Nietzsche and Freud Destroy the World

The hope which gave the Enlightenment its light was Reason. The great thinkers of that time period proclaimed that all men were reasonable, and all men were connected through such Reason. Intellect gave them insight; with that insight they could find the burdens of liberty and blockades to truth and, eventually, destroy them. After all, it was reasonable that all men wanted liberty, for it was their natural right. It was also reasonable that rationality would overcome fear, thus leaving a hungering desire for truth in all humanity. Reason and science could unlock such truth; reason and science could create an ideal government; Reason and science could take mankind as far as he wanted to go. Reason, like a towel of Babel, would continue to build on itself until it took man to heaven itself.

“God is dead,” uttered the madman, “We have killed him.”

Truth shattered, leaving in its void eternal nothingness. Without God there was no way to define the good and evil that had been the standard for morality for over a thousand years. Without God there could be no absolute truth, waiting to be discovered. Without God humanity had no natural rights to hope for. Without God man could only wander, “straying, as through an infinite nothing.” And we had done it ourselves.

It did not end there, however; Freud took humanity’s despair a step further. He asserted that humanity was not Reasonable; in fact, all humans were irrational, neurotic, and selfish.

Nietzsche and Freud had different approaches to their diagnosis of western civilization. Nietzsche, like the Romantics, detested the over-thinking, scientific approach used on all manner of thought and philosophy; Freud, however, embraced science. They both felt similarly that man was irrational and the future for civilized humanity was bleak. Their method of reaching that conclusion was very different. Nietzsche explored the religious and philosophical side of society through the eyes of poet, while Freud examined the psychological effects of society and the scientific aspects of the human mind. Still, their diagnosis was frighteningly alike: Civilization had, or was, a terminal illness.

Nietzsche’s philosophy was that of a slow degeneration of society. The backbone of everything western civilization had been build upon had fractured; indeed, civilization itself had broken it. Mankind’s horizon had expanded farther and farther until the spine of civilization could no longer bear the weight. Without this backbone, society would break apart and float away into the “infinite nothing.” Society had killed God, their basis for existence and morality, and thus no one was left to define good and evil for them. No one was left to give them their beloved “natural rights.” The world had become too big, an eternal void. Humans could never inhabit this place. It could only be lived in by gods themselves.

Still there was hope. Nietzsche believed that with no God, there was room for humanity to become gods and thrive. There was no truth, only will. If man accepted this and embraced the nothingness, Nietzsche believed, he would find true liberty – so long sought by all systems of ideals. Yet humans were unaware of God’s death; thus they continued in the suffocating moral code of Christianity, unable to “become themselves.” Though he wanted humanity to better itself, to become “supermen,” Nietzsche realized that humanity would most likely remain locked in its blinded standards of good and evil. He predicted that man would never rise above medieval morality and mindset, so they were doomed to decay.

Freud’s diagnosis, equally bleak, was not so philosophical. He used science to explore humanity’s mental condition. In his theories he determined that all humans are neurotic and that neurosis comes from living in civilization. From childhood we develop conditions such as hysteria, anxiety, depression, and obsession due to conflict within ourselves placed there by society’s restraints. He theorized about three parts of a man’s mind: The Ego, the Id, and the Super Ego. The Id of a man is raw desire. It craves raw, passionate pleasures. The Super Ego is society-placed values and morals. Should a man give into his Id, the Super Ego would oppress him with enormous guilt; should a man listen to his Super Ego’s moralizing, his Id will go on unpleased. The Ego acts as a balance between the two. Thus, because of civilization and society, a man will always be torn at the very core of his mind.

Humanity is not inherently good, claims Freud. Should a man run across his neighbor, it is only his Super Ego that provides the loving pleasantries. In reality, mankind wants to meet their neighbor and to “satisfy their aggressiveness on him, to exploit his capacity for work without compensation, to use him sexually without his consent, to seize his possessions, to humiliate him, to cause him pain, to torture and to kill him.” According to Freud civilized humanity is selfish and will remain forever conflicted, never able to become truly human.

Nietzsche and Freud found separate paths to the same, desolate ending. Not only did they find the flaws in civilization, they were brave enough to show them to a time that would have, horrified, rejected such ideas. They diagnose a painful death for all civilization, yet they offer potential cures as well. Freud’s solution was therapy, and his methods are used today to treat many sick minds. Nietzsche offered humanity a possibility of complete freedom, a chance to build the tower of Babel without the threat of God destroying it. It isn’t important whether or not their diagnosis is right or wrong; they introduced new ways of thinking that have provided the basis for further explorations and ideals in the 20th century.