BOOKS
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equally valuable. But without
e~pounding
Neitzsche's complex view
myself or even trying to establish a better term for it than perspec–
tivism, I can report that Nehamas treats it in genuinely dialectical
fashion - as he does all of the ideas he discusses. He makes each ob–
jection to Nietzsche's perspectivism so plausible that it seems he is
about to conclude that the idea must be given up as contradictory,
only then to find that Nietzsche had a more sophisticated position
that he ultimately can defend.
One of the most important objections characterizes Nietzsche's
position:
.. . as the thesis (P) that every view is an interpretation. Now it
appears that if (P) is true, and if every view is in fact an inter–
pretation, this would apply to (P) itself. In that case (P) also
turns out to be an interpretation, and (P) seems to have refuted
itself.
This is important, of course, since it seems to undermine much of
what Nietzsche wrote. How could he expect his readers to accept his
views about moral values, for instance, if by his own argument they
can be only his interpretations? And why, if he knew that whatever
he should write would be nothing more than his interpretation, did
he bother to publish his arguments? Nehamas exposes a logical lapse
in this objection; it is a demonstration that, in the interest of
suspense, I leave the reader to find in the book.
More importantly, however, Nehamas shows that Nietzsche,
while contending for his views, did not advance them as true in the
same sense as earlier philosophers did. According to Nehamas:
... in admitting its own status as interpretation, [Nietzsche's]
perspective does not require that it be accepted. It concedes that
no one is obliged to believe it.
The question then becomes, how could Nietzsche reveal the status of
his views as interpretations while arguing energetically for their cor–
rectness? For example, Nietzsche attacks morality and asceticism in
very certain terms, hardly compatible with his declared perspec–
tivism. In
The Genealogy ofMorals
he asserts that asceticism is a "lie,"
and he advances his genealogical interpretation of the history of
morality, the famous argument that the moral values of good and
evil are transpositions of aristocratic values of good and bad, as the
scientific truth.
