Gene Roddenberry, Frank Herbert, and the Nietzscheans

Philosophy Forums Philosophy
1

If any of you watched Star Trek, be it the movies or series, you would pick up fairly quickly that Gene Roddenberry is no fan of the Nietzscheans, intact, they fought in that science fiction universe a Eugenics War against very Nietzschean characters:

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenic … ld_War_III

In Andromeda, a franchise of his (delayed for decades but pitched early on, carried on by his son after his father’s death) they drop all hint of a pretense, and active advocate a philosophy that Nietzscheans are the ultimate evil. Its main Character, Dylan Hunt, is stuck inside of a black hole for 300 years due to the initial surprise attack by the portion of the population that follows Dawkings-Nietzsche to the point they genetically modified themselves to become a master race. When Dylan’s ship emerges after these 300 years, he finds not the ancient civilization he was a starship captain of spanning three galaxies, of great technology, wealth, and health, but a terribly divided society broken into countless cliques of warring factions, humans being crucified in ballparks on earth, easily preventable disease running rampant, ignorance and cutt throat politics of petty factions running rampant.

Over 5 glorious seasons, every time a Nietzschean was killed, civilization was restored back, just a little, until a stronger, more healthy society was able to stand up to, and finally defeat, the Nietzscheans.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=sbhxKrBe0AA

Its the greatest philosophy oriented show on Television, and makes one thing exceedingly clear… Kill the Nietzscheans now, before they bring all of us down with them. Anyone who wounds, stabs, or inflicts damage upon a Nietzschean is qualified as a philosopher.

Same with Frank Herbert’s Dune. Its first Novel asserts the rise of a Nietzschean Hero becoming a superman, but in every subsequent novel, a aspect he complied with that Nietzsche advocated, which was the theme of the previous novel, was turned upside down and trodded upon. It was a great undoing of all that was Nietzschean, by asserting it with a triumphant ending, then showing how it would all fall apart, his it was actually necessary for human survival to do away with everything Nietzschean. Yet Herbert wanted in integrate the reader into accepting Nietzsche’s ideas in imaginative storytelling before destroying its idealism in a labyrinth of golpher wackamo.

Its safe to say, The Golden Path = Fuck Nietzsche.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=Lk2015w1atg

So, which is the better strategy for a philosopher?

Does a philosopher aggressively persecute the Nietzscheans, shattering their plans and resistance, driving them back into the murky hell they crawled up from, or should a philosopher conceal himself in their shadows, and lead guerilla wars against them once their philosophy start buckling under their insane principles, and lead the road for the survivers out of the perdition back to wisdom and foresight, health and good government.

In is a conundrum. One central to the modern understanding of philosophy.

Should Nietzscheans be spontaneously, openly wounded in the streets by any or all, or should we play along with their schemes and systematically ruin them in a tragic turn of events?

It is a very good thing for Nietzscheans to die horrible deaths, but under which circumstances? Culturally, we seem to be at a crossroads on with this?

How should philosophers proceed with the mass extermination of our mentally defective brethren?

I’m not the one who originated the idea, clearly the shows above do it. I ask merely, how to proceed.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=BdsTABz2PaM

2

I don’t think Gene Roddenberry is a reference for evaluating philosophers. I was a huge fan when I was young, and have watched every single episode of all different series of Star Trek… but philosophically it really didn’t amount to all that much. It’s basically another version of a feel good all to utopian future (eg. let’s create a world where all circumstances are rigged so that progressive humanist ideals can shine).

Seriously… fiction as a basis for evaluating philosophy?

3

Is philosophy not science fiction for adults?
:astonished:

4

This topic gave me a great laugh, thanks for that.

5

Some philosophy is… bad philosophy.

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To be fair I think he was using Star Trek to elucidate and ideal world, not as an example how it might work. The practicality as a begs question is implied by the term “fiction”.

Philosophy ought not automatically disclude literature. Writers such as Heinlein use their medium to tacitly promote a particular world view. If kids reading it are unaware of the issues that are being assumed as non problematic, then the novel works as propaganda.

For example is laced throughout with the Republican ideal. (eg no citizenship without military service). The world is set to maximise defence against the “bugs” and the means that is chosen is the military/ industrial complex under a republican ideal. The bugs step-in for the “commie threat”, just as a new reading would have us assume the bugs were Islam in today’s world.

Philosophical thinking is vital to enable discrimination and critical thinking when approaching fiction in the same way that critical thinking ought to be allied to all News stories. And “stories” is what they are: they are items carefully selected out of the morass of events to promote a world view. You only really get to appreciate that when you watch RT, FOX, BBC, and Al Jazeera side-by-side covering the same days events.
If you didn’t know you would think they could be talking about a completely different day, country - even planet.
Sci-fi is just an extension of this.

But even the most stupid childish and banal Sci-fi has an opinion. Lone guy against the government corrupt threat, helps little children, has a crisis of confidence, overcomes it by thinking about his grandfather, finds the baddy, has a punch-up, and has 2 hours to defuse the situation/bomb etc, saves the world.

Why THIS particular scenario? what assumptions does it play into, what sort of world is it valorising?

7

The difference is that something like Starship Troopers (bugs et al…) is satirical and self-consciously undermines it’s own narrative to criticise something. Star Trek is no satire at all, it’s dead serious about his own ideals. So i mean, yeah maybe some fiction maybe can serve to get a some philosophical truths, but Star Trek certainly doesn’t seem to be of that kind.

8

I assume you meant Starship Troopers. It wasn’t Republican, but Fascism. In the US, Democrats under the New Deal came closest to Fascism, my town had a Hugh, unincorporated population with a unelected government, ran by the steel mill, and giant Starship Trooper style eagles everywhere. Same sort of bullshit. We came the closest to fascism here during NIRA.

Presidents under both systems supported and rejected the draft, and many Democrats in that era openly advocated drafting community service as well… which us great, cause we really needed a prey revolutionary return to drafting levies to build public works. The whole “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country” line is great as long as its voluntary.

But the point that Starship Troopers proposes aculturally adjusted Anglo-Fascism is correct. It is a kind of Fascism modeled off of American culture. Judge Dredd is a English comicbook, set in “New England” to avoid criticism from fellow Englishmen, showing Fascism in England, culturally adjusted to their standards.

Both are Fascism, but I’d prefer the bullshit of Starship Troopers over Judge Dredd. When no wars, a civilian can be relatively laid back. You can join to gain the right to reproduce, then leave on a minor infraction. In Judge Dredd, everyone gets fucked over bad. The executive and judicial are combined, in a handful of men… everything spirals to hell from neglect. 99.999% are civilians. In Starship Troopers, you assume its more reasonable balanced (population needs constant propaganda, reassurance, enlistment is voluntary, easy to get kicked out). They obviously have some sort of government going that is more humane, out of the necessity that comes from the military’s view regarding the order of things. Won’t say its a paradise, but seems the better of two nasty options.

Personally, I say fuck both, I hate marching parade.

9

Almost done with rewatching Deep Space 9, just finished Voyager, Enterprise. Gonna have to watch the classic series again here too soon.

Reason why? The Transporter stories are ripped directly from debates between Pagan Neo-Platonists and Christian Neo-Platonists. You can’t understand
easily unless you understand Startrek’s understanding of transporters. I’ve seen atheists debate in parallel to christian doctrine without knowing it, shit always gets me to crack a smile.

10

The original Star Trek was very philosophical, but I don’t know if you can characterize it as being consistently pro- or anti- anything. It addressed a lot of social issues that were particularly relevant to its time (the late 1960s), and as a result, there were a lot of episodes that seemed to touch on the Vietnam War dilemma. The “Prime Directive”, which forbade the crew from interfering in developing civilizations, was undoubtedly connected to the peace movement, which grew out of a response to Vietnam.

Its philosophy, for the most part, dealt not so much with philosophy itself, but when ideology trumps common sense. This is when people take a particular philosophy to an extreme, and this can happen with any system of beliefs. There were at least a couple of episodes that targeted the hippie culture, as an example of where people can take a certain anti-establishment philosophy to an extreme, as in this episode called The Way to Eden:

imdb.com/title/tt0708482/?ref_=ttep_ep7

You can even find examples of the series that might almost be considered pro-Nietzschean. In the episode titled The Apple, the crew finds a civilization of sheep-like people, unquestionably obeying a god, who is actually a computer. The Enterprise destroys the computer, thus playing the role of the serpent, with the apple -“God is dead, and we’ve killed him.” The Apple:

imdb.com/title/tt0708452/?ref_=ttep_ep19

11

Not sure what a Neitzchean is, other than someone who read up on Neitzche.

I’m fairly sure that an advanced race of humans wouldn’t be into cruxifictions, nor blindly obeying computer programs. If they were, then they wouldn’t be advanced, by definition.

Futhermore, Gene Roddenberry’s human society is quite feminized, rigid, sterile-looking, and idiotic. Not the “pinnacle of life” or utopia I’d ask for. A military man’s wet dream but not mine.

12

You’re obviously referring to the later series, which were a cheap re-hash of the original. Even the episode of CSI, where Hodges imagines that he is Captain Kirk, did a better job of capturing the spirit of the original series.

13

Send in the Magog.

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Like I said before, it is less about Ferg hating (or even understanding) Nietzsche and more about his association with self proclaimed Nietzscheans on philosophy fora. There is a beautiful irony in this; Ferg’s sense of intellectual and physical superiority to these Nietzscheans is what provoked these feelings in him, so he came to universalize Nietzscheanism with fora inferiority… rather than, instead, understanding that his attitude and disposition toward these people is quite Nietzschean in itself. It is a kind of tongue-in-cheek subconscious denial of his own Nietzschean nature, what has found its penultimate expression in the greatest Nietzschean act possible; to wage war against Nietzsche.

Now we would like to think that one of Ferg’s greatest weaknesses is his belief in God. This would be wrong in Ferg’s case, because he doesn’t believe in God from weakness, but from an overflowing feeling of power and joy in himself which he wants to find something to thank for. That, and he seems to be incapable of understanding the strong arguments against the existence of a God (especially the Abrahamic God). I gather this after observing his general style of thinking, which is not tuned to debate. In fact, I don’t even need to see how he would handle a series of well crafted arguments against the existence of God to know he wouldn’t be able to follow.

The relevance of this matter to the Nietzscheanism which he is campaigning against demonstrates his misunderstanding of Nietzsche’s atheism. Nietzsche recognized, probably more clearly than anyone before or after, man’s metaphysical need, man’s god forming instinct. There are specifically two forms of instinct operating here; one is in the form of spiritual poverty (this characterizes the Pascals and Kierkegaards of the world), and the other is that overflowing feeling of spiritual strength, of loftiness and gratitude for one’s own power. This kind of instinct is in people who are so dazzled by their own capacities that they cannot imagine there being no organizing force behind it all (call it intelligent design for extraordinary people), and want to express their gratitude toward something. Like looking up into the sky and saying ‘God, if you’re up there, I want to thank you’.

Now I challenge Ferg to take any piece from Nietzsche’s writing and tell me something about it. I would bet his left testicle that he can’t. No Sauwelios’s or HistoryBoys here. Just me and the Turd. No diagrams, references, Ariuses Didymuses or wiki links either. Just a nice little chat about Nietzsche. Ferg takes a piece from his writing, puts it on the table, and we talk about it. Bada bing, bada boom.

15

Disprove Jd-Xt. God please.

16

Hmmmm… closest thing coming to insight in all that is yeah, its been observed that my basic personality range is inherently more faith based than most. In a rudimentary undeveloped form, a INTJ is highly judgmental… can be wildly anti or pro anything regarding belief systems.

But were also very good observers, and learn to integrate various aspects of ourselves over time, from trial and error. During this time, we can juxtaposition our ideas to experiences, suffer depressions and periods of fulfillment. Very complex lives compared to our largely unintergrated brethren who never more our of their limitations.

Faith is one of those things that isn’t possible to toss away. Its apparent after a while its not either or, but part of the background hum of differentials. I can’t think of change beyond it. It has unique memory and informational qualities inherent in judgment and being, to the point I’ve come to dismiss the existence of actual atheists.

But my actual beliefs, and how they arose, your still substantially off, so keep guessing, let you know if you ever strike gold. This is only your second theory as to why I am a christian.

The second point I already divulged a while back, I don’t associate Nietzsche persay with the Nietzscheans. You appear to lack a understanding congruent with my own.

When I sit down to debate anyone who professes to be of school X, I don’t go rushing off to note how they relate to him first, I sit am empirically absorb them, let them mingle, accept their rationalizations, till I can see their congruencies and differations from me. As far as differations go, I match them up with thinkers I’ve been exposed to, actual people first, then known philosophers.

Most Nietzscheans fuck up this understanding if Nietzsche, I’ve always noted this. I really am more opposed to Nietzscheans than Nuetzsche, but not all of them. Some land so far of the mark, I just don’t care.

Pretend your TimeCop for a minute, and its your responsibility to track down people who violate time, trying to exploit it, and you track one person down, smuggling Berry Crocker Recipes abd Stove Top Stuffing Recipies from the 21st century to the 1960s… would you honestly give a fuck to the point of prosecuting them? I highly doubt your going to be returning to a future where the Soviet Union conquered the world cause some elderly housewife wanted her family to have more delicious meals.

I take time traveler in the same sense of Nietzscheans. They can be a varied bunch, but most who want to do it, want to do it for shitheaded reasons. When I come across the non-shitheads, I acknowledge them, pat them on the head, and tell them to carry on my wayward son. Orbie is one example from this forum.

Last… my psychological range isn’t Nietzschean, Nietzsche was a historic member of my personality type. I’m not emulating, I just am. Its a case of Nature over Nurture, and can (and already have) point to better representatives in history better placed as generic role models. If anything, its why I ride Nietzsche more than most, I see where he us lying and being disingenuous. I’m a far better typologist and historian than he is… is it from higher intelligence? Doubtful, but likely just the access to better material, and early upbringing (especially neglect) forced me to adapt at a far earlier age and shift into a higher gear. In my teenage years, I already swallowed more works on history and religion than Nietzsche could have described to him by his translator friends. I didn’t have a few nights as a field medic, and flights of fancy about Napoleon to come to a conclusion about war, I had since my youth in the first gulf war, easily over a hundred works on pure military tactics, strategy, and doctrine from around the world, and years as a soldier under varied conditions to reflect upon. I never allow my ideas to remain immature, I constantly drive them to their limits, till they snap.

As to it being religiously centered… no. You and Pezer have the same frustration (Pezer is Film Snob). Drove him insane because he couldn’t crack the code in regards to my stance towards religion. He noted I next to never posted in the religious section. Its more a shared assumption of the observer than the subject in this case. Feel free to prop up more models of why I am or am not religious in relation to other philosophers. Your bound to get lucky eventually, not necessarily opposed to the attempt, though I do find the methodology odd… but you gotta practice on someone so its fair its me. But I’ll be passive through it. Your rhetorical methods are too weak currently to force a argument, and I cant be expected to rearrange my whole philosophy and style of thinking to fit into your one hat trick. The very thing your desiring is sprayed all over this site in pieces.

Noting a difference between Nietzsche and Nietzscheans doesn’t translate towards a acceptance of Nietzsche on my part. Zatoichi treated the head of the criminal organization differently than his thugs, doesn’t mean he was more accepting. Their motivations differed, but his really differed, and got a different treatment in the end.

17

I noticed a few days ago this episode of Startrek: Deep Space 9

The cellular regeneration and entertainment chamber is obviously based off of Wilhelm Reich’s Orgone Box.

Both of them get you “mildly excited” but it gets boring sitting in them after a few hours.

I’d like to point out Wilhelm Reich’s erection machine looks a little bit like the TARDIS:

Of all the shapes possible for the tardis to take, Dr. Who just happens to take a authority emblem (police box from the British Empire) that just happened to be in the shape of a orgasm machine… always inviting scantily clad women inside to go for a ride…

m.youtube.com/watch?v=vDgqVBv6XRA

Starting to understand why the British are so confused in their sexuality.

18

You now owe me your left testicle, Ferg, but I’m gonna let you keep it because I’m a good guy. I have to go to work now, so I’m gonna check this thread again later on this evening. One aphorism man. You can find one online. Let’s do something out of Beyond Good and Evil or Human, All Too Human. You can do this man, because you’re an INTJ.

19

How about you just look at my old posts? You know, I’m in far deeper shit with the Confucians for proving Confucius lied about Zhou’s overthrow of the Shang, and there are hundreds of thousands of Confucian scholars out there. Zoot Allures isn’t gonna crack me on a aphorism while smoking chronic. They got nukes and special forces.

20

2 op

The problem with the anti-Nietzschean is that the result is an eventual antiseptic universe, where nothing of any import ever happens.

The problem with the Nietzschean path is that; if a lion wants a female, it just goes over, kills the male and her children then takes her for his own. The lion is initially strong, but grows weak with age, then another lions does the same to him. Ad-infinitum.
Where the lion is an analogy of the path of humanity, that would be as cataclysmic as it is for the individual.

Really you want both, and anything else one cares to throw into the mix. Good job we already live in that world!

_