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Nietzsche: the first radical constructivist and his inspiration in contemporary physiology

Publication at Faculty of Humanities |
2018

Abstract

The study deals with Nietzsche's On Truth and Lies in Non-Moral Sense [Ueber Wahrheit und Lüge im aussermoralischen Sinne] and claims that the author's standpoint in the treatise corresponds to that of radical constructivism. Such standpoint rejects the validity of sensory perception as representation of the external world.

Secondly, the standpoint stresses the societal meaning of subjective experience, the adaptive and coordinating function of the intellect. Lastly, the standpoint is being formulated using biological and physiological theories, which is true in the case of contemporary radical constructivism as well as in the case of Nietzsche himself.

The second thesis presented in the study is that Nietzsche paid attention to contemporary physiology, very likely to the so-called law of specific nerve-energies by Johannes Müller. Any reading of Nietzsche's On Truth and Lies ignorant of this context might prove substantially inadequate.