The reduction to the absolute 0 depends on eternal reoccurance, or, vice versa.
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A Question of Nietzsche’s Texts
6000 feet beyond man and time.
Ecce Homo
In Ecce Homo Nietzsche reviewed his own philosophical development with characteristically outrageous immodesty and equally characteristic literary brilliance. The book was written just before insanity was to stay his provocative hand forever. Less than two months span the first completed draft and madness; less than four weeks intervene between Nietzsche’s consuming illness and the published version of Ecce Homo. It isone of the most extraordinary intellectual “autobiographies” ever written, the penultimate work of an incredibly productive year.1 Only Nietzsche contra Wagner stands between Ecce Homo and Nietzsche’s collapse on a Turin street in the first week of January 1889. The preface to that last work is dated Christmas 1888, less than two weeks before his breakdown.
The origin of the doctrine of eternal recurrence is cited in Ecce Homo: “The concept of eternal recurrence belongs in August 1881. It was jotted down on a page with the inscription ‘6000 feet beyond man and time.’ I walked through the woods at Silvaplana lake that day; I stopped at an enormous pyramidal rock not far from Surlei. There the thought came to me.”2
Disagreements concerning the meaning of this thought, which seems almost to have invaded Nietzsche, continue to be rehearsed in the literature. Debates are often spirited and prolonged. Some early Nietzsche commentators dismissed the doctrine of eternal recurrence outright as a quasi-religious experience which is opaque to philosophical analysis,3 or worse still considered it “a deceptively mocking mystery of delusion.”4 Contemporary analytical philosophers tend for the most part to ignore the doctrine altogether, as indeed they tend to ignore Nietzsche altogether, too. It represents for most of them simply another conceptual excess in the work of a chronically excessive polemicist. Even among analytically inclined philosophers who find Nietzsche a valuable and suggestive philosopher, Arthur Danto and Robert Solomon for example, the doctrine of eternal recurrence poses a puzzle and somewhat of an embarrassment. The doctrine once unpacked is said to raise the question why Nietzsche should have been so enthusiastic about such a manifestly dubious, if not trivial, notion.
Some lines of disagreement are fairly well drawn among recent commentators as among past commentators. Nietzsche enthusiasts often wave the banner of “profundity,” sometimes as if they had a monopoly onit. “Conceptual analysis” often is a pejorative expression in their vocabulary, and conceptual analysis of thedoctrine of eternal recurrence is therefore viewed as a superficial and futile procrustean exercise; as impertinent child’s play. Eternal recurrence must be experienced, they often tell us. To the analytically inclined commentator, on the other hand, the uncritical Nietzschephile is a person who is addicted to clever prose, who falsely believes that a dazzling play of metaphors is an adequate substitute for philosophical analysis. The Nietzschephile’s paean to recurrence seems from this perspective to be little more than uncomprehending praise of incoherence or contradiction.
It is sometimes difficult to say who are Nietzsche’s worst detractors, Nietzschephobes or Nietzschephiles. For it is clear that even some of Nietzsche’s most ardent admirers often present us with a disingenuous antinomy: either contradiction and depth, or shallow coherence and lucidity.
The position argued in this manuscript insists that the contrary is true; that Nietzsche’s doctrine of eternal recurrence can be reconstituted as at once coherent and profound. This is particularly truewhen it is understood in terms of a specific strategy, a strategy which motivates much of his writing; namely, the presentation of an existential imperative and ontology in allegory which is designed to function as an alternative to the dominant tradition. When the doctrine of eternal recurrence is understood in such a context, the sometimes testy differences between analytically and existentially inclined philosophers appear irrelevant, perhaps even petty. For the critique of traditional metaphysics, religion and morality, which Nietzsche sought to provide is entirely consistent with both traditions. Nietzsche’s rejection of the dominant tradition eschews habitual ways of thinking and speaking about man and world. His rejection of traditional ways of thinking about knowledge, values, truth andother basic issues, is due in part to his critique of our traditional linguistic habits. An ontology of sorts comes ready-made within each natural language and is concealed within that language so as to be scarcely noticed any longer, Nietzsche argues. The theory which pervades our theory-laden perception and speech appears to the perceiver and speaker to be entirely natural. Like Kant’s forms of perception (Anschauung), perceiving, thinking, and speaking seem to us to be scarcely possible in ways other than the way in which we perceive, think, and speak. So for those who stress Nietzsche’s attempt to liberate us from former metaphysical habits and do so in the linguistic idiom, his intention is not irrelevant to the philosophy which has come to dominate Anglo-American philosophy from Carnap and Wittgenstein, (early and late) to Quine, Kripke and Unger. On theother hand, Nietzsche’s critique is certainly not restricted to nor motivated by linguistic considerations alone. Such considerations play a role, to be sure. But the habits which Nietzsche would have us transform are habits of living. The form which has to be overcome is a form of life, not just of thought and speech. Habits of thought and speech may imprison us in their nihilistic grip. But redemption from nihilism, overcoming alienation by retrieving a paradigmatic way of being human, involves more than overcoming traditional thought and speech, for Nietzsche frequently suggests that metaphysical thinking and speaking are an expression of nihilism, not the cause of it. And consideration of such matters does not seem alien to Heidegger, Jaspers, Sartre, or Habermas, for example. My general point, then, is that Nietzsche straddles both traditions (and many others besides).5 The presentation of what I am calling an ontology in allegory, a “theory” which is designed to liberate us from the dominant tradition, should therefore be of considerable interest and significance to philosophers generally, quite apart from ideological and methodological predilections.
Much preliminary work needs to be done, however, before many of these bare assertions can make much sense. In particular, we need to ask once again what it is that recurs. And since Nietzsche himself tended to distinguish between the foundation of the doctrine and its effect,6 we too shall employ that heuristic and consider first the cluster of problems which the foundation of the doctrine raises: the empirical version of the doctrine of eternal recurrence.
THE TEXTUAL NACHLASS
Commentators quarrel not merely about the nuances of the doctrine of eternal recurrence but about its gross outlines. There are those who believe that Nietzsche’s doctrine is intended to sanction the view that nothing in fact recurs empirically.7 There are those, however, who believe that Nietzsche’s doctrine of eternal recurrence is intended to sanction the view that some specific thing or things recur;8 and there are those who believe that Nietzsche’s doctrine of eternal recurrence is intended to sanction the view that everything recurs.9 The logically possible options, grosso modo, have been exhausted in answer to our question, “What recurs?”
Many Nietzsche scholars, however, tend reluctantly to advance the view that Nietzsche had hoped to demonstrate that everything in fact recurs eternally under the yoke of his doctrine. At the same time, it is commonly held that eternal recurrence simultaneously and primarily asserts that we ought to behave as if everything recurs eternally. Let us use a convenient and commonly employed distinction here and characterize the factual claim as “empirical,” the other as “normative.” Within the mainstream of Nietzsche scholarship, then, the doctrine of eternal recurrence has been approached from two points of vantage, normative and empirical.
A distinction between normative and empirical versions of the doctrine of eternal recurrence is neither generic nor immune to counter examples, to be sure. Even a moment’s reflection indicates that the empirical and normative versions are not mutually exclusive. If, for example, there are thought to be a finite number of possible world-states, states ofthe universe, which recur eternally, and if human actions are conceived by Nietzsche to be a part of any such given world-state, then human actions are in some sense fated, governed, or bound within the doctrine of eternal recurrence. If the answer to our empirical-looking question, “What recurs?” is “Everything,” then that alleged fact presumably impinges on a quite different normative question, namely, “How ought I to behave?” In thiscontext the cosmology of the doctrine has a bearing on normative considerations, and the distinction between empirical and normative renditions and criteria seems to collapse. For it is hard to know what to make of the exhortation to live as if our lives recur eternally if that advice entails or implies a cyclical cosmology a priori. The difficulty is plain enough. It is hard to know what to make of the exhortation to live as if our lives recur eternally if they do in fact recur eternally. Consider a most unsympathetic analogous example. What sense could be made of the exhortation to live as if subject to the law of gravity? Nietzsche’s uneasy merger of normative imperative and cyclical cosmology is expressed stunningly in KGW V2, p. 403 and GOA Nachlass XII, 64: “My doctrine declares: the task is to live in such a way that you must wish to live again—you will anyway.” The critic’s reply is that how I now live is a recurrence, too. Then how I now live must be how I lived an infinite number of previous occasions. But I can only live in such a way that I must wish to live again if, in previous recurrences, I lived in such a way that I must wish to live again. And so on. The descriptive version of recurrence appears to embrace a fatalism which defeats the imperative force of the normative rendition. This will be considered later in detail, of course.
Distinguishing two versions of Nietzsche’s doctrine, empirical and normative, is useful primarily in differentiating the emphasis of each Nietzsche entry which has the doctrine of eternal recurrence as its subject. So, for example, when Nietzsche asserts above that “The task is to live in such a way that you must wish to live again,” this part ought to be construed as a normative entry. Where, on the other hand, Nietzsche seems to argue primarily from empirical considerations, as when he speaks in terms of a finite sum of energy, a finite number of energy configurations, and finite space, all of them in infinite time, such entries may reasonably be regarded as primarily empirical in intention. That is our proposed method to sort through the texts for now.
All of these preliminaries may appear to be overly careful or subtle, a case of excessive attention to detail. Too many trees, no forest. It might even appear to be much ado about nothing. But the curious fact is, that while much has been written about the cosmological version of Nietzsche’s doctrine of eternal recurrence, and much more claimed about it still, insufficient attention has been devoted to the language in which that doctrine is couched. Yet it is an axiom of scholarship in the history of philosophy that where one is confronted with conflicting interpretations of fundamental doctrines the texts must be scrutinized more closely, not less.
Nietzsche commentators have generally supposed that the language of his cosmology of recurrence is clear and that for the most part other interpretative questions alone remain. I do not believe that that is the case, however. The purpose of the textual analysis which follows, then, is neither irrelevant digression, nor a confusion of textual and conceptual analysis. Rather, careful attention to the language of Nietzsche’s alleged “proof” of recurrence seems to show that no such “proof” exists unambiguously. Further, and more troubling, the textual evidence may be taken to suggest that perhaps there can be no unambiguous empirical argument for recurrence in Nietzsche’s works at all, and that he was himself aware of this fact.
Of the two versions of the doctrine of eternal recurrence which we have distinguished, normative and empirical, no sustained argument for the cosmological status of eternal recurrence exists in any work published by Nietzsche or authorized by him for publication. References to the empirical requirements of the doctrine are to be found only in the Nachlass.10 Specifically, the doctrine of eternal recurrence is unmistakably presented in the form of an empirical hypothesis in the notes from the period during which Nietzsche wrote Die Fröhliche Wissenschaft (The Gay Science) and in notes published initially by his sister in his behalf under the title The Will to Power. In the published version of The Gay Science the doctrine of eternal recurrence is presented in hypothetical language only, as we saw in a previous chapter. Recall, if you will, from Chapter One11 that in The Gay Science you are asked toimagine the following situation: A demon “sneaks after you” one day or night and asks you “what if” the life you are presently leading you would have to live not simply once more but innumerable times more. Nothing would be different, you are told. Every sigh, every joy, each sorrow will be relived in the same sequence and order. Considering this state-of-affairs, the demon then asks whether you would prostrate yourself and gnash your teeth in the face of such an unwelcome depiction. Or would you find such a picture exhilarating beyond belief, saying to the messenger “You are a god and never have I heard anything more godly”? For the aphorism in question advises us that the demon’s possible-world description conceals a question which, when posed, would weigh upon our actions as the greatest stress: Do you want this once more and innumerable times more? Facing this question openly and in candor would, perhaps, crush us. Perhaps it would transform us. But to crave this imagined state-of-affairs fervently, passionately, how well disposed toward life would we have to become?
This extremely rich and compact aphorism entitled “the greatest stress,” which was reproduced in the first chapter, is typical of the references to recurrence found in Nietzsche’s published writings; typical in its hypothetical form, graphic imagery, poetic intensity and immediacy. By contrast, the unpublished reflections, which were penned at about the same time and are preoccupied with the empirical requirements of the doctrine of recurrence, tend to be declarative in form, are largely argumentative, are at once bold and halting.
Consider if you will some of the pertinent material which consists of three entries from the Nachlass of the fall of 1881, which I insert here at length at the risk of trying the reader’s patience. These entries present some of the most essential elements in Nietzsche’s empirical formulations which have not been adequately represented hitherto.
A.* The amount of total energy is limited not infinite. Let us beware of such conceptual vagaries! Consequently, the number of states, changes, combinations and developments of this energy is incredibly large and practically unmeasurable, but nonetheless limited and not infinite. However, time, in which the totality exerts its energy, is infinite. That is, energy is eternally equal and eternally active. Up tothis moment an infinity has passed, i.e., all possible developments must already have come to pass. Consequently, the present development must be a repetition and also the one which bore it and the one which will originate from it, and so on forward and backward! Everything has come to pass in so far as the total configuration of all energy eternally recurs. Whether, quite aside from that, anything identical has come to pass is entirely indemonstrable. It would appear that the configuration structures attributes anew in the greatest detail, so that two different configurations cannot contain anything identical. Whether anything identical can exist within a configuration, for example two leaves—I doubt it. . . ,12
B. The external world of energies leads back to a simplest state of these energies; and alsoforward to a simplest state. Could not and must not both states be identical? Out of a system of fixed energies, i.e., out of a measurable energy, no innumerability of states can arise. Only in the case of the false presupposition of an infinite space, in which energies evaporate as it were, is the last state an unproductive one, a dead one.13
C. If an equilibrium of energy had ever been reached it would still exist. Thus, it never occurred. The present state contradicts such an assumption. (However,) if one assumes that a state has existed absolutely the same as the present one, this assumption would not be contradicted by the present state. But, among the infinite possibilities this must have been the case, because an eternity has already passed until now. . . . And, if the present state has already occurred, then also the one which bore it and the one which preceded it and so on, backward. From this there emerges the fact that it has already occurred a second and third time; also, that it will occur a second and third time—innumerable times, backward and forward. That is, all becoming moves in a fixed number of entirely identical states. . . . Assuming an incredible number of cases, arriving accidentally at the identical condition is more probable than (arriving at) the absolutely never identical.14
Apart from these three entries, the first of which (“A”) we shall have to dissect in some detail, there is an entry in The Will to Power which is invariably cited by Nietzsche commentators. Although it adds nothing in principle which is not rehearsed far more adequately in the previous entries, I shall include it for the record also, since it receives such frequent mention. We will have occasion to refer to it later ourselves, in any case, so once again I must ask for your indulgence. This time, however, only the relevant paragraph of that longish aphorism need be quoted:
If the world may be thought of as a determinate quantity of force and as a determinate number of centers of force—and every other idea is indeterminate and therefore useless—it follows that, in the great dice game of existence, it must pass through a calculable number of combinations. In infinite time, every possible combination would at some time or other be realized; more: it would be realized an infinite number of times. And since between every combination and its next recurrence all other possible combinations would have to take place, and each of these combinations conditions the entire sequence of combinations in the same series, a circular movement of absolutely identical series is thereby demonstrated: the world as a circular movement that has already repeated itself infinitely often and plays its game in infinitum. This conception is not simply mechanistic; for if it were that, it would not condition an infinite recurrence of identical cases, but a final state. Because the world has not reached this, mechanistic theory must be considered an imperfect and merely tentative hypothesis.15
At least the following broad empirical assumptions expressly appear in the above texts.
(i)
Energy is finite (in A).
(ii)
The number of energy states (Lagen) is finite (A, B, and C).
(iii)
Energy is conserved (in A).
(iv)
The number of energy combinations and developments is finite (in A).
(v)
Time is infinite (in A).
(vi)
Space is finite (in B).
(vii)
Energy has infinite duration (in A).
(viii)
Change is eternal (A and C).
(ix)
Novelty is inadmissible (A and C).
Put informally and oversimply, if there are a finite number of configurations possible, a finite number of states of the universe at an instant, whose order and sequence is fixed, and if time is infinite, each configuration will have to occur an infinite number of times: “the eternal recurrence of the same.” But the same configuration will not only recur an infinite number of times, it must have occurred an infinite number of previous times. Accordingly, this moment may be viewed as one repetition of an infinity of identical moments in the “past” which are fated to recur eternally in the “future.”
Three issues need to be separated. First, are these nine premises derivable from A, B and C, as I claim they are? Second, do these nine premises taken together justify the conclusion which they are designed to warrant—eternal recurrence? Third, can the premises themselves be justified?
The second and third questions fall outside the scope of this chapter, although they will occupy us later. Only the first question bears on our present inquiry, and it can be disposed of rather quickly. It deserves comment primarily because Danto believes that (seven of) these nine assumptions would be sufficient to generate the doctrinal conclusion Nietzsche needs, while Danto at the same time finds premises (i)-(iii) only in the text itself. That is curious, for (v) is unmistakably present in A: “However, time, in which the totality exerts its energy, is infinite.” Similarly, the infinite duration of energy claim (premise vii) is easily deduced from the assertion that “energy is eternally equal and eternally active.” In order to be active eternally energy must surely have infinite duration. The supposition that change is eternal (premise viii) seems likewise to be contained in C: “If an equilibrium of energy had ever been reached it would still exist.” For since “all possible developments must already have come to pass” (A) an equilibrium of energy cannot have occurred, because if it had, it would still exist. An end-state would have been reached. It could also be argued that the eternal activity of energy which Nietzsche alleges in A precludes a circumstance in which no change could occur. Here, however, “change” and “activity of energy” would have to be equated. Finally, no new energy configuration can arise (premise ix) since Nietzsche asserts in A that all of the possible developments and combinations of energy have already occurred. The same point is made in C: “all becoming moves in a fixed number of entirely identical states.” If the fixed number of possible states has been exhausted, then no others are possible. In consequence, there can be no new energy states.
Now even if all nine premises can be derived successfully from the texts, that sheds little light on the question of how these empirical formulations are to be understood. What purpose are they designedto serve? Entry A, for example, has generally been construed as the basis for the cosmological version of Nietzsche’s doctrine of eternal recurrence. But this paradigm demonstration has always been presented in a truncated version, from Löwith through Danto and Pfeffer. For reasons which are not at all clear to me, Nietzsche commentators appear uniformly to have ignoredthe last four sentences of A, presented above. But in my opinion, these four sentences need at least as much attention as do the preceding ones, since their meaning is unclear.
The conclusion of entry A can be interpreted in at least two incompatible ways, either as consistent or inconsistent with the remainder of the entry. But if the reading which holds that the conclusion of A is inconsistent with its remainder is the correct reading, then we simply have no proof, no demonstration of recurrence at all. For such a construction turns the last four sentences of A into a rejection of the sentences which precede.
Having argued that energy is finite, that the states (Lagen), changes, and evolutionsof this energy are likewise finite, and that these states unfold in an eternity, Nietzsche says: (1) “Everything has come to pass in so far as the total configuration of all energy eternally recurs.” The next three sentences, if consistent with the preceding ones, assert the following: (2) The sentence, “Whether quite aside from that, anything identical has come to pass is entirely indemonstrable,” would mean, simply, that it is impossible to give empirical evidence in support of the eternal recurrence hypothesis. The phrase which begins with “davon abgesehen” would mean “apart from the fact that the total configuration of all energy eternally recurs.” In short, the sentence could easily be rendered, “Whether anything identical has come to pass is entirely indemonstrable, apart from the fact that the total configuration of all energy eternally recurs.” This rendering is consistent with the remainder of the entry, since the doctrine would then a priori preclude the possibility of finding empirical evidence in its support. Since identical recurrent world-states presumably exist within all configurations, each item of evidence in one state would have an identical counterpart in every other world-state. Stated differently, in the absence of differential empirical evidence, we cannot demonstrate the existence of an earlier identical world-state, because the evidence required is identical within each world-state. There are no “outside” spectators. An identity of indiscernibles would thus hold within any configuration. The thrust of this sentence is therefore directed exclusively at the impossibility of giving a proof, any empirical proof, I should add, of the hypothesis. (3) The next sentence (“It would appear that the configuration structures attributes anew in the greatest detail, so that two different configurations cannot contain anything identical”) would mean, then, that two discrete world-states (a and b) do not possess an identical content since they are different—since “the configuration structures attributes anew in the greatest detail.” (4) The final sentence, then, merely asserts that the same rule applies within a given configuration (a or b)—that no identical elements are to be found within a single configuration.
An interpretation of this sort renders the entire quoted entry A consistent. It argues that Nietzsche is advancing three theses: first, the indemonstrability of the eternal recurrence hypothesis by empirical means, that is, the indemonstrability of the putative fact that the existence of configuration “a” supports the existence of an earlier configuration “a”; it argues, second, that there exists more than one discrete configuration (at least a and b) in which all elements are differentiated and between which there is no carry-over; and, third, it argues that within any configuration (a or b) its content is sufficiently diversified so as to preclude identities within elements of that configuration (“for example, two leaves”).
Such an interpretation, however prima facie plausible, must first be related to the text and the terms it introduces. Specifically, what does the crucial term Gesamtlage (configuration) mean, and what is its relationship to the term Lage (state) and its surrogates? Does the term “two different configurations” refer to configurations in the sense of disjuncts a or b? The expressions Gesamtlage and Lage (and its surrogates) are crucial here. Their meaning has been traditionally conflated, yet their intension and denotation differ, as I hope to show.
The term Gesamtlage is first introduced in our sentence “(1)” which precedes the three concluding sentences of A. It appears only in these sentences. It refers, specifically, to “the total configuration of all energy.” Before introducing that term, Nietzsche had spoken of the relationship between two orders of phenomena. On the one hand we have “Das Mass der All-Kraft,” the total amount of energy constituting the universe, and on the other hand we have the various states (Lagen), changes (Veränderungen), developments (Entwicklungen) and combinations (Combinationen) of this energy. If the term Gesamtlage is meant to refer to either order of phenomena, Lage or Das Mass der All-Kraft, which it plainly does, it refers to the latter and not the former; that is, it refers to the gesamte Lagen, hence Gesamtlage, of energy— the total ensemble of states. It would, therefore, be mistaken to assume that the term “configuration” (Gesamtlage) can be employed in the same sense as the term Lage (state) and its surrogates. “Configuration” and “state,” Gesamtlage and Lage, are not synonymous expressions. The term Gesamtlage introduces not a given configuration among many (a or b, etc.) but the total ensemble of these states. It is a macrocosmic and not a microcosmic term.16
To illustrate this point, imagine three states (Lagen) of energy—each one corresponding to an historical period, X, Y, and Z. To render each one more graphic, let X represent the period from the dawn of human life to the beginnings of recorded, written, history; let Y represent the period from recorded history to the death of Socrates; let Z represent the period from 399 B.C. to Nietzsche’s discovery of eternal recurrence in 1881.
Each phase, X, Y, Z, represents a Lage (state), according to Nietzsche.17 Nietzsche subsequently and consistently uses the term Zustand as a synonym for a specific energy state (Lage) in the material quoted above, A, B, and C. Each state (Lage or Zustand) is a change, development, or combination of the amount of total energy. “Consequently,” says Nietzsche, “the present development (Z) is but a repetition and also the one which bore it (Y) . . .” The term Gesamtlage is introduced at this point: “Everything has come to pass in so far as the total configuration of all energy (Gesamtlage aller Kräfte) eternally recurs.” Can the term here still refer to X or Y or Z? Certainly not. The term, here, must refer to X, Y, and Z, taken collectively. Each individual Lage (X, or Y, or Z) forms a link in the chain Gesamtlage aller Kräfte, the total ensemble of states of energy. The words Lage, Entwicklung, Veränderung, Combination and Zustand, are fairly well interchangeable without loss of sense precisely because—as modalities of energy—they are the forms that energy can assume. And the forms which this one determinate amount of energy assumes, the ensemble of its states, is the Gesamtlage aller Kräfte —the total configuration of all energy. Note also that the term Gesamtlage is singular—as indeed it ought to be. The sum of Lagen forms one Gesamtlage. That much seems plain. Parenthetically, the plural Gesamtlagen is not introduced until the penultimate sentence of this entry and raises an additional difficulty in understanding Nietzsche’s empirical formulation. Up to the penultimate sentence, then, Nietzsche seems to be talking about two distinguishable orders of phenomena, the “form” and its “content.” The “contents” are the Lagen (states) and their transformation, the “form” is the Mass der All-Kraft or the Gesamtlage aller Kräfte. Thus Lagen X, Y, Z constitute the single Gesamtlage X-Y-Z.
If the above interpretation is plausible, the three concluding sentences of A which we numbered earlier assert something like the following. (2) Whether anything identical has ever come to pass—apart from the hypothetical recurrence of Gesamtlage X-Y-Z—is indemonstrable. (3) The next sentence introduces the plural form, Gesamtlagen, for the first time, and declares that “It would appear that the Gesamtlage structures attributes anew in the greatest detail, so that two different Gesamtlagen [(pl.)] cannot contain anything identical.” This sentence is somewhat puzzling. On the one hand, says Nietzsche, it would appear that a Gesamtlage (X-Y-Z) structures its attributes (X and its content, Y and its content, Z and its content) in such a way that two distinct Gesamtlagen share nothing identical. That is odd. On the basis of the hypothesis Nietzsche had just presented, one would be inclined to conclude that any two Gesamtlagen would have to “contain something identical.” In terms of our illustration, Gesamtlage X-Y-Z could recur in any sequence within the following order: X-Y-Z, X-Z-Y, Y-X-Z, Y-Z-X, Z-X-Y, Z-Y-X. This much would seem to follow from Nietzsche’s argument. But in that case any “two different Gesamtlagen” would have to share, at a minimum, a specific Lage—X or Y or Z. To rescue the apparent inconsistency we would, it seems to me, either have to eliminate the distinction advanced above between Lage and Gesamtlage, or we would have to show that the distinction does not, in fact, materially affect the argument. Since the first alternative seriously alters the text, perhaps the second alternative is viable.
We might want to suggest that the distinction between Lage and Gesamtlage is a different sort of relationship of form to content. Perhaps amore felicitous distinction is “part” to “whole,” not content to form. In terms of our illustration, we might want to identify a Lage as an event within a Gesamtlage; for instance, the death of Socrates (Lage) as an event in Gesamtlage Y. In that case, the doctrine of eternal recurrence would assert that discrete world-events (Lagen) recur because the Gesamtlage eternally recurs. An insurmountable difficulty then arises, however. The difficulty is that it would become completely impossible to speak of the plural Gesamtlagen in this case. For if a Lage is a discrete world-event, and a Gesamtlage is the ensemble of Lagen, how can there be more than one ensemble of all discrete world-events? On this construction, either Gesamtlage X or Y or Z is the only possible ensemble of Lagen, or we wind up with the dilemma suggested by our earlier interpretation. If we admit three (or more) Gesamtlagen containing discrete world-events, the recurring Gesamtlagen have to duplicate one another.
If we now reflect on the penultimate sentence of entry A, we are left with at least two options. Either Nietzsche has introduced an inconsistency in the formulation of which he is unaware, or he is aware of some difficulty. I prefer to suggest that Nietzsche was probably aware of some inadequacy in the argument (even if it is not the one advanced here) and, in consequence, chose not to publish it in any shape or form. If this is a plausible view, any number of ambiguities in the cosmological formulation may have given rise to Nietzsche’s reluctance to develop it further and, ultimately, to publish his “discovery.”
For example, in addition to the apparent inconsistency which a distinction between Lagen and Gesamtlage introduces, there is an ambiguity suggested by the sentence “Everything has come to pass in so far as the Gesamtlage aller Kräfte eternally recurs.” In the opening passages of the entry under discussion, Nietzsche had claimed that a finite number of Lagen constitute eternally recurring elements of one sum of energy (All-Kraft). Nietzsche merely asserts that there are a finite number of such Lagen. No attempt to justify this assertion is made, beyond the declaration that a finite amount of energy, somehow, implies a finite number of energy states. In the sentence quoted above, however, the finite number of Lagen is made to depend explicitly upon the eternal recurrence of the Gesamtlage (everything recurs because—“in so far as”—the Gesamtlage recurs). This introduces an important source of errors. As has been shown repeatedly, the mere finiteness of the quantity of energy does not entail a finite number of possible configurations of this energy.18 If Nietzsche’s formulation of the doctrine of eternal recurrence is based on the fact that energy is finite, then he is simply mistaken in deducing a finite number of world-states from it. But, and this is an interesting and subtle feature of Nietzsche’s argument, the notion of a finite quantity of energy is silently dropped subsequently in favor of a Gesamtlage of this energy. In consequence, the sentence “Everything has come to pass in so far as the Gesamtlage of all energy eternally recurs,” introduces a new material condition. In this formulation, the number of Lagen (states) is finite not because the amount of energy is finite, but because the ensemble, the collection of Lagen is a finite number. Of course, the argument is then circular. It merely asserts that there are a finite number of members in the class Gesamtlage, because the set consists of a finite number of members.
If we now step back from this alleged “proof,” it seems that we have opened a Pandora’s box. If Nietzsche had perhaps scribbled the term Gesamtlage in haste, he would have fallen into an invalid deduction by eliminating it and speaking only of the relationship of “states” to the totality of energy. We can’t deduce a finite number of states from a finite amount of energy constituting them. On the other hand, by introducing the term Gesamtlage, he begs the question by assuming that a finite energy sum consists of a finite number of energy states.
Nietzsche may have been aware of the difficulties of this argument. Perhaps, and this is unsupported speculation, the term Gesamtlage was introduced specifically to avoid the false assumption that a finite sum of energy somehow entails a finite number of energy states. Certainly in The Will to Power a finite sum of energy and a finite number of energy states are asserted independently: “If the world may be thought of as a determinate quantity of force and a determinate number of centers of force . . . it must pass through a calculable number of combinations.”
The conclusion of A should now be reinterpreted as follows:
(1)“Everything has come to pass in so far as the total configuration (Gesamtlage) of all energy eternally recurs.” That is, the reason for affirming the eternal recurrence hypothesis is that the Gesamtlage eternally recurs. There is no independent evidence to justify the claim that a finite sum of energy necessarily consists of a finite ensemble of energy states, and yet this must be assumed if we are to argue for eternal recurrence.
(2)“Whether, quite aside from that, anything identical has come to pass is entirely indemonstrable.” That is, there is no way to demonstrate the recurrence of anything if we do not first assume that the finite sum of energy is a sum whose member states are also finite. Only on the assumption of a Gesamtlage aller Kräfte, a finite total ensemble of states of energy, can we entertain the hypothesis.
Within this context, the penultimate sentence may be read as expressing Nietzsche’s own reservations about the cogency of his formulation. In short, it could be read as an attempt to relate the hypothesis to the testimony of experience.
(3)“It would appear that the configuration structures attributes anew in the greatest detail, so that two different configurations (Gesamtlagen) cannot contain anything identical.” The sentence now asserts that any Gesamtlage is so rich in novelty and detail that two Gesamtlagen cannot possibly contain anything identical. In short, there are no good empirical reasons for suggesting the recurrence hypothesis in the first place. It seems that each Gesamtlage, configuration, structures its Lagen, states, in such a way that we have only novelty rather than identities.
If such a reading of the penultimate sentence is plausible, the last line merely elaborates on this point. That is, the last sentence, (4), asserts that it seems doubtful that anything identical exists in a Gesamtlage; even leaves are not identical!
To sum up: If Nietzsche’s distinction between Lage and Gesamtlage is accidental and irrelevant, his formulation becomes a reductio ad absurdum which asserts, in effect, that a finite number of energy states recurs eternally because . . . a finite number of energy states recurs. Or, again if we ignore the distinction, Nietzsche is simply wrong. A finite sum of energy does not entail a finite number of energy states. Since the distinction introduced by the term Gesamtlage appears in the last four sentences, and thereafter the term silently slips from view, we are perhaps justified in attaching importance to it. In any case, it cannot be ignored. If, then, the distinction between Lagen, Gesamtlage, and Gesamtlagen is significant, the argument is, at a minimum, a petitio principii and, at worst, inconsistent.
In the light of these considerations, coupled with the fact that these are unpublished entries, I have suggested that Nietzsche may have been aware of the difficulties in the formulation, and an attempt was made to interpret the last three lines of A as the expression of such an awareness. But certainly Nietzsche expressed his own reservation about the persuasiveness of his formulation more poignantly than we have done, in a note which follows the quoted material: “Isn’t the existence of any variation at all in the world which surrounds us, rather than complete circularity, already a sufficient refutation of a uniform circularity of all that exists?”19
I have spent a decent amount of time considering the last three sentences of entry A primarily to show that the cosmological/empirical argument was written more in the spirit of a thought experiment—and many of Nietzsche’s notes assume this character—than as a sustained argument in support of a definite thesis. Still less should it be construed as a “proof” or “demonstration.” My reasons for doing this textual analysis, as has been stated earlier, are to point out that previous interpretations have relied too heavily on Nietzsche’s alleged cosmological hypothesis, assuming that it possessed a greater degree of intelligibility and freedom from ambigiuity than do the normative formulations of the doctrine of eternal recurrence. I do not mean to imply, of course, that the cosmological argument is of no value in understanding Nietzsche’s admittedly difficult teaching, but the methodology espoused here subordinates its importance to those reflections concerning the doctrine of eternal recurrence which Nietzsche chose to publish. They appear one and all to be normative in emphasis.
THE MOST SCIENTIFIC HYPOTHESIS
There is another strategy commonly pursued by Nietzsche scholars which should not be ignored. It is closely connected with the easy but mistaken view that a clear (whether valid or invalid) “proof” for recurrence exists in the Nachlass. The strategy is to appeal to Nietzsche’s claim that the doctrine of eternal recurrence is the most scientific of all hypotheses to support the view that he must have had a cosmology in mind after all.
To be sure, the Nachlass supports the view that Nietzsche regarded the doctrine of eternal recurrence as “the most scientific of all hypotheses,”20 and further exhibits Nietzsche’s view that “the law of conservation of energy demands eternal recurrence.”21These often-quoted phrases, whether offered as evidence to support the logical or chronological priority of the cosmological version of the doctrine, simply won’t do. First both phrases were written in the late eighties, long after the cosmological and normative versions had been composed and after the normative dimension had been explored in print.
Second, Nietzsche’s claim that the doctrine of eternal recurrence is “the most scientific” hypothesis does not necessarily imply that it is an empirical/cosmological hypothesis. The term wissenschaftlichste (most scientific) carries a far more restricted meaning in English than it does in German. The term “scientific” has been preempted, in English, by the “exact” sciences, the “natural” and “mathematical” sciences. In English the term “the most scientific” immediately suggests methodological rigor, empirical verification, or an axiomatized deductive system. However, the noun Wissenschaft (“science”) also means “knowledge,” “learning,” or “scholarship.” We would probably wince if the arts and humanities were referred to as “sciences” in ordinary English usage. Yet, the philologisch-historische Wissenschaften are, precisely, the “Humanities.” Similarly, the adjective “scientific” has a much more restricted meaning in English than does its German counterpart, icissenschaftlich. In German it suggests “scholarly,” “learned,” as well as “scientific.”
Nietzsche’s assertion that the doctrine of eternal recurrence is “the most scientific” hypothesis leaves in doubt the discipline to which it belongs. No one would cringe at the suggestion that the wissenschaftlichste hypothesis is a normative or metaphysical principle—if he were Nietzsche’s German contemporary. It is a feature peculiar to English language usage that we do encounter considerable embarrassment in suggesting “the most scientific” normative or metaphysical hypothesis. Since the term “the most scientific” can apply with equal force to an hypothesis in either of the two versions we suggested—empirical and normative—it does not follow that Nietzsche’s claim to have discovered “the most scientific” hypothesis means, specifically, an empirical postulate.
Finally, it should be noted that the opinion that the law of conservation “demands” eternal recurrence surely does not entail the “how" or why of that demand. It doesn’t even suggest how the former “demands” the latter. Are we to understand that the cosmological entries, dissected earlier, are the explications of the “how” of that demand? Or is this simply another suggestive entry, which Nietzsche later ignored? If the former is the case, then no new light is shed on the empirical arguments. If the latter alternative is the case, again, nothing new in principle is introduced.
So the problem of relating the “cosmology” of recurrence to the “axiology” remains. If we reject the view that the implications of the doctrine of eternal recurrence express Nietzsche’s overblown psychological response to his empirical cosmology; as we will do in the next chapter, we are left with only two options. We can hunt, in vain, for evidence that Nietzsche presented “transformation” rules which would relate the empirical to the normative version of eternal recurrence. We would have to find a great many premises, I am afraid; among them that all human actions are reducible to energy transformations within a configuration, that all qualities are reducible to quantity transformations and, at least, that no novel quality-action-matter-energy configuration can ever emerge. There would have to be a great many more assumptions, I regret to say, the nature and force of which we shall soon have to explore. If Nietzsche had deduced an imperative from his empirical formulations he would indeed have taken quite a leap.
The second alternative, for which we have tacitly been arguing all along, is to suggest that Nietzsche’s cosmological argument is a consequence or corollary of, not the cause of, some more basic insight. Indeed, the thought of eternal recurrence occurred to Nietzsche in August 1881 “6000 feet beyond man and time.”22 This is hardly empirical terrain. And as Nietzsche himself asserts, his published works are an attempt to articulate this insight—the doctrine of eternal recurrence: “I now relate the story of Zarathustra. The basic conception of this work (is) the eternal recurrence notion.”23 Of course, I do not mean to suggest that Nietzsche was uninterested in finding empirical confirmation for his doctrine. On the contrary, he was very much interested in finding empirical confirmation, but apparently for a doctrine which he had embraced for reasons other than empirical cogency.
- The letter “A” is supplied by this writer, not by Nietzsche, as well as “B” and “C” in theother passages to be discussed here.
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