ABSTRACT
ASSESSING NIETZSCHE If we take Nietzsche’s ethical and political ideas seriously-and I have assumed throughout this book that we should-the most important problem facing us is to determine where we should agree with them and where we should not. In this chapter I would like to say something about the implications which the preceding eight chapters have for the solution of this problem. It would be foolish of me to attempt a summary view of “what is living and what is dead” in the philosophy of Nietzsche: the issues he raises are too complex and difficult to be settled in one brief chapter. What I would like to do, though, is to begin by posing a problem that appears when we try to put together some Nietzschean themes into a coherent position on the basis of which human beings might do well to live. I think it is a problem that anyone who is inclined to accept Nietzsche’s ideas must try to resolve somehow.
