at least a western semi-democracy like Australia,US or Britain do the people continually empower authoritarian style governments be they Liberal/republican/Tory or Labor/Democrat -embracing the 'slave morality'-Why is Libertaianism or Anarchy not more popular?

I think this goes along well with the last podcast of The Reasoning Show with Dr. Susan Blackmore on memes. In a sense, the government itself has become a living body of government. I see in America where the government is taking power away from the people, and even the vote is sometimes rigged. One example is when I was living in Ft. Pierce and the overwhelming majority wanted a bridge connecting south A1A to north A1A because we had to drive 15 miles out of our way to get around the inlet. After much fighting, it finally got on the ballot - but sometimes they link two totally unrelated issues onto one vote. The way the vote read was yes or no, do we want a bridge connecting south A1A to north A1A and give all city government officials an exorbitant pay raise (I forget what the pay raise was, but I think it was 15 or 20%, and they were already better paid than about 95% of the residents). Of course it got voted no, and they would not put it to the vote again because they said they already had it on a ballot and the citizens voted it down. Now if they can get away with something that blatant, what are they sneaking by behind closed doors? What are they spending all our tax dollars on? Why don't we have any real say in how much they charge us to live in this country, much less what the money gets spent on beyond a few red herring issues?

The people are not giving the government power so much as the government itself is just taking it. Throughout history, when government got too powerful, a revolution occurred. Nobody ever wants a civil war, and with advances in weaponry and the degree of teeth that big governments have now in their military, it isn't like just storming a castle anymore. Governments are already big and powerful, and still power-hungry. Like you quoted:

Anything which] is a living and not a dying body... will have to be an incarnate will to power, it will strive to grow, spread, seize, become predominant - not from any morality or immorality but because it is living and because life simply is will to power... 'Exploitation'... belongs to the essence of what lives, as a basic organic function; it is a consequence of the will to power, which is after all the will to life.
from Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil, s.259, Walter Kaufmann transl.

So the living government body is growing (more government employees), spreading (making new laws, new rules, and taking on new projects), seizing power from the people (representatives are supposed to vote the way the people would want them to vote, but once cloistered in the government body, speaking mostly with lobbyists and each other, their views on reality can get skewed), and becoming more and more predominant (laws touch so much of our lives and take our money that we worked for, and if we don't give it up, we go to prison), and with more and more power, it becomes more and more natural for the government to exploit its citizens rather than serve them.
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[Faust]

And hence the superiority, at least ideally, of a true nationalist autocratic constitutional monarchy.

[Jamesh]

Too many questions that would require pages and pages to respond to, so I just provide a semi-response.


The first quote is brilliantly correct. The second quote is an extension of the first tailored to “life”.

Was Neitzsche wrong, or just wildly optimistic?

Study the first quote again.

Namely “But it continually encounters similar efforts on the part of other bodies and ends by coming to an arrangement ("union") with those of them that are sufficiently related to it”

The mental processes of a person, including processes of desire, are formed by what they experience. Our novel experiences are for the most part a matter of interfacing with other competing bodies, other humans. The modern and future worlds will be more and more structured, more organised, or to use Neitzies word, more “arrangements” will be in place (the more modern word I use is synergies).

These synergies have become necessary for our survival, we no longer have the skills to survive on our own. The vast numbers of humans mean that we cannot go back to physical self-sufficiency without first destroying the bulk of the human population. Nor at this stage, while resources are still sufficiently plentiful, do we desire to break away from the synergistic herds that offer us extreme living convenience, safety and longer lives. Almost the entire population has no choice but to submit to "existing arrangments".

How did communism or national socialism in China, Russia, Germany, Cuba etc. get such a foothold (post Neitzche) amongst billions of people?

Evolution of memes. Successful memes spread because they offer something to a persons Will to Power. Successful memes do not have to be rational (and the most powerful are not - religion and respect for the most egotistical, for example) or good for other groups less realted to one's own.

Women now are gaining control over many human activities and they are the least naturally individualistic, and therefore they will accept and promulgate memes passed on from others with very little questioning.

People are not taught to think for themselves, because the most powerful do not allow that to occur – notice how little actual thinking skills are taught in schools, it is all rote. Truths of reality that could lead a person to later develop “real” individuality are simply not taught because they are so dangerous to the powerful (take the completely inane “truths” put forward by Creationists who hold power in southern US states for example).

To think for oneself means placing oneself outside of the dominant memes, memes that in all countries are biased towards the mob having a synergistic relationship with the rich and powerful. The herd intuitively knows that allowing individuality will lead to anarchy, and that anarchy in a global society will simply lead to massive destruction of humans, with the most anarchical (non-synergistic) dying out first.

The Ubermensch, if it comes at all, will come about once technology turns the corner and makes small groups able to have all the benefits that large societies bring. They will need robotics, nanotechnology, free energy, and an extensive library of human knowledge. I do not see this occurring unless the human population decreases to under 200 million, which is something that could occur once the fore-mentioned technologies have been in place for a few hundred years. A decrease in population will occur because we will find technology far more satisfying than humans, I mean once we can create intelligent, human looking fuckbuddy robots, population growth will be all over. It will then become a game of competing with each other until only a few are left. Personally the odds of us getting that far are rather low, about 1000 to 1. The greater strength and availability our technology has the greater chance it will fall into insane hands be they ego-ravaged leaders or Ubermensch-desiring individuals in the underclass, and these insane hands will kill the world. If however in the meantime we become a single world nation as a result of issues like pollution becoming a priority for every human, then we have a small chance – it however will require an almost communist political system and the chances of capitalists allowing that to occur are remote, rather then will try and gain control, we will revolt and kill them, but that will lead us into disorganisation and we will go on to kill each other.

Won’t happen in my or your lifetime though, so no need to care about this at all.

[Jason]

The Ubermensch, if it comes at all, will come about once technology turns the corner and makes small groups able to have all the benefits that large societies bring. They will need robotics, nanotechnology, free energy, and an extensive library of human knowledge. I do not see this occurring unless the human population decreases to under 200 million, which is something that could occur once the fore-mentioned technologies have been in place for a few hundred years. A decrease in population will occur because we will find technology far more satisfying than humans, I mean once we can create intelligent, human looking fuckbuddy robots, population growth will be all over.

This is funny and maybe also prophetic: I Dated A Robot

Won’t happen in my or your lifetime though, so no need to care about this at all.

I don't know about the other situations you predict, but I reckon technology to simulate sex, and its popularity, could really take off in the next few decades, and will just get more and more realistic. Check out these(warning: explicit sexual content):

Virtual Sex Machine

Real Doll

I also believe there is a possibility that the youger people on this forum may have the chance to live considerably increased lifespans due to scientific and medical advances.