Nietzsche's Vitalism: Shaping 19th Century Western Philosophy

Nietzsche's Vitalism: A Response to 19th Century Thought

The 19th century was characterized by bourgeois revolutions against authoritarian regimes, the rise of liberalism, and rapid industrialization. In this scientific and cultural atmosphere, a series of philosophies like Vitalism emerged as a reaction against positivist excesses, marking the transition to the 20th century in the period prior to the First World War.

Vitalism and its Core Tenets

Among these transitional currents, Vitalism focused on aspects undervalued by positivism, such as life, the spirit, freedom, and history. Vitalism was mainly represented by Friedrich Nietzsche, who considered life as the radical reality. Nietzsche was deeply influenced by Schopenhauer's irrationalism. Schopenhauer defended that the world was a mere representation of true reality, which was an irrational and blind will that sought to express itself in human beings, turning their lives into pure suffering. Although Nietzsche wasn't too pessimistic, his key concept of the Will to Power was undoubtedly influenced by Schopenhauer.

Nietzsche's Early Philosophy and Cultural Critique

The criticism of German culture became the main motivation of Nietzsche's first philosophy. He attacked Historicism, Positivism, and Judeo-Christian cultural pressures. Indeed, the time was socially marked by the decadence of German Christian-bourgeois values and its Puritanism. Nietzsche reacted against the mediocrity and conventionalism of traditional morality, which he considered to be causes of the transvaluation of Western civilization's values. The enormous crisis of the last decades of the 19th century produced a sense of boredom (or nihilism) regarding the fundamental ideas of the previous age. Nietzsche, the most brilliant representative of this crisis, proposed the Übermensch (or Superman), an individual who affirmed life and sought to transcend traditional concepts of God.

Nietzsche's Intellectual Development

The defining moment in Nietzsche's intellectual development came in 1865 when he accidentally discovered Schopenhauer's The World as Will and Representation (1818).

Periods of Nietzsche's Work

• Romantic Period (1871-1878): Influenced by Schopenhauer and Wagner, this period was rather critical of Ancient Greek philosophy, notably in The Birth of Tragedy.
• Positivist Period (1878-1883): Characterized by his attacks on Christian religion, metaphysics, and traditional arts, with works like The Gay Science or Human, All Too Human.
• Critical Period (1883-1889): A fundamental period in which he criticized Western philosophy and culture in important works such as Thus Spoke Zarathustra, The Twilight of the Idols, or On the Genealogy of Morality.