This study explores the German philosopher's response to the intellectual debates sparked by the publication of Charles Darwin's Origin of Species. By examining the abundance of biological metaphors in Nietzsche's writings, Gregory Moore questions his recent reputation as an eminently subversive and post modern thinker. The book analyzes key themes of Nietzsche's thought--his critique of morality, his philosophy of art and the Übermensch--in the light of the theory of evolution, the nineteenth-century sense of decadence and the rise of anti-Semitism.
Author(s): Gregory Moore
Edition: 1
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Year: 2006
Language: English
Pages: 240
Cover......Page 1
Half-title......Page 3
Title......Page 5
Copyright......Page 6
Contents......Page 7
Acknowledgements......Page 8
Abbreviations......Page 9
Introduction......Page 11
Nietzsche and nineteenth-century biologism......Page 12
Nietzsche on metaphor and rhetoric......Page 20
Part I Evolution......Page 29
1 The physiology of power......Page 31
The problem of progress......Page 39
The aristocracy of the body......Page 44
Evolution and the increase of life......Page 56
2 The physiology of morality......Page 66
Nietzsche contra Spencer......Page 72
Self-regulation and the social organism......Page 82
3 The physiology of art......Page 95
The Kunsttrieb and evolution......Page 99
Art and evolutionary epistemology......Page 106
Eros and evolution......Page 112
Part II Degeneration......Page 123
4 Nietzsche and the nervous age......Page 125
Degeneration: the physiology of decadence......Page 130
Sex, degeneration and eugenics......Page 138
5 Christianity and degeneration......Page 149
Crime and Christianity......Page 150
The religious neurosis......Page 154
Race, religion and eugenics......Page 163
6 Degenerate art......Page 175
The aesthetics of degeneration......Page 178
Hysteria and histrionics......Page 185
The case of Nietzsche......Page 197
Conclusion......Page 203
Bibliography......Page 222
Index......Page 235
