Keith Ansell-Pearson's book is an important and very welcome contribution to a neglected area of research: Nietzsche's political thought. Nietzsche is widely regarded as a significant moral philosopher, but his political thinking has often been dismissed as either impossibly individualistic or dangerously totalitarian. Nietzsche contra Rousseau takes a serious look at Nietzsche as political thinker and relates his political ideas to the dominant traditions of modern political thought. In particular, the nature of Nietzsche's dialogue with the philosophy (...) of Jean-Jacques Rousseau is examined, in order to demonstrate Rousseau's crucial role in Nietzsche's understanding of modernity and its discontents. (shrink)

_Germinal Life_ is the sequel to the highly successful _Viroid Life_. Where _Viroid Life_ provided a compelling reading of Nietzsche's philosophy of the human, _Germinal Life_ is an original and groundbreaking analysis of little known and difficult theoretical aspects of the work of French philosopher Gilles Deleuze. In particular, Keith Ansell Pearson provides fresh and insightful readings of Deleuze's work on Bergson and Deleuze's most famous texts _Difference and Repetition_ and _A Thousand Plateaus_. _Germinal Life _also provides (...) new insights into Deleuze's relation to some of the most original thinkers of modernity, from Darwin to Freud and Nietzsche, and explores the connections between Deleuze and more recent thinkers such as Adorno and Merleau-Ponty. (shrink)

Nietzsche's vision of the 'overman' continues to haunt the postmodern imagination. His call that 'man is something that must be overcome' can no longer be seen as simple rhetoric. Our experiences of the hybrid realities of artificial life have made the 'transhuman' a figure that looks over us all. Inspired by this vision, Keith Ansell Pearson sets out to examine if evolution is 'out of control' and machines are taking over. In a series of six fascinating perspectives, (...) he links Nietzsche's thought with the issues at stake in contemporary conceptions of evolution from the biological to the technological. _Viroid Life; Perspectives on Nietzsche and the Transhuman Condition_ considers the hybrid, 'inhuman' character of our future with the aid of Nietzsche's philosophy. Keith Ansell Pearson contrasts Nietzsche and Darwin before introducing the more recent figures such as Giles Deleuze and Guy Debord to sketch a new thinking of technics and machines and stress the ambiguous character of our 'machine enslavement'. (shrink)

This is a lively and engaging introduction to the contentious topic of Nietzsche's political thought. It traces the development of Nietzsche's thinking on politics from his earliest writings to the mature work in which he advocates aristocratic radicalism as opposed to 'petty' European nationalism. The key ideas of the will to power, eternal return and the overman are discussed and all Nietzsche's major works analysed in detail, such as Beyond Good and Evil and The Genealogy of Morals, within the context (...) of the concerns of modern political theory. The book concludes with an assessment of Nietzsche's enduring relevance and of the insights afforded by contemporary liberal and feminist readings. This textbook will be essential for all students of Nietzsche and of the history of political ideas. It includes a chronology of Nietzsche's life and works and a guide to further reading. (shrink)

This essay examines Deleuze’s relation to new materialism through an engagement with new materialist claims about the human and nonhuman relation and about agency. It first considers the work of Elisabeth Grosz and then moves on to a consideration of Deleuze’s own conception of a new materialism/new naturalism. I seek to show that Deleuze is an ethically motivated naturalist concerned with an ethical pedagogy of the human, which he derives from his reading of Spinoza. I seek to illuminate some of (...) the principal features of this ethically guided materialism/naturalism and show that even in his later work with Felix Guattari, which situates all life, human and nonhuman, on a plane of immanence, there remains a recognition that the human animal is ethically distinguished as the inventive species par excellence. My main claim, then, is that Deleuze’s project cannot be aligned with a new materialism that supposes a flat ontology and that does away with an ethical distinction between the human and the nonhuman. Although Deleuze bequeaths a complex legacy to post-modern thought in his thinking about the human, it should not be supposed that he has no affinities with aspects of a humanist position and pedagogy. (shrink)

Informed by the philosophy of the virtual, Keith Ansell Pearson offers up one of the most lucid and original works on the central philosophical questions. He asks that if our basic concepts on what it means to be human are wrong then, what is this to mean for our ideas of time, being, consciousness? A critical examination ensues, one informed by a multitude of responses to a large number of philosophers. Under discussion is the mathematical limits as (...) found in Russell, questions on Relativity, Kant's notion of judgement, Popper, Dennett, Dawkins and Proust. He brings into the rapport the concepts of Bergson and their explosive insights into the idea of time. (shrink)

The work of Gilles Deleuze has had an impact far beyond philosophy. He is among Foucault and Derrida as one of the most cited of all contemporary French thinkers. Never a student 'of' philosophy, Deleuze was always philosophical and many influential poststructuralist and postmodernist texts can be traced to his celebrated resurrection of Nietzsche against Hegel in his Nietzsche and Philosophy , from which this collection draws its title. This searching new collection considers Deleuze's relation to the philosophical tradition and (...) beyond to the future of philosophy, science and technology. In addition to considering Deleuze's imaginative readings of classic figures such as Spinoza and Kant, the essays also point to the meaning of Deleuze on 'monstrous' and machinic thinking, on philosophy and engineering, on philosophy and biology, on modern painting and literature. Deleuze and Philosophy continues the spirit of experimentation and invention that features in Deleuze's work and will appeal to those studying across philosophy, social theory, literature and cultural studies who themselves are seeking new paradigms of thought. (shrink)

With the development of new technologies and the Internet, the notion of the virtual has grown increasingly important. In this lucid collection of essays, Pearson bridges the continental-analytic divide in philosophy, bringing the virtual to centre stage and arguing its importance for re-thinking such central philosophical questions as time and life. Drawing on philosophers from Bergson, Kant and Nietzsche to Proust, Russell, Dennett and Badiou, Pearson examines the limits of continuity, explores relativity, and offers a concept of creative (...) evolution. (shrink)

An examination of key aspects of Nietzsche;'s middle writings, focused on his conceptions of philosopher and the tasks of the philosopher.

This unique book explores Nietzsche’s philosophy at the time of Dawn’s writing and discusses the modern relevance of themes such as fear, superstition, terror, and moral and religious fanaticism. The authors highlight Dawn’s links with key areas of philosophical inquiry, such as “the art of living well,” skepticism, and naturalism. The book begins by introducing Dawn and discussing how to read Nietzsche, his literary and philosophical influences, his relation to German philosophy, and his efforts to advance his ‘free spirit’ philosophy. (...) Subsequent discussions address a wide range of topics relevant to Dawn, including presumptions of customary morality, hatred of the self, free-minded thinking, and embracing science and the passion of knowledge. (shrink)

The book seeks to illuminate Bergson's view that philosophy is the discipline of thinking that makes the effort to think beyond the human condition so as to extend our perception of the universe. In the book I explore Bergson on time and freedom, on memory, on his reformation of philosophy in Creative Evolution, on religion, on ethics, and on education and the art of life.

_A Companion to Nietzsche_ provides a comprehensive guide to all the main aspects of Nietzsche's philosophy, profiling the most recent research and trends in scholarship. Brings together an international roster of both rising stars and established scholars, including many of the leading commentators and interpreters of Nietzsche. Showcases the latest trends in Nietzsche scholarship, such as the renewed focus on Nietzsche’s philosophy of time, of nature, and of life. Includes clearly organized sections on Art, Nature, and Individuation; Nietzsche's New Philosophy (...) of the Future; Eternal Recurrence, the Overhuman, and Nihilism; Philosophy of Mind; Philosophy and Genealogy; Ethics; Politics; Aesthetics; Evolution and Life. Features fresh treatments of Nietzsche’s core and enigmatic doctrines. (shrink)

This volume aims to inspire a return to the energetics of Nietzsche's prose and the critical intensity of his approach to nihilism. For too long contemporary thought has been dominated by a depressed "what is to be done?" All is regarded to be in vain, nothing is deemed real, there is nothing new seen under the sun. Such a "postmodern" lament is easily confounded with an apathetic reluctance to think engagedly. Hence the contributors here draw on a variety of issues--the (...) future of life, the nature of life-forms, the techno-sciences, the body, religions--as a way of tackling the question of nihilism's pertinence to us now. (shrink)

In this essay I explore the nature of Deleuze’s commitment to an affirmative naturalism that is based on certain Epicurean principles and insights. The essay is divided into two main parts. In the first part I bring to light some of the key features of Lucretius’s great poem on the nature of things, and I do so with the aid of Bergson and his reading of the teaching as fundamentally melancholic. In the second part I switch my attention to Deleuze (...) and show how he links together physics and ethics as a way of providing an emancipatory and affirmative philosophy of life and one that aims to defeat sadness. In the conclusion I return to the question of melancholy and indicate how the problem might be best negotiated. (shrink)

This essay is an explanation of how the concept of the sublime is deployed by Nietzche in Dawn . This text represents a high point in Nietzche's thinking on the sublime. Nietzche, I show, wants us to purify ourselves of the origins and sources of our desire for the sublime because the higher feelings associated with it are bound up with humanity's investment in an imaginary world. However, he does not propose that we simply jettison the sublime but, rather, seek (...) new experiences of it and these will cenre on knowledge and our right to self-experimentation. I suggest that Nietzsche is in effect opening up new "spaces" and "times" for thinking. My interpretation aims to show in what way Nietzsche commits himself to fashioning new sublimities of philosophy, including expanding our appreciation of the beautiful. By focusing on the topic of the sublime I hope to reveal in what way Dawn represents an important moment in the evolution of Nietzsche's conception of the role and tasks of philosophy.Der Aufsatz untersucht, wie der Begriff des Erhabenen von Nietzsche in Morgenröhe verwendet wird, wo er einen Höhepunkt in Nietzsches Denken des Erhabenen bildet. Nietzsche will, so zeige ich, dass wir uns selbst von den Ursprüngen udn Quellen unseres strebens nach dem Erhabenen reinigen, weil die es begleitenden höheren Gefühle mit menschlichen Investionen in eine imaginäre Welt verbunden sind. Er will jedoch nicht, dass wir das Erhabene einfach über Bord werfen, sondern vielmehr nach neuen Erfahrungen des Erhabenen suchen, wobei das Wissen und unser Recht auf Selbstversuche dabei im Zentrum stehen. Ich meine, dass Nietzsche dadurch neue 'Räume' und 'Zeiten' für das Denken öffnet. Meine interpretation soll zeigen, auf welche Weise Neitzsche sich damit auf die Gestaltung neuer Sublimitäten der Philosophie festlegt, einschließlich der Erweiterrung unseres Gefallens am Schönen. Durch die Fokussierung auf das Erhabene hoff ich zeigen zu können, inwiefern Morgenröthe einen bedeutenden Moment in der Evolution von Nietzsches Auffassung über Rolle und Aufgaben der Philosophie darstellt. (shrink)

In this essay I focus on the text Creative Evolution and show that although Bergson intended to make a contribution to the science of biology and to the philosophy of life, the primary aim of the text is to show the need for a fundamental reformation of philosophy. Bergson wants to show how, through an appreciation of the evolution of life, philosophy can expand our perception of the universe. I examine in detail the two essential claims he makes in the (...) text: first, that we have to see the theory of knowledge and the theory of life as deeply related; second, that there is a need to “think beyond the human condition” or human state. Indeed, Bergson conceives philosophy as the discipline that “raises us above the human condition” and makes the effort to “surpass” it. This reveals itself to be something of an extraordinary endeavour since it means bringing the human intellect into rapport with other kinds of consciousness. Moreover, if we do not place our thinking about the nature, character, and limits of knowledge within the context of the evolution of life then we risk uncritically accepting the concepts that have been placed at our disposal. It means we think within pre-existing frames. We need, then, to ask two questions: first, how has the human intellect evolved?, and second, how can we enlarge and go beyond the frames of knowledge available to us? (shrink)

Intent upon letting the reader experience the pleasure and intellectual stimulation in reading these classic authors, the How to Read series provides a context and an explanation that will facilitate and enrich your understanding of texts vital to the canon.

Friedrich Nietzsche is one of the most influential thinkers of the past 150 years and On the Genealogy of Morality is his most important work on ethics and politics. A polemical contribution to moral and political theory, it offers a critique of moral values and traces the historical evolution of concepts such as guilt, conscience, responsibility, law and justice. This is a revised and updated 2006 edition of one of the most successful volumes to appear in Cambridge Texts in the (...) History of Political Thought. Keith Ansell-Pearson modified his introduction to Nietzsche's classic text, and Carol Diethe incorporated a number of changes to the translation itself, reflecting the considerable advances in our understanding of Nietzsche. In this guise the Cambridge Texts edition of Nietzsche's Genealogy should continue to enjoy widespread adoption, at both undergraduate and graduate level. (shrink)

An examination of Nietzsche on the passion of knowledge and that then looks at aspects of Foucault's work on this theme or motif.

There is a tradition of modern French philosophy that contains valuable resources for thinking about the nature and limits of obligation and how a higher calling of life beyond obligation might be conceived. This is a tradition of an ethics of generosity whose best exemplar is perhaps Henri Bergson and that extends in our own time to the writing of Gilles Deleuze.

This volume covers the period between the 1890s and 1930s, a period that witnessed revolutions in the arts and society which set the agenda for the rest of the century. In philosophy, the period saw the birth of analytic philosophy, the development of new programmes and new modes of inquiry, the emergence of phenomenology as a new rigorous science, the birth of Freudian psychoanalysis, and the maturing of the discipline of sociology. This period saw the most influential work of a (...) remarkable series of thinkers who reviewed, evaluated and transformed 19th-century thought. A generation of thinkers - among them, Henri Bergson, Emile Durkheim, Sigmund Freud, Martin Heidegger, Edmund Husserl, Karl Jaspers, Max Scheler, and Ludwig Wittgenstein - completed the disenchantment of the world and sought a new re-enchantment. (shrink)

This book presents a student-friendly introduction to one of Nietzsche's most widely-read and studied texts. "Beyond Good and Evil" contains Nietzsche's mature philosophy of the free spirit. Although it is one of his most widely read texts, it is a notoriously difficult piece of philosophical writing. The authors demonstrate in clear and precise terms why it is to be regarded as Nietzsche's philosophical masterpiece and the work of a revolutionary genius. This "Reader's Guide" is the ideal companion to study, offering (...) guidance on: philosophical and historical context, key themes, reading the text, reception and influence and further reading. "Continuum Reader's Guides are clear, concise and accessible introductions to key texts in literature and philosophy. Each book explores the themes, context, criticism and influence of key works, providing a practical introduction to close reading, guiding students towards a thorough understanding of the text. They provide an essential, up-to-date resource, ideal for undergraduate students. (shrink)

This chapter focuses on Nietzsche's analyses of religion and Christianity, as well as a religious figure such as Saint Paul, so as to highlight the character of his critical procedures and the probing manner in which he subjects so‐called “spiritual” phenomena and matters to psychological scrutiny. Nietzsche attempts to develop a purely psychological explanation of the religious states, including the need for salvation, one that will be free of mythology. One prejudice Nietzsche attacks in Dawn is that of “pure spirit”. (...) He seeks to expose the costs to the health of the body of a teaching of pure spirituality. An important point to note is that, on Nietzsche's account, Paul and Christianity both stand in opposition to science. According to Nietzsche, Christianity is said to be a religion out of touch with reality and is mortally opposed to the wisdom of the world or to “science”. (shrink)

Nietzsche is no longer a marginal figure in the study of philosophy. This collection of specially commissioned essays reflects the emergence of a serious interest amongst philosophers, sociologists and political theorists. By considering Nietzsche's ideas in the context of the modern philosophical tradition from which it emerged, his importance in contemporary thought is refined and reaffirmed. Modern German thought begins with Kant and has rarely escaped his influence. It is with respect to this Kantian heritage that this volume examines Nietzsche. (...) These essays critically consider Nietzsche's relation to Kant and the post-Kantian tradition. In broad terms it is his relation to the domains of knowledge, ethics and aesthetics, that is through the three Kantian critiques, that Nietzsche's thought is illuminated. This allows a surprising variety of areas and questions, both about Nietzsche and about philosophy to be investigated. (shrink)

This chapter discusses how the final aphorism, 575, of Nietszsche's Dawn, presents a positive vision of humanity as future‐oriented and self‐cultivating. It explores how Nietzsche's vision of humanity as future‐oriented and self‐creating is taken up once again by him in his later writings. In the final aphorism Nietzsche's use of the symbolism of flight is significant. This final aphorism is entitled "We aeronauts of the spirit". As Duncan Large has pointed out, the aeronauts in the aphorism are flying an "air‐ship", (...) and their flying out over the sea indicates "how close is their kinship to their more earthbound, or at least sea‐bound mariner‐cousins". In addition to his use of the sea as a metaphor for both the infinity of the future and humanity's orientation toward this future, Nietzsche draws upon the metaphor of flight to elaborate on this continuation of human development. (shrink)

Individuality and Beyond: Nietzsche Reads Emerson. By Zavatta Benedetta, Reynolds Alexander).

Nietzsche regarded Thus Spoke Zarathustra as his most important philosophical contribution because it proposes solutions to the problems and questions he poses in his later books – for example, his cure for the human disposition to vengefulness and his creation of new values as the antidote to nihilism. It is also the only place where he elaborates his concepts of the superhuman and the eternal recurrence of the same. In this Critical Guide, an international group of distinguished scholars analyze the (...) philosophical ideas in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, discussing a range of topics that include literary parody as philosophical critique, philosophy as a way of life, the meaning of human life, philosophical naturalism, fatalism, radical flux, human passions and virtues, great politics, transhumanism, and ecological conscience. The volume will be invaluable for philosophers, scholars and students interested in Nietzsche's thought. (shrink)

This co-authored chapter offers a reconstruction of Bergson's conception of the relationship between the political and religion focusing on "The Two Sources of Morality and Religion". Bergson's claims and arguments are related to those of Nietzsche with a focus on the themes of critique, immanence and affirmation.

Suitable for those conducting research or teaching in philosophy, this title provides analyses of the continental tradition of philosophy from Kant. Placing continental philosophy within a historical context, it helps define what the continental tradition has been and where it is moving.

This volume covers the period between the 1890s and 1930s, a period that witnessed revolutions in the arts and society which set the agenda for the rest of the century. In philosophy, the period saw the birth of analytic philosophy, the development of new programmes and new modes of inquiry, the emergence of phenomenology as a new rigorous science, the birth of Freudian psychoanalysis, and the maturing of the discipline of sociology. This period saw the most influential work of a (...) remarkable series of thinkers who reviewed, evaluated and transformed 19th-century thought. A generation of thinkers - among them, Henri Bergson, Emile Durkheim, Sigmund Freud, Martin Heidegger, Edmund Husserl, Karl Jaspers, Max Scheler, and Ludwig Wittgenstein - completed the disenchantment of the world and sought a new re-enchantment. (shrink)