Nietzsche's Constructivism

A Metaphysics of Material Objects

Justin Remhof

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781315410036
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Filosofía
• Subtopic: Historia y teoría filosóficas

Like Kant, the German Idealists, and many neo-Kantian philosophers before him, Nietzsche was persistently concerned with metaphysical questions about the nature of objects. His texts often address questions concerning the existence and non-existence of objects, the relation of objects to human minds, and how different views of objects impact commitments in many areas of philosophy—not just metaphysics, but also language, epistemology, science, logic and mathematics, and even ethics. In this book, Remhof presents a systematic and comprehensive analysis of Nietzsche's material object metaphysics. He argues that Nietzsche embraces the controversial constructivist view that all concrete objects are socially constructed. Reading Nietzsche as a constructivist, Remhof contends, provides fresh insight into Nietzsche's views on truth, science, naturalism, and nihilism. The book also investigates how Nietzsche's view of objects compares with views offered by influential American pragmatists and explores the implications of Nietzsche's constructivism for debates in contemporary material object metaphysics. Nietzsche's Constructivism is a highly original and timely contribution to the steadily growing literature on Nietzsche's thought.

1 Interpreting Nietzsche on Objects

Like Kant, the German Idealists, and many neo-Kantian philosophers before him, Nietzsche was persistently concerned with metaphysical questions about the nature of objects. His texts often address questions concerning the existence and non-existence of objects, the relation of objects to human minds, and how different views of objects impact commitments in many areas of philosophy—not just metaphysics, but also language, science, epistemology, logic and mathematics, and even ethics. When referring to an object, Nietzsche follows common German usage by employing ‘Ding’ [thing] more often than ‘Objekt’ [object], but the two are generally interchangeable. Both typically refer to concrete, macroscopic entities we experience in everyday life, such as trees and leaves, cats and dogs, and tables and chairs. The primary aim of this book is to present and defend the view that, according to Nietzsche, all such objects are socially constructed. Broadly, to say objects are socially constructed is to say objects are brought into existence by social practices. I call this view of objects—which is clearly controversial—constructivism.

The view that Nietzsche endorses constructivism about objects has been suggested by Nehamas (1985, ch. 3), Anderson (1998), and Cox (1999, 152–163).¹ However, I offer much more than existing accounts, and what follows will serve as a quick-and-dirty outline of the book. I develop a new argument for reading Nietzsche as a constructivist. I explore the extent to which Nietzsche thinks even the basic particles of the world are constructed. I offer arguments against all contemporary competing interpretations of Nietzsche’s view of objects in the analytic tradition. I develop and respond to challenging objections to reading Nietzsche as a constructivist. I explain how reading Nietzsche as a constructivist can help resolve deep-seated interpretive issues that concern his wider philosophical program, specifically with respect to truth, science, and naturalism. I elucidate an unexpected motivation behind Nietzsche’s commitment to constructivism: the advent of nihilism. I compare and contrast Nietzsche’s version of constructivism with constructivist positions developed by key thinkers in the American pragmatist movement. And, I explore the extent to which Nietzsche’s constructivism could play a game-changing role in contemporary debates about material object metaphysics. This is all uncharted territory.

There is an immediate difficulty with undertaking a study of Nietzsche’s material object metaphysics, though: his remarks on the topic are incredibly perplexing. Consider the various positions that can be culled from the corpus. In The Birth of Tragedy (1872), Nietzsche maintains that reality is ultimately undifferentiated, such that seemingly individuated objects of everyday experience are actually illusions (see BT 1, 2, 4, 16, 18). In the influential essay “On Truth and Lies in a Non-moral Sense” (1873), he assumes that objects exist but holds that we cannot know their basic natures. In Human, all-too-Human (1878), Nietzsche asserts that objects do not exist (see HH I: 19) but also appears to believe that we structure the world of everyday experience into objects—a process which seems to be revealed by modern science (see HH I: 16, 29). In The Gay Science (1882), he reiterates that objects do not exist (see GS 110) but then explicitly claims that we are capable of bringing them into existence (see GS 58). In Beyond Good and Evil (1886), Nietzsche attacks the very idea of material reality, which presumably includes objects, and suggests that the world is nothing more than a sea of forces (see BGE 12, 17, 36). In Twilight of the Idols (1888), he indicates that belief in objects is an error because it is based on erroneous beliefs about the self (see TI “Reason” 5; “Errors” 3). The Nachlaß is chock-full of passages that crisscross all these themes and more, even adding that nihilism is partly a result of adopting an ontology traditionally assumed to contain particular kinds of objects (see KSA 13:11[99]). This dizzying array of views is enough to confuse even subtle readers.

Which of these positions, if any, captures Nietzsche’s considered view? Both over time and within singular works, he appears to present views that are not only painfully inconsistent but also philosophically suspect—even outright strange. This could very well indicate that Nietzsche is not concerned with metaphysical questions concerning objects. After all, if he truly cared about such questions, why would his remarks be so persistently puzzling? Is he just incompetent to write about them?² Either he fails at doing what he wants to do, one might argue, or he has no interest in the game. We most often see Nietzsche engaging ethical issues, for instance, not issues concerning objecthood. Perhaps, as sometimes supposed, Nietzsche even believes that the entire metaphysical enterprise is misguided—perhaps it is hopeless to make claims about the way the world is.³ Metaphysics could be just a vestige of inquiry subsumed by the life-negating ascetic ideal that needs to be over and done with. So say the detractors.

Not unsurprisingly, I find a good deal of this unconvincing. Yes, Nietzsche is primarily concerned with ethics. That much cannot be doubted. But he is also very much interested in making metaphysical claims about the way the world is. For instance, he thinks the world contains no egos (BGE 17). He holds that causal forces typically embraced by the Christian tradition, such as “God,” “soul,” and “ego,” “spirit,” and “free will,” do not exist (A 15). He asserts that there are no enduring, self-identical entities (GS 110). He proclaims that mathematics and logic do not reflect reality (TI “Reason” 3). He thinks that the existence of human consciousness developed in conjunction with language (GS 354). He suggests that human beings are comprised of drives and affects (BGE 12). He writes that the “essence of life” is “will to power” (GM II: 12). He asserts that the desire to preserve oneself is a “limitation of the truly basic life-instinct” (GS 349). And so on. Denying any of these metaphysical commitments—and these are just a few examples—would most certainly result in failing to grasp Nietzsche’s philosophical program.

There are, of course, times when Nietzsche appears to attack metaphysical philosophy. However, his attacks center on a particular approach to metaphysics, rather than the ability to make general claims about the nature of reality. For instance, he often ridicules philosophical positions divorced from the possibility of empirical confirmation.⁴ In Human, all-too-Human, he disparages what he calls “metaphysical philosophy,” but only targets the metaphysical view that entities have a “miraculous source” in some fully mind-independent world (HH I: 1, cf. I: 20; BGE 2; TI “Reason” 1). Nietzsche’s own metaphysical thinking rejects appeal to mind-independent worlds. This commitment, I argue in Chapter 4, motivates him to discard metaphysical thinking subsumed by the ascetic ideal. Moreover, the fact that Nietzsche is worried about inquiry caught up with the ascetic ideal indicates that his engagement with metaphysics is part and parcel of his larger concern with ethics. In Chapter 5, I suggest that Nietzsche’s interest in the metaphysical status of objects is partly motivated by his focus on affirming life. Nietzsche is certainly a metaphysician, then, but one motivated by ethical concerns.

Should we conclude that Nietzsche is not interested in material object metaphysics, or that he simply has no considered view on the matter, from the fact that his remarks are not obviously consistent? Absolutely not. Nietzsche is unquestionably attentive to questions concerning objects. The topic populates most published works and occurs frequently in the notebooks. Of course, Nietzsche’s texts are notoriously difficult to disentangle—but that is my task here. There has been no attempt to sort through his various remarks on objects, and so, predictably, commentators have proposed wide-ranging, jointly incompatible interpretations. I plan to show that Nietzsche has a consistent, considered position on objects, and I plan to defend that view from opposing interpretations.⁵ In doing so, I will utilize helpful distinctions from contemporary analytic metaphysics. In recent years, philosophy has seen a surge of interest in the area of material object metaphysics.⁶ The debate has generated a fresh look at the topic and given birth to a refined vocabulary that, with a cautious and careful hand, can be employed to help understand historical positions like Nietzsche’s. Using this vocabulary, I aim to deliver a clear understanding of Nietzsche’s commitments concerning material objects.

Another worry facing my project is that those who agree that Nietzsche is concerned with material object metaphysics may nonetheless think that constructivism treads tired ground. It could be argued that Nietzsche’s “perspectivism,” which has received overwhelming attention in the literature, already involves commitment to constructivism. So, one might think, my project is old hat. Now, there is no uniform interpretation of perspectivism, but on many readings, perspectivism and constructivism come apart. In particular, perspectivism is often taken to be a semantic or epistemological view. Truth or knowledge is thought to be perspectival, where “perspectival” suggests “merely relative to a particular framework,” whatever the details may be.⁷ But neither of these interpretations of perspectivism implies anything about the way the world is. Constructivism does—it is a metaphysical position.

What happens if perspectivism is construed metaphysically? On this reading, Nietzsche thinks reality is comprised of forces, each of which has a particular perspective, and objects are particular bundles of forces. Nietzsche writes about “this necessary perspectivism according to which every center of force […] construes the rest of the world from itself” (KSA 13:11[373]). Even on the metaphysical reading, however, constructivism and perspectivism are distinct. For example, some commentators take Nietzsche to believe that objects are bundles of forces organized according to intrinsically similar perspectives.⁸ This would entail that constructivism is false. Constructivism holds that some extrinsic perspective, namely, the perspective of agents, organizes bundles of forces into objects. Why care about how bundles of forces become objects? The fact that there is disagreement shows that a mere defense of the metaphysical reading of perspectivism will not establish constructivism. This book, then, offers something yet unseen. Furthermore, since I do think the metaphysical reading of perspectivism is correct—though I offer no argument here⁹—I promise to explain why the metaphysical reading of perspectivism uniquely supports a constructivist reading of Nietzsche.¹⁰ Again, this is untouched terrain.

A final worry about the book is that a constructivist reading of Nietzsche is anachronistic. Constructivism seems to be associated with later thinkers, such as Goodman and Rorty, and the word ‘constructivism’ never appears in Nietzsche’s texts. But the charge of anachronism is too quick. Constructivism is highly visible in Nietzsche’s historical context, whether official in name or not. Nietzsche was familiar with constructivism through Kant and the neo-Kantian movement of the 19th century that developed in reaction to Hegel and German idealism. Nietzsche was primarily exposed to Kant through Arthur Schopenhauer, Kuno Fischer’s commentary on Kant, and the neo-Kantian philosophers Friedrich Albert Lange, Gustav Teichmüeller, Friedrich Überweg, Otto Leibmann, Hermann von Helmholtz, Heinrich Romundt, Afrikan Spir, and Eduard von Hartmann. Kant and the neo-Kantians propose various forms of the idealist position that our cognitive apparatus is an essential condition for there being objects, and there is no way to cognize objects as they are fully independent of our particular mode of cognition. Lange, for instance, who strongly influenced Nietzsche, writes that “The sense-world [viz., the empirical world] is a product of our organization,” and the “sense-world” provides “only pictures of an unknown object,” such that “the transcendent basis of our organization remains therefore […] unknown to us” (Lange 1873–75, 3: 219, brackets added). The nature of empirical objects depends partly on how we structure the world, while the nature of objects apart from our structuring cannot be known.

It is not always clear which commitments of Kantian idealism Nietzsche accepts and which he rejects. Schopenhauer seems to have had the most direct Kantian influence on Nietzsche’s thought, and elements of Schopenhauer’s idealism can certainly be found in Nietzsche. For Nietzsche, there is reason to think that reality independent of human practices is undifferentiated, and objects come into existence by virtue of applying conceptual representations to the world in experience. Similarly, in The World as Will and Representation, Schopenhauer holds that what most basically exists is undifferentiated will, and objects are just ways in which that will is empirically objectified in relation to an intellect equipped with conceptual capacities—in this case, the ability to apply the principle of sufficient reason. In these respects, Nietzsche and Schopenhauer’s Kantian idealism find agreement.

But there are substantial differences between the two views. Consider just four. First, due to the fact that there is only undifferentiated will, Schopenhauer thinks constructed, individuated objects are ultimately illusions, whereas Nietzsche sides with Kant in holding that constructed, individuated objects have genuine existence.¹¹ Second, while Nietzsche accepts that concepts construct objects, he never describes this process in a way compatible with, or even reminiscent of, Schopenhauer’s principle of sufficient reason. There is no evidence to suggest that, according to Nietzsche, objects come into existence by virtue of such a principle. Third, Schopenhauer argues that idealism gains ground by virtue of the fact that philosophy is limited to the facts of representational consciousness, since, following Descartes, philosophy must concern itself with what is certain, and only what lies within representational consciousness is certain (see Schopenhauer 1958, 4–5). Nietzsche rejects the connection between consciousness and certainly, he denies the narrow scope Schopenhauer gives to philosophical inquiry, and he often seeks philosophical explanations in the subconscious mechanisms that cause various states of representational consciousness, rather than taking representational consciousness to be of primary philosophical importance.¹² The fourth difference is that Schopenhauer appears to vacillate between thinking empirical reality is what must be actually represented by some consciousness (see Schopenhauer 1958, 4–5) and what can possibly be represented by some consciousness (see Schopenhauer 1958, 5, 9).¹³ If the former is true, then, for instance, it seems impossible for objects to exist before humans, which is obviously false. But, I argue in Chapter 4, it is perfectly reasonable to think objects exist before humans if reality is what we can in principle encounter in experience, and Nietzsche follows Kant in embracing such a position.¹⁴ Although Nietzsche and Schopenhauer’s versions of Kantian idealism are broadly aligned, then, there are sharp differences in the details.

Nietzsche’s constructivism appears to have much stronger roots in Kant.¹⁵ This comes through clearest in Nietzsche’s description of constructivism. He writes, “A ‘thing’ is the sum of its effects, synthetically united by a concept, an image” [ein ‘Ding’ ist eine Summe seiner Wirkungen, synthetisch gebunden durch einen Begriff, Bild] (KSA 13:14[98]). The wording here—“synthetically united by a concept”—is unmistakably Kantian. In the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant argues that our cognitive faculties come equipped with an a priori conceptual framework which partially constitutes the structure of objects by organizing sensory information. This develops from Kant’s Copernican Revolution, which challenges the longstanding assumption that material objects are mind-independent. Kant contends that instead of thinking that our representations should conform to objects outside us, as commonly supposed, we should think that objects outside us conform to our representations, such that our cognitive capacities play an essential role in determining the structure of objects. If all cognition is supposed to conform to objects that exist constitutively independent of us, Kant argues, objects would only contingently affect subjects, and consequently we could never arrive at genuine knowledge of the world in experience. Kant proposes that something can be an object just in case it can conf...